Elitism is a dangerous enemy
In his opinion piece in the Mail and Guardian titled ‘Elitism remains the enemy of democracy’, Richard Pithouse speaks of South Africa being for millions of people what Frantz Fanon called “a non-viable society”.
This is also true in Namibia, where systemic unemployment makes it impossible or extremely difficult for young people to find a viable path to a better future.
Pithouse rightly laments that people try to cope using anything from cheap drugs to self-help books and get-rich-quick schemes, crime and investing in dangerous forms of masculinity, or turning to religion to find, in Karl Marx’s words, “the heart of a heartless world”.
“For some people, patience and the support of family are eventually rewarded with some sort of work. For others, the spirals of panic attacks and depression get tighter and tighter until they go down and can’t come up again,” Pithouse wrote.
It is also true that it is extremely rare for the majority, especially young people, to accept radical social exclusion as a permanent feature of their lives and their society. And yes, usually something must give.
In the Namibian context it is also true that the outcome of liberation was essentially the introduction of another layer into the existing elitism paradigm.
This layer of elite were the leaders and economic networks of the so-called liberators, who have shamelessly enriched themselves using state resources.
This is not to say that a social security network was not actively implemented by the state, yet this approach has obvious benefits in terms of securing voters, who see government and not necessarily taxpayers as the purveyors of social grants.
We agree with Pithouse when he says there is also an urgent imperative to find ways to deepen democracy, to extend its authority over the economic realm, and to find practical and effective ways to ensure that access to collective decision-making, land and wealth is radically expanded. For Namibia it is a matter of extreme urgency.
This is also true in Namibia, where systemic unemployment makes it impossible or extremely difficult for young people to find a viable path to a better future.
Pithouse rightly laments that people try to cope using anything from cheap drugs to self-help books and get-rich-quick schemes, crime and investing in dangerous forms of masculinity, or turning to religion to find, in Karl Marx’s words, “the heart of a heartless world”.
“For some people, patience and the support of family are eventually rewarded with some sort of work. For others, the spirals of panic attacks and depression get tighter and tighter until they go down and can’t come up again,” Pithouse wrote.
It is also true that it is extremely rare for the majority, especially young people, to accept radical social exclusion as a permanent feature of their lives and their society. And yes, usually something must give.
In the Namibian context it is also true that the outcome of liberation was essentially the introduction of another layer into the existing elitism paradigm.
This layer of elite were the leaders and economic networks of the so-called liberators, who have shamelessly enriched themselves using state resources.
This is not to say that a social security network was not actively implemented by the state, yet this approach has obvious benefits in terms of securing voters, who see government and not necessarily taxpayers as the purveyors of social grants.
We agree with Pithouse when he says there is also an urgent imperative to find ways to deepen democracy, to extend its authority over the economic realm, and to find practical and effective ways to ensure that access to collective decision-making, land and wealth is radically expanded. For Namibia it is a matter of extreme urgency.
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