Planning has lost credibility because planners use the process as part of the power game to dominate others rather than as means of anticipating developments of the object of the plan, or to evaluate ways of trouble shooting. Because of this people only follow plans as long as it is expedient to please and appease the powerful. As soon as the power shifts, especially to those affected by the power game which caused development of the plan, the implementers shift their loyalties to the new dominant group and the change of plans.
CEPEC provides an ideal opportunity to build local initiatives into the national economy. Each town along each route can plan its own development within the potentials of trade, industry and commerce to match the flow of the international economy along that road. It can assess the potential of its hinterland for mineral, agricultural or livestock resources and opportunities offered by commercial actors along the route to boost its economic and political potential through local power and federal institutions with political energy.
The western, mountain route runs through Pathan and Baloch tribal regions where water scarcity is not severe in northern part. The southern half is extremely arid but richer in minerals. Parts of this route are fertile and drainage, from rivers and streams of piedmonts feeding the Indus, is sometimes torrential. The Indus highway and the Pakhtun hold over trucking transport are ideal for local development. The eastern route of plains links the Punjab and Sindh irrigation, the natural agrarian allies in an age old drainage of trade that existed from the Harappan civilization till the colonial period. The British rail link at first supplemented, and then supplanted the medieval riverine trade from Central Asia.
Since they use “natural materials” in a “natural environment”, nomads can be oblivious of litter in an urban environment due to the biodegradable consumption pattern. Although pastoralists are as conscious of biology, but because of their lifestyle in an equally natural environment, they can be made conscious of litter management as they occupy one place for a stretch of time. They also carry more equipment and are considerate in preservation of animal life. However, perhaps urban awareness of the potential in unutilized waste led to the development of industries based on by-products. The socio-economic structure of human society became a reality only after urban lifestyle led to the emergence of states.
The three facets of this ‘social cube’ are state, urbanization and culture. The political and administrative aspects of society represent the state; its technology, economy and ecology underpin the urban fabric; while ethnicity and communal values represent the DNA of a culture, despite internal diversity and find expression in language and ethics. The town is the level of existence where the rural, the urban and the pastoral communities of Pakistan can be integrated and made to work collectively in a way that no other entity can.
I had promised to return to the topic of administrative links of the federal government and the independence of provincial functionaries at the local level. If the participatory form of communal governance is utilized, these weaknesses and the societal apathy of Pakistanis can be used as sources of national strength and means of social and political uplift by the inclusion of citizens in power instead of the bureaucratic authority exercised today.
In every state and society we find three broad categories of individuals: the good, the bad and the bulk in between which makes a spectrum across activities, regions and categories or social classes. As suggested in the context of communal involvement in state activities, the government must support the first and oppose the second so that a larger portion of the third is aligned with the good and willingly accepts the writ of state.
In the case of Pakistan, the number of those who are good can be increased by exploiting the links of family and community at one level and the cultural values that are conducive to altruism. In Lahore, for example, the host at a meal likes to be lavish; in Islamabad, the sophistication of the venue is given preference. The businessman has always been drawn to the high-brow society and the youth to social celebrities. Sometimes, therefore, people are ready to pay higher taxes or make voluntary contributions to administrative initiatives if the quid pro quo includes enhanced social status or preferential treatment. This is true in most societies. However, in every case, the incentives have to be socially sensitive.
I presume that someone may like a special booth at the national parade; another may want a dinner with the top executive; while a third may like to be a member of an elite club or merely the reputation of being known as the nation’s top tax-payer, a celebrity of another kind. In fact, I can think of unique privileges that a resident of Faisalabad may like, or the tribal leader of FATA, or the regional elite of Baluchistan would covet.
TO END MY LENGTHY DISCOURSE ON A PERSONAL NOTE, I have no pretention of being an administrative genius. Perhaps some of my views may seem puerile, juvenile or banal to the seasoned administrator; they are, in fact, being offered as the musings of a historian of ordinary skill based on a semi-educated exposure to practical management of human affairs. There is only one part that I believe is un-debatable in my set of premises: unless management and governance of society is administered properly, communities can’t prosper. No system, however well balanced; no policy, however well constructed; and no ruler, however well meaning, can succeed unless the executive arm of the state & government is effective and efficient. Administrative laxity, whenever and wherever it has occurred in history has brought about the decline of state, society, nation and country.
