Education System: Reengineering

Education should be the high priority of the government. It should be recognized as one of the fundamental rights of a citizen and universal access to every citizen. Pakistan’s sustained economic growth can only be achieved with higher emphasis on timely investment in education. This can pay rewarding dividends for future economic growth and well being of the society as a whole.

Physical condition of many schools in the province is a fundamental problem that should have been undertaken before stepping on to other areas. A factor hindering high attendance is the poor infrastructure. Out of some 60,000 public-sector primary schools - with about 4.5 million students - some 8 percent have no buildings, while thousands more are without drinking water, electricity and toilets. The government must allocate resources for the provision of basic infrastructure and facilities in educational institutions.

The junior teacher that forms the lifeline of the nation, as in making the generation, draws lesser in money than that of an unskilled worker. There are 350,000 teachers in Punjab. Since there is nothing done for their welfare, the slogans like ‘Educated Punjab’ appears a mere hoax.

PTC/ JVT teachers are in grade 7 in provincial government and in grade 9 in federal setup and they draw Rs 2000 and Rs 2600 respectively. The United Nations has defined poverty line as 2 Dollars a day and in Punjab Province alone 350,000 teachers and of them 175,000 is living below poverty line.

The Punjab Ombudsman Report 2004 says, “There were 63,000 schools functioning in the Punjab where nine million students were studying. The second highest number of complaints (1193) was filed against the Education Department. It is strange that while Punjab chief minister is spending million of taxpayer money on personal projection and publicity on the electronic & print media, he has not paid any attention to the Education Department. Every thoughtful Pakistani is upset with Pakistan's system and quality of education. It is tragic and quite ironic that Pakistan ranks among the lowest in the world in term of literacy. Most developed and even developing countries spend six or ten percent of their GDP on education but Pakistan only spends 2. 3 % of its GDP.”

The present education system has failed to disclose before the new generation the founding reasons of Pakistan. The most alarming aspect besides ideological confusion and moral degradation is the falling standard of education. Class distinction in education has been created. Because of this, Pakistani nation is most discreetly broken down into an upper English medium and a lower Urdu medium class. Ironically each school has its own curriculum. The education system needs to be reengineered by every inch. Pakistan studies and the national character should be the fundamental elements.

Creating sectarian cohesion and teaching regional and social parity, a uniform syllabus, system of examination and medium of instructions should be enforced in all educational institutions.

Private institutions, at all levels have failed to maintain a regular quality supremacy over public schools. Private schools have now become an industry. According to the first census of private education institutions there are 22,855 private institutions in Punjab. It can be inferred that private schools have not been able to play a significant role in improving the education system. Since it is a transformed industry, the educational infrastructure provided by private schools is small and have poor facilities and untrained teachers. Some 64% are registered, and 3.4% recognized. The rest are unregistered. Nevertheless many parents prefer the inadequacies of the private sector to the government school, provided that there is one in the vicinity.

Exploitation by private educational institutions in the name of education should be regulated. These institutions should be made to boost standardized education on the one hand and on the other, to embrace all classes of society on basis of merit.

Punjab needs concrete planning but the tools to educate need immediate attention or it will stay as an advertisement gimmick.Asif J. Mir, Organizational Transfortmation

Planning for Future Disasters

Sooner or later, civilization is going to be disrupted by more natural events. Manipulating our natural and constructed environments is a prerequisite for surviving these disasters. Once we strip doomsday fears from the emerging spate of disaster-threat discoveries, a deep environmental challenge emerges: Nature's cycle includes periodic disruptions that could toss humanity backwards.

Besides planet-killing asteroids and calamities, other natural events may be serious threats in the future. They comprise floods, huge volcanoes, seismic disorders, equatorial drift, and repeated meteor cascade. They are sustained that might prompt loss of infrastructure, disorder of agriculture, or pollution caused by industrial debris.

Using the power of upcoming technologies we can overcome doomsday. Space telescopes, DNA analysis, sedimentary analysis, and application of engineering to archaeology are improving our ability to understand past and future planetary threats. Scientists have started interpreting old evidence in a new light.

To outlast future we need to transform our ecology. Even though we are not capable of unfolding, exposing, or protecting ruthless natural phenomena, it is crystal clear that ecologists need to take them unswervingly.

