The Zimbabwe I want

Was talking with a friend recently and as we talked we happened to touch on a number of important issues that have occupied my mind ever since. Although we talked about a number of issues, the issues of Zimbabwe's political future captivated my soul. I have always doubted the relevance of the current political system and i have always thought that we need a paradigm shift in terms of political thinking. Our politics has lost relevance in terms of the economic and strategic development of the dear country. Our political parties seem to be nothing more than opportunists who saw a political vacuum and wasted no time in exploiting it. Our people have become nothing more than convenient voters who like a crowd in a football pitch are left with no choice between two "equally" confused player who have nothing new to offer except a change of faces.
Our academics have joined the game in such a way that they no longer seem to be able to distinguish the lines between social scientific scrutiny and partisanship.
In all this one realises that maybe what we need is not just a simple change in leaders but a serious change in political strategy and sportsmanship.
I always look at our political landscape as someone watching a growing child. The game is still in infant stages and this looks like a convenient moment for positive change.
The liberation spirit that we inherited from our independence struggle has to be modified and be used as the rallying point of our national strategy.
Zimbabwe is no-one's property but most of us seem to forget this so often. No matter how long we are going to live it is an absolute truth that one day we shall finally depart but the important question is the legacy that you are going to leave. We all leave some footprints on the face of mother earth but some are too weak to be remembered while others are forcebly rubbed off the landscape because of the bitter memories associated with them.
I believe what we need at the moment is a leadership that is going to stir the troubled ship towards a certain, well-defined and desirable destination. We need a leadership whose echoes shall send ripples and shock-waves in the minds and hearts of the people. We need a leadership that is able to rally the masses for a common cause that has a promise of a better future for everyone.
This is not a time for shortcuts and premature developments paths but a moment of facing the grueling realities posed by the globalizing forces and the difficult choices that have to be made for the benefit of all. It is a time of realising that in the real world winning does not necessitate pulling down your fellow ... that in the long-run conscience rules the day...          

Habermas' communicative action and the colonisation of lifeworlds

 WITH
REFERENCE TO THE POLITICAL SITUATION IN ZIMBABWE EXAMINE THE UTILITY OF
HABERMAS’ NOTIONS OF COLONIZATION OF LIFE-WORLD AND COMMUNICATIVE ACTION.

 

Habermas’ notions of communicative action and the
colonization of the life-world have proved to be important concepts in the
understanding of political domination and people’s dedicated attempt for
emancipation in the modern world. Habermas’ communicative action is basically a
situation where (in his own words) “the actions of the agents involved are
coordinated not through egocentric calculations of success but through acts of
reaching understanding”.  In
communicative action participants are “not primarily oriented to their own
success, they pursue their individual goals under the condition that they can harmonize
their plans of action on the basis of common situation definitions” (Habermas,
1988). The colonization of the life-world involves (in Habermas’ terminology)
the encroachment of ‘systems’ into the domain of "more or less diffuse,
always unproblematic, background convictions" (Habermas 1988, p. 70) that
guide us in communicative action? Patsy Healey refers to "the life-world
of personal existence; the daily, weekly and yearly going about and getting on
in the life of personal experience" (Habermas, 1997)
.
The idea is more or less the same with Weber’s critique of the dominance of instrumental
rationality in modern society. This paper commences with a critique of
Habermas’ notions of life-world and the theory of communicative action followed
by attempts to contextualize the concepts in Zimbabwe’s political terrain.
Since there is no clear distinction between the ruling party and the state (at
least before the unity government), the terms ‘ZANU PF’ and the ‘state’ are
used interchangeably in this paper.

Habermas’ notions of public sphere and communicative action have
been subject to various criticisms based on several inherent flaws in its
foundations. The first point of contention according to Keller (1979) is that
he does not discuss the normative character of communication media in democracy
or suggest how a progressive media politics could evolve. Part of the problem ,
he says, is that Habermas' notion of the public sphere was grounded
historically in the era of print media which, as McLuhan and Gouldner (1979)
have argued, fostered modes of argumentation characterized by linear
rationality, objectivity, and consensus. (Keller, 1997)      Since
writing is his medium of choice and print media is his privileged site of
intervention, its plausible that Habermas downplays broadcasting and other
communication media, the Internet and new spheres of public debate, and various
alternative public spheres in part because according to Keller he does not
participate in these media and arenas himself and partly because, as I am
suggesting, the categorical distinctions in his theory denigrate these domains
in contrast to the realms of communicative action and the life-world. But these
blind spots and conceptual limitations truncate Habermas' discussions of
democracy and undermine his obvious intention of fostering democratization
himself. The second contention is that Habermas theory is informed by classical
bourgeois public sphere which excluded the voices of the poor masses hence his
concepts are still flawed towards middle class public sphere and communicative
action. The voices of women, minority groups and the poor masses are not given
adequeate theoretical grounding.

In Zimbabwe ZANU PF has been on record interfering with
communicative action through in Habermas terminology the colonization of the
life-world. One of the major areas in which ZANU PF has manipulated to that
effect is the media. For Habermas, the function of the media have thus been
transformed from facilitating rational discourse and debate within the public
sphere into shaping, constructing, and limiting public discourse to those
themes validated and approved by media corporations. Hence, the interconnection
between a sphere of public debate and individual participation has been
fractured and transmuted into that of a realm of political information and
spectacle, in which citizen-consumers ingest and absorb passively entertainment
and information. "Citizens" thus become spectators of media
presentations and discourse which mold public opinion, reducing consumer/citizens
to objects of news, information, and public affairs. In Habermas' words:
"Inasmuch as the mass media today strip away the literary husks from the
kind of bourgeois self-interpretation and utilize them as marketable forms for
the public services provided in a culture of consumers, the original meaning is
reversed (Habermas, 1989a: 171). The state in Zimbabwe has dominated public
media by monopolizing state run media such as ZBC TV, The Herald and all radio
stations while at the same time upsetting the operations of independent media.  This has been achieved through various means
including legislation and implicit acts of violence such as the bombing of the
Daily News offices as well as continuous arrest, intimidations and persecution
of journalists. At the base of all this is an attempt to paralyze the public
sphere and the colonization of the life-world. The only voice that is permitted
officially is the voice of ZANU PF while all contenting voices are suppressed. The
enactment of AIPA was a benchmark in ZANU PF attempts to control the life-world.
It gave the state the power to ‘legally’ silence divergent voices through
conspicuous privacy protection clauses and the necessity for accreditation for
all foreign journalists. Massive propaganda was also used to continuously
bombard the public with ZANU PF pronunciamento and views so as to shape public
perception and opinion.  Thus as Habermas
would expect ZANU PF used the media as agents of manipulation and social
control through the media's power to directly and consistently manipulate the
public.

