can western economic system deliver for pakistan

The concern for a western style economic system has plagued Pakistan for sometime. The concepts given are theoretical but much more is the fact that the system is based on a cultural premise that does not exist; that all cultures are neutral to economics. If one then considers the human factors that are players in the game, one sees the difficulty.

The human element is at such variance in Pakistan that it is impossible to place a handle on these variances for the purpose of public benefit. Besides the human factors, the shaping of relevant institutions requires many considerations. The institutions of the West are based on a different premise than the ones that we have in Pakistan and that the developing world has in general.

Capitalism and democratic institutions mean different things to different people and policymakers. The policymakers, on the other hand, are at variance with the general public the ultimate ones that have to bear the consequences of these policies; the result, a mismatch between the intended and the unintended consequences of that policy.

Consider some of the objectives that the world order imposes on Pakistan in particular. It imposed during the regime of Musharraf, a new administrative structure that was so ludicrous that the entire system was thrown into turmoil. It was created with the objective that the coterie then in power would be there in perpetuity and that independent thinking was of no concern of the power bloc as the requirement was for them to do their job in accordance with their concerns.

Secretaries were transferred if they did not toe the line. The case of an SADB loan in which the then Secretary of agriculture was transferred because of his refusal to sign the loan at Manila as it did not provide the benefits worth $350 million was, in fact, a non-starter and subsequent events have shown this to be the case. The debt incurred was for the future generations.

Things went so far out of hand that the consultant selected for the job had virtually no experience of the subject matter and had been around as a civil servant first in Pakistan and then in the WB; a recipe for disaster as he had no exponential experience of the country.

The selection was passed on to Pakistan and was not of their taking. How long can such things continue? It happened in other projects also and these supercilious idiots, who formed the coterie of hit men sent to Pakistan, are lounging around in New York or in Washington. The burden of their actions and their conveniences would fall eventually on the future generations.

What moral right has the WB and the ADB to determine how we should, in Pakistan, administer the economy? These were loans and had to be repaid by Pakistan and not grants or charity. Time and again, the game seems to be to take Pakistan on the road to a sure disaster. I recall the total loans when ZAB was in power were of the order of 3 billion dollars.

Zia and his hitmen took it to unbearable levels. Pakistan cannot afford the luxury of non-descript loans and the eventual impossibility of utilising them without the benefit of earning from them. Most of these loans were used for consumption purposes. The liberal policies that were forced on the country were different from the liberal policies that had been debated and worked in their own country.

Let us examine some common threads that are needed in Pakistan s economy. Do you need a common objective in the social order? If so, tell me how and why did you kill Nawab Akbar Bugti and why were there so many decisions by the Musharraf regime in which innocent citizens were butchered or went missing.

Why are the persons responsible for this not being tried? Why this selectivity of actions of Musharraf and why this obvious question that the public is seeking as to the selective use of the actions of the previous regime. If that regime is false in little things, it is false in big things and it is false in everything.

There are no ifs and buts about this. Can you have a common objective about the social order between the provinces or even within the provinces? Can the, and does the Baloch tribes think as the Pathan tribes and can we have a modification of policy if the end question is of getting them to harmonise? There are serious divergences between the Punjabi and the persons of other provinces. So policies have to cater for the needs of the people and their way of living.

Pakistan has not been able to cash in on the initial success of trying to guide society towards specific goals. Independence has lost out and the greed of the few has messed up the many that were the inhabitants of this country. Institutions that have been with excessive physical power have to be handled and made subject to the will of the people as exercised through the Parliament. The greed of the few was so powerful that the ordinary people simply succumbed to the power tactics of the weapon-holders.

The power of sacrifice for the common good was lost. Why should anyone accept the loss of the poor and take up cudgels for them? I can give you umpteen examples of the rule of the powerful where the rule of law has been exterminated systematically. No one questioned the rule of the army, for whatever it was worth.

We are very good at hitting those that have fallen and we forgot simple decency and decided that if some one was to be incarcerated and you did not like him, let him stew in his own juice. Double standards these were not, these were poisonous fangs that hit the simple societal norms. We proudly display our prejudices and we proudly sit on judgement. The evidence they tell me is at the tips of their tongues.

If that is so, then we need to cut those tips and place them as evidence. What nonsense! The rules of evidence have been forgotten just because the media enjoys unfettered liberty. At heart, the scums have got to the decent and the indecent have a field day. The third caveat that I would like to speak on is that knowledge is communicated through and by social institutions and so are the rules of conduct.

What knowledge is communicated? Take agriculture and the obsolete institutions that are supposed to give and disseminate knowledge to the pluralistic society that embodies Pakistan. If the people have such divergences then how is that knowledge going to be assimilated. As it is the simple systems that we have are not conducive to the giving of knowledge.

Obsolete institutions cannot give any new knowledge to the public at large unless this knowledge is self-generated. Since most of the educated have been to the west and imbibed the culture of the west it is necessary to have them adapt that knowledge and make it country-specific.

With different tiers of knowledge, the surprising part is that the people who are the recipients of this information will differently assimilate the same knowledge. How can a PhD talk to the farmer that has not been educated in the system, any system? The tragedy of the system is that we expect the farmer to deliver and he has, so far, but now the difficulty is visible.

The farmer is at the tail-end of education and that seems to be his destiny for the country is not doing anything to liven his life. So the solution lies in having a lot of public servants that do not play to the gallery but understand the nuances of public life. It will take some doing.

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“The greatest discovery of all time is that a person can change his future by merely changing his attitude.”