{"id":61166,"date":"2016-12-07T13:02:53","date_gmt":"2016-12-07T20:02:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=61166"},"modified":"2016-12-07T13:02:53","modified_gmt":"2016-12-07T20:02:53","slug":"failure-of-our-academics-to-answer-issues-of-the-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2016\/12\/07\/failure-of-our-academics-to-answer-issues-of-the-day\/","title":{"rendered":"Failure of our academics to answer issues of\u00a0 the day"},"content":{"rendered":"

H. L. D. Mahindapala<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n

After the retirement of the anti-Sinhala-Buddhist mafia in academia \u2013 namely, Jayadeva (Marthelis)\u00a0 Uyangoda, Kumari Jayawardena, Carlo Fonseka, and their fellow-travellers\u00a0 \u2013 the public face of universities that has been\u00a0 popping up like a bad penny is that of Nirmal Ranjith Dewasiri, the Senior Lecturer\u00a0 in History at the Colombo University. His talking head appears\u00a0 on TV shows too which is good for\u00a0 light\u00a0 entertainment when Sunil Perera is not there. His latest\u00a0 interview with Kelum Bandara in the Daily Mirror<\/strong><\/em> (30\/11\/16) demonstrates not only his inability to field serious questions and present a lucid analysis but also the mediocrity of\u00a0 our\u00a0 academics whose interlocutory interventions invariably distort the public discourse.<\/p>\n

The headline, picked from one\u00a0 of his\u00a0 quotes,(Nationalism is the manifestation of a crisis, not a solution to it<\/strong><\/em>\u201d)\u00a0 made it\u00a0 clear that the\u00a0 main topic was Donald Trump\u00a0 and the\u00a0 impact\u00a0 of his\u00a0 brand of\u00a0 nationalism\u201d in the immediate future. In reading\u00a0 it I was hoping to get some insightful revelations radiating from the Colombo University. At the end of it, I am sad to say, I was left with only irrelevant inanities to most of the questions raised by Kelum. I am afraid I can\u2019t deal with all his irrelevant imbecilities due to the limited of space available in this article. I will confine myself to only a selected few.<\/p>\n

As for Donald Trump, I must say, in passing, that the showmanship qualities in\u00a0 his swaggering braggadocio can be titillating up to a point. But in the end he comes\u00a0 out of it as a picaresque con artist who bulldozed his way in to White House of the Alt-right. He stands out as the\u00a0 ultimate\u00a0 symbol of the\u00a0 American pop culture which, I thought, was always tainted with obscene and loud vulgarities. All of it\u00a0 seems to have come\u00a0 together in the arrogant pomposities of Donald Trump.<\/p>\n

That apart, the first question put to Dewasiri (Q:<\/strong> With the conclusion of the election in the United States, there is a perception that nationalism is triumphing over internationalism. What are your views?) opened up possibilities of covering a wide range of issues. In the main, it touched on the new dimensions of Trump\u2019s foreign policy arising from his inward-looking nationalism that put American first, virtually dismissing its traditional military, economic and\u00a0 political alliances abroad. Dewasiri\u2019s confused answer to Kelum\u2019s first question runs in diverse directions except to explicate Trump\u2019s impact on his version of American nationalism\u201d which verges on isolationism, perhaps, even a new version of Munroeism. At least, as a self-professed Leftist, he should have attempted to dissect the consequences that would flow from Trump\u2019s nationalism\u201d to the global order as it exists now. But his answer only exposes his total inability to grasp the far-reaching dynamics of the issue. Instead his answer drifts in the direction of ko-hay-da-yan-nay- mal-lay-pol. (Where-are-you-going-there-are coconuts-in-my-bag).\u00a0<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

He is all over the place with his wish-washy answers. He rambles on about the French Revolution, Karl Marx, Engels, UN, human rights, globalisation etc., \u2013 none\u00a0 of which explains the consequences of the Trumpist\u201d\u00a0 variety of nationalism \u2013 and concludes with the clich\u00e9 that\u00a0 nationalism has always been a strong force\u201d. Even the dullards in his class will know that because they feel it running\u00a0 through their veins as an existentialist force. As an academic he should\u00a0 have dealt with the new forces that Trump has threatened to unleash on the global theatre. He is the new face of capitalism turning\u00a0 inwards to embrace economic nationalism, abandoning globalism \/ regionalism. He is threatening to dismantle the entire European and even global order put together by the post-World War II diplomacy of America. Dewasiri, drowning\u00a0 in his ignorance, doesn\u2019t have a word to say about it. He doesn\u2019t even mention Westphalia which is accepted by all historians as the defining moment in the concept of nationalism.<\/p>\n