As already noted one of the means through which ZANU PF used
to colonize the life-world is through the manipulation of the legal system
through the enactment of repressive laws and making sure the interpretation of
the law generally achieve its partisan objectives. AIPA was meant to curb the
emancipator wings of the media while POSA was meant to directly reduce the
public’s potential for meaningful organizations through public participation
and collective action the very basis of the theory of communicative action. This
action by ZANU PF can also be understood within the context of Habermas notion
of Legitimation crises which according to Ritzer (2006) is the systems of ideas
generated by the political system, and theoretically any other system to
support the existence of that system. They are designed to mystify the
political system to make unclear exactly what is happening and it seems ZANU PF
did this pretty well by creating an ideology based on British and American and
western enemies legitimating its attack on local divergent voices as puppets of
the west hence political dissidents.

Also within the realm of the law is the contentious issue of
constitution making which has played a central role in Zimbabwean politics. Habermas
provides a theoretical basis for a view of law making that emphasizes
widespread public participation, sharing of information wit the public,
reaching consensus through public dialogue rather than exercise of power,
avoiding privileging of experts and bureaucrats, and replacing the model of the
technical expert with one of the reflective consultant (Argyris and Schön 1974).
In this view, the legitimacy of democracy depends not only on constitutional
processes of enacting laws, but also on "the discursive quality of the
full processes of deliberation leading up to such a result," as Stephen
White (1995, p.12) puts it. John Dryzek notes that Habermas prompts the policy
analyst to work on conditions of political interaction and design of
institutions rather than merely the content of policy proposals, and
Habermasian ideal institutions rule out “authority based on anything other than
a good argument” (1995, pp. 108-110). This Habermas terms juridification as
opposed to jurisdiction. In this view, the legitimacy of democracy depends not
only on constitutional processes of enacting laws, but also on "the
discursive quality of the full processes of deliberation leading up to such a
result". This is an area of current serious debate in Zimbabwe since so
much has been said about the lack of popular participation in the constitution
making process which has been trusted in the hands of bureaucrats in the name
of parliamentarians and a couple of civic society members. This Habermas
correctly sees as a compromise of pure communicative action.

The state in Zimbabwe has also sought to control the public
sphere and communicative action as well as effect the colonization of the life-world
through what can be seen as a reign of terror. This involves the use of secret
intelligence to spy on people, the use of the military and police to disable
all forms of popular discourse formation and organization as well as violence
against political opponents and other divergent voices. We can also include in
this category election fraud as the highest form of efforts to derail
communicative action. Habermas sees public political participation in the form
of voting as one of the most and often plausible forms of communicative action
(one of the few that doesn’t use language) but even in this area ZANU PF has
tried to interfere through violent electioneering and rigging. People’s choices
are literally eroded and what is left is the will of the powerful being imposed
on the masses. The educational system has also seen several changes meant to
indoctrinate young people towards accepting the efficacy and legitimacy of ZANU
PF as the rulers of Zimbabwe. State run National Service institutions were
created and became places of intensive indoctrination with ZANU PF chimurenga
ideology and for some time these were made mandatory for anyone wishing to join
the civil service.  

It is important at this juncture to note that Habermas
theory of communicative action has strong elements and opportunities for the
redefinition of the public sphere and emancipation. One can say with Keller
that there are better opportunities for a more participatory communicative
action now than ever before through the internet and satellite television and
radio systems which are not all under the control of the state and large
corporates. Habermas does not see people as passive recipients of state
propaganda and repressive acts but he sees the potential for spheres of
political contestations. This view is very apparent in Zimbabwe where as a sign
of defiance most people have resorted to satellite television so as to gain a contrasting
view of political and social reality to that of state propaganda in local state
media.

There has also been an emergence of numerous internet forums
and discussions about the Zimbabwean political situation such as Kubatana.org
while even social networks such as Facebook have become sites of political discourse.
Online news agents have been working hard to portray the true picture of the
Zimbabwean situation without state interference while other projects such as
Kubatana and SWA Radio went as far as creating a sms platform where subscribers
will receive constant updates on state repressive actions on the mobile phones
for free. Private radio stations such as Studio 7 have also provided a platform
for divergent views and voices to reach the common people hence acting as a
counter to state propaganda. Millions of people decided to leave the country as
asylum seekers in neibouring countries and abroad where they organize
themselves and engage in debates and contestation about political events in
Zimbabwe. Some people have also shown their disapproval to the current
political establishment through none participation in voting while it seems the
final nail in this sort of communicative action was delivered by voting for the
MDC in the last election.

Thus communicative action and the colonization of
life-worlds if taken beyond their its limited conceptualization by Habermas can
provide a plausible reference point for the analysis if democracy and popular
political participation especially in Zimbabwe. As noted in this paper the
state has instituted several attempts to colonise the life-worlds of the people
through repressive laws, media control and propaganda, reign of terror and
other means while the public reenacted the public sphere and communicative
action through internet public discussions, satellite television and other
channels. Thus despite its flaws Habermas concepts have good utility in the
understanding of Zimbabwean politics.

   

 

 

 

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Argyris,
C. and Donald S. (1974) Theory
in Practice: Increasing Professional Effectiveness. San
Francisco: Jossey-Bass

Dryzek,
J. S. (1995). "Critical Theory As a Research Program," in Stephen K.
White, ed. The Cambridge
Companion to Habermas, 97-119. New York:
Cambridge University Press.

Gouldner, A. W. (1976) The
Dialectic of Ideology and Technology. New York: Seabury. 

Habermas, J. (1977). Knowledge and human interests. (J. Shapiro,
Trans.). Boston: Beacon

Habermas, J. (1987). Theory of communicative action, Vol. 2. (T.
McCarthy, Trans.). London: Heinemann.

Habermas, J. (1996). Between facts and norms. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Habermas, J. (2001). Theory of communicative action, Vol. 1. (T.
McCarthy, Trans.).London: Heinemann.

Healey, P. (1997). Collaborative Planning: Shaping Places in Fragmented Societies. Vancouver:
University of British Columbia Press

Kellner, D.  (1990) Television and the Crisis of
Democracy. Boulder: Westview Press. 

Kellner, D. (1979) "TV,
Ideology, and Emancipatory Popular Culture," Socialist Review 45
(May-June): 13-53.  

Kellner, D. (1997)
"Intellectuals, the New Public Spheres, and Technopolitics," New
Political Science 41-42 (Fall): 169-188. 

Miller, J. (1994) 'Democracy
Is in the Streets': From Port Huron to the Siege of Chicago. Cambridge:
Harvard University Press.

 Ritzer G. Social Theory,

White, S.K. (1995). The Cambridge companion to Habermas. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press

The Power of Your Love (Worship Video with lyrics)

I love this song.. its saying something to my heart or is it soul..

“The Solution to the problem of population growth lies in expanding the freedom of women.” Discuss this statement in relation to population policies in developing countries.

