Indian Society: The Indian Caste System

The Indian caste system place some strong communitarian checks n individual agency, The economic man did not have primacy but was subordinate. A kinship system determined occupation, with some similarities to Plato’s ideas. However, the system of castes proliferated as the trend within Indian society was absorptive rather than exclusive. Thus rather than exterminate outsiders, they were given a cell within the catacomb f Indian society. Within their caste they had some freedom and agency, and were free of coercion and exploitation, Caste mobility was possible and kinship groups were created, the system had a certain degree of flexibility and adaptability. However, the system was always challebnged by free thinkers and was daptable to them.

There was always a concept of balance of power and checks on the power of the monarch, even constitutional monarchy. The system had a capacity for rich cultural creativity, and it would have been interesting to see it develop along its own lines. There was always an element of affirmation and struggle, a Kshatriya element in Indian society. Buddhism and its asceticism, as well as Jainism tapped into another strain within Indian society. Sikhism arguably brought together the two strains. Islam left Indian society alone beyond a point and it’s encroachments did not cross a certain limit. There was a zone of cultural and ethnic intermixing that occurred and the Muslim rulers in time became as Indian as anyone else. The false ideology of the British that India was a barbarian land which they had civilized and unified was responsible for the mischief of the idea that only a centralized unity was appropriate to India. The western ideology of the centralized state, of a dichotomy between economic planning and hyper market capitalism, of a mixture of class hierarchy and social fluidity were all elements that came to dominate the mind of the English educated bourgeoisie who were deracinated and

The natural world is full of structure and underlying laws, and human beings are subject to these natural laws. However, we can overcome our natural limitations through various means. These allow us to multiply our strength, reduce time and effort.