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What Pakistan needs beyond brick and mortar
The Pakistani economy is looking good. After years of downturns and rough patches, things appear to be finally moving in the right direction.
The World Bank believes that the growth rate should be touching five per cent for the next few years. Deficit is stabilising and tax collection is on the up.
On the face of it, at least statistically, Pakistan is going through a period of economic growth. The recent Chinese investment package is being touted as proof of global investor confidence returning to Pakistan.
But, that is not the complete picture.
Also read: Rethinking the budget
We still have social justice issues that are piling up and going ignored. While the economy is growing, so is the gap between the rich and the poor. This is resulting in escalation in crime and worsening of security conditions. Moreover, radicalisation and extremism are spreading fast.
So, while things appear bright on some fronts, the bigger realities are as grave as they used to be. We have four provinces and only one of these is functioning...barely.
See: Experts term economic growth mere illusion
Celebrating the one barely functioning province is not really setting a high bar. The other three provinces are experiencing a complete breakdown when it comes to governance. Provincial governments in Sindh, Balochistan and KP can be taken out tomorrow and nothing will change.
Or for that matter, Punjab can lose its provincial government and everything would still work more or less the same, because the bureaucrats run the show anyway. And service delivery – the one thing they're supposed to do – is the last thing they care about.
The federal government is doing what it can. Trade is improving, so is the overall economy. On a macro level, their efforts are working to a certain extent, but these are meaningless without taking service delivery and social capacity into consideration; when the second tier of governance i.e. the provincial tier, is so useless
Pakistan needs jobs… but it also needs social justice and good governance. Churning out students from universities is not education, just like perpetually building infrastructure around metro areas is not growth.
To put it simply, our indicators for progress are flawed. There are no indicators for the loss of lives, the slump in education quality or the swell in hatred. And, while it is uplifting to keep feeding ourselves the ‘this is also Pakistan’ narrative, those are the indicators which matter.
Take a look: Health of the economy
At this point, what is needed is a holistic approach to progress. Beyond building brick and mortar structures, development should include improving the quality of life for the citizens, which means a better economy, more jobs as well as safety and security.
Accordingly, discussions should focus on civic matters more than federal issues.
Currently, most of the debate revolves around security dynamics and economic growth. While the government flaunts the economic indicators to tout success, the opposition seizes social indicators such as security and injustice to portray failure. To cut through the noise, an improved set of indicators is needed to measure not our growth or development but our progress.
Also read: Power politics: 3 serious governance issues nobody is talking about
'Progress' refers to quality of life; inclusive of income inequality, inflation, social justice, safety nets and economic improvement. Unless we have a new set of indicators to measure our ground realities, we will continue to live in a place which is half a fool’s paradise or half a fool’s inferno; where a segment of the society is obsessed with presenting a rosy picture when there is none, while the other segment is bent on presenting all the doom and gloom, which is also not the case.
Until we find a way to measure what matters, the policies we keep designing are simply not going to fix enough things. Better policy needs better measures and for now that is being ignored in favour of political priorities.
The writer is currently doing his PhD in Political Science at Georgia State University. He tweets @adnanrasool
The views expressed by this writer and commenters below do not necessarily reflect the views and policies of the Dawn Media Group.
Comments (24) Closed
We should shout about the economic improvements being made and visible, I am from an Agriculture family, and our taxes have gone up, but more then happy to pay those taxes, as i see a huge improvement in Punjab and have started to see where the money hoes, alot still needs to be done, but sitting here in the UK, we cant start comparing the Pak Delivery style with that of the other countries.
A very well written article. Excellent! Pakistan is required to spend more on its people. The priority list should be like education, health, energy and then rest of things like roads and other infrastructure.
rule are rule who breaked the rule punished him
pakistan needs India more than china
Great article.
What Pakistanis need is Roti, Kapada and Makan.
Look like you are no longer assosiated with PMLN which is sad! Great article. Things are moving forward. You have to crawl before you walk and walk before you run. This govt is doing better than others and we must demand more from this and future governments and from people.
The review is self explanatory."Progress' refers to quality of life; inclusive of income inequality, inflation, social justice, safety nets and economic improvement," I only repeated Adnan Rasool.
interesting points about a new set of indicators to measure progress in social justice and other indicators.
We can start by copying the UK when it comes to economic stats, and making them independent so that they are not generated misused and lose credibility as they are often by politicians. We need an office for budget responsibility type system and an independent central bank.
Economy will improve when Social justice is take care of, and social justice cannot impose until economy is taken care of. So that is the question of this decade!
Very well said......now all someone must do is teach our leaders that they can ALSO make money from projects that REALLY help the people but are not visible to the naked eye.
We would increasingly see articles like these here. Articles that would "argue" that what a useless idea Pak China Corridor really is and how we should not give it any importance at all.
I am not a big fan of Nwaz family government (don't like Zardari govt. either), however, I do give credit to his government for stopping the downhill economic trend and start improving it. We have been so disappointed for so long, any good news is a hugely moral boosting. I hope he starts paying attention to good governance also. Without tackling that issue any improvement will be gone in no time.
Human Development Index is a good yard stick of a country's progress. Somehow, many in Pakistan have been made to believe that 100+ cable channels, uncensored internet access, and proliferation of smart phones is equal to progress...
Smart phone is not going to make anyone 'smart', anymore than Facebook or Twitter is going increase your knowledge or skills.
Impressive skill in writing a lot of words but saying very little.
Good comments - but where is the money gonna come from? Taxation reforms is the pre-requisite to everything you state.
Without TRUE checks and balances, TRUE and EQUAL justice and Law and Order in place any economic boom is nothing but high level stealing and corruption at its best.
Another Cynical view on the CPEC. We as a nation just do not believe anything good happening to us. The recent revelation that Modi complained against this project " In the strongest terms" is enough evidence of the potential of this project in uplifting pakistan. Also the assertion that the three provinces excluding punjab are a complete failure in terms of governance shows that the writer have not done any proper research and just goes by the negative news shown on the chanells which again being a cynical nation sells the most.
"The Pakistani economy is looking good." A 4.1% growth being touted as good is why this nations settles for the little that it does. The author is detached from reality.
good Article.
We can expect to see more of these articles which would inform us just how useless and controversial CPEC really is ! Stay tuned !!!
The crux of the matter is that there exists a huge ideological philosophical existential vacuum which would prorotize matters to enhance progress health and happiness for all citizens the point is concepts events n people come in that order
Good Article, thank you.
Don't agree with your sentence 'Provincial governments in Sindh, Balochistan and KP can be taken out tomorrow and nothing will change' It is clear that KP government is putting a lot of effort into improving things, education health and security in particular.
Good point regarding introducing relevant indicators.
Something you didn't mention at all is corruption? one of the biggest cause of our nation's failure!
Although,personally Ive been in Construction business,yet I'll suggest that instead of investing in bricks and mortars,Pakistani authorities need to invest in flesh and bones. similarly,reforming the education system of Pakistan needs prioritization.