Fanon - Constructive Violence

Constructive Violence

Arise, ye prisoners of starvation!
Arise, ye wretched of the earth!
For justice thunders condemnation:
A better world's in birth!
No more tradition's chains shall bind us;
Arise, ye slaves, no more in thrall!
The earth shall rise on new foundations:
We have been nought, we shall be all!
'Tis the final conflict;
Let each stand in his place.
The International working class
Shall be the human race!
'Tis the final conflict;
Let each stand in his place.
The International working class
Shall be the human race!

“Get this into your head: if violence were only a thing of the future, if exploitation and oppression never existed on earth, perhaps displays of nonviolence might relieve the conflict. But if the entire regime, even your nonviolent thoughts, is governed by a thousand-year old oppression, your passiveness serves no other purpose but to put you on the side of the oppressors.”
―Jean-Paul Sartre,The Wretched of the Earth

Colonialism

“Colonialism is not a thinking machine, nor a body endowed with reasoning faculties. It is a violence in its natural state, and it will only yield when it is confronted with greater violence.

Decolonisation

Decolonization is a violent phenomenon.

“It is quite simply the replacing of a certain species of men by another species of men”

It is a historical process “It cannot be understood, it cannot become intelligible nor clear to itself except in the exact measure that we can discern the movements which give it historical form and content.”

“The last shall be first and the first last.” Decolonization is the putting practice of this sentence.

The process of decolonization is evident, it takes in an explicit manner, it comes with new language and new humanity.

Dissemination of power happens through creating the atmosphere of submission and inhibition in capitalist societies. The medal which is given after fifty years of good service and educational system together creates this harmony. But in colonised countries this is done through police force.

Manichean world

To be Manichean is to follow the philosophy of Manichaeism, which is an old religion that breaks everything down into good or evil. It also means “duality,” so if your thinking isManichean, you see things in black and white.

Manichean comes from the word Mani, which is the name of an apostle who lived in Mesopotamia who taught a universal religion based on what we now call dualism. If you believe in the Manichean idea of dualism, you tend to look at things as having two sides that are opposed. To Manicheans, life can be divided neatly between good or evil, light or dark, or love and hate. When you see Manichean, think “two.”

The zone of native and settler, in Aristotelian logic follow the principle of Aristotelian reciprocal exclusivity.

Colonial Space deals with Manichean thinking.

“The colonial world is divided into compartments”. Within the colonized country there are two zones European and native. The manichean geography exposes itself most dramatically in colonial cities, where clean, well built, brightly lit foreign quarters adjoin dirty,ramshackle,dark native quarters. Manichean thinking, which mistakes existence for essence, easily classifies people in terms of their physical environment: thus colonists embody secure, civilized order while colonized embody threatening, primitive chaos.

The zone of white are sophisticated, neat, clean, luxurious spacious while that of native are unclean,dark, hungry town starved of bread or any other necessities. The look that native turns is look of lust, a look of envy expressing his dream of possession.

In the colonies, the economic substructure is also a superstructure. The cause is consequence.You are rich because you are white, you are white because you are rich. This is why the marxist analysis should always be slightly stretched every time while they are dealing with this colonial problem.

“The destruction of colonial world is no more and less than the abolition of one zone, its burial in the depth of of the earth or its expulsion from the country”.

How Natives are portrayed by Settlers

Settlers point out that native is a sort of quintessence of evil.

1. They are insensible to ethics.

2. They are enemy of values and thus an absolute evil.

The church of white will not call native to Gods ways but to ways of white men.

Settlers even use zoological term and native is aware of this . He realizes his own humanity and sharpens the weapon. The natives looks at western humanity which is imposed on by aggressive means.When we find that those values propagated by westerners has nothing to do with the concrete conflict ,a genuine eradication of the superstructure built by these bourgeoisie colonialist environment will take place.

Truth Fanon defines is “in every age, among the people, truth is the property of national cause. No absolute verity, no discourse on the purity of soul can shake this position. Belief in fatality removes all blame from oppressor to God and those evil spirits.

Tactics

Colonialist bourgeoisie will introduce a new idea of non violence which is in proper parlance with creation of colonial situation. The intellectual and economic elite of the colonised country may think that bourgeoisie has the same interest in them. It involves the colonial system and young nationalist bourgeoisie. Nationalist bourgeoisie who are afraid of unpredictable consequence of uprising may act as a role of mediator, find themselves somersaulted into the van of negotiations and compromises.

Colonized countries were once a source of raw material, . The bourgeoisie of the mother country expects that their government may safeguard their legitimate interests.A detached complicity exists between capitalism and violent forces. Native is not alone in their fight, political and diplomatic support of progressive countries and peoples will be there.

Fanon points out the vanity of political parties . He says that 'reasonable' nationalist political parties take the interest of both parties into consideration. They may conduct mass demonstrations, boycott imported commodities .But this is just a kind of hibernation. The non violent saints propagate religion of pacifism. At the decisive moment they brandish the danger of mass mobilization as the weapon which would magically end the colonial regime. Those revolutionaries who turn their backs upon the farce of national independence may soon be brushed aside.

