Daily Times

Can Pakistan become a neutral, social democratic and secular country for a prosperous future? That is the question deliberated by some “practical socialist” intellectuals — to borrow Fabian socialist Blatchford’s term — as against the ideas of the “ideal socialist.” In the latter part of an idealist’s life he/she usually become a realist and practical, realising that the objective situation is not conducive to a socialist revolutionary.

Let’s first take the issue of repositioning Pakistan’s disastrous foreign policy. At present, our country is a revanchist security state that cannot be a social democratic state concurrently. Countries that have been successful as social democratic states have had a long dividend of peace. Sweden, for instance, has no claim on the territories of other countries, and has managed to remain neutral during the last two world wars. That actually helped the people of Sweden to construct a social democratic country that is idealised the world over.

The present government of Pakistan is being criticised for having no sense of direction, for not having any cabinet meeting on the urgent foreign policy issues, and no full-time foreign minister. Analyse this. They may be allegedly corrupt but both Asif Ali Zardari and Nawaz Sharif, ostensibly the president and the prime minister of the country, knew what they wanted and changed the direction of the foreign policy, but both were cut to size by the establishment. To save their respective tenures, they abdicated the right to steer the foreign policy. So now Sartaj Aziz’s job is to toe the establishment’s line. Of course, he can deal with countries like Uganda. And Tariq Fatemi has all the time to decide postings of every foreign office staff except those of ambassadors to important countries.

Coming back to social democracy, ever since China and Vietnam switched to market socialism their poverty has reduced and people have a better lifestyle. The major difference with market socialism is that it changes in enterprise ownership and management, whereas social democracy attempts to do so by subsidies and taxes on privately owned enterprises to finance welfare programmes. The endemic issue of corruption remains in focus in Pakistan more than the issues of social security though it is also linked. Opposition and media are obsessed with that, as it is an easy and juicy subject. Not that it is not an important issue but that it diverts the attention from the mismanagement of the existing institutional set that was established for the welfare of the people.

Education in countries like Sweden is free even if a citizen wants to do a doctorate in any subject, and health is taken care of by the state resulting in longer, healthier life. Pensions and unemployment allowances are provided for citizens so that they are taken care of in all eventualities, and that they don’t have to worry about their or their children’s future, one of the major factors that tempts people in a society like ours to evade taxes and indulge in other corrupt practices.

But to finance social security programmes for the people in these countries, government levies higher taxes ranging between 43-51 percent. In my recent visit to Sweden and Denmark I found the people happy with the social democratic system, and they do not resent the high-tax regime because the state’s spending on social security is high — a fact recognised by the people of these countries. These countries have been acknowledged as the best governed by The Economist.

One of the strong pillars of social democracies is the formidable presence of the trade union movement, something that has been declining in Pakistan. Though the northern social democratic countries have a capitalist system there is a tripartite system in which the employers, the government and the labour have a working relationship with great understanding. In Pakistan, decades ago a tripartite system was evolved that resulted in some relief for the working classes. Perhaps one of the items on the agenda of the social democrats here should be how to strengthen trade unionism — only three percent workers are registered with trade unions at present — and pressurise the government to revive the tripartite system for setting up employment terms and revising them from time to time.

Pakistan has some basic social security, legal and institutional infrastructure, which should be scrutinised by the social democratic forces, for a start. Pakistan’s constitution delineates social security as an explicit citizenship right. Article 38 (d) and (e), Principles of Policy of the Constitution of Pakistan states: “The State shall provide for all persons employed in the service of Pakistan or otherwise, social security by compulsory social insurance or other means; provide basic necessities of life such as food, clothing, housing, education and medical relief, for all such citizens, irrespective of sex, creed, caste, or race, as are permanently or temporarily unable to earn their livelihood on account of infirmity, sickness or unemployment; reduce disparity in the income.”

There are institutions like the EOBI and Provincial Social Security Institutions that cover only nine percent of the non-agricultural labour force. According to Sayeed and Ali (1999), “Since much of the incremental employment in the economy is being generated in the informal sector, the coverage of these two institutions, as a proportion of the labour force, is estimated to be declining over the years.”

Pressure should be built to expand the coverage of working class people by the institutions that have the mandate. Both formal and informal industrial and commercial sectors evade the network. Agricultural sector workers are inadequately covered by social schemes, while they remain the most exploited and poor. BISP, including its different Waseela programmes, and Zakat schemes barely scratch the surface.

Campaigning on how to make such schemes more effective, transparent and substantive should also be apart of the agenda of the social democratic forces. What is imperative is to first do what is doable now and not to keep postponing people’s present to distant future derivatives. Indeed, some major challenges to social democracy are a paradigm shift from a security state to a social democracy to release our human and financial resources; increase revenue income to meet social sector expenditure; control population explosion; and counter hyper-religiosity. no country with these traits is prosperous and has happy citizens.

The writer is freelance journalist and author. He can be reached at ayazbabar@gmail.com