Daily Times

“True prosperity is built on a foundation of strong institutions, responsible policies, and a commitment to future generations,” said Kofi Atta Annan, former Secretary-General of the United Nations.

Pakistan has not yet attained sustainable economic growth, or political stability either, which are the basic requirements to build a prosperous society. What could be the reasons behind such conditions in our country? Did our institutions fail to evolve to such a strength?

If so, why? Do our policymakers fail to understand which policy-making decisions would lead to higher standards of life for individuals on a larger scale? These are the questions which every intellectual citizen of our country might have.

The familiar names we hear in the tech industry, automobiles, shipbuilding and pop culture like Samsung, LG, Hyundai, KIA, K-pop and K-culture, all belong to one of the developed nations South Korea. Despite being devastated by the Korean War (1950-53), one of the poorest nations, South Korea made the path towards prosperity by undertaking key reforms.

The transformation of South Korea provides the best example to highlight the flaws in our system. After independence from Japan in 1945, South Korea was ruled by an authoritarian politician Syngman Rhee, whose policies concentrated power and wealth in the hands of the military, landlords and bureaucratic elite and encouraged corruption and cronyism.

They resisted the economic and institutional reforms that were making them looser by challenging their control over economic and political decision-making that aimed to create equal opportunities for everyone to grow and prosper and become a winner. Later, in 1961, General Park Chung-Hee acquired power by having a coup and initiated all the necessary reforms in the institutions to make them inclusive for all, despite the resistance from the well-established elite.

He focused on investing heavily in education, curbing corruption and building economic institutions to support the growth. The policies initiated by General Park made the institutions strong enough that despite the second military coup after his assassination in 1979, sustainability prevailed and never led to exclusivity but to a full democracy in the 1990s.

Pakistan, much like South Korea in the 1960s, was also on the same track with similar kinds of policies and priorities for economic growth. Both took off, South Korea strengthened the institutions while Pakistan entered the Indo-Pak war of 1965 which led to a cut-off from US financial aid and ultimately downturn in the economic trajectory.

With the weak economy, political stability also deteriorated, which strengthened the suppressed issues and widened the gap between the public and institutions. Despite his efforts to reduce this divide in the remaining part of the broken country, Prime Minister Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto’s policies led to greater institutional exclusivity, which was fully exploited by successive governments.

One of the reasons that his policies failed was that during his tenure the economy was crumbling, so the traditional elites like powerful military officials, bureaucrats, landlords and family businessmen took advantage of it and dominated and influenced the weak institutions successfully to resist the change, which might have made them potential looser.

In short, the traditional legacy of institutional control has continued and persisted to this day, preventing reforms for inclusivity and enforcing elite dominance. This is evident in the recent 26th Amendment that has limited judicial independence and PECA 2025, the 2025 Prevention of Electronic Crimes Amendment, to suppress criticism of the government and its allies.

The writer is a researcher and can be contacted at sadeemalisahito.bbaf22@iba-suk.edu.pk.