“The Scam” – Debashis Basu and Sucheta Dalal – Was it the Beginning of the End?

“India is a turnaround scrip in the world market.”

“Either you kill, or you get killed” 

— Harshad Mehta

“Though normally quite reasonable and courteous, there was one breed of brokers he truly detested. to him and other kids in the money markets, brokers were meant to be treated like loyal dogs.”

— Broker

The first two claims by Harshad Mehta could be said to form the central theme of the book, The Scam, while the third statement is testimony to the fact of how compartmentalization within the camaraderie proved efficacious to the broker-trader nexus getting nixed, albeit briefly. The authors Debasish Basu and Sucheta Dalal have put a rigorous investigation into unraveling the complexity of what in popular culture has come to be known as the first big securities scam in India in the early 90s. That was only the beginning, for securities scams, banking frauds and financial crimes have since become a recurrent feature, thanks to increasing mathematization and financialization of market practices, stark mismatches on regulatory scales of The Reserve Bank of India (RBI), Public Sector Banks and foreign banks, and stock-market-oriented economization. The last in particular has severed the myth that stock markets are speculative and had no truck with the banking system, by capitalizing and furthering the only link between the two, and that being banks providing loans against shares subject to high margins.  

The scam which took the country by storm in 1992 had a central figure in Harshad Mehta, though the book does a most amazing archaeology into unearthing other equally, if not more important figures that formed a collusive network of deceit and bilk. The almost spider-like weave, not anywhere near in comparison to a similar network that emanated from London and spread out from Tokyo and billed as the largest financial scandal of manipulating LIBOR, thanks to Thomas Hayes by the turn of the century, nevertheless magnified the crevices existing within the banking system and bridging it with the once-closed secretive and closed bond market. So, what exactly was the scam and why did it rock India’s economic boat, especially when the country was opening up to liberal policies and amalgamating itself with globalization? 

As Basu and Dalal say, simply put, the first traces of the scam were observed when the State Bank of India (SBI), Main Branch, Mumbai discovered that it was short by Rs. 574 crore in securities. In other words, the antiquated manually written books kept at the Office of Public Debt at the RBI showed that Rs. 1170.95 crore of an 11.5% of central government loan of 2010 maturity was standing against SBI’s name on the 29th February 1992 figure of Rs. 1744.95 crore in SBI’s books, a clear gap of Rs. 574 crore, with the discrepancy apparently held in Securities General Ledger (SGL). Of the Rs. 574 crore missing, Rs. 500 crore were transferred to Harshad Mehta’s account. Now, an SGL contains the details to support the general ledger control account. For instance, the subsidiary ledger for accounts receivable contains all the information on each of the credit sales to customers, each customer’s remittance, return of merchandise, discounts and so on. Now, SGLs were a prime culprit when it came to conceiving the illegalities that followed. SGLs were issued as substitutes for actual securities by a cleverly worked out machination. Bank Receipts (BRs) were invoked as replacement for SGLs, which on the one hand confirmed that the bank had sold the securities at the rates mentioned therein, while on the other prevented the SGLs from bouncing. BRs is a shrewd plot line whereby the bank could put a deal through, even if their Public Debt Office (PDO) was in the negative. Why was this circumvention clever was precisely because had the transactions taken place through SGLs, they would have simply bounced, and BRs acted as a convenient run-around, and also because BRs were unsupported by securities. In order to derive the most from BRs, a Ready Forward Deal (RFD) was introduced that prevented the securities from moving back and forth in actuality. Sucheta Dalal had already exposed the use of this instrument by Harshad Mehta way back in 1992 while writing for the Times of India. The RFD was essentially a secured short-term (generally 15 day) loan from open bank to another, where the banks would lend against Government securities. The borrowing bank sells the securities to the lending bank and buys them back at the end of the period of the loan, typically at a slightly higher price. Harshad Mehta roped in two relatively obscure and unknown little banks in Bank of Karad and Mumbai Mercantile Cooperative Bank (MMCB) to issue fake BRs, or BRs not backed by Government securities. It were these fake BRs that were eventually exchanged with other banks that paid Mehta unbeknownst of the fact that they were in fact dealing with fake BRs. 

By a cunning turn of reason, and not to rest till such payments were made to reflect on the stock market, Harshad Mehta began to artificially enhance share prices by going on a buying spree. To maximize profits on such investments, the broker, now the darling of the stock market and referred to as the Big Bull decided to sell off the shares and in the process retiring the BRs. Little did anyone know then, that the day shares were sold, the market would crash, and crash it did. Mehta’s maneuvers lent a feel-good factor to the stock market until the scam erupted, and when it did erupt, many banks were swindled to a massive loss of Rs. 4000 crore, for they held on to BRs that had no value attached to them. The one that took the most stinging loss was the State Bank of India and it was payback time. The mechanism by which the money was paid back cannot be understood unless one gets to the root of an RBI subsidiary, National Housing Bank (NHB). When the State Bank of India directed Harshad Mehta to produce either the securities or return the money, Mehta approached the NHB seeking help, for the thaw between the broker and RBI’s subsidiary had grown over the years, the discovery of which had appalled officials at the Reserve Bank. This only lends credibility to the broker-banker collusion, the likes of which only got murkier as the scam was getting unravelled. NHB did come to rescue Harshad Mehta by issuing a cheque in favor of ANZ Grindlays Bank. The deal again proved to be one-handed as NHB did not get securities in return from Harshad Mehta, and eventually the cheque found its way into Mehta’s ANZ account, which helped clear the dues due to the SBI. The most pertinent question here was why did RBI’s subsidiary act so collusively? This could only make sense, once one is in the clear that Harshad Mehta delivered considerable profits to the NHB by way of ready forward deals (RFDs). If this has been the flow chart of payment routes to SBI, the authors of The Scam point out to how the SBI once again debited Harshad Mehta’s account, which had by then exhausted its balance. This was done by releasing a massive overdraft of Rs. 707 crore, which is essentially an extension of a credit by a lending institution when the account gets exhausted. Then the incredulous happened! This overdraft was released against no security!, and the deal was acquiesced to since there was a widespread belief within the director-fold of the SBI that most of what was paid to the NHB would have come back to SBI subsidies from where SBI had got its money in the first place. 

The Scam is neatly divided into two books comprising 23 chapters, with the first part delineating the rise of Harshad Mehta as a broker superstar, The Big Bull. He is not the only character to be pilloried as the nexus meshed all the way from Mumbai (then Bombay) to Kolkata (then Calcutta) to Bengaluru (then Bangalore) to Delhi and Chennai (then Madras) with a host of jobbers, market makers, brokers and traders who were embezzling funds off the banks, colluded by the banks on overheating the stock market in a country that was only officially trying to jettison the tag of Nehruvian socialism. But, it wasn’t merely individuated, but the range of complicitous relations also grabbed governmental and private institutions and firms. Be it the Standard Chartered, or the Citibank, or monetizing the not-even in possession of assets bought; forward selling the transaction to make it appear cash-neutral; or lending money to the corporate sector as clean credit implying banks taking risks on the borrowers unapproved by the banks because it did not fall under the mainline corporate lending, rules and regulations of the RBI were flouted and breached with increasing alacrity and in clear violations of guidelines. But credit is definitely due to S Venkitaraman, the Governor of the RBI, who in his two-year at the helm of affairs exposed the scam, but was meted out a disturbing treatment at the hands of some of members of the Joint Parliamentary Committee. Harshad Mehta had grown increasingly confident of his means and mechanisms to siphon-off money using inter-bank transactions, and when he was finally apprehended, he was charged with 72 criminal offenses and more than 600 civil action suits were filed against him leading to his arrest by the CBI in the November of 1992. Banished from the stock market, he did make a comeback as a market guru before the Bombay High Court convicted him to prison. But, the seamster that he was projected to be, he wouldn’t rest without creating chaos and commotion, and one such bomb was dropped by him claiming to have paid the Congress Prime minister PV Narsimha Rao a hefty sum to knock him off the scandal. Harshad Mehta passed away from a cardiac arrest while in prison in Thane, but his legacy continued within the folds he had inspired and spread far and wide. 