Whether these musings are valuable or trash, I wish that some politician or bureaucrat or chief executive of state will take the trouble of sifting the chaff from the straw and take serious note of my refrains: that without administration, there is no hope for the system to deliver; without the social context, no system which we install has any chance of success; and that no governance model, which does not take a sober view of the implications of Pakistan’s cultural, ethnic and ecological diversity, can be viable.
If we wish to attack this hydra, we can look to one or more of the following options:
- Grass root community mobilization from an urban base in order to promote local activism and utilize the best practices visible in our own national experiences.
- Form action groups to link sincere & competent functionaries of state and genuine pro-Pakistan section of civil-society to fortify us against negativity and defeatism.
- Prepare a strategy sustainable for fifteen/twenty years for the secondary education level, in order to inculcate socio-political values of indigenous culture/traditions.
- Create model of real-politic to control our anti-Pakistan elite in the global village.
Every Pakistani [urban, rural, pastoral or nomadic] is entitled to have some expectations from the state. Currently, the non-urban population suffers from an incremental alienation with state and government. A sense of alienation among common citizens is responsible for their retaining deeper links with their communities which have existed independently from time immemorial. An ordinary Pakistani may acknowledge the rights of community even over family and society; the nation and state are definitely at a lower level.
If the state wishes to increase its share in the loyalties of its citizens, the path must still lie through the community as interface. By increasing the economic and political role of the state in actualizing the aspirations of the communal forms with which we Pakistanis are associated, the state can bring itself at par with family and society. This is where it should settle in without damaging the communal affiliations. The mesh of communal affiliations operates at a variety of levels simultaneously causes the integration of society that serves as insurance for national integration. As a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural, multi-communal nation, our national interests should exist at three levels: a Muslim contextual orientation towards West Asia and Africa; the regional context with the gigantic China and India to the East; and the Central Asian context from Afghanistan to Kazakhstan in the north.
On the political front, we must find a solution to the constant flux of inter-party changes on the part of communally popular [electable] politicians. This practice which has gained the name “lotacracy” is common among ‘professional politicians’ who fail to get seats or status according to their expectation within one party and shift to another for that reason. The leader, as a symbol of ‘policies and principles’, is sacrificed along with loyalty to state and its institutions. Instead there is the politician’s self-image which denies loyalty even to people and party leaders. Consensus should be developed regarding the principles of politics which we wish to promote. Personally, I am in favour of religious tolerance, not secularism and brotherhood not communism; I believe that these were out traditions.
I think we should set our goal as primary education, generally given to a child between the ages of 5 and 10 years; but also to adults in case they have for some reason not been given the knowledge in early life. The syllabus would be structured to lead from a mother tongue to the national language Urdu such that identification of letters and sounds would be taught from the personal vocabulary of a child when admitted to school.
The course to be taught would focus on civic duties and social responsibilities in the local dialect within the Union-Council, Village, Ward/Muhalla. An essential component would be maths, basic concepts of personal hygiene and family oriented economic management. A component of ecological and environmental responsibility would also be included. The primary education would be structured to include rudiments of ethnic/cultural sensitivity, linguistic affiliation and the place of national institutions. These basics would provide the foundation which could be built upon if a person graduated to secondary education.
Whereas the components of primary education would be compulsory for all citizens in a procedure that would be convenient for the individual, community and society; secondary education would be a requisite for people who are to be assigned social responsibilities or civic duties by the community or the state. At this level, a modicum of understanding of the national fabric, its human mosaic and physical components would be developed.
Beyond the secondary level, a structure of education should be framed in which skills of engineering, medicine, polytechnic, governance, sciences and social sciences, humanities and arts are provided to those who are to cater to national needs in these fields. In order to develop such a curriculum, the Pakistanis must determine their ideal of nationhood. People must be asked what they expect state and society to provide and what they would like to do for their society and community. Without these parameters it will be impossible for us to chart out a course from our present condition, current abilities and potential, to the condition of our choice the development of our polity and enhancing our potential.