Bangladesh does not have any balance-of-power/security or balance-of-trade/economic history long enough or strong enough to breed instincts of the sort hitherto discussed in this series: true, as East Pakistan we were part of the South-east Asian Treaty Organisation (SEATO) U.S. alliance against a domino communist threat, and the supplier of a product, jute, accounting for over three-quarters of the world's consumption. Yet, military and commercial juices were not the springboard of any of our own instincts, even when we supplied the world with Sonargaon-produced muslin and ships three centuries ago: these transactions were initiated, conducted, and consummated by outsiders largely, if not exclusively, from our territory. That was going to partly change when the RMG (ready-made garment) revolution began in the late-1970s and early-1980s. Even then, a quarter-century of a booming RMG industry did not breed our instincts: their existence depends upon some other force/dynamic.
One might turn to the founding four pillars of the country: nationalism, socialism, secularity, and democracy. Of those, secularism dropped out by 1978, was visibly replaced by Islam by the 1990s, and, particularly in the 21st Century thus far, with the Holey Artisan Bakery incident this year capping it off, given a distorted, terror face. We were far more secular in the Pakistani years, if the proportion of women donning headscarves/burqas, or the student population getting educated in madrasas, out of the total population, are any guide. Even before, our population were known to be conservative, but not fundamentalist: we did not turn out as an Islamic country (officially and unofficially) like many other Islamic countries, particularly those where the religion began and initially diffused to, like Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, and so forth. It is a force that can become an instinct, but not the driving one.
Even less so is socialism. In fact, only the first half of the 1970s can be associated with its official life in Bangladesh: the Pakistani years were riven by private enterprise, so much so that one of the reasons for the country's genesis was how East Pakistani resources fuelled West Pakistani riches; before that British India was founded upon our resources too, as a history of the East India Company will reveal; and even before that economic transactions were so localised that fitting them into generic terms like socialism and capitalism raises more questions than it answers. After the mid-1970s, socialism died an unheralded death.
Nationalism comes as close to being a sustainable source of instincts. Rabindranath Tagore dramatised it in the same way the common people understood it, but this was only natural for a colony yearning to be free of imperial rule. Our Pakistani years accented it from as early as February 21, 1952, which kept on being renewed periodically until it climaxed on March 07, 1971, then yet again on December 16 that year. It is one force behind which both major political parties agree: the Awami League became its most significant vehicle by converting associated sentiments into an independent country; and the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) by virtue of its middle name. Beyond independence, nationalism ripples in our blood mostly through major accomplishments, such as a cricket game, especially with a victory, an Everest conquest, or more recently, given the Rio de Janeiro Olympics, a patriarchal pathway to a (foreign) gold-medal winner (Margarita Mamun). As evident in that gold medal winning, we have many offsetting forces: we have many emigrants, remittances, RMG (ready-made garments) markets and earnings, and so forth, exemplifying our growing offsetting "international" dynamics.
Where, then, must we go if even nationalism has peaked and was not behind our climb from the economic basement ("bottomless pit," if anyone still remembers its 1971 author and reality), to a middle-income "new kid" in the global "block"? Perhaps that economic climb holds an answer: because we were at the pit from as far back as one can recall, perhaps our most sustainable instinct is to simply rise one step higher. It is why we had Dhanmandi and Gulshan/Banani/Uttara, now Baridhari and Boshundhara, with Purbachal and Rupayan in the pipeline, each one of them our "City on the Hill," in other words, our get-away from the paddy-field (literally Dhanmandi's name), wooded countryside (Gulshan/Banani/ Uttara), or swamps (Boshundhara, Purbachal, Rupayan), and all the barren adjectives these contained, like poverty and peasantry, to show these existed a cut above the rest we could all gravitate to. It is why muslin was woven, to adorn a foreigner or royalty, in turn to uplift the weaver to whom the rewards, or part of the rewards, would eventually trickle down to.
It is why the RMG revolution multiplied businessmen faster than in all of Bengal's recorded history, why we have thousand-times more millionaires today than in the Pakistani years (even including all the West Pakistani millionaires). It is why millions of our citizens from all social strata, including the lowest, in fact, largely from the lowest, go abroad for jobs, in turn inspiring millions others to follow, legally and illegally, even with the devil as guide.
One can argue this is the same "self-help" (or "ego") instinct this series had previously attributed to Great Britain and the United States in the west, or China and India much closer to home, among other countries. It is an argument difficult to refute, yet with still some claims to uniqueness. For each of these four countries, the highlighted instinct ("Rule Brittania," "U.S. Century," "Confucian" respect for the elder, and so forth), carried an externalising element, in fact, it was a more dominant manifestation progressively or only found meaning within an external context. Ours is not of the same breed. We seek one tiny improvement within our own community. It is where we make most mileage: note how a bulk of our millionaires resides here, not abroad; and if the "abroad" plays any part in their lives, it is for vacations, exports, or purchasing household appliances.
Of course, this tendency is projected to change given the huge numbers of migrants, students, and others moving abroad. Yet, the residual desire to move one-step higher is destined to stay with us for quite a while, given how much space there is for so many of our population to move up to just to be "noticed," but not as a "number."
Cataclysmic events might change the configuration, as socialism did in 1971, then again in 1975. Yet, the upward mobility drive remains intact, getting more urgent and competitive with each upward-mobility step accomplished. More interesting, at least for this series, is what we do in our external relations the more "beefed" up we get economically. This is uncharted territory for Bangladesh: we do not have the history, or the histrionics, of power peddling globally; and nor has our territory been so strategic that other countries will drag us in. As we see before our very eyes, times change, and as the next and final article in this series will propose, it may be time to shed the "strangers" costume and accelerate the "upward-mobility" propensities outside.
Dr. Imtiaz A. Hussain is Professor & Head of the newly-built Department of Global Studies & Governance at Independent University, Bangladesh.
inv198@hotmail.com
Bangladeshi roots: Nationalism as a source of instincts
Imtiaz A. Hussain in the fourth of a five-part series titled Instincts and international relations | Published: October 21, 2016 00:00:00 | Updated: February 01, 2018 00:00:00
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