Jaguar at Wal-Mart price?

Will you buy Jaguar at Wal-Mart?

From The Statesman
26 December 2007

ND Batra

What will happen to the Jaguar brand image if it is acquired by Tata Motors, a company that is associated with tractor-trailers, full-size SUVs, and now getting ready to manufacture the world’s cheapest automobile?

India may tolerate contradictions, slums and high towers in the same neighbourhood, but the global marketplace does not.

Writing in The New York Times, Heather Timmons commented: “Jaguar dealers in the United States have expressed concern about an Indian buyer, which they believe would devalue the luxury brand name.” But the Tata business empire also includes Tata Consultancy Services, one of the world’s largest providers of information technology, consulting services and business-process outsourcing with presence in 47 countries.

Last year, the Tata Group bought the Anglo-Dutch company Corus, making it the world’s sixth largest steelmaker. The Time magazine called it one of the top ten business deals of 2007.

Protecting brands is important, especially when the global market is becoming crowded with cheaper goods and it is difficult to distinguish between one product and another, though of course, you won’t confuse a Land Rover with a “One-Lakh Car”.

In the struggle for shelf space in the buyer’s imagination, branding has become indispensable. Brands create loyalty by offering identity, prestige and security, though the quality of a brand name product may not be much higher than its non-brand twin. And as non-brands and copycats themselves become recognizable names, the need to strengthen brand loyalty through its intensification becomes imperative.

Ulrich Steger says in his book Corporate Diplomacy: “Today brands indicate a life style, aspirations, a set of ideas or a social cachet.” Most people feel satisfied with pizza but some do want to have caviar. But will they go to Pizza Hut for caviar if it were available there? Some of the attributes of a good brand include originality, quality, reliability and personality. Quoting Naomi Klein, Steger says: “As companies become weightless, focusing on marketing and design only (but reaping with this bulk of the profit), they are shifting production into sweat shops elsewhere.”

So even if Jaguar and Land Rover will continue to be manufactured in Britain, thanks to the vote of confidence by its powerful union, Tata Motors cannot ignore the problem of image management and product reputation by association. India may not be a “land of tigers, jungles and cobras,” but you cannot hide the slums.

The survival of a strong brand in a competitive environment of meaning and identity creation is a serious question. A scandal could raise social protests and destroy a brand, unless brand values are deeply shared and lived by the whole company. “Always Low, Always” Wal-Mart’s slogan, for example, was being interpreted as putting the employees low.

The gap between promises and reality of a company’s behaviour gives critics opportunities to strike at the company.

Reputation of a company is as important as its other assets, including the country in which it is embedded.

The question is: Will European and American buyers continue buying the luxury brands Rover and Jaguar if they were sold, in a manner of speaking, through K-Mart or Wal-Mart?

Will the cool soon become a passing fad as it changes hands? Marguerite Rigoglioso, reporting the research done by Stanford business professor Chip Heath and Jona Berger of Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, wrote in Stanford GSB online that “as soon as chic goes mainstream, or geeks start sporting the clothes of jocks, items are dropped like passé hot potatoes by the kings and queens of cool.”

Rupert Murdoch, the Australian global media tycoon, faced a serious problem when he tried to buy the Wall Street Journal, whose brand value exceeds its intellectual value. Murdoch had to bend his knees and promise not to mess up with the editorial independence and integrity of the Journal. He had to accept a most humiliating condition: the establishment of a self-perpetuating independent editorial board to oversee the integrity of the newspaper.

Of course Jaguar will not be sold at bargain basement prices, and the Tata Group has a better reputation than Murdoch; nonetheless, the company has to understand that selling a Corus steel structure is not the same thing as selling a Jaguar convertible, which sits on your driveway. The Jaguar brand has a social meaning beyond its value.

As Wharton’s Professor Berger says: “Companies need to manage meaning. Brands need to attend to who is adopting their products, because these adopters can change what purchasing or using the product signals, and can lead other consumers to abandon it. If you want your brand to retain caché, you might want to think about protecting or segmenting meaning. Brands can constrain the type of consumers who can easily find it, or can use sub-brands or limited edition options that allow the company to sell to the mainstream while also maintaining the desired signal for the taste leaders.”

Let me rephrase the question: Will Europeans and Americans buy Champagne from the slums of Mumbai? The Tatas, the Mittals, the Ambanis and their billionaire kinds, as they go on mergers and acquisitions (M&A) sprees abroad, should also help clean up the slums of India.

Unlike Indians, Europeans and Americans have little tolerance for cognitive dissonance.

Living Virtually

Emerging virtual landscape

From The Statesman
ND Batra
Japanese prefer to use their cells for text messaging probably because it is considered rude to talk in public places, buses and train. According to a Reuter report, the Chinese sent 429 billion text messages last year, a country where there is limited freedom of the Press.

If researchers could do content analysis of the totality of the messages, they might discover the emerging mindset of the Chinese people. Different cultures use the same technology differently.

Americans love to talk and they do it everywhere regardless of how others feel. Music mobility is big in the United States and cell phones and mobile music devices have begun to converge. Similarly, Indian culture in its own way is affecting life and work now that mobile technology is rapidly penetrating even rural areas connecting millions of isolated people. But as villagers increasingly become wirelessly mobile, they would use it primarily to improve their human condition, including access to the market for their products and services as well as healthcare.

The consequences of the chirping revolution are unfathomable as wireless computer chips get embedded into everyday technologies. Wireless networks are abridging space and time, turning geographic space into cyberspace, and are bringing people together for collaboration in workplaces and cultural spaces. The experience of the presence of others in a virtual environment created by networked communication is a new social experience for many; those who use MySpace, Facebook and Second Life know the feeling.

Virtual presence could become active political presence. Isolated activists could organise virtually and become smart mobs and strike anywhere. Every human activity from porn to the most complex mathematical calculations is potentially nothing but information in the digital format.

So whatever activity that takes place in the analogue world can be turned into digital data, and can instantly be distributed globally through computer networks, thus extending the reach of human communication. That’s how we came to know the simmering rage of the Myanmarese Buddhist monks.

Imagine if millions of Tibetans get access to cell phones! Digital data cannot only be stored and retrieved instantly anywhere, but they can also be transformed into predictive intelligence about human behaviour regarding commerce, national security or any other social or political activity. Books, music files, or terrorist messages become indistinguishable as they converge in a digital stream and surge through cyberspace; but they can be mined and analysed.

US Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) Programs, about which Congress has expressed concerns, are already doing it. Convergence, instantaneity and feedback interactivity make the Internet the most powerful medium of communication ever developed. Since the traditional media, including books, television, newspapers, magazines, radio, music and interpersonal communication are converging on the Internet as multimedia streams into which anyone can plug in, their power increases manifold and in ways whose implications we still don’t understand.

Outsourcing, for example, has given India a constant state of virtual presence in the global political and corporate discourse. Unlike the offshoring of manufacturing, outsourcing of research and development and other forms of intellectual and professional work is bringing India, Europe and the United States into a virtual world of global supply chain where brainpower and creativity are shared and enhanced, for example, as in Hollywood-Bollywood animation venture Shrek2 and Madagascar.

The Internet thus is transformative in the sense that it is lowering barriers for cooperative coexistence of cultures. It is a stuff of the legend how GE contributed to the seeding of the digital revolution in India and how India is saving billions of dollars for corporate America and in the process enriching itself. Cultures prosper when they cooperate as well as compete. Historically speaking, a new medium of communication creates a cultural shift and changes our concept of space and time with far-reaching consequences, wrote the Canadian scholar Herald Innis in The Bias of Communication.

Although ancients tried to abridge space and time by sending messages through drums and smoke signals, not until the invention of telegraph was it possible to think about communication in terms other than transportation. Like goods, messages were communicated from place to place at a speed that the best transportation system of the time, for example, the pony express or the railroad made it possible. Telegraph altered the geography-based metaphor of communication, which ceased to be synonymous with transportation.

As telegraph triggered the development of new technologies in the early part of the 20th century and telephone, radio, and television became universal, communication became increasingly liberated from the constraints of space and time. Computer networks and the Internet have further altered our view of how we look at ourselves. A networked organisation or an individual with instant messaging and e-mail has a different feel of space and time than the people of the pre-digital era. Mouse is the door to cyberspace and once you are there, you are in a world that is simultaneously synchronous and asynchronous, a world that gives a greater sense of freedom and control than the real world.

For the digital generation, activities in a virtual universe are as real as they are in physical space. With mobile digital energy we could see the emergence of collective brainpower to solve complex problems. As more and more people experience activities in cyberspace through virtual presence, they would see that what is local is becoming global; what is Bollywood is becoming Hollywood; and vice a versa.

