Conclusion

This chapter concludes the book by examining how Ambedkar’s own thought on democracy and individual rights within the deeply diverse Indian context could inform efforts to develop a framework of more cosmopolitan, more democratically accountable political institutional at the regional and ultimately global levels. It reviews the argument of the book by chapter, then explores a possible “Ambedkarian” model for advancing the development of democratic institutions and forms of political humility beyond the state. Such a model would focus on softening barriers and promoting interaction between national communities, while promoting some types of broader identification as a means of advancing rights protections. The chapter closes with discussion of a future project on feasibility issues related to the development of such a framework.

Political Arrogance and National Belonging

This chapter considers arrogance claims lodged by members of the UK Independence Party, against the backdrop of Britain’s “Brexit” referendum to leave the European Union (EU). Many UKIP respondents see EU institutions as inappropriately treating national communities as not authorized to set policy in line with their own distinctive national priorities. And, they argue that EU free movement rules inappropriately impose a more cosmopolitan vision of membership on national communities—especially when prospective members such as Turkey are a “poor fit” with the British nation. Some Turkish respondents challenge such poor fit claims. Further challenges are raised to democratic theory arguments that give strong emphasis to national belonging. Overall, it is shown, claims for the moral and empirical distinctiveness of nations are difficult to sustain, and thus so are nationalist objections to democracy beyond the nation-state.

Introduction

This chapter first offers narratives introducing actors in the book’s major case studies. In India, these include members of the National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights, which has sought to enlist global allies to press the Indian government for stronger action against caste discrimination, and its critics in the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party. The right-wing populist UK Independence Party’s aims for British secession from the European Union are highlighted, as are its claims that the prospect of European Union accession for predominantly Muslim Turkey is a chief reason why Britain should leave. The Turkish case is introduced via street scenes of activists confronting police amid the country’s rising authoritarianism. Then the chapter outlines the book’s major claims for how a robust institutional cosmopolitanism can be shown to orient to political humility rather than arrogance. Variants of cosmopolitanism are discussed, and the book’s argument is previewed by chapter.

Breaking India

This chapter presents the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) case, with emphasis on the disloyalty and neo-imperial conspiracy charges levied against activists from the National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights (NCDHR), and related claims of moral parochialism against cosmopolitanism. Details are offered on the BJP’s distinctive Hindu nationalist ideology and ways in which it has informed the party’s governing actions and its critiques of the NCDHR global outreach. Responses are offered to the parochialism objections, in part via responses Ambedkar was provoked to give about the secular character of the 1950 Indian Constitution. It is argued that, while no system is wholly culturally neutral, one aiming to establish robust mechanisms of input and challenge can enable individuals to make objectionable forms of parochialism more visible and better contest them, both globally and domestically. The chapter then presents some NCDHR activists’ responses to the moral neo-imperialism claims, and to claims that they may have been simply coopted by Western nongovernmental organizations or institutions.

The Global Challenge of the National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights

This chapter highlights the importance of enabling individuals to give input and lodge challenges beyond the state through detailing the actions and views of those in the National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights (NCDHR). It first gives details on the grounded normative theory approach adopted in the book, involving the direct conduct and incorporation of empirical research in the development of normative claims. Then NCDHR’s formation and primary efforts are discussed, including its member organizations’ documentation of caste-related discrimination and violence, oversight of government agents, and contributions to Dalit social and economic development. The campaign’s global outreach is detailed, with emphasis on engagement with United Nations human rights bodies. Throughout, activists’ own views are presented on the importance of their globally oriented challenges, and on the justifiability of airing their country’s “dirty linen,” against claims by their critics that they are disloyal and engaged in a neo-imperial conspiracy against India.

The “Soul of Democracy”

This chapter considers how political humility can or should be promoted, through the adoption of a primarily instrumental approach to democracy informed by Ambedkar’s own instrumentalism and his one person, one value vision of the “soul of democracy.” The approach is primarily rather than wholly instrumental, because it can accommodate some limited claims of intrinsic value for equal democratic citizenship as a public affirmation of equal status for individuals. It does not, however, presume that democratic participation necessarily enables autonomy or embodies equality. Both can be frustrated for persistent electoral minorities. A primarily instrumental approach is shown to orient more clearly to political humility, in part by emphasizing mechanisms of challenge before an impartial arbiter in legal and ombuds systems. Such an approach cannot guarantee that political humility will prevail. It does, however, provide individuals with important resources for challenging forms of political arrogance, while also promoting a systemic orientation to political humility.

Ambedkar on Political Humility and Challenging Political Arrogance

This chapter situates an initial presentation of humility and arrogance in the context of Ambedkar’s lifelong struggle against the “arrogance and selfishness” of a caste system. It contrasts Gandhi’s calls for the mostly voluntary abolition of practices of untouchability with Ambedkar’s institutional emphasis. Ambedkar sought the establishment of relatively strongly empowered democratic institutions affirming political equality for all persons, and electoral and other reservations for deeply excluded groups such as Dalits. Some recent psychological and philosophical literature is surveyed on personal and political humility, with the latter understood as an acknowledgment of the equal standing of others within political institutions, openness to input and challenge from them, and an intellectual modesty about the finality of one’s own views or judgments. Ambedkar’s own evolving conceptions of political humility are then presented, in ideals of fraternity, Deweyan social endosmosis, and the Buddhist maitri.

The Soul of Global Democracy

This chapter considers some objections lodged by universalist moral theorists. First it addresses Martha Nussbaum’s rejection of robust cosmopolitan institutions on grounds that they would not respect collective domestic choices. Such a stance is shown to give too little attention to domestic repression. Simon Caney’s partly instrumental model of cosmopolitan democracy is shown to provide important insights. It places such strong emphasis on respecting “reasonable disagreement” among persons, however, that it could affirm democratic outcomes deeply skewed in favor of the global majority. An alternative is outlined, informed by Ambedkar’s “soul of democracy” vision of social democracy. It would work to constitutionalize some global economic aim rights, including freer movement of persons, and support the development of related challenge mechanisms. Some practical insights to inform the development of such a framework, and rights specifications processes within it, are taken from the case of the National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights, and from the European and other regional governance contexts.

The Arrogance of States

This chapter argues that the current global system is structurally oriented to political arrogance. It inappropriately permits states to summarily reject the standing of actors such as the National Campaign on Dalit Human rights to file any actionable rights-based challenges vertically, to global bodies, and the standing of individual “outsiders” or other states to file horizontal challenges. Such rejections are inappropriate because the claims being dismissed are typically based in the very rights that ground states’ sovereign prerogatives to dismiss them. The current system is also shown to be strongly conducive to political vices of apathy and selfishness. The identification of each political vice, it is argued, highlights reasons to support an institutional global citizenship approach, alongside collective-action problems and other reasons offered by institutional cosmopolitan theorists. Some possible individual duties of global citizenship to support global institutional development are then discussed, and some stringent recent objections to such duties are engaged.

Embracing the “Fiction of Equality”

This chapter addresses why political humility should be affirmed and promoted, even against some dominant societal norms. It takes as its departure point Ambedkar’s own core questions around moral duties in his deeply segregated and inegalitarian domestic context: “Why must the individual be the end and not the means of all social purposes? . . . Why should we sacrifice our most precious possessions and our lives to defend the rights of the human person?” He offers practically oriented arguments for accepting the “fiction of equality” and seeking equal treatment for all persons from social and political institutions. He also offers multiple doctrinal and nondoctrinal groundings for affirming the high equal worth of persons and the high moral status it would entail. Each, it is shown, supports the recognition of equal standing that is at the core of political humility, while also providing important groundings for some categories of fundamental individual rights.