A powerful parliament

Source: http://jang.com.pk/thenews/apr2008-weekly/nos-20-04-2008/pol1.htm#4

Pakistan is currently faced with a lot of challenges on the political economy front

By Zubair Faisal Abbasi

The political corridors of Pakistan seem to be resonant with the voices of a fresh and enthusiastic start towards a vibrant political milieu. The parliament is expected to be a leading institutional arrangement to counter multi-faceted challenges to the country of more than 160 million people. Of these, whose power this parliament will use under the Constitution's provisions, a vast majority still lives in zones of silence carefully guarded by a feudal and elitist cultural ethos. How to genuinely empower the parliament itself and the people it represents is a question that needs enormous political acumen, foresight, and a sense of basic commitment to the democratic governance and dispensation.

At the same time, the political economy corridor of the country also deserves a fresh and enthusiastic start. This corridor resonates with the protesting voices of regional and income inequality, both in terms of opportunities and access to productive resources. The voices in this corridor are not new. These are coming from the chambers of an ever-exploitative system of economic governance that systematically generates elitist capital accumulation, while excluding the not-so-rich and the poor alike. The system, by implication, ensures that the fruits of economic growth seldom 'trickle-down' to the people at the lowest level of economic hierarchy.

As a result, the political economy of Pakistan, at this very moment, shows the signs of social polarisation leading to a stalemate -- failing to generate momentum for a long-term equitable economic development. This is a point where Pakistan, despite trying most of the policy instruments earlier employed by East Asian economies, fails to become a tiger economy, being perpetually trapped in a low equilibrium.

In fact, East Asian economies could accumulate, use the accumulation for productive investments and execute structural transformation because of a couple of basic commitments. The commitments included that the state has to be responsible, effective, efficient and autonomous at the same time. Another basic commitment that newly industrialised countries of East Asia always kept was to acknowledge the ethnic diversity and inequality in society, and manage the 'trichotomy' of state-society-market relations in such a way that fruits of economic growth spread equitably. Their commitments delivered.

Look at the challenges of political economy for Pakistan! One can see that such challenges are no longer confined to managing the economic fundamentals and getting short-term results. Perhaps the post-9/11 situation -- which led to increase in inflow of remittances, and also brought some aid and debt-rescheduling, helping Pakistan's economy to re-emerge -- needs reassessment. This re-assessment needs to anatomise, besides using a monetary perspective, the structural causes of rising inflationary pressures, especially related to food items; worsening trade deficit; and the persistent unemployment.

In fact, the real challenges of political economy are structural in composition, and go well beyond reliance on monetary and fiscal policy solutions. They enter the domains of economic governance, asking to review the role of the state in economic change. At the same time, these challenges are related with establishing autonomy of and accountability in the state institutions. Responses to these challenges entail bringing back the state into lived experience of the people -- the experience of welfare-oriented state that was promised by the founding fathers and later enshrined in the 1973 Constitution.

So, the challenges of the political economy are to make the people believe, not by rhetoric but by action, that they can trust the capacity of the state institutions. The primary function of the state institutions is to prevent crisis, as well as protect the citizens in the case of financial and economic downturn, while facilitating people-friendly equitable economic growth and development.

These challenges are not like the ones that can be met by bringing in bankers or military personnel on commanding heights of economic governance, or increasing or decreasing the money supply. These can also not be met with dolling out loans to the elites and writing them off later in the 'supreme national interest'. In fact, the enormity of challenges asks for developing a national development framework that is manifestly in sync with the spirit of the Constitution. At the same time, it is equally important that the state institutional arrangements show basic commitment to pursue the objectives of this framework. Perhaps the economic role of constitutional provisions needs to be brought to the fore while developing any public policy.

In addition, the framework should not be about how to pursue more privatisation, liberalisation and deregulation. The sought-after should target the state institutions, making them fully functional, effective and competent to guide the markets. Pakistan needs a strong but democratic 'doctrine of state' embedded in institutional working that consistently builds social consensus for the kind of developmental policies needed to be pursued.

Interestingly, many empirical studies show that not only the now-developed countries, but also newly-industrialised countries, have had both the state and corporate agencies for industrialisation and economic development. They did it while keeping bureaucracy aligned with basic commitment to equitable development, establishing a reasonable rule of law to prevent non-productive rent-seeking in its ranks. Such economies did not always believed in the so-called virtues of free-market-based resource allocations. They could guide such allocations to create and guide markets in preferred sectors and geographical regions. This type of policy and direct intervention by the state can create room for management of conflicts over economic resources.

At the same time, the new government should realise that Pakistan does not sufficiently and equitably invest in human and infrastructure development -- required to generate and retain highly-skilled workforce to fuel the engines of long-term economic growth. Consistent investment in knowledge and technological capability, in a layperson's language, generates self-perpetuating momentum for a long-term growth. Similarly, increase in skill and knowledge level enables and empowers people to search new avenues to participate in economic development processes. Such investments, with socio-political equity in mind, can also mainstream the neglected regions and people in a society.

