Waiting for Change (or for Godot)

One of the articles that we discussed intimately during the Sustainable Global Economic Law Summer School last week was Amna A. Akbar’s Non-Reformist Reforms and Struggles over Life, Death, and Democracy. This piece was nothing short of provocative and mindblowing. In one part, Akbar wrote that “to focus on reformism is to orient action toward entrenching, rather than overthrowing or substituting, a fundamentally corrupt system, institution, or set of relations.” To accentuate her point, Akbar cited to Rosa Luxemburg, who - in Reform or Revolution - wrote:

“[P]eople who pronounce themselves in favor or legislative reform in place of and in contradistinction to the conquest of political power and social revolution do not choose a more tranquil, calmer, and slower road to the same goal, but a different goal. Instead of taking a stand for the establishment of a new society they take a stand for surface modification of the old society.”

These words got me in a bit of a funk (I think in a good way if there is such a thing). It prodded me with the uncomfortable question of “am I doing enough?!”, which was followed up by the “am I part of the problem?!” inquisition. I’ve been grappling with the question of how people and institutions (can) change to behave in a more pro-social manner (in boardrooms and in classrooms). I’ve been researching how laws can (or cannot) incentivize such changes. Though I have yet to find any panaceas (perhaps because none exist), I was generally convinced that I was doing more good than harm, that is until I read Akbar’s piece.

At times, I’ve advocated for revolutionary thinking (but with a careful and politically sensitive caveat of “don't be too militant about it”). At times, I’ve “played the game” and tried to work within “the system” with all of its glorious, bureaucratic confinements. I’ve even used terms like kaizen (unironically) like a good little Japanese boy and convinced myself that “this is the way”. Through these emotional and strategic oscillations, I always found myself constantly second guessing whether what I was doing was “right” or whether change was actually coming. Akbar’s piece lit a match to my already gasoline-filled insecurity.

In Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot, the moment Vladimir and Estragon realize that Godot is not coming (even though they spent the entire play talking about him and waiting for the man), the absurdist reveal is made. This realization forces the audience to also question what we are doing with our lives (at least I think that’s what the play was about). In some ways, we’re all Vladimir and Estragon, waiting for changes that never seem to manifest. Here, I’m not necessarily talking about small scale changes (which I think/hope are possible), but big systematic changes like fighting climate change or smashing the patriarchy. Are we making enough meaningful strides here or are we just operating within what Akbar refers to as a “fundamentally corrupt system” with its set of unfair rules that distribute wealth and entitlements so unequally? Are we all just complicit in perpetuating the status quo by talking about reforms instead of profoundly fundamental, structural changes?

One of the participants from the summer school (Chatham House rules and all) quoted Gary Simpson from The Sentimental Life of International Law, noting that:

“[p]rotesting is one thing, reconstituting society is quite another. The thrill of dissent or opposition is just so much more appealing than the hard yards of political reconstruction. Shared opposition is relatively easy, a shared programme not so easy… And yet, the thought persisits… what, indeed, is to be done?”

Waiting around for change or merely complaining about all the injustices in the world, like waiting for Godot, doesn’t really get us anywhere. Even small scale reforms - if you side with Akbar and Luxembourg - may not lead to meaningful changes in fixing a fundamentally broken system. While some may argue that the status quo is not as broken as it seems, I would suspect that those with such sentiments are entitled to extreme privileges, which are not afforded to those that bear the burdens of our flawed systems and institutions.

So how do we change or what do we change? These were the fundamental questions that we posed in the summer school and long story short, we all struggled mightily to answer them. As Simpson observed, it's easy to realize that's something isn't right and to call that out (or as the academics would say, “raising awareness”). But reconstituing societies, well, that is the grand challenge of our time (akin to getting Godot to actually show up for dinner). No panaceas here, but once you wake up to this realization - that the systems that we operate on are flawed - it’s impossible to close that Pandora’s box and to sleep peacefully at night. So in closing, I’m sorry for opening your box. I was just trying to “raise awareness” in the misguided (and possibly selfish) hopes of lightening the burden that I’ve been trying to process since the summer school.