DR. S. AUSAF SAIED VASFI writes that salvation of the world does not lie in either Capitalism or Communism. The world has to come back to Islam which strikes a balance between the two extremes.
Both Imperialism or Capitalism and Communism or Socialism are two sides of a counterfeit coin. Their parentage or source is one and the same. Their fundamentals or basics are the same, although their methodologies rather modus operandi differ. Apparently, they appear to be diagonally opposed to each other. But there is no intrinsic difference between the two. Both start from a wrong premise and end up at wrong conclusions. In the process, their first casualty is man, in whose name both the doctrines have come into existence.
Let us see how: The assumption with which both Capitalism and Socialism start is: Man is sovereign. He is capable and competent rather he alone is capable and competent to devise his way of life. There is no God, or if He is there at all, He is incapable or incompetent to help man as far as charting out the course of his life is concerned.
What follows from this fallacious philosophy is: Man is not accountable for his deeds to any super human or Divine Being. Even if he is accountable to anyone, it is men like him, who make laws and rules in Parliament or those who sit in judgment in courts of law.
To cut the too-long story short, the wiseacres of Capitalism, after scores of brainstorming sessions, spread over centuries, arrived at the conclusion that Model Life can come into existence through affluence. Criminals, they argued, would vanish if they have enough to consume. Therefore, Model Societies were sought to be created by turning the State into a shangrillah of opulence. The result?
US PRISONERS
According to a Reuters story (December 10, 2006), the United States has the largest number of prisoners in the world. To quote the operative part of the 750-word story: Tough sentencing laws, record numbers of drug offenders and high crime rates have contributed to the United States having the largest prison population and the highest rate of incarceration in the world, according to criminal justice experts.
A US Justice Department report, released on November 30 last, showed that a record 7 million people – or one in every 32 American adults – were behind bars, on probation or on parole at the end of the last year. Of the total, 2.2 million were in prison or jail.
According to the International Centre for Prison Studies at King’s College in London, more people are behind bars in the United States than in any other country. China ranks second with 1.5 million prisoners, followed by Russia with 870,000.
The US incarceration rate of 737 per 100,000 people is the highest, followed by 611 in Russia and 547 for St. Kitts and Nevis. In contrast, the incarceration rates in many Western industrial nations range around 100 per 100,000 people. This is just a glimpse of the “Sovereignty of Man”.
PROMISCUITY
What havoc can this duo of “Man is Sovereign” and “Man is unaccountable” can play in the civil society can be seen in the very American society. According to a report released by the American Census Bureau in October 2007, the number of unmarried couples is growing. Since 2000, those identifying themselves as un-married opposite-sex couples rose by 24 per cent and female couples by 12 per cent. The gay couples were undercounted because many gay couples were reluctant to disclose their sexual orientation. The report added: the number of single young adults and elderly widows were both growing. A growing number of adults are spending more of their lives single or living unmarried with partners. The census survey estimated that 5.2 million couples, a little more than 5 per cent of households, were unmarried opposite-sex partners. An additional 413,000 households were male couples, and 363,000 were female couples. In all, nearly one in 10 couples was unmarried. (One in 20 households consisted of people living alone).
OTHER EXTREME
While Capitalism is one extreme, Socialism is another. In a Capitalist state, man gets almost un-bridled liberty, while in Socialist straitjacket, man lives for the state and at its mercy and disposal. Islam strikes a golden mean between the two extremes. In fact, “balance” is the other name of Islam.
When the Communist or Socialist citadel crashed in the early 1990s, it was not because of the success of Capitalism. It crashed under its own weight, as it was based on an utterly flawed thesis, the thesis that the citizenry would work for the state and the state would provide food and shelter for it. Russian eyes were opened for the first time when it had to import wheat from “imperialist” Canada. For the havoc that socialism caused in the moral sphere, see the West- Asian streets today. Except in Saudi Arabia, streets in each and every Mid-East country are found dotted with Russian women in the evening, soliciting sex.
Both Russia and China endeavoured hard to create apologists for them at the world level. They devised Breshzner Doctrine to help the erring friendly states, lest they should join the opposite camp. But nothing worked. Their downfall started with defeat in Afghanistan. Since then their defeats have not looked back.
INDIAN SOMESAULT
It would have, perhaps never occurred to Moscow or Beijing that their admirers in India would publicly admit the failure of the Socialist philosophy. To quote their patriarch, Mr. Jyoti Basu on Socialism in the current situation: “We want capital both foreign and domestic. After all we are working in a capitalist system. Socialism is not possible now. We had spoken about building a classless society, but that was a long time ago. Socialism is our political agenda and was mentioned in our party document, but capitalism will continue to be the compulsion for the future.”
One thing quite peculiar about the Left in India is their traditional tilt either towards Moscow or Beijing. Their latest stand on the nuclear issue is for the benefit of China or Russia. See beneath the surface of the much talked of democracies: In ultimate analysis, each and every democracy is totalitarian and imperialist. Similarly each and every political party, wedded to democratic values, is dictatorial.
HATE OF ISLAM
The hate of Islam, common to both doctrines, the capitalist and the socialist, is a significant point to be noted. The manner in which both cooperated with each other in Bosnia and Herzegovina is a case in point. On the issue of Kosovo, the United States, European Union and Russia were one. NATO bombed Serbia for 11 weeks. To quote S. Nihal Singh, the eminent political commentator (The Asian Age, December 14, 2007): An estimated 800,000 ethnic Albanians had fled Kosovo in the face of a crackdown by Serbian forces in 1999. And after the merciless NATO bombing of Serbia, it was the turn of the Serbs to flee. Now only 100, 000 Serbs are left in a total population of two million. Some 17,000 Serbs live in the divided city of Mitrovica, north of the Ibar River, with 36,000 more in nearby areas with a thin Albanian population. But about 60 per cent Serbs live in Southern Kosovo.
PALESTINE
Do you see any basic difference in the approaches of the US and Russia on the question of the homeland for the Palestinians or the question of Jerusalem? If the US is the proverbial Tweedledee, Russia is the proverbial Tweedledum.
Well: where do we go from this inexplicable situation?
The task of bringing back the world to Islam is stupendous rather too-stupendous. But there is no shortcut to it. The only point of relief is: you are not supposed to be inevitably successful in your task. Just strive or invest yourself honestly and sincerely. Success is not in your hands. And for that you shall not be accountable. You would be questioned on the Day of Judgement how much, and how sincerely you strived in that way. Did you shirk in your responsibility or die in that struggle?