To conclude, history shows that the true dynamism for economic growth does not come from prescriptions of economists or international development establishment; the real dynamism comes from leaders. If leadership is able to define the challenges correctly, coordinate the vision and processes for development, and make the state simultaneously autonomous and accountable, then the people of Pakistan can stretch all the production possibility frontiers. The political economy challenge to the new government is enormous, but this is also the right time to respond by mobilising all intellectual and political resources.

(Email: abbasi.zubair@gmail.com)






Give peace a chance!
History tells us that politics of violence is embedded in the Pakistani society

By Sibtain Raza Khan

The Pakistani society is a complex one, where emotions sometimes overcome intellectual faculties and rationale. Since 1947, we have seen that political violence has not only become a part of our political culture, but has also become a hindrance in the establishment of true democratic norms and values in the society. The current wave of politics of violence is a bad omen for democracy, which demands accommodation and reconciliation among different political actors, rather than use of force.

The important issue is that which forces are instigating political violence and what long-term affects this trend is likely to have? What appears from the political history of Pakistan is that specific sections within almost all political and non-political communities have resorted to violent means in persuasion of their goals, and these violent acts have not only damaged that community's public image but also clouded its real objectives. For instance, the recent use of force by some lawyers against a former federal minister affected public impression of that community, as well as exposed differences within it.

Going in the recent past, when Lal Masjid and Jamia Hafza students turned violent, it not only brought loss of innocent lives but also brought a bad name to the religious community as a whole. The same can be said about the May 12 incidents in Karachi, where certain elements of a political party were involved in violence leading to massive killings. This brought a bad name to the party, whose leadership may not be supportive of all these actions. There is a pressing need for minimising violent conflict between different communities, because politics of violence has resulted only in economic problems, political instability and strengthening of undemocratic forces.

Motives for committing political violence can range from economic -- like poverty and inequality -- to political -- like lack of democracy, lack of openness, hate-vote syndrome and failure of the government to deliver. It is true that some political groups have exploited the multi-ethnic and multi-lingual aspect of the Pakistani society, and got popular through hate-vote syndrome. This syndrome has bred intolerant political behaviour, which, in turn, has resulted in politics of revenge and weakening of democratic institutions.

The cost of politics of violence is very high. Besides the human loss, the country also suffers, in particular in terms of economy. This, in turn, inflicts further human misery in the form of joblessness or underemployment and flight of capital due to security concerns. There is no blinking the fact that Pakistan's business hub -- Karachi -- has suffered a lot because of the politics of violence. In 2006, the Karachi Chamber of Commerce and Industries (KCCI) estimated that a one day strike deprives the city and the country of more than one billion rupees in revenues and exports. However, the current KCCI president projected the losses at Rs 14 billion (this amount includes taxes and duties, production and exports, as well as losses incurred in commercial markets. According to the KCCI's calculations, Karachi suffered corporate losses of Rs 80 billion in just five days during the mayhem that followed Benazir Bhutto's assassination.

According to a research study, political violence has significant short- as well as long-term effects on the society, in terms of physical and psychological trauma, financial losses, poor schooling and health, biased pattern of child development, migration of families, and further division of society into identifiable communities that may prolong the conflict. Revenge seeking and score-settling behaviour also results in political instability in the country. In this way, non political forces exploit this situation and democratic forces suffer losses in the form of discontinuation of elected democratic process. There is also a view that the recent wave of violence is an attempt to change the public opinion that democracy does not suit us, and the politicians are not only incompetent but also responsible for the miseries of the masses.

Pakistan is passing through a difficult juncture in its history, and it is high time that political leaderships realise this reality; and forget the differences and work collectively for the betterment of the country. Instead of paying lip-service to the virtues of non- violence and tolerance, we all have to work together to address the root causes of political violence. Pakistan needs ethnic, as well as political harmony, for the smooth functioning of democratic institutions. Besides this, when one political group tries to achieve its objectives through violent means, in the absence of justice, the other group retaliates. Consequently, violence breeds violence, and the country faces political and economic instability in the form of loss of lives and property. We have witnessed that foreign investors are leaving the country because of heated up political violence since the last year. As a result, Pakistan's economy is suffering a lot due.

This now is the responsibility of the democratic forces to collectively strive to build a law-abiding democratic society. Leaderships of political parties need to show exemplary maturity in their conduct. Instead of adopting the path of politics of violence and revenge, they need to sit together and work for the supremacy of rule of law, as well as to provide relief to the masses and mitigate their sufferings. They need to practice the politics of tolerance and adopt the path of constant engagement, rather than confrontation. Doors for reconciliation and cooperation should not be closed in the larger interest of democracy.

All the stakeholders should play their due role in strengthening democratic institutions in the country. Political leaderships have to prefer politics of reconciliation over that of revenge and confrontation, and spirit of mutual tolerance would have to be reflected in their actions. It is expected that good democratic ideals and traditions would be followed, and all energies would be devoted for mitigating the sufferings and problems of the masses. In transition to democracy, it is essential to achieve national reconciliation and consensus, as this could prove to be a major stabilising factor. Instead of indulging in the politics of hate and revenge, all efforts should now be directed towards meeting the challenges facing the country.