Trumpism\u201d, together with Brexitism\u201d, signals that the people who are losing their identity in the globalised market, are yearning\u00a0 to go back and reinforce their roots. Economic nationalism is intertwined with political nationalism. Trumpism\u201d and Brexitism\u201d hope to make America \/ Britain great\u00a0 again with\u00a0 home-centric economics. But this runs contrary to the intrinsic nature of capitalism. Adventurous capital always tend to get out of the box;<\/strong> not to get locked up inside a box at home and stagnate. Money does not grow inside a box. It grows only when it is invested outside the box. Colonialism, regionalism and globalisation\u00a0 are natural extensions of capitalism. So can Trump\u2019s reversal to keep jobs at home by threats and\u00a0 incentives to the corporate sector be the answer? Or is he blindly playing the role of King Canute, ordering the waves of globalisation to roll back?<\/p>\n

Trump has clearly decided to pull up the draw bridge and keep out the invading aliens. This\u00a0 has raised new challenges. With all his entrepreneurial skills he cannot contain capitalism within his domestic walls because the crippling effect on the ever-expanding forces of capitalism, spinning beyond\u00a0 his control, can rebound and drag America deeper into a Trumpist\u201d black hole. His is a recipe for recession \/ depression.<\/p>\n

Capitalism has come a long way from the narrow Dickensian garrets on which Marx based his questionable predictions. Capitalism\u00a0 is at the stage where it cannot survive only on the sales of local market, however big the market may be. Besides, market forces has turned the globe into a village. America has to compete in the global village if it is to survive. If America doesn\u2019t do it there are plenty of others who will fill the gap. China still can continue to remain national because its labour\u00a0 market is comparatively cheap and retains the capacity to compete with the world. The economic nationalism\u00a0 that works for China\u00a0 will not work for America.<\/p>\n

Besides, Trump is hoping to make America great\u00a0 by keeping his industrial babies at home. Can he do that? If America is to be competitive and grow it has to cut labour costs to survive in the global markets. But that is not going to happen in America. So somebody has to either cut the spiralling costs of labour, or subsidise the high cost of labour to keep the profits up. If this can\u2019t be done then industries will have to go in search of cheap labour.<\/p>\n

Donald Duck-economics wants to have it both ways, judging from his deal with air-conditioning giant, Carrier, which was planning\u00a0 to relocate its factory in Mexico, sacking 1100 workers from its plant in Cincinnati, Ohio. All the hoopla about his success in keeping\u00a0 jobs at\u00a0 home is a load of codswallop. He\u00a0 has cut a deal to pay Carrier $7 million for ten years and keep only half its working\u00a0 force in Ohio. In other words, it\u00a0 is the taxpayers who will have to subsidise industries struggling\u00a0 to survive in America. Can Trump go round the country and offer subsidies to hundreds of American\u00a0 industries struggling to keep head above water? Of course, he is making a big show of his deal with Carrier to gain some political mileage which is a part of his showmanship. Sooner\u00a0 or later, the weight\u00a0 of subsidising\u00a0 American corporations to stay at home will cripple both the economy and Trump. The winner in this game, so far, is not Trump but Carriers. They got a subsidy from Trump and they are also exporting\u00a0 half the jobs to Mexico. On both counts the American tax payer is asked to carry the burden. Angered by this betrayal, Sarah Palin, one of Trump\u2019s\u00a0 sidekicks, is condemning\u00a0 it as crony capitalism.\u201d<\/p>\n

This is the reality that bites into the hype of Trump. Besides, even before he can take office he has set himself on a collision course with China. Dewasiri\u2019s answer does not show any understanding of the serious consequences of Trump\u2019s politics or economics? Or of the\u00a0 inherent contradictions in Trump\u2019s populism that will drag him down? His economic nationalism\u201d\u00a0 has turned into unsustainable crony capitalism\u201d. Can this be a long-term solution for the American economy? The example of Carrier also indicates that some jobs and industries will continue to go abroad. Of course, Trump has a chance of creating jobs by investing state funds in public utilities like roads, bridges, schools etc. But he has to go beyond that to reinvigorate the economy and make it competitive\u00a0 internationally. Can he do that by subsidising private industries?<\/p>\n

These are some\u00a0 of the issue that a perceptive\u00a0 academic\u00a0 should address. But Dewasiri hasn\u2019t a clue about the new dynamics that will derail Trump\u2019s triumphalism. I am more concerned about Dewasiri\u2019s\u00a0 ko-hay-da-yan-nay-mallay-pol<\/strong><\/em> answer.\u00a0 Prime\u00a0 Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe told Parliament that\u00a0 his\u00a0 academic wife draws a bigger salary than he does. Leaving her\u00a0 aside, (she may be worth her weight in gold!) the tax-payer\u00a0 is entitled to ask whether the public is getting their money\u2019s worth from papier mache<\/em> heads like Dewasiri pontificating in academia.<\/p>\n