(ND Batra is Professor of Communications, Norwich University, Vermont USA)

Too Much Popularity Can Make Items Uncool: Research: News: Stanford GSB

"In a recent paper, Stanford researchers found that consumers may abandon products if they start being favored by the masses, or by members of certain social groups. In other words, as soon as chic goes mainstream, or geeks start sporting the clothes of jocks, items are dropped like passé hot potatoes by the kings and queens of cool." Read more... Too Much Popularity Can Make Items Uncool

Tagore on History

Tagore

Thou Hast Made Me Endless Part IX

From RAJAT DAS GUPTA
Calcutta

e-mail: rajatdasgupta53@yahoo.com
rajarch@cal3.vsnl.net.in


Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941 AD) the Nobel Laureate of 1913 was introduced to the West primarily through the collection of English translation of some of his poems/songs captioned as ‘Gitanjali’ (=Offering of Songs). More translations of his works followed by the poet himself and others after he had won the Nobel, including poems/songs, dramas, short stories etc. However, such efforts were sporadic and sluggish, mostly on individual initiative, which still remain so.As a result, a vast volume of the poet’s works remains un-translated while, it appears, it is an impossible proposition to translate even a substantial part of the poet’s total works to permit those, not privileged by the knowledge of Bengali language, a reasonably broad view of his myriad creations where unfathomable perceptional depth of top grade aesthetics runs through, literally true to his song “Thou hast made me endless / Such is Thy pleasure”.Notwithstanding this, an upsurge of Tagore translation took place in the last decade of the twentieth century by virtue of a good number of eminent poets/translators e.g.William Radice, Joe Winter, Ketaki Kushari Dyson, to name a few, all of whom left their valuable contribution to this oeuvre and my book THE ECLIPSED SUN is a modest addition to this. I have put stress on a few aspects of the poet’s works, particularly those in his twilight years, which seemed to me quite inadequately covered so far. The followings are presented mostly based on this book. RAJAT DAS GUPTA: Calcutta: e-mail: rajatdasgupta53@yahoo.com
rajarch@cal3.vsnl.net.in
Tagore the Historian (Contd..2)

In my introductory note in the first part published in the first week of Nov. ’07 to illustrate Tagore as a historian, it was stated that through a number of his inspiring poems Tagore had extracted and presented us hot the human emotions, ego, uprightness, virtuosity, malice, evil etc. which had propelled our history. But Tagore was no less competent than any other historian as a dispassionate historical analyst which the following essay illustrates.

Essay: SHIVAJI AND GURU GOVIND SINGH (Courtesy: P. R. COMMUMICATION AGE, Calcutta, December 1999 issue.)

[Translator’s note: This write up is a translation of an essay in Bengali by Rabindranath Tagore which he had written in mid-twenties. I read it decades back which was long lost in oblivion. Yet, this essay rang me a bell while I recently attended a function of the Sikhs at Delhi in celebration of the Tercentenary of Khalsa and also read a few publications there on this occasion where I noted the unqualified esteem of the Sikh community for Guru Govind Singh which is shared equally by the non-Sikhs as well, at least those who read about re-vitalization of the Sikh spirit under his leadership through a number of inspiring poems/essays of Tagore on the Sikhs and/or from other sources. Yet, in this essay Tagore has dispassionately compared Guru Govind Singh and Shivaji, particularly with Guru Nanak to highlight their slips from the broader humanism with which Nanak set his ball of Sikhism rolling. I am very much hopeful, my Sikh friends will take the critique of the Poet of their highly esteemed Guru Govind in its true spirit for an objective analysis of the Sikh history. It is notable that the Poet himself realizes that Guru Govind’s tailoring of Nanak’s liberalism was out of historical and social compulsions of that time. Yet, the Poet cannot help his disappointment with Sikhism having to discount the eternal human values propounded by Nanak where martial values had elbowed in, that also failing to assume an all India dimension in the Shivaji line while that too flopped for want of a strong national base. However, the remnants of Sikhism is still precious to us and had the Poet been among us, he would certainly be happy to note to-day’s endeavor for its preservation, as is being particularly notable in North India in 1999, the year of the said Trecentenary.]

The main difference of the Sikh history with the Marathas’ is that Shivaji, the leader of the latter launched his movement with the clear objective of establishing a Hindu sovereignty. His conquests, expansion of empire and elimination of enemies were all part of this all India master plan

On the other hand, the Sikh history started as one of spirituality. The liberty which Baba Nanak perceived was not of a statehood. The iconic religion confined with geographical limits, racial concepts and rituals to which the entire mankind does not have a right, was not Nanak’s. His heart was liberated of all such fetters and he dedicated his life preaching this spirit. Those who fell for it and accepted his baptism, were known as Sikh (a disciple). Irrespective of caste or creed everybody had a right to it. That a racial history would emerge out of Nanak’s followers, was not evident at the beginning.

But the brutal tortures of the Mughols congregated those disciples into an identifiable community. Putting a halt to their religious mission amidst the mass at large, they concentrated on self defence. The said external pressures resulted in their emergence as a cohered race.

The last Guru of the Sikhs dedicated himself particularly to this task. He felt the need of building up the Sikhs as a powerful race at the cost of Nanak’s concept of religious mission for humanity at large. Indeed this is not the task of a prophet but an army general’s, and/or politician’s. Guru Govind had these virtues. With his outstanding perseverance he converted his religious community into a martial one and vacated the seat of Guru. He upstaged Nanak’s perception of human liberty and stamped deep in the minds of his followers the urge for being relieved of all animosity around. No doubt this sparked up the Sikh might for a few moments in our history and that did generate high martial skill. But a lot of the capital with which Baba Nanak set them on their pilgrimage was spent up on this diversion with their objective lost/

The subsequent history is only of battles and territorial expansion. More the Mughol power was on the decline, more successful the Sikhs were, followed by increasing temptation for sovereign expansion.

So long the opponents are stronger, the motive for defence remains supreme which acts as the uniting force. As the external pressure eases out what can hold the arrogance of triumph? The martial power that builds up in the process of self defence, who can rein it then for self development instead of hurting others? For sake of short term need, Guru Govind put down that faculty which might have. Instead of Guru, he gifted the Sikhs sword. When he passed away, the supreme truth that Nanak preached got captive in Granth Sahib. No more it flowed through Guru legacy into the life stream for fruition among human society at large. It stagnated at a point.

Their power in this situation turned out to be a genie out of the bottle. Rampant became scramble and faction amidst which up rose Ranjit Singh. He held the Sikhs together for sometime but that was with muscle power alone. As he was the strongest, he could quell the rest.

He who unites by might, does it by mayhem. Besides, he accomplishes his task by crippling love which alone is the eternal foundation of unity. Ranjit Singh held firm all the Sikhs together by all trickery for his self interest. He did not inspire the Sikhs with any noble idea that might bind them even after he would pass away. He was an example of self dedication even based on rampant deceit. His greed was unbounded. His only credit was, he achieved whatever he had wanted. He controlled himself only where the British had dictated so. However, on the whole, he was successful. But nothing imperils one more than one’s success, while it obscures wisdom and boosts greed. It is then as good as suicidal. Nanak, the pioneer of Sikhism, is a bright example of failure. For that he had had enough reprimand from his merchant father. The setback in his salt trade at Nanak’s hand is well known. He was poor. But the inspiration which enabled the Jat peasants to slight all sufferings including death, and to grow into a mighty institution, was nourished by this poor hermit/

On the other hand, the Maharaja, who is an example of success, who suppressed all the enemies of the Sikhs undaunted by all adversities, eruption of whose fire set afire the evening sky of the setting sun of the Mughol empire at the advent of the rise of the British, what did he leave behind for the Sikhs? It was disunity, mistrust and lack of discipline.

Those in the forefront among the Sikhs, learnt from their ‘successful’ king that ‘might is right’. They did not learn sacrifice and modesty, they forgot the maxim – victory lies where holy principles do; that is- the spiritual power with which modest Nanak held them, the almighty king gutted it out resulting in extinction of the ‘Sikh’ star in the sky of human history after its brief glitter. To-day, the Sikhs have stagnated, reduced to a small community. No more they are growing; over a few centuries they did not gift mankind with a human Guru any more; they did not add any more to the man’s treasure of wisdom and spiritual dedications.

No doubt, Nanak’s disciples are competent warriors to-day. But I don’t think that sole glory of Nanak’s posterity was destined to be in their martial engagements in various parts of the globe as we find to-day (the Poet obviously refers to the periods of the world wars – Translator). Nanak’s dedication was not for their parades in the army barracks alone in the wide arena of humanism. (I am sure, the Poet would have been very happy to see how the Sikhs to-day are dominating the mainstream of our national life also, besides the army barracks, if he were among us. – Translator)

Nanak’s call to his disciples was to be free from self-centeredness, sectarian religion and spiritual numbness – to give the widest accomplishment to their humanism. Guru Govind moulded the Sikhs for a specific need and so that it does not slip into oblivion, he firmly stamped this need in their nomenclature and attire. Thus, he harnessed the Sikh’s strong current of humanism from diverse courses to a particular one. Thus, the Sikhs were caught in the mould of that specific need and of course attained solidarity.

When the Sikhs thus became ‘useful’ instead of being liberal humans, the powerful rulers utilized their skill toward their own end and till now such exploitation is going on. At Sparta, when Greece shrank its humanism for a particular purpose, it was indeed able to fight, but only upon pruning itself – as competence for battle is not man’s ultimate goal. There are a lot of such examples of man dwarfing his nobility for the immediate need and sacrifice of humans at the altar of the urge for shortsighted gain is going on. The icon thirsty of human blood may happen to be the society, state, religion or any other so called ‘cause’ that spoils human virtues with its mass hypnotism.

