The horoscope has been written and hence the child must be born accordingly The once celebrated 'Kerala Model' is now being subjected to attack from every quarter. Increased life expectancy, low infant mortality rate, a favourable gender ratio and widespread literacy were the quality of life indices that distinguished the model. When the economic indicator of low economic production was linked to the phenomenon, the model became exceptional and unparalleled. The phenomenon can be paraphrased in common parlance as 'higher quality of life at low cost'. Ever since the model began to be taken note of at the the international level, criticisms too had surfaced. Conventional economic logicians had then itself written off the phenomenon as unsustainable. The increased economic production that should normally precede this level of social development was missing- they quoted statistics. True, but the bewilderment of the economists should have been actually written off as the limitations of conventional economic logic to take on board the unusual features of Kerala's development pattern. The usual approach of scientists when confronted with a reality that does not fit into their neatly laid out matrix is to either deny it completely or to trim it to fit to the limitations of their understanding. This could not be more true about the current discussions on the 'Kerala model'. The horoscope has been written and hence the child must be born accordingly and live out the sacred premonitions, they insist. If Kerala's development trajectory does not fit economic logic, then we must reduce it to the logic, goes the current reasoning of courtier economists and rulers. In fact, the fountainhead of the present crisis Kerala is confronted with is the belief that quality of life cannot and should not improve at such low cost; and if it indeed has, then proportionate increase in costs should immediately catch up. To afford that, production must increase, to facilitate which investment must flow, to favour which the social sector must be squeezed and so on and so forth, till the whole chain of events that is the staple diet of neo liberal economic agenda needs to be set in motion.
The uncontested fact though is this – a development model that is without many parallels, that does not lend itself to easy interpretation by conventional economic logic, has at least for a brief while, taken root in Kerala. And despite widespread forewarnings about it being a temporary phenomenon, there is near universal acceptance that its fruits are qualitatively better. If so, should not the direction of development thinking in Kerala be focusing on how the model can be institutionalised on a sustainable basis? Simultaneously, the economic pundits could probably engage themselves in expanding the horizons of economic theory by factoring in the Kerala experience of development. What we are currently engaged in is just the opposite. The dominant pre-occupation of economists and social scientists of every which hue is try and dismantle the Kerala model in the quickest possible time and install in its stead the economic trajectory that conforms to conventional economic and development logic. If the course of action that serves the purpose is dismantling of the public distribution system, affordable health care and public schools so be it.
The distinguishing feature of the Kerala model of development is its universality. In matters of food, health and knowledge there has been a decentralized spread that positively impinged on the lives of the vast majority of the state's population. True, hillocks of accumulated wealth and capital are not common sight. But neither are valleys of abject poverty. Universal literacy prevails, even if IAS toppers are not an annual feature. Life expectancy has increased considerably, even if super speciality hospitals do not dot the countryside. A situation where the entire population begins converging into the ranks of the middle class; where the boundaries between village and town get progressively blurred.
Unique pattern While this model has several inherent limitations, it is grounded on a value foundation that far outweighs all such limitations. The value of inclusiveness. And the evolution and grounding of this value is intertwined with the geography, history and social structure of Kerala.
The land of Kerala- a mere forty thousand square kilometers, stretched thinly north south is crisscrossed by forty-four rivers. Shared between 14 districts, there are 3 rivers to each relatively small sized district of Kerala. On the west, the Arabian Sea offers a full-length coastal stretch. What this means in practical terms is that water – a basic human requirement has been universally decentralized. All the civilizations of the world evolved, centered on the availability of water. If you divide them into coastal and river basin civilizations, Kerala represents the amalgamation of both. It is the decentralized nature of water resources that have determined the habitat patterns of Kerala. Instead of the prevalent demarcations into cities, villages and wastelands, the villages in Kerala merge into cities and the cities melt into the countryside all too easily. And there is hardly anything that can qualify as wastelands. This pattern that is unique even on a global scale is inherently detrimental to the unbridled accumulation of wealth.
Historical foundations The systems of living that emerged on this unique topography would also have imbibed the ethos of inclusive egalitarianism. The myth of Maveli is in fact an eloquent testimony to the collective subconscious of the Malayalee. Maveli, in the Malayalee mind, is no empire expanding monarch or a mighty tellurian that challenged the heavens, but the representative of a social system where human beings lived in equanimity and harmony. This is not to suggest that hierarchical distinctions did not exist in Kerala. The only suggestion is that the prevalent gross generalisations about caste system and feudalism may not be particularly mindful about the specifics of Kerala's Social history. For instance, the caste system, classically understood, survived by excluding the rungs lower in the caste hierarchy from knowledge and wealth. The Kerala encounter with caste though was characteristically different. As part of education in olden times, the codified knowledge streams commonly imparted were medicine and astrology. After language and literature, the practice in formal education was to specialize in either of these. Neither of these knowledge system was the monopoly of higher castes in Kerala. Among the practitioners of indigenous medicine were families that belonged to all the caste formations in Kerala. Similarly, the families that practiced astrology as a handed down tradition did not belong to the upper castes. Castes that were preoccupied in teaching language and literature were also were not recognized as belonging to the higher echelons of the caste hierarchy.
