The India that Newbigin encountered, during the decades of the 1940‟s, 50‟s and 60‟s, was a unique period in Indian history when the country was flush with idealism and anticipation of the changes that democratic socialism could bring to the country. The figure who dominated and influenced India throughout this period, more than any other, was Jawaharlal Nehru (1889-1964). Nehru was one of the leaders of the
independence movement, and Prime Minister of India from independence in 1947 till his death in 1964. Newbigin refers warmly to Nehru as “one of the noblest examples of the secular spirit at its best,” attributing to his influence the maintenance of a public space that made possible genuine political debate and discussion about the future of India.445 Nehru oversaw the creation of India as a socialist democratic republic and committed the country to a state controlled economy. Unsurprisingly, given colonial history, Nehru had a suspicion that the free market would be used to work against Indian interests. However, the decades that followed Nehru‟s death did not lead to the hoped for development and prosperity and by the beginning of the 1990‟s India was virtually bankrupt and on the verge of defaulting on its international payments. The economic reforms subsequently initiated in 1991 began movement towards a free market economy: the state began to loosen its control of industry and business and foreign investment began to enter the country. The degree of liberalization of the economy over the past two decades is debated, given that state owned companies have 41% of the total market share, companies owned by family dynasties another 41%,
443
L. Newbigin, Foolishness to the Greeks, 109.
444 L. Newbigin, The Open Secret, 95.
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and institutional ownership and subsidiaries of foreign companies another 18%.446 While the form that capitalism has taken in India may be unique, it has brought changes to India that are familiar to capitalism throughout the world.
Newbigin‟s critique raises the following question for India: „Has the pursuit of self-interest as a good in itself become the dominant ideology?‟ There are some indications that this is the case. In her study of the upper middle class in Delhi, India, Christiane Brosius points to the bringing together of capitalism and a sense of national responsibility. By participating in the new consumer society and the pursuit of
personal well-being and satisfaction there is a sense within the middle class that this is not a selfish pursuit, but one that contributes to the uplift of the nation as a whole:
While capitalism was previously identified with lack of patriotism, members of the new middle classes now consider themselves as motors of a new national revitalization, both in terms of economy and moral values. . . . William Mazzarella has defined this as a shift of concepts from the duty of progress to progress through the pleasure of consumption.447
This shift of concept from “the duty of progress” of Nehru‟s socialism, to the idea of “progress through the pleasure of consumption” is the manifestation of Newbigin‟s description of the core belief of capitalism as the pursuit of self-interest being of benefit for all. An executive director of a venture capital firm in India articulates this well when he states that the “cure” for poverty in India and the gulf between the two Indias is the pervasive spread of the free market throughout the economy: “Only markets can connect the two Indias and transform the poorer India into a prosperous India, not government largesse.”448
Brosius points to how some scholars indicate that a new form of national identity has been created with “the shift from dutiful nation- citizen to consumer citizen.”449
In addition to this sense of acting in the public good, other positive qualities are also attributed to the pursuit of self-interest, such as it being a natural and normal care of self: “Conspicuous consumption is not only valued
446 Patrick Foulis, „Adventures in Capitalism,‟ The Economist, October 22, 2011
(http://www.economist.com/node/21532448, accessed 9 July 2013). Foulis points to the difficulty of properly identifying the form capitalism has taken in India describing it as an unusual “mix of Sao Paulo, Seoul and Shanghai.”
447 Christiane Brosius, India’s Middle Class: New Forms of Urban Leisure, Consumption and
Prosperity (New Delhi: Routledge, 2010), 11.
448
R. Mantri, 26 November 2010, http://blogs.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Adventure- Capitalist/entry/connecting-the-two-indias.
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as investment in a better lifestyle but as a sign of one caring for oneself.”450
Other studies affirm the changes in thinking and behavior taking place in India. Gallup conducted a survey of 2000 Indian consumers in 1996 and another in 2006 and found a clear change in the traditional emphasis on saving with more attention to immediate satisfaction: “Although long-term plans remain a high priority, life‟s pleasures in the here and now have gained importance over the past decade.”451
The change in attitudes, but also of the dominant ideology in India, may be a process particularly located within the upper middle class who can be considered the key consumer group in India, but the concepts and ideals associated with this reaches down through the whole society, primarily through the media.452
Newbigin believed that the capitalist ideology of the pursuit of self-interest as good for all was destructive of relationships. While traditional family values in India show every indication of remaining intact, it can be argued that relationships within the wider society are placed under strain in a growing lack of consciousness of the plight of the poor and marginalized. This can be seen in film and television
particularly. From the time of independence up until the early 1990‟s the dominance of Nehru‟s socialism helped minimize aspiration for wealth within the society, as Raghavendra explains with regard to the portrayal of wealth in Hindi cinema:
Until the early part of the 1990s, „Nehruvian socialism‟ was India‟s official ideology and this finds correspondence in class/social conflict of various kinds in Hindi cinema, the poor being morally favoured over the rich. This continues until 1992-93.453
Participation in the global economy opened the door to new sources of apparently legitimate wealth. Wealth in a largely rural India had often been associated with the rapacious and oppressive landlord, so that to have wealth had dubious moral
associations. Gandhi‟s own apparent repudiation of wealth and identification with the poor also significantly contributed to this perception. However, following economic liberalization, in the early 1990‟s, wealth became available through flows of money from the global economy. The lifestyle of the urban rich rapidly became represented
450
C. Brosius, India’s Middle Class, 23.
451 Ashok Gopal and Rajesh Srinivasan, „The New Indian Consumer,‟ Harvard Business Review,
October 2006, 22.