To me, the end of Sikh history seems sad. When the river with destination sea emerges from the snow white peak of lofty mountain only to be lost into a midway desert and loses its momentum forgetting its own music, that futility is tragic. Similarly, when the holy impulse founts from the devotees’ heart to fertile the earth with spirituality, it is sad it perverts into the mud crimson red with the soldiers’ blood, with its early glory no more left. The Sikh history had its slips, due to temptation of revenge or other narrow objectives, from a wider fulfillment in the field of humanism, neither had lesser success within national limits. The empire of Ranjit Singh was his exclusive. Govind Singh’s struggle with the Mughols was only of Sikh community. He could not transmit their resolution further beyond.

The difference of the Sikh history with the Marathas’ is notable here. Shivaji’s endeavour was not confined to a small community. His objective to liberate the Hindus and their religion from the Muslim tyranny was far flung unlike Guru Govind’s which remained confined among his disciples. No doubt, Shivaji’s goal was to rebuild the history of the entire Indian sub-continent. Guru Govind and Shivaji were more or less contemporaries while the liberalism of Akbar declined resulting in provocation by the Mughols of all non-Muslim religions and communities for a defensive stand.

All the internal and external shocks at that time sponsored a religious enterprise at various places in India. The turmoil in the Hindu religious life then crystallized around various saints, particularly in the Deccan, and had manifestation in various missions. Amidst this consciousness, stoked up by the torturous Aurengzeb, emergence of a hero like Shivaji to earn victory for India’s primeval religion was natural.

Again, in the west, the new inspiration of Sikhism overflowed the hearts of the Sikhs. That is why, the Mughol atrocities could not stifle it. On the contrary, it fanned up like a fire. Notwithstanding the identical external blows and the internal inspirations, their manifestations through Guru Govind and Shivaji were different in nature.

Guru Govind had many battles with the Mughols, but in a haphazard manner. Revenge and self-defence were their main objectives. [History records that Guru Govnd’s father iTeg Bahadur was put to death by Aurengzeb for his refusal to embrace Islam in 1675 A.D. His two sons were slain before his eyes in a battle. Govind’s determination to avenge these deaths was largely behind his relentless fight against the Mughols, as some historians observed which obviously misled Tagore. A quote from Dr. Trilochan Singh’s book ‘Hymns of Guru Teg Bahadur’ may take us nearer to truth –
“These historians fail to study Guru’s concept of martyrdom and of Saviour with the sword who is convinced that he is commissioned by God to establish righteousness, punish the wicked, chastise the tyrants, which also means that the Guru was determined never to use sword for revenge or aggression” – Translator]
But those of Shivaji were in logical steps, not for preposterous avenge, but far sighted for a colossal organization in right sequence. It was not manifestation of a communal emotion, but an enterprise for a great objective. [It is difficult to accept the Poet’s view that the Sikh;s worked for communal interest alone while their history is replete with examples coming as saviours of the Hindus also from Muslim atrocities – Translator].

Yet, both Sikh and Maratha history ended in similar futility. The reason for this is, an objective cannot be pervasive countrywide based on the dreams of a few. Shivaji could not link his heart with his countrymen’s. So, despite all his move, his intent could not come up as the entire country’s.

If the welfare meant for all cannot be established in their heart, but remains confined among few, it loses its character and turns into a menace for all. What was pure in Shivaji’s mind, became polluted by selfishness of the Peshwas. It could not be so had the communication channels of this ideal among the masses remained open. In that case the great inspiration would get its nourishment in its great receptacle, as the fire of a near extinguishing piece of wood may catch another for its flare up if placed in a stack.

Repeatedly we have noted in our country uprising of vitality only to lose its continuity. Great men come and pass away as the natural advantages to hold and nourish their inspirations are missing here. The reason for this is disunity. Wind borne seeds may drop on loose soil unable to hold manure and, thus, do not sprout there effectively. Our land has endless diversities, be it in our religion, deed, food, language or anywhere for that matter. That is why, floods of emotion pour down, but dry up in dreary sand; energy sparks up only to extinguish with a bit of smoke; notable endeavours do not become great ones; the great men pass away only glaring the incompetence of the mass.

As we compare the rise and fall of the Marathas and the Sikhs, it may be seen that the Sikhs once united on inspiration from a highly noble intent which brought a message of truth without any geographical or ritual confinement neither generated out of a momentary impulse, but is an eternal belonging to mankind at large, to broaden human rights, to liberate their soul, and to reckon where lies man’s fullest glory. At the magnanimous call of this liberal religion of Nanak, for several centuries the Sikh ideal expanded amidst various sufferings. Perception of such a religion amidst all their glorious ordeals, the Sikhs unwittingly laid down the foundation of a unity on a wide scale.

Guru Govind harnessed this spiritual unity of the Sikhs for the purpose of their task at hand. For their ephemeral need, he pruned down this spiritual unity with the goal of a statehood. He uprooted the caste system which stood on his way. Of course, he could do it as Nanak’s liberalism already eroded parochialism from the base which fell into pieces at the very first stroke of Guru Govind. Without this prior preparedness he would not be able to achieve it, however essential, neither this intent to dissolve this all futile divisiveness would shape up in his mind.

But Guru Govind, while strengthening unity, dethroned the very power (i.e. religiosity/ spirituality) which made it feasible, or at least, did coronate its rival partner (i.e. martial values), to corner the former. As a result, some immediate purposes were achieved, but what was advancing toward an absolute liberation, was stranded midway. The Sikhs were thick among themselves, but lost the momentum for the said advance. Their march for man’s ultimate glory halted at soldiery. There the Sikh history terminated.

The objective to which Shivaji dedicated himself was not ephemeral, for which the influence of religious Gurus at Deccan already prepared a ground. So, his inspiration could percolate down the entire Maratha race.

A pot with holes cannot hold water though for a while it may be overflowing. Our society is full of holes, incapable of holding great ideals, resulting in abundance of lifeless parched rituals. In his contemporary Maratha/ Hindu populace Shivaji introduced an inspiration powerful enough to keep its momentum for sometime. But he failed to solidify its receptacle, rather did not even attempt it. He set sail in the stormy sea with his leaky vessel, as its need was imminent. In fact, he wanted these very leaks across. The Hindu society which he aimed to win over the Mughol invasion, ritualistic cracks were at the base of it, which he aimed to turn triumphant in India. Shivaji never stood on any ideal which might heal up all these basic disintegration. His grievance that his own religion was being raped by external forces was natural, but to capitalize that alone to turn his religion as the victor all over India was bound to be futile, as it was being ruptured from within, continuously splitting and insulating man. He never looked inward to realize this menace but took itself as our holy religion. It is beyond man to establish sovereignty of such a fragmented monastic order in such a vast country like India as it cannot be any divine design. A nation merely infuriated by external blows cannot be great or victorious so long it is not conscious of the prudence of unity and its power will not motivate it, at heart and externally also, for an integration on a great ideal. Until then, no external blow, neither the personality or valor of any talent can make it compact or vivacious.

[Publication of this essay of Tagore at this time will be quite relevant to the Tercentenary of Khalsa movement this year – Editor, P. R. COMMUNICATION AGE]

Indian story

CORRUPTION IN INDIA IS TOXIC

"Rather, it is corrosive, debilitating corruption, which runs through all levels of society from the lowest to the highest, and creates a massive barrier to the deployment of foreign capital and the development of efficient markets. Yet it is an issue few Indian business and political leaders are prepared to even talk about let alone confront."
Read more...in The Indepenednt
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Peaceful Iran?

Iran War a non-starter?

Frrom The statesman

ND Batra

The rhetoric of war against Iran has become muted. The hawks are in disarray. US Vice-President Mr Dick Cheney has been boxed and shoved into a corner for now.

Democrat and Republican presidential candidates are scrambling to come up with new policy postures toward Iran, whom they continue to regard as an unfriendly country, albeit not an evil one, that could provoke World War III, as President George W Bush warned in October.Europeans who have been reluctantly cooperating with the USA are baffled by the revelations. Russia and China are hastening to go back to their cozy commercial relations with Iran. India says its stand that the Iran nuclear issue should be handled by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and not by the UN Security Council has been vindicated.

This is a rare example of how information put together as a well-constructed report free from political bias can change overnight the mindset of almost an entire nation. What happened to the Intelligence community’s earlier conclusions that Iran was in the advanced stages of highly enriched uranium for nuclear weapons? Perhaps, Intelligence became smarter and developed new insights.

The National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), a report based on the findings of the 16 agencies of the US Intelligence community, has concluded “with a high level of confidence” in its report released last week that Iran is not engaged in the development of nuclear weapons today. Teheran halted its nuclear weapons programme in 2003, though it continues pursuing nuclear energy development for civilian energy purposes. What a relief! But what happened? Several factors such as the US invasion of Iraq and the subsequent chaos and destruction of the country, Libya’s giving up of its nuclear weapons development programme under US and UK pressures, the dismantling of Pakistan’s clandestine nuclear bazaar operated by AQ Khan from which Iran had benefited, and the rising drumbeat of the Axis of Evil might have persuaded Iran to reconsider its options and so it decided to freeze its programme.

