Let us rejoice therefore

The new academic year is around the corner. Students will soon pour into the Msida labyrinth. Most first-years will not wish to be dropped off by the “old” gate by their parents. That’s for kids, they will argue. But if their papa and mama insist – those who have not themselves had the opportunity to attend University, first and foremost – then first-years will condescendingly please them but with the paternalism of someone who has already made it. Roles are switched. The first-year becomes father or mother; their fathers and mothers become children. In any case, when they are out of the car, first-years rarely look back to wave back at their idiotically-waving parents. They dive into the crowd and pretend they came alone.

The others, those who’ve been there for a year or two, will tend to look down on first-years. You do so by feigning an air of world-weariness, of impatience with the self-important and apparently purposeful strutting of first-years around the campus. The second-years are the best in this regard. If the first-year stands erect and adopts a studious posture (armfuls of books are determinant), the second-year slouches, adopts a meticulously studied who-cares look, carries no books. Third-years and beyond don’t care what you think anyway; they’re too busy worrying. The aesthetic considerations of first-years and second-years are none of their concern.

“Ubi sunt qui ante nos in mundo fuere?” (Where are they who before us went into the world?). This, many will have recognised it, is the first verse of the oldest surviving part of De Brevitate Vitae (On the shortness of life), the student hymn sung all over Europe and beyond since mediaeval times and better known as Gaudeamus igitur (Let us rejoice therefore). The contrast between the sombre ancient core of the hymn crowned by its dead serious correct title and the jolly fun bits (where sex gets top priority) crowned by the famous title, could not be starker.

Ubi sunt qui ante nos in mundo fuere?                                                                                                                                                                                                    Vadite ad superos
Transite in inferos
Hos si vis videre(Where are they who before us were in the world? Go to the heavens. Cross over into hell. If you wish to see them.)

These verses, probably from a 13th century penitential hymn, are more congenial to world-weary students in their second year and beyond than to the first-years. One academic year is, however, more than enough to realise that the out-there world is full of former students, many of whom ought, by rights, to be rotting in hell and a few who probably deserve to be in heaven after having suffered for half a dozen eons in purgatory.

The idea of the university as an ivory tower unreachable by the evils of the “out-there” world is, of course, a naïve one that the student soon learns to abandon. The second-year with a minimum of intelligence (don’t be duped by the apparent asininity, it is a survival tactic requiring great skill and constant practice) knows that whatever is in the “out-there” – in our society – is also “in here”, in the apparently “other” world of academia. The second-year has seen it all. The experience of her/his first year at University has confirmed what s/he suspected all along. Maltese society is not for the innocent.

Students in the so-called Middle Ages, especially those whose student life was about to come to an end and who were about to go into the world out there, knew that it was going to be tough. The latter – modern, if you wish – parts of the song indicate various possible life strategies one might wish to adopt in these circumstances.

In view of the shortness and brutishness of life “out-there” – of which, I repeat, they had a taste in the ivory tower – the Gaudeamus igitur suggests that one ought, first of all, to be nice to those in power. First of all kowtow to your lecturers: “Vivat academia! Vivant professores!” (Long live the academy! Long live the professors!). But the place of honour is reserved to those above the university and the professors, those who wield state power.

Vivat et respublica
et qui illam regit.
Vivat nostra civitas,
Maecenatum caritas
Quae nos hic protegit.

 

(Long live the state as well. And he who rules it! Long live our city. [And] the charity of benefactors, which protects us here!) Substitute “benefactors” for the state that pays your stipendium and it all fits together nicely. Hence, the pragmatism of the third-years. Two and over years of the University of Malta have impressed upon them the necessity of bowing to those in power. It’s a certificate in your kowtowing proficiency today. It will be a government job tomorrow. Or whatever you might need and are unable to get without intercession.

Finally, because a people must be discouraged from taking too close an interest in the affairs of state and the panem et circenses trick still works, the old hymn exclaims: Pereat tristitia! (Perish sadness). In words written before universities opened their doors to women, the student is encouraged to go to Paceville.

Vivant omnes virgines
Faciles, formosae…

Mario Vella

This article appeared in Dr Vella’s column in The Times of Malta on September 14, 2009.  The original may be accessed at http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20090914/opinion/let-us-rejoice-therefore

You chew your bread

If you are one of those who do not like having their bread chewed into a disgusting pulp by others and then pumped down their throat, then I am talking to you. Am I right to say that there is a sense of pointlessness and exhaustion in the air; a feeling that the country is running out of steam, that creativity and the will to get things done have reached historically unprecedented low levels? Am I wrong to suggest that there is a creeping despair – among those of us who would rather bite personally into their loaf – that, as a country, we will ever measure up to the European ideals we often pay lip service to? Is this, perhaps, merely the fruit of my fertile imagination?

Or is it, perhaps, the evil fruit of my more than evident political commitment to Joseph Muscat’s new season? Pause to consider the latter possibility. Could it be the case that the author of this fortnightly column is simply out to demoralise you, to lead you astray from the right path, with a view to contributing to undermine your confidence in Lawrence Gonzi and those in his party that continue to support him? Could it be, in fact, that you – as one of those who prefer to chew their bread themselves – are in great spirits and have no doubt at all that we are living in the best of possible worlds?

• I often return to a slim volume – it lies horizontally on other, thicker ones on the bookshelf closest to me in my study – by Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini, the former Archbishop of Milan, an intellectual highly respected across Italy’s political spectrum and well beyond. It’s his Viaggio nel Vocabolario dell’Etica (1993), translated into Maltese by Dun Anġ Seychell and published, with a preface by Dr. Joe (Peppinu) Cassar.

