Sometimes in life we are in the middle of a major social transition on a national scale, but the intensity of the movement and the frenzy of it can often reach such a pitch that we are not able to see past the furor and recognize, at a deeper level, the fundamental alteration that is taking place. One such for me was living in North America in the latter stages of the US involvement in the Vietnam War and witnessing the intense anti-war protests on college campuses and streets where clashes and arrests were a routine matter. Very few of us, caught up in our own concerns, were able to recognize that back of the protests, away from the streets, American public opinion, in the mass sense, had shifted from a benign attitude toward the war to concerted opposition. Only after the demise of Lyndon Johnson were we able to see what had happened in America despite their President’s determination that the war should go on.
Witnessing the frenzy that is accompanying our upcoming election here, it is possible that we may well be in a fundamental transition in Guyana that is not yet obvious to us. One example is the upsurge in commentaries on the subject of racial voting which has dominated our politics since independence. In many of the writings, from both established advocates and ordinary citizens, what is being conveyed is that many Guyanese are recognizing the impediments in such an approach in a country with two dominant ethnic groups, and are openly calling for an end to it. Over the years, there have been some specific voices, in both public and private life, decrying this position and citing it as a critical factor in the contentious, even antagonistic, attitudes in our political life and in the rigidity of
