Jaina Political Thought

Author(s): G C Pandey
Publisher: Prakrit Bharti Academy

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cannot avoid encountering beliefs which appear to or claimto transcend the bounds of merely positive knowledge. If a species of political theory were to regard all such transcendental beliefs as erroneous or reducible to natural elements, it would be plainly incompatible with religious faith as such.
Jaina political thought, thus, is by definition rooted in a specific religious tradition and excludes a positive conception of political theory. I propose to argue subsequently that this is an advantage, not a limitation.
It may be objected that this would make Jaina political thought unscientific and by running counter to secularism tend to induct fantaticism and communalism in political life. It may be argued further that in view of this, even if a tradition of political thought was sectarianin the past,should we not now treat its old form as only a kind of historical matrix and pick out for emphasis and reinterpretation only its scientific and secular elements ? Or, alternatively, if it is essentially religious, should we not regardit as merely a historical curiosity belonging to an age when the modern scientific and secular conception of politics had not yet emerged or been securely established ?
The first of these objections mistakes a programme for actual achievement. Those who seek to create a science of politics are till now stuck with methodological debates on the one hand and the piece-meal observation of wholly ephemeral and particular data on the other. The high-sounding jargon of much of contemporary 'political science', whether as theory-making or as detailed research, continues to be a transparent cover for its essentially tendentious and ideological character. Nor is this situation accidental and likely to disappear gradually as the new 'scientific enterprise matures. That political theory is or ought to be a science and not a philosophy, is a timeless philosophical opinion. Its roots are philosophical though a social soil in which positive science is given high esteem helps it to flourish. At the same time preferences about values and institutions encompassing political life can hardly be avoided. It is, of course, possible for the political scientist to argue that his own preferences are objective appraisals of purely impirical difficulties. It will, however, be seen in the sequel that this argument is valid only for one aspect of political thought.
As for the objection from secularism, it seems to arise from a mistaker. notion of both religion and politics. The toleration of religious differences is essentially a moral principle. It is not a political principle arising out of practical expediency. Were that so it would be reversible with a change of circumstances. Besides, the question of tolerating differences arises also for other spheres than religion. Totalitarian repression has many hues and colours. By the side of militant religious communalism and sectarianism we
st place militant economic, political and ethnicist ideologies.It is their
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