This is an edited extract from the 2004 Sydney Peace Prize lecture
delivered by Arundhati Roy at the Seymour Center last night.
Sometimes there's truth in old cliches. There can be no real
peace without justice. And without resistance there will be no
justice. Today, it is not merely justice itself, but the idea of
justice that is under attack.
The assault on vulnerable, fragile sections of society is so
complete, so cruel and so clever that its sheer audacity has eroded
our definition of justice. It has forced us to lower our sights,
and curtail our expectations. Even among the well-intentioned, the
magnificent concept of justice is gradually being substituted with
the reduced, far more fragile discourse of "human rights".
This is an alarming shift. The difference is that notions of
equality, of parity, have been pried loose and eased out of the
equation. It's a process of attrition. Almost unconsciously, we
begin to think of justice for the rich and human rights for the
poor. Justice for the corporate world, human rights for its
victims. Justice for Americans, human rights for Afghans and
Iraqis. Justice for the Indian upper castes, human rights for
Dalits and Adivasis (if that.) Justice for white Australians, human
rights for Aborigines and immigrants (most times, not even
that.)
It is becoming more than clear that violating human rights is an
inherent and necessary part of the process of implementing a
coercive and unjust political and economic structure on the world.
Increasingly, human rights violations are being portrayed as the
unfortunate, almost accidental, fallout of an otherwise acceptable
political and economic system. As though they are a small problem
that can be mopped up with a little extra attention from some
non-government organisation.
This is why in areas of heightened conflict - in Kashmir and in
Iraq for example - human rights professionals are regarded with a
degree of suspicion. Many resistance movements in poor countries
which are fighting huge injustice and questioning the underlying
principles of what constitutes "liberation" and "development" view
human rights non-government organisations as modern-day
missionaries who have come to take the ugly edge off imperialism -
to defuse political anger and to maintain the status quo.
It has been only a few weeks since Australia re-elected John
Howard, who, among other things, led the nation to participate in
the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq.
That invasion will surely go down in history as one of the most
cowardly wars ever. It was a war in which a band of rich nations,
armed with enough nuclear weapons to destroy the world several
times over, rounded on a poor nation, falsely accused it of having
nuclear weapons, used the United Nations to force it to disarm,
then invaded it, occupied it and are now in the process of selling
it.
I speak of Iraq, not because everybody is talking about it, but
because it is a sign of things to come. Iraq marks the beginning of
a new cycle. It offers us an opportunity to watch the
corporate-military cabal that has come to be known as "empire" at
work. In the new Iraq, the gloves are off.
As the battle to control the world's resources intensifies,
economic colonialism through formal military aggression is staging
a comeback. Iraq is the logical culmination of the process of
corporate globalisation in which neo-colonialism and neo-liberalism
have fused. If we can find it in ourselves to peep behind the
curtain of blood, we would glimpse the pitiless transactions taking
place backstage.
Invaded and occupied Iraq has been made to pay out $US200
million ($270 million) in "reparations" for lost profits to
corporations such as Halliburton, Shell, Mobil, Nestle, Pepsi,
Kentucky Fried Chicken and Toys R Us. That's apart from its $US125
billion sovereign debt forcing it to turn to the IMF, waiting in
the wings like the angel of death, with its structural adjustment
program. (Though in Iraq there don't seem to be many structures
left to adjust.)
So what does peace mean in this savage, corporatised,
militarised world? What does peace mean to people in occupied Iraq,
Palestine, Kashmir, Tibet and Chechnya? Or to the Aboriginal people
of Australia? Or the Kurds in Turkey? Or the Dalits and Adivasis of
India? What does peace mean to non-Muslims in Islamic countries, or
to women in Iran, Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan? What does it mean
to the millions who are being uprooted from their lands by dams and
development projects? What does peace mean to the poor who are
being actively robbed of their resources? For them, peace is
war.
We know very well who benefits from war in the age of empire.
But we must also ask ourselves honestly who benefits from peace in
the age of empire? War mongering is criminal. But talking of peace
without talking of justice could easily become advocacy for a kind
of capitulation. And talking of justice without unmasking the
institutions and the systems that perpetrate injustice is beyond
hypocritical.
It's easy to blame the poor for being poor. It's easy to believe
that the world is being caught up in an escalating spiral of
terrorism and war. That's what allows George Bush to say, "You're
either with us or with the terrorists." But that's a spurious
choice. Terrorism is only the privatisation of war. Terrorists are
the free marketeers of war. They believe that the legitimate use of
violence is not the sole prerogative of the state.
It is mendacious to make moral distinction between the
unspeakable brutality of terrorism and the indiscriminate carnage
of war and occupation. Both kinds of violence are unacceptable. We
cannot support one and condemn the other.
© 2004 Sydney Morning Herald
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