Ecologists oppose the use of biotech application for hindering the environmental equilibrium, causing danger to humanity, and playing God with natural systems. The opposing view is that organic farming is inherently inefficient and risky, and it forces the destruction of forests to put more land into production. If we consider the two positions from the standpoint of surviving mass natural changes, however, both sides take on a fundamentally different look.

To have a sustainable society we need a culture with enough staying power to endure and with the capacity to preserve its collective memory. The Egyptians did it for 3,000 years; no one else has come close. We are at the beginning rather than the end of that road.

Sustainable development is a controversial term with contradictory definitions. It is often interpreted to mean advancing economically without destroying the ecology we depend on. Enormous amounts are being spent for ensuring sustainable development, but somehow the importance of mega-disaster survival has been overlooked in our culture.

It is not likely that sustainable urban development could survive inundation by a once-in-5,000 years flood. Earthquakes, which produce tsunami and volcano fire in the US, and some countries of the Far East of Southeast Asia might tear down our technological foundation. A heliacal inclement weather would flatten many space stations in orbit. Moreover, if the Gulf Stream moves south, the agriculture in Europe can’t sustain.

Earthquake-resistant designs, flood canals, and wind resistance are part of modern cities now, but these innovations cannot handle the kind of super-threats referred to here. Food production and delivery systems need to be able to withstand enormous climatic stresses and recover in a few years. Genetic manipulation combined with microcomputers could help preserve our food supply in times of crisis.

The spiritual aspect of our futures is complex, yet basic to our ability to take the next steps. Science fiction and theological writers give us glimpses into that state of affairs, but have not yet paved the way between now and those futures.

Our understanding of pre-history requires far more investment. We need to find out more about natural events that occurred just prior to the beginning of modern history, 5,000-en-25,000 years ago. Theories about this period suggest that planetary disruptions may cause cyclical rather than linear evolution of civilizations. If true, this throws conventional understanding of history on its ear. Some physical clues exist, but we need to separate science from pseudo-science in this arena.

To carry each of these first steps forward will require institutions to take on the imminent danger of disastrous threats—by recognizing their existence, and by allocating much more resources to singling out their nature and where they will probably strike.

The good news is that the tools are emerging and we have the possibilities in our hands. We are nevertheless unwilling to see the time limit that we confront. Even though watching bright-hued live transmission of a planet striking the Jupiter only some years ago, a lot of even now turn down the probability that if it could happen to them at all.

It's healthy to be skeptical of doomsday fears. Yet the discovery of big natural risks may alter our perception of Armageddon. Adapting to those risks may be our greatest challenge.

It seems pointless for a human society to struggle 5,000 years only to have its accomplishments destroyed by a stray meteor storm, ice age, or inundation. For humanity to be truly sustainable we must protect ourselves from natural catastrophes that exterminated the dinosaurs and other species in the past. Asif J. Mir, Organizational Transformation

The Local Government System

A vision of local government (LG) in the future addresses two fundamental questions: why is LG necessary; and how will it secure the skills and capacity to do its job well. City planning thus involves the anticipation, so far as practicable, of all the city's future needs, physical, social, and financial. It seeks to turn the lessons of the past to the profit of the future.

Increased attention is now being given, the world over, to the improvement of the fundamental influences affecting city life. This new solicitude has been inspired by the extraordinary growth of cities, by the steadily increasing complexity of urban relations, and by a better appreciation of the fact that contented citizenship is largely a matter of congenial environment. The enterprise is today known as city planning—an endeavor to transform the modern community into a safer, more convenient, more healthful, and more attractive place of human abode.


The new system of local government indeed superbly excellent, despite initial years of its implantation, continues to sail in troubled waters. Most key officials are yet to understand the new situation providing a dominating role to the locally elected members in running the affairs of the city government. With this ambiguity we continue to see tons of uncollected trash, broken roads, and contaminated water supply and sewerage system in ghastly conditions. Many problems remain to be solved—securing clarity and understanding about the concept by all stakeholders. Still much work still has to be done.

The councils were elected on non-party basis to avoid conflict in service delivery. Sadly, not only the conflict continues to exist but cooperation is also absent. The development of LGs has also created a dearth of trained manpower, particularly in finance and planning, information technology, law and literacy groups.