Population policing is one of the most controversial issues facing the world today and has become a battleground between the north and the south that has often become marred in power politics and intellectual. Given the breadth and context of the debate, it is clear that writing a paper on the issue is no easy job. This paper will interrogation the idea of population policing from on multiple levels. First we shall consider the whole population control enterprise from the perspective of scholars such as Dr Jacqueline Kasun, Nicholas Eberstadt, Julian Simon, Amatya Sen and others who don’t think the world has a population problem but a distribution and consumerist problem. Secondly the paper shall analyse current population policies in developing countries such as Zimbabwe, Nigeria, India, and others and see how much they are addressing the potential causes of population growth which to a greater extend relate to women’s disempowerment. Finally the paper will posit the possible solutions to population growth basing especially in the empowerment of women, development and redistribution giving evidence that all population success stories stem from expanding the freedom of women (and indeed man especially in poor households). Expanding the freedom of women can be loosely synonymous to empowerment but has more to do with giving women more choices over issues affecting their lives especially in reproduction while a population policy can be any measure meant to directly determine the present or future size of a place or country’s population.

Instead of taking the issues of population policing and control as given it might be necessary to look at its development and the controversies that it has led to among politicians and academics. Although population policies have been in existence in the world over the millennia Malthus can be regarded as the man who brought population control consciousness to the modern world. Malthusian and neo-Malthusian population policies have however been criticized from many fronts especially because of claims about their racist, elitist and Darwinian elements. Unfortunately the current global trend tends to be still informed by Malthus’ ideas in its orientation. One interesting question that has been asked by some scholars is whether population growth is in fact a problem as claimed by anti natalist scholars such as Paul Ehrlich. The claim that more resources would be needed to satisfy a growing population might be obvious but no one can accurately determine the carrying capacity of the planet earth and it is not clear which factors are to be used in the determination between food, resources or living space but it seems clear that all factors are too relative and most importantly no case can be scientifically made for overpopulation with respect to all three variables. Dr. Osterfeld, Professor of Political Science at Saint Joseph's College in Rensselaer, Indiana, concludes that although there are now more people in the world than ever before, "by any meaningful measure the world is actually becoming relatively less populated." Nicholas Eberstadt (1997) ironically challenges current “depopulation” policies claiming that if current trends were maintained or intensified the world would head for a social, economic and financial crisis mostly because of disproportionate demographic distribution structures and shortage of people especially as consumers. Without taking this debate too far it is important to at least note that claims for population growth problems are clumsy, ill-founded and controversial.

The idea of population policing and control might however not be a bad idea at least if it is implemented in a reasonable and holistic way taking into consideration the interests of those involved and affected by it especially women. The focus of population policies in developing world and indeed the whole world has been mercilessly targeted on women through family planning programmes such as sterilization, forced abortion, family planning tablets, and other things. In China for example it has need reported that the one child policy imposed on the population has negatively affected women more than men since women have been sore victims of forced abortions and forced sterilizations. In other countries such as Honduras and Bangladesh there are claims that cases of forced sterilizations were so rampant in the 1990s while in India the situation was even worsened by the Caste system’s relegation of women especially in rural areas. Thus instead of extending the freedoms of woman, at least some of the population policies practiced around the world have been used as an attack on the female race.

Although the current rhetoric especially since the Cairo Population Conference of 1994 is that women rights is at the center of current population policy position at global level, Amatya Sen is skeptical claiming that women’s rights are being reduced to reproductive issues and this tends to put the real issues on the sideline. Even where some efforts are being made to expand the freedom of women, the gains are not really significant and relevant because the purpose is not to really benefit women but to reduce their effects on population growth.

Some feminists and other scholars have pointed out that the real issue in the world is not population control per ser but the control of certain populations.  As Claire (2009), guest-blogging at Feministe recently, asked, "Has science ever actually defined the number of people the world and it's resources can support, or is this fear of a "population bomb" about something else, more to do with which babies are being born than how many are being born?". In Singapore in the 1990s while the general orientation was to reduce the national population growth rate through various ways, incentives were given to middle class and working class women to have more children. In order to encourage educated women to have more children, tax incentives were given to mothers with professional or university degrees and three or more children. Children of these women were also given priority in enrolling in the best schools. Younger mothers without secondary school degrees and fewer than three children were offered $4,700 toward purchase of public housing if they accept sterilization (Encarta 2008).

It has been noted that generally throughout the world the tendency is to discourage poor people and minority ethnic groups to have children while encouraging the richer families to have more children. In Nigeria it has been reported that the government seem to be stricter on population control against specific minority ethnic groups than the dominant groups. Probably the logic would be that rich families are capable of sufficiently provide for their children as compared to poor people but this raises a lot of questions. Indeed no official position has been spelled out to this effect in most countries but it is not so difficult to discover this tendency in practice. Unfortunately as already pointed out the problem in the world today especially if considered in the context of the environment, pollution, shortages of food and other resources as well as increasing poverty has very little (if any) to do with the developing world’s growing population although all population control policies are bases on these myths. It has been reported that a child born in the US consumes more resources than 30 children born in rural Indian or anywhere in the developing world. The point really is that the problems in the world today are caused mostly by the obsessive western consumerism such that even if the world population was to be constant at 6 billion or even be reduced by a few billions and all those people had same consumerist tendencies as Americans, the world would be overpopulated still. The consumption explosion in the West, especially in the United States, is much more dangerous than the population 'explosion' in terms of putting pressure on natural resources...and yet the poor of developing countries...are now being blamed for the destruction of the environment (Encarta 2008). Unfortunately very little is ever heard about the need to reduce the continuing and accelerating western consumerist behavior but the whole world is being bombarded with how very much the world is overpopulated by blacks, Asians, Latinos and others. In the end a package of policies and measures are put in place that permanently destroy the well being of women and the real issues are left out.

The economic, socio-cultural and political empowerment of women has been considered the most effective (if not the only effective) way of reducing population growth in developing countries and indeed the whole world. It has been noted by some scholars that in China the general improvement in the standards of living across the board had more impact on the population growth rate than the controversial “one child policy” because real gains were made in the 1970s and early 80s before the one child policy was in place or was not yet being forcibly implemented (Encarta 2008). Almost the same issue has been at the root of India’s failure to reduce its population growth rate satisfactorily. Instead of empowering women through education, economic empowerment, proper health services and different family planning options the focus in some countries has been of family planning through sterilization, child spacing tablets and other such methods. When applying for government loans, or jobs people were told that their chances of receiving such aids would be increased if they could produce a certificate of sterilization. Fortunately, in recent years, it appears that many Indians are aware of the negative effects of the traditional policies and are striving for a change in the system. Taking heed of the recommendations put forth in the 1994 UN Conference on Population and Development, India has shifted attention away from the strict promotion of contraceptive measures and is working on the development of women’s economic, educational and social welfare which will give women more control over their own bodies and indirectly curb population growth. India put forth a “New Population Plan” (NPP), hoping that by the year 2010, the average total fertility rate will fall from the early 90’s figure of 3.4 to around the replacement rate of 2.1. In order to achieve this goal, the NPP will make strides in improving reproductive health: it will allow universal access to contraceptives and promote greater education on contraception, train more people to safely aid in the birth of children, require a formal registration of all marriages and births, maintain and enforce the minimum age of marriage at 18, and strive to provide primary education for more citizens.

 It has been claimed that Zimbabwe is one example of a success story in Africa’s Sub-Region in terms of reducing population growth rate and that this is mostly because of the widespread improvement in education, healthy delivery services and widespread family planning support systems especially in the 1980s and 90s. Other examples include the current official policy that a woman can only get paid maternity leave for the first three babies alone.      