There is no doubt that Iran has the necessary scientific, technological and industrial base and knowledge to make nuclear bombs. Suspending the programme does not mean, however, that Iran has altogether given up its intention to build a nuclear arsenal in the pursuit of its strategic interests in the region. At least for the time being, it is not doing it.

The report says, “Our assessment that Iran halted the programme in 2003 primarily in response to international pressure indicates Teheran’s decisions are guided by a cost-benefit approach, rather than a rush to a weapon irrespective of the political, economic, and military costs.” Of course, the national interest calculus includes both short and long term cost-benefit analyses. And Iran taking into account the ruthless determination of the Bush administration that it displayed in the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq might have thought it to be unwise to continue with its nuclear weapons programme.

But the US Intelligence community did not know about Iran’s suspension of its nuclear programme; nor was it convinced about the regime’s protestations that it is pursuing nuclear development only for civilian uses.

That explains perhaps why the 2005 Intelligence estimate said: “Iran currently is determined to develop nuclear weapons despite its international obligations and international pressure.” The 2005 report gave the Bush administration the rationale for persuading its European allies as well as Russia and China to impose effective sanctions on Iran. The latest Intelligence report, which was commissioned by the Democrat-controlled Congress, is said to have used more rigorous methods of Intelligence gathering and analysis so that the previous Intelligence fiasco regarding Iraq’s development of weapons of mass destruction should not be repeated. Faulty Intelligence in the hands of a frightened nation, as the USA had become after 9/11, can have terrible global consequences.

In 2002, accurate and reliable Intelligence about Iraq might have persuaded the USA to adopt some other method of dealing with Saddam Hussein. The new Intelligence report, which contradicts the previous alarming findings about Iran’s intentions, buttresses the arguments of non-hawkish Americans, Republicans and Democrats, who believe that concerted international diplomacy would work.The report recommends that “some combination of threats of intensified international scrutiny and pressure, along with opportunities for Iran to achieve its security, prestige, and goals for regional influence in other ways, might ~ if perceived by Iran’s leaders as credible ~ prompt Teheran to extend the current halt to its nuclear weapons programme”.

According to the IAEA, Iran continues to operate 3,000 centrifuges to enrich uranium for civilian nuclear energy purposes, which could give it enough fissile material to produce nuclear weapons in less than a decade if its intentions change and it can get away with international scrutiny and pressure. With the long-range Ashoura and Shahab series, Iran has a well developed ballistic missile development programme.With its immense oil and natural gas resources and nuclear capabilities, Iran is a significant power in the region. But no single power should be allowed to dominate the Gulf region through which millions of barrels of oil flow every day.

Now that war is off the table, dealing with Iran’s geopolitical ambitions becomes a great diplomatic challenge not only for the next US administration but also for the international community. As French President Mr Nicolas Sarkozy said after the NIE report was released, “The threat exists”.

Engaging Iran at multiple levels will open up this ancient civilisation. The next US President should take the first step in this direction.

(ND Batra teaches communications and diplomacy at Norwich University, USA)

China censorship

Kathrin Hille of Financial Times says:

"Ang Lee has acknowledged that he edited his latest film for political reasons to allow it to be shown in China. The award-winning Taiwanese director said he changed the dialogue at the climax of Lust, Caution, which won the Golden Lion award at the Venice Film Festival this year, to accommodate Chinese censors’ requests that the female lead’s patriotic character should not be compromised."
Read more: FT.com / Asia-Pacific / China - Taiwan director bowed to China censors

Muslim Women in India Seek Secular Justice

Muslim Women in India Seek Secular Justice


Aditi Bhaduri says:
"After years of silence, Muslim women in India are loudly battling repressive religious laws. The case of one semi-literate woman, a survivor of rape, ignited their cause. Second in a series on the changing role of women in India."

The Merchant of Arabia

Uncle Sam and the merchant of Arabia

From The Statesman
ND Batra

With the rise of crude oil to $90-100 a barrel, the camel is overloaded with the greenback. And there is no better place for the Arab merchant to unload his petrodollars than to lend it Americans who juggle their daily lives between credit cards and debit cards, home equity loans and foreclosures. But it is not only the Joe Six-pack who is in trouble. His lenders too are sleepless.

Like other American financial institutions, Citigroup, the global financial giant, has been reeling under billions of dollars mortgage-and-subprime related losses. The Citigroup board, instead of responding to merger overtures from other financial institutions, went in search of Arab petrodollars and obtained $7.5 billion cash flow from the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, the government’s sovereign wealth fund, for a 4.9 per cent equity stake plus 11 per cent annual interest rate, making it one of the biggest investors in the bank.In this age of globalisation, you might say, so what?

Not everyone seems to be happy about the Citigroup deal with the Arab merchant. In an editorial titled “Citi of Arabia”, The Wall Street Journal wrote: “We hate to spoil the party, but it strikes us as unfortunate, if not a tragedy, that America’s largest bank had to go hat in hand to the Arab sheikhs because of bad management and blundering US monetary policy.” Many transnational corporations and international businesses try to develop an early awareness system, which picks up weak signals that might become a raging storm later. An early awareness system helps prepare a company to nip the evil in the bud. But American financial institutions did not foresee any sign of trouble.

Nobody understood what havoc subprime lending might create.Nor does anybody fully understand how the global wealth is shifting to other regions. Irwin Stelzer, director of economic policy studies at the Hudson Institute wrote in Times Online: “The world has changed. Wealth has moved into new hands. Morgan Stanley estimates that the world’s sovereign wealth funds hold some $2.5 trillion in assets, more than the global hedge-fund industry.And they are adding about $500 billion to their assets every year. One Goldman Sachs banker told me that until recently he had never been to West Asia; now he makes several trips each month.”

The widespread hostility against globalisation is unfortunately prevalent in the USA. In the Internet age, there is a tremendous mobility of factors from foreign direct investment to job outsourcing to state-controlled sovereign wealth funds equity investment. In this sense the world, instead of becoming flat as The New York Times columnist Tom Friedman believes, is rather developing peaks and valleys, dungeons and dragons. The fear of “MacDonaldisation” is being replaced by the fear of secretive Arab and Chinese sovereign wealth funds and state-controlled companies nibbling at American assets, which are becoming cheaper to acquire, thanks to the fall of the dollar.

The Arabs own 10 per cent of Citigroup and their voice will eventually be heard in the boardroom. Recently, Dubai and Abu Dhabi made significant investments in Advanced Micro Devices, a leading semiconductor company that handles many defence contracts. Globalisation is a dynamic process of creating interdependencies in economics, international trade and culture, and is likely to create instabilities. It is much more than bilateralism because a country has to be opened to the flow of influences from all around.Transnational corporations stride the world like a colossus. Their business depends upon their reputation, which makes them extremely vulnerable not only to the government of the host country but also to the news over which the government has no control, especially in a democratic society.

In authoritarian countries, where the news media is controlled by the government, transnational corporations have a much easier time doing business. That is one of the most important reasons transnational corporations find it easy to do business in China.They have to deal with one authority, that of the central government. They don’t have to deal with environmental degradation, oil spills and uprooting of people without compensation to build new buildings. The news media plays no part and international NGOs have no say. And for the same reason, when a state-controlled Chinese company or an Arab sovereign wealth fund buys American assets, Americans become paranoid because of the lack of transparency.

The government’s impact upon economic activities is limited because in the global village there are so many actors, and the government cannot control all of them. Government has limited control over the mobility of capital. Key instruments of monetary and fiscal policy, exchange rates and import barriers are not totally under government control. Globalisation creates comparative choices and highlights inefficiencies both in the government and corporations. But just as governments are constrained by forces beyond their control, so are transnational corporations.

Microsoft had to face anti-trust regulations both in the USA and the European Union. Similar controls might have to be applied to secretive sovereign wealth funds if they seek to buy assets in the USA and other open societies. A case in point is the Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI), which explains why Americans are worried about the merchant of Arabia. In 1991, BCCI was found by regulators in the USA and the UK to have been involved in arms dealing, money laundering, bribery, support of terrorism, tax evasion, smuggling, illegal immigration and the sale of nuclear technologies. The Emir of Abu Dhabi, Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, the father of the present ruler, controlled the bank, which was closed after the investigation.

In this environment, corporate diplomacy is imperative. International corporations and sovereign wealth funds must become culturally attractive to host country publics. Unless sovereign wealth funds from West Asia and state-controlled global companies from the Middle Kingdom become transparent and publicly accountable, they must be watched and scrutinised.

(ND Batra is professor of communications and diplomacy at Norwich University, Vermont.)

Best Practices of Global Innovators — HBS Working Knowledge

Best Practices of Global Innovators — HBS Working Knowledge

China: “Red Foreigner” Sings Red Songs Naked

China: “Red Foreigner” Sings Red Songs Naked

Global Voices Online » China: Report from Hong Kong on sweatshop

China: Report from Hong Kong on sweatshop

The Future is Biotech

The future is here

From The Statesman

The recent breakthrough in stem cell research carried out independently in Japan and the USA, by Shinya Yamanaka of Kyoto University and James A Thomson with his colleagues at the University of Wisconsin, shows another path to human rejuvenation, including a cure for many incurable diseases.

