Hello,
My kopie van Isaiah Berlin: A life by Michael Ignatieff gevolg vir die volgende en aangevul soos nodig:
Hierdie frase vorm, "A liberal might have to defend liberty (of, say, a minority) against a democratic tyranny", deel van die volgende volledige paragraaf en verdien daarom om dieper ondersoek te word:
'The lecture was a strong defence of the liberty of the individual, rather than a defence of democratic goverment as such. Democratic self goverment on the whole provides a better guarantee of negative freedom than other regimes, but only on the whole. A liberal might have to defend liberty (of, say, a minority) against a democratic tyranny. Such a confict of values was intrinsic in modern political life'.
Waarvoor is Berlin gebruik, dalk die bevoorregting van 'n wit minderheid?
Wat Berlin probeer oordra is juis die verskeidenheid van waardes wat in 'n sosiale en politieke bestel voor voorsiening gemaak moet word, die pluralisme van onversoenbare waardes funksioneer maar waarvoor die samelewing egter nog steeds voorsiening voor moet maak.
Of soos bevestig in 'n onderhoud met Berlin:
So, too, variety as a positive value is a new idea. The old idea is that truth is one, error is many. To any real question, only one true answer can in principle be given; the other answers are necessarily false. The idea that there can be two sides to a question, that there may be two or more incompatible answers, any one of which could be accepted by honest, rational men—that is a very recent notion. Some think that Pericles said something of this kind in his famous Funeral Speech. He comes close to it but does not reach it. If Athenian democracy is good then Sparta or Persia cannot be accepted. The merit of a free society is that it allows of a great variety of conflicting opinions without the need for suppression that is surely comparatively new in the West.
Dit verlang daarom dat daar vir sekere waardes opgestaan moet word, soos byvoorbeeld die vryheid van seksuele voorkeur en weerstand teen diskriminasie van alle soorte, apartheid, homofobie, diskriminasie volgens geslag en die ontkenning van vryhede soos die godsdiens wat beoefen mag word.
Dit maak nie die voorsiening dat 'n minderheid se wil op die meerderheid afgedruk word nie. Dit het juis as doelwit dat 'n verskeidenheid van waardes moet floreer en het dit juis teen onderdrukking, beide polities en sosiaal.
Voorheen het ek al verwys na sekere argumente van Berlin wat waarsku teen nasionalisme soos byvoorbeeld Afrikaner-nasionalisme wat heeltemal hand uitgeruk het en herhaal dit weer hier:
Die Utopie van die Volk, gebaseer op grond en taal.
In 'n sekere tydvak in Europa se geskiedenis was daar 'n tendens om Europa in 'n Franse gemeenskaplike gebied te laat ontwikkel.
Johann Gottfried von Herder veg teen dit en kom vorendag met die volgende as die anti-utopiese-denke wat ontwikkel word om die verheerliking van die Volk te formuleer en voer ook aan dat die idee as pluralisties beskou moet word, oop vir enige volk wat dit wil aanneem en ontwikkel. Die Volk was dus nie net beperk tot die 'Duitse staat' nie. Ander nasies is ook aangemoedig om die idee te aanvaar en te ontwikkel en 'n formulering van hulle eie 'Volkstum' te verwoord. Op grond hiervan het verskeie skrywers later 'n onderskeid begin tref tussen die goeie kulturele en algemene nasionalisme soos verwoord deur Herder en die latere problematiese politieke nasionalisme van latere Duitse skrywers beginendemet Fichte.
Maar daar is gronde vir skeptisisme oor wat hierdie onderskeid sou wees en is daarom oop vir debat. Herder se kulturele nasionalisme het besliste gevolge wat Herder moes voorsien het. Nie net het dit gepoog om Franse heerskappy te verswak vanaf 'n kulturele oogpunt maar het dit ook die basis gelê uiteindelike hereniging van Duitsland. Herder se weergawe van kulturele nasionalisme het ook verraderlike gevolge in 'n politieke konteks. Herder se idees is dan aangeneem deur verskeie minderhede in die magtige Habsburgse Ryk en daarmee die grondslag vir die strewe na ontbinding van daardie bestel. Herder se denke bied dus die samesnoering van 'n groeter Duitsland tesame met 'n aftakeling van die gesag van moondhede soos die Habsburg Ryk.