Political parties can never break their ties with colonialism. They may keep on discussing electoral democracy, liberty of press and reform. This easily forms ' a kind of class of enfranchised slaves or slaves who are individually free'.

These political parties may speak a lot, but there will not be any definite subject matter and no political or social purposes. They avoid actual overthrowing of the state, but they install a consciousness of the terrible ferment or subversion. The nationalist politicians actually induce imagination.

The agitations and speeches of leader creates a feeling that moment has come for taking actions. People make use of this chance. They sacrifice themselves for the cause of independence which paves way for future revolutions.

The uprising of the new nation and the breaking down of colonial structures are the result of two causes

1.either of violent struggle of the people in their own right.

2. or of action surrounding colonised people which acts as a brake in the colonial regime in question.

This violence will immediately mature in spite of metamorphosis which the colonial regime imposed upon it. Soon the good natives become so scarce and aggressive behaviour appears. Nationalist parties hold a great many meetings, strengthening of police force and reinforcement of soldiers are brought in.

The authorities may take spectacular measures. They arrest one or two leaders conduct war like exercises and finally this democratic situation reinforce aggressiveness. The hecatombs are an indication that between oppressors and oppressed everything can be solved only by force.

All the actions are result of fear. Colonialism may decide to arrest the nationalist leaders. Today the government of colonized countries know that it is extremely dangerous to deprive masses of their leaders.They soon start taking actions.This give them (colonised)free reign to their blood thirsty instincts and force colonialism to free their leaders. They will rise slogan now the time has come.

The parties are soon outdistanced, the leaders become uelesss and bureaucracy removed from events act as 'speaking in the name of the silenced nation.'

Slaves of modern time are impatient and these people try to break their chains.After all these upheaval frustrated mass feels that 'it wasn't worthwhile' It is a common place to observe that for 95% of population in underdeveloped countries independence bring no immediate change.

Every repression committed is reverberated in international arena.

Media from developed nations give negative images of under developed countries. The 'ex' natives often gets impression that these reports are already written.The photos which illustrate the article are simply creating negative images of colonised country.

Strengthened by the unconditional support of the socialist countries, the colonized people fling themselves with whatever arms they have against the impregnable citadel of colonialism. America take their role of international capitalism very seriously.

Capitalism realizes that everything has lost by the outbreaks of nationalist wars, But within the framework of peaceful co existence, all colonies are destined to disappear.The peaceful coexistence between two blocs provoke and feed the violence. Capitalism and imperialism uses people against people.The peaceful violence that the world steeped in has a sort of homogeneity. The native and underdeveloped are today political animals in the most universal sense of the word. Though independence has brought moral compensation to colonized they have not yet had time to elaborate a society or to build up or affirm values.

Political leaders faced with this situation chose neutralism.In one sense it is a sort of tainted Mercantilism which consist of taking what it can get from both sides.Though it allows underdeveloped countries to receive economic help from both sides, does not allow purity to aid underdeveloped countries to the extent that is necessary.

Neutralism in the citizen of the third world, a state of mind which is expressed in every day complicity life by fearlessness and ancestral pride strangely resembling defiance. The poverty stricken countries which have no tramways without troops and without money have no justification for the bravado that they display in broad daylight. The men at the head of empty countries are in great demand

But they have no grip with the bourgeoisie machine and not develop their sense of class struggle.

The combat between natives and settlers - Violence

People decide to trust violence. The native use the same tool of settlers. The logic is 'it is them or us'. They organize themselves. For the native, violence represents the absolute line of action.The colonized find his freedom through violence. The violence of colonial regime and the counter violence of native balance each other and respond to each other in an extra ordinary reciprocal homogeneity. The development of violence among colonised will be directly proportionate to the violence exercised by the threatened colonial regime.

At first home government is the slave of settlers. and armed struggle may reach a point of no return The settlers work to make even dreams of liberty impossible for natives. The native work to imagine all possible methods for destroying settlers. The practice of violence binds them together as a whole and the nation is indivisible. The armed struggle may throw them to one direction. The idea of common cause of a national destiny and of collective history comes to their mind.

Violence in the International Context. The attempt of young independent nation to 'prove themselves to whole world by gigantic and disproportionate effort to attain the same achievement of developed countries seems to be unreasonable.

The European opulence is literally scandalous, for it has been founded on slavery. It has been nourished with slavery and the newly independent nation s leaders demands gigantic effort from the natives.

When third world countries refuse to undergo this ordeal, they get over it by accepting the conditions of the former guardian power.They soon becomes economically dependent country.They have to chose between capitalism and socialism Fanon says they have to develop 'their own particular values methods and style. Fanon advices to chose socialist regime which is completely oriented towards the people as a whole and based on the principle that man is precious of all possessions.

The economic system should be modified which was first aimed to feed the economy of colonial regime .The capitalists behaved in the under developed world like war criminals. ( deportations massacres and forced labour and slavery has been the main methods used by capitalism to increase its wealth.

