Can Politics Empathise?

 

E. M. Forster wrote about the need for ‘tolerance’ and argued that the real force which can help rebuild the world after the World Wars will be not love or forgiveness, but 'tolerance'. Though I read that essay long back during student days, as it was ‘taught’ as part of curricular requirement, it was 'studied' and then abandoned, in a way. But still the argument of the essay kept coming back, as it does now. I didn't grasp quickly the inherent link between empathy and tolerance, but there sure is a reason why Forster showed up. There are many ways the two, tolerance and empathy, complement each other and the presence of the former can surely help build the other. Empathy is the capacity to know and experience how others feel, putting yourself in another's position. But is there something like political empathy? Why is it not there, generally speaking? I would like to explain political empathy as the capacity of one political party, group, dispensation or politician, to put itself/oneself in the other's/others’  shoes (or chairs!) and see how it would have fared or responded to a particular situation. The party in power can visualise in the mind's eye (in the power’s eye!) how it, its members, followers and supporters, would have handled a particular issue, whether it be woman-centered or gold-oriented or both rolled into one. Or whether it is a matter of border violation of a country or a corruption charge related to arms purchase. Is such a political virtue possible? If not, what makes it impossible? Is this not possible because it is patently unimaginable for the members of a political entity to put itself in the position of another, even for the sake of an 'if'? Though this is a silly question, the intensity of hatred certain political parties unleash on members of the others (the ‘Other’ being defined not as some who think different, but as some who don’t think like ‘us’!) Does a similarity in positions and arguments put the stature and existence of these political groups at risk? Assonance in issues, a togetherness in thoughts will make them look similar and will negate their unique capacity to differ and belong? May be so. Common sense fails to comprehend why they don’t otherwise. Political wisdom, whatever it is, often falls short of common sense in this matter. Depending on which side of the governance one is, the political parties  seem to let go of common sense and oppose the very idea it marketed once and / or supports the plan it opposed once, feeling stupidly assured that the public around is equally bereft of the sense of the common kind. 'When we do it, it is good and when they do it, it is bad ' philosophy seems to dictate terms a lot. If political parties shed this paranoiac approach towards the other, it will be for the good of the communities and people. But it is people who must wake themselves up and react to this apparent lack of empathy, which in fact is, act of opportunism. A robust, organic, forward looking, pro-people, political party should be honest too (Don’t make faces, honesty and politics can sleep together and they must!). They can put themselves in the position of the other party and see that those are the best options, best solutions in the given situation for a problem. If the party in power or opposition, understands that the other one is acting as it can, it should and that is the way the one in power or opposition would have acted, had they been in such a situation, that is it. Agree, appreciate and applaud. But the inherent difficulty seems to be accepting, appreciating or occasionally applauding the other! What the politics of the land seems not to realize (or pretend not to, again!) is that empathy doesn’t force you to applaud everything the other does. But what the other does and also what it fails to do, again on understandable grounds, must be understood in right earnest. If this were so, how good the country will be! How admirable the politics! The country can also save resources being wasted today in terms of time and energy, not to mention the money part. The act of critiques mounted during one Opposition regarding an issue morphing into the manifestos when they turn the ruling front can be done away with! Each issue, each accusation, each act of corruption, violations of moral principles, molestation of ethics, political vandalism- seem to be taken up by different political parties for a 'holier-than-thou' posture while the public around sympathize, watching the same with appalling revulsion. Each such episode leaves the moral fabric (!) of the political dispensation short of a weave here and a stitch there. The nudity of the contemporary emperors are such a purchase, with decades of disinvestment in Political Empathy. Empathy is cardinal for a humane world. No community, political or otherwise, can hold on for long without it. When the political communities have systematically distanced themselves from this core virtue and have come to believe that this defunct show of theirs can go on, there is a price they pay. On one level the political communities are being projected as being increasingly morally unreliable and dishonest. But at another more important level, they are letting the larger communities become party to a corruption, without being aware that the rot they set in will eat away the adjoining core values too and the same politics will be at a different kind of a receiving end before long. But they need to worry only if they have set their eyes morally high! If politics is the art of the possible, it should also be part of the morally possible too. When political expediency pushes empathy completely off the table, the moral expediency of the larger public should get into the act. In many social media groups, from school friends to professional, one can find the so called highly educated and savagely civilized ones screaming their heads off at political opponents, with no sense of empathy. Oblivious of what they stood for, their political party stood for, or will stand for, these friends and fellow professionals breathe unempathetic fire! One is at a loss wondering about their education and civilization. Acknowledging the virtues of others and understanding their limits too must be part of being human, and political too. If we are talking about humane politics, that is! A Covid 19 triggered advertisement of a soap was heard exhorting people to wash their hands, using 'any' soap, not necessarily the brand which is being advertised! There is the clear statement that any soap can do the trick, not just our brand of (political) soap! Though the ad could be read by a select few as an attempt to promote a brand in the guise of a public interest good practice advice, it does accept that other too can deliver (whatever be the compulsions which made one brand acknowledge all other brands!)   It is time we removed the term ‘opposition’ from the political, administrative jargon as the parties in that position always seem to take it literally their job to ‘oppose’! By the same argument, the ‘Ruling’ dispensation too shouldn’t rule themselves out of their past inclinations and oppositions. Empathy can’t be legislated into the politic of the country (the situation which forces us to think of such a possibility itself reflects the alarming moral drop!). Wish they could at least make it a character trait, like some rare politicians do. ------------------------------------------------------------------