Hierdie dan bevestig die volgende:
This place Herder as a precursor of the militantly völkisch thinkers of the nineteenth century, and those thinkers themselves generally saw Herder in that light, ignoring the inconvenient aspects of his thought for the sake of his supreme merits as the founder of the cult of das Volk. And that cult culminated in the most ghastly of all Utopias.
Daardie kultus van utopie woed hom self later uit in Suid-Afrika in die volgende terme:
In 1936, a group of Afrikaner nationalist ideologues, Dr. N. Diederichs, Dr. P.J. Meyer, and Dr. A. Cronje, worked out a general nationalist program for South Africa. Not merely would the Afrikaner volk have its own land, but so would every other volk in all South Africa, and every other volk would be encouraged to be as proud of its own identity and traditions as the Afrikaner volk already was. This benevolent conception, when put into practice twelve years later, became known to the world as apartheid.
In the South African case nationalism-as-theory was a facade: the reality was Afrikaner nationalism, as a driving feeling.
Berlin se klem val dus op die pluraliteit en die kontradiksie wat bestaan in waardes wat deur die mensdom gehandhaaf word en voer aan dat dit wat as goed beskou word kan nie uiting kry in 'n enkele lewe of slegs 'n gemeenskap of een enkele manier van lewe nie. Sy beroemde voorbeeld is die van die krygsman en die monnik. Die krygsman gee uiting aan 'n stel waardes terwyl die monnik 'n totale ander stel waardes bied. Hierdie kontradiksie gaan tot die kern van menswees. Dieselfde konflik speel uit in politiek ook. Berlin verwys na die demokrasie van Athene. Was die demokrasie van Athene afhanklik van die bestaan van slawerny soos Benjamin Constant aanvoer en indien wel is dit dan verkieslik dat daar nooit 'n demokratiese Athene moes wees nie?
Veroorsaak die relatiewe vreedsame liberale demokrasie soos beoefen in Brittanje en die Verenigde State van Amerika, politieke apatie en 'n wydverspreide onvermoë om ernstig te dink oor openbare sake?
Indien wel, wil ons dit prysgee ter wille van 'n meer onstuimige intellektuele en politieke lewe as 'n teenvoeter vir belangeloosheid?
Net soos dit nie toelaat dat 'n minderheid se wil die groter samelewing oorheers nie en dat daar dan om daardie rede gedurige onderhandeling moet wees om die verskeidenheid van waardes te laat floreer en 'n plek in die son te bied.
Hierdie frase verlang ook om ondersoek te word, "He could see that the Arabs preferred to be governed badly by their own people rather than be well governed by the Jews".
Die volgende aangehaalde frase vorm deel van die volgende paragraaf en benodig ook om in sy volle konteks gelees te word:
He was a Zionist, but already he was troubled by the Zionist myth of Palestine as a land without people given to a people without land. There was a people on the land and a reckoning with their claims was inevitable.
Aangesien Israel gereeld hier gebruik word om toestande in Suid-Afrika ook te ondersoek is bogenoemde inleidende paragraaf nog meer van waarde vir Suid-Afrika se geskiedenis as die gedeelte wat aangehaal is en dui duidelik op die vraagstuk wat so lank vermy is deur die beleid van apartheid. Waar die eise van die meerderheid van die bevolking vir meer as 84 jaar ontken is, 1910 tot 1991 en die uiteindelike verkiesing van 1994.