Even with regard to wealth, unbridled accumulation was by and large alien to Kerala. There were not in the state many huge palaces or temples that amassed vast resources, in any case nothing that would compare with what obtained in the neighbouring states. Compared to the ostentatious lifestyles of their counterparts in the neighbouring states, Kerala rulers led rather Spartan lives.
There is little to suggest that the Kerala society evolved following the classic textbook determined stages of slavery to feudalism to capitalism. It is also a moot point whether the inhuman characteristics of feudal relations of production those were prevalent during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries when foreign domination was widespread, would be applicable to the preceding stages in Kerala history. And it is commonly accepted that the economic exploitation of the feudal system was most acutely felt in the Malabar region, which fell directly under the British rule. Agrarian strife originated there. It is also doubtful whether the Kerala prior to the period of foreign dominance could even be considered as an agrarian economy. It has been observed that during the period when Malabar pepper dominated the world markets, pepper was not a cultivated crop in Kerala. Even after independence, Jackfruit, mango, cashew etc. were not being 'cultivated and cropped' in Kerala, but merely 'gathered'. It is debatable whether this system can be dumped into any economic categorization. While the temptation would be to label it as part tribal-part feudal, it is more to the point to recognize it as a unique system that evolved in Kerala. It is also a lesson of Kerala history that reining in accumulative tendencies would probably also involve setting limits to infinite linear expansion of production.
In the matter of gender equality, Kerala has an astonishing history. But for the exception of some minority communities, the status of Kerala women, in the several matrilineal systems that once existed in the state, are unparalleled even globally. While the modernity project has dealt a body blow to the status of women in Kerala, in a genuine deconstruction of human history on the parameters of gender inclusiveness, Kerala would definitely be more than an adjunct.
This is no attempt to ascribe to Kerala a glorious history sans exploitation and oppression. The mere suggestion is that the Kerala model of development did not merely spring from some administrative or even reformist dictact but does rest on certain historical foundations. Both the proponents and opponents of the Kerala model ascribe the paternity of the Kerala model to the left movements of the state.
What was the role of the left movements to the evolution of the Kerala model?
We have observed that the ideal and limited experience of inclusiveness, equality and economic decentralization had been embedded in the Kerala psyche. The social reform movements in the first half of the 20th century made some giant leaps in this regard. It is during this period that the left movements began taking roots in Kerala. Their attempt, it must be said, was to implant into this soil, totally alien and western concepts of socialism and communism without any attempt at inculturation or acclimatization to the local milieu and context. These ideologies were nothing more than a body of alternatives to the crisis of capitalism during the 19th century. It primarily aimed at resolving the fallouts of gross inequity and the corresponding unrest among the population ingrained in capitalist production and economic organization. These ideologies held the view that while the capitalist production methods could be retained intact, the interventions in the area of distribution would take care of the problem of economic inequalities. They upheld equality and lack of exploitation as two towering ideals. Since the inclusive social fabric of Kerala was already attuned to these ideals, the left movement took root and quickly emerged as crucial players in Kerala society and polity.
The innate contradiction of Kerala's development being influenced in a crucial fashion by ideologies that sought relevance as antidote to the crisis of western capitalism has been lost on many. Thus their strange prescription –first develop western capitalist mode of production, later we would address the crisis it give rise to. (In simple terms, create a crisis that is absent to then resolve it!) No wonder, Kerala's modern development trajectory is characterized by western capitalist production modes on the one hand and efforts at ameliorating the economic inequities such a production mode was bound to give rise to on the other. Starting with the first communist ministry, every government in Kerala diligently pursued the agenda of dams across every rivulet and stream, aimed at luring the industrialists with the promise of cheap electricity and raw materials at throw away prices. The hidden agenda of developing an exploitative production structure and the open agenda of upholding the ideal of equality played out itself to telling effect in Kerala. The much hailed land reforms for instance limited the holdings of small scale native farmers while granting exemption from ceiling limits to large scale commercial cultivators. (These very same estate owners are today deserting the farms, leaving the labourers to their own misery.)
Diametrically divergent agendas The economic crisis that has engulfed the state today is the result of pursuing two diametrically divergent agendas. Economic disparity and capital accumulation are pre requisites to the capitalist mode of production. On the one hand while attempts are made to foster these, undue interference is exerted on the distribution front on the other hand to engender economic parity. It is this lack of coherence between production and distribution that necessitates welfare schemes, subsidies, pensions and freebies. To structure distribution in this fashion, a huge bureaucracy is also needed. In short, it is not the shortage of production but the capitalist exploitation involved in production that is the fountainhead of the crisis facing Kerala.
We have observed that a capital intensive and exploitative production mode does not vibe well with the Kerala mindset. The initial euphoria of the socialist and communist packages that came in the external idealistic garb of equality and the internal DNA (soul) of exploitative production modes is now on low ebb, unable to solve this basic contradiction. What is coming in its stead is unadulterated capitalism sans all idealist trappings. Though a section of the left is crying hoarse against globalization and for the public sector, it is unlikely that they will be able to push forward an argument about which they themselves are not sufficiently convinced. Convinced as they are that the production increase in the capitalist frame as paramount, they fail to confront the contemporary capitalist thrust, symbolized in globalization and privatisation.