In the fight against population increase it is important probably to deal with the real (not supposed) causes of population increase. It has been reiterated that when asked most women want to have fewer children (after all child birth is no funny experience and you tend to age with every conception) but there are factors which ultimately lead to them having more children. One important aspect is women’s lack of power over their reproduction. It has been noted that providing women with accessible and cheap family planning services wouldn’t serve the intended purpose since after all it is the husband who often decides how many children to have. Its even worse in cases when the woman is sterilized (willingly or unwillingly) without the consent of the husband with cases in India and other countries of women being divorced for “infertility” after going through sterilization. It is also true that in most developing countries a family is likely to continue until they have a male child because of the different values put on male and female children. Unfortunately the world population is generally skewed against men and this paints a bleak picture for those calling for population control especially as long as “they” want more of male than female children. In Iran population growth rates have been reduced through various

Another important yet neglected issue relates to the economic logic of having more children in poor households. As long as children are considered economic asserts (as opposed to a liability as in the developed world) then the world will continue to see more births maybe at an accelerated. Having more children is also associated with higher infant and general mortality rates because parents wouldn’t be sure which one or how many of their children would die or survive. This is also associated with the desire for old age security which in developing countries is in children who are expected to take care of their parents in old age because of lack of other forms of social security to that effect. It has also been recognized that children are a form of pride and measure of wealth in some developing communities hence the desire to have as many as possible especially male children.

However overemphasizing the controversies surrounding population control policies and practices wouldn’t be good nor even necessary. Thus it is important to note that real gains have been made in population policy programming despite the fact that some scholars still think that its far from the ideal. A good example of ideal population policy can be noted in Iran were both partners are compelled to go through family planning sessions before a marriage certificate is awarded to them. On top of that family planning services are readily available at affordable prices and this has led to better informed family planning decisions leading to a significant reduction in the overall national population rate. Recent evidence from China has also shown that if women and people in general are given proper guidance and support with freedom in terms of choosing their family sizes they tend to opt for smaller families. What is important is for them to have good reason for not having too many children and this is usually correlated with standards of living, women education, women economic empowerment, women power over their reproduction and other issues.

Thus this paper sought to bring all the relevant issues in the present day population policy debate with special focus on the expansion of women’s freedom. It seems clear that debates about population policy can only be properly understood within the context of global geo-politics and western socio-political interests. Other debates such as the carrying capacity of the earth, western consumerism which degrades the environment, the relationship between poverty and population growth, are very pertinent issues that this paper tried to reflect on. However it also became lucid that the extension and expansion of women’s freedom is the central issue in population policing and programming. Evidence around the world reinforce this perspective.                     

            

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Eberstadt, N. (1998). "Demography and International Relations," in The Washington Quarterly, Spring, pp. 33-52.

Simon, J.L. (1990).  Population Matters, New Brunswick (NJ): Transaction Publishers.

Eberstadt N. (1994). Feminist population Policy. www.feministre.us/blog/archives/population . (accessed on 5 October 2009).

Rowley, J. (2008).  "Population Pressure." Microsoft® Encarta® 2006 [CD]. Microsoft Corporation.

United Nations (2006). World population Policies. UN Publications. N.Y.

Osterfeld ,W. (2004). Population Myth. Sage Publications. CA.

  

Population policing is one of the most controversial issues facing the world today and has become a battleground between the north and the south that has often become marred in power politics and intellectual. Given the breadth and context of the debate, it is clear that writing a paper on the issue is no easy job. This paper will interrogation the idea of population policing from on multiple levels. First we shall consider the whole population control enterprise from the perspective of scholars such as Dr Jacqueline Kasun, Nicholas Eberstadt, Julian Simon, Amatya Sen and others who don’t think the world has a population problem but a distribution and consumerist problem. Secondly the paper shall analyse current population policies in developing countries such as Zimbabwe, Nigeria, India, and others and see how much they are addressing the potential causes of population growth which to a greater extend relate to women’s disempowerment. Finally the paper will posit the possible solutions to population growth basing especially in the empowerment of women, development and redistribution giving evidence that all population success stories stem from expanding the freedom of women (and indeed man especially in poor households). Expanding the freedom of women can be loosely synonymous to empowerment but has more to do with giving women more choices over issues affecting their lives especially in reproduction while a population policy can be any measure meant to directly determine the present or future size of a place or country’s population.

Instead of taking the issues of population policing and control as given it might be necessary to look at its development and the controversies that it has led to among politicians and academics. Although population policies have been in existence in the world over the millennia Malthus can be regarded as the man who brought population control consciousness to the modern world. Malthusian and neo-Malthusian population policies have however been criticized from many fronts especially because of claims about their racist, elitist and Darwinian elements. Unfortunately the current global trend tends to be still informed by Malthus’ ideas in its orientation. One interesting question that has been asked by some scholars is whether population growth is in fact a problem as claimed by anti natalist scholars such as Paul Ehrlich. The claim that more resources would be needed to satisfy a growing population might be obvious but no one can accurately determine the carrying capacity of the planet earth and it is not clear which factors are to be used in the determination between food, resources or living space but it seems clear that all factors are too relative and most importantly no case can be scientifically made for overpopulation with respect to all three variables. Dr. Osterfeld, Professor of Political Science at Saint Joseph's College in Rensselaer, Indiana, concludes that although there are now more people in the world than ever before, "by any meaningful measure the world is actually becoming relatively less populated." Nicholas Eberstadt (1997) ironically challenges current “depopulation” policies claiming that if current trends were maintained or intensified the world would head for a social, economic and financial crisis mostly because of disproportionate demographic distribution structures and shortage of people especially as consumers. Without taking this debate too far it is important to at least note that claims for population growth problems are clumsy, ill-founded and controversial.

The idea of population policing and control might however not be a bad idea at least if it is implemented in a reasonable and holistic way taking into consideration the interests of those involved and affected by it especially women. The focus of population policies in developing world and indeed the whole world has been mercilessly targeted on women through family planning programmes such as sterilization, forced abortion, family planning tablets, and other things. In China for example it has need reported that the one child policy imposed on the population has negatively affected women more than men since women have been sore victims of forced abortions and forced sterilizations. In other countries such as Honduras and Bangladesh there are claims that cases of forced sterilizations were so rampant in the 1990s while in India the situation was even worsened by the Caste system’s relegation of women especially in rural areas. Thus instead of extending the freedoms of woman, at least some of the population policies practiced around the world have been used as an attack on the female race.

Although the current rhetoric especially since the Cairo Population Conference of 1994 is that women rights is at the center of current population policy position at global level, Amatya Sen is skeptical claiming that women’s rights are being reduced to reproductive issues and this tends to put the real issues on the sideline. Even where some efforts are being made to expand the freedom of women, the gains are not really significant and relevant because the purpose is not to really benefit women but to reduce their effects on population growth.

