ONE of the lasting contributions, French existentialist, Jean-Paul Sartre (perhaps the second-best existentialist in philosophy after Martin Heidegger) has made to philosophy is his modification of the dialectic.
With his innovative and iconoclastic input, Sartre has changed our understanding of how the dialectic shapes the dynamism inherent in society. Prior to Sartre’s magnum opus, “Critique of Dialectical Reason,” traditional Marxists adhered to the acceptance that man is a product of circumstances which determine man’s action.

Even though the exceptional Italian philosopher, Antonio Gramsci, disputed this approach, his exposition was overlooked and traditional Marxists stuck with what they believed was the position of Marx that there are general laws of history and these laws determine human action. Traditional Marxists based their understanding of Marx (which is a misunderstanding of Marx’s work) that man’s make-up is the deterministic product of existing circumstances shaped by economic conditions.

Most unfortunate in the study of philosophy after the Second World War was the overlooking of Gramsci’s brilliant dissection of global capitalism and his seminal contribution to how the ruling classes use culture and psychology to preserve their hegemony in class struggle. But while Gramsci was overlooked because he died in prison under Mussolini’s dictatorship before the war, Sartre was the celebrated star of philosophy after the war when Marxist philosophy took hold of global academia.

In publishing “Critique of Dialectical Reason” in 1960, Sartre turned the dialectic upside-down. Here is what Sartre offered and it has since become an integral part of understanding how the dialectic moves society. Sartre argued that man makes history not only in given circumstances as Marx wrote but man may be able to shape those circumstances. Sartre puts it this way: “The point is to affirm the specific character of the human act … while traversing the social scene… within a certain field of possibilities, man steps outside his historical and social limitations by what he succeeds in making what has been made of him.”
This was a breathtaking departure in the understanding of the dialectic. What Sartre had argued is that man makes the dialectic just as the dialectic makes him. Here are the words of Sartre: “Man undergoes the dialectic as much as he makes it and makes it as much as he undergoes it.”

After the publication of “Critique of Dialectical Reason” our understanding of the dialectic was now based on Sartre’s theorising and today it has complete acceptance in philosophy. Before I apply Sartre to President Ali in Guyana, two points in philosophy need clarification. One is that though Sartre became the definitive philosopher after the war, Marxist philosophy owes its recognition of its traditional flaws to the brilliance of Gramsci. If there was no Gramsci there might not have been a Jean-Paul Sartre.

The other point to note is that Marx, like Sigmund Freud, was a complex thinker and there is unlimited misunderstanding of what he wrote. I believe Marx did not succumb to the vulgarization that man is conditioned and shaped by the prevailing milieu of which he is a part and cannot force changes in the milieu. In his book, “Theses on Feuerbach,” Marx argues the contrary.
Now for President Ali. Having laid the groundwork for the polemic that the individual can act on the dialectic and bring about changes, I think Guyana is seeing this with Ali. I don’t think anyone in Guyana foresaw that Ali could have emerged as a game changer in Guyana’s sociology. But this is what we are seeing in Guyana today.

The one area of Guyana’s sociology where I think he has proven Sartre right is ethnic psychology. Ali in a racially suspicious society has traversed the social scene (using Sartre’s words) and has reshaped Guyana’s recurring sociological curse – ethnic suspicion of leaders based on race.
I have not seen one episode where Ali has been met with a lukewarm reception from African Guyanese and the Amerindian people. There has been no instance of hostility from the African people to his presence. His presence among African people on Soiree night, the event the night before Emancipation traditionally held in Hopetown, Berbice and on Emancipation Day itself, tells a story of the dialectic and how the individual can shape it.

It is outside the scope of a newspaper column to explain how the dialectic is changing ethnic sociology in Guyana and the role of President Ali in reshaping the ethnic landscape. I will end with my belief that the embrace of the Amerindians and Africans that he is currently getting and if he uses that acceptance to deliver to them what they expect (and I don’t see why the oil economy cannot make that delivery a reality), Ali is going to end up as the best politician Guyana’s history has produced.
DISCLAIMER: The views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Guyana National Newspapers Limited.