New leadership?

TRANSFORMATIVE leadership is our strong desire and an urgent need, given the doom we face due to long years of misrule. But many naïvely expect messiahs to come from the sky, as in fairytales.
New leaders don’t parachute in, but rise organically from and lead a social group opposing the old guard. They reflect the group interests (but may stitch up larger alliances to win) and views whose quality decides how well they rule. The descent of messiahs can’t be foretold via social science tools, being the stuff of fervent supplications. But such tools do show that it is not messiahs but challenger groups that bring change. They can also review if any group is strong enough to undo our old guard and rule ably.
Our old guard is an establishment-backed cabal of parasitical rural and urban upper-class elites producing low end-stuff that makes big money by breaking laws and without innovation and good management. They win power via the PPP, PML-N or the establishment to get large state loans, subsidies, etc. But the masses are given mere crumbs. So, state ills originate in market ills. They undercut four key aims — macroeconomic stability, productive growth, equity and sustainability — and often threaten default.
Which social group can challenge them? The middle class has done so for long via the Jamaat-i-Islami, MQM, PTI and even the TLP. At first glance, it seems ideally armed, with its education, global links and some money. But oddly, middle-class parties indulge in populist, inept and even corrupt politics that weakens the venal status quo without producing a new system.
Do these ills across all parties show deeper flaws in the social group? One can’t generalise. But some common traits among their backers, their social circles and TV show gurus may explain why this middle-class subset isn’t a positive political force.
The main cause among many is self-focused politics and apathy for principled politics that benefits the masses. They prefer unreliable, rigid TV and social media views over serious sources. They also desire populist messiahs, not ideological leaders, who can package their narrow politics as mass politics.
This desire echoes US singer Bonnie Tyler’s passionate, urgent plea: “I need a hero … a Superman to sweep me off my feet.” Bonnie still awaits such a hero, but our middle-class has had many — Altaf Husain, Imran Khan, Khadim Rizvi, etc. All have cults and, mind you, not blind but clever ones which, believing that all is fair in love, war and politics, gleefully parrot populist lies to sell their narrow politics. Lacking money (to do patronage politics) and ideology, they use populism as their main political option.
In rising states like India, Bangladesh, etc, neoliberal-plus lots rule: big business, allied parties and think tanks that idolise markets. Unlike our venal lot, these businesses, aided by the state, compete globally to generate economic stability and growth. They ignore equity and sustainability. But conflicts in India and Bangladesh show that without the latter two, even the former two may end.
Given their small core base, allied parties win via xenophobia and top-down social aid that don’t end inequity between the elites and the masses, and/or repression. Our venal lot warily applies neoliberalism under IMF deals. But our neoliberals are too weak to undo them and win power. Even our best businesses are tiny domestic flat-track bullies. The new Awaam Party, a likely ally, lacks support and ideas.
That leaves the progressives. Despite representing the masses, they are a bit strong in our poorest conflict zones — former Fata and Bal­o­chistan — given establishment abu­ses and aid for pa­­tronage, populist and extremist politics and the brainwashing of the masses.
Change will come when, despite the risk of jail, torture and death, progressives spread a strong agenda among the masses. So, they must craft a post-Soviet agenda that doesn’t nix the markets but ensures that the state and market both serve the masses. It must build on local mass issues across Pakistan to craft not just a welfare and protective state for the weak but also a developmental state which gives a decent income to all and helps us do well globally.
As no challenger is strong enough to topple our venal lot soon, better rule is a distant prospect. Autocracy has filled the veins of society with toxic extremism, conflict and stagnation, so much so that social capital can’t be formed for progress. One must desire and aid the rise of able groups ultimately. Till then, the urgent aim is to push the venal lot to avoid doom. There’s some chance an establishment-backed, inept, neoliberal lot may be our next fate. Anything better is unluckily not in our foreseeable future.
The writer is a political economist with a PhD from the University of California, Berkeley.
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X: @NiazMurtaza2
Published in Dawn, August 6th, 2024