Some feminists and other scholars have pointed out that the real issue in the world is not population control per ser but the control of certain populations.  As Claire (2009), guest-blogging at Feministe recently, asked, "Has science ever actually defined the number of people the world and it's resources can support, or is this fear of a "population bomb" about something else, more to do with which babies are being born than how many are being born?". In Singapore in the 1990s while the general orientation was to reduce the national population growth rate through various ways, incentives were given to middle class and working class women to have more children. In order to encourage educated women to have more children, tax incentives were given to mothers with professional or university degrees and three or more children. Children of these women were also given priority in enrolling in the best schools. Younger mothers without secondary school degrees and fewer than three children were offered $4,700 toward purchase of public housing if they accept sterilization (Encarta 2008).

It has been noted that generally throughout the world the tendency is to discourage poor people and minority ethnic groups to have children while encouraging the richer families to have more children. In Nigeria it has been reported that the government seem to be stricter on population control against specific minority ethnic groups than the dominant groups. Probably the logic would be that rich families are capable of sufficiently provide for their children as compared to poor people but this raises a lot of questions. Indeed no official position has been spelled out to this effect in most countries but it is not so difficult to discover this tendency in practice. Unfortunately as already pointed out the problem in the world today especially if considered in the context of the environment, pollution, shortages of food and other resources as well as increasing poverty has very little (if any) to do with the developing world’s growing population although all population control policies are bases on these myths. It has been reported that a child born in the US consumes more resources than 30 children born in rural Indian or anywhere in the developing world. The point really is that the problems in the world today are caused mostly by the obsessive western consumerism such that even if the world population was to be constant at 6 billion or even be reduced by a few billions and all those people had same consumerist tendencies as Americans, the world would be overpopulated still. The consumption explosion in the West, especially in the United States, is much more dangerous than the population 'explosion' in terms of putting pressure on natural resources...and yet the poor of developing countries...are now being blamed for the destruction of the environment (Encarta 2008). Unfortunately very little is ever heard about the need to reduce the continuing and accelerating western consumerist behavior but the whole world is being bombarded with how very much the world is overpopulated by blacks, Asians, Latinos and others. In the end a package of policies and measures are put in place that permanently destroy the well being of women and the real issues are left out.

The economic, socio-cultural and political empowerment of women has been considered the most effective (if not the only effective) way of reducing population growth in developing countries and indeed the whole world. It has been noted by some scholars that in China the general improvement in the standards of living across the board had more impact on the population growth rate than the controversial “one child policy” because real gains were made in the 1970s and early 80s before the one child policy was in place or was not yet being forcibly implemented (Encarta 2008). Almost the same issue has been at the root of India’s failure to reduce its population growth rate satisfactorily. Instead of empowering women through education, economic empowerment, proper health services and different family planning options the focus in some countries has been of family planning through sterilization, child spacing tablets and other such methods. When applying for government loans, or jobs people were told that their chances of receiving such aids would be increased if they could produce a certificate of sterilization. Fortunately, in recent years, it appears that many Indians are aware of the negative effects of the traditional policies and are striving for a change in the system. Taking heed of the recommendations put forth in the 1994 UN Conference on Population and Development, India has shifted attention away from the strict promotion of contraceptive measures and is working on the development of women’s economic, educational and social welfare which will give women more control over their own bodies and indirectly curb population growth. India put forth a “New Population Plan” (NPP), hoping that by the year 2010, the average total fertility rate will fall from the early 90’s figure of 3.4 to around the replacement rate of 2.1. In order to achieve this goal, the NPP will make strides in improving reproductive health: it will allow universal access to contraceptives and promote greater education on contraception, train more people to safely aid in the birth of children, require a formal registration of all marriages and births, maintain and enforce the minimum age of marriage at 18, and strive to provide primary education for more citizens.

 It has been claimed that Zimbabwe is one example of a success story in Africa’s Sub-Region in terms of reducing population growth rate and that this is mostly because of the widespread improvement in education, healthy delivery services and widespread family planning support systems especially in the 1980s and 90s. Other examples include the current official policy that a woman can only get paid maternity leave for the first three babies alone.      

In the fight against population increase it is important probably to deal with the real (not supposed) causes of population increase. It has been reiterated that when asked most women want to have fewer children (after all child birth is no funny experience and you tend to age with every conception) but there are factors which ultimately lead to them having more children. One important aspect is women’s lack of power over their reproduction. It has been noted that providing women with accessible and cheap family planning services wouldn’t serve the intended purpose since after all it is the husband who often decides how many children to have. Its even worse in cases when the woman is sterilized (willingly or unwillingly) without the consent of the husband with cases in India and other countries of women being divorced for “infertility” after going through sterilization. It is also true that in most developing countries a family is likely to continue until they have a male child because of the different values put on male and female children. Unfortunately the world population is generally skewed against men and this paints a bleak picture for those calling for population control especially as long as “they” want more of male than female children. In Iran population growth rates have been reduced through various

Another important yet neglected issue relates to the economic logic of having more children in poor households. As long as children are considered economic asserts (as opposed to a liability as in the developed world) then the world will continue to see more births maybe at an accelerated. Having more children is also associated with higher infant and general mortality rates because parents wouldn’t be sure which one or how many of their children would die or survive. This is also associated with the desire for old age security which in developing countries is in children who are expected to take care of their parents in old age because of lack of other forms of social security to that effect. It has also been recognized that children are a form of pride and measure of wealth in some developing communities hence the desire to have as many as possible especially male children.

However overemphasizing the controversies surrounding population control policies and practices wouldn’t be good nor even necessary. Thus it is important to note that real gains have been made in population policy programming despite the fact that some scholars still think that its far from the ideal. A good example of ideal population policy can be noted in Iran were both partners are compelled to go through family planning sessions before a marriage certificate is awarded to them. On top of that family planning services are readily available at affordable prices and this has led to better informed family planning decisions leading to a significant reduction in the overall national population rate. Recent evidence from China has also shown that if women and people in general are given proper guidance and support with freedom in terms of choosing their family sizes they tend to opt for smaller families. What is important is for them to have good reason for not having too many children and this is usually correlated with standards of living, women education, women economic empowerment, women power over their reproduction and other issues.

Thus this paper sought to bring all the relevant issues in the present day population policy debate with special focus on the expansion of women’s freedom. It seems clear that debates about population policy can only be properly understood within the context of global geo-politics and western socio-political interests. Other debates such as the carrying capacity of the earth, western consumerism which degrades the environment, the relationship between poverty and population growth, are very pertinent issues that this paper tried to reflect on. However it also became lucid that the extension and expansion of women’s freedom is the central issue in population policing and programming. Evidence around the world reinforce this perspective.                     

            

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Eberstadt, N. (1998). "Demography and International Relations," in The Washington Quarterly, Spring, pp. 33-52.

Simon, J.L. (1990).  Population Matters, New Brunswick (NJ): Transaction Publishers.

Eberstadt N. (1994). Feminist population Policy. www.feministre.us/blog/archives/population . (accessed on 5 October 2009).

Rowley, J. (2008).  "Population Pressure." Microsoft® Encarta® 2006 [CD]. Microsoft Corporation.

