PAKISTAN: DO A ‘CIVIL SOCIETY’ AND A ‘PEACE CONSTITUENCY’ EXIST?

By Dr. Subhash Kapila

Introductory Observations

In India there does undoubtedly exist a sizeable ‘civil society’ which is a product of its politically liberalized society, democratic institutions and a general level of religious tolerance in a traditionally historic multi-racial society. It also emerges from a well educated middle class and an enlarging one fuelled by its high rate of economic growth. Credit also needs to be given in this regard to the growth of political liberal institutions established during the British rule and further nurtured in the last 60 years of independent India.

There is also a sizeable ‘peace constituency’ in India, spurred more by political idealism than political realism that advocates peace with Pakistan. Both taken together are then flaunted as icons by India’s political parties and the intelligentsia (including the media) to reinforce their strategies of ‘political secularism’ as opposed to the existential societal secularism.

In this context, a major question that calls for an answer is that whether a corresponding ‘civil society’ and ‘peace constituency’ exists in Pakistan. Why this question is important and calls for an answer is because in India it is assumed that such societal segments do exist in Pakistan and such segments have similar aspirations for peace with India. If it existed then such segments would have emerged as strong pressure groups on Pakistan’s governing establishment and restrained them from use of terrorism as an instrument of state policy and the strategies of confrontation with India.

On July 17, 2006, in the wake of the Mumbai 7/11 bombing incidents in which more than 200 innocent lives were lost and 700 wounded, this author was co-opted by Pakistan’s GEO TV channel in a live show along with a former Pakistani Ambassador to review the impact of these Mumbai blasts on the ongoing India-Pakistan peace dialogue.

The main thrust of this author’s participation in the Pakistani TV show was as under:

• India’s public opinion encompassing an extraordinary wide political spectrum outpaced the initial muted responses by the present Indian Government. Public opinion forced the establishment to come out with stronger political responses against terrorism emanating from Pakistan.
• India at large expected Pakistan’s President to honour his pledges to restrain terrorism, Mumbai 7/11 blasts were an indicator to the contrary and would therefore impact the ongoing peace process.
• The future of the India-Pakistan peace dialogue and its substantial success would depend heavily on the emergence of a sizeable civil society and peace constituency in Pakistan. This can only come about with such groups pressing strongly for restoration of democracy in Pakistan.

However, this author prefaced his participation in the Pakistani GEO TV show with the remarks that India at large today expected that the ‘civil society’ and the ‘peace constituency’ in Pakistan would come out with strong and vocal condemnations of the Mumbai 7/11 bombings (whose trails led to Pakistan's ISI and its protégé terrorist organisations) as ‘wanton destruction' of innocent lives were a crime against humanity.

In the succeeding weeks, this author eagerly and hopefully awaited such responses from Pakistan’s ‘civil society’ and ‘peace constituency’. Scanning the English language Pakistani media there does not seem to have been any evidence of any heartfelt forthright condemnation forthcoming.

It is this which leads one to ponder whether in reality a ‘civil society’ and a ‘peace constituency’ exists in Pakistan?

Pakistan: The Absence of a ‘Civil Society’

Some may be able to discern a semblance of a ‘civil society’ in Pakistan from a handful of objective political commentators, intellectuals and human rights activists, Pakistan otherwise seems to be devoid of an effective and a widely established 'civil society'.

The Pakistan nation-state projects the following deficiencies of a ‘civil society’ in Pakistan:

• Liberal political institutions are not visible in Pakistan.
• Pakistan has in the last 60 years regressed from the liberal political institutional framework left by the British and down-slided into an autocratic Pakistan Army – Islamist Mullah gridlock. Liberalism stands snuffed out.
• Pakistani society stands polarized between a feudal extravagantly rich ruling establishment and a vast economically weak lower strata of society.
• Lack of any sustained economic growth, as a result of exorbitant expenditure on military buildup has retarded the emergence of a sizeable and vocal middle class.
• Pakistan is totally devoid of representative and responsive political structures and mechanisms.
• The Pakistan Army has always strongly reacted to any signs of emergence of ‘civilian supremacy’ in Pakistan’s governance.

