Contradictions of Conservatism
| Date | 01 June 2018 |
| Author | Sudipta Kaviraj |
| Published date | 01 June 2018 |
| DOI | 10.1177/2321023018762661 |
| Subject Matter | Conservatism in India |
Contradictions of Conservatism
Studies in Indian Politics
6(1) 1–14
© 2018 Lokniti, Centre for the
Study of Developing Societies
SAGE Publications
sagepub.in/home.nav
Sudipta Kaviraj1
DOI: 10.1177/2321023018762661
http://journals.sagepub.com/home/inp
Abstract
This article identifies the difficulty in defining conservatism and then goes on to illustrate the contradiction
inherent in conservative thought.* The central problem addressed by the article is the absence of con-
servative thinking in modern India. Contrary to the practice of labelling certain strands of thinking
as conservative, Indian political thought of past two centuries hardly has any serious conservative
tradition. Looking at the ideas of Malaviya, Gandhi and Hindu nationalists, this article shows that while
some of their positions did come close to conservative thinking, they did not systematically pursue
conservative thinking. A key reason for this is the colonial rupture that negative possibility of serious
engagement with past.
Keywords
Conservatism, Hindu nationalism, Malaviya, Savarkar, Gandhi
What is Conservatism?
The object of this article is not to explore the form of thinking that is generally called conservatism, but
to clarify our language. Just as there is a need to use precise concepts to characterize objects in the social
world, we need a conceptual language that grasps forms of thought with accuracy, before we engage
in the process of critical assessment. I suggest in this article that what is generally designated as
conservative political thought is fraught with ambiguity. Instead of being something transparent, which
we know, and must either politically fight or support, conservatism is an enigma that has to be resolved.2
* This and the following three articles (Bhargav, Chibber et al. and Verniers) form the second part of the articles on Conservatism
in India in continuation of the articles published in the last issue of SIP (5.2; 205–61). Like the earlier articles, these articles too
draw from papers presented at Paris and Berkeley, where the project on Conservatism in India was initiated by Christophe
Jaffrelot and Pradeep Chhibber and also at Columbia University and Ashoka University where the final workshop was funded by
Alliance, a consortium associating Sciences Po in Paris and Columbia University. Editors.
1 Professor of Indian Politics and Intellectual History, Director of Graduate Studies, Department of Middle Eastern, South Asian
and African Studies, Columbia University, New York, NY USA.
2 In recent years, political supporters of BJP and Hindu Nationalism in general have occasionally lamented the lack of a conservative
tradition in Indian political thought. For example, Swapan Dasgupta has expressed this sentiment. But this is an unreflective claim
which supports a political position before thinking about what its contents might be.
Corresponding author:
Sudipta Kaviraj, Department of Middle Eastern, South Asian and African Studies, 412 Knox Hall, Columbia
University, New York, NY 10027, USA.
E-mail: sk2828@columbia.edu
2
Studies in Indian Politics 6(1)
The trouble in taking a stance about ‘conservatism’ in Indian society is the difficulty of defining what it
is. But even if eventually conservatism remains hard to define, and we do not find a body of political
doctrine that can be definitely characterized by that description, by this exercise we grasp something
interesting and troubling about the academic language through which we seek to grasp and evaluate our
political world.3
When we are asked to think about the place of conservatism in our society, our impulse is cleave to an
analysis of Hindu nationalist thought. But I want to pause and ask if this equation of Hindu nationalism
with conservatism is entirely without theoretical difficulty. Is Narendra Modi a conservative? It is true
that, if asked whether he wants to ‘restore’ ramarajya, he is likely to answer in the affirmative. But the
idea of all such ‘returns’ is elusive, and riddled with difficulties. Ramarajya is not something that anyone
has seen or recorded with accuracy, so that it can function as a political destination of some clarity—if we
take the verb restore seriously. Conservatism, in one of its meanings at least, must refer to some definite
state of affairs where it is the task of that form of thought and practice to conserve; but ‘conserve’ could
be used only if that state of affairs was still the prevalent condition of society. What Modi or other mem-
bers of the RSS or the BJP might mean by ramarajya which they would like to restore—to which we
cannot apply the verb ‘conserve’ simply because that involves the implausible assumption that it existed
in the recent past, and has been destroyed presumably by the long history of modernity and more recently,
by the wanton assault of Nehruvian radicalism. What makes it hard to associate Modi with any simply
conservative stance towards history is the fact he comes from a relatively low caste in the Hindu hierarchi-
cal caste order, the son of a chaiwalla—which he never fails to mention—and has risen through the decid-
edly modern mechanisms of an electoral democracy, to hold the office of the greatest terrestrial power in
the country. Such an irresistible rise to political eminence was inconceivable even 50 years back, despite
the operation of a republican constitution since 1950. Modi or the political forces he represents does not
deplore the historical change that has made this possible. Clearly, the BJP and political Hindu nationalism
is not opposed to the transformation of one of the central tenets of the sanatan dharma.