Ketan Parekh forms a substantial character of Book 2 of The Scam. Often referred to as Midas in privy for his ability to turn whatever he touched into gold on Dalal Street by his financial trickery, he decided to take the unfinished project of Harshad Mehta to fruition. Known for his timid demeanor, Parekh from a brokers family and with his training as a Chartered Accountant, he was able to devise a trading ring that helped him rig stock prices keeping his vested interests at the forefront. He was a bull on the wild run, whose match was found in a bear cartel that hammered prices of K-10 stocks precipitating payment crisis. K-10 stocks were colloquially named for these driven in sets of 10, and the promotion of these was done through creating bellwethers and seeking support fro Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs). India was already seven years old into the LPG regime, but still sailing the rough seas of economic transitioning into smooth sailing. This wasn’t the most conducive of timing to appropriate profits, but a prodigy that he was, his ingenuity lay in instrumentalizing the jacking up of shares prices to translate it into the much needed liquidity. this way, he was able to keep FIIs and promoters satisfied and multiply money on his own end. This, in financial jargon goes by the name circular trading, but his brilliance was epitomized by his timing of dumping devalued shares with institutions like the Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) and Unit Trust of India (UTI). But, what differentiated him from Harshad Mehta was his staying off public money or expropriating public institutions. such was his prowess that share markets would tend to catch cold when he sneezed and his modus operandi was invest into small companies through private placements, manipulate the markets to rig shares and sell them to devalue the same. But lady luck wouldn’t continue to shine on him as with the turn of the century, Parekh, who had invested heavily into information stocks was hit large by the collapse of the dotcom bubble. Add to that when NDA government headed by Atal Bihari Vajpayee presented the Union Budget in 2001, the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) Sensex crashed prompting the Government to dig deep into such a market reaction. SEBI’s (Securities and Exchange Board of India) investigation revealed the rogue nature of Ketan Parekh as a trader, who was charged with shaking the very foundations of Indian financial markets. Ketan Parekh has been banned from trading until 2017, but SEBI isn’t too comfortable with the fact that his proteges are carrying forward the master’s legacy. Though such allegations are yet to be put to rest. 

The legacy of Harshad Mehta and Ketan Parekh continue to haunt financial markets in the country to date, and were only signatures of what was to follow in the form of plaguing banking crisis, public sector banks are faced with. As Basu and Dalal write, “in money markets the first signs of rot began to appear in the mid-1980s. After more than a decade of so-called social banking, banks found themselves groaning under a load of investments they were forced to make to maintain the Statutory Liquidity Ratio. The investments were in low-interest bearing loans issued by the central and state governments that financed the government’s ever-increasing appetite for cash. Banks intended to hold these low-interest government bonds till maturity. But each time a new set of loans came with a slightly higher interest rate called the coupon rate, the market price of older securities fell, and thereafter banks began to book losses, which eroded their profitability,” the situation is a lot more grim today. RBI’s autonomy has come under increased threat, and the question that requires the most incision is to find a resolution to what one Citibank executive said, “RBI guidelines are just that, guidelines. Not the law of the land.” 

The Scam, as much as a personal element of deceit faced during the tumultuous times, is a brisk read, with some minor hurdles in the form of technicalities that intersperse the volume and tend to disrupt the plot lines. Such technical details are in the realm of share markets and unless negotiated well with either a prior knowledge, or hyperlinking tends to derail the speed, but in no should be considered as a book not worth looking at. As a matter of fact, the third edition with its fifth reprint is testimony to the fact that the book’s market is alive and ever-growing. One only wonders at the end of it as to where have all such journalists disappeared from this country. That Debashis Basu and Sucheta Dalal, partners in real life are indeed partners in crime if they aim at exposing financial crimes of such magnitudes for the multitude in this country who would otherwise be bereft of such understandings had it not been for them. 

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Infrastructure and Asian Infrastructure and Investment Bank. Some Scattered Thoughts.

What is Infrastructure?

Infrastructure, though definitionally an elusive term, encompasses an economic standpoint consisting of large capital intensive natural monopolies. The term attains it heterogeneity by including physical structures of various types used by many industries as inputs to the production of goods and services. By this, it has come to mean either social, or economic infrastructure, wherein, in the former, are schools, hospitals etc, while in the latter are energy, water, transport, and digital communications, often considered essential ingredients in the success of the modern economy. Conceptually, infrastructure may affect aggregate output in two main ways: (i) directly, considering the sector contribution to GDP formation and as an additional input in the production process of other sectors; and (ii) indirectly, raising total factor productivity by reducing transaction and other costs thus allowing a more efficient use of conventional productive inputs. Infrastructure can be considered as a complementary factor for economic growth. How big is the contribution of infrastructure to aggregate economic performance? The answer is critical for many policy decisions – for example, to gauge the growth effects of fiscal interventions in the form of public investment changes, or to assess if public infrastructure investments can be self-financing.

Let us ponder on this a bit and begin with the question. Why is infrastructure even important? Extensive and efficient infrastructure is critical for ensuring the effective functioning of the economy, as it is an important factor determining the location of economic activity and the kinds of activities or sectors that can develop in a particular economy. Well-developed infrastructure reduces the effect of distance between regions, integrating the national market and connecting it at low cost to markets in other countries and regions. In addition, the quality and extensiveness of infrastructure networks significantly impact economic growth and affect income inequalities and poverty in a variety of ways. A well-developed transport and communications infrastructure network is a prerequisite for the access of less-developed communities to core economic activities and services. Effective modes of transport, including quality roads, railroads, ports, and air transport, enable entrepreneurs to get their goods and services to market in a secure and timely manner and facilitate the movement of workers to the most suitable jobs. Economies also depend on electricity supplies that are free of interruptions and shortages so that businesses and factories can work unimpeded. Finally, a solid and extensive communications network allows for a rapid and free flow of information, which increases overall economic efficiency by helping to ensure that businesses can communicate and decisions are made by economic actors taking into account all available relevant information. There is an existing correlation between infrastructure and economic activity through which the economic effects originate in the construction phase and rise during the usage phase. The construction phase is associated with the short-term effects and are a consequence of the decisions in the public sector that could affect macroeconomic variables: GDP, employment, public deficit, inflation, among others. The public investment expands the aggregate demand, yielding a boost to the employment, production and income. The macroeconomic effects at a medium and long term, associated with the utilization phase are related to the increase of productivity in the private sector and its effects over the territory. Both influence significantly in the competitiveness degree of the economy. In conclusion, investing in infrastructure constitutes one of the main mechanisms to increase income, employment, productivity and consequently, the competitiveness of an economy. Is this so? Well, thats what the economics textbook teaches us, and thus governments all over the world turn to infrastructure development as a lubricant to maintain current economic output at best and it can also be the basis for better industry which contributes to better economic output. Governments, thus necessitate realignment of countries’ infrastructure in tune with the changing nature of global political economy. Infrastructure security and stability concerns the quantity of spare capacity (or security of supply). Instead of acting on the efficiency frontier, infrastructure projects must operate with spare capacity to contribute to economic growth through ensuring reliable service provisions. Spare capacity is a necessary condition for a properly functioning system. To assure the level of spare capacity in the absence of storage and demand, the system needs to have excess supply. However, no rational profit-seeker will deliberately create conditions of excess supply, since it would produce a marginal cost lower than the average cost, and to circumnavigate this market failure, governments are invested with the responsibility of creating incentives ensuring securities of supply. This is seeding the substitutability of economics with financialization. 

So far, so good, but then, so what? This is where social analysts need to be incisive in unearthing facts from fiction and this faction is what constitutes the critique of development, a critique that is engineered against a foci on GDP-led growth model. This is to be done by asking uncomfortable questions to policy-makers, such as: What is the most efficient way to finance infrastructure spending? What are optimal infrastructure pricing, maintenance and investment policies? What have proven to be the respective strengths and weaknesses of the public and private sectors in infrastructure provision and management, and what shapes those strengths and weaknesses? What are the distributional consequences of infrastructure policies? How do political forces impact the efficiency of public sector provision? What framework deals best with monopoly providers of infrastructure? For developing countries, which have hitherto been plagued by weaker legal systems making regulation and enforcement more complicated, the fiscally weak position leads to higher borrowing costs. A most natural outcome is a systemic increase in financial speculation driven by deregulation transforming into financial assets. Contrary to common sense and what civil society assumes, financial markets are going deeper and deeper into the real economy as a response to the financial crisis, so that speculative capital is structurally being intertwined with productive capital changing the whole dynamics of infrastructure investment. The question then is, how far viable or sustainable are these financial interventions? Financialization produces effects which can create long-term trends (such as those on functional income distribution) but can also change across different periods of economic growth, slowdown and recession. Interpreting the implications of financialization for sustainability, therefore, requires a methodological diverse and empirical dual-track approach which combines different methods of investigations. Even times of prosperity, despite their fragile and vulnerable nature, can endure for several years before collapsing due to high levels of indebtedness, which in turn amplify the real effects of a financial crisis and hinder the economic growth. 

