Wednesday, 9 June 2021

Predicting Zimbabwe’s Future(s)

By Takura Zhangazha*

In Zimbabwe we rarely talk about the future.  Our focus is at best on the present.  Or even more callously the immediate.  Almost as though our lives are defined by shrugging our shoulders each day as it passes and helplessly waiting for the next one. 

There are many reasons for this.  Not least among them the fact that our political economy is highly individualistic.  And that individuals rarely think beyond themselves. Or at best beyond their immediate families. All aided by the fact that our present day economic system is designed in the same way with not only individualism as a preferred way of living but also its accompanying materialism and consumerism. 

We however do have a penchant to discuss the past as far as it affects the immediate.  And again at very personal levels.  For example a lot of cdes are wont to discuss what occurred in the past as it relates to their immediate material well-being.  And often times this is done on the basis of religion and assumptions of not being successful or facing individual challenges because of a lack of one faith or the other.  And basing any assumptions of individual futures on the same.  

We rarely think of our collective national future in an organic manner.  Its either based on our individual political preferences or even more stubborn assumptions or our individual ‘feelings’ as mediated by social media to 'algorithmically' point us to its owned preferred future.

However this is not unique to Zimbabwe.  ‘Ephemeralism’ is now almost a universal given.   As are assumptions of the significance of the individual as being most superior in society.  

What is important however is that we need to always consider Zimbabwean futures beyond our individual concerns, material desires and ambitions.  Mainly because where we think of the future with our own personal children in mind we can never run away from the reality that they too will live in one society or the other.  Be it in Zimbabwe or other countries where a decent number of parents continually, and wrongly in my view, continue to encourage young Zimbabweans to depart to. 

In discussing Zimbabwean futures we need to remind ourselves of that key word, ‘posterity’. In whatever leadership positions we hold. Wherever we hold them, we must understand that we never lead for ourselves but for others.  And particularly others that are already and will inevitably come after us. 

It is therefore on this initial 'posterity' principle that we can then understand that because the past informs the present as the latter does the future, we can still imagine and try to predict our collective futures.

Whereas our own individual circumstances of existence may have made us particularly sensitive to certain things such as political repression, individual health, education, jobs, intellectualism and even gender inequality, we are always obliged to think beyond our own experiences. And to think for others and their betterment. 

So what are Zimbabwe’s futures given our past and our contemporary context?

In the political it is relatively apparent that we are caught in a whirlwind of a lack of organic national consciousness. One in which we are almost schizophrenic because of our divisions and our own lack of national self confidence.  It is a dilemma that we run the risk of passing on to the next generation because in many instances we cannot confront our collective historical realities. But be that as it may our collective political future looks like it will most likely be typically nationalist in identity but not necessarily in economics. Like a number of other countries we will be captured by global political events and discourse because of our penchant for mimicry/admiration of the global north societies. We will likely move further away from Pan African discourse to a universalism in which we will not recognize our inequality.  And sadly we will still pander to philosophies of life that are not intended to make us universally equal. 

On the economic front we are likely headed to neo-liberal global integration and subservience to private capital.   All based once again on our own individualist materialism that suits the same said neoliberal economic frameworks.  It may however suit us now to pursue this path but it will most certainly not suit those that come after us because it essentially creates a narcissistic value system that is unsustainable. Mainly because we refuse to learn from history that existence is not singularly about our consumption and enjoyment but also for future generations. But as the adage goes, ‘the only thing we learn from history is that we never learn from history.’

On the social front Zimbabwean society is likely to evolve, based on our economics into even more individualism.  Where almost everything including water, education, health will eventually be pre-paid.  Not necessarily via a pre-paid meter but all the same via our own convoluted sense of individual self-importance.   The signs are already there.  And the sings will remain with us for a while.  And we will rapidly urbanise our society so the rural folk are quite literally living on borrowed time. 

To conclude, writing this short blog was about my own personal fear about Zimbabwe’s future. For my children and those of all of us. It wasn’t intended as an intellectual exercise but just an abstract stream of consciousness.  Either way, we still need to think about Zimbabwe’s future(s) in realistic ways.

*Takura Zhangazha writes here in his personal capacity (takura-zhangazha.blgospot.com)     

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