Nazism transformed the whole of Europe into a veritable colony.The government of European nations demanded restitution in kind and money of the wealth which had been stolen from them .The wealth of the imperial countries is the wealth of colonised countries. “When European state declare that he must come to the help of under developed we don't tremble with gratitude 'it is a just reparation which will paid to us”.

This help should be the ratification of double realization. Realization by the colonised people that it is their due and the realization by the capitalist powers that in fact they must pay. Capitalist withdraw all their capital from the colony in the time of decolonization. The private companies which establish industries in colonised countries asked some guarantee which the former colony cannot give and they asked their government to guarantee the investments. Only few countries could fulfill these conditions and capital remains blocked in Europe.

The underdeveloped people wile decide to continue their evolution. Soon western industry will lose their market and a struggle may ensue. The European working class may engage in an open struggle against colonial regime. Monopolies will realize that their true interest lie in giving aid to he underdeveloped countries. So we should emphasis and explain to them that problem is not struggle between socialist regime and them .

The cold war must be ended

Plans for nuclearizing the world must stop

Large scale investments and technical aid must be given to the under developed children.

The Third world expects from those who for centuries have kept it in slavery is that they will help it to rehabilitate mankind. The European peoples first decide to wake up and shake themselves, use their brains, and stop playing the stupid games of sleeping beauty

Stretching Marxism

Fanon believes that colonialism is the foundation of capitalism, which is the engine of western democracy. He also believes that colonialism is global robbery. Thus the political systems built upon it are necessarily corrupt, intrinsically dependent on preserving and exploiting a vast underclass. Fanon advocate socialism as both practical and an ethical “solution for merging countries”. He recognises that economic and social organization in 'underdeveloped countries' bear little resemblance to conditions in highly developed ones and that the pressures of colonial situation must be dealt with as well.Fanon agrees with Marx that history runs dialectically, through the struggle of fraction against fraction .Marx categorised factions in terms of economic class. Fanon claims that race is the key categorical term in colonial situations.

Fanon states that “ Decolonization is always a violent phenomenon

Behind this assertion lie violent wars of liberation waged on the African continent during Fanons life time including Mau Mau uprising in Kenya, the guerilla struggle in Portuguese colonies and Algerian revolution.Fanon says that revolutionary violence needs no justification because it is the inevitable consequence of colonialism itself established through armed invasion, perpetuated by brutal force.Therefore a politically arranged decolonisation fails to bring the radical changes needed for true liberation.

Individual perspective

Here Fanon points out the dehumanization of colonised by colonisers.The colonised always live in an atmosphere of violence, fear, and oppression in order to keep him in subservient place within the rigid manichean system.

“At the level of individuals violence is a cleansing force. It frees natives from his inferiority complex and from his despair and enaction it makes him fearless and restores his self respect.

Fanon argues that violence gives energy to an individual makes him dynamic and with physical release he can channelise his energy in a proper way. A colonised person is just like a neurotic patient who releases his mental chaos through other means. Cathartic effect of violence

Releasing emotions decreases the pressure or tension in the person so they have fewer negative emotions and are less aggressive.

Sigmund Freud was the first to use catharsis theory in psychological therapy, although he gave up on cathartic therapy and spent more time on psychoanalysis. The theory states that expressing or getting out one's aggression and anger should reduce the feeling of aggression.

Remember that Fanon was a psychiatrist. Fanon has been accused for advocating violence as a liberating force. But he has explained why certain kinds of violence are liberating.

At first must keep in mind that Africans were in such a state that majority could not even recognise the destructive power of colonial force that enslaved them. Violence was a better means than giving them or advising them certain ideas regarding non violence or any such moderate means. The apt tool for mobilization was violence .

One of the core propositions in Wretched of the Earth is that there is no possibility for middle ground in a struggle against colonialism. Fanon writes, “’It’s them or us’ is not a paradox since colonialism, as we have seen, [it] is precisely the organization of a Manichean world, of a compartmentalized world” (F

The National Perspective

Fanon opinionated that freedom cannot be granted it must be won. “The colonized man finds his freedom in and through violence”.

Violence is crucial to the revolutionary common sense.He criticises primarily politial approaches to decolonization especially non violent strategies and negotiated compromises. Native intellectuals, trades people and government workers benefit from colonialism.

The elite may “ attempt to settle the colonial problem around a green baize table” before the colonized actually react.

The philosophies of political compromise betray the will of the people even as they deepen the split between the urban middle class and the rural peasantry. Nationalist leaders can use violence as a slogan and as a threat. But only those leaders who can understand the authentic causes of violent resistance and lack of food land and dignity can unite spontaneous uprising into a disciplined struggle against colonialism.

The International Perspective.

The colonial powerstructure cannot afford means of violence. In the face of determined violent resistance, a colonial power try slipping into neo colonial relationship with a former colony by granting it nominal independence but keeping it in economic thralldom. This is why compromise and accommodation are so dangerous to a liberation movement.