A Pakistani intellectual Iftikhar H. Malik in a work on ‘State and Civil Society in Pakistan’, makes the following observations:

• The Pakistani State has successfully refurbished itself at the expense of vital civil institutions – Constitution, pluralism, political parties, independent judiciary, free press and activist groups.
• The imperatives for establishment of a civil society in Pakistan have been side lined.
• Totalitarianism, elitist monopolization, majoritarian coercion and ethnic fascism which normally stand rejected by a ‘civil society’ are all pervasive and predominant in Pakistan.

The Pakistani author also makes an important observation that a ‘civil society’ cannot be taken as a given reality, it has to be created and strengthened. Sadly, Pakistan even after 60 years of independence is bereft of a ‘civil society’ – an essential prerequisite of any modern and progressive state.

Indian policy planners and its thinking elite have therefore to take it as a given in their planning and formulations, that a ‘civil society’ does not exist.

As a corollary to the above, India cannot count on an India-Pakistan peace dialogue to be carried forward on this premise.

Pakistan’s ‘Peace Constituency’ as a Reckonable Political Force: A Mistaken Indian Notion

India’s political compulsions for peace with Pakistan, for whatever external or internal reasons, has been fed with the assumption that an appreciable ‘peace constituency’ exists in Pakistan and that this political segment is an enlarging one.

That a sizeable number of average Pakistanis aspire for peace with India is conceded. People on both sides have wanted peace. But what cannot be conceded is that a sizeable ‘peace constituency’ exists in Pakistan. And why it cannot be conceded is that there are two very good reasons for it.

Firstly, when we talk of ‘peace constituency’ the term has political connotations. It implies that within the Pakistani governing elite and establishment and whatever passes for representative political opinion in Pakistan, a sizeable segment exists, which as opposed to rhetoric, has a genuine and abiding investment in a peace process with India. It does not exist.

Western interpretations of the truthfulness of intentions of Pakistan’s governing military establishment for peace with India are politically motivated to serve their own strategic interests. They cannot be taken as ‘givens’ in India’s policy formulations.

Secondly, having conceded that a sizeable number of Pakistani average citizens aspire for peace with India, however, does not obliterate the reality that this aspiration of such Pakistani citizens is not ‘translatable’ to a determining political force to impel the Pakistani governing establishment to forge a viable peace with India.

Hence, it is a mistaken notion for the Indian Government and the Indian media to constantly flaunt that a sizeable peace constituency exists in Pakistan and that it is an enlarging one. Further, that India as the larger country can be generous and accommodative on contentious issues as a contributory factor towards growth of a ‘peace constituency’ in Pakistan. This argument is untenable. It is the people of Pakistan that need to be politically vociferous for peace with India and towards that end organise a mass political mobilisation which brings about a transformation of Pakistan's political landscape in which a 'civil society' and 'peace constituency' emerge as strong determinants of Pakistan's policies.

India can hope for that whenever democracy is restored in Pakistan, such a ‘peace constituency’ will emerge there. Currently it cannot be taken as a determinant for India’s peace dialogue policy formulations.

Concluding Observations

Policy planners and decision- makers in India, or even elsewhere, must resist the common failing of applying the templates of political and social conditions existent in their own country to other countries while devising policy formulations and responses. In the instant case while India does have a ‘civil society’ and ‘peace constituency’ the same cannot be said of Pakistan.

It is in India’s interests that such segments emerge on Pakistan’s political firmament. But for these to emerge, India will have to actively espouse and be pro-active in the cause for the restoration of democracy in Pakistan, Democracy in Pakistan is an imperative for India’s national security interests and the surest way of ensuring this imperative is to make the ‘India-Pakistan peace dialogue’ contingent on the return of democracy to Pakistan. There cannot be a purposeful peace dialogue with Pakistan in the absence of representative and responsive political governance.

(The author is an International Relations and Strategic Affairs analyst. He is the Consultant, Strategic Affairs with South Asia Analysis Group. Email:drsubhashkapila@yahoo.com)