United Nations (2006). World population Policies. UN Publications. N.Y.

Osterfeld ,W. (2004). Population Myth. Sage Publications. CA.

  

WITH REFERENCE TO THE POLITICAL SITUATION IN ZIMBABWE EXAMINE THE UTILITY OF HABERMAS’ NOTIONS OF COLONIZATION OF LIFE-WORLD AND COMMUNICATIVE ACTION.

Habermas’ notions of communicative action and the colonization of the life-world have proved to be important concepts in the understanding of political domination and people’s dedicated attempt for emancipation in the modern world. Habermas’ communicative action is basically a situation where (in his own words) “the actions of the agents involved are coordinated not through egocentric calculations of success but through acts of reaching understanding”.  In communicative action participants are “not primarily oriented to their own success, they pursue their individual goals under the condition that they can harmonize their plans of action on the basis of common situation definitions” (Habermas, 1988). The colonization of the life-world involves (in Habermas’ terminology) the encroachment of ‘systems’ into the domain of "more or less diffuse, always unproblematic, background convictions" (Habermas 1988, p. 70) that guide us in communicative action? Patsy Healey refers to "the life-world of personal existence; the daily, weekly and yearly going about and getting on in the life of personal experience" (Habermas, 1997) . The idea is more or less the same with Weber’s critique of the dominance of instrumental rationality in modern society. This paper commences with a critique of Habermas’ notions of life-world and the theory of communicative action followed by attempts to contextualize the concepts in Zimbabwe’s political terrain. Since there is no clear distinction between the ruling party and the state (at least before the unity government), the terms ‘ZANU PF’ and the ‘state’ are used interchangeably in this paper.

Habermas’ notions of public sphere and communicative action have been subject to various criticisms based on several inherent flaws in its foundations. The first point of contention according to Keller (1979) is that he does not discuss the normative character of communication media in democracy or suggest how a progressive media politics could evolve. Part of the problem , he says, is that Habermas' notion of the public sphere was grounded historically in the era of print media which, as McLuhan and Gouldner (1979) have argued, fostered modes of argumentation characterized by linear rationality, objectivity, and consensus. (Keller, 1997)      Since writing is his medium of choice and print media is his privileged site of intervention, its plausible that Habermas downplays broadcasting and other communication media, the Internet and new spheres of public debate, and various alternative public spheres in part because according to Keller he does not participate in these media and arenas himself and partly because, as I am suggesting, the categorical distinctions in his theory denigrate these domains in contrast to the realms of communicative action and the life-world. But these blind spots and conceptual limitations truncate Habermas' discussions of democracy and undermine his obvious intention of fostering democratization himself. The second contention is that Habermas theory is informed by classical bourgeois public sphere which excluded the voices of the poor masses hence his concepts are still flawed towards middle class public sphere and communicative action. The voices of women, minority groups and the poor masses are not given adequeate theoretical grounding.

In Zimbabwe ZANU PF has been on record interfering with communicative action through in Habermas terminology the colonization of the life-world. One of the major areas in which ZANU PF has manipulated to that effect is the media. For Habermas, the function of the media have thus been transformed from facilitating rational discourse and debate within the public sphere into shaping, constructing, and limiting public discourse to those themes validated and approved by media corporations. Hence, the interconnection between a sphere of public debate and individual participation has been fractured and transmuted into that of a realm of political information and spectacle, in which citizen-consumers ingest and absorb passively entertainment and information. "Citizens" thus become spectators of media presentations and discourse which mold public opinion, reducing consumer/citizens to objects of news, information, and public affairs. In Habermas' words: "Inasmuch as the mass media today strip away the literary husks from the kind of bourgeois self-interpretation and utilize them as marketable forms for the public services provided in a culture of consumers, the original meaning is reversed (Habermas, 1989a: 171). The state in Zimbabwe has dominated public media by monopolizing state run media such as ZBC TV, The Herald and all radio stations while at the same time upsetting the operations of independent media.  This has been achieved through various means including legislation and implicit acts of violence such as the bombing of the Daily News offices as well as continuous arrest, intimidations and persecution of journalists. At the base of all this is an attempt to paralyze the public sphere and the colonization of the life-world. The only voice that is permitted officially is the voice of ZANU PF while all contenting voices are suppressed. The enactment of AIPA was a benchmark in ZANU PF attempts to control the life-world. It gave the state the power to ‘legally’ silence divergent voices through conspicuous privacy protection clauses and the necessity for accreditation for all foreign journalists. Massive propaganda was also used to continuously bombard the public with ZANU PF pronunciamento and views so as to shape public perception and opinion.  Thus as Habermas would expect ZANU PF used the media as agents of manipulation and social control through the media's power to directly and consistently manipulate the public.

As already noted one of the means through which ZANU PF used to colonize the life-world is through the manipulation of the legal system through the enactment of repressive laws and making sure the interpretation of the law generally achieve its partisan objectives. AIPA was meant to curb the emancipator wings of the media while POSA was meant to directly reduce the public’s potential for meaningful organizations through public participation and collective action the very basis of the theory of communicative action. This action by ZANU PF can also be understood within the context of Habermas notion of Legitimation crises which according to Ritzer (2006) is the systems of ideas generated by the political system, and theoretically any other system to support the existence of that system. They are designed to mystify the political system to make unclear exactly what is happening and it seems ZANU PF did this pretty well by creating an ideology based on British and American and western enemies legitimating its attack on local divergent voices as puppets of the west hence political dissidents.

Also within the realm of the law is the contentious issue of constitution making which has played a central role in Zimbabwean politics. Habermas provides a theoretical basis for a view of law making that emphasizes widespread public participation, sharing of information wit the public, reaching consensus through public dialogue rather than exercise of power, avoiding privileging of experts and bureaucrats, and replacing the model of the technical expert with one of the reflective consultant (Argyris and Schön 1974). In this view, the legitimacy of democracy depends not only on constitutional processes of enacting laws, but also on "the discursive quality of the full processes of deliberation leading up to such a result," as Stephen White (1995, p.12) puts it. John Dryzek notes that Habermas prompts the policy analyst to work on conditions of political interaction and design of institutions rather than merely the content of policy proposals, and Habermasian ideal institutions rule out “authority based on anything other than a good argument” (1995, pp. 108-110). This Habermas terms juridification as opposed to jurisdiction. In this view, the legitimacy of democracy depends not only on constitutional processes of enacting laws, but also on "the discursive quality of the full processes of deliberation leading up to such a result". This is an area of current serious debate in Zimbabwe since so much has been said about the lack of popular participation in the constitution making process which has been trusted in the hands of bureaucrats in the name of parliamentarians and a couple of civic society members. This Habermas correctly sees as a compromise of pure communicative action.

