Paramendra Bhagat's Blog
Thursday, July 29, 2004
Wow, and now The Janakpur Blog.
Monday, July 26, 2004
I have seen more of America than the four white boys Kerry, Edwards, Bush and Cheney put together: not bad for an election year!
I doubt I will ever run for public office although I keep track of political news the way some people keep track of sports scores.
My online marketing business, which really happens during face time: I believe I have found my preferred way to earn a living. If I end up doing better than that, that will help me meet some of my political objectives, like the Global Democracy Fund, dedicated to a total spread of democracy through non-violent means, and defanging the American extreme right wing as a necessary corollary to such a wide spread. One allure about business is there is a much clearer measuring rod for progress: dollars. And the business is more in tune with the two megatrends of globalization and the internet than anything else I could think of doing.
What I would really like to do is contribute an equation or two to group dynamics. Falling short of that, I will settle for business success.
I am also going to make a book, the way people make movies, with a small team of research assistants to help me, to be based in the mud culture of Mithila; a novel, a fictional account of six generations within a family. It feels like launching a small company of information workers. Work has already begun.
I get to go home to Janakpur for a few months in February.
I am proudest of this: Jyoti Kosh.
The road, the wireless internet access, and the library, with thoughts of New York City.
Thursday, July 01, 2004
There were Buddhist republics thousands of years ago that can claim to have been democracies, and there are examples from ancient Greece. There must be many more examples. But for the modern democracy 1776 was a landmark year. It brought forth a new definition of the individual through a system of majority rule, minority rights, with the ultimate minority being the individual, and a separation of powers. That definition has made it possible to tackle many social ills of the founding community of whites, still a work in progress. The social ills are more acute in many forms in the "feeding" countries, from where the new Americans keep streaming in. So when one expresses displeasure of the American social inadequacies, it is not a longing for another land. Rather, globalization and the internet promise to make it possible for a new, more refined definition of the individual. It is the promise of the future, not of another land, definitely not the past, a promise of what could be possible. An individual beyond the reach of the various isms in a post-isms world where diversity is treated like a beautiful rainforest and not a reason to dislike those you do not understand.
As if we needed to teach democracy to the rest of the world, especially the Global South, and diversity to America.
