Dada Amir Haider Khan and Sukarno are separated by several decades and thousands of miles. While one is set in the context of Communist internationalism, the other immediately follows global decolonization. And yet this does nothing to reduce the decidedly similar desires and hopes that their words reflect. Both represent the possibility of a world that diverges from European ways of being.
At the very beginning, Sukarno lays out that the Afro-Asian countries are present in Bandung because of a conscious choice and not out of a necessity or a sense of obligation to any other country. This is the first prominent departure from the kinds of conferences that were organized historically. For one, the countries are seen as equals in both their status and their ability to contribute to a mission that goes beyond their own selves. For another, no one is a silent bystander: every country gets its voice heard and respected. And in this process, the geographic centers of power have started to shift. In the time that this part of Dada’s account is set, the only geography that mattered was the link between the colony and the metropole. Moscow represented a completely unprecedented alternative and in some ways became the center of a new world that promised the ideals of Communism. As far as the time of the Bandung Conference is concerned, it represented a shift of power from the global north to the newly decolonized countries who could now hope to meet in places of their own choice, voluntarily.
A prominent theme in Sukarno’s speech is that of diversity. While Europe looked at diversity (whether it came through skin colour, ethnicity, language or religion) as a threat, it was a source of mutual recognition for Sukarno (which automatically implied acknowledgment of, and respect for, traditions and customs that were local to Asia and Africa). This recognition and sense of self-worth is precisely what the colonized had been robbed of by the colonialists. Regardless of how apparently different people may be, as long as they are guided by similar principles, diversity becomes a strength and represents a potential for self-recognition. In Moscow, Dada recounts a similar multiplicity of people gathered. Volunteers from all over the world congregated in one city and bridged the social distance that otherwise made cohabitating near impossible. The needs of the collective took priority over those of the individual. Diversity can hence become a positive trait “when there is unity in desire” and oppressed groups globally can gather in solidarity.
The presence of a cohesive society also became contingent upon state structures. For Dada, Moscow became the ideal that other places were compared to. A civilized society was one that had some social safety nets for its citizens (including access to healthcare, education, security and unemployment benefits). If a state failed to provide this to its people, then it could no longer expect the people to abide by its unjust laws. Interestingly Sukarno also talks about the ideal state and its responsibilities. He claims that the purpose of the law is fulfilled only so long as it is deployed for the wellbeing of people. In saying this, he is reconceptualising the idea of what politics can and should look like.
Dada and Sukarno allude to transformative experiences that helped shape the people who are engaged in these activities in their own times. For Sukarno, it is the price they have had to pay for freedom, on the journey to self-transformation. The pain and sacrifice that has helped shape the people, has also enabled them to stand on an equal footing with all others. For Dada, transformation was entirely different. It was the experience of the University of the Peoples of the East that many got to attend in Moscow and the pivotal shift it represented for them. For many, it was their first exposure to formal education. It also tied them in to people with similar aims globally and became a source of pride, for all the traits that were deemed undesirable in a Euro-centric world were desirable in this one.
Decoloniality and Decolonization 