By reprogramming a human skin cell, the researchers have been able to bring it back to its original pure embryonic stage, a pluripotent stage from where the cell could be coaxed to become any of the 220 specialised human cells, for example, heart, lungs, brain, muscle cells, which could be used for customised therapeutic healing. A brain-injured person could live a full, healthy life again. That is the future, perhaps.

The awesome beauty of this discovery is that the process of reversion of a skin cell to its de novo embryonic stage does not involve the destruction of embryos, which many pro-life people from President George W Bush to the late Pope John Paul II condemned as immoral. President Bush has steadfastly denied the use of federal funds “to promote science that destroys life to save life,” despite the fact that most Americans have never been with him on this issue.

Dr Bill Frist, a heart-lung transplant surgeon by training, who was Senate majority leader (2003-2007), for example, spoke for most Americans, when he said: “I am pro-life, I believe human life begins at conception. I also believe that embryonic stem cell research should be encouraged and supported.” Former First Lady Nancy Reagan said: “Embryonic stem cell research has the potential to alleviate so much suffering. Surely, by working together we can harness its life-giving potential.” Her husband, President Ronald Reagan, spent the last years of his life in Alzheimer’s limbo.

President Bush, nonetheless, repeatedly said, "my way or the highway". You see the power of presidential leadership; and also its limitations because he could not stop the private funding of embryonic stem cell research by states, biotechnology companies, and private universities who have been pursuing the research regardless of the opposition. For example, in 2004 California voters approved a $3-billion bond to promote research in the state.

Since last year, the Harvard Stem Cell Institute has been doing research using the Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer process to create specific cell lines from cloned human embryos, which again raised hopes for millions of people suffering from incurable diseases. Harvard research is said to be diseases specific; for example, the nucleus of a skin cell of a diabetic patient is inserted into an unfertilised donor egg, from which the nucleus has been removed. The newly engineered composite egg is nurtured in a Petri dish to develop into an early embryo from which embryonic stem cell lines is developed and guided into becoming healthy insulin producing pancreatic islet cells to replace the diseased ones, for example, in a child suffering from juvenile diabetes.

It is painful to imagine how much a child with juvenile diabetes suffers; or how much the family members endure as they see the wasting away of their loved one with the knowledge that one day if the stem cell research continued there might be hope for a most emaciating human illness. Anytime an older person forgets the name of his own children, you wonder if this could be the beginning of a slow end. In the USA, people look to science and medicine for salvation. They know embryonic stem cells could be the beginning of a new life for persons suffering from fatal ailments. Stem cells that are derived from aborted and discarded embryos could be potentially directed to grow into any kind of specialised cells to repair damaged human parts and trigger a self-regenerative process in the human body. It is an example of how killing life can save lives.

Choosing life over potential life is practical ethics at its best, it has been argued.

Though many people favour embryonic stem cell research, pro-lifers argue that research in regenerative and therapeutic medicine and technology should not be left to the marketplace because somewhere in the process life begins. The late pope John Paul II urged that a “free and virtuous society, which the USA aspires to be, must reject practices that devalue and violate human life at any stage from conception until natural death.”

The Pope was afflicted with Parkinson’s, one of the millions of sufferers of the debilitating disease but he never wavered, and warned “how a tragic coarsening of consciences accompanies the assault on innocent human life in the womb, leading to accommodation and acquiescence in the face of other related evils such as euthanasia, infanticide…”

That’s why many Americans could not ignore the late Pope’s warning that the destruction of embryos to extract stem cells, even when the purpose is to fight diseases and reduce human suffering, would dehumanise us. Stem cell revolution is as momentous as was the smashing of an atom; therefore, it needs safeguards to harness its benefits without the coarsening of our conscience.

The recent development of reprogramming skin cells into embryonic stages offers scientists an equally fertile method of developing cell therapy, which will make destruction of embryos unnecessary. Science has solved its own ethical dilemmas. The discovery also illustrates the concept of “equifinality” in general systems theory, according to which a dynamic system, if challenged, could reach the same goal by other means. There is always an alternative.

And thereby hangs another question: Is human body nothing but an information system that could be reprogrammed cell by cell? We will talk about human soul some other time.

(ND Batra teaches communications and diplomacy at Norwich University. The author of Digital Freedom, he is working on a new book, This is the American Way.)

China-US Confrontation

Washington Post speculates that China's

Naval Rebuff Could Be Reply to Dalai Lama's Medal

Chinese Propaganda

Chinese propaganda reaches new heights

Peter Goodspeed in National Post

“Fifty years after the Soviet Union launched Sputnik, the world's first man-made satellite, and just hours after the U.S. space shuttle Discovery thundered into orbit to work on the International Space Station, China took the next step in a new space race yesterday, sending aloft its first lunar orbiter.” READ MORE

“Seeking to reaffirm India's cultural commonalty with Asean is a good idea” says Sunanda K. Datta-Ray in Business Standard.
READ MORE

Don't Cry for Pakistan

A moment of meditation on Pakistan

From the Statesman
ND Batra

Pakistan is not a failed state but at present it is in a state of dynamic instability, which could spin out of control if the situation is not handled wisely by its neighbors, international allies, and all-weather friends.

And what makes Pakistan an intriguing story is that to insure its own survival it has successfully developed nuclear weapons and now has enough arsenals to cause nuclear havoc all around, if they fall into the hands of Islamic militants.

Thanks to the unsupervised autonomy given to its footloose nuclear scientists, AQ Khan and others, to develop nuclear weapons, it has also been a nuclear proliferator: Iran is said to have benefited from its nuclear technology. Having conceived and given birth to the Taliban movement, it is a breeding ground and hideout for Al Qaeda and Taliban militants and terrorists.

Added to its complexity is yet another remarkable layer: of a progressive, liberal and somewhat secular Pakistan that surfaced recently when Benazir Bhutto returned home after eight years of exile; and when lawyers, journalists, students and other open-minded moderate groups protested by the thousands against President Pervez Musharraf for his high-handedness in the dismissal of the Supreme Court justices.

Lest we hastily romanticize the bench, the Pakistan Supreme Court instead of being a neutral umpire and interpreter of the law had begun to give the impression of being a partisan group. The Court could have and should have played the role of a pacifier in an extremely violent environment.

Before you hastily dismiss Musharraf as a tin pot dictator, consider the initiatives he took to bring India and Pakistan closer for trade and commerce and resolve the Kashmir problem. Violence has abated in the valley. Between the peoples of India and Pakistan, there is a genuine feeling of goodwill and desire to live and work together. This is no small achievement, for which Musharraf deserves the most credit.

Since Musharraf assumed power eight years ago, Pakistan has registered remarkable economic growth, which has swelled and beefed up the Pakistani middle class. According to the World Bank, “After a decade of anemic economic growth, Pakistan’s economy has grown by more than 6.5 percent per year since 2003. While income inequality has increased somewhat, poverty has declined significantly….A wide-ranging program of economic reforms launched in 2000 – fiscal adjustment, privatization of energy, telecommunications, and production, banking sector reform and trade reform – have played a key role in the country’s economic recovery… Pakistan's economy has shown great resilience in the face of the devastating earthquake, and future growth prospects for the economy are good.”

A growing and self-confident Pakistani middle class is clamoring for more political breathing space; but in any case the country is not mimicking China— Pakistan’s all-weather friend. The Pakistani middle class’s aspirations are closer to that of India than any other country, in spite of it being an Islamic country. A self-confident and stable Pakistan is in India’s national interest, as I said earlier in this column. As Stephen P. Cohen, a South Asian expert at the Brookings Institute said, India by being India and leaving Pakistan alone can help Pakistan become a better Pakistan.

So don’t cry for Pakistan. Not yet.

Unlike most other Muslim countries, Pakistan is no stranger to freedom and democracy. It has a vibrant press; a free and bold, albeit erratic, judiciary; and an intellectual class that you find nowhere else in the Muslim world except perhaps in Turkey. Its scientific community, which developed nuclear weaponry with the help of China, cannot be brushed aside. Pakistan has brainpower waiting to be tapped. It is unfortunate that Pakistan is caught up between democratic aspirations at the top and religious obtuseness at the bottom.

Senator Joe Biden, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee wrote in The Baltimore Sun that the United States “must move from a Musharraf policy to a Pakistan policy that gives the moderate majority a chance to succeed.” Instead of depending upon the questionable political strength and commitment of Musharraf alone for war against terrorism, the United States should be reaching out to a wide variety of constituencies in Pakistan including the media, universities, businesses, non-profit organizations, tribal leaders and intelligence communities. I agree. Not only that, the United States should open up its duty free portals to Pakistani manufacturers. A nation that trades cannot afford to hate others.

It is true that Musharraf has not been to make a total break from the forces that have supported him in his hold on power and hence his inability to wipe out terrorism totally. Musharraf’s deal with tribal leaders relinquishing sovereign authority over the tribal territory did not turn out to be a wise political move. Perhaps it was done out of helplessness. Pakistan has become a safe haven for Al Qaeda and the Taliban.

