Notes on Jean-Paul Sartre's Preface to Frantz Fanon's Wretched of the Earth

 Jean Paul Sartre's Preface to Frantz Fanon, Wretched of the Earth, Grove Press, New York, 2004

Colonialism, Scars and Chains

"…our victims know us by their scars and by their chains, and it is this that makes their evidence irrefutable. It is enough that they show us what we have made of them for us to realize what we have made of ourselves" (13).

Decolonization as the Recreation of Man

"They would do well to read Fanon; for he shows clearly that this irrepressible violence is neither sound nor fury, nor the resurrection of savage instincts, nor even the effect of resentment; it is man recreating himself" (21).

Decolonization, Responsibility, Structure

"The war, by merely setting the question of command and responsibility, institutes new structures which will become the first institutions of peace. Here, then, is man even now established in new traditions, the future children of a horrible present" (23).

Violence Abroad, Breakup at Home

"Today violence, blocked everywhere, comes back on us though our soldiers, comes inside and takes possession of us. Involution starts; the native recreates himself, and we, settlers and Europeans, ultras and liberals, we break up"(28).

The Anxiety of the Whistleblower

How do whistleblowers fare in America, in one of the oldest and most advanced democracies in the world? Whistleblowers are employees who expose the misconduct of the companies in which they are employed. There are laws made to protect whistleblowers, to be sure. However, whistleblowers often suffer terribly for their actions. They lose their jobs and careers. They experience loneliness and depression. Political theorist Fred Alford writes that whistleblowers in America usually get to discover the deception underpinning official state ideology. They find out, for example, that the following statements are wrong:

"That if one is right and persistent, things will turn out all right in the end
That it makes sense to stand up and do the right thing.
That the family is a haven in a heartless world. Spouses and children will not abondon you in your hour of need.
That ours is a government of laws, not men.
That loyalty isn't equivalent to herd instinct." (Whistleblowers, page 49)

Public life, whistleblowers discover, is anchored in conformity. It is more prudent to obey and conform than commit to truth. This holds for democratic public orders as well. Democracy, in fact, exerts forms of social pressure that are often more effective than the chain and the knout. This is not just a contemporary phenomenon. It has historical roots. Consider Tocqueville's observations about 19th century America in his Democracy in America:

"When the inhabitant of a democratic country compares himself with all those about him, he feels with pride that he is the equal of anyone of them; but when he comes to survey the totality of his fellows, and to place himself in contrast with so huge a body, he is instantly overwhelmed by the sense of his own insignificance and weakness. The same equality which renders him independent of each of his fellow-citizens taken severally, exposes him alone and unprotected to the influence of the greater number. The public has therefore, among a democratic people, a singular power, which aristocratic nations cannot conceive of, for it does not persuade to certain opinions, but it enforces them, and infuses them into the intellect by a sort of enormous pressure of the minds of all upon the reason of each...."(Tocqueville, Book 2, Chapter 2).

The families, organizations and political parties that compose the public sometimes act in conformity and unison. They thus create a 'singular power.' Think of this as the center of a circle drawing multiple forces around it into itself. Whistleblowers are the best people to tell us about how strong that force is. This is because they resisted that force and suffered for it.

This does not mean, however, that the American society, whether in its historical or contemporary form, is overwhelmingly uniform. There are divisions and conflicts between the forces composing the American public. Furthermore, these are not minor divisions: they are about ultimate values of life. American democracy, to its credit, contains their conflicts effectively.

Philosopher Thomas Nagel describes this containment as follows:

"[Moral and political conflicts in America] are not just about the best means to pursue generally accepted ends. They are about ultimate values. Yet they do not threaten the stability and legitimacy of the system. Except for a small lunatic fringe, citizens of the United States are prepared to accept the results of the political and legal process even when those results contravene some of their most fundamental convictions. Americans may vilify one another as bigoted religious fanatics or morally depraved atheists, racist reactionaries or crypto-totalitarian socialists, but they know they will not be put up against the wall if their party loses an election" (Thomas Nagel, "Sandel and the Paradox of Liberalism", p.110).

