THE question is repeatedly asked if we are being threatened by Talibanisation. There are either scaremongers or there are ostriches. There is either apocalypse or there is utopia.

The prophets of gloom cite, erroneously, the analogy of the Nazis under Hitler who took control of Germany from a very small and narrow base. They ignore the historical background of pre-Second World War Germany.

For those who live in their ivory towers, they will do well to remember the Iranian revolution. Only weeks before it erupted, the Iranian Bourbons were waltzing in their chandeliered ballrooms and the CIA was reporting to its president that the Shah was in total control. If today's Pakistan can draw any parallels, it is to the pre-revolution Iran. The people of Iran rose up not as champions of fundamentalist Islam but against social and economic disparity and as a reaction to the lifestyles of their elite.

Pakistanis are not a bigoted or radical lot. Sufism is too deeply ingrained in its soil and its soul for Wahabism to prevail. The Taliban and their various cousins including the lashkars of Punjab cannot easily win this battle for “we” are many and “they” are few. As Pakistan's metropolis and its economic lifeline, Karachi arouses the greatest concern. Will Talibanisation come to Karachi? I think not.

Karachi is virtually a nation-state, an indulgent mother who absorbs the pain and privation of her children, provides for them and moulds them into her own shape. Karachi is not an atypical city; it is rather an enterprise, a vast cosmopolitan centre which creates a stake for its denizens. Its industrial and commercial hub is the engine which processes and refines rough raw material. Karachi's peace has in the past and will in the future be threatened not by the Taliban ideology but by turf wars between its multiple ethnic groups. But if Karachi is allowed to fall into economic decay and depredation, the guarantees will not hold.

In Pakistan, the ceasefire line is defined by the economy, not ideology. The battle for Pakistan is being waged not in the hills and mountains of Swat and Fata but in its hinterland where the population is crying out for economic and social justice. Terrorists thrive in a vacuum. They are the dark forces which seek out interstices and cracks created by poor governance and implant their poisonous seed. When normal institutions for the expression of political and economic discontent are stifled and the fruits of progress and prosperity are blocked, then, like water rising behind a dam, they will seek whatever avenues are available to them.

There is an inherent message in the looming crisis for every sector of society. In Samuel Huntington's words, “it is not the form of government but the degree of government”, which is important. The government has to become visible and seen to be governing. It must take good governance to the doorsteps of the people. It must firmly establish the rule of law otherwise the state will become merely another mediating institution, simply another source of central authority to ignore. It must launch a campaign blitz to counter the propaganda of the fundamentalists and expose their convoluted and false version of Islam.

Sadly, our lives are dictated by the dark détente of backroom deals while the people are denied a stake in the system. What is denied by the state will be fulfilled by the non-state. The laws of nature apply too to the laws of society. We cannot on the one hand condemn the barbarity of the fundamentalists and ignore honour killings, 'marriages' to the Quran, and the private jails of the feudal and tribal oligarchs who run our country. There is equilibrium in the universe and when our societies, which are its microcosm, do not mirror its laws, the system will eventually collapse. And you will have the barbarians at the gate. But who will enforce societal equilibrium? Ironically, it is this very feudal and tribal empire which sends its scions to our parliaments. It is the cancer of their spectacular greed that keeps us in poverty. There is so much that is rotten in our state and needs to vanish in one clean stroke.

Our politicians need a primer in history lessons while our treasured elite need to be sensitised to their societal obligation. Let them not flaunt their lavish lifestyles in the faces of the very poor. Let them be discreet and sensitive to the grime and poverty that surrounds them. Embarrassing contrasts between two different poles of society sit on the very edge of our national consciousness, waiting to gobble us up. The majority enact their daily lives in the theatre of torment and tragedy. They represent a sickening contrast to the few whose life is the trinity of the four-wheelers, Blackberrys and Armani.

We have done well to acknowledge that this is now our war as much as America's. But the Americans need a few lessons of their own. They went into Baghdad, a seat of ancient civilisation, and destroyed it. They went into Afghanistan, a veritable wasteland with an opportunity to build, and squandered that opportunity. They come to us now but they must come bearing the right gifts. They have to win the hearts and minds of the Pakistani people. The din of their drones must be replaced by container-loads of consumables.

Let them build schools and clinics in our towns and villages. Let them recall the spirit of the 1960s when their friendship was symbolised by the picture of America's handshake. We still remember President Johnson's famous visit when he stopped his cavalcade in the middle of a Karachi road and stepped out to meet Bashir the camel driver. There still has to be that kind of America somewhere. Let it step out from the shadows and show itself.

We will build a better society and a brighter tomorrow. But we must shake ourselves out of our entrenched complacency to save this beautiful land. We have to unite to ensure that the dream and vision of Jinnah's Pakistan does not disintegrate in the acid of sectarian and ethnic violence. Time it is now to quarantine the past and stand behind our army which has sacrificed its very young and is valiantly fighting for our future. If we stand firm and resolute, we would have fertilised the green shoots of a national and economic recovery.