FIREBRAND politicians from Lahore to London have advocated revolution as the only solution for Pakistan's ills as have many other analysts. It seems that anyone who wants to appear sagacious, patriotic and cool starts talking about a French-like revolution.

A revolution formally refers to the use of armed struggle by a group to dethrone an elitist government and establish an egalitarian government. While it is also used to refer to non-violent and more modest political changes in everyday language, such people are clearly expressing a preference for violent revolution by referring specifically to the French revolution. However, a violent revolution in Pakistan is extremely unlikely to erupt, lea alone succeed, and even less likely to produce positive long-term results.

Its emergence is unlikely since people adopt violence as a last resort only when a hated individual or group has remained firmly entrenched in power for decades and is unlikely to be unseated via other means, such as the royal family in France.

In Pakistan, forget elected governments, even dictators do not enjoy such a firm hold on power and can be brought down by a few weeks of street demonstrations or in ultimate elections. Thus, the principle of the conservation of energy and common sense rule out a violent revolution in Pakistan in the presence of easier avenues.

In the unlikely event that a group launches an armed struggle, it will soon discover, like the Taliban, the difficulties involved in defeating our vaunted army. Revolutions have generally succeeded where armies were weak or highly disaffected with the ruling group but lacking the means to remove it themselves, e.g., in Ethiopia.

None of this is true for Pakistan. Finally, the history of developing countries shows that groups that capture power through violence do not become able post-revolution rulers who can foster progress. Hotheads continue to dominate and attempt to deal with major problems through force rather than sophisticated policy, leading to stagnation and dissent.

No wonder, there are hardly any instances of successful revolutions that have yielded long-term benefits in developing countries. Over the last two to three decades, the pendulum has tilted away from revolutions and towards social movements given the failures of the former and the decreasing number of governments relying on brutal force to stay in power.

Social movements have helped in significantly improving governance in several Latin American countries, such as Brazil, Mexico and Argentina. Thus, it is much wiser to look at the potential of social movements in effecting improvements in governance in Pakistan.

Social movements generally refer to loosely linked networks of individuals, groups and agencies, which jointly pursue social and political change by increasing awareness among the public and by applying non-violent social pressure at power centres.

Individuals and agencies are deeply rooted in specific communities, understand their problems and mobilise them to identify and pursue peaceful, policy-based solutions to various problems, such as unemployment and lack of social services.

They then link with other communities facing similar problems to apply social pressure for change on governments and other institutions. Their strategies for doing so range from working within the system (such as writing petitions, filing lawsuits and negotiating personally with officials) to disrupting the system through peaceful protests (such as sit-ins, demonstrations and strikes where necessary).

In contrast with revolutions that throw up violence-prone leaders into the political arena, social movements act as nurseries for rooted, honest and peaceful activists, some of whom later join or create political parties, such as Brazil's highly successful President Lula.

What is the likelihood of similar social movements occurring in Pakistan? The success of social movements hinges most importantly on the presence of a tolerant government not prone to using brute force against peaceful social mobilisation.

Where governments react violently against dissent, as in North Korea, Eritrea and Myanmar, social movements are unlikely to thrive and armed insurrections become more likely. Governments highly integrated with democratic-minded western countries are less likely to respond with force for fear of western pressure, unless they happen to be strategic allies whose suppression of local groups evokes faint western protests at best.

In contrast, countries dependent mainly on China, such as North Korea, Myanmar and Sudan, have a freer licence to brutally repress local dissent as China is becoming not only the second biggest economy but also the second biggest supporter of autocratic regimes after the US.

High urbanisation also facilitates the success of social movements as communication and coordination become easier. The presence of a relatively free and critical mass media and judiciary also helps the work of social movements.

Each of these trends is apparent in Pakistan. Due to the fear of western rebukes and internal strife, even a dictator like Musharraf could only go so far in repressing the lawyers' movement, which can be considered a time-bound, issue-specific social movement.

Urbanisation is increasing rapidly in Pakistan, and will likely touch 70 per cent over the coming decades. Finally, the mass media and judiciary, despite their many shortcomings, are playing an increasingly positive role in challenging mal-governance. Thus, Pakistan now is a country more fit for social movements rather than armed revolutions.

Not surprisingly, many highly effective community-based groups are already doing excellent work at the community-level and are increasingly linking at the provincial and national levels.

The biggest obstacle to their expansion is not the fear of retribution from the government but from armed terrorist, sectarian and mafia elements. The latter groups undermine the work of social movements by targeting their leaders, perpetrating violence on their peaceful rallies and attracting vulnerable youth away from peaceful, policy-based avenues to their own reactive, violent means.

However, the experience of Latin American countries shows that social movements can overcome such violence to foster social change. Thus, change in Pakistan will more likely come through the efforts of peaceful social activists rather than of armed revolutionaries.

The writer is a research associate on political economy at the University of California at Berkeley, US

murtazaniaz@yahoo.com