The state in Zimbabwe has also sought to control the public sphere and communicative action as well as effect the colonization of the life-world through what can be seen as a reign of terror. This involves the use of secret intelligence to spy on people, the use of the military and police to disable all forms of popular discourse formation and organization as well as violence against political opponents and other divergent voices. We can also include in this category election fraud as the highest form of efforts to derail communicative action. Habermas sees public political participation in the form of voting as one of the most and often plausible forms of communicative action (one of the few that doesn’t use language) but even in this area ZANU PF has tried to interfere through violent electioneering and rigging. People’s choices are literally eroded and what is left is the will of the powerful being imposed on the masses. The educational system has also seen several changes meant to indoctrinate young people towards accepting the efficacy and legitimacy of ZANU PF as the rulers of Zimbabwe. State run National Service institutions were created and became places of intensive indoctrination with ZANU PF chimurenga ideology and for some time these were made mandatory for anyone wishing to join the civil service.  

It is important at this juncture to note that Habermas theory of communicative action has strong elements and opportunities for the redefinition of the public sphere and emancipation. One can say with Keller that there are better opportunities for a more participatory communicative action now than ever before through the internet and satellite television and radio systems which are not all under the control of the state and large corporates. Habermas does not see people as passive recipients of state propaganda and repressive acts but he sees the potential for spheres of political contestations. This view is very apparent in Zimbabwe where as a sign of defiance most people have resorted to satellite television so as to gain a contrasting view of political and social reality to that of state propaganda in local state media.

There has also been an emergence of numerous internet forums and discussions about the Zimbabwean political situation such as Kubatana.org while even social networks such as Facebook have become sites of political discourse. Online news agents have been working hard to portray the true picture of the Zimbabwean situation without state interference while other projects such as Kubatana and SWA Radio went as far as creating a sms platform where subscribers will receive constant updates on state repressive actions on the mobile phones for free. Private radio stations such as Studio 7 have also provided a platform for divergent views and voices to reach the common people hence acting as a counter to state propaganda. Millions of people decided to leave the country as asylum seekers in neibouring countries and abroad where they organize themselves and engage in debates and contestation about political events in Zimbabwe. Some people have also shown their disapproval to the current political establishment through none participation in voting while it seems the final nail in this sort of communicative action was delivered by voting for the MDC in the last election.

Thus communicative action and the colonization of life-worlds if taken beyond their its limited conceptualization by Habermas can provide a plausible reference point for the analysis if democracy and popular political participation especially in Zimbabwe. As noted in this paper the state has instituted several attempts to colonise the life-worlds of the people through repressive laws, media control and propaganda, reign of terror and other means while the public reenacted the public sphere and communicative action through internet public discussions, satellite television and other channels. Thus despite its flaws Habermas concepts have good utility in the understanding of Zimbabwean politics.

   

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Argyris, C. and Donald S. (1974) Theory in Practice: Increasing Professional Effectiveness. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass

Dryzek, J. S. (1995). "Critical Theory As a Research Program," in Stephen K. White, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Habermas, 97-119. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Gouldner, A. W. (1976) The Dialectic of Ideology and Technology. New York: Seabury. 

Habermas, J. (1977). Knowledge and human interests. (J. Shapiro, Trans.). Boston: Beacon

Habermas, J. (1987). Theory of communicative action, Vol. 2. (T. McCarthy, Trans.). London: Heinemann.

Habermas, J. (1996). Between facts and norms. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Habermas, J. (2001). Theory of communicative action, Vol. 1. (T. McCarthy, Trans.).London: Heinemann.

Healey, P. (1997). Collaborative Planning: Shaping Places in Fragmented Societies. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press

Kellner, D.  (1990) Television and the Crisis of Democracy. Boulder: Westview Press. 

Kellner, D. (1979) "TV, Ideology, and Emancipatory Popular Culture," Socialist Review 45 (May-June): 13-53.  

Kellner, D. (1997) "Intellectuals, the New Public Spheres, and Technopolitics," New Political Science 41-42 (Fall): 169-188. 

Miller, J. (1994) 'Democracy Is in the Streets': From Port Huron to the Siege of Chicago. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

 Ritzer G. Social Theory,

White, S.K. (1995). The Cambridge companion to Habermas. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

Habermas - communicative act colonization of life worlds and relevance to Zimbabwe's politics

Habermas’ notions of communicative action and the colonization of the life-world have proved to be important concepts in the understanding of political domination and people’s dedicated attempt for emancipation in the modern world. Habermas’ communicative action is basically a situation where (in his own words) “the actions of the agents involved are coordinated not through egocentric calculations of success but through acts of reaching understanding”.  In communicative action participants are “not primarily oriented to their own success, they pursue their individual goals under the condition that they can harmonize their plans of action on the basis of common situation definitions” (Habermas, 1988). The colonization of the life-world involves (in Habermas’ terminology) the encroachment of ‘systems’ into the domain of "more or less diffuse, always unproblematic, background convictions" (Habermas 1988, p. 70) that guide us in communicative action? Patsy Healey refers to "the life-world of personal existence; the daily, weekly and yearly going about and getting on in the life of personal experience" (Habermas, 1997) . The idea is more or less the same with Weber’s critique of the dominance of instrumental rationality in modern society. This paper commences with a critique of Habermas’ notions of life-world and the theory of communicative action followed by attempts to contextualize the concepts in Zimbabwe’s political terrain. Since there is no clear distinction between the ruling party and the state (at least before the unity government), the terms ‘ZANU PF’ and the ‘state’ are used interchangeably in this paper.

Habermas’ notions of public sphere and communicative action have been subject to various criticisms based on several inherent flaws in its foundations. The first point of contention according to Keller (1979) is that he does not discuss the normative character of communication media in democracy or suggest how a progressive media politics could evolve. Part of the problem , he says, is that Habermas' notion of the public sphere was grounded historically in the era of print media which, as McLuhan and Gouldner (1979) have argued, fostered modes of argumentation characterized by linear rationality, objectivity, and consensus. (Keller, 1997)      Since writing is his medium of choice and print media is his privileged site of intervention, its plausible that Habermas downplays broadcasting and other communication media, the Internet and new spheres of public debate, and various alternative public spheres in part because according to Keller he does not participate in these media and arenas himself and partly because, as I am suggesting, the categorical distinctions in his theory denigrate these domains in contrast to the realms of communicative action and the life-world. But these blind spots and conceptual limitations truncate Habermas' discussions of democracy and undermine his obvious intention of fostering democratization himself. The second contention is that Habermas theory is informed by classical bourgeois public sphere which excluded the voices of the poor masses hence his concepts are still flawed towards middle class public sphere and communicative action. The voices of women, minority groups and the poor masses are not given adequeate theoretical grounding.