Role of Development Banks and AIIB

Where do development banks fit into the schema as regards infrastructure investment? This question is a useful gamble in order to tackle AIIB, the new kid on the bloc. As the world struggles to find funds to meet the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), development banks could be instrumental in narrowing the gap. So, goes the logic promulgated by these banks. They can help to crowd-in the private sector and anchor private-public sector partnerships, particularly for infrastructure financing. However, misusing development banks can lead to fiscal risks and credit market distortions. To avoid these potential pitfalls, development banks need a well-defined mandate, operate without political influence, focus on addressing significant market failures, concentrate on areas where the private sector is not present, monitor and evaluate interventions and adjust as necessary to ensure impact, and, finally, be transparent and accountable. All of these are the ideals, which more often than not go the other way. China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), despite having no track record still enjoys the highest ratings on par with the World Bank. This has fueled debates ranging from adding much-needed capital augmenting infrastructure to leniency in observing high standards of governance, and possibly ignoring environmental and societal impacts.

The AIIB was officially launched in Beijing on January 16th, 2016, with 57 founding members, including 37 in Asia and 20 non-regional countries. Being the largest shareholder of the AIIB, China has an initial subscription of $29.78 billion in authorized capital stock in the AIIB out of a total of $100 billion, and made a grant contribution of another $50 million to the AIIB Project Preparation Special Fund on January 16th, 2017. India is the second-largest shareholder, contributing $8.4 billion. Russia is the third-largest shareholder, contributing $6.5 billion, and Germany is the largest non-regional shareholder (also the fourth largest shareholder), contributing $4.5 billion. While being open to the participation of non-regional members, the AIIB is committed to and prioritizes the ownership of Asian members. This is reflected in the capital structure requirement and the requirements for the composition of Board of Governors in the AIIB’s Article of Agreement (AOA), which requires no less than 75 percent of the total subscribed capital stock to be held by regional members unless otherwise agreed by the Board of Governors by a Super Majority vote. The AOA also requires that 9 out of the AIIB’s 12 members be elected by the Governors representing regional members, and 3 representing non-regional members. The prioritization of Asian-members’ ownership of the AIIB does not necessarily mean that the AIIB’s investment is restricted only to Asia. According to its AOA, the AIIB aims to “improve infrastructure connectivity in Asia,” and it will invest in Asia and beyond as long as the investment is “concerned with economic development of the region.” The bank currently has 64 member states while another 20 are prospective members for a total of 84 approved members. 

The AIIB’s EU/OECD members potentially could have some positive influence over the institutional building and standard setting of the young institution. The European Commission has recognized that an EU presence in China-driven institutions would contribute to the adoption of best practices and fair, global standards. Adherence to such standards will be promoted by the AIIB entering into partnership with existing Multilateral Development Banks. It has also been argued that joining the AIIB would give the European countries access to the decision-making process within the AIIB, and may even allow the European countries to play a role in shaping the AIIB’s organizational structure. As an example of EU/OECD members’ activism in monitoring the AIIB’s funds allocation, both Denmark and the UK, who are AIIB’s OECD members, proposed that contributions to the AIIB would qualify as official development aid (ODA). After a thorough review of AIIB’s AOA, mandate, work plan and other available materials, the OECD’s Secretariat of the Development Assistance Committee (DAC) recommended including AIIB on the List under the category of “Regional development banks,” which means the OECD would recognize the AIIB as one of the ODA-eligible international organizations. Once approved, the Secretariat of DAC will be able to “monitor the future recipient breakdown of the AIIB’s borrowers through AIIB’s future Creditor Reporting System and thereby confirm that the actual share of funds going to countries on the DAC List of ODA Recipients is over 90%.” That is to say, if approved, there would be additional external monitor to make sure that the funds channeled through the AIIB to recipient countries are used properly. 

The AIIB’s initial total capital is $100 billion, equivalent to about 61 percent of the ADB’s initial total capital, 43 percent of the World Bank’s, 30 percent of the European Investment Bank’s (EIB), and more than twice of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development’s (EBRD). Of this $100 billion initial capital, 20 percent is to be largely paid-in by 2019 and fully paid-in by 2024, and the remaining 80 percent is in callable capital. It needs to be noted that according to the AOA, payments for paid-in capital are due in five installments, with the exception of members designated as less developed countries, who may pay in ten installments. As of any moment, the snapshot of AIIB’s financial sheet includes total assets, members’ equities and liabilities, the last of which has negligible debt at the current stage since the AIIB has not issued any debenture or borrowed money from outside. However, to reduce the funding costs and to gain access to wider source of capital, the AIIB cannot rely solely on equity and has to issue debenture and take some leverage, particularly given that the AIIB intends to be a for-profit institution. In February 2017, the AIIB signed an International Swaps and Derivatives Association (ISDA) Master Agreement with the International Finance Corporation (IFC), which would facilitate local currency bond issuance in client countries. Moreover, AIIB intends to actively originate and lead transactions that mobilize private capital and make it a trusted partner for all parties involved in the transactions that the Bank leads. In the long term, the AIIB aims to be the repository of know-how and best practices in infrastructure finance. 

It is widely perceived that the AIIB is a tool of Chinese foreign policy, and that it is a vehicle for the implementation of the Belt and Road (One Belt, One Road) Initiative. During a meeting with global executives in June 2016, the AIIB President Jin Liqun clarified China’s position, saying the AIIB “was not created exclusively for this initiative,” and that the AIIB would “finance infrastructure projects in all emerging market economies even though they don’t belong to the Belt and Road Initiative.” It is worth pointing out that despite the efforts on trying to put some distance between the AIIB and the Belt and Road Initiative, there is still a broad perception that these two are closely related. Moreover, China has differentiated AIIB projects from its other foreign assistance projects by co-financing its initial projects with the preexisting MDBs. Co-financing, combined with European membership, will make it more likely this institution largely conforms to the international standards” and potentially will steer the AIIB away from becoming solely a tool of Chinese foreign policy. This supports China’s stated intention to complement existing MDBs rather than compete with them. It also means that the AIIB can depend on its partners, if they would allow so, for expertise on a wide range of policy and procedural issues as it develops its lending portfolio.

Although AIIB has attracted a great number of developing and developed countries to join as members and it has co-financed several projects with other MDBs, there is no guarantee for any easy success in the future. There are several formidable challenges for the young multilateral institution down the road. Not all the infrastructure investment needs in Asia is immediately bankable and ready for investors’ money. Capital, regardless it’s sovereign or private, will not flow in to any project without any proper preparation. Although Asia faces a huge infrastructure financing gap, there is a shortage of ‘shovel-ready’ bankable projects owing to the capacity limitations. The young AIIB lacks the talent and expertise to create investor-ready bankable projects, despite that it has created a Project Preparation Special Fund thanks to $50 million by China. The AIIB aims to raise money in global capital markets to invest in the improvement of trans-regional connectivity. However, infrastructure projects are not naturally attractive investment due to huge uncertainties throughout the entire life cycle as well as unjustified risk-profit balance. Getting a top-notch credit rating is just a start. The AIIB has to find innovative ways to improve the risk-adjusted profitability of its projects. This issue itself has been a big challenge for many MDBs who engage in infrastructure financing for a long time. It is uncertain if the AIIB could outperform the other much more matured MDBs to find a solution to tackle the profitability problem in infrastructure financing. The highest rating it has received from ratings agencies could pose a challenge in itself. The high rating not only endorses the bank’s high capital adequacy and robust liquidity position, but also validates the strong political will of AIIB’s members and the bank’s governance frameworks. A good rating will help the AIIB issue bonds at favorable rate and utilize capital markets to reduce its funding costs. This certainly will contribute to AIIB’s efforts to define itself as a for-profit infrastructure investment bank. However, there is no guarantee that the rating will hold forever. Many factors may impact the rating in the future, including but not limited to AIIB’s self-capital ratio, liquidity, management, yieldability, risk management ability, and its autonomy and independency from China’s influence. 

