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Dr Rasul Bakhsh Rais is Professor of Political Science in the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, LUMS, Lahore, since 2002 and author of several books including Recovering the Frontier State: War, Ethnicity and State in Afghanistan. This interview is part of a series for the January Issue of Global Village Space magazine looking at the next decade for Pakistan – its strategic challenges and opportunities (2021-30).
GVS: Where do you see Pakistan’s politics in the next 10 years.
Dr Rasul Bakhsh Rais: You have basically raised a question with a big scope; I can make an assessment of what is likely to be the developments in the next 10 years.
One is that this remarkable democratic continuity with the peaceful transfer of power and regular elections. Four transfers of powers peacefully from one party to another rooted Pakistani democracy pretty firmly. Pakistan has crossed the transitional line to become a genuine democracy. I think genuine in a sense that reversal to dictatorship becomes quite unlikely after four peaceful transfers of power. Three is generally the limit.
Second, I think what we need to look at is the social forces that support democracy have been spanning in Pakistan for the last 20 years or so. I count these forces as an expansion of the middle classes, which is roughly about 50% of Pakistan’s population.
The third is urbanization, cities in Pakistan like Lahore, Islamabad, Karachi, Peshawar, and almost every city are expanding very rapidly and there is rural-urban migration and interprovincial migration as well, so urbanization means a lot for a more democratic and meaningful politics because people in the city can organize political action and they become unhinged from the traditional conventional forces that matter for casting a vote and also their identities and political affiliations.
Fourth, I think, a hopeful sign is that citizens in Pakistan are much more conscious about three-four things that really matter in democratic politics; corruption, accountability, rule of law, equality, freedom, and governance. These are some of the issues I believe are defining the political behaviour and attitudes of Pakistani citizens and I think we will see a rise in the curve of expectations of citizens on these counts.
Read full article...
Where is Pakistani politics going in next decade- 2030
Dr Rasul Bakhsh Rais is Professor of Political Science in the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, LUMS, Lahore, since 2002 and author of several books including Recovering the Frontier State: War, Ethnicity and State in Afghanistan. This interview is part of a series for the January Issue of Global Village Space magazine looking at the next decade for Pakistan – its strategic challenges and opportunities (2021-30).
GVS: Where do you see Pakistan’s politics in the next 10 years.
Dr Rasul Bakhsh Rais: You have basically raised a question with a big scope; I can make an assessment of what is likely to be the developments in the next 10 years.
One is that this remarkable democratic continuity with the peaceful transfer of power and regular elections. Four transfers of powers peacefully from one party to another rooted Pakistani democracy pretty firmly. Pakistan has crossed the transitional line to become a genuine democracy. I think genuine in a sense that reversal to dictatorship becomes quite unlikely after four peaceful transfers of power. Three is generally the limit.
Second, I think what we need to look at is the social forces that support democracy have been spanning in Pakistan for the last 20 years or so. I count these forces as an expansion of the middle classes, which is roughly about 50% of Pakistan’s population.
The third is urbanization, cities in Pakistan like Lahore, Islamabad, Karachi, Peshawar, and almost every city are expanding very rapidly and there is rural-urban migration and interprovincial migration as well, so urbanization means a lot for a more democratic and meaningful politics because people in the city can organize political action and they become unhinged from the traditional conventional forces that matter for casting a vote and also their identities and political affiliations.
Fourth, I think, a hopeful sign is that citizens in Pakistan are much more conscious about three-four things that really matter in democratic politics; corruption, accountability, rule of law, equality, freedom, and governance. These are some of the issues I believe are defining the political behaviour and attitudes of Pakistani citizens and I think we will see a rise in the curve of expectations of citizens on these counts.
Read full article...
Where is Pakistani politics going in next decade- 2030
