SLAVERY OR LIBERTY?
J.C. Kumarappa
As we had long been taught to look at economics through the window of money economy most of us associate capitalism with the method of production in which accumulated wealth
is sunk in the equipment needed to produce goods. This description is partly correct. If this were all, capitalism would have died long ago as there is no means of propagating itself.
For the continuity of its existence capitalism has to create a clientele for itself by setting up social customs and fashions which people will follow without questioning their rationale. The
life of any organisation depends on its capacity thus to make a place for itself. Therefore, a more correct classification would be one which sorts out the methods of production according
to the manner by which a system seeks to control the environment and circumstances of human beings so as to justify its existence and to create and retain its market and custom.
To classify satisfactorily we have to examine the favourable conditions which will be needed for the growth of different systems and see how they affect human beings in regard
to their development, taking into account: 1) human wants, 2) how they are met, 3) what is the reaction on human beings. Such a classification will be human rather than monetary.
A. THE ENSLAVING SYSTEM
The shopkeeper would like to see the wants of the people increase, he would like to supply their needs himself and the more helpless the people are to help themselves, the better will
his own business be. Therefore, his interest is identical with making his customers depend on him. To this end he will study their needs most minutely and attempt to supply them
better than they themselves can. The ultimate result of this will be, the customer will become emaciated, numbed and paralysed for lack of scope to develop his faculties and the
shopkeeper will become fat, flourishing and resourceful. This is what is happening under centralised methods of production. We witness the degradation of races and nations who
have become dependent politically and economically on those who supply their wants under various masks of trusteeship for civilising backward races. They give their victims
an opiate that with the aid of factory production people can raise their standard of living, can buy standardised goods cheaply and have more of them. In the measure in which
manufacturers succeed in doping their victims into thinking that it is to the customer’s advantage to take their help to that extent only can they thrive. ....
The capitalistic structure of centralised production rests on the tombstones of the initiative of the customers. Therefore judged from the point of view of its effect on human
beings centralised production may be appropriately described as an enslaving, parasitic, or as Tagore would have it, cannibalistic system. Once the victim realises the true
situation, bestirs himself and sets about supplying all his own needs the capitalist’s reign is doomed.
B. THE EMANCIPATING SYSTEM
As against this, our purpose as represented by the programme of the A.I.V.I.A., is to awaken the people and make them realise their own possibilities. A method of production which can
do this will be an emancipator, creative or evolutive system. Our villages can meet their wants in two ways:—i. provide what they need by their own efforts, and ii. forego such of
what they need as cannot be supplied by themselves. The reaction will be progressive self-reliance, and self-advancement though in the beginning the so-called standard of living may
appear low. Our goal is a state where the villagers will supply all their own requirements and that of the city people. Their effort to do so will bring employment to millions and make for
a better circulation of money. This is the only permanent way of dispelling poverty and creating wealth.
Self-help: Unfortunately we have lived so long under the soporific effects of capitalism that many of us still expect that everything should be done for us. At the A.I.V.I.A. we get orders
for such simple things as stools to sit on while grinding flour with Maganvadi chakkis. Stools are simple articles which can be made by any village carpenter. Although the A.I.V.I.A
may experiment and supply models of improved implements which can be easily copied by others, it will not be fulfilling its mission if people are left still so helpless as to expect it to
spoon-feed them at every stage. The charkha has been simplified in construction into the Dhanush Takli and yet people prefer to obtain ready-made ones from long distances, rather than
take the trouble of producing them locally. The ideals behind the village industries movement cannot countenance such a state of affairs. We do not exist to supply the needs of the people
for all time, thus saving them the trouble of production. On the other hand, we are like crutches to a man with an injured foot. As soon as the foot heals, the crutches are to be thrown away.
We are not fulfilling the permanent function of an artificial limb to a lame man.
In this transitional period bodies like the A.I.V.I.A. have to help with experiments and suggestions but people should not expect our work to cover the whole ground and not bestir themselves.
We shall gauge our success by the extent to which we have imparted self-reliance to village producers. They should increase and we should decrease.
Freedom
As our people learn to produce all that is needed by the country they will acquire self-reliance which is the basis of freedom, while dependence on others is the essence of slavery. What shall
we do with political freedom even if it is given as a gift? It will be meaningless, as we shall not be able to turn it to good account. If, on the other hand, the villagers have become self-reliant,
they will attain freedom; they will then be able to look after themselves. Their panchayats will function, they will settle their own disputes and banish litigation, they will control their
water supply and sanitation, build their own roads, run their own schools and to an extent, tax themselves and thus govern themselves. If we are not prepared to take up all this
responsibility our second state will be worse than the first. By the terrible ordeal of a civil war the United States of America had banished the personal type of slavery from their shores
in the middle of the last century. But they are now fast building up the foundation of an economic slave system by the cramping effect which the capitalistic system of production has
on the initiative of individuals and the dependence on mass production it engenders. Let us be forewarned and learn from the experience of others, and help ourselves, for only then will
God help us.
Our Duty
Hence it is that constructive work is so fundamental to our struggle for freedom...If we are not village producers we may at least stimulate village production by consuming as far as
possible only village industry products.
(Gram Udyog Patrika March 1941, Reprinted by Kumarappa Memorial Trust, 1971)