The three-day Woodstock Music Festival of 1969, attended by half a million young people, formalised the cultural change that began with the Beat Generation of the 1950s, bringing in an era of humanitarian ideals, peace, hope and progress to benefit all humanity.

It was the “Dawning of the Age of Aquarius”. The sixties ethos spread to countries in the sphere of American influence, both in Europe and in the newly liberated countries that looked to the Western model of progress. So Karachi, at least its elite, had its own 1960s culture of music, psychedelic Smartelle fabrics and marijuana.

Behind the haze of pot, free love and The Beatles, the sixties were also known for achieving many political milestones. In the US, the civil rights movement gained momentum, there was a call for equal pay for women, reducing the voting age from 21 to 18 — since this was the age for being drafted into the army — and equal voting rights for African Americans. Politically aware students now included the working class youth and minorities, thus making campuses and public spaces arenas for civil resistance, sit-ins, boycotts and marches.

Conservative forces were alarmed and, as White House aide John Ehrlichman said, “We understood that we couldn’t make it illegal to be young or poor or black in the United States, but we could criminalise their common pleasure.” However, the change could not be contained. By 1960, colour TVs in almost every home showed images of the Vietnam war, poverty, racism and the nuclear threat.

The 1960s are remembered as a time of great cultural, social and political change. Are we on the verge of another such era?

The Baby Boomers, born between 1946 and 1964, spearheaded the change. Along with committed social activism, this was a generation of inventors. The internet, the USB, nanoscale motors and new business models reshaped the world. By the end of the decade, the first men had stepped on to the moon.

The philosophy of think big, live big, unwittingly ushered in consumerism and capitalism. Stew Albert, the American radical, described the spirit of the 1960s as “socialism in one person.” The British writer Janan Ganesh says about the 1960s, “Its emphasis on the individual reinforced the market, not the revolution.” This was epitomised by the entrepreneur Richard Branson, whose business grew from a 100 pound sterling loan from his mother into a 4.8 billion pound empire.

There was change across the world. Africa acquired an international presence, as 27 countries gained their independence from colonial rule. The Berlin wall was erected in 1961, and the Soviet Union faced many rebellions. China broke with Russia to create a second large communist bloc, sending waves of panic into the US that moved from the Cold War to active war, and scrambled for influence in the many new nations that emerged, finding it easier to deal with autocratic one-party states and military juntas.

While the sixties was a difficult period for India — a time of scarcity and prohibitions, the death of Jawaharlal Nehru, wars with China and Pakistan, and a looming foreign debt that devalued the rupee by 57 percent — for Pakistan, it was a time of progress.

The Green Revolution and the boost to industry created an economic growth of over 5 percent per year — more than other developing countries. The GNP rose by 45 percent and manufactured goods began to overtake exports of raw materials. Several hydroelectric projects, canals and dams, and a nuclear power plant were completed.

Educational curricula were revised and many public-sector universities and schools were built. PIA became the first Asian airline with a jet aircraft in its fleet. Suparco, Pakistan’s space programme, was established, which launched sounding rockets throughout the 1960s.

Despite reservations from the US and Europe, foreign relations with Russia and China were strengthened. A Regional Cooperation for Development (RCD) organisation was established between Pakistan, Iran and Turkey and, interestingly, in 1962, President Ayub Khan signed an international agreement for establishing a single world constitution, alongside many idealists, including Martin Luther King Jr and Bertrand Russell.

We are sixty years on from the sixties, living once more in authoritarian times, part of what lawyer and activist Vinay Orekondy calls the exhausted majority. Sixty years before the 1960s, was another decade of world changing events — the first air flight by the Wright Brothers, Einstein’s theory of relativity, Freud’s theories of the subconscious and the first full length feature film.

The Babylonians, the Chinese and Hindus consider 60 an important time marker. Are we on the brink of another era like the sixties? Or, as Fariduddin Attar said, “The sea will be the sea whatever the drop’s philosophy.”

Durriya Kazi is a Karachi-based artist.
She may be reached at durriyakazi1918@gmail.com

Published in Dawn, EOS, October 15th, 2023