The core thought of the outspoken Turinese priest, in this text, is that we are all, individually and collectively, responsible for what goes on around us. Not only does he not exclude the political sphere but, on the contrary, he emphasises its central role within the issue of responsibility. Politics, he argues with his customary clarity, is not the exclusive business of politicians. Politics is everybody’s business.

Is there a point to politics? He asks. Is there hope in politics? He also asks. Yes, he replies, but only if… well, he does not need me to tell you what he thinks is required to give meaning to politics and hope to those that have to bear its consequences. I am sure the booklet is still easily available in either Maltese or Italian, get it and read it. It is 16 years old but tastes as fresh as a freshly baked Maltese loaf. You don’t need me to bite and chew it for you.

Moreover, there are other texts of his. Not all set in the sermon mode. As a man who appreciates the communicative value of dialogue, he excels in the giving, the taking and the sharing of conversation with those that appear to stand on an intellectually distant, indeed unreachable, shore. In which case you could begin (or continue), for example, with Umberto Eco, Carlo Maria Martini, Belief or non-belief? A Confrontation (latest edition 2006).

The issue of hope recurs in the conversation between the cardinal and the philosopher. Once you have read it, and you will read it all the way to the end – as one does with a crackling ħobża biż-żejt – once you start, you have the distinct impression that as long as there are individuals like Cardinal Martini and Professor Eco, there will be hope. In this regard, what they have in common is the courage (founded on solid intellectual foundations) to question the wisdom of abdicating one’s responsibility to those in power.

You may recall that Cardinal Martini, about two years ago, had irritated the Vatican with his remark that the “Church does not give orders” and that it “is necessary to listen to others”. This brings us back to the core message of the booklet ably translated by Dun Anġ. That political responsibility is not the sole prerogative (or the sole burden, if you wish) of those whose job it is to “do politics”. Even less, of those who have the power to give orders and who, all too often, do not bother to listen. Perhaps because they have forgotten how to.

• Peppinu Cassar, in his introduction to the Maltese translation (Vjaġġ fid-Dizzjunarju ta’ l-Etika, Edizzjoni Klabb Qari Nisrani, 1995), calls for the “courage to ask and enquire”. If I have not merely imagined what I referred to above as the current “sense of pointlessness and exhaustion”, as the “creeping despair” that this country will ever emancipate itself from this sorry state (and I am not maliciously attempting to demoralise you), then perhaps the way out of the quick-sand is to have the courage to question those that do not listen.

Mario Vella

This article appeared in Dr Vella’s column in The Times of Malta on August 31, 2009.                                                                                                      You may access the original at  http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20090831/opinion/you-chew-your-bread

Uncool deep down south

Click on this link, listen to this vintage piece and then read on…Bix Beiderbecke \”I\’m wondering who\” 1927

“One of the things I like about jazz, kid, is that I don’t know what’s going to happen next. Do you?”  This oft quoted cool quip, attributed to jazz composer, cornetist and pianist Leon Bismark (Bix) Beiderbecke (1903-1931), is of the sort generally used to cut a long story short. It comes in handy when you need to deliver 500 words fast to publicise one of the countless jazz festivals in tourist resorts anywhere in the world from Woodyard Bottom (Catahoula, LA) to  Timbuktu.                                                                                                                                                      Says a lot but says nothing. Saves time. Tells a jazz audience what it already knows, that improvisation by an accomplished musician can be exhilarating. Also, preventively, like health hazard labels on tobacco products, it warns spectators to expect uneven quality. Some performances may be unforgettable, others best forgotten. Also, quoting Bix suggests you’re hip.
I mean, you must be cool to quote the guy who generated or co-generated stuff like “Davenport Blues”, “In a Mist (Bixology)”, “For No Reason at All in C”, “Candlelights”, “Flashes”, “In the Dark”.  And Bix, who recorded benchmark renditions of “Riverboat Shuffle”, “Clarinet Marmalade”, “Missisippi Mud” and “Deep down south”, was cool. Indeed, together with Frankie Trumbauer, he was the precursor of “cool jazz”.
Moreover Bix’s decline coincided with the first 22 months of the Great Depression and ended when he died, young, alone, unable to find work in the New York City area and broken by low quality prohibition era alcohol. Quoting Bix today, as the world experiences a momentous recession whose final outcome only fools dare predict, elicits pathos from the better read.

The chairman of the Malta Council for Culture and the Arts, Adrian Mamo, quotes the Bix quip on the Malta Jazz Festival 2009 Blog (see http://maltajazzfestival.wordpress.com/2009/07/09/adrian-mamo-on-the-malta-jazz-festival/ ). You will recall that on the Monday before last, I invited the gentleman – qua chairman of MCCA – to reassure us that the Council he presides over has not acted in a manner that contradicts a fundamental guideline set by the Act of Parliament that created it, namely, that it should “promote [...] freedom of artistic expression”.
If you wish to refresh your memory regarding why I am making such a fuss over why I regard the MCCA’s behaviour and attitude unacceptable in a European country today, see http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20090803/opinion/for-nations-vague-as-weed and www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20090720/opinion/unbecoming-europe.
The MCCA chairman’s choice not to respond to my invitation – I am not aware that he responded in this newspaper or, for all I know, anywhere else – adds insult to injury to those who feel that Malta deserves better, much better. It only goes to show how far some of us have to go to become the cool Europeans they think they are. I am afraid that down here, in Europe’s deep South, culture is definitely uncool. Quoting Bix is just not enough.
To take liberties with Beiderbecke’s famous words: “One of the things I don’t like about our culture, kid, is that I know what’s going to happen next. Do you?” Of course you do. Nothing. The MCCA should be there to promote freedom of artistic expression, an important element of freedom generally, and yet it does exactly the opposite. Its decision in the Raphael Vella case promotes a culture within which freedom of expression is not a priority. It promotes a culture wherein kowtowing to the powers that be is acceptable and unobjectionable.
Before you conclude that the problem is, after all, limited to the nine members of the said Council (including the chairman) – a very small minority of the population of Malta and Gozo, you will say, and perhaps not a representative sample – please contemplate the hypothesis that the tendency to kowtow to political power is not limited to a small minority. Let me be absolutely clear, had the MCCA acted the way it did under a different government – say one led by Dr Joseph Muscat – I would still be writing what I am writing now. Kowtowing to power is unbecoming in contemporary Europe, irrespective of which party is in government.
Journalists have a special responsibility in this regard. They should lead the effort to emancipate our culture from its tendency to promote servility towards power. Nationalist Party leaning journalists and their Labour Party as well as Green leaning colleagues ought to enter into a solemn agreement whereby whichever party or parties is/are in power, journalists leaning towards the party in government will refuse to knowingly mangle or fabricate “facts” to favour “their” government. Such a pact for truth would deal a fatal blow to the fine Maltese art of kowtowing. It would certainly have prevented some of the obscenities we have witnessed in the past few weeks… no, nothing to do with the MCCA this time.