17th Century England – Onwards to Restoration.

In the 17^th century England, the middle class had carried forward their rebellion against absolute monarchy based on divine rights. The Parliament was the representation of this class and its fight. The men who now fought the Stuart Kings were precisely those who had profited from Tudor absolutism, which now began to irritate them. The lower middle class then split from their upper counterpart and rallied Cromwell. So far as the untitled and unmoneyed class was concerned, they stood largely by the throne, although they had as little to gain by the King as by the Parliament. The middle class was so afraid of the poor people as of the King. When the parliamentarians talked of a government based on consent, they had no intention of extending the franchise to the people; it was to be their own consent. Right to property, which they held to be sacred, meant to them the principle that the King had no right to tax them without their consent; it also meant a denial of property to the people who were poor.

Coke, who was appointed the Attorney General (and also the Chief Justice) in 1594, was attacking the divine rights of Kings and he regarded both King and the Parliament, as subject to common law which, to him, was the truly sovereign power in the land. Common law had to be interpreted by the judges. Throughout Europe, absolute state was becoming the order of the day. Louis XI had first subjugated the feudal nobility. The Reformation then enabled the monarchs to better the Church. Henry VIII had claimed jurisdiction and powers, which earlier no British King had done. To the discomfiture of Hobbes, the cursed Puritans had undone the work so artistically done by Henry VIII and the price had to be redesigned so that the fabric may be saved from total destruction in the hands of the rabble. Someone, like Thomas Hobbes agrees with Machiavelli that man is selfish and that human nature is bad but insists that the state could transfer the man into a moral being by the exercise of the master’s rod.  He is indebted to Bodin for his concept of sovereignty, but, unlike Bodin, would impose no limitations of Divine, Natural or Constitutional law on his subjects. He agrees with Grotius that, reason is the basis of law but insists that it must be sovereign’s reason alone. He modifies the Divine Right theory by discarding the divine origin of state and by giving Divine Right to the State instead to the King. Hobbes like Machiavelli, subordinated ethics and religion to politics and was the first prophet of unlimited sovereignty.

Elizabeth (1558 – 1603)

Elizabeth was the daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn. She ascended to the throne at the age of 25 in 1558 on the death of Queen Mary. She was not only regal but also human. Like her father, she had courage, determination and self-confidence. She was willful and domineering in all matters. Like her mother she was fond of pomp and pleasure. Her great virtue was that she loved the people of England and for their sake she was prepared to make any sacrifices. Her conservative mind made extreme Protestantism suspect to her, separated the foreign policy from any enthusiasm and fitted her to be the real maker of Anglicanism.

When she ascended to the throne, she had to face many difficulties. There was the danger of the civil war in the country. The orthodox Catholics regarded Elizabeth as an usurper and they were prepared to take up arms against her in order to support the cause of Mary Stuart. The Protestants were also bitter. They were determined to carry the Reformation further. There was also a danger of foreign invasion and conquest. A lot of money had been wasted in the French war during the reign of Mary Tudor. The coinage had also been debased. The credit goes to Elizabeth that she not only surmounted all these difficulties but were also able to make her country great and strong.

Religion at her time of ascension

The first great achievement of Elizabeth was her religious settlement. The policy followed by her was that she stopped the burning of the people. The “Act of Supremacy” eliminated the authority of the Pope in England and made Elizabeth the head of the Church of England. She took up the title of “Supreme Governor” and not “Supreme Head” as had been done by her father. The monasteries were dissolved and their lands were passed to the crown. A Book of Common Prayer in English was issued. Extremists among the Catholics and the Protestants were not prepared to reconcile themselves with her religious settlement. However, Elizabeth did not take any strong action against them so long as the people attended the Church. The Church settlement got a setback after 1570, when the Pope issued an excommunication and deposed Elizabeth and declared her to be longer a Queen of England. Her subjects were absolved from their allegiance to her. In 1571, the British Parliament passed an Act, which declared to be high treason for anyone in England to call the Queen a heretic, and usurper or an infidel. The puritans also attacked the Church settlement. They were utterly dissatisfied by the moderate character of it. Most of the ceremonies prescribed by the Church were considered by them to be a relic of Popery and they would like to abolish the same. However, the fact remains that, Elizabeth succeeded in attaining a large unity in the Church and that is the reason why she was successful against Spain, when the Armada attacked England in 1558.

Her foreign policy

The foreign policy of Elizabeth was essentially that of peace. Since England had been weakened in the reigns of Edward VI and Mary Tudor, it was not in her interest to fight against any foreign power in that condition. Her great danger was an invasion from France or Spain, both Catholic countries. However, Elizabeth took advantage of the bitter rivalry going on between France and Spain and was successful in playing off the one against the other. Her foreign policy approach was not dogmatic, but was guided by enlightened national interest. The reign of Elizabeth saw the beginning of English maritime activity. It brought naval supremacy to England.

Her rule in general

Elizabeth can rightly be called as one of the greatest rulers of England. No other ruler was called upon to face so many difficulties and none else faced them so boldly and successfully. She addressed in these words a deputation of both the houses of Parliament: “Though I be a woman, I’ve as good a courage answerable to my place as ever my father had. I’m your anointed Queen. I’ll never be by violence constrained to do anything. I thank God that I’d been endued with such qualities that if I were turned out of the realm in my petticoat, I were able to live in any place in Christendom.” She was the child of the Renaissance rather than that of the Reformation. Skeptical and tolerant in the age of intolerance, she was born and brought up to re-establish the Anglican Church and to evade religious war by a compromise between the Catholics and Protestants.

Tudor rule 

Tudor rule was arbitrary and autocratic in nature. It was despotism, under more or less parliamentary forms. Though despots, their rule was not a tyranny. It was popular despotism based upon the assent of the people and it was assented to because in the main it identified itself with national interests. Their rule in nature was of the dictatorship. The rising middle class called for a strong ruler and was ready to overlook his violence and unconstitutional acts if he would maintain peace and order. The policy of the Tudors was to rule with the support of the subservient Parliament. As a result, Parliament was degraded into an instrument of royal will. The Tudors had broken the power of the great nobles. Monarchs could influence elections and so secure the return of members who favoured his views. Thus, as against the sovereign, Parliament had little influence. The Tudors, however, never sought to override the authority of the Parliament. On the contrary, they encouraged the parliamentary action of the commons. Grave and momentous questions were brought before it such as the anti-papal measures, which cut off Pope’s authority in England. As a consequence, the importance of Parliament increased. The commons grew more self-reliant and were gradually fitted to shake off their tutelage to the crown. There was little friction between the Crown and the Parliament. Parliament submitted to royal guidance and the sovereign in its turn never sought to override its legislative authority.

One of the most important characteristics of the Tudor rule was the growth of the strong monarchy built upon the ruins of the feudal system. That was partly due to the decline of the power of the nobility and the invention of the gunpowder. Another important point was the broadening of the people’s minds on account of the Renaissance movement. The new spirit paved the way for the Reformation movement.

James I (1603 – 1625) 

James I ruled from 1603 to 1625. He was born in 1556 and he came to the throne after the expulsion of his mother from Scotland. When his mother was a prisoner in England, he was the King of Scotland. He did nothing to support the cause of his mother. The result was that Elizabeth accepted him as her successor to the throne of England. He had been brought up under rigid Calvinist discipline. He failed as the King of England, even though he was a man of great learning. He was so fond of “unbuttoning his royal stores of wisdom for the benefits of his subjects” that Henry IV of France called him the “wisest fool in Christendom”. He was intolerant to any criticism. He believed that Kings should have supreme authority over all. He believed that people had no right to revolt. “The state of monarchy is the supremest thing on Earth; for Kings are not only God’s lieutenants upon Earth and sit upon God’s throne, but even by God Himself, they are called Gods…it is sedition in subjects to dispute what a King may do in the height of his power. I will not be content that my power be disputed on.” 