In Zimbabwe ZANU PF has been on record interfering with communicative action through in Habermas terminology the colonization of the life-world. One of the major areas in which ZANU PF has manipulated to that effect is the media. For Habermas, the function of the media have thus been transformed from facilitating rational discourse and debate within the public sphere into shaping, constructing, and limiting public discourse to those themes validated and approved by media corporations. Hence, the interconnection between a sphere of public debate and individual participation has been fractured and transmuted into that of a realm of political information and spectacle, in which citizen-consumers ingest and absorb passively entertainment and information. "Citizens" thus become spectators of media presentations and discourse which mold public opinion, reducing consumer/citizens to objects of news, information, and public affairs. In Habermas' words: "Inasmuch as the mass media today strip away the literary husks from the kind of bourgeois self-interpretation and utilize them as marketable forms for the public services provided in a culture of consumers, the original meaning is reversed (Habermas, 1989a: 171). The state in Zimbabwe has dominated public media by monopolizing state run media such as ZBC TV, The Herald and all radio stations while at the same time upsetting the operations of independent media.  This has been achieved through various means including legislation and implicit acts of violence such as the bombing of the Daily News offices as well as continuous arrest, intimidations and persecution of journalists. At the base of all this is an attempt to paralyze the public sphere and the colonization of the life-world. The only voice that is permitted officially is the voice of ZANU PF while all contenting voices are suppressed. The enactment of AIPA was a benchmark in ZANU PF attempts to control the life-world. It gave the state the power to ‘legally’ silence divergent voices through conspicuous privacy protection clauses and the necessity for accreditation for all foreign journalists. Massive propaganda was also used to continuously bombard the public with ZANU PF pronunciamento and views so as to shape public perception and opinion.  Thus as Habermas would expect ZANU PF used the media as agents of manipulation and social control through the media's power to directly and consistently manipulate the public.

As already noted one of the means through which ZANU PF used to colonize the life-world is through the manipulation of the legal system through the enactment of repressive laws and making sure the interpretation of the law generally achieve its partisan objectives. AIPA was meant to curb the emancipator wings of the media while POSA was meant to directly reduce the public’s potential for meaningful organizations through public participation and collective action the very basis of the theory of communicative action. This action by ZANU PF can also be understood within the context of Habermas notion of Legitimation crises which according to Ritzer (2006) is the systems of ideas generated by the political system, and theoretically any other system to support the existence of that system. They are designed to mystify the political system to make unclear exactly what is happening and it seems ZANU PF did this pretty well by creating an ideology based on British and American and western enemies legitimating its attack on local divergent voices as puppets of the west hence political dissidents.

Also within the realm of the law is the contentious issue of constitution making which has played a central role in Zimbabwean politics. Habermas provides a theoretical basis for a view of law making that emphasizes widespread public participation, sharing of information wit the public, reaching consensus through public dialogue rather than exercise of power, avoiding privileging of experts and bureaucrats, and replacing the model of the technical expert with one of the reflective consultant (Argyris and Schön 1974). In this view, the legitimacy of democracy depends not only on constitutional processes of enacting laws, but also on "the discursive quality of the full processes of deliberation leading up to such a result," as Stephen White (1995, p.12) puts it. John Dryzek notes that Habermas prompts the policy analyst to work on conditions of political interaction and design of institutions rather than merely the content of policy proposals, and Habermasian ideal institutions rule out “authority based on anything other than a good argument” (1995, pp. 108-110). This Habermas terms juridification as opposed to jurisdiction. In this view, the legitimacy of democracy depends not only on constitutional processes of enacting laws, but also on "the discursive quality of the full processes of deliberation leading up to such a result". This is an area of current serious debate in Zimbabwe since so much has been said about the lack of popular participation in the constitution making process which has been trusted in the hands of bureaucrats in the name of parliamentarians and a couple of civic society members. This Habermas correctly sees as a compromise of pure communicative action.

The state in Zimbabwe has also sought to control the public sphere and communicative action as well as effect the colonization of the life-world through what can be seen as a reign of terror. This involves the use of secret intelligence to spy on people, the use of the military and police to disable all forms of popular discourse formation and organization as well as violence against political opponents and other divergent voices. We can also include in this category election fraud as the highest form of efforts to derail communicative action. Habermas sees public political participation in the form of voting as one of the most and often plausible forms of communicative action (one of the few that doesn’t use language) but even in this area ZANU PF has tried to interfere through violent electioneering and rigging. People’s choices are literally eroded and what is left is the will of the powerful being imposed on the masses. The educational system has also seen several changes meant to indoctrinate young people towards accepting the efficacy and legitimacy of ZANU PF as the rulers of Zimbabwe. State run National Service institutions were created and became places of intensive indoctrination with ZANU PF chimurenga ideology and for some time these were made mandatory for anyone wishing to join the civil service.  

It is important at this juncture to note that Habermas theory of communicative action has strong elements and opportunities for the redefinition of the public sphere and emancipation. One can say with Keller that there are better opportunities for a more participatory communicative action now than ever before through the internet and satellite television and radio systems which are not all under the control of the state and large corporates. Habermas does not see people as passive recipients of state propaganda and repressive acts but he sees the potential for spheres of political contestations. This view is very apparent in Zimbabwe where as a sign of defiance most people have resorted to satellite television so as to gain a contrasting view of political and social reality to that of state propaganda in local state media.

There has also been an emergence of numerous internet forums and discussions about the Zimbabwean political situation such as Kubatana.org while even social networks such as Facebook have become sites of political discourse. Online news agents have been working hard to portray the true picture of the Zimbabwean situation without state interference while other projects such as Kubatana and SWA Radio went as far as creating a sms platform where subscribers will receive constant updates on state repressive actions on the mobile phones for free. Private radio stations such as Studio 7 have also provided a platform for divergent views and voices to reach the common people hence acting as a counter to state propaganda. Millions of people decided to leave the country as asylum seekers in neibouring countries and abroad where they organize themselves and engage in debates and contestation about political events in Zimbabwe. Some people have also shown their disapproval to the current political establishment through none participation in voting while it seems the final nail in this sort of communicative action was delivered by voting for the MDC in the last election.

Thus communicative action and the colonization of life-worlds if taken beyond their its limited conceptualization by Habermas can provide a plausible reference point for the analysis if democracy and popular political participation especially in Zimbabwe. As noted in this paper the state has instituted several attempts to colonise the life-worlds of the people through repressive laws, media control and propaganda, reign of terror and other means while the public reenacted the public sphere and communicative action through internet public discussions, satellite television and other channels. Thus despite its flaws Habermas concepts have good utility in the understanding of Zimbabwean politics.

   

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Argyris, C. and Donald S. (1974) Theory in Practice: Increasing Professional Effectiveness. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass

Dryzek, J. S. (1995). "Critical Theory As a Research Program," in Stephen K. White, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Habermas, 97-119. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Gouldner, A. W. (1976) The Dialectic of Ideology and Technology. New York: Seabury. 

Habermas, J. (1977). Knowledge and human interests. (J. Shapiro, Trans.). Boston: Beacon

Habermas, J. (1987). Theory of communicative action, Vol. 2. (T. McCarthy, Trans.). London: Heinemann.

Habermas, J. (1996). Between facts and norms. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Habermas, J. (2001). Theory of communicative action, Vol. 1. (T. McCarthy, Trans.).London: Heinemann.

Healey, P. (1997). Collaborative Planning: Shaping Places in Fragmented Societies. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press

Kellner, D.  (1990) Television and the Crisis of Democracy. Boulder: Westview Press. 

Kellner, D. (1979) "TV, Ideology, and Emancipatory Popular Culture," Socialist Review 45 (May-June): 13-53.  

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