The Blame Game and the Genetic Code-Hegemony

There is something strange about the playground and the dynamics of growing up. There big guy is seldom the bully...if you pay close attention he is often used by a smaller guy whose size does not seem to limit the depths of his ambition. He ( the little guy) veils his inadequacies by controlling others and successfully manages to control and manipulate the bigger guy into doing his dirty work. 

This is China's dilemma. He is simply the bigger guy who everyone watches and blames while a littler guy gets away with all the planning and dirty work. So how do we identify the little guy in order to ease the tension on China. 

This week the premier spoke quite clearly about China's DNA and the idea that it is not written into the people's code to exercise rule over others. 

So what does the future look like. The dragon (revered in the East but feared and shunned in the West) is a useful symbol in understanding Chinese Psyche but statements by the German leader about the it's rise in the future have done little to assuage these fears. 

I suspect that the future will bring about more thoughts about different civilizations that marked ancient China...and even date I say thoughts but a revival of the Ancient Rulers. Strange that a Hong Kong billionaire has recently sought to create a prize of his own (which he is calling the Tang Prize) to rival the Nobel Prize. This could be a sign of a desire to revive not the Kings necessarily, but the individual civilizations in their glory. 

So what shape or form does the little bully take?

Is it communism? A concept that was developed by the Russians and that helped shape Chinese thinking. Or maybe thoughts from France regarding revolution which were also responsible for displacing the ruling class and helping refocus the population towards the working class.

The challenge is that the blame will fall on the bigger guy and he will have to face a barrage of insults until the power or force behind him is identified. What is strange about this is that 

China's size and her needs for energy and resources (especially food) places her in a place of vulnerability so that none of what she does in defense of her freedoms or territories can be seen as anything but aggression. Her smaller neighbors on the other hand, can do as they please and lay the blame on their larger neighbor. 

My suggestion- watch her smaller neighbors..Taiwan and Tibet. They may have the key to understanding her aggression. 

The Game and The Politics

It is interesting to watch the interplay between politics and soccer.
Politics and governance seems to produce to effects in its citizens.
There is always a group that choses to leave. It may have experienced a little oppression or may feel little or limited hope in a system that is skewed against its particular clan or language group.
Then there is another select portion that is just adventurous and that has a pioneering spirit. All that and a some extra cash. Moving to a foreign country can be a costly measure. Sometimes this same group often has to pay for this trip with scarce resources and then invests all its hopes in one member. The price of this venture is often land (scare, valuable and treasured). 

Then there are those who stay because leadership often flows in relationships and benefits those with the right name.
Along this group though is another that stays because it has not choice. You must watch this group because it has its stake on the land and its resources and contributes directly using its sweat and tears. Scriptural reference to plows and pruning hooks is written for this group not those who govern and lead using other methods.

At the heart of this struggle is the idea that some still celebrate independence while others are a little too smart to believe the hype. Interestingly, the Amazon has produced very few tribes that have lasted this long using compromise.   

Post independence struggles have instead created a patronage system that progresses by compromise.

Soccer has created similar results. What you have are a few who brave the seas and endure that abuse to find a spot in a good football club. After the struggle many often return to take center stage but facing the difficulty of creating a united front. The challenge for this group is uniting with the group that stays and that feels like it has right to the stage too.

The teams which these guys play for too, have something that they can teach us. Firstly, they are often are not easily led because of a preference for foreign coaches. The feeling is that they are often 'better', but i suspect that the skills they offer have nothing to do with this. Our populations are better led by foreigners with little or no knowledge of our practices because they can judge us entirely on performance. Local coaches on the other hand can be seen to be partial even if they are just as capable.  

It is interesting to watch the current scene of players as it splits between colonial master and colonized.
Well funded and not so well funded.
Maybe at this point it is most important to realize that one is competent enough to find their way onto the Center stage and to have an impact.  

The Dragon's Den

A few weeks ago i posted the linked to an podcast about
the importance of establishing hegemony and the 'conversation' that is taking place between the U.S and China. I am new to this stuff but it was amazing how much flexibility the Americans have enjoyed around the world.