What is the actual nature of crisis in the production sphere in Kerala? In a society where almost ninety per cent of the population actually belongs to the ranks of the middle classes, where capital accumulation beyond a point is well nigh impossible, a Bill Gates, TATA or Ambani cannot emerge. This is not a negative commentary on Kerala. It is in fact one of its most positive aspects. Production increase cannot be an end in itself. In fact production increase that does not impact on the nature of distribution is a myth. To use a Marxist jargon the relationship between production and distribution is dialectic. May be Gandhi had this in mind when he said that what is needed is not mass production but production by the masses. The unilateral emphasis on increased production is premised on the belief that since we cannot distribute poverty there is no option but to first increase production and then structure distribution. This is a fallacy.
Is production increase all that critical?
Starvation deaths, today we know, happen not due to shortage of production but the imbalance in distribution. This is the true import of Gandhi's statement that the earth has enough for every ones need but not for anyone's greed. The process of production itself is human intervention in the distribution of natural resources. A stone as stone belongs to everyone, once someone sharpens it into a tool it becomes that person's personal possession. Thus the production process of turning the stone into a tool is an intervention in its distribution. Thus production justice is a pre requisite to the pursuit of distributive justice. Which is why, the "no matter black or white cat" theory of Chinese communist leadership is dangerous. The hi-tech production mode that enables few people to produce more goods results in a distributive imbalance that makes few people corner most goods. The greater the human participation in production process, the more just the distribution. Thus the choice of technology also becomes a justice concern.
The middle class society of Kerala assimilated the ideological packages of socialism and communism not in its totality. While they accepted Socialism and communism as an ideal they refused to imbibe fully its hidden agenda of capitalist mode of production. However, the left movements managed to instill, to a large extend, the materialistic consumption ethos of western capitalism. An austere simplicity and moderation thus gave way to conspicuous middle class consumption. Kerala turned into consumerist state. Contrary to what the advocates of more production blame, it is not lack of entrepreneurship that is the problem with Kerala but the fact that it got restricted to the service sector. The fact that the hospitals, educational institutions, supermarkets and shopping complexes continue to thrive, points not to the absence of entrepreneurship in Kerala but to the conspicuous consumption of its burgeoning middle classes.
While the modernist ideologies of capitalism, socialism and communism managed to turn Kerala into a consumerist state, they did not succeed in creating the necessary iniquitous economic conditions to facilitate an upsurge in capitalist production. There are two primary reasons for this.
൧.Concerns of inclusive equity embedded in the social mindset of Kerala under the influence of its unique history, settlement patterns and natural topography.
൨.The conscious intervention of the state in the area of distribution.
It is only through the elimination of these two factors that the capitalist production mode would be able to thrive in Kerala. It is precisely this agenda that the global banking institutions are dictating through their economic reform programmes and are being implemented by the swadesi governments. In other words, liberalization does not mean the withdrawal of the state from production but the termination of social interventions in distribution.
The conditions attached to loans by the World Bank bear this out amply. The state that is withdrawing both from the public sector and from the service sector is gradually freeing itself of financial expenditure. Typically, in a situation of this nature, the government should not be in need of emergency loans. The lending agencies insist that the loaned amount be invested in specific projects. These are primarily energy, transportation, information technology and such infrastructural areas. It is these infrastructural areas that determine the production modes that ensue. In effect, this denotes the continuing control of the state in production. While on the one hand, the state is discarding the public sector and the service sector, on the other hand it is intervening directly in production by investment of public funds. It is the same government that is closing down schools and hospitals that is building express highways and initiating computerization. By focusing on the control of the infrastructural sector instead of directly participating in production, the governments of the day are perched on an advantageous position. They do not have to face the people in the production and distribution areas. But in controlling the infrastructural sector they will be in direct control of production and in indirect control of distribution. In short, liberalization actually makes the control from the top more omnipresent and omnipotent. This is the true 'license raj'
Liberation of the infrastructure The so called crisis in Kerala's economic sphere is linked to a production mode that is disjointed from Kerala's history, geography and settlement pattern, all of which in varying degrees negated centralization and fostered inclusion. The solution therefore must be sought in liberating the production and distributive sectors from the stranglehold of these ideologies. This freedom is critical for a production, distribution and consumption pattern that is a genuine evolution from the nature and history of this state. A pre requisite for this is the freedom of the infrastructure sector that determines the nature of production. Fair enough, the control of international lending agencies and their local middlemen on the infrastructural areas ranging from education to information technology and from transportation to healthcare must surely be withdrawn. However, the liberation of the infrastructure from centralized, state or private hold involves in far greater measure the unhindered flow of rivers, the thriving of the forests, and the organic evolution of human settlements, the freedom of the labour from the servitude of capital and the liberation of knowledge from the tyranny of text and established view points.
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This article was originally appeared in Malayalam in ' Patabhedam'(Alter text) and the English translation appeared in the collection 'Participatory Democracy, Reasserting the Empowerment agenda' Published by RCPLA-PRAXIS
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