Mario Vella

This article appeared on Monday, August 17, 2009  in Dr Vella’s regular fortnightly column on The Times of Malta. You can access the original at http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20090817/opinion/uncool-deep-down-south

For nations vague as weed

Perhaps it’s the heat. Perhaps it would have been different in winter. Perhaps if it had happened at a higher latitude or at a higher altitude there would have been a public outcry of the sort that changes a national culture. Perhaps had there been a different party in government it would have happened. Perhaps had they excluded a different object from the exhibition, the reaction would have been different.
Perhaps had the moon been in a different phase…
But there was no outcry. There was hardly a whimper. A handful of columnists and bloggers expressed their concern. Another handful of correspondents responded with indignation. And that’s it. The whole issue has been swallowed up into the black hole of normality. Something unacceptable happened and, thanks to the indifference of all those who, in a less benighted provincial corner of Europe, would have considered it their duty to stand up to denounce it, the unacceptable has become acceptable.
Actually, it is more of a confirmation that in this country the unacceptable continues to be acceptable. We pose as a sophisticated nation and some of us go as far as reciting apparently sophisticated utterances, even radical ones, and yet, when it comes to the crunch, sophistication fades into mediocrity and radicals turn conservative. An island of litigants where the 11th commandment reads: Thou shalt sue thy neighbour, but when the roll is called we hide behind one another and form an indistinguishable mass.
We are one of those “nations vague as weed” for whose “small-statured cross-faced” inhabitants, to quote Larkin, “life is slow dying”. Like our lizards, “nomads among stones”, we scurry and scamper among overbuilt structures we can scarcely afford – habitations, public buildings, workplaces, graves – braving heat, dust, precipitous crevices, floods and the occasional predator. We pretend to be scandalised but will almost never stand up to be counted, preferring to don our camouflage and blend into the environment.
Two weeks ago in this column I wrote about the exclusion of Raphael Vella’s work from the Life Model exhibition organised by the Malta Council for Culture and the Arts. I mentioned no names, not even the MCCA, preferring to focus on the institutional dimension of the issue.
To refresh your memory go to www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20090720/opinion/unbecoming-europe.
I received several phone calls from persons who said they agreed that whoever took the decision to exclude the art coordinator of our university’s Faculty of Education from this exhibition should give a more exhaustive explanation than has emerged so far. Needless to say, none of the callers volunteered to publicly demand such an explanation. In any case, they are right that the explanation that has emerged so far is unacceptable in a European country in 2009.
We have been told that the MCCA excluded the work concerned because of the possibility of libel action from politicians recognising themselves (or imagining they do) in the said work. This explanation is intended to deviate attention from the moral and political aspects of the issue and to switch it on to a technical-legal track. The bottom line is that it is unacceptable even by the guidelines set by the Act of Parliament that created the MCCA, according to which the council should “promote [...] freedom of artistic expression”. That the artist involved is a respected pedagogue is relevant. What will his students make of the MCCA’s decision? How will it impact on their intellectual formation?
Another aspect that deserves attention, which attention it has to date conveniently escaped, is that of our “political class”. If the MCCA seriously fears that our politicians would have been aggrieved by the works concerned but was not expressly warned by any particular politician that including a particular work would have resulted in libel action, then we can only conclude that MCCA has a very poor idea of our politicians’ intellectual standards.
The matter is too important in terms of the MCCA’s own vision and mission statement to pretend that the whole thing never happened. If it is to accomplish its mission, live up to its vision and abide by the letter and the spirit of the law that brought it into existence, the MCCA cannot ignore the educational and cultural impact of its own actions. It must explain the principles and the considerations underlying its decisions. Purely legal explanations (a mere repetition of what has been said so far) will just not do. We want to know why MCCA has such a low opinion of our politicians’ cultural horizons.
In my previous article on this subject I mentioned no names. Now we need to go one step further. When organisations fail to give a satisfactory account of their actions, one is left with no choice but to invite specific individuals to speak up.
According to the MCCA’s website, the council is chaired by Adrian Mamo. I – and certainly a number of readers – would appreciate his views on this sad story. If he would rather not, we will not give up. We will invite each of the members of the council to do so.
We will surely find one of them unwilling to be silent.

Mario Vella

This article appeared on The Times of Malta on August 3, 2009. The original may be accessed at http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20090803/opinion/for-nations-vague-as-weed

Unbecoming Europe. Or, The obscenity of power.