The question is: If Musharraf has not been able to exercise full control over the forces operating in the divided country, what can be done? Would a civilian government headed by Benazir Bhutto or anybody else, if it were possible to hold free elections, be able to control the raging militancy in Swat, Waziristan, and not least, in the hearts and minds of many Pakistanis? Bhutto can launch a thousand ships against Musharraf, but what will she do against the Taliban and Al Qaeda? Nonetheless, Benazir Bhutto symbolizes a future that must happen in Pakistan one day.

(ND Batra, who teaches communications and diplomacy at Norwich University, is the author of Digital Freedom and is working on a new book, This is the America Way)

Corporate Leadership

What makes a successful leader of a global corporation?

Heart and mind at the service of all stakeholders of society, said Narayana Murthy of Infosys at the Stanford Graduate School of Business.

Read More …

Watch Video

China Media Control

How China tries media control

China not only manipulates its own media but also tries to browbeat other Asian media outlets.
Read what Ming Dai says in Beijing hones media manipulation (Asia Times).

Digital natives collaborating

Digital natives collaborating

From The Statesman

ND Batra

The challenge for the academia lies in tapping and pooling the brainpower within academic units as well as outside and creating an environment of synergy and enthusiasm for collaboration. That is how you develop what is called “swarming intelligence.”

As it has been often said, the digital age is breaking walls and melding previously divergent communities, for example, of critics and practitioners; of message creators and audiences; of teachers and learners. The virtual and the physical are crisscrossing and becoming co-extensive parallel universes.

The Second Life, YouTube, MySpace, and Facebook generation is developing its sensibilities in virtual environments characterised by new assumptions based on heterarchy, interactivity, and intellectual engagement, what MIT’s Henry Jenkins describes as “a culture with relatively low barriers to artistic expression and civic engagement, strong support for creating and sharing one’s creations, and some type of informal mentorship whereby what is known by the most experienced is passed along to novices.”

This kind of heterarchical culture generates “opportunities for peer-to-peer learning, a changed attitude toward intellectual property, the diversification of cultural expression, the development of skills valued in the workplace, and a more empowered conception of citizenship.” The cyber generation that is descending upon campuses requires skills that enable it to be competitive in a global environment where collaborative teamwork, spread across time-zones and continents, is becoming a necessity.

Fortunately, thanks to computer and video games, many kids are already coming to colleges equipped with some of the skills suggested by Jenkins; for example: “the capacity to experiment with one’s surroundings as a form of problem-solving; the ability to adopt alternative identities for the purpose of improvisation and discovery; the ability to interpret and construct dynamic models of real-world processes; the ability to meaningfully sample and remix media content; the ability to scan one’s environment and shift focus as needed to salient details; the ability to interact meaningfully with tools that expand mental capacities; the ability to pool knowledge and compare notes with others toward a common goal; the ability to evaluate the reliability and credibility of different information sources; the ability to follow the flow of stories and information across multiple modalities; the ability to search for, synthesise, and disseminate information; the ability to travel across diverse communities, discerning and respecting multiple perspectives, and grasping and following alternative norms.”
And there is much more to come.
To educate the cyber generation, the campus grey eminence needs to develop tools for collaborative environment in which students and teachers can work as co-workers and performers. For a university an important step in building collaboration for innovation is to develop its own Wiki, where people can collaborate, build, edit, and correct each other. The idea of Wiki is based on the principle of redundancy and the system’s self-correcting behaviour, which makes it possible for knowledge and creativity to emerge through continuous emendation, additions and revisions. Andrew P McAffee calls it (Sloan Management Review) as “The Dawn of Emergent Collaboration.”

Convergence and emergence shape our lives today.

I believe that in an innovation and knowledge-driven world collaboration is imperative, though most of us are obsessed with lone geniuses like Albert Einstein transforming space-time dimensions into abstract mathematical equations; Ludwig van Beethoven composing and conducting the orchestra and chorus in the premiere of his Ninth Symphony that he could not hear; or John Milton, blind and old, dictating Paradise Lost to his daughter. It is not that the proverbial genius will ever vanish; rather the most important point in the age of social networking and collaborative code-making is that academically disparate people now have the means, for example, as mentioned earlier, a constantly evolving digital platform like Wiki, to work together and enhance the creation of knowledge and scholarship.

Consider the novel Click, which was collaboratively created under the editorial oversight of Arthur Levine by ten authors each contributing a chapter to a mystery surrounding “a camera, some photographs and box with seven shells.” The collaboration took place sequentially, each author’s contribution built upon the previous one, story upon story that has hung together as a wholesome plot. But the novel could have been created in Wiki also, probably with better results, tapping into the collective wisdom and interactivity of the group instead of each author waiting for his or her turn to write a chapter.

Collaboration in the arts and humanities is not something new. In televisions, as I mentioned in one of my earlier books, The Hour of Television, creativity is normally negotiated and bargained, where, in fact, the collective is the creator and programs emerge from a generative system rather than as an act of individual creation. Think of "Guiding Light", a programme that originated as a radio soap opera (25 January 1937) and was transferred to television (30 June 1952) and has been continuing since then - an example of generative collaborative creativity across two generations.

From Bollywood to Hollywood, collaboration is of the essence.

In the digital age, poor communication occurs because of structural and bureaucratic potholes and because people who have expertise in one field fail to appreciate new ideas in others and shut them out.

Sometime collaboration fails because it is limited to very few people in partnering academic centres, so if some key expert quits, the network withers away. Redundancy, the basis of decentralised networking, is not only essential for continuous creativity but also acts as an antidote to the arrogance of expert power.
In the digital age, chain of commands is an anathema.
The challenge is how to integrate creative activities and unique knowledge as effectively as global supply chains integrate labour, raw materials, finance, and marketing. In the world of globalised business, creative work flows in loops across people, building on shared brainpower, each knowledge hub validating and adding value to the work done by the other, thus, hastening testing, and shaping up and perfecting the final project that might have begun in Kolkata but ends up in Silicon Valley.

In cyberspace, disciplinary zones need not become impenetrable barriers but in order to turn them into an asset it is necessary to develop a user-friendly IT system that provides reliable and uniform services, which can be adapted to ever increasing complex environment across academic disciplines, divisions, and schools.

The task henceforth is to create a system that is capable of accessing available sources of knowledge and mining all modes of human expression, whether audio, video, pictorial, or textual - a protocol that transcends cultural and disciplinary barriers. IT system should be capable of customizing knowledge as per individual or group needs.
For example, consider Dragon Naturally Speaking, which I have been using to dictate my weekly column for The Statesman and update my blog, CorporatePower. In the beginning, the programme would ask me to read the given text passages over and over again, and as I did, the system began to learn my speech rhythm, cadence and accent (Indian-American), and eventually it adapted itself to my needs. The more I use it, the more it learns and more intelligent it becomes. Dragon Naturally Speaking was not created for people like me but for busy corporate executives. The important point is that systems can be created that listen to us and evolve to meet our scholarly, scientific, humanistic, and artistic needs.

And that is a blessing of the digital age, which digital natives are exploring as they build collaborative platforms across cultures from Bangalore to Boston, from IIT to MIT.

(ND Batra teaches communications and diplomacy at Norwich University. The author of Digital Freedom, he is now working on a new book, This is the American Way.)

Creating trust in a diverse multicultural environment

Question of the day

How can a business leader create trust in a diverse multicultural environment?

Anthony Giddens writes in Perspective:

"Three years ago, the editor of Prospect, David Goodhart, published an article arguing that the increasing diversity, individualism and mobility found in present-day societies may pose a threat to the welfare state. Ethnic diversity produced by immigration adds to this mix. Goodhart stirred up a hornet's nest of criticism, even though he was by no means the first to raise the possibility, and indeed he raised it only as a possibility. The welfare state, he pointed out, is based upon sharing; yet sharing might be in conflict with diversity. People feel stronger obligations to others when these others are like themselves."

Read more..

Beyond the Red Wall

How China censors global media

CBC cancels Beyond the Red Wall

"The upcoming 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing and recent regulations about the distribution of news from foreign wire services are drawing international attention to censorship tactics in China."

Council on Foreign Relations

Oh-My-God

Maybe God Lives in Black Holes

 

"An international team of scientists said Thursday that they have tracked down the origin of the mysterious "Oh-My-God" particle -- a cosmic ray bearing energies millions of times larger than the most powerful particle accelerator can produce on Earth."

LA Times

Corporate Leadership

What are some of the contributions of charismatic and transformational
leaders to organization, with special reference to Lee Iacocca (CEO,
Chrysler 1980s) and Sir Howard Stringer
(Chairman & Chief Executive Officer, Sony Corporation)?

Sweatshop Free, China Free

GAP in consumer awareness

From The Statesman

I gaped in amusement a few days ago when I received Diwali greetings from a telecom company. Someone wanted to help me to save my money only if I would switch over from my present long-distance carrier to them.

Lightheartedly I said I was more interested in saving time and wanted to be left alone. That was the end of the conversation but the beginning of a serious concern, which many Americans have today that they are being profiled, clustered and targeted for data-base marketing. The company knew who I was: an Indian Hindu, one most likely to respond to the Diwali message, especially when no child labour was involved.