This organization of the political space demands from us fortitude and tolerance when we lose in social and political contests. But, again, some losses, like the losses endured by whistleblowers, take place beneath the register of electoral politics. They are hard to discern. True, whistleblowers are usually not 'put up against the wall.' But, they suffer in a heartless world and end up severely alienated.

Let us think, now, with political theorist Sheldon Wolin:

"While the powers and responsibilities of the presidency have accordingly kept pace with the growth of Superpower, the powers and responsibilities of the citizen have shrunk- also accordingly. This becomes most apparent when important elections loom. The media aided by the pollsters proceed unchallenged to construct either a Pavlovian democracy conditioned to respond to stupefying questions("public opinion polls show that 60 percent of the voters believe that the president is doing a good job"), or a democracy fragmented into abstract categories of citizens who do not consciously know, associate, or colloborate with each other on the basis of such categories-"over thirty years old," "women earning over 50000 a year," and so on"(Politics and Vision, p.509).

Is the contemporary American democracy, then, a Pavlovian democracy with a diminished sense of community? Fragmentation seems overwhelming. Our civic preferences are aggregated by putting us in abstract groups- boxes- that do not mean much to us.

But maybe we should not rush ahead too far like this. We are allowed to seek solidarity outside these given boxes: we can find our own ideological niche.

Yet, again, the moment the whistleblower tries to deny fragmentation and connect to others, to the public at large, he or she is pushed away. He or she is rendered insignificant and weak. Can the society contain his/her resultant anxiety? That seems to be the great challenge of our democracy now- more so than public opinion and the problems associated with majority rule.

Reflections on the "Plague"

Let us reflect on certain passages from Albert Camus' Plague (passages from the book are in bold):

Albert Camus, Plague, Vintage International,121:
Toward two o'clock the town slowly empties, it is the time when silence, sunlight, dust, and plague have the streets to themselves. Wave after wave of heat flows over the frontage of the tall gray houses during these long, languid hours. Thus the afternoon wears on, slowly merging into an evening that settles down like a red winding-sheet onto the serried tumult of the town. At the start of the great heat, for some unascertained reason, the evenings found the streets almost empty. But now the least ripple of cooler air brings an easing of the strain, if not a flutter of hope. Then all stream out into the open, drug themselves with talking, start arguing or love-making, and in the last glow of sunset the town, freighted with lovers two by two and loud with voices, drifts like a helmless ship into the throbbing darkness. In vain a zealous evangelist with a felt hat and flowing tie threads his way through the crowd, crying without cease: ' God is great and good. Come unto Him.' On the contrary, they all make haste toward some trivial objective that seems of more immediate interest than God.

The town infected with the plague longs for 'the least ripple of cooler air.' It looks for a sign to revert back to the ordinary. The citizens of Oran want no great apocalypse, no call for redemption. They want to go back to the pursuit of trivial objectives. 

Plague, 131-32:

Next day Tarrou set to work and enrolled a first team of workers, soon to be followed by many others. However, it is not the narrator's intention to ascribe to these sanitary groups more importance than their due. Doubtless today many of our fellow citizens are apt to yield to the temptation of exagerrating the services they rendered. But the narrator is inclined to think that by attributing overimportance to praiseworthy actions one may, by implication, be paying indirect but potent homage to the worse side of human nature.... Those who enrolled in the 'sanitary squads,' as they were called, had, indeed, no such great merit in doing as they did, since they knew it was the only thing to do, and the unthinkable thing would then have been not to have brought themselves to do it. These groups enabled our townsfolk to come to grips with the disease and convinced them that, now that plague was among us, it was up to them to do whatever can be done to fight it. Since plague became in this way some men's duty, it revealed itself as what it really was; that is, the concern of all.

The plague reminds the town dwellers of the need for political organization. They craft institutions to this end. They build "sanitary squads" based on voluntary membership and an altruistic spirit. Camus insists that this formation is not driven by heroism. The inhabitants of the town simply heed 'the right thing to do,' a reasonable 'concern for all.' They start taking care of the public realm.

Also consider the following remark of Jean Tarraou, the wanderer who helps Dr. Rieux to combat the plague:

What is natural is the microbe. All the rest- health, integrity, purity (if you like)- is a product of the human will, of a vigilance that must never falter. The good man... is the man who has the fewest lapses of attention.