In fact, it is interesting to analyse the episode of the chaiwalla insult just before the 2014 election.
It shows that, as far as social mobility out of caste disabilities is concerned, Modi is a progressive, and
Iyer a conservative. Modi regards his rise to the highest office from the status of a tea seller background
as a great historical good; Iyer, despite his impeccable secular credentials, regards this as a historical
change to be derided in true aristocratic style. This simple example shows that conservatism can be
seen in two ways—as a systematic doctrine about history and society, or, alternatively, as a fragmentary
complex of contingently interconnected social attitudes, which can be distributed in surprising ways
across the social spectrum.
What Do We Mean by Conservative Thought?
A first problem is a lack of clarity about what constitutes conservative political thought. What kind of
thought are we trying to understand and assess? Political thought is a vast and tricky field not merely
because there are so many kinds of political thinking, and their infinite subspecies. This is not the only
trouble with studying political thought. By definition, political thought is a kind of thought that affects
3 I want to stress that my strictures are about the language of academic political science, and the study of political thought. Notably,
ordinary political discourse—speeches by politicians, conversation among ordinary observers, commentaries by journalists writing
in the vernacular—usually dispenses with a characterization that is strictly equivalent to this term. In Bengali, for instance, the
direct equivalent for conservative will be ‘rakshansheel’—an awkward tatsma neologism; but how many times is it used in real
political utterance?
Kaviraj 3
politics—political life, and commonly political action. This raises some additional problems. Evidently,
forms of political thinking are stretched across several levels in their intellectual existence—that is, in
the way they exist in the real world. Political thought exists in ordinary peoples’ thinking inspiring and
conditioning their understandings, assessments and judgements about political life. It exists in the
textures of more formally intellectual political discourse—in newspaper editorials, comments, even in
the analytical inflections of the news reports. It exists at times in the construction and functioning of
political institutions—as in constitutional documents, in the way specific institutions like the legislature
or judiciary function. Finally, they also exist and are expressed in the form of formal writing of theory—
in the work of systematic political writers and theorists. All strands of political thought might not be equally
present at all these levels. I think a feature of the hegemony of a kind of political thought in a specific
society is reflected in the fact that some forms of thought might actually be overrepresented on some
strata, and others might be hidden in the less formal levels of the structure of a political ideology4—if we
designate as a political ideology, the entire structure of these dissimilar levels of thinking.
Conservative thought presents a particular problem in modern India, probably in the modern world
generally. Conservative thinking seems to be under-represented on the formal levels of theoretical state-
ments; however, it is much more perceptible if we go down the levels to public discourse, and popular
individual opinion.5 There is also a somewhat different problem—particularly acute among intellectu-
als—about deciding the relation between expression of opinion and real belief. It is fairly common in
India to find intellectuals who are particularly strident in their declaration of ‘progressive’...
To continue reading
Request your trial