Here is an extract from the Vicar of Bray, an old ballad:

                  To teach his flock he never missed,

                  Kings are by God appointed,

                  And damned are they, who do resist,

                  Or touch the Lord’s Anointed.

He had fixed views about politics and the status of Kings. He believed in the Divine Rights of Kings. This view was that Kings were Kings because God made them Kings and they were responsible to God alone for whatever they did and the people had no right to either find fault with them or to challenge their authority. It was this concept of monarchy that was responsible for all his troubles. James I stood for universal peace. He raised the slogan of “Beati Pacifici” (Blessed are the peace makers). His ideas of religious toleration were a cry in the wilderness. In spite of his good intentions, he was a complete failure as a king.

His relations with the Parliament

The relations between James I and the Parliament were not cordial. He believed in the Divine Rights of Kings, but the Parliament claimed certain rights on the basis of tradition, customs and evolutionary growth. Parliament based its rights and privileges on the score of History. Parliament, during the reign of James I, asserted with success its right to impeach the ministers of the King. It protested against the new impositions. It passed its law against monopolies. It asserted its rights to discuss all the affairs of the State although the King strongly protested against the claim. It failed to secure the right of meeting regularly. From these relations, it was clear that the struggle between the two had begun.

Common law

No account of the reign of James I can be complete without a reference to the common law lawyers headed by the Chief Justice Coke. In 1594, Coke was appointed Attorney General. He was a great champion of the common law. His view was that the propriety of all actions must be judged by the common law. There was no place for the Divine Rights of the Kings. The judges alone could resolve the conflicts between the prerogatives and the statutes. The view of Coke was different from that of Bacon who held that judges were lions, but lions under the throne. It was during the reign of James I that many English colonies were established beyond the seas. In 1612, the English East India Company set up its factory at Surat (Gujarat, India). Thus, the beginnings of the future British Empire in India and America were laid during the reign of James I.

Charles I (1625 – 1649)

James I died on the 27^th March 1625 and was succeeded by his second son, Charles I. Charles I loved those who were close near him, but was cold towards others. He was devoted to the Church of England and was punctual in his devotion to it. To Charles I, the Divine Right was the question of his faith, as deeply rooted as his belief in the Church. He was a bad judge of public questions and political men. He viewed them through the lens of his affections. He saw only rebellion in the critics of the Church of England. The reign of Charles I can be divided into four periods. The first four years of his reign from 1625 to 1629 covered the first period. During this period foreign wars were fought but lost and the relations between the King and the Parliament were bitter. The second period was covered by the years from 1629 to 1640. During this period, he ruled without a Parliament. The third period was covered by the years 1640 to 1642. It was also a period of short and long Parliament. The fourth period is covered by the two Civil wars (1642 – 1649). Charles I was executed in January 1649.

Relations with the Parliament 

The fundamental dispute between the King and the Parliament was that the Parliament was determined to become the sovereign of the country and was not prepared to allow the King to do whatever he wanted to do. The execution of Charles I shocked the people. The people were not in favour of Parliament going to such an extreme. The dignified behaviour of the King at the time of his execution also excited universal admiration. There was a strong reaction in favour of the monarch. Many called him the martyr who died for the Church of England. There were others who gave him the credit for having died for the laws and liberties of the English men. A few days after his death, a book entitled “Sikon Basilike” was published. It purported to give the views of the King on Government. It was felt that the dictatorship of the army was no guarantee to safeguard the popular institutions of England and the liberties of the people. The army could fight but could not reconstruct society. This execution was followed by military despotism, which was as bad as the tyranny of the King himself. The question has been asked whether the execution of Charles I was justified or not. From the legal point of view, there was no justification for trying the King as no process could be issued against the monarch. Moreover, the members of the court were partisans and did not come up to the ideal of impartiality as required by the judges. The only justification for the execution of Charles I was moral and political. Cromwell was right in saying that it was a cruel necessity. It was cruel because it was an extreme measure involving the execution of the King. It was a necessity because without it there would have been no liberty for Englishmen. Charles I was not at all prepared to accept any limitations on his powers. He was given many opportunities both by the Parliament and the army to come to reasonable compromise but he was declared dishonest by these very bodies and hence it was difficult to come to any sort of an agreement with him. The Parliament and the army always thought of him as extremely cynical and his dealings with these two constitutional bodies were inherently insincere in nature and thus no wonder such an insincere man was put to death.

Commonwealth 

The Commonwealth was established in England on January 4, 1649 by a proclamation by the Rump Parliament that “the people are, under God, the origin of all just power…that the commons of England in Parliament assembled, being chosen by and representing the people have the supreme power in this nation”. On February 5, the Rump decided that the House of Lords, being dangerous and useless, should be abolished. On February 6, it was resolved that “it hath been found by experience and this House doth declare that the office of the King in this nation and to have power thereof in any single person, is unnecessary and burdensome and dangerous to the liberty, safety and public interest of the people of this nation and thereof ought to be abolished”. On March 17 and 19, 1649, two Acts were passed by which the offices of the King and the House of Lords were abolished. Thus the House of Commons became the sole governing body of England. The chief organ of administration of the Commonwealth was the Council of the State. It was annually chosen by the Parliament. The council was concerned with the army, the navy, foreign affairs etc. In July 1649, was passed the “Treason Act”, which made it treasonable for anyone who published maliciously that “the Government is usurped or unlawful or that the Commons assembled in Parliament are not the supreme authority of this nation”. In September 1649, was passed the “Press Act” which muzzled the freedom of the press. The publication of any printed material without a license from the Government was forbidden. A special court of justice consisting of 12 judges was established to liquidate the enemies of the Commonwealth.

The members of the Parliament were Presbyterians and they insisted on imposing “certain fundamentals before a man should be free to propagate his opinions”. Cromwell was in favour of religious toleration for all except the Roman Catholics. Certain changes were introduced in the Church whereby it became less Presbyterian. It lost its autonomy and became subordinate to the State. Rump Parliament was “the first English Government to appreciate the importance of sea power”. It also was responsible for England a great sea power. The Rump Parliament also attended to foreign trade and the overseas empire of England. In 1651, was passed the “Navigation Act”. This Act was intended to strike a blow at the commercial power of Holland and no wonder it aroused the indignation of that country. The Rump had become unpopular with the army because it was a small body, which did not represent the whole nation. Moreover, many of its members were guilty of favouritism and corruption. Cromwell and his army urged the dissolution of the Parliament but the Rump refused to be dissolved. Cromwell could not tolerate the pride ambition and self-seeking of the members of the Parliament. On April 20, 1653, Cromwell himself went to the House of the Commons and turned out the members of the House and had the doors locked. The same afternoon, the Council of State also fell before military violence. After the dissolution of the Rump, Cromwell set up a new council of State which recommended that a Parliament of saints composed of 140 Godly men, 129 from England, 5 from Scotland and 6 from Ireland be summoned. This Parliament met in 1653. it is also known as Barebone’s Parliament. This Parliament was a unique one and it passed many laws like the solemnization of marriage a civil institution, public registration of births, marriages and death. Another law provided for the better custody of insanes. But this Parliament too failed. Cromwell was essentially a reluctant and an apologetic dictator. Lambert drew up a constitutional document called the “Instrument of Government”. It was the first and the last written English constitution. By this instrument, Cromwell was made Lord Protector for life with Council of State to help him. England, Scotland and Ireland were to be united in a single commonwealth with a Parliament representing the three countries. Parliament consisting of one House was to possess the legislative power and was to be elected every three years by a reformed electorate. This instrument gave Cromwell a limited monarchy for life. While the peculiarity of the English constitution was that it was flexible and unwritten, but the instrument tried to make it rigid and written.