Guess which Maltese quango unblushingly proclaims the following as its “vision”: “A bold and daring expression of Malta’s unique Cultural and Artistic identity that engages society and impacts future history” (capital letters in the original). Let me spoon-feed you: It is the same organisation that, according to its “mission” statement, solemnly declares its resolve “to achieve new heights in creativity and accomplishment for Culture and the Arts in Malta” (again, their caps). There’s more: It also spells out how it will behave in the course of its mission. It will be nothing less than “Adventurous and Brave”, “Passionate and Committed”, “Focused”, “Open”, “Quality Driven” and, of course, “Results Oriented” (sic, their caps yet again).

You don’t need to be particularly savvy in the corporate communications trade to know that the drafting of mission statements is a chore that serious copy text writers undertake with the healthy cynicism that one expects from hardened professionals. In fact, clients’ own enthusiasm for hyperbolic mission statements has visibly decreased over the years. The onset of the global economic crisis has further encouraged the adoption of a more sober and feet-on-the-ground language. Ironically, the taste for ornate corporate rhetoric tends to linger on in the culturally-provincial peripheries.

Back to our mysterious quango. If you haven’t yet worked out its identity, I’ll give you some more clues.
It was set up by an Act of Parliament in 2002, which Act decrees that the said body “shall consist of a chairperson and not less than four and not more than eight other members”. These “shall be appointed by the minister [responsible for culture] for a term of three years but the members so appointed shall be eligible for re-appointment on the expiration of their term of office”. The law also provides for any such member who “in the opinion of the minister [...] is unfit to continue in office”. In such cases, the person concerned “may be removed from office by the minister”.

In a manner typical of quangos (quasi nongovernmental organisations), the body in question is a hybrid. It “is a body corporate having a distinct legal personality” but it is ultimately at the minister’s mercy. When He (my cap this time) directs it to do something, the organisation “shall [...] give effect to all such directives and shall conduct its affairs accordingly”. Should the mysterious body “fail to comply”, “the Prime Minister may make an order transferring to the minister in whole or in part any of [its] functions”.

The Act provides the members of this body with operational guidelines. Some are frankly nebulous and ambiguous, for example, to “advise the minister on cultural policies and strategies that reach out to the whole socio-cultural sphere”. Others are refreshingly clear and to the point, for example, to “promote [...] freedom of artistic expression”.
Make no mistake. This organisation is not just a talking shop. It may enter into contracts, acquire, hold and dispose of property, employ people, lend and borrow money, levy fees and other payments prescribed by the Act, receive funds from the Minister of Finance from the Consolidated Fund, use and administer immovable state-owned assets. It can be a very influential body and/or an effective transmission belt of decisions and instructions by effective decision makers. It can be an instrument of state power.

Quangos can also be used to protect the ultimate wielders of power from the focus of public attention. Power, you see, often prefers to be off-stage, off the scene. Perhaps because sometimes, having disobeyed the divine order not to take a bite of the fruit of the tree of good and evil, power becomes aware of its nakedness. It perceives itself as obscene (according to an admittedly uncertain etymology, “that which should not be seen”) and hides behind a variety of fronts.

I could perhaps add that this body recently took responsibility for a disturbing decision, one that does not become the highest standards of European culture. In fact, from a European point of view, it was an unbecoming decision and will certainly not help this country become as European as it should be. This body’s decision to exclude from an exhibition an artwork whose author’s artistic seriousness has not been questioned is scandalous, even by such “old” standards as the 1973 Miller test.

Wittingly, or otherwise, the corporate entity I have chosen not to name – call it a form of symbolic censorship or of censure if you must – has promoted the sort of culture Zizek refers to when he writes: “Is this not what, ultimately, culture is? One of the elementary rules of culture is to know when (and how) to pretend not to know (or notice), to go on and act as if something which happened did not happen. When a person near me accidentally produces an unpleasant vulgar noise, the proper thing to do is to ignore it, not to comfort him: ‘I know it was an accident, don’t worry, it doesn’t really matter!’”

If anyone considers the above text libellous, please sue me.

Mario Vella

The original article may be accessed at  http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20090720/opinion/unbecoming-europe

Unveiling right and left.

Don’t worry. My last substantial comment on Fr Peter Serracino Inglott’s “perspective”, published 20 years ago, was 218 pages long. [1]  Today’s comment will be somewhat shorter and not as substantial. Please refer to Miriam Vincenti’s interview with Fr Serracino Inglott in The Sunday Times of June 21, [2] wherein she begins by coyly declaring that she will refrain from asking him about the European Parliament result as this would amount to “rubbing salt in the wounds”. Instead, she announces, she will ask him about the book he is reading.

Reflect on this apparently innocent starter. Knowingly or otherwise, the interviewer is indicating to the not particularly advanced reader that philosophy professors who read books that he is unlikely to have ever heard of, let alone read, such as a collection of writings by Louis Massignon (1883-1962), have reason to be unhappy with the European Parliament results. Had the great unread allowed themselves to be guided by philosopher kings, by wisdom and reason, the results would have been different.

As this is a well-worn rhetorical device, the experienced reader is not at all surprised when Fr Serracino Inglott magnanimously waves aside the interviewer’s scruples, proceeds to sacrifice himself on the altar of the “public interest” and cheerfully welcomes the rubbing of salt into his wounds for our salvation. Before he gets on with it, however, there’s another rhetorical trick up his sleeve. Expecting most readers to expect him to be concerned with the June 6 results in Malta – How many fellow citizens on either side lost any sleep on the overall results in Europe? – he again delays the exposition of his views by commenting on… the overall results in Europe.

