To pacify the chronic detractors, who can eternally be identified by their leitmotif, NO, the story that the Greeks invented democracy is just that, a story, dreamed up to provide some credibility to a modern idea that creates an illusion of power for the masses while letting the elites continue with their plunder peacefully. The Greeks can't even manage their economy today, let alone think up a complicated pseudo governance structure! And no, Magna Carta is also not democracy's first play book; King John simply wanted the nobles off his backside.
Further, we are not the only nation divided by political polarization; it's a problem afflicting almost each and every nation today that can reasonably be categorised as a democracy, and there aren't very many of those in the world today. Populism is another word for a nation divided! While I concede that fear is, more likely than not, the singular impetus controlling the masses, under so called hybrid democracies like Turkey and Russia, and in China, whatever you might want to call their system, but, is not the question to than ask is, whether or not a divided nation is a bigger disaster!
The fact that a troubled economy could not galvanize us out of the current state of extreme political polarization perchance isn't really shocking since almost everyone is clueless about the subject. On the other hand, I really can't decide on the appropriate word to describe a situation where threats from the reigning superpower of the globe have failed to jolt a nation out of its unproductive stupor; appalling, perhaps. I had always subscribed to the notion that war united a nation; we seem to be hell bent on proving the theory wrong!
Admittedly, warmongering is despicable, but so is keeping your head buried in the sand.
I for one, don't harbour any doubts that the current aggressive posturing, originating from a doleful tweet, of the only superpower on the globe, is quite similar to that adopted with other nations in the recent past, all of which episodes have not ended well. I also don't believe the narrative that there is disconnect between the Head and the State; you simply cannot dissect the two. Albeit, even if I am wrong, and the infamous tweet can be categorised as an idle threat, should not the nation still be united in its response and stance.
Unfortunately we seem to have forgotten the pillars of nation building as encapsulated by the founding father; well at least two of them. Within days our political parties are back to business as usual, holding rallies and gatherings, and vociferously arguing their own old domestic agendas. For a little while, there were reactions, but these mostly reeked of self aggrandisement or were identifiable with the blame game syndrome. On the other extreme, the media, perhaps rather obviously, was quick to capitalize on this bonanza, from their perspective, and wasted no time in postulating theories, mostly conspiratorial, behind the genesis of the tweet, some of which even defying bullshit.
On a lighter note, as far as theories go, to each their own. As an accountant I can only subscribe to the dollar theory; protecting the status of the dollar as an international reserve currency has always been a shoot first ask questions later strategy for the Americans; considering their billions of dollar debt, arguably, reasonably so. And while on the subject of debt, definitely it is not the dollar aid that is the problem. Most of the US$ 90 billion debt that we have piled up over the years, as well as the dollars we need to borrow again pretty soon since we refuse to monitor and eliminate our trade deficit for some inexplicable reason, is from, and will probably come from, lenders who are deeply intertwined with the west. By the way if you belong to the group who pompously believes that all hell will not break loose if we simply default on our external debt, all I have to say to you is, Cheers!
Nonetheless, the point is that even in the face of adversity we remain politically polarised; a nation divided by various fault lines, ethnic, religious, social and political. Which than always begets the question, who is right and are we reading the situation correctly, and more importantly, is our response appropriate?
At this point, I confess, somewhere in between I lost control of this particular write up . The original plan was to follow up last week's article with a debate on the lack of trust amongst our ruling class hindering much needed cooperation on key issues, but despite of re-reading, I can't figure out at which point I moved away from trust to national unity; and ended up changing the title! Except that there are no accidents.
Perhaps the lack of trust plaguing our ruling class is also the reason we lack national unity!
(The writer is Chartered Accountant based in Islamabad) email: [email protected]