Die paragraaf gaan aan:
In letters he argued that Jews should work harder to integrate Arabs within the Palestinian economy. At the same time he thought that British attempts to appease the Arabs were responsible for the radicalisation of Zionism and the emergence of groups prepared to use violence, both against the British and against the Arabs. He could see that the Arabs preferred to be governed badly by their own people, rather than well governed by the Jews and that in 15 years time the Arab nationalists will be sincere, incorruptible, utterly brutal fascists. It is then that the fun will begin'.
Weereens kan die lyn nie getrek word na Suid-Afrika waar swartes verkies om volgens die argument eerder swak regeer te word as goed onder die wittes nie en is die verwantskap eerder een van ontkenning van selfbeskikking het in hierdie land ook geweld in opstand teen daardie ontkenning gebring.
Weereens is die les anders as wat die enkele aanhaling sou impliseer en word die betekenis veel duideliker wanneer dit in die konteks van die volledige paragraaf gelees word.
Berlin sien duidelik die mite van Palestina wat die oorspronklike inwoners ontken as 'n teelaarde vir toekomstige konflik en is die geskiedenis van Palestina en Israel en die konflik wat daar heers 'n bevestiging van daardie profesie.
Dit is inderdaad so dat Berlin gekant teen geweld is en antwoord soos volg op dit in 'n onderhoud:
Jahanbegloo: Do you think violence is inevitable?
Berlin: No. Moreover, I hate it deeply whatever its necessity. Well, I think I told you, ever since I saw a policeman being dragged to his death in the first Russian Revolution, I acquired an instinctive dislike of physical violence which has been with me all my life. But still, one has to fight wars. I was not against war with Hitler. The Italians were right to fight the Austrians.
In die konteks van geweld word die volgende dan gelees soos aangehaal deur Comestor:
"National liberation movements that claimed to be fighting for liberty against a colonial oppressor were not necessarily fighting for liberty, but for recognition of their distinctiveness as a national people and for the status of national independence"
Maar Ignatieff bevestig die volgende:
Berlin was not unsympathetic to these instincts - indeed as a Zionist, his liberalism was unusually receptive to this craving for recognition and status.
Sekerlik 'n les wat Verwoerd en ander kon aangespreek het.
Daar is wel die volgende waarskuwing wat waardevol is en met vrug gebruik kan word met die ongelukkigheid wat huidiglik heers oor die ANC en gaan die paragraaf soos volg aan:
But to call national liberation a fight for liberty was to mistake the motives behind such colonial revolts and hence to guarantee disillusion when they fail to deliver the emancipation they promised.
Hier het ons gereeld die stelling dat politieke vryheid is bereik maar nog nie ekonomiese vryheid en daarom dan die gevaar van mislukking waarteen Berlin waarsku net soos die Afrikaner se nasionalisme hom ook gefaal het.
Net soos die aanhaling 'fighting injustice was essential, but men 'do not live only by fighting evils' gesien moet word in die argument van pluralisme wat na vore bly kom en gaan die res van die paragraaf soos volg:
They live by choosing their own goals - a vast variety of them, seldom predictable, at times incompatible. It was individual freedom, to choose well or ill, which had to be defended, not some ultimate vision of the human good.
Hoor in jou verbeelding vir die wat bekend is met Isaiah Berlin se stem en manier van praat, die vinnige uitasem aframmel van idees.
Berlin is aan die woord uit 'n opstel getiteld, Notes on Prejudice, waarvan daar sekerlik te veel is:
Nationalism which everybody in the nineteenth century thought was ebbing is the strongest & most dangerous force at large to-day. It is usually the product of a wound inflicted by one nation on the pride or territory of another: if Louis XIV had not attacked & devastated the Germans, & humiliated them for years—the Sun King whose state gave laws to everybody, in politics, warfare, art, philosophy, science—then the Germans would not, perhaps, have become quite so aggressive by, say, the early nineteenth century when they became fiercely nationalistic against Napoleon. If the Russians, similarly, had not been treated as a barbarous mass by the West in the nineteenth century, or the Chinese had not been humiliated by opium wars or general exploitation, neither would have fallen so easily to a doctrine which promised they would inherit the earth after they had, with the help of historic forces which none may stop, crushed all the capitalist unbelievers. If the Indians had not been patronized, etc., etc.