Excellence is revealed to be vigilance and the will to fight the forces of decay in nature. The fight against nature demands unfaltering vigilance and full attention.

Let us continue:

Plague 182:For the first time exiles from those they loved had no reluctance to talk freely about them, using the same words as everybody else, and regarding their deprivation from the same angle as that from which they viewed the latest statistics of the epidemic. This change was striking, since until now they had jealously withheld their personal grief from the common stock of suffering; now they accepted its inclusion. Without memories, without hope, they lived for the moment only. Indeed, the here and now had come to mean everything to them. For there is no denying that the plague had gradually killed off in all of us the faculty not of love but even of friendship. Naturally enough, since love asks something of the future, and nothing was left us but a series of present moments.

The plague thus creates an impoverished present 'here and now.' It robs people of love and friendship by making them unable to project themselves and their relationships into the future. 

Plague 228:

" My brothers"- the preacher's tone showed he was nearing the conclusion of his sermon-" the love of God is a hard love. It demands total self-surrender, disdain of our human personality. And yet it alone can reconcile us to suffering and deaths of children........ Thus in some churches of the south of France plague victims have lain sleeping many a century under the flagstones of the chancel. and priests now speak above their tombs, and the divine message they bring to men rises from that charnel, to which, nevertheless, children have contributed their share."

The preacher comes back to reconcile fathers to the death of their children, or to God who licenses such tragedy. He summons people to a 'hard love' as if their contemporary predicament was not hard enough. 'Hard love to ward off hard pain' is the formula of his religion. 
Plague 236:

Meanwhile the authorities had another cause for anxiety in the difficulty of maintaining the food-supply. Profiteers were taking a hand and purveying at enormous prices essential foodstuffs not available in the shops. The result was that poor families were in great straits, while the rich went short of practically nothing. Thus, whereas plague by its impartial ministrations should have promoted equality among our townsfolk, it now had the opposite effect and, thanks to the habitual conflict of cupidities, exacerbated the sense of injustice rankling in men's hearts.

Notably, the plague gives rise to economic inequality. Profiteers raise the prices of essential foodstuffs. The "impartial ministrations of the plague" fail to take hold.


Plague, 308:

And, indeed, as he listened to the cries of joy rising from the town, Rieux remembered that such joy is always imperiled. He knew what those jubilant crowds did not know but could have learned from the books: that the plague bacillus never dies or disappears for good; that it can lie dormant for years and years in furniture and linen-chests; that it bides its time in bedrooms, cellars, trunks, and bookshelves; and that perhaps the day would come when, for the bane and the enlightening of men, it would rouse up its rats again and send them forth to die in a happy city.

The town recovers. 'Ordinary happiness' comes back. Dr. Rieux is cautious, however. He knows his science and its grim reality. His caution contrasts with the excitable preacher. Against the apologetic hard love of the priest, Camus sets the calm wisdom and responsible care of the scientist doctor. Note, however, that Dr. Rieux is out of place in Oran. Will he ever be happily adjusted to it, or to the world in general?

T.S Eliot and Jonathan Lear: Insights on Education and Leadership

We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time
Through the unknown, unremembered gate
When the last of the earth left to discover
Is that which was the beginning
--- T.S. Eliot

The ceaseless exploration that T.S. Eliot depicts in the poem above describes an attractive journey. It takes us (if we are willing to partake of the "we" in the "we shall not cease from exploration) into uncharted territory. We set off unaware of a final destination. We should try, the poem also suggests however, to find our way back to home, the place where the journey began. We can thus come to see what is belonging to our home- what is familiar- with new eyes. The new knowledge we acquire finds its way to the depths of our identity, our starting-point.

Now let us consider another sagely counsel described in the dream of Young Plenty Coups of the Crows tribe in Montana. In this dream, Young Plenty Coups is taken up and counseled by the Dwarf-chief, the head of the Little People, legendary creatures who lived in the hills and valley near Pryor, Montana. This account is found in Jonathan Lear's brilliant book Radical Hope.