This paradigm shift in marketing communication, individually designed messages, is seen even at the shop-floor level, where most of the sales are finally clinched. Recently I went to the Home Depot, a cavernous store which sells everything you need to build, repair or decorate your home. The young salesman not only helped me in selecting the four-by-ones but also cut them to the size, and assured me that the material was so good that he had bought the same stuff for his father. The store, he said, has a no-question-asked return policy. The aggressive marketing was so kid-gloved that the Home Depot indeed felt homey.

A specialist in marketing communication explained to me that American businesses are embracing a new concept, integrated marketing communication (IMC), heralding the end of mass marketing era. One size fits all may still be true but the message should be custom-designed for different people. Now you understand why the telephone company sent me the Diwali greetings.

The technology to segment masses into clusters of tastes and special interests is available. It gives advertising and marketing experts the tools to reach the customer as if he were very special. People may drive the same model car, wear the same designer clothes and eat the same food in a restaurant, but they feel special about their choices because they receive individualised messages. For many of us, personal freedom means to make our own choices, although some time too many choices puzzle us.

Remember how our grandmothers made us feel so special when we were kids. Of course she did the same with all our siblings and made them feel equally special. That’s why we love our grannies. Something similar is being done by today’s marketing communication experts. Like a child, every customer is special.

Companies are moving away from the traditional Four P’s of marketing - price, product, packaging and promotion - a formula that worked well in the era of mass-produced culture, when consumers were struggling with their basic needs. No longer in the United States can a manufacturer simply make a product and price it to sell by packaging and promotion through the mass media.

Consumers do not tolerate being treated as undifferentiated mindless dolts; they resent manipulative and condescending messages. No wonder the Wal-Mart salesman, I observed lately, was so apologetic to the housewife because the GPS that she had used for more than a year did not work very well, and he gladly returned her money. He took the blame for her choice. This is salesmanship in a new key.

Consumers have rising expectations because of the variety of sources from which products and services are available, and they prefer to buy things which enhance the quality of life, especially in regard to environment, human rights and child labour. Experts say that consumers today not only buy a product; they buy the company which produces them.

The entire matrix of marketing communication, that’s, advertising, public relations, sales promotion and even employee communication should appear to the consumer as a stream of information from one single source that establishes a distinct identity for the company. Call it raising a brand. Brand creates public trust. It reveals core values and business philosophy.

GAP, of course, is good: but who makes the product? Children, who should be in school rather than in a sweatshop? Today buyers of imported rugs want assurance that no child labour is involved in their manufacture, and they look for label such as Kaleen, promoted by the Government of India and the carpet industry; and RugMark, an international non-profit organisation which guarantees to customers that they have gone thorough inspection.

The recently published undercover story in the **Observer**, a British newspaper, has persuaded GAP to work with the Global March Against Child Labour to develop a plan for putting a label on its products: “Child Labour Sweatshop Free”.

The other day when I was browsing through Macy’s domestic section, I overheard a customer asking the salesman whether she could buy chinaware not-made-in China. The salesman apologetically said that everyone was asking the same question.

Millions of toys and other made-in-China products have been recalled by US companies because of the hazardous materials including lead that had been used. It is not going to be easy for a company to be able to sell made-in-China products in the United States unless it certifies product safety. In fact, some companies in the United States have begun to put a label: China Free.

Conscience of the consumer is awake. Children should go to school, not work in sweatshops. Clothes and toys should be made for children but not by children. Above all, children should be safe when they use products made for children. All factories in China and India should be open to international inspection.

(ND Batra teaches communications and diplomacy at Norwich University. A googled edition of his new book, Digital Freedom is available, and it is free:

http://books.google.com/books?id=MKh9sZYo5FsC&printsec=frontcover&dq=nd+batra#PPP1,M1)

Sweatshop Free

GAP in consumer awareness

From The Statesman

I gaped in amusement a few days ago when I received Diwali greetings from a telecom company. Someone wanted to help me to save my money only if I would switch over from my present long-distance carrier to them.

Lightheartedly I said I was more interested in saving time and wanted to be left alone. That was the end of the conversation but the beginning of a serious concern, which many Americans have today that they are being profiled, clustered and targeted for data-base marketing. The company knew who I was: an Indian Hindu, one most likely to respond to the Diwali message, especially when no child labour was involved. This paradigm shift in marketing communication, individually designed messages, is seen even at the shop-floor level, where most of the sales are finally clinched.

Recently I went to the Home Depot, a cavernous store which sells everything you need to build, repair or decorate your home. The young salesman not only helped me in selecting the four-by-ones but also cut them to the size, and assured me that the material was so good that he had bought the same stuff for his father. The store, he said, has a no-question-asked return policy. The aggressive marketing was so kid-gloved that the Home Depot indeed felt homey.

A specialist in marketing communication explained to me that American businesses are embracing a new concept, integrated marketing communication (IMC), heralding the end of mass marketing era. One size fits all may still be true but the message should be custom-designed for different people. Now you understand why the telephone company sent me the Diwali greetings.

The technology to segment masses into clusters of tastes and special interests is available. It gives advertising and marketing experts the tools to reach the customer as if he were very special. People may drive the same model car, wear the same designer clothes and eat the same food in a restaurant, but they feel special about their choices because they receive individualised messages.

For many of us, personal freedom means to make our own choices, although some time too many choices puzzle us. Remember how our grandmothers made us feel so special when we were kids. Of course she did the same with all our siblings and made them feel equally special. That’s why we love our grannies. Something similar is being done by today’s marketing communication experts. Like a child, every customer is special.

Companies are moving away from the traditional Four P’s of marketing - price, product, packaging and promotion - a formula that worked well in the era of mass-produced culture, when consumers were struggling with their basic needs. No longer in the United States can a manufacturer simply make a product and price it to sell by packaging and promotion through the mass media. Consumers do not tolerate being treated as undifferentiated mindless dolts; they resent manipulative and condescending messages.

No wonder the Wal-Mart salesman, I observed lately, was so apologetic to the housewife because the GPS that she had used for more than a year did not work very well, and he gladly returned her money. He took the blame for her choice. This is salesmanship in a new key.

Consumers have rising expectations because of the variety of sources from which products and services are available, and they prefer to buy things which enhance the quality of life, especially in regard to environment, human rights and child labour. Experts say that consumers today not only buy a product; they buy the company which produces them. The entire matrix of marketing communication, that’s, advertising, public relations, sales promotion and even employee communication should appear to the consumer as a stream of information from one single source that establishes a distinct identity for the company. Call it raising a brand. Brand creates public trust. It reveals core values and business philosophy.

GAP, of course, is good: but who makes the product? Children, who should be in school rather than in a sweatshop? Today buyers of imported rugs want assurance that no child labour is involved in their manufacture, and they look for label such as Kaleen, promoted by the Government of India and the carpet industry; and RugMark, an international non-profit organisation which guarantees to customers that they have gone thorough inspection.

The recently published undercover story in the Observer, a British newspaper, has persuaded GAP to work with the Global March Against Child Labour to develop a plan for putting a label on its products: “Child Labour Sweatshop Free”. The other day when I was browsing through Macy’s domestic section, I overheard a customer asking the salesman whether she could buy chinaware not-made-in China.

The salesman apologetically said that everyone was asking the same question. Millions of toys and other made-in-China products have been recalled by US companies because of the hazardous materials including lead that had been used. It is not going to be easy for a company to be able to sell made-in-China products in the United States unless it certifies product safety. In fact, some companies in the United States have begun to put a label: China Free.

Conscience of the consumer is awake. Children should go to school, not work in sweatshops. Clothes and toys should be made for children but not by children. Above all, children should be safe when they use products made for children. All factories in China and India should be open to international inspection.

(ND Batra teaches communications and diplomacy at Norwich University. A googled edition of his new book, Digital Freedom is available, and it is free: Click here

Virtual Faithfullness

Question of the Day

Does a person have to be digitally faithful, let's say in Second Life,
to be deemed as faithful in real life? If an avatar has an affair with
another avatar, is that a form of infidelity and legitimate reason for
divorce?

Tagore as historian

Tagore the Historian

Thou Hast Made Me Endless- Part VIII

RAJAT DAS GUPTA

[Translator's note: Historians have recorded, interpreted and analyzed
the historical events/developments. Tagore, through a number of his
poems, has extracted and presented us hot the human emotions, ego,
uprightness, virtuosity, malice, evil etc. which had propelled our
history. Our students have to cram their history lessons upon
compulsion. Could Tagore's poems anyway supplement their lessons to
enable them to understand the humans of the yore beyond their mere
historical silhouettes? They may find at least some of the chapters of
Indian history e.g. those on the struggles of the Sikhs, Marathas and
Rajputs, the Buddhist period etc. animated by virtue of a good number
of inspiring poems of Tagore based on historical facts and legends
related to these periods, inter alia. Our teachers may give this
proposal a thought. Following are a few examples.]

Poem: Bandi Bir (The Captive Hero} of the book Katha (Legends) written in 1899.