We have not experienced China's rise and the use of her influence at least not in the full regard. What we seem to have seen here, is the expression of her strength economically and in her ability to drive African development...with no apparent strings attached. The Americans though have emerged with new technology which is changing the manner in which war are fought. But limitations in this regard still mean that at the end of the day, boots still matter.

How quickly technology can recreate the soldier so that men can merge with machines or at least imitate the boots on the ground is an argument for another blog. What is clear though is that China's need for resources and the size of her populations along with her eventual military muscle will soon overtake her need for soft power. We are seeing some expressions of this in the Far East as smaller powers cower at the dragon's tail and its desire for more resources.

It is no wonder the unimagined is now happening and the Vietnamese are now embracing and courting the American's who...not too long ago they successfully resisted.

Maybe this time around the younger Vietnamese will rekindle the flames of their long gone heroes to launch a similar resistance but times have changed and military battles are not fought with ordinary weapons. Vietnam has been challenged though and this time around America in not facing the same Russian foe. 

The Author of the podcast stated that one of the advantages of establishing a regional hegemony was that it gives you freedom to roam...unchallenged.

Conflicts that arise will therefore be linked to other nations that challenge one's ability to roam freely and the exert influence and in our case affect access to resources.
The American public is exhausted but its military industrial complex is booming. Clearly the drone is as significant a development in the History of warfare as was the Oxbow, Catapault, firearm and later on the Mechanized Vehicle. 

A word of caution. The party is much bigger than the individual and care must be taken to ensure that sensitivities within the Chinese psyche are considered (loosing face). So be very careful never to rebuke or challenge your foreign friends publicly. The last thing on their minds is messing you up and loosing face. If you have to let them deal with their own challenges.

There is an interesting development in Korean History and Chinese History where three kingdom mergers came to the fore. Every time powerful kingdoms met with other Kingdoms (or their religious manifestations), they each faced the challenge of disunity (internally rising from groups that had to chose who to follow) and the choice toward unity for all smaller kingdoms under one banner. In Uganda, the Ganda, Ankole, Soga and Bunyoro Kingdoms faced similar challenges.

In the early nineteen hundreds, choices had to be made between reigning monarch and factions that were pro British (protestant), French (catholic), or even Arab (muslim). The casualties were many but the results devastating. There was a failure to realize that none of the groups that came to 'evangelize' were independent from governments that sent them and that none was insulated from the desire for resources and trade.   

Good Idea bad press.

Its been about four weeks since the launch of a new project to help register Ugandans. The project is a great idea but also a challenge for the new head of the Internal Affairs Ministry.

Around the time of the previous elections, we became familiar with the new system and many of us indeed did brave the process,long lines, photos and finger printing that came with this project. It is highly doubtful that the Germans that helped manage this project could have failed in its execution (but that is just my opinion regarding the effectiveness of our Bavarian Friends). But that is besides the point.

The ads that are running in some media outlets are rather discouraging especially for someone who has lived in other countries (Kenya, Uganda and South Africa?). For starters, the ad refers to kitambulisho which is an infamous term that those who lived in Kenya in the early eighties are all to aware of. At the time, many Ugandans were living as refugees and fears were ripe about the possibilities of being deported to a country that at the time was rather unstable and still recovering.

The Kenyans too had similar encounters although their experiences predated independence and were more common in the class system that separated blacks from white and that brought about the rise of the Mau Mau movement.

As the gap between rich and poor grows larger and as a revival of precolonial tendencies seems to reemerge, i suspect that we will find ourselves battling our old colonial demons.

Another common reference that has fueled many concerns amongst historians and common citizens is the return of late seventies systems of leadership and law enforcement that were referred to as panda gari. At the heart of some of this concern was the use of the Swahili language which was often used by liberators but that was also used by rowdy and undisciplined soldiers to intimidate the populace.

