While policymakers are stuck in the old ways of doing things, the quality and content of public discourse worldwide have changed, marked by a focus shift from such issues as the role of the technocrats in economic growth to the realm of social sciences in building a better world.

By extending the frontiers of knowledge, social sciences have helped resolve problems encountered in humanity’s march to progress and prosperity. There is a consensus among social scientists that there is a close link between economic and social progress and political stability, writes former vice-president of the World Bank Shahid Javed Burki in his article on ‘The need for a new development paradigm.’

That is also evident from the latest media reports that international lenders, particularly the International Monetary Fund (IMF), are seeking assurance from Pakistan that the country’s future political setup will respect any deal signed by Islamabad with them.

Inclusive development, Mr Burki says, means bringing all segments of society into the process of development. And one may add here that the latest studies place a lot of emphasis on the equitable distribution of fruits of economic development.

Enlightened economic nationalism, embedded with the spirit of collectivism, has the potential to transform the current international propensity towards hegemony

The growing prominence of economists, scholars, social scientists, think tanks, analysts and social activists etc, in public debate worldwide is creating a congenial environment for different schools of thought to contend and flower — the likely catalyst needed to address the world’s interlinked economic, political and social woes.

While the global movement of capital and people seems to be faltering, the international flow of ideas and latest technologies is gaining momentum, with receptive mindsets eager to embrace a culture change both in their management and work practices.

In his book ‘Poverty, by America’, famous author and US sociologist Mathew Desmond writes, “poverty isn’t simply the condition of not having enough money. It’s the condition of not having enough choice and being taken advantage of because of that.” As eminent scholar Joseph Stiglitz puts it, the market orthodoxy has turned economic science into a religious faith. And in Pakistan, says a media analyst, efforts to harmonise the society perforce have failed, and diversity demands a behaviour change.

The “deployment of austerity is a wrong economic policy based on wrong economic theory that has never succeeded in achieving the stated ends,” says eminent economist Clara Matai. Her views are widely shared.

Investors around the world are worried that the latest failure of the two US banks is a sign of trouble at other firms. Experts say the banks were overtly exposed to assets whose values came under pressure from the rising interest rates.

Critics say austerity reduces economic activity, impairs aggregate supply, increases unemployment, and enhances inequity and poverty. Worst of all, austerity programmes perpetuate the capacity of the elite to influence public policy towards strengthening their extractive economic institutional design, says analyst Dr Omer Javed.

Solutions have to be negotiated between stakeholders for their long-term sustainability — the failure to negotiate in the political arena resulted in the 1971 catastrophe while the 1973 Constitution and the 18th Amendment were the outcome of political engagement

Former finance minister Miftah Ismail argues that politics is played out on a left-right ideological spectrum in America but not so in Pakistan. Perhaps for a non-dynastic political party to be successful, he thinks, it is necessary to have an ideological base.

In his recent article titled ‘Unstable States’ noted analyst Niaz Murtaza points out that the way forward for the establishment in Pakistan is to let the ideological politics flourish and undertake grass root mobilisation based on egalitarian ideas. Ideology has been defined as a system of ideas and ideals that form the basis of economic and political theory.

According to one estimate, about 31 per cent of the youth in Pakistan are unemployed and 67pc want to leave the country. The challenge is to provide youth with decent jobs or self-employment by empowering them with entrepreneurial and technical skills and required financing opportunities.

Technocrats think that they have economic solutions, but politicians do not have the will to execute them, says senior political economist Dr Pervez Tahir. What is not appreciated, he argues, is that economic solutions have to be negotiated between stakeholders for their long-term sustainability. The failure to negotiate in the political arena resulted in the 1971 catastrophe. The 1973 Constitution and the 18th Amendment were the outcome of political engagement.

Pakistan also needs to keep pace with a transforming world. In the international arena, “after decades of giddy globalisation, the pendulum is shifting back to the nation,” says Quinn Slobodian, professor of the history of ideas at Wellesley College.

In America these days, he notes, all the talk is about bringing the supply chains home. US Congress has just passed a nearly $400 billion bill intended to increase domestic production, aid green energy transition and reduce foreign dependence. “Pundits have declared the dawn of a new era — the age of economic nationalism.”

Notwithstanding the economic progress achieved by it, globalisation, now fragmented, is not socially sustainable. In his article titled ‘How capitalism works today’ Professor Slobodian says: “Economic zones —over 5,400 worldwide, many more than sovereign states — control the global economy.

An enlightened, progressive economic nationalism, embedded with the spirit of collectivism, as stipulated by a social scientist, has the potential to transform the current international dispensation, based on narrow, regressive nationalism, into a hegemony-free world economy.

Published in Dawn, The Business and Finance Weekly, March 20th, 2023