PAKISTAN’S seventy years are replete with words such as ‘failed state’, least developing nation, corruption and a stagnating economy. Analyses of Pakistan’s success as an independent nation have ranged from an emerging Asian tiger in the late 1950s and 1960s to a country which harbours terrorists and plays at ‘good Taliban, bad Taliban’ in the murky world of extremism.
There is no doubt that Pakistan may suffer from the above mentioned ills, amongst many others. This has led to many claiming that Pakistan as a country has been a failure-another name in the endless list of post-colonial nations that failed to live up to the alacrity surrounding their independence.
In reality, this tag of a failed state and all the connotations attached to it stem from a very myopic way of thinking about nations and their successes and failures. Since the rise of the neo-liberal world order and the stark divide between the Global North and the Global South that emerged in the wake of the wave of decolonisation in the decades 1940-60s, such measures have become the benchmarksin assessing a nation’s performance and the adulation it garners from the world community.
Measures such as high GDP growth, human rights records and the ‘extent’ of democracy prevalent in a country have allowed the West to proclaim itself as the ‘civilised’ and developed nations, and look down upon those with darker skins and fewer multinational corporations. This has also forced ‘third world’ countries into viewing themselves as backward and considering western civilization to be superior to their own cultures. As Frantz Fanon, author of The Wretched of the Earth remarked, “The oppressed will always believe the worst about themselves.”
The very word ‘failed state’ in fact, stems from the West’s proclivity of viewing the other parts of the world through the lens of economic development and claiming that these nations need to follow the blueprint of western progress in order to grow as societies. This resulted in the Bretton Woods System which used multinational organisations such as the IMF and the World Bank to impose ideologies which only further perpetuated the West’s hegemony.
In On Western Terrorism, Noam Chomsky argues that the West uses a shallow analysis of development in western countries to portray its superiority. This narrative allows the West to ignore the successes of other nations
Noam Chomsky, in his short but highly powerful work, On Western Terrorism, makes this very argument when he claims that the West uses a shallow analysis of development in western countries to portray its superiority. This narrative allows the West to ignore the successes of other nations, such as the USSR which played a fundamental part in the decolonization waves of the twentieth century and which had staggeringly high levels of literacy and employment-the latter of which continues to evade economic giants such as the United States. Chomsky claims, “Many countries worldwide would still be colonies if not for the help their liberation movements received from the Soviet Union.”
Any critical perusal of Pakistan’s time as independent nation must, therefore, be predicated on going beyond simple assessments of its economic indicators or the level of corruption in our society. A thorough analysis of Pakistan’s struggles must raise the question of what a ‘Pakistani state’ really meant and how this nation came into being. This will allow us to then analyse the issues Pakistan faced as a nation-struggles that were both common in the decolonised nations but were also highly peculiar to Pakistan’s unique independence.
Muhammad Ali Jinnah, Pakistan’s founder and Quaid-i-Azam claimed on the 23rd of March, 1940, “The Mussalmans of India are a nation by every definition of the word nation, and must have their separate territories, homeland and state.” While this quote clearly adumbrates Jinnah’s view on a separate homeland for Muslims, he did not lay down the contours of what such a Muslim nation would look like.
Pakistan’s founders and early leaders would struggle to shape this Muslim ‘nation’ and give it practical form. As Faisal Devji in his momentous book Muslim Zion claims, Pakistan was a unique exercise in state building since Pakistan was the only nation-state that emerged on the basis of a religious identity. It was only until Israel’s independence in 1948, writes Devji, that another nation emerged which could claim its identity on a common religion. Devji argues,
“The Zionist movement leading to the creation of Israel in 1948 was an example of the political form [Zion], with Muslim nationalism, resulting in the founding of Pakistan a year earlier, constituting both its precedent, and perhaps its closest political relation as well.”
The appeal to religion for Pakistan’s unity is not hard to understand, considering the ethnic and provincial tensions that plagued the nascent Muslim country. With its two wings separated by a 1000 miles of hostile territory, Pakistan was from its earliest days plagued by ethnic, provincial and linguistic tensions. This was evidenced in the strikes in East Bengal to declare Bengali a national language and in the separatist movements that emerged in Balochistan and the then NWFP.
A common identity in the shape of religion would allow Pakistan’s founding politicians to supersede these ethnic and provincial tendencies, and instead champion a unity based on Islam and Islamic culture. This appeal to Islam was perhaps best summed by a speech Liaquat Ali Khan made in Washington D.C in 1950, “”I am often asked what the ideology of Pakistan as a state is? I will try and tell you in a few very simple but clear words. We Muslims believe in God and His supreme sovereignty.”
This quote highlights how the struggle for Pakistan was completely seen as an effort for the emancipation of India’s Muslims, and this laid the subsequent platform from which leaders such as Jinnah and Liaquat Ali Khan would attempt to hold together Pakistan’s flimsy unity and integrity.
