Blog 3 – A Cultural Liberation

The first overlap between Sukarno’s and Cabral’s exploration of culture and anti-colonial liberation is about the tolerance and acceptance that each of the colonized people must extend to each other. Both refer to a need for unity in the face of colonial oppression, which continues in insidious extensions of economic and political hegemony even after supposed decolonization. Sukarno’s emphasis on maintaining unity despite the sheer variety of cultures, religions and worldviews existing in the postcolonial states suggests that culture has a significant effect on the paradigms of the aforementioned states. Any form of cultural chauvinism might lead to gaps between the necessary cultural and political understanding that must be cultivated. Both recognize the significant diversity even within continents and regions but both view this as strength. Cabral suggests that the working revolutionary classes will be galvanized as they come into contact with various groups and communities. Similarly, Sukarno focuses on unity in diversity, as a means of bringing a diverse range of inputs into mutual discussion while carrying the common premise of anti-colonialism. One must not believe their culture to be superior to that of the other, claims Cabral.  Cabral places an inherent moral value in the preservation of culture that is progressive and leads to positive outcomes. Sukarno suggests that the movement of the postcolonial states must now be one characterized by strong ethics and morals. It is not difficult to believe that Sukarno would have also agreed with this particular view of Cabral. Cabral’s warnings against cultural chauvinism become more potent where we see Sukarno clamouring for the states to push for preservation of international peace and security. Such peace can be difficult to achieve if states are competing with each other, in attempts to declare their culture superior.

Both individuals have similar conceptions of how colonialism impacted local culture and it appears more explicitly in Cabral’s text. He characterizes the colonial powers as implanting their own culture within the colony, denigrating that of the indigenous populations and attempting to assimilate the local elite. Sukarno characterizes the colonized people as passive and unaware, lacking the strength to rally against the injustices. Cabral suggests that the best way to prevent discontent from fermenting was to alienate the colonized from their culture, divorce the local elite from the more culturally entrenched working class and make the former associate lowness with that culture and hence with the latter. Both of these refer to a population unwilling to rally for their rights that is fractured and weak. Such was the impact of cultural colonialism.

Sukarno does not suggest that systems and cultures may contain elements that are regressive or obstacles to socio-economic development of nations and groups. This is a primary focus of Cabral, who insists that regressive ideas should be abandoned and to not follow a culture for its own sake.  Sukarno attempts to bring all backgrounds and faiths into one united front and these require the glossing over of the inadequacies in many cultures.