THE easiest thing to do is — nothing. It’s also the easiest thing to forget — that doing nothing is always an option.

Must, should, could, may — maybe not, after all. Or, just a whimpered no.

Everyone is so desperate to get the state to do its job — some of its job, part of its job, any of its job — that they forget that it’s also possible for the state to not do its job. At all.

Zardari it was easy to beat up on. No one liked him anyway.

Nawaz, perhaps fairly, possibly unfairly, was supposed to be a different bag. Even if you didn’t like him, he seemed like a guy who understood the job — finally — and was willing to do something about it.

Now, he’s just ambling around, not even making a pretence of making a pretence. Remember January? Two new chiefs, all the plans to be unveiled then? Yeah, never mind.

But forget Nawaz and Zardari and Imran for a minute. Because there’s so much focus on them, the point can sometimes get obscured by the emotions and stakes in play.

Have a look over at Balochistan. How, exactly, is Malik’s government turning out to be any different to Raisani’s?

Raisani didn’t care and didn’t even try to hide that he didn’t care — he knew who was really in charge, he knew his impotence and he was OK with it.

Malik cares and tries to show that he cares — but the ones in charge are still in charge and there’s not much that Malik can do about it.

End result the same, just different route to getting there. It’s like being asked to choose between getting whacked on the head and punched in the gut. A niche choice for the fetishists, perhaps.

Nothing. Doing nothing is the easiest thing to do.

But the quicksand. It’s pulling them in. It’s pulling us all in. The inexorable pull of the grim inevitable. Save us, save themselves. Do something, anything. They have to do something.

But they don’t. They don’t have to do anything. Because there is no pressure on them. Or pressure on them of the right sort anyway.

Yes, there is unhappiness. Yes, there is wailing and chest-beating. Yes, there is rancour and bitterness. But there is no organised constituency for change and reform in society — a constituency than can systematically and methodically put pressure on the state to do its job.

Well, there is an organised constituency for change — just not of the good kind. But we’ll get to that in a bit. Little examples will suffice.

A few schoolchildren die in a thoroughly avoidable road accident. Then, another few die in another thoroughly avoidable accident. Then, yet another bunch of them die in yet another thoroughly avoidable incident.

So, what happens next? Nothing. Or, more bluntly, resignation to the next bunch of kids dying in the next thoroughly avoidable accident that will be mourned for a bit.

The path to change is obvious. Pakistani roads are dangerous. You really can’t eliminate all the risk to schoolchildren in isolation: fully protected kids means fully protected everyone on the roads — and that’s a long, long way off.

But that doesn’t mean nothing can be done to reduce at least some of the risk kids face while being ferried to school and back. Adequate vehicles that are properly maintained and properly licensed drivers with adequate training — those two, small steps alone could save the lives of many schoolchildren.

And it’s not like it’s hard to find the school vans and drivers. Schools aren’t exactly hidden away.

But who’s demanding it? Nobody.

The ones with most at stake — the parents — are the most obvious constituency for reform. But they still haven’t coalesced into a meaningful constituency for reform — so nobody is petitioning the schools, the van and bus operators, the local administration, the government.

Nothing. Other than grieving for the dead.

Here’s the thing with positive reforms: more often than not, they need perseverance. Months, years, time, patience. Lots and lots of patience. And organisation. A constituency for reform. Because reform, by definition, means getting the state to do something it isn’t willing to do of its own volition.

Zoom out from schoolchildren dying in thoroughly avoidable accidents and look elsewhere. Where are the constituencies for reform — the organised, seeking-to-improve-the-public-good kind?

The economy? Where’s the constituency for reform? Rights? Ditto. Security? Let’s not even go there.

There are pleas from the public — please, leaders, elected representatives, state, lead us out of the darkness somehow.

There are no demands — insistent, fierce, persistent demands — from the public: it’s your job, dammit, and we’re going to stay on your case until you do what you were elected, appointed or nominated to do.

The attitude is more ‘save us’ than ‘this is our right’. Always a plea, never a demand.

But see how the other side does it, the forces of darkness. Organised, persistent, loud, insistent, furious. We want you, the state, to do X and until you give us X we’re going to hound you and threaten you and intimidate you.

So the right wing and beyond always gets what it wants. Because it knows how to get it. They are a constituency for change — just not the kind of change you or I would like to see.

That’s why they do nothing. Nawaz or Zardari. Raheel or Kayani. Malik or Raisani.

Because doing nothing is an option.

It’s just that everyone else forgets that they do have a choice — and nothing comes as easy as doing nothing.

The writer is a member of staff.

cyril.a@gmail.com

Twitter: @cyalm