[Notes: This poem is based on the anthology of the British historian
Todd. The facts narrated by Todd have not been distorted in this poem.
However, this is one of the poems where Tagore upholds that the
seeming defeat of the Sikhs was a victory in the test of history. It
was the victory of their spirituality over the brutal force they had
to encounter. That is why Sikh ideal survives as a dynamic force, one
of the noble heritages that will propel the Indian nation forward. And
what happened to the omnipotent rulers (Mughols) who had let the hell
loose on this beautiful earth, cultivated cruelty and inhumanity at
its highest and appeared invincible? In the words of the Poet –
"With blood stained sword in hand, with their bloody look,
They hide face in the children's lesson book……………"]

On the banks of the five rivers,
Up rise the Sikhs spontaneous;
With hair coiled above their head
Inspired by the Mantra their Guru spread
Fearless and unyielding…..
"Glory to Guruji" – thousands of them
Resound the horizon;
At the rising sun of the dawn
The Sikhs stare with deep emotion
With new awakening.

"Alakha Niranjan!" (means 'Holy Spotless'= God)
The war cry of the rebellion;
Let loose their chilvalry;
On their ribs clank swords luminary;
In wild joy was Punjab's insurrection
"Alakha Niranjan!"

There came a day,
Thousands of hearts were on their way
Without any binding or fear,
Life and death at their feet slaves mere;
There on the banks of those rivers
The tale of that day still shivers.

At the tower of the Delhi palace,
Where the Sikhs are apace –
The Badshajada' s (*) drowsy spell (*= Emperor)
Time and again they quell;
Whose voices there, the dark sky tear?
Whose torches set the horizon afire?

On the banks of the rivers five,
For supreme sacrifice was their dive,
Unleashed there was the flood
Of the devotee's blood.
From thousands of hearts torn apart
For destination divine in their lark –
The heroes putting their sacred blood mark
On the forehead of their motherland
There around the five rivers so dear and grand.

In the Mughol and Sikh battle
Their embrace to each other throttle
Like the fight between the eagle and snake,
Deep bruise one to the other did make.

In the fierce fight of that day –
In blood craze "Din Din" the Mughols bay,
"Glory to Guruji" – was the Sikh's commotion
In their divine devotion.

At Gurudaspur castle
When Banda was captured amidst all bustle
In the hands of the Turani troop,
As if a lion fettered with his group;
To capital Delhi they were taken,
Alas, at Gurudaspur Banda was beaten!

The Mughol soldiers march ahead,
Kicking up the road dust in sneer,
Hoisting the Sikh's chopped head
At the blade of their spear.
Follow them Sikhs seven hundred,
Tinkles their chain,
Throng people on the road widespread,
Windows open – a glimpse they fain,
"Glory to Guruji", the Sikhs roar,
For fear of life none is sore,
Sikhs with the Mughols to-day,
Stormed the Delhi road all in gay.

Started the scurry,
For lead in the carnage was their hurry;
They line up at the dawn
Defiant till their execution.
"Glory to Guruji" was their slogan
Until they were done.

Thus over a week,
The arena turned bleak;
With seven hundred lives gone –
Upon the martyrs' immortalization.
On the last round of cruelty
Banda was ordered by the Kazi
To kill his own son,
At ease to be done.

In mere teen was the boy,
With hands tied thrown as a toy
Into the lap of Banda and without a word
He drew him close to his heart.
For a while he put his hand on his head,
Just once kissed his turban red.
He then draws his dagger,
Whispers in the child's ear –
"Glory be to Guruji – fear not my son"
A virile in the boy's face did burn –
In his juvenile voice the court did ring
"Glory to Guruji" as he did sing.
With his left hand Banda held the boy,
With right struck the dagger in his ploy,
"Glory be to Guruji", was all he did implore
As he took to the floor.

Silence fell in the court,
Guruji's inspiration still not abort.
Then with tong red hot
Banda's body was pieced apart;
A word of moan he uttered not
And all in calm did he depart.
As stopped his heart throb
Witnesses closed eyes – silence choked pin drop.

• * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Poem Prarthanatit Dan (Gift Beyond that Begged) of the book Katha
(Legends) written in 1899.

[Translator's note: So far I have read Sikh history, Taru Singh was
taken a prisoner by the Mughols on the charge of treason for helping
the fugitive Sikhs in the jungles in various ways and eventually had
to face death sentence in the cruelest way, with his head forcefully
shaven, for refusing to take to Islam. So, if this poem will raise
eyebrows of the hardcore historians and pundits as to the authenticity
of the Poet's presentation of Taru as a prisoner of war, a scholarly
debate may indeed follow. But we, humbler people, will be least
interested in that and remain happy with the poem so touchingly
flashing the uprightness and holding on to one's faith and
convictions, the highest of human virtues for which the Sikhs stood
during the severest crisis in their history.]

When the Pathans brought them chained
All in calm they remained
The captive Sikhs – though at Sahidgunj town
With their comrades' blood the soil was brown.

Says the Nawab, "Look Taru Singh –
I want to forgive you without misgiving."
Says Taru, "Why for me so much slight?"
Nawab says, "A great warrior you are
That you proved in your fight;
So, to you I bear no anger;
Only I beg of you the gift of your Beni (*)
And you will be spared harm any."
Taru replied, "I owe you as your mercy's nominee;
So offer a bit more, my head with my Beni (*)

(*) Note by Tagore: "To shave off Beni is as good as forsaking
religion for a Sikh".
"Beni" in Bengali means the coiled hair the Sikhs keep.

• * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Poem:: Nakalgarh Poem (False Fort)- of the book KATHA (Legends) written in 1899.
[This poem touchingly reflects the heroic character of the Rajputs and
yet their various factional ego which was the cause of their downfall
at the hands of the Muslim invaders.]

"I'll touch not water"
Thus did the Chitore Rana (*) swear
"Till the Bundi fort
Standing there I can't abort".
"Alas! What an oath;
Impregnable it is" – the ministers quoth;
"You can venture it
But for ignoble defeat".
The Rana says, "If so,
My oath will go".

Chitore and Bundi fort are asunder
But only six miles from one to the other.
The Harabansi tribe there
Dare devil as tigers they are.
Random is their king Hamu's raid
Of any hazard he is not afraid;
All these the Rana heard about –
Evidences now leave him no more doubt.
And it is only six miles away,
So the Rana will no more sway.

Calls all his subservient the minister –
Thus all of them confer –
"Let's build a false fort to-night
That like Bundi will sight;
Let the Rana with his hands own
Hit the fort and see it blown.
Else, just his words to abide
He is heading for suicide!"
So the minister with his aides
The false fort near Chitore lays.

Kumbha a Harabansi, Rana's vassal
Yet with his bravery tribal
On return from his stag hunt
Shoulders with archery load stunt
Smells foul in the hearsay
Early in the day –
Cries aloud, "Who's there!
With a false fort dare
Abase the Harabansi Rajput –
I'll guard the fake castle astute."

Comes Rana amidst bustle
To smash the clay castle –
"Keep afar Your Highness" –
Uproarious Kumbha says,
" A fake Bundi for a fake fight
Never I'll endure this slight;
To defend that clay mound
To-day I'm duty bound".
So does Kumbha thunder –
"Your Highness, keep afar!"

On the ground sets his knees
Shoots arrows in whiz;
Kumbha alone wards off
Their sly plot to scoff
The Harabansi glory
In full fury.

Rana's troop slay his head
All round surrounded
Near the gateway
Of the fort for play.
He drops dead,
His blood crimson red
Sanctifies the castle clean
In ablution of all vicious sin.

Note: "Rana" was the title of the King of Rajputana (now Rajasthan)
whose capital Chitore was once upon a time
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * **

Thou Hast Made Me Endless- Part VIII

Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941 AD) the Nobel Laureate of 1913 was
introduced to the West primarily through the collection of English
translation of some of his poems/songs captioned as 'Gitanjali'
(=Offering of Songs).
More translations of his works followed by the poet himself and others
after he had won the Nobel, including poems/songs, dramas, short
stories etc. However, such efforts were sporadic and sluggish, mostly
on individual initiative, which still remain so.
As a result, a vast volume of the poet's works remains un-translated
while, it appears, it is an impossible proposition to translate even a
substantial part of the poet's total works to permit those, not
privileged by the knowledge of Bengali language, a reasonably broad
view of his myriad creations where unfathomable perceptional depth of
top grade aesthetics runs through, literally true to his song "Thou
hast made me endless / Such is Thy pleasure".
Notwithstanding this, an upsurge of Tagore translation took place in
the last decade of the twentieth century by virtue of a good number of
eminent poets/translators e.g.
William Radice, Joe Winter, Ketaki Kushari Dyson, to name a few, all
of whom left their valuable contribution to this oeuvre and my book
THE ECLIPSED SUN , published in 2002, is a modest addition to this. I
have put stress on a few aspects of the poet's works, particularly
those in his twilight years, which seemed to me quite inadequately
covered so far. The followings are presented mostly based on this
book.

RAJAT DAS GUPTA: Calcutta: e-mail: rajatdasgupta53@yahoo.com

rajarch@cal3.vsnl.net.in