Cromwell

Cromwell was one of the greatest figures in the History of England. He was born in 1599 at Huntington. He was a son of a country gentleman and was educated in a college in Cambridge. He emerged as a leader of his country when she was plunged in a Civil war on account of the conflict between the King and the Parliament. He not only won victories for the Parliament but also restored law and order in the country. Cromwell was the first pronounced imperialist in the history of England. His objective was to extend the power of England overseas and he did not hesitate to use all possible means to achieve that end. In his foreign policy, he showed zeal for Protestantism, but while doing so, he did not ignore the trade and commerce of his country. He was himself a Republican, but circumstances forced him to act as a military despot. He tried to govern by a system involving the division of power between himself and the Parliament. When he failed in that objective, he ruled despotically. He levied taxes without the sanction of the Parliament. He imprisoned people without trial. As a matter of fact, he set up a military tyranny. He wished for the Parliament to be supreme and did not wish to take up the title of the King. His faith in God was both a source of his strength and his weakness. In all that he did, whether good or evil, in the three kingdoms, his conviction was that God would support him in everything that he undertook. What he judged to be necessary for the present, that he thought to be predestined for the future. His victories seemed to him, not the result of the means, which he employed, but proofs that his policies were also the will of the Divine. Although he is regarded by some as the greatest patriot and by others as the greatest traitor, he was without doubt one of the greatest men of his country. He possessed military capacity of a very high order. He organized and maintained an army, which was so efficient that he did not meet with any defeat. Oliver Cromwell died on September 3,1658. When his strong hand was removed, the country was plunged into confusion. The Levellers stood for a Republic in which the common people were to rule without Lords, Priests or Lawyers. They had a very treatment from Oliver Cromwell but now they felt that they could do whatever they pleased. Another set known as the Fifth Monarchy Men was led by Harrison. They foretold the immediate end of the world. According to their reading of Daniel, the four monarchies of antiquity, Babylonia, Persia, Greece, and Rome were to be succeeded by the fifth monarchy, now at hand, the reign of Christ and his Saints.

Oliver Cromwell had named his son Richard Cromwell to succeed as the Lord Protector. He lacked political capacity and had no advisers. The gulf between Richard and the army was widening. In order to strengthen his position, Richard decided to summon the Parliament and the members of the Parliament were hostile to the army. The army did not like the law, which forbade the army officers from having political meetings. Parliament was dissolved by force in April 1659 and the Rump was recalled. Richard resigned his charge. About the period between 1649 and 1660, monarchy had gone and the House of Lords was established as “useless and dangerous”. This “freedom” was to rise to a climax of Puritan democracy, to decline by reaction into military dictatorship and at last to expire through faction. But it left a legacy. Puritanism released an energy, which called for liberty in religion and every department of life with efficiency greater than anything England had seen. It took long strides towards union with Scotland and Ireland. Its administrative machinery pointed towards the cabinet and its economic doctrine led to the capitalist Britain of the next two centuries.

Restoration

The Restoration of Charles II to the throne of England in 1660 was not merely the restoration of the King but also of Parliament, the Anglican Church, the historic law courts and the old system of local governments in the country. It is wrong to say that the monarchy that was restored was the unlimited and absolute monarchy of Charles I and James I. The “Triennial Act” of 1641 had not been repealed and it meant that the King could not carry on Government without calling a Parliament at least once in three years. Thus, the “Triennial Act” put a check on the power of the King. The result was that Charles II had to be less arbitrary and act according to the law. The very fact that Parliament had made Charles II, the King of England implied that in the last resort Parliament could also unmake him. The Divine Right of Kings to rule was practically dead. A point of conflict between the first two Stuart Kings and the Parliament was the question of taxation. Charles I had levied taxes without the consent of the Parliament. Now it was clearly understood that new taxes could be levied only with the consent of the Parliament. It is clear that although monarchy was restored, it was restored with a difference. Restoration gave to Parliament its old form and organization, which had so radically been changed during the Commonwealth period. The two Houses of the Parliament were restored and the House of Commons became more powerful than the House of Lords. Charles II never questioned the privileges of the Parliament. As a matter of fact, most of his important laws were passed through the Parliament.

Restoration of the Church

Restoration was also the restoration of the Church of England. The Parliament, which was elected in 1661 after the dissolution of the convention Parliament, was predominantly Anglican in nature. The Presbyterian element had disappeared altogether. The so-called Cavalier Parliament ended the work of the Presbyterian majority and restored the Anglican Church to its former position. The “Act of Uniformity” of 1662 provided that all clergymen and teachers were to declare their acceptance of the Anglican Prayer Book. The “Conventicle Act” of 1664 forbade under severe penalties, attendance of any public worship, which was not of Anglican form, of more than four persons, unless they belonged to the same family. The “Test Act” of 1673 provided that all civil and military officers were to take the oath of allegiance and accept the supremacy of the Church of England. In 1679, was passed the “Parliamentary Test Act” which provided that no person was to be a Member of Parliament unless he belonged to the Church of England. 1679 was also the year of Hobbes’ death. It is clear that the Anglican Church was established as a State Church, but with the difference that the headship of the Church no longer belonged to the King as a prerogative right. The leadership of the Church lay with the King-in-Parliament. As has been rightly put by Sir D. L. Keir that the restoration of monarchy in 1660 was especially a return to Government by Law. In this period, the legislative union with Scotland and Ireland was dissolved.

The reign of Charles II

During the reign of Charles II, some constitutional progress was made. The system of appropriation of supplies was established. While granting money to the King, the Parliament laid down the specific purpose for which the money was granted. The responsibility of the Ministers of Parliament was also secured to some extent. During the reign of Charles II, parliamentary parties with definite political programmes were formed and that also added to the strength of the Parliament. The passing of the “Habeas Corpus Act” in 1679 has become a cornerstone of the liberties of the people of England. The Parliament, which placed Charles II on the throne, was known as the Convention Parliament because it was summoned without a royal writ. The lands of the Royalists, which were confiscated, were restored. The Royal revenue was fixed at a fixed sum. Feudal dues and purveyance were abolished. A permanent excise tax was granted to the King as a compensation for the loss of his feudal revenues. The Convention Parliament was dissolved in 1661 and fresh elections were held. The new Parliament, which met in 1661, sat for 18 years and is known as the Cavalier Parliament. It was so called because the cavalier spirit was present among its members. This Parliament was royalist in nature in politics and Anglican in religion. It hated the Puritans and stood for the strengthening of the Church of England. It is true that during the reign of Charles II, the court was corrupt and there were pleasures all around. However, during this period, humanity and refinement spread rapidly in England. Literature, art and science, architecture and etiquette and fashions were copied from the court off Louis XIV, the grand monarch of France. One of the most notable men of this age wasIsaac Newton (1642 – 1727). There were great strides made in the disciplines of Astronomy, Physics, Chemistry and Medicine.

Post-Foundationalism Versus Anti-Foundationalism. Thought of the Day 58.0

In the words of Judith Butler,

the point is not to do away with foundations, or even to champion a position which goes under the name of antifoundationalism: Both of these positions belong together as different versions of foundationalism and the sceptical problematic it engenders. Rather, the task is to interrogate what the theoretical move that establishes foundations authorizes, and what precisely it excludes or forecloses.

The notion of contingent foundations, proposed by Butler as an alternative framing, could best be described as an ontological weakening of the status of foundation without doing away with foundations entirely. It is on its account, that what came to be called post-foundationalism should not be confused with anti-foundationalism. What distinguishes the former from the latter is that it does not assume the absence of any ground; what it assumes is the absence of an ultimate ground, since it is only on the basis of such absence that grounds, in the plural, are possible. The problem is therefore posed not in terms of no foundations (the logic of all- or -nothing), but in terms of contingent foundations. Hence, post-foundationalism does not stop after having assumed the absence of a final ground and so it does not turn into anti-foundationalist nihilism, existentialism or pluralism, all of which would assume the absence of any ground and would result in complete meaninglessness, absolute freedom or total autonomy. Nor does it turn into a sort of post-modern pluralism for which all meta-narratives have equally melted into air, for what is still accepted by post-foundationalism is the necessity for some grounds.

What becomes problematic as a result is not the existence of foundations (in the plural) but their ontological status – which is seen now as necessarily contingent. This shift in the analysis from the ‘actually existing’ foundations to their status – that is to say, to their conditions of possibility – can be described as a quasi-transcendental move. Although implicitly present in Spivak’s notion of a ‘perpetually rehearsed critique’ as well as in Butler’s notion of ‘interrogation’, this quasi-transcendental turn is made explicit by Ernesto Laclau who, starting from the post-foundational premise that ‘the crisis of essentialist universalism as a self-asserted ground has led our attention to the contingent grounds (in the plural) of its emergence and to the complex process of construction’, comes to the conclusion that ‘[t]his operation is, sensu stricto, transcendental: it involves a retreat from an object to its conditions of possibility’.