"He will be a Chief," said the Dwarf-chief. I can give him nothing. He already possesses the power to become great if he will use it. Let him cultivate his senses, let him use the powers which Ah-badt-dadt-deah[God] has given him, and he will go far. The difference between men grows out of the use, or non-use, of what was given them by Ah-badt-dadt-deah in the first place... In you as in all men are natural powers. You have a will. Learn to use it. Make it work for you. Sharpen your senses as you would sharpen your knife. Remember the wolf smells better than you do because he has learned to depend on his nose. It tells him every secret the winds carry because he uses it all the time, makes it work for him. We can give you nothing. You already possess everything necessary to become great. Use your powers. Make them work for you, and you will become a chief"(p. 125).

"We can give you nothing": at first, this sounds odd to me. Teachers surely do have something to give; otherwise, we students would not seek their help. But, upon closer introspection, I realize that Dwarf-chief expresses a profound insight. He knows that Young Plenty Coups, like the rest of us, already has the raw material to work on- his natural powers. What he requires is a willingness to depend on what he has- like the wolf who uses his senses to learn the secret of the winds. Attunement to, not overcoming of, what we already have within ourselves is the key.

The Dwarf-chief's perspective is not far from that of T.S Eliot. Both urge us to look back at our starting-points- our senses, natural powers and convictions- in the midst of a perilous journey of educative exploration. Upon looking back, we will be equipped with new insights about ourselves. We will also be more willing to take up new quests and bring new gifts to the house of our being. These gifts are not things that decay or perish with time- like money, status and might. They are rather values that connect deeply with the innermost part of our nature- our curiosity, desire to sharpen our skills and yearning to understand what is around us, for example, the last piece of the earth, the secret of the winds or how best to take care of the public realm.

"So much depends on a red wheel-barrow"

The Red Wheelbarrow
William Carlos Williams

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so much depends
upon
a red wheel
barrow

glazed with rain
water

beside the white
chickens.
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I have always felt as if there is a subterranean and serious depth under the seemingly ordinary and playful surface of Williams' poem- a red wheel barrow, rain water and white chickens. After all, why does so much depend on the red wheel barrow? Especially when rain-water glazes it and white chickens gather around it?
The glass-like redness of the wheel-barrow probably appears pleasant to the eye when it lays beside the white chickens who might be "thinking" of small edible seeds and fruits in the wheel-barrow. The chickens probably do not like the rain and might be seeking shelter near the wheel-barrow. Is the "so much" that depends on the wheel-barrow then security and warmth on which depends the well-being of chickens who lay eggs for our well-being, the well-being of the wheel-barrow users? Is the poem about the interdependence and beauty in nature? One can also think about the interdependence among human farmers who probably have to share the red wheel-barrow? The red wheel-barrow built and used in unison? Colored red and placed beside the chickens as a work of art, not only to be used but also to be watched in a reflective spirit of admiration....

Musicians as Citizens of an Unknown Homeland

Marcel Proust, The Prisoner and the Fugitive, Penguin, page 235-236 quoted in Jon Elster, Reason and Rationality, page 18

"Each great artist seems to be the citizen of an unknown homeland which he has forgotten[...] It is not that musicians can remember this lost homeland, but each always remains unconsciously in tune with it; he is overcome with joy when he sings the songs of his country, he may sometimes betray it for the sake of glory, but when he seeks glory in this way he moves further away from it, and only finds it when he turns his back on it."

In this quote by Proust on the plight of the musician/artist, our attention is drawn to the ideas of an "unknown homeland," attunement to a place of belonging and finally glory. The joy of singing the songs of one's country feeds upon a sense of intuitive, un-reflective and visceral sense of belonging to common experiences and relations. 

The relation between that joy and glory, the other key concept in the quote, is complicated. At first, they do not seem to easily go together. The lure of glory may tempt the musician away from his/her roots which he/she may come to see too provincial and rustic. However, this temptation does not bear fruit, Proust tells us. Glory is gained instead when we express, not run away from, our longing for roots through melodies and words. Such is the lovely 'pragmatic incoherence'(to use a term of Jon Elster) of belonging somewhere deep down to a homeland, forgotten in the midst of a mobile life, but forever sought through melodies.