In the Jain tradition, there is a folk tale in which a group of blind men, wandering in a forest, encounter an elephant and attempt to identify the beast. One touches the tail and decides that it is a rope; another feels the elephant’s side and thinks that it is a wall; another believes that the tusk is a spear; while one man identifies the trunk as a snake. They argue among themselves until a wise man, conveniently passing by, tells them that they are all partially right in their descriptions, because they have only touched or experienced a part of the whole. True awareness involves connecting all these parts together. The modern reader should not interpret the ‘blindness’ of the men literally. It is a metaphor for partial understanding and the dogmatic assertion of half-truths.
The Jains are a religious and cultural minority in India, with an extensive diaspora in East Africa, Britain, continental Europe and North America. They are noted for their commitment to nonviolence or Ahimsa — which influenced Mahatma Gandhi — accompanied by a strong belief in the careful stewardship of the environment. Jains also attach a high value to education — indeed, Indian Jains are almost four times as likely to be university-educated as compared to the average Indian — and have been disproportionately successful across the professional world. In India and abroad, they are well represented in law and medicine, academic research and traditional bourgeoisie businesses such as jewellery.
More a philosophy of life and a system of metaphysics than a religion in the same sense as Christianity or Islam, Jainism emphasises the importance of community and a sense of interconnectedness that includes animals and plants as well as human beings. Nonetheless, it places an even greater emphasis on the individual conscience and the individual’s responsibility to discern the difference between ‘the whole’ truth and distorted or limited worldviews. Jains use two closely related technical terms for the process of discernment. The first is Anekantavada, literally ‘many-sidedness.’ The second is Syadvada, meaning ‘multiple viewpoints.’ Both concepts are reflected in the story of the blind men and the elephant. The Jain mathematician Kanti Mardia OBE has likened the search for spiritual insight to the work of a scientist in the laboratory. He tells me that he prefers to think less of ‘Jainism’ as an ideology and more of ‘Jainness’ as a disposition or sensibility. This is characterised by the questioning of oneself as much as others.
What has all this to do with the centre-right, or indeed with British politics in general? Being on the centre-right should involve a process of critical reasoning and an avoidance of doctrinaire certainty. Michael Oakeshott, not dissimilarly to Mardia’s description of Jainism, described conservatism as a disposition rather than an ideology. His explicitly Tory worldview expresses a preference for “the tried to the untried, fact to mystery … the convenient to the perfect, present laughter to utopian bliss.” Like the disposition of Jainness, it is based on a connection with reality as opposed to abstract visions of what should be. This form of conservatism often questions the need for change, yet it is equally capable of advocating for constructive, grounded reforms, or in Edmund Burke’s words, “improving on what we know.” A political disposition that values cautious reformism alongside a deep respect for history and tradition serves as a crucial counterweight to the politics of noise, disruption and demagogy assailing us from the populist fringes.
This last observation leads me to the most important reason why the story of the elephant and the blind men should resonate now. We could very much do with a bit more many-sidedness in our politics, a greater capacity to accept that there are multiple viewpoints, or simply the ability to see things from other people’s point of view. Far from representing triangulation, surrender or vacillation, this would be a signal of intellectual strength and pragmatic, long-term thinking. Populist slogans are easy to recite and offer transient satisfaction. Yet even most of those who embrace populism probably know in their hearts that it is a hollow and divisive dead end. Once the other party comes into power, nothing lasting will have been created.
The centre-right used to be good at nuance. These days, it is being pulled further into a vortex of culture wars, absolutist positions and, saddest of all, deliberately outrageous rhetoric. There is a wide range of multi-faceted questions that a more confident centre-right should be able to address in more imaginative ways. How can we engage constructively with the EU to our economic, cultural and strategic benefit after Brexit? How can we broaden our international alliances in the light of change in the priorities of the United States? How can we reconcile economic growth with the protection of the environment, the conservation of nature and the overall quality of life? How can we leverage the positive contribution of immigrants and at the same time address the pressing needs of neglected working-class communities? How can we address women’s concerns about hard-won historic rights, personal privacy and equal opportunity while respecting the dignity of genuinely vulnerable transgender people? How do we define what it means to be British? On these and other many-sided issues, the centre-right has too often been tempted to appease or even embrace the populist war cries of narrow intransigence and demands for total victory. Yet events across the Atlantic, in the Middle East and many other parts of the world should remind us that such absolute victories are elusive and intransigence pushes us only to further extremes. The revolution eats its children.
We are living through a political moment when it often seems to take more courage to be a moderate than to be a zealot. If we are to break the doom loop of one-sidedness, the centre-right needs to be more Jain and find its voice again, drawing upon our rich traditions of empiricism, scepticism and intellectual honesty.
The original photo is by Shivam Tiwari.