The rise of Asia has been the ‘in’ debate since the early 1980s. Pinioned on the growth rates of a few Asian states, most romanticise Asia’s golden past and celebrate their long-term prognosis for the future. In the present, however, Asian societies struggle with the multifaceted challenges of nation-building. In most indices these stand nowhere compared to industrialised countries. Compared to Western powers, the ‘rise’ of Asia remains grafted on the thinner ice of its rather recent decolonisation. It is these issues of the depth, variety, and robustness of Asian nationalisms, as also their extreme heterogeneity in varying physical sizes, political systems, religions, languages, ethnicity, caste, class and gender that this book seeks to examine. What makes it an interesting read is that it does so by using the biographical method of narratives on major political personalities.
The book opens with an essay on Gandhi. Written by editor Ram Guha, it seeks to underline the revolutionary nature of Mahatma’s unconventional political protests. It shows how Gandhi’s peaceful defiance of imperialists and rejection of social hierarchies in South Africa were already influencing the patriarchal and petition-writing-style national movement back home much before he returned to India. He was to make Indian nationalism truly national and formidable. It is a century later that the world appreciates his ideas of sustainable development and religious pluralism.
Guha’s essay on Nehru paints him as a ‘romantic in politics’. Nehru not only had an ambitious father but was groomed by Gandhi. Nehru was elected Congress president at the young age of 40. Gandhi was smitten by Nehru’s personal integrity and his faith in inter-religious harmony. These have come to be appreciated only recently even as Nehru is criticised for his handling of Kashmir, his China policy and increasingly for the neglect of primary health and education, which explain China’s recent rise.
The essay on Chaing Kai-Shek by Jay Taylor underlines how Chiang remains consigned to the dustbin of history even while his pragmatic authoritarianism best explains today’s China. Following the Japanese example, Chiang had promoted western-educated Chinese elite to unleash his modernisation drives which were interrupted first by Japanese attacks and later by Communists. His 23 years of leadership in the mainland and 26 years in Taiwan were to lay the critical foundations in turning these two into ‘miracles’ in Asia’s rise.
Mao, writes Rana Mitter, remains significant to the understanding of the noble geopolitics of Asia’s rise with China at its epicentre. Mao was shaped by the May Fourth movement that rejected old Confucian norms to build a ‘new’ China. Disillusioned Mao was easily enthralled by Marxism, yet his old romantic and Darwinian streaks led to his disastrous experiments like the Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution. Mao might not have approved the return to capitalism yet, but China’s economic flourish under political authoritarianism owes it to him. This is equally true in the economic rise of all other East Asian Sinic societies.
Zhou Enlai is described by Chen Jian as “rather conciliatory” who believed in building Afro-Asian unity by crossing Cold War divides. Zhou had rescued Mao during difficult times; yet Mao remained suspicious of Zhou’s intentions. In later years, Zhou was denounced as “rightist” and “Chinese traitor”. Yet, “tens of thousands of ordinary people” occupied Tiananmen Square in January 1976 to mourn his death. What made Zhou second to Mao was his urban-centred vision of revolution compared to Mao’s focus on millions of the rural peasantry. But Zhou was far more prominent in foreign policy and shared personal chemistry with several Asian leaders of his time.
Deng outlived Mao and Zhou by twenty years to make his mark on Asian history. Odd Arne Westad credits Deng with making China richer and freer. Deng’s seven years in France shaped his views on China and Asia, colonised by the Europeans. Deng earned a reputation for planning, centralisation and efficiency which made Mao make him head his Great Leap Forward resulting in 20 million deaths and triggering the process of Deng’s purges. After Mao’s death, Deng gradually opened up China by personally travelling to several countries including Japan and US which turned around China’s global profile. Deng’s crackdown of Tiananmen Square protests of June 1989 dented his reputation briefly.
Ho Chi Minh was the other great communist leader of Asia. Sophie Quinn-Judge portrays this austere symbol of Asian anti-colonialism becoming increasingly irrelevant to the Vietnamese. Though the tallest communist leader of Vietnam and the current communist regime seeking legitimacy in its Ho Chi Minh lineage, he is best described as a pragmatist who was often controversial for his shifting alliances with major powers abroad and for his co-opting of various non-communist patriots and even undermining fellow communists.
Sukarno, writes James Rush, saw himself as Bhima of Mahabharata who succeeds in recovering their stolen kingdom. As a young student at the European Hogere Burger School in Suravaya, he came under the tutelage of HOS Cokroaminoto — the founder of Sarekat Islam. In July 1927, Sukarno founded the Indonesian Nationalist Party with the goal of immediate independence through non-cooperation. He worked hard to bridge divisions amongst Marxists-Nationalists-Islamists and between Javanese and Sumatrans by using his five principles (Panca Sila) of national unity plus his charismatic authority. In spite of continued internal squabbles he tried to build the “Bandung Spirit” of Afro-Asian unity. But following the coup by Soeharto in 1966, Sukarno spent his last years under house arrest — marginalised and neglected.
A rather critical essay on Indira Gandhi, by Srinath Raghavan, sees hardly “anything edifying in her record and legacy.” But her being a single child (a rarity to her generation and class), being lonely (given her family was often in jail), and her shouldering of far greater responsibilities (given her mother’s illness and early demise) are provided as reasons for her peculiar blend of great power and great insecurity. He calls her a superb manager of crisis with focus on short-term achievements and her role in the liberation of Bangladesh was to forever change South Asia’s geopolitics. Michael Barr presents Singapore’s Lee Kuan Yew incarnating his city-state as his own life. Lee sought to build this tiny Chinese beacon of the talent-driven in the Southeast Asian sea of mediocrity. Race formed the basis of his understanding of the hierarchies of the talented. This is not what he had inherited. Till the early 1970s, S Rajaratnam’s and C V Devan’s Singapore was a melting pot of races with majority of Chinese being actually marginalised. But having survived the ‘old guard’, the 1980s saw Lee unleash his vision of superiority of Chinese culture that expects minorities to mimic or stay silent.
Farzana Shaikh’s essay on Zulfikar Ali Bhutto sees him remembered as the founder of Pakistan’s most controversial political dynasty. His ambitions weaken his original vision of projecting Pakistan as embodiment of Asian self-determination. He becomes the architect of Pakistan’s China policy, its nuclear programme and its quest for pan-Islamic solidarity. Having survived most of the Asian leaders of the Afro-Asian Unity of the1960s, Bhutto briefly took upon himself to build this platform for his rise. But his controversial role in the bifurcation of Pakistan contributed to internal chaos, resulting in a military coup in 1977 followed by his imprisonment and execution in 1979.
Reading this book reminds one of the popular title, “What Brought You Here Won’t Take You There” by Marshall Goldsmith where Makers of Modern Asia fills a critical gap about what has brought Asia where it is today. It also alludes to the continued relevance of Asia’s 20th century political icons as also to their fresh interpretations. It makes an easy and highly recommended read with several of its contributors having already done book length studies on their chosen leader.