The “motivation of my post-election blues”, Fr Serracino Inglott states, “is the loss of the elections by the Left”. He complains that “the increased relative majority obtained by the Popular Party cannot be considered to be a victory of Christian Democracy” and that “the dominant group in the Popular Party is now rather more right than centre-right”. In fact, the European People’s Party, as it is officially called, defines itself as “the largest political group in a Parliament where non-socialist parties now enjoy a clear majority” (www.eppgroup.eu/home/en/aboutus.asp). It sells itself as the champion of all those against the Left and that includes plenty of people most decent readers wouldn’t want to be seen with. Yes, Fr Serracino Inglott ought to be unhappy. We need not quibble on his assumption that Christian Democrat parties are fundamentally “centre-left”.

But what all readers are really waiting for is Fr Serracino Inglott on the European Parliament results in Malta. And, finally, mercifully, he sheds the last of the veils… but one. The “local victory by the Labour Party certainly cannot be considered an exception to the general trend”, he says. In other words, it would seem to follow, the Left lost in Malta too. Is he suggesting that the PN is the “real” Left and PL the “real” right? This would surprise most of The Sunday Times’ readers who are unaccustomed to think of themselves as Leftists.

Those familiar with Fr Serracino Inglott’s views, however, will not have been surprised. In a recent interview on my conversation programme on One TV, Tango, he insisted that he has always been on the left of the Maltese political spectrum but could not work with Labour because of a number of specific issues. In my own book on his work and its context, I argued that had Fr Serracino Inglott not existed, the Nationalist Party would have had to invent him.

My point was that Fr Serracino Inglott was decisive for the transformation of the PN from a worn-out network of conservative notables to a popular mass party speaking a local dialect of Christian Democrat language. The leftish elements of this language enable Christian Democrat parties to win electoral market share from parties with blue-collar appeal.

This is relatively easy when they are in opposition, especially when the government is itself torn between the needs of international cost competitiveness and the expectations of its own mass base, as in the Maltese case after the second oil shock of 1979. It becomes more difficult when a sometime Christian Democrat party is itself in government. At that point it is characters like Richard Cachia Caruana that are more useful than a Fr Serracino Inglott… until they too outlive their political usefulness. In my view, the traditional Left vs Right distinction is unhelpful to understand what really goes on and needs to be replaced by concrete analysis. [3]

Fr Serracino Inglott’s taste for the choreographic rhetoric of the veil (whereby the speaker comes to the point after shedding a number of veils) would certainly remind Massignon – “one of my spiritual fathers”, Fr Serracino Inglott tells Ms Vincenti – of Salman al-Farisi’s veiled criticism of the unholy hurry with which Abu Bakr was elected successor to the prophet Mohammad on June 8, 653 (“you did and you did not”, he is reported to have told the electors of, in the regard of the Sunnis, the first of the Caliphs). [4]

[1]  Reflections in a canvas bag. Beginning philosophy between politics and history, PEG, 1989.

[2] May be accessed at http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20090621/opinion/a-prophet-for-our-time

[3] I argue this in a paper in J. Cutajar and G. Cassar, eds. Transitions in Maltese society. Miller, forthcoming, 2009. 

[4] In the above mentioned interview, Serracino Inglott must be referring to Écrits mémorables, edited by Christian Jambet, François Angelier, François L’Yvonnet and Souâd Ayada, published by Robert-Laffont, in their ”Bouquins” series, 2 volumes, 2009. My own reference above to Massignon’s comment on Salman al-Farisi is to an essay in Parole donnée (Paris, Julliard, 1962). Unfortunately, I do not have the French original of the latter and must refer the reader to the Italian translation in my library, Salman Pak e le primizie spirituali dell’Islam iraniano, on p.115 of Parola data, Adelphi, Milano 1995.

Mario Vella

The author’s  writes every other Monday on page 8 of  The Times of Malta. The article above (except footnotes) originally appeared on The Times of Malta on July 6, 2009, and may be accessed at http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20090706/opinion/unveiling-right-and-left

Dahrendorf rivizitat.

F’dan is-sens ir-rwol ta’ Dah­rendorf kien pożittiv. Kien sinjal ta’ allarm tal-insostenib­biltà soċjali ta’ guffaġni poli­tika. F’mument fejn l-aktar li kellna bżonn nifirxu l-eġemo­nija tagħna fl-irkejjen kollha tas-soċjetà ċivili – kundizzjoni essenzjali biex nibnu soċjetà tabilħaqq progressiva – ħraqna eluf ta’ alleati li kellna bżonn­hom bħall-ħobż. L-għażla ta’ Joseph Muscat bħala mexxej tindika li qiegħdin nitgħallmu mill-imgħoddi.

“Imsieken dawn il-Maltin!” Hekk żgur jgħid Ralf Dahren­dorf kieku kellu jaqra wħud mill-affarijet li nkitbu dwaru f’dawn il-jiem f’Malta. Jien kont student gradwat tas-soċjoloġija fil-London School of Economics and Political Science (magħrufa aħjar bħala l-LSE) fl-ewwel snin tiegħu bħala direttur ta’ dan iċ-ċentru ewlieni fil-qasam tax-xjenzi soċjali.

Kien in-nofs tas-snin 70 u Dahrendorf kien għadu ‘biss’ ċittadin Ġermaniż. Kiseb iċ-ċittadinanza doppja fl-1988 meta kien onorat bil-KBE, ħames snin qabel ma nħatar membru għal għomru tal-House of Lords. Ma kinitx ħaġa stramba li professur barrani jilħaq Direttur tal-LSE. Dan il-kulleġġ tal-Università ta’ Londra (illum awtonomu) kellu fama bħala d-‘dar’ ta’ wħud mill-aħjar imħuħ tal-kontinent Ewropew, fosthom dawk li kienu ħarbu mid-ditta­-tura Nażista tal-Ġermanja fis-snin 30 u 40.

