Daily Times

The reactionary rightwing is rising in many part of the world and Pakistan is no different. One should read Pankaj Mishra’s new book The Age of Anger (2017) to understand why million of people around are the world are disillusioned by the broken promise of progress of the liberal democracy (as recently illustrated by the Boston Review, amongst other sources). For example, many have written that in the US, the wages of working class in real terms are at their comparable level of many decades ago reflecting lack of growth of income over time. Turkey, Brazil, Philippine, and India(amongst others) have installed the authoritarian rulers after winning the democratic elections in their respective countries. The power of the rightwing in Pakistan needs to be seen both in terms of the recent global trends as well as in its peculiar history of being a security-driven state.

French economist Thomas Piketty has thrown light on issues of inequality by using historical data in his groundbreaking book Capital in the Twenty-First Century (2013). Inequality is the new buzzword now around the world in the academic, media and policy circles. The rise of the reactionary rightwing globally might just be a response to this rising inequality. It would be interesting to analyse the reasons behind the recurring rightwing capture of this discontentment and lack of ability of the leftwing to capitalise on it. However, there are exceptions to this rule, most notably Jeremy Corbyn in the UK. One could only speculate if Bernie Sanders had been able to secure the nomination of the Democratic Party instead of Hillary Clinton, would the US presidential election result be any different in 2016. This is in the context of progressive Sanders been able to be more successful in channeling the discontentment over inequality into an electoral victory.

Viewing Pakistan in the backdrop of this global trend, the hold of the rightwing might just be the curse of the excluded, amongst other factors. Recently in the context of the UN’s Human Development Index, the press reported that Pakistan’s Gross National Income (GNI) is highest amongst the other countries of comparable size in South Asia. As has been discussed in these pages and elsewhere that Pakistan lacks behind on most of human development indicators in the South Asian region. As per the press reports, the recently released UN agencies report on hunger and malnutrition states that in the Asia-Pacific region, 486 million people are undernourished and in Pakistan’s case, only 4 percent of children are fed with a “minimally acceptable diet.” The press also reported that as high as 44 percent of all children in Pakistan are stunted as per the National Nutrition Survey, 2011.The gini coefficient that measures income inequality in a country on the scale between 0 and 1 with higher the number, the more the degree of inequality was0.33 for Pakistan in 2015, as per the World Bank. The WB statistics also state that income share held by the lowest 20 percent was only 8.9 percent and by highest 20 percent 42.8 percent for Pakistan in 2015 (the latest year for which the data is available).

There is desperate need to revitalize the left politics in Pakistan to fill this void. One also hopes that not only the security establishment’s patronage of the rightwing would end, it would also stop viewing the leftwing politicians as the “enemies of the state”

In other words, the degree of inequality is high in Pakistan despite having the highest gross national income in the South Asian region. Lack of ability of Pakistan’s elite to take care of the public welfare is also manifest in low human development statistics despite progress made in the last few decades. Inequality could be one of the reasons behind the rightwing’s ability to have a certain hold over people’s aspirations and sensibilities. Instead of demonising those who are drawn to the rightwing politics, we should try to understand the factors that attract them to this brand of politics.

After Bhutto’s “roti, kapra aur makan” slogan in the late 1960s, no other leader of national stature has been able to speak for the downtrodden. Policies of our national security state might also be responsible for this void. The security establishment not only used extremism as a foreign policy and to some extent also domestic policy tool that gave rise to obscurantism and a certain level of hold of the rightwing in Pakistan; it also played a role in dismantling the organised left politics in Pakistan since the 1950s under the Cold War politics. Pakistan fighting the Cold War proxy wars in collaboration with the US and other allies played a great role in the rollback of the left politics in the country. Due to virtual non-existence of the leftwing politics sans its nominal presence, the rightwing has been emboldened both due to the patronage of the security establishment as well as its ability to capitalise of people’s discontent over inequality.

There is desperate need to revitalise the left politics in Pakistan to fill this void. One also hopes that not only the security establishment’s patronage of the rightwing would end, it would also stop viewing the leftwing politicians as the “enemies of the state.” There is need of change both in the structures of the national institutions as well as in the agency of politicians to offer a viable leftwing alternative to the people of Pakistan, as well as globally in other countries around the world.

The writer has a social science | background and can be reached on Twitter @FoqiaKhan

Published in Daily Times, November  11^th 2018.