The Obama effect

Come now and let us reason together.” Whether or not one believes in a Lord or His words, this simple biblical injunction from the book of Isaiah, with its reference to both reason and reciprocity, is as good as any a description of what genuine leadership in democracy should seek to inculcate. Barack Obama’s justly celebrated Philadelphia speech on race relations in America was remarkable less for what it said about race than for what it implied about genuine leadership. The context was this. Senator Obama’s pastor, Jeremiah Wright, had made incendiary statements about race in America. But rather than take an easy way out, Obama criticised the pastor’s specific comments, yet did not disown a man who had an extraordinary influence on his life. He used the occasion to have a frank conversation, not just about race relations but deep-seated fears and apprehensions. The speech was a reminder of all that politics in India has come to lack.

What was remarkable about the speech was the dignity it granted its audience. It assumed that its audience was capable of exercising a moral delicacy and making fine distinctions. It strove for clarity, rather than simplicity, because in the end clarity is more accessible than feigned simplicity. I happened to be rereading Jawaharlal Nehru’s speeches. He did often worry about our penchant for being emotional, woolly-minded and given to simple abstractions. But he seldom infantilised his audience. He made errors of judgment. But his reasoning was never abridged by a slogan, his understanding of complex causes never distorted by the desire to simply blame someone, and self-reflection went hand in hand with historical reflection.

Obama also did something remarkable. He took on the whole history of race relations, yet was not trapped in it. He referred to history in order to overcome it, he transcended tradition without making all of tradition despicable, and openly talked about conflict in order to find a way out of it. Just try and remember the last time any leader in India deigned to have a frank conversation about caste that managed to simultaneously do four things: do sincere justice to the enormity of the indignity caste still imposes on Indian society, give an account of the complex changes that have modified the forms of caste conflict, candidly discuss the interventions that might genuinely help overcome the deprivations of caste rather than pretend to do so, and find a discourse that does not confuse raw power play with justice.

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