Topological Drifts in Deleuze. Note Quote.

Brion Gysin: How do you get in… get into these paintings?

William Burroughs: Usually I get in by a port of entry, as I call it. It is often a face through whose eyes the picture opens into a landscape and I go literally right through that eye into that landscape. Sometimes it is rather like an archway… a number of little details or a special spot of colours makes the port of entry and then the entire picture will suddenly become a three-dimensional frieze in plaster or jade or some other precious material.

The word fornix means “an archway” or “vault” (in Rome, prostitutes could be solicited there). More directly, fornicatio means “done in the archway”; thus a euphemism for prostitution.

Diagrammatic praxis proposes a contractual (push, pull) approach in which the movement between abstract machine, biogram (embodied, inflected diagram), formal diagram (drawing of, drawing off) and artaffect (realized thing) is topologically immanent. It imagines the practice of writing, of this writing, interleaved with the mapping processes with which it folds and unfolds – forming, deforming and reforming both processes. The relations of non-relations that power the diagram, the thought intensities that resonate between fragments, between content ad expression, the seeable and the sayable, the discursive and the non-discursive, mark entry points; portals of entry through which all points of the diagram pass – push, pull, fold, unfold – without the designation of arrival and departure, without the input/output connotations of a black boxed confection. Ports, as focal points of passage, attract lines of resistance or lines of flight through which the diagram may become both an effectuating concrete assemblage (thing) and remain outside the stratified zone of the audiovisual. It’s as if the port itself is a bifurcating point, a figural inflected archway. The port, as a bifurcation point of resistance (contra black box), modulates and changes the unstable, turbulent interplay between pure Matter and pure Function of the abstract machine. These ports are marked out, localized, situated, by the continuous movement of power-relations:

These power-relations … simultaneously local, unstable and diffuse, do not emanate from a central point or unique locus of sovereignty, but at each moment move from one point to another in a field of forces, marking inflections, resistances, twists and turns when one changes direction or retraces one’s steps… (Gilles Deleuze, Sean Hand-Foucault)

An inflection point, marked out by the diagram, is not a symmetrical form but the difference between concavity and convexity, a pure temporality, a “true atom of form, the true object of geography.” (Bernard Cache)

Figure: Left: A bifurcating event presented figurally as an archway, a port of entry through order and chaos. Right: Event/entry with inflexion points, points of suspension, of pure temporality, that gives a form “of an absolute exteriority that is not even the exteriority of any given interiority, but which arise from that most interior place that can be perceived or even conceived […] that of which the perceiving itself is radically temporal or transitory”. The passing through of passage.

Cache’s absolute exteriority is equivalent to Deleuze’s description of the Outside “more distant than any exterior […] ‘twisted’, folded and doubled by an Inside that is deeper than any interior, and alone creates the possibility of the derived relation between the interior and the exterior”. This folded and doubled interior is diagrammed by Deleuze in the folds chapter of Foucault.

Thinking does not depend on a beautiful interiority that reunites the visible ad articulable elements, but is carried under the intrusion of an outside that eats into the interval and forces or dismembers the internal […] when there are only environments and whatever lies betwen them, when words and things are opened up by the environment without ever coinciding, there is a liberation of forces which come from the outside and exist only in a mixed up state of agitation, modification and mutation. In truth they are dice throws, for thinking involves throwing the dice. If the outside, farther away than any external world, is also closer than any internal world, is this not a sign that thought affects itself, by revealing the outside to be its own unthought element?

“It cannot discover the unthought […] without immediately bringing the unthought nearer to itself – or even, perhaps, without pushing it farther away, and in any case without causing man’s own being to undergo a change by the very fact, since it is deployed in the distance between them” (Gilles Deleuze, Sean Hand-Foucault)

Figure: Left: a simulation of Deleuze’s central marking in his diagram of the Foucaultian diagram. This is the line of the Outside as Fold. Right: To best express the relations of diagrammatic praxis between content and expression (theory and practice) the Fold figure needs to be drawn as a double Fold (“twice twice” as Massumi might say) – a folded möbius strip. Here the superinflections between inside/outside and content/expression provide transversal vectors.

A topology or topological becoming-shapeshift retains its connectivity, its interconnectedness to preserve its autonomy as a singularity. All the points of all its matter reshape as difference in itself. A topology does not resemble itself. The möbius strip and the infamous torus-to-coffe cup are examples of 2d and 3d topologies. technically a topological surface is totalized, it can not comprise fragments cut or glued to produce a whole. Its change is continuous. It is not cut-copy-pasted. But the cut and its interval are requisite to an emergent new.

For Deleuze, the essence of meaning, the essence of essence, is best expressed in two infinitives; ‘to cut ” and “to die” […] Definite tenses keeping company in time. In the slash between their future and their past: “to cut” as always timeless and alone (Massumi).

Add the individuating “to shift” to the infinitives that reside in the timeless zone of indetermination of future-past. Given the paradigm of the topological-becoming, how might we address writing in the age of copy-paste and hypertext? The seamless and the stitched? As potential is it diagram? A linguistic multiplicity whose virtual immanence is the metalanguage potentiality between the phonemes that gives rise to all language?

An overview diagram of diagrammatic praxis based on Deleuze’s diagram of the Foucaultian model shown below. The main modification is to the representation of the Fold. In the top figure, the Fold or zone of subjectification becomes a double-folded möbius strip.

Four folds of subjectification:

1. material part of ourselves which is to be surrounded and folded

2. the fold of the relation between forces always according to a particular rule that the relation between forces is bent back in order to become a relation to oneself (rule ; natural, divine, rational, aesthetic, etc)

3. fold of knowledge constitutes the relation of truth to our being and our being to truth which will serve as the formal condition for any kind of knowledge

4. the fold of the outside itself is the ultimate fold: an ‘interiority of expectation’ from which the subject, in different ways, hopes for immortality, eternity, salvation, freedom or death or detachment.

New Critique: From Hyper-heteronomy to Autonomy. Thought of the Day 13.0

The new critique is an invention of a new form of autonomy from hyper-heteronomy, a therapeutics of the pharmakon. This critique is dimensional in that, it is pharmacological, a critique that consists in analyzing the specifics of the pharmaka, a critique that invests its energy in finding the toxic possibilities of individuation, through an approach that is both theoretical and absolute and that is without a context, but not totally context-free, since it is an organological approach, an approach which is always within a context, in the Nietzschean genealogical sense of the term, but is at the same time independent of any particular political situation.

What creates autonomy is the development of autonomy. That’s the problem Adorno and Horkheimer deal with in The Dialect of Enlightenment when they say that the social development of reason has engendered alienation; that is to say, the opposite of reason. It is a pharmacological reality, though they don’t come to that conclusion because they don’t offer a critique of Enlightenment: they don’t make a critique of Kant – Hegel would be more useful anyway – in order to understand finally that reason is inscribed in a logic that is not Hegel’s master/slave dialectic; one can interpret it as such but in my opinion it’s much more complex. On the other hand, this means that reason, in developing its autonomy, always concretises a heteronomy, that is to say, a new heteronomy that is a technical cretinisation. All philosophical operations, in Plato for example, do this. Platonic theory is the pre-condition of cybernetics. In reality, if one looks closely, it depends on which of Plato’s dialogues you’re looking at; but with respect to ‘The Sophist’, Theaetetus, etc., Plato constructs a propositional theory of the logos: he says everything is in the proposition. And that is the condition moving through Leibniz to the development of cybernetics. This means that what Plato works out against heteronomy – because his is obviously a discourse against heteronomy – will construct a hyper-heteronomy, since cybernetics is a hyper-heteronomy.

Conjuncted: Whats Right-Wing With Negri? Note Quote.