Din kienet l-LSE li Herbert Ganado kien identifika bħala ċentru ta’ propaganda soċja­lista u komunista li saħansitra, ma nafx kif imma dejjem skont Ganado, kienet għajn ta’ ispi­raz­zjoni politika għal Mintoff (Rajt Malta Tinbidel, Vol. 3, it-tieni edizzjoni, 1977, p.290). Safejn naf jien, il-Perit Oxford studja u mhux l-LSE. Veru li din twaqqfet fl-1895 permezz ta’ somma flus li l-Fabian So­ciety, għaqda soċjal-riformista qrib il-Partit Laburista, wirtet mingħand donatur. Veru wkoll, iżda, li l-LSE malajr żviluppat f’ċentru ta’ eċċel­lenza internazzjonali li ġibdet lejha ħassieba brillanti imma frankament konservattivi bħal Karl Popper (1902-1994) u Friederich August Hayek (1899-1992), it-tnejn idoli ta’ Margaret Thatcher (ċertament mhix xellugija).

Dahrendorf laħaq direttur fl-1974, l-istess sena li Hayek rebaħ il-Premju Nobel għall-Ekonomija, u sena qabel li Thatcher laħqet kap tal-Partit Konservattiv. Il-kredenzjali tiegħu għal din il-kariga kienu eċċellenti: kien studja taħt Popper l-LSE fis-snin 50 u hemm kiseb il-PhD, kien għal­lem is-soċjoloġija f’Amburgu, f’Tubinga u f’Kostanza u ppub­-blika l-kapulavur “Klassi u konflitt ta’ klassi fis-soċjetà industrijali”. Kellu wkoll esper­jenza politika u amministrat­tiva: kien deputat tal-FDP (żgur mhux partit xellugi), segretarju parlamentari u Kummissarju Ewropew (l-ew­wel għall-affarijet barranin u kummerċ, imbagħad għax-xjenza, ir-riċerka u l-edukaz­zjoni).

Madankollu, f’Malta fior del mondo, Ganado seta’ jikteb hekk: “Il-London School of Economics [...] kellha wkoll filosofija ekonomika Soċjalista. Sa ftit ilu kienet f’idejn Lasky, orjentat lejn il-Komuniżmu. Issa [...] qiegħda f’idejn Dah­-rendorf li, waqt li qed nikteb, ippreżenta r-rapport tal-kum­missjoni li ppresieda fuq l-Università ta’ Malta” (op.cit. p.291). L-avukat Ganado kien qed jinsinwa li minn xi ħadd li kien qed imexxi istitut allega­ta­ment imnebbaħ mill-Marxiż­mu ateju u anti-klerikali (jaq­leb għal dan is-suġġett immed­jatament fl-istess paġna), wie­ħed kellu bilfors jistenna pro­posti li jissovvertu t-tradizzjo­nijet sagrosanti tal-kultura Maltija.

Il-pandemonju li qam bir-riformi tal-Università ta’ Malta huwa parti mill-istorija ta’ pajjiżna iżda għadu frisk wisq fil-memorja ta’ min għex dak il-perjodu, biex din l-istorja tinkiteb b’mod seren u kemm jista’ jkun oġġettiv. F’dak il-kuntest, l-għażla ta’ Dahren­dorf biex imexxi l-Kummis­sjoni kienet tajba: intellettwali kbir, eks Kummissarju Ewro­pew għall-edukazzjoni, politi­kament differenti mill-gvern li kkummissjonah.

Il-PL ftit jiem ilu ħareġ stqar­rija li wriet maturità poli­tika kbira. Qabel xejn, sellem lil Dahrendorf u fakkar kemm għamel biex kattar il-kultura Ġermaniża f’Malta f’perjodu meta l-komprensjoni reċipro­ka kienet essenzjali biex jitkattar l-investiment Ġermaniż f’Malta (il-Ġermanja kienet għajn ewlenija ta’ investiment fis-snin 70). Imbagħad irrefera għar-rwol ‘pożittiv’ li kellu Dahrendorf fil-kwistjoni tar-riformi tal-edukazzjoni għolja, liema rwol jeħtieġ li jkun rival­wat fil-kuntest storiku ta’ dawk iż-żminijiet.

X’jista’ jfisser dak il-‘pożit­tiv’? Kif fakkruna wħud li ħatfu l-okkażjoni tal-mewt ta’ Dahrendorf il-ġimgħa li għad­diet biex mingħalihom iħam­mru wiċċ il-PL (imma ma rnexxielhom jagħmlu xejn ħlief li jikkonfermaw kemm huma ‘msieken’), f’ċertu mument tal-proċess ta’ riforma Dahren­dorf kien qal ċar u tond li hu ma kienx jaqbel ma dak kollu li kien qed jagħmel il-gvern laburista. Illum qiegħdin na­raw li kieku dakinhar il-Partit Laburista kellu jinterpreta id-dissens ta’ Dahrendorf korret­tament, x’aktarx li numru kbir ta’ persuni li setgħu joqorbu lejna ma kinux ikomplu jit­biegħdu minna, u oħrajn li kienu viċin tagħna ma kinux jitilquna. Mhux qed ngħid missna warrabna l-għan li niirriformaw l-edukazjoni għolja, imma li missna fassalna il-pjani tagħna b’mod aktar għaqli u fittxejna kunsens akbar biex ‘nwet­tqu ir-riforma.

