The COAS has said that Pakistan needs to turn into a hard state, to be able to counter internal and external threats. For far too long has Pakistan trudged along its constitutional path like an athlete with leaky guts, whose labours come to a sputtering halt each time he leaps forward.
Gunnar Myrdal coined the term ‘soft state’ in his work, ‘Asian Drama: An Inquiry into the Poverty of Nations’ (1968), to refer to the developing states of Asia that were beset with serious governance indiscipline and an inability to enforce the laws of the state.
The antonym to a soft state is a hard state that is the polar opposite of a soft state. A hard state has a strong administrative capacity and a coercive law-enforcement apparatus to enforce compliance with rule of law. A hard state is not a despotic or exploitative state that coerces but one that ensures that laws are enforced and institutions strengthened for the delivery of public goods.
Autocratic regimes are hardest yet may not be geared towards public wealth and inclusivity. Similarly, democratic regimes may be soft or hard, depending on the nature of democracy. Illiberal democracies, according to Fareed Zakaria, possess all the outward trappings of democracy like representative institutions and regular elections, yet lack the liberal spirit of an effective judiciary, rule of law and democratic accountability. Illiberal democracies are also branded as anocracies, that are part democracy and part autocracy, much like ‘hybrid regimes’.
Why do democracies become hybrid? The answer lies in the inability of the ruling elite to respect the social contract with the people and extract rents for themselves, at the cost of public welfare and equitable distribution of the national wealth. The hybridity yields to the unelected forces that slowly yet steadily stake their claim in national governance due to the failure of the extractive ruling elite to promote political pluralism and economic equity at the national level. Ethno-linguistic particularism and religious extremism thrive in such soft states.
The gold standard for effective governance and socioeconomic equity is the delivery of justice, rule of law and democratic accountability. Some scholars argue that democratic accountability and socio-economic equity are not possible sans effective governance. Whatever system of politics is introduced and whatever social contract is professed, nothing would work without an effective governance system that ensures the writ of the state.
Though not fashionable in these heady times of decolonisation narratives, the example of colonial governance is apposite in Pakistan’s context. During the British colonial era, the system of governance was premised upon district administration and police, with the army as a backstop. Revenue collection was efficient and so was the depoliticised district administration that ensured the delivery of public goods efficiently. The writ of the state when challenged was responded to with the full force of the state.
After independence, Pakistan has steadily sloughed off the colonial efficiency to adopt a laissez-faire and politicised approach to governance. With the civil servants and police deliberately politicised to keep the extractive ruling elite satisfied in its ‘thana katcheri’ grab, our first-past-the-post electoral model only serves the interests of a minority. The state is deliberately kept soft to keep the crime mafias and illegal economy strong for the pecuniary gains of the extractive political elite.
The nexus between crime and politics is carefully nurtured to keep the state soft and the elite hard. Similarly, it is in the interest of the corrupt government functionaries and border control apparatus to keep the state soft so that they reap the illegal economic gains from illegal acts like smuggling, human trafficking and gun running.
Due to a confluence of the above interests, the political elite and government functionaries connive to keep the state soft for steady economic rents earned through that softness. The soft state environment has created an environment of indiscipline and venality where everyone thinks one can get away with blue murder provided one is rich or influential enough. The proverbial long arm of the law has been reduced to a shrivelled paw, incapable of countering crime and illegality.
Pakistan has become a soft state where the state cannot even ensure the removal of graffiti from the walls and encroachments from thoroughfares. This softness is a sure recipe for crime and terrorism due to the absent writ of the state. The governance vacuum in the shape of weak policing, justice and administration allows militant entities and crime mafias to fill the ungoverned spaces to challenge the writ of the state. The external meddling and geopolitics further queer the pitch.
The state needs to be hardened to ensure its writ through effective administration, policing and provision of public goods like health, education and civic amenities. The B areas in Balochistan need to go and the merged districts of KP economically and administratively integrated, to reduce space for crime and terrorism.
Elimination of corruption and an ecosystem of crime and illegal transactions need a whole-of-the-nation approach, as the lobbies and beneficiaries of the illegal rents would oppose the hardening of the state tooth and nail. Does the state have the will to take on those lobbies and mafias?
The writer is a security and defence analyst. He can be reached at: rwjanjhotmail.com