IT is outside the scope of a newspaper column to explain one of the great concepts in the study of philosophy called the dialectic.
Though ancient Hindu and Greek thinkers wrote about this peculiar force that shapes the broad flow of events in life, it was first developed in the modern world by the German philosopher, Georg Hegel, then given brilliant elaboration by Karl Marx and taken to its logical climax by French philosopher, Jean Paul Sartre.
To put it in a form that is crudely brief, the dialectic is the force that is responsible for the general and broad movement of society from stage to stage in the evolution of social development in which social contradictions work themselves out in ways that are not necessarily predictable.
Prior to the input of Sartre, Marxist philosophers accepted that humans were subjected to the relentless march of the dialectic. In his seminal work in philosophy, ‘Critique of Dialectical Reason’, Sartre took issue with mainstream Marxist philosophy’s understanding of the dialectic.

Sartre removed the passive role of humans in the movement of the dialectic and inserted an active role for what philosophers call “individual will” in the working out of the dialectic which he borrowed from the Dutch existentialist philosopher, Soren Kierkegaard. Sartre put it this way, “man makes the dialectic just as the dialectic makes him.”
Though this was Kierkegaard’s original thought, Sartre’s expansion on it created a revolution in the study of philosophy and his book is regarded as one of the best 20th century texts on philosophy; in my opinion, second only to Martin Heidegger’s “Being and Time.” It is now acknowledged in the study of the dialectic that there is a definitive role for free will in the determination of events; that just as the dialectic can change the social scene, the individual can shape the social scene.
For the best simplification for the lay person of Kierkegaard and Sartre versus Marxist philosophers, see the book by the great 20th century European communist, Franz Marek, “Philosophy of World Revolution.” It has been out of print since 1969 but you can Xerox my copy.

I would argue on the basis of both Marx’s and Sartre’s postulations on the dialectic that the PPP can win a future local government election (LGE) for the Georgetown district. Ralph Ramkarran writing last week in his Conversation Tree blog observed that: “The PPP can never win the Mayoralty and the majority of seats on the City Council.”
Based on my acceptance of the dialectic, I believe there are all kinds of possibilities in politics. When I read what Ralph wrote I thought of what I heard millions of times from a small boy to a grown up adult – an Afro-American can never be the president of the US. The son of India immigrants is the PM of the UK. The most Catholic country after Italy has a PM that is in the LGBTQ+ community.

The USSR collapsed and the first Cold War ended. The US pulled out of South Vietnam and Vietnamese unification was achieved. In the strictly Muslin nations of Pakistan and Bangladesh, women became the heads of government.

The dialectic can favour a PPP victory from both the perspective of Marx and Sartre. First, both class and ethnic confrontation in Guyana fall within the realm of the demand to share in national wealth. If the petroleum industry can provide a national income that is colossal over a long period of time, economic changes can satisfy both class and ethnic demands.
From all the predictions I have seen there will be a yearly increase in oil revenues for decades to come. The oil find in Guyana is huge within the context of the smallness of our population. Petro-dollars, if used with the application of a certain amount of socialist perspectives, can see the following – mitigation of class and ethnic suspicion by the African proletariat and the African middle class; the expansion of the currently small rural African peasantry and the rapid increase of the nascent African petit bourgeoisie.
These dialectical changes will have tremendous implications for electoral competition that will tend to favour the incumbent. It is silly for anyone to think that the incumbent that distributes the national patrimony will not enjoy electoral capital.

Secondly, in terms of the role of the individual in the movement of the dialectic, as described by Sartre, there is the personality of an innovative president, Dr. Ali. He will win the 2025 poll and at the conclusion of his ten years, I think he may eclipse Cheddi Jagan as Guyana’s leading political figure. In conclusion, the PPP could win the Georgetown LGE. That is a distinct possibility.