Like all the NGO and academic pundits he poses as if he is the solution to the crises facing the nation. But\u00a0 he\u00a0 is only regurgitating the same\u00a0 old slogans and recipes of the Tamil-NGO lobbies. For instance, he claims that the confederalism\u201d \u2013 not federalism \u2013 is the answer\u00a0 to the constitutional crisis. And with\u00a0 this\u00a0 pronouncement he poses as the genius who has at last found the ultimate solution! At a time when the nation can\u2019t agree even on federalism\u00a0 to ask for confederalism\u00a0 is like asking a ninety-year-old woman to produce quintuplets when she can\u00a0 hardly produce a foetus. But\u00a0 this type of fantasising is typical of\u00a0 our dunderheads\u00a0 in academia and NGOs — all of whom pretend to be problem-solvers.<\/p>\n

Consider also how\u00a0 this yakka-demic\u201d\u00a0 deals\u00a0 with the following straightforward\u00a0 question : Q You are an academic who strived for the installation of the current government that pledged to implement good governance principles. How detrimental is this trend for the country?\u201d<\/p>\n

Now, I urge you not to laugh. This is his answer: Good governance is something different I have to explain to you. I do not use it in that sense. If I leave it aside, there will be a lot for us to talk about in this case…..\u201d Hilarious, isn\u2019t it? He was asked about good\u00a0 government and\u00a0 he says leave it aside\u201d. How many marks\u00a0 will he get\u00a0 if\u00a0 he\u00a0 gave that answer to a question\u00a0 asked from him at an exam.\u00a0 It reminds me of the story of\u00a0 a student\u00a0 who answered his question\u00a0 paper saying : I don\u2019t know. Only God knows\u201d. The examiner\u00a0 wrote back saying : God gets 100 marks. You get nought!\u201d<\/p>\n

Obviously, he doesn\u2019t want to admit his vacuous mind cannot cope\u00a0 with the embarrassing\u00a0 question.\u00a0 He crowed glowingly about his good governance\u201d on January 8. He couldn\u2019t stop talking about it. But when he is asked how detrimental it\u00a0 is now for\u00a0 the country, he dodges the issue and says let\u2019s talk about nationalism\u201d. Once again it\u2019s ko-hay-da-yan-nay-mal-lay pol.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/em>He says good governance\u00a0 is something\u00a0 different\u201d. Different from what? He\u00a0 doesn\u2019t say. He adds: I do not use\u00a0 it that sense.\u201d What is the sense he has told Kelum?\u00a0 Dewasiri unable\u00a0 to answer\u00a0 the question is trying to con his way out.<\/p>\n

Really, how can\u00a0 our\u00a0 universities ever\u00a0 hope\u00a0 to\u00a0 rise to\u00a0 higher\u00a0 levels when\u00a0 it is in the\u00a0 hands of yakka-demics\u201d who can\u2019t answer a simple question?\u00a0 Dewasiri is the\u00a0 kind\u00a0 of yakka-demic\u201d who runs down\u00a0 the Mahavamsa<\/strong><\/em> without\u00a0 having the capacity to\u00a0 write a\u00a0 book of that magnitude ever in his life. While his\u00a0 doctoral thesis\u00a0 on some\u00a0 obscure fragment of\u00a0 the Dutch administration must\u00a0 be\u00a0 gathering\u00a0 dust\u00a0 in the mortuary of Leiden\u00a0 University\u00a0 the Mahavamsa <\/strong><\/em>has been studied, annotated, analysed and revered by some of\u00a0 the\u00a0 great Oriental scholars and the public. It has been\u00a0 the\u00a0 source of\u00a0 inspiration to millions and guidance to\u00a0 leading international historiographers. It is the living, undying, monumental treasure which the yakka-demics\u201d have tried to bury and failed.<\/p>\n

Can Dewasiri who can\u2019t provide credible answers to simple\u00a0 questions put\u00a0 to him ever hope to attain the\u00a0 intellectual heights of the\u00a0 humble monk who put the Mahavamsa<\/strong><\/em> together? How many of his peers\u00a0 have even bothered to cite his thesis in their footnotes? He is not even doing anything original in attacking the Mahavamsa. <\/strong><\/em>He is merely repeating what G. G. Ponnambalam did in the thirties.<\/p>\n

What then are the chances of Dewasiri growing up to some\u00a0 degree of maturity in his life time?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

H. L. D. Mahindapala After the retirement of the anti-Sinhala-Buddhist mafia in academia \u2013 namely, Jayadeva (Marthelis)\u00a0 Uyangoda, Kumari Jayawardena, Carlo Fonseka, and their fellow-travellers\u00a0 \u2013 the public face of universities that has been\u00a0 popping up like a bad penny is that of Nirmal Ranjith Dewasiri, the Senior Lecturer\u00a0 in History at the Colombo University. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-61166","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-h-l-d-mahindapala"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61166","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=61166"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61166\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=61166"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=61166"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=61166"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}