The desire for unity was made all the more urgent because of Pakistan’s fears of Indian designs of seeing Pakistan destroyed. Liaquat Ali Khan again summed up this fear when in another speech to an American audience in 1950, he claimed Pakistan and India’s relations were not ‘free from anxiety’ and this anxiety stemmed from the fact that ‘India is a larger country than Pakistan’ and the threat this posed to Pakistan’s territorial integrity.
This reliance on fostering unity in Pakistan resulted in the Pakistani state taking measures that damaged the move towards a stronger federation, and instead concentrated power in the centre. This fear of India also forced the state to direct most of Pakistan’s budget towards the military, as argued by Aqil Shah in his book The Army and Democracy, which resulted in the military becoming significantly more efficient and stronger vis-à-vis civilian institutions. This centralisation of power and the strengthening of the army at a time when civilian institutions failed to establish control-it took nine years for Pakistan’s first constitution to emerge-resulted in the current civil-military imbalance which ominously hangs over Pakistan’s political landscape.
It is thus, very important to assess the historical developments behind certain elements of Pakistani society before we begin to critique them. The argument that Pakistani politicians are corrupt and democracy has never worked in Pakistan is wrong because it fails to analyse why democracy failed to take root in Pakistan. Claims such as Pakistani people are not used to democracy because of high tempers and temperatures-a claim former President Ayub Khan made in his autobiography-do not hold true. Similarly, a brief overview of the history of funding to Pakistan’s army and the lack thereof for civilian institutions explains why civilian institutions failed to develop. This also explains why our politicians and Parliament reek of corruption-not because of democracy or the ‘inherent’ venal nature of politicians, but because mechanisms of accountability never developed in Pakistan which could have curbed corruption.
Pakistan’s struggles in its early years after independence can thus explain the causes behind some of the problems facing the country, and it is imperative that we study the historical trajectory of these issues before making shallow analyses of Pakistan’s performance as a country. It is also important to realise that this exercise is not meant to absolve Pakistan or Pakistanis of our struggles. On the other hand, a thorough historical analysis will allow us to better gauge how we can tackle the problems that grip our nation.
In his momentous book Muslim Zion, Faisal Devji has claimed that in 1947 Pakistan was a unique exercise in state building since it was the only nation-state that emerged on the world map on the basis of a religious identity
Studying the political and historical events surrounding the birth of decolonised nations is thus crucial, not just to gain a better understanding of these nations but also to assess where they stand today. These analyses will allow us to eschew fallacious yardsticks of comparison, and instead study unique aspects of each country.
Considering all of this-where does Pakistan stand today? There is no denying that Pakistan is not the heaven it was made out to be. Rampant poverty, staggering levels of income inequality and oppression of women and minorities are common sights in Pakistan today. Millions of Pakistani citizens face threats to their lives and do not have the resources to live decent lives. It is on these grounds that we need to judge Pakistan and hold it accountable. Why do Shiites and other minorities continue to feel threatened while those who terrorise them walk freely? Why does the centre continue to marginalise Balochistan and rely on an increasing militarization of the province which has completely failed to rid the province of radical organisations? Has Pakistan ameliorated the striking income inequality prevalent in our society? Does our state indulge in social welfare projects such as housing programs for the poor?
These questions are meant to force us to think outside of the prism of neoliberal economics and policymaking. Simply increasing foreign investment and touting Chinese largesse as the panacea to all ills is not enough to solve the common Pakistani’s problems. What of the plight of domestic workers, or the derelict state of our courts which fail hundreds who seek justice against horrific crimes? Will anti-terrorism courts really improve justice in Pakistan? Our people seek the answers to these questions, and it is our responsibility to come up with the answers.
Pakistanis will not rid themselves of their problems by simply adhering to the shadow of democracy that exists in Pakistan, or keeping faith with a system which is meant to oppress the majority. The answer is not as simple as several mainstream politicians make it out to be. Simply ‘eradicating’ corruption-whatever that entails-is not the answers Pakistanis seek. In fact, the politicians who espouse this line of thought to solve Pakistan’s problems are a product of the very system that has for seventy years subjugated the farmer, the peasant, the worker, the aam Pakistani.
Instead, we Pakistanis must agitate and clamour for real change that overhauls the entire system. This includes launching challenges on a political, social and economic front, with economic emancipation at the vanguard. Only a wave of mass politics that comes from the grassroots up and carries with it intellectuals and students and workers and the downtrodden can revamp this system and improve Pakistan’s standing. For only then can we dream of having a prosperous Pakistan, a khushaal Pakistan, where indeed all are ‘free to go to their mosques and their temples’ and where one can belong to ‘any religion, caste or creed’ without fear of oppression, as the Quaid envisioned. Happy 70th, my country.
The writer is a member of staff and graduated from Aitchison College and Cornell University, USA. He also studied at Oxford University and can be reached at mabrahim.shah@gmail.com
Published in Daily Times, August 17th 2017.