F’dan is-sens ir-rwol ta’ Dah­rendorf kien pożittiv. Kien sinjal ta’ allarm tal-insostenib­biltà soċjali ta’ guffaġni poli­tika. F’mument fejn l-aktar li kellna bżonn nifirxu l-eġemo­nija tagħna fl-irkejjen kollha tas-soċjetà ċivili – kundizzjoni essenzjali biex nibnu soċjetà tabilħaqq progressiva – ħraqna eluf ta’ alleati li kellna bżonn­hom bħall-ħobż. L-għażla ta’ Joseph Muscat bħala mexxej tindika li qiegħdin nitgħallmu mill-imgħoddi.

X’differenza bejn it-ton tal-istqarrija tal-PL u dak ta’ xi stqarrijiet u kummenti li qrajna fil-gazzetti Maltin f’dawn il-jiem! Hemm min ma jitlifx opportunità biex jipprova jerġa’ jqajjem l-ispirtu ta’ kon­-frontazzjoni u ta’ gwerra qad­-­disa ta’ żminijiet li biex xi darba nifhmuhom neħtieġu kuraġġ u maturità intellettwali kbar

Mario Vella

Dan l-artiklu deher fit-Torca 29 Gunju 2009  http://www.it-torca.com/news.asp?newsitemid=8040

Ritratt: Ralf Dahrendorf f’diskussjoni pubblika ma Rudi Dutschke, 1968. Hajr: die Tageszeitung (taz.de) http://www.taz.de/1/leben/koepfe/artikel/1/der-minirock-wurde-nicht-1968-erfunden/

Uneasy lie the heads.

No, there’s no typo in the title. Of course, what Henry IV says in Part II, Act III, Scene I, Line 33 – when complaining that the solace of restful sleep does not come easy to those in power – is “Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown”.

Shakespeare speaks of one head, the king’s, hence the third person singular. Weary and wary (who wouldn’t be when beset by rebellion?), Harry’s crown weighs heavily upon his royal skull.

No typo then, the use of the plural is expressly intended. I speak of all heads that wear a crown. Let’s start with the Prime Minister and kap. (Aside: The Nationalist Party prefers to use this Italianate term, from capo from the Latin caput, head, as opposed to Labour’s unapologetically semitic mexxej. Much in the same way as they prefer Nazzjonijet Uniti to Labour’s Ġnus Magħquda…a hint of the PN’s unease with ethnic identity?)

But back to business. The June 6 results can’t possibly fail to be a pain in the neck for the honourable gentleman, in whichever of his two institutional positions of responsibility. This holds for anyone who is anyone in the governing party. In fact, I would go as far as saying that this is true for anyone with a modicum of brain who identifies her/himself with the PN.

For the June 6 results are not merely symptoms of a passing malaise but they indicate deep subterranean changes. They confirmed what we had been suspecting for a while, namely, that a growing number of voters no longer recognise themselves in the either/or fundamentalism that has ruled this country for far too long.

You may consider yourself a Nationalist and yet not accept all of the PN’s views as sacred dogma. Likewise, if you feel at home with the Labour Party. More and more citizens that feel they belong to one of the two major parties are ready to disagree with particular policies and statements enunciated by the respective office holders and elected representatives.

But what happens, you will ask, if I am “blue” and discover that I disagree fundamentally with what “blue” stands for? The easy answer is that in this case you are not really “blue” and that, for the sake of moral consistency, you ought to come out in the open about it. The less easy answer is another important question: “What does it mean to be really blue (or really red) after all?”

In my view, a growing number of voters on both sides will increasingly tend to vote, not for “their” party, but for the party that addresses their concerns with greater credibility. This growing category of voters will also increasingly tend to vote for the party that is less fundamentalist in terms of the requirement that members and supporters should adhere to its articles of faith.

For example, a kap who believes that declared gays ought not candidate themselves for Parliament is thereby imposing his prejudices on his party’s members and supporters. Such a kap will tend to become unelectable and a political liability. This is true of any policy based on the moral convictions, tenets of faith or mere prejudices of only a part of the electorate. It is true of any other issue of the same nature, from divorce to cremation. I suggested that we begin by considering the implications of these seismic changes on Lawrence Gonzi because I think that, of the two leaders, he is the less likely to successfully adapt to the emerging political landscape. He belongs to a cultural world that may once have been solid but has now largely melted into air.

If this is the case, then the PN needs to draw the consequences and to reinvent itself. If it is doesn’t, peggio per loro.

What about the PL? Well, Joseph Muscat has so far shown that he has a feel for the changing electorate that is not simply beyond Dr Gonzi’s will but also beyond his comprehension.

This is not a moral issue but a cultural one. I am convinced that Dr Gonzi is a good man but that is not the point. The point is that today’s world requires a correspondingly contemporary world view that he does not have. It is not a question of age. I know far too many persons – on both sides – who are younger than Dr Muscat but even more intellectually out of touch with the world than Dr Gonzi himself. It is a question of culture.

Am I suggesting that a party’s survival depends on promising whatever quantitatively significant market segments signal that they want, according to market surveys? No. Such a party would not “hold together” and would be swept aside by the electorate itself. Dr Muscat is a case in point. He is both the product of ongoing deep changes in our political culture and a conscious agent of this change. 

An easy task? Far from it. Uneasy lie all heads that wear a crown, including that of Opposition Leader. You can’t sleep as you sail uncharted waters.

Mario Vella

You can access the original article in Dr Vella column in the Times of Malta of June 22nd at http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20090622/opinion/uneasy-lie-the-heads

 

Niebuhr, McCabe, Kirk, Crane & Co.