Already with his concept of the socialised worker, Negri had rejected the central pillar of Marx’s economics – the relationship between value and labour. As the whole of society becomes a social factory, so the duration of labour becomes unquantifiable and it becomes impossible to reduce specific forms of labour into abstract socially necessary labour. As the 1980s and 1990s unfolded Negri underpinned his new politics with reference to two fashionable right wing theories – the idea of a ‘weightless economy’ developing out of a high tech ‘third industrial revolution’ and, more recently, extreme versions of globalisation theory depicting the death of the nationstate. Today Negri claims that ‘immaterial labour’ has taken the place of industrial labour as the hegemonic form of production that other forms of labour tend towards. Negri’s descriptions of contemporary production will seem unfamiliar to most workers: ‘A gigantic cultural revolution is under way. Free expression and the joy of bodies, the autonomy, hybridisation and the reconstruction of languages, the creation of new singular mobile modes of production—all this emerges, everywhere and continually’.

[Global corporations are anxious to include] difference within their realm and thus aim to maximise creativity, free play and diversity in the corporate workplace. People of all different races, sexes and sexual orientations should potentially be included in the corporation; the daily routine of the workplace should be rejuvenated with unexpected changes and an atmosphere of fun. Break down the old boundaries and let 100 flowers bloom!

Exploitation, in the Marxist sense of the pumping of unpaid surplus labour out of workers, has ended. Exploitation today means capturing the creative energies of a joyous, cooperating multitude – who may be inside or outside of the workplace. The domination of dead labour, such as machinery or computers, over living is finished because living (for Negri, intellectual) labour is now dominant. The tool of production is now the brain. Paul Thompson explains how Negri’s thinking parallels right wing accounts of the economic changes since the 1970s:

This appears to be remarkably similar to knowledge economy arguments, which we might briefly summarise in the following way. In the information age, capital and labour are said to have been displaced by the centrality of knowledge; brawn by brain; and the production of goods by services and manipulation of symbols. As a commodity, knowledge is too complex, intensive and esoteric to be managed through command and control. The archetypal worker in the new economy makes his or her living from judgement, service and analysis… As none of this is calculable or easily measured, it is the inherent property of the producer… This shifts the power balance to the employee, an increasing proportion of whom fall into the category of mobile, self-reliant and demanding ‘free workers’.

Thompson goes on to provide a detailed critique of the idea of immaterial labour. Even at the most immaterial end of the labour market, intellectual property regimes allow the commodification of knowledge. And such workers are still subject to exploitation and control centred upon the workplace.

Far from the workplace ceasing to be the centre of capital accumulation for the ruling class, it plays an increasingly important role in a world of labour intensification and tightening managerial control. The workplace is still the point at which fixed capital necessary for the production of most goods and services is centralised. And it is still the site where surplus value is extracted from workers – the central obsession of capitalists and states – and thus the point at which those opposed to the rule of capital should concentrate their efforts. Just like his vision of the weightless economy, Negri’s account of
globalisation is almost entirely unsupported by empirical evidence. He writes that:

large transnational corporations have effectively surpassed the jurisdiction and authority of nation-states…the state has been defeated and corporations now rule the earth!

Autopoiesis Revisited

Autopoiesis principally dealt with determining the essence of living beings to start off with, thus calling to attention a clarification between organization and structure. This distinction was highlighted with organization subtending the set of all possible relations of the autopoietic processes of an organism and structure as a synchronic snapshot from the organizational set that was active at any given instant. This distinction was tension ridden, for a possibility of a production of a novel functional structure was inhibited, and especially so, when the system had perturbations vis-à-vis the environment that housed it. Thus within the realm of autopoiesis, a diachronic emergence was conceivable only as a natural drift. John Protevi throws light on this perspective with his insistence on synchronic emergence as autonomous, and since autonomy is interest directed, the question of autopoiesis in the social realm is ruled out. The case of understanding rejection of extending autopoiesis to the social realm, especially Varela’s rejection, is a move conceived more to move beyond autopoiesis, rather than beyond neocybernetics as concerned with the organizational closure of informational systems, lest a risk of slipping into polarization should loom large. The aggrandizing threat of fascistic and authoritarian tendencies in Varela were indeed ill-conceived. This polarity that Varela considered later in his intellectual trajectory as comprising of fragments that constituted the whole, and collectively constructed, was a launch pad for Luhmann to enter the fray and use autopoiesis to social systems. Autopoiesis forms the central notion for his self-referential systems, where the latter are characterized by acknowledging their referring to themselves in every operation. Autopoietic system while organizationally closed nevertheless references an environment, background or context. This is an indication that pure auto-referentiality is generally lacking, replaced instead by a broader process of self- referentiality which comprises hetero-referentiality with a reference to an environment. This process is watchful of the distinction between itself and the environment, lest it should fail to take off. As Luhmann says that if an autopoietic system did not have an environment, it would be forced to invent one as the horizon of its auto-referentiality.

A system distinguishes itself from the environment by boundaries, where the latter is a zone of high-degree complexity, the former is a one of reduced complexity. Even Luhmann’s system believes in being interest-driven, where the communication is selective with the available information to the best of its efficiency. Luhmann likens the operation of autopoiesis to a program, making a series of logical distinctions. Here, Luhmann refers to the British mathematician G. Spencer Brown’s logic of distinctions that Maturana and Varela had identified as a model for the functioning of any cognitive process. The supreme criteria guiding the “self-creation” of any given system is a defining binary code. This binary code is taken by Luhmann to problematize the auto-referential system’s continuous confrontation with the dilemma of disintegration/continuation. Importantly, Luhmann treats systems on an ontological level, that is, systems exist, and this paradigm is attempted to be changed through the differential relations between the system and the environment.

Philosophically, complexity and self-organizational principles shifts trends into interdisciplinarity. To take a case of holism, emergentism within complexity abhors a study through reductionism. Scientifically, this notion of holism failed to stamp its authority due to a lack of any solid scientificity, and the hubristic Newtonian paradigm of reductionism as the panacea for all ills came to stay. The rapprochement was not possible until a German biologist Ludwig von Bertalanffy shocked the prevalent world view with his thesis on the openness of living systems through interactions with the surrounding systems for their continual survival. This idea deliberated on a system embedded within an environment separated by a boundary that lent the system its own identity. Input from the environment and output from the system could be conceived as a plurality of systems interacting with one another to form a network, which, if functionally coherent is a system in its own right, or a supersystem, with the initial conditions as its subsystems. This strips the subsystems of any independence, but determinable within a network via relations and/or mapping. This in general is termed constraint, that abhors independence from relations between the coupled systems (supersystem/subsystem). If the coupling between the systems is tight enough, an organization with its identity and autonomy results. Cybernetics deals precisely with such a formulation, where the autonomy in question is maintained through goal-directed seemingly intelligent action in line with the thoughts of Varela and Luhmann. This is significant because the perturbations originating in the environment are compensated for by the system actively in order to maintain its preferred state of affairs, with greater the amount of perturbations implying greater compensatory actions on the part of the system. One consequence of such a systemic perspective has gotten rid of Cartesian mind-matter split by thinking of it as nothing more than a special kind of relation. Such is the efficacy of autopoiesis in negotiating the dilemma surrounding the metaphysical question concerning the origin of order.

Researching NITI Aayog: Drunken Risibility

I am raising the issue of trying to bring NITI Aayog under the purview of fiscal governance. Unlike the Soviet-era Planning Commission of India, this so-called think tank is supposedly to look at a synergistic relation with the Finance Commission. Under the former, Finance Commission was relegated to determining revenue gaps of states and filled up these by means of devolution of taxes and grants in aids. Such constraints elevated Planning Commission’s job to planning capital expenditure. Interestingly, NITI is stripped off what never really was Planning Commission’s mandate, and vested with monitoring progress of programmes. This is where the screw turns, and the role of Finance Commission gets back to the Finance Ministry’s acquiescing to its recommendations. This means that not only NITI acts as a pulley to lift up Finance Commission to its constitutional agenda, but also stays away from influencing Finance Ministry in that the Ministry could work in tandem with Commission in determining capital, grant requirements the states would either fall short of, or enjoy a surplus with. NITI’s creation is politico-financial with the polity deciding on quantum of finance to be disbursed through a blue print that wouldn’t have any autonomy left. So, while targeting mechanisms and instruments to bring constitutional financial institutions under scanner, one should, as a researcher not lose sight of why NITI is an ingenious lubricant to bring forth growth-led development model to fruition…….