IN the utterly compelling story of capitalist modernity woven together by Marx and other radicals over the course of the 19th and 20th centuries, the property-owning bourgeoisie plays the role of chief villain, committed exclusively to the accumulation of wealth and incessant exploitation of the toiling classes.

Even if one is not moved by the Marxist grand narrative — let alone harbours a commitment to the principles of socialism — it is hard not to agree that the exponential growth in property and the unequal access of different segments of society to it has been, and continues to be, amongst the most defining aspects of life in the modern world.

Western societies that had become attuned to the idea of the ‘end of history’ were reminded spectacularly about the reality of class and property by the financial crisis of 2007, which precipitated the Occupy movements, as well as electoral victories such as that of Syriza in Greece.

The ‘property dealer’ has become the most savvy entrepreneur.

That these wake-up calls have not necessarily precipitated a shift in the balance of class power in these countries, and, indeed, around the world, was confirmed only this past week when Europe’s big fish imposed a draconian bailout package on the Greek people, in spite of the latter resoundingly voting against exactly such impositions only a few days earlier. But then capitalism has never really been about democracy, no matter what the rhetoric suggests.

The mainstream academy has also been more inclined to recognise the fact that the divide between the propertied and the property-less is as significant at the present juncture of history as at any other time in the recent past. Thomas Picketty’s acclaimed book Capital in the twenty-first century confirms that inequality has increased steadily over time in the Western world, and, by extension, across the globe.

Yet despite all of the relatively obvious evidence, there remains a tendency even amongst radicals to employ outdated slogans rather than generate concrete analyses of the contours of contemporary capitalism. The question is: who is today’s bourgeoisie and how does it manage to subdue challenges to its power in the wake of such huge contradictions within the capitalist order?

One of the defining features of global capitalism as it has evolved over the past few decades is the emergence of real estate as a major avenue of profit. What started as a trend in Western metropolises in the 1970s is now a genuinely global phenomenon; the buying and selling of land in an increasingly built-up urban environment, and the speculative bubbles associated with this process, has become amongst the most lucrative businesses in human history.

In Pakistan the ‘property dealer’ has arguably become the most savvy entrepreneur in an economy characterised by informal dealings and huge windfalls. While Karachi is the classic case of speculative land investments (and the many political conflicts that follow), the rest of the country has caught up quickly.

In my estimation Islamabad is amongst the most interesting cases of all, and definitely the most dynamic. Over the past 15 years or so, the city’s population has increased exponentially due both to an influx of migrants and internal growth. It is in this same period that the market for land has been completely transformed.

Since Islamabad was conceived and then created, the area’s native population has largely been unable to assert itself in the city’s economy or politics. Most owners of land in what was a relatively poor, rain-fed region were forced into giving up their lands in exchange for next-to-nothing and/or land compensation in agricultural regions in southern Punjab and Sindh. Many owners, however, remain invisible to planners because of what were still fairly circumscribed city limits.

Since the turn of the century, however, these limits have been stretched beyond what anyone might have imagined. As big housing schemes have reared their head, families that owned a few kanals of land on the outskirts of the federal capital have made millions, and have accordingly become influential in local politics. One of the results has been the reassertion of biradari-based political alignments and the growing militarisation of biradaris in direct competition with one another for formal political recognition.

I — following others like Arif Hasan — have written on these pages before about the trading and transporting segments in Pakistani society whose economic and political clout has grown steadily over the past few decades, to the point that they are now genuine players in the power game. We now need to recognise that it is not only ‘traditional’ traders, merchants and transporters that are making hay in Pakistan’s — and for that matter the global — political economy.

Marx predicted long ago that speculators would become big players in a capitalist world economy both dynamic and yet incredibly fragile. Here in Pakistan, like in so many parts of the world, he is being proven right.

The writer teaches at Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad.

Published in Dawn, July 17th, 2015

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