Conquest, enslavement of peoples, imperialism etc are not fed just by greed or desire for glory, but have to justify themselves to themselves by some central idea: French as the only true culture; the white man’s burden; communism: & the stereotypes of others as inferior or wicked. Only knowledge, carefully acquired & not by short cuts, can dispel this: even that won’t dispel human aggressiveness or dislike for the dissimilar (in skin, culture, religion) by itself: still, education in history, anthropology, law (especially if they are “comparative” & not just of one’s own country as they usually are) helps.
Berlin beskryf sy politiek soos volg: “Surtout, pas trop de zele” - (Above all, not too much zeal)
Daar word ook afgesluit met die volgende, dit is verstaanbaar hoekom Berlin nooit 'grand synthesis' kon bereik nie en is uit 'n lesing van hom en word die belangrikste temas aangehaal:
I realized that what all these views had in common was a Platonic ideal: in the first place that, as in the sciences, all genuine questions must have one true answer and one only, all the rest being necessarily errors. In the second place, that there must be a dependable path toward the discovery of these truths. In the third place, that the true answers, when found, must necessarily be compatible with one another and form a single whole, for one truth cannot be incompatible with another—that we knew a priori. This kind of omniscience was the solution of the cosmic jigsaw puzzle. In the case of morals, we could then conceive what the perfect life must be, founded as it would be on a correct understanding of the rules that governed the universe. The answers must be known to someone; perhaps Adam in Paradise knew; perhaps we shall only reach them at the end of days; if men cannot know them, perhaps the angels know; and if not the angels, then God knows. These timeless truths must in principle be knowable.
Dan kom Machiavelli:
The idea that this planted in my mind was the realization, which came as something of a shock, that not all the supreme values pursued by mankind now and in the past were necessarily compatible with one another. It undermined my earlier assumption, based on the philosophia perennis, that there could be no conflict between true ends, true answers to the central problems of life.
Dan kom Giambattista Vico:
For Vico there is a plurality of civilizations (repetitive cycles of them, but that is unimportant), each with its own unique pattern.
Dan kom Johann Gottfried Herder:
Vico thought of a succession of civilizations, Herder went further and compared national cultures in many lands and periods, and held that every society had what he called its own center of gravity, which differed from that of others. If, as he wished, we are to understand Scandinavian sagas or the poetry of the Bible, we must not apply to them the aesthetic criteria of the critics of eighteenth-century Paris. The ways in which men live, think, feel, speak to one another, the clothes they wear, the songs they sing, the gods they worship, the food they eat, the assumptions, customs, habits which are intrinsic to them—it is this that creates communities, each of which has its own “life style.” Communities may resemble each other in many respects, but the Greeks differ from Lutheran Germans, the Chinese differ from both; what they strive after and what they fear or worship is scarcely ever similar.
Miskien sal Cornelius Henn dit eendag insien ...
En word daar afgesluit met die volgende:
Herder’s view, and Vico’s, is what I should describe as pluralism that is, the conception that there are many different ends that men may seek and still be fully rational, fully men, capable of understanding each other and sympathizing and deriving light from each other, as we derive it from reading Plato or the novels of medieval Japan—worlds, outlooks, very remote from our own.
Daarom dan diversiteit en die wil om onderdrukking teen te staan die lesse wat geneem kan word van Isaiah Berlin en een van die groot geeste en elke opstel van hom 'n les in die kompleksiteit van die mensdom.
Veel beter as om oor Berlin te skryf is om al die opstelle van hom te lees, dit is 'n opvoeding waarvan die waarde bo korale is.
Baie dankie
Wouter