Hard core ganda loyalists were therefore often anti-swahili because they seemed to have borne the brunt of the force.

South Africa comes into mind because more and more Africans seem to look on her as a liberator of sorts mainly because of the work of men like Madiba. Others though have seemed more doubtful about the true demonstration of these freedoms and have accused the ANC of failing to deliver and instead consolidating power into political hands. South Africa has relevance because here too, the concept of Kitambulisho came to the fore and was fiercely resisted by the vibrant populations.

Machiavelli: Religion and Politics

In this installment on power and politics, I will deal briefly with Machiavelli

And his suggestions for leaders and their relationship with Religion.

I will attempt to give it a little bit of context by restricting some of these discussions to UG. 

He was writing a little like the Arabian Nights story. He know his life was in danger and his success and progress in the hands of that influential Italian Family rested in his ability to demonstrate just how useful he was going to be. 

Recently, we faced an election in a resistance movement stronghold-Luwero. Experts and historians say that this triangle was used to help begin the resistance war that ushered in the new regime. This is described as a historical stronghold of the Democratic Party which was Catholic. The Uganda Peoples Congress was accused of rigging an election and was enjoying a second phase in power when the current president-then rebel took to the bush. 

While the current women representative elections seems to have little effect on larger political questions, there is an attempt to restore or amalgamate politics around religion. 

In the game of chess, as I have written before(http://intas8n.blogspot.com/2014/02/mr-no-regrets.html), the master strategist has to make sure that he allies his king and queen with a religious stronghold on both sides of the monarchy. Even if we seldom admit it, religion has played a major role in dictating the manner in which our kingdoms and run and the delicate means by which successors to the throne are determined. The Protestants realized this long ago and chose to focus the thrust of thief religious authority on the monarchy. 

In UG, most of our seven hills have sets to our most significant religious systems. Old Kampala for the Muslims, Namirembe for the Protestants, and  for the Catholics. It is also important to note that corresponding medical centers were also established at this key points in the city. 

While the Kingdom reasons rather silent on issues of loyalty often the news is awash with stories of martyrdom and a bloody history of Kings who clashed with subjects that put religion of kingdom. 

But the battle rages on. Countries like the Philippines have taken on a tougher stance with their governments and have been actively involved in politics perhaps even taking on the role of kingmaker. 

Here the balance is much more delicate. I suspect though that religion will take centre stage in the battle for leadership and influence. 

Maybe more camels(land cruisers) will exchange hands. Maybe like in some previous posts the emergence of new leadership in Anglican circles will begin to look frighteningly similar to district level elections

(http://intas8n.blogspot.com/2014/02/when-religious-appointment-meets.html). We wait to see! 

Plowshares into Swords?

Plowshares into Swords?

Every time trouble breaks out in these parts, and a struggle begins, you immediately have the emergence of two groups. A group that chooses to stay and fight and one that chooses to leave.
http://www.monitor.co.ug/Magazines/PeoplePower/Lupembe--How-presidents-Lule--Binaisa-were-juggled/-/689844/2318542/-/4lmu90/-/index.html the article by Henry Lubega has some interesting similarities to this very idea. The difference though, is that these are being played out in a different context. 

Even if some could argue that there is no overt push towards and struggle similar to that of the eighties, certain challenges in the economy have forced many to leave and the harder core to stay. 

These differences have resulted in an interesting relationship between those who by circumstance have decided to work in foreign countries while supporting relatives and friends back home. The tensions that have arisen on the return of the former are still as palpable as those that were mentioned in the article by Lubega. 

There are some ways in which Post World War I and II, nations have been forced more that ever to devise other means by which to annihilate each other and even if the effects are often less gruesome they are still as effective and damaging if not more. In a sense, most of our modern day battles have become economic. The fallout from these battles has been an increase in poetry and a rise in real estate for ghettos and shanty towns. 

So the need to better circumstances has driven us abroad in search of better pastures. While many are unwilling to turn their plowshares into swords, they have none the less held on to these tools in preparation for a change of circumstance.