I “met” Reinhold Niebuhr (1892-1971) twice three years after he passed away. Finals were hurtling towards me at vertiginous speed, like the menacing asteroids on the main screen on the bridge of Star Ship Enterprise*. Anticipation of release from Malta, however, was an effective palliative against the apprehension of impending impact with exams. I had set my sights on the LSE and on diversifying from philosophy to sociology. My spaceship was ready “to boldly go”. These first encounters with Niebuhr were of the brief and, apparently, inconsequential kind.

The first was ephemeral. A SUNY Binghamton student on her 1973/1974 study-abroad programme, having heard me express strong views on neocolonialism, suggested that I beware of the “messianic impulse”. While agreeing with me, she felt I was self-righteous and that I might benefit from reading Niebuhr. She had done so and, she claimed, his “realism” had transformed her into a “wiser” person. I did not. I mean, I did not forthwith read him and did not become wiser.

The second one was a non-encounter. This was during a visit to Malta by Herbert McCabe (1926-2001), a close friend of my then professor of philosophy, Fr Peter Serracino Inglott. I remember a long walk with McCabe around Mellieħa, in the company of Sammy Vella (who brought along a liberal supply of his wine) and Evarist Bartolo (who brought along food and his wit). I remember the conversation swinging between the abstract (our questions to the author of Love, Law & Language) and the concrete (his questions to us about Maltese politics).

We asked about the “McCabe affair”. Reacting to theologian Charles Davis’ decision to leave the priesthood and the Catholic Church because of the latter’s “concern for authority at the expense of truth” (Time, December 30, 1966), in the February 1967 issue of New Blackfriars, McCabe argued that although the Church was “quite plainly corrupt” this did not justify leaving it. He was sacked – thereby illustrating Davis’ point about authority and truth – and suspended from administering the sacraments and preaching. We knew about the legendary first sentence of his first editorial upon reinstatement at New Blackfriars (“As I was saying before being so oddly interrupted…”), but were delighted to hear it live.

I remember how this led McCabe to advise us to be concrete in our political judgments, to base these on concrete analyses of concrete situations. He warned us against political infantilism and urged us not to exile ourselves in marginal groups, no matter how far from ideal a mass party with whom “the people” identified might be. He set me thinking. What is the point of being self-appointed proud keepers of uncompromising, absolute, eternal, perfect and pure ideas of what is politically good (yes, Platonic idealism), if you are utterly incapable of changing the real world even just a little bit? Unwillingness to compromise is complicity with those that oppose change. It was then that I recalled Niebuhr’s notion of a negotiated compromise between the ideal and the possible.

Suddenly, it was very late and I drove McCabe back to the Rabat Dominican Priory, where he was staying. I was hoping we would have time for a nightcap before saying goodnight – there were so many other things I wanted to hear his views on, including Niebuhr’s realism – but, when the yawning monk who came to the door looked at his watch, I knew that Niebuhr would once again have to wait. How could I tell a churlish Maltese patri that I wanted to hang around a while longer with a guest brother of his who was viewed suspiciously in Rome, was a radical thinker and an Irishman to boot, to sip whiskey and discuss the views of an American Protestant of German descent? **

My first consequential encounter with Niebuhr took place 22 years later, on the last Friday of March 1996, in New York City, in a second-hand bookshop whose name I have forgotten, on Third Avenue between 8th and 9th streets. I wasn’t looking for him, just browsing, when I came across his The Nature and Destiny of Man. It was not a mystical life-changing epiphany but the comfort he offered and the challenges he posed earned Niebuhr a privileged place in myself, a place to which I often return even though William Shatner, the original Captain Kirk of Star Trek has meanwhile metamorphosed into Boston Legal’s lawyer Denny Crane. Join me, next time I visit him in this column.

Beam us up, Scotty!

Mario Vella

---

* An “overseas boarder” at De La Salle College, Cottonera, I had gobbled what I could of the original 1966-1969 Star Trek series on USAFTV during school holidays back home in Tripoli. Only later did I learn that USS Enterprise prematurely terminated its “five-year mission to go boldly where no man had gone before” not because of King Idris’ deposition in September of the same year but that NBC had dropped it after its third television season due to low ratings.

** See McCabe’s obituary by John Orme Mills OP http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/fr-herbert-mccabe-729262.html .

You can access the original article in Dr Vella’s Times of Malta column (June 8, 2009) at  http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20090608/opinion/niebuhr-mccabe-kirk-crane-amp-co

Simon Busuttil 68,819 u “l-image ta’ Lawrence Gonzi naraha qieghda tbati”.

 “L-image ta’ Lawrence Gonzi ukoll naraha qieghda tbati. Fi zmien l-elezzjoni kellek il-veru sens ta’ “kap”, li jhaddem l-awtorita’ tieghu minghajr hadd ma jistaqsi xejn u li tista’ tghid li hu u l-partit huma haga wahda. Wara l-elezzjoni bhal irtira f’Kastilja, bhal tilef l-aura li donnu kienet tigbed ir-rispett anke mir-rivali tieghu u spicca jaqleb minn surmast, kultant jiddixxiplina l-parlamentari Nazzjonalisti, ghall-qassis f’konfessjonarju, dak li jmorru jigru ghandu l-imsiehba socjali wara glieda jew m’Austin Gatt jew ma’ John Dalli. Nahseb li jekk il-partit Nazzjonalista ma jiehux azzjoni minnufih jispicca bhal gvern ta’ John Major bejn in-’92 u n-’97: il-pajjiz miexi l-quddiem, imma l-partit assedjat minn kull naha, b’Tony Blair isir bhal messija gdid, meta assolutament ma kien xejn specjali.”

Glenn Galea

Inredden

http://inredden.blogspot.com/2009/06/fid-dawl-ta-dak-li-qed-jigri.html