452 C. Brosius, India’s Middle Class, 3. 453
M. K. Raghavendra, „Local Resistance to Global Bangalore: Reading minority Indian cinema,‟ in
Popular Culture in a Globalized India, eds. K. M. Gokulsung and Wimal Dissanayake (New Delhi:
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as something of an ideal in Hindi cinema, such that Bollywood, the source of Hindi cinema today, “more or less” endorses globalization.454 This has had the effect of marginalizing or at least lessening the perceived importance of other values. Raghavendra points to an example of this in the discomfort that regional language cinema sometimes shows in its representations of current Indian society. He uses the example of Duniya which frequently references Sakshatkara, a 1971 film that
“powerfully identified a set of virtues that long defined the self-image of Kannadigas – aristocratic, noble, trusting, generous and tolerant.” Duniya represents this people as a diminished force and refers to the film “as a lament on how such a class of people could be so reduced.”455
As Tharoor points out the “new consumer culture” has generated a “competitive ferment,”456
and such a ferment hardly supports community virtues of generosity and trust.
The television channels, which are largely dependent on advertising for their survival, are orientated particularly towards the urban upper middle classes, which is reflected in their content and also advertising. As Metha points out, the T.V. schedule is driven by ratings among the urban middle classes, the main target group for the companies on whose advertising they depend:
India‟s entire rural population, consisting of an estimated 145 million
households, is totally ignored. Even within the urban areas, only towns with a population of more than one lakh are measured (presentation shown to Mehta by Atul Phadnis, based on NRS surveys). The others are not considered important enough to measure. Thirdly until at least 2005, vast areas like all the north-east states, Bihar and Kashmir were not represented. Fourth the TAM system has always been skewed towards higher income householders. Until January 2007, it reserved 25 per cent of its meters outright for SEC A householders, defined as the highest earning socio- economic category.457
Consequently, the images and advertised products are frequently totally beyond the income of the majority of those watching. Furthermore, the content of the programming is also reflective of a focus on the urban middle classes, the channels naturally being eager to win their viewing. Rural issues and peripheral states tend to be largely ignored in T.V. programming such as television news. Mehta gives an
454 M. K. Raghavendra, „Local Resistance to Global Bangalore,‟ 15. 455 M. K. Raghavendra, „Local Resistance to Global Bangalore, 22. 456
Shashi Tharoor, India: From Midnight to the Millenium and Beyond, rev. ed. (New Delhi: Penguin Books India, 2007), 324.
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example of this with the presence of 500 television accredited journalists present at a week long fashion festival, in contrast to only one television journalist covering the crisis in rural India which was “experiencing the worst spate of farmer suicides in decades.”458
Nothing could give a starker illustration of indifference to the plight of the poor.
The poor have become invisible, yet India remains, as some of her leaders acknowledge, a poor country. In a country where it is accepted that approximately 40% of children under the age of five are severely malnourished this is a conclusion that is hard to avoid. An equally large proportion of the population remain excluded from the most basic of healthcare and educational opportunity. Their life has changed relatively little from that of their forebears - a daily struggle on a small patch of land to eke out a living. This story, in terms of film and television, is largely hidden from the dominant society.
3.6 Conclusion
The conflict-victory dimension of the cross, as considered in this chapter, has direct application for the church‟s life and mission in relation to two aspects of Indian society today: the ongoing Dalit experience of marginalisation and the spread of capitalist ideology. The way in which the conflict-victory aspect of the cross can relate to the Dalit experience is perhaps more obvious than in relation to capitalism. As considered above, the capitalist ideology that the pursuit of self-interest will eventually lead to a new society for all, is fundamentally at odds with an eschatology rooted in the cross. The church, arguably, has a role to play today in Indian society by challenging this logic through a life of participation in Christ‟s suffering and victory. In this way the church will demonstrate and embody an alternative logic for a
renewed Indian society. Yet, a renewed Indian society not only involves liberation from dehumanizing ideology but also an appropriate orientation and integration of the culture as a whole, as will now be considered.
458 N. Mehta, India on Television, 185.
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Chapter 4
Mission as Inculturation
4.1 Introduction
Given Newbigin‟s locating the church‟s mission in relation to the eschatological reign of God on earth it is appropriate to ask about his understanding of the
relationship of inculturation to this reign.459 What does it mean for the church to be a sign, instrument and foretaste of the kingdom of God in a particular culture? More specifically, what does it mean for the church to be a sign, instrument and foretaste of the kingdom of God in the culture and cultures that belong to India? Newbigin could write warmly of how the “glory and honour of India” will be brought into the new city at the end of the ages.460 What does this mean for the church‟s faith, life and practice today?