Contrary to the concept of LG, the prevailing corrupt culture has thrown consumers of services at far end, with no say, whatsoever. The Council members receiving kickbacks from infrastructure projects, display large banners in self-praise and thus trying to create false impressions of their good work. Local projects are conceived not on preference basis, but on the amount of sweetener the elected representative will get. Thus the representatives elected by people turned out to be the guardians of their own private interests.

Among the varied activities of the modern city few are more intimately related to the daily life of the people. To safeguard the public health in any large community is a task of the first magnitude. But it is an indispensable public undertaking, for health is the greatest single factor in personal efficiency.

The modern city throws off an enormous amount of waste material from day to day. The total is sometimes as much as a ton daily per head of population. This waste consists of a great variety of things namely, rubbish, garbage, and sewage. Rubbish and garbage may become a health menace under certain conditions by increasing the number of rats, mosquitoes, flies and other insect carriers. The LG must engage private sector in handling these issues.

If the most imperative need of a modern city is its water supply, the next in point of urgency among its daily requirements is the removal of waste. A modern community could endure for a season without pavements, street lights, parks, telephones, or street cars; and it might conceivably struggle along for a time without schools, police, or fire protection; but without water and sewerage it would find the greatest discomfort and inconvenience within twenty-four hours. Public sanitation is therefore entitled to a place at the top of the list among the essential industries of every large community. It may be briefly defined as the art of removing all objectionable wastes in the most unobjectionable way.

The street plan of the city determines the configuration of its growth and development, including the general uniformity or variety of private structures. Nearly all the physical aspects of municipal administration are in some way or other related to the public thoroughfares, and it is for this reason that the fundamental importance of street planning, street construction, and street maintenance can hardly be exaggerated. In the modern city one-third or more of all the land area is dedicated to street use.

The Nazim occupies a position of great visibility, and constituents have high expectations about the leadership that he ought to deliver. He is viewed as the problem-solver-in-chief in city government. Unfortunately, despite the available power and authority, his honor has failed to get things done. The incumbents are more concerned in pseudo publicity rather than real work. They need to learn that only service to people matters. They will win hearts of people when they will solve their real problems. False publicity only promotes cynicism.

EDOs are professionals, and skilled civil servants. They have adopted a policy leadership role as well as implementation of programs, delivery of services, and management of resources. Though still somewhat ambivalent about this new role, they bypass the LGs for provincial governments on many important issues, including preparation of budgets.

LG should be seen as an asset rather than a potential threat. It is not defined as a delivery agent for federal or provincial government. It is another democratically elected tier of government, with the strengths and responsibilities that come with a democratic mandate.
Bureaucracy should accept this changed situation.

Cities in Pakistan are under increasing pressure to find effective ways to meet their problems and respond to the needs of citizens. With diminishing outside assistance, officials in city government are challenged to determine the purpose and direction of their government and to generate the resources to carry out their mission. They must not only find more revenues locally to address their problems, they must also discover the resources within themselves to give leadership to their city, provide quality services, and manage shrinking budgets with greater efficiency. Asif J. Mir, Organizational Transformation

Homes: Upcoming Trends

The home of most value in the future will not use technology primarily to automatically control the environment. It will help its occupants learn how to control the environment on their own.

People spend more time in their homes than in any other space. The home ideally provides a safe, comfortable environment in which to relax, communicate, learn, and be entertained. Increasingly, it is where people connect with friends and family, conduct supplementary business, manage resources, learn about the world, and maintain health and autonomy as they age. People invest extraordinary amounts of time, money, and emotional energy to mold their homes into living spaces that meet their needs.

Unfortunately, homes today are ill suited to exploiting the pervasive computing applications being developed in laboratories. Most homes do not easily accommodate even the simplest new technologies, let alone embedded sensor infrastructures and ubiquitous display technologies. Perhaps, homeowners generally believe that computer devices make life more complex and frustrating rather than easier and more relaxing. They are wary of the aesthetic, financial, and cognitive challenges of bringing new technologies into their homes.

If we are to believe most movies, television, and popular press articles that mention home life in the future, we will have complete control over our spaces at the touch of a button. In fact, our homes will be so fully automated and “smart” that we will rarely have to think about everyday tasks at all. We will spend nearly all our time in the home engaged in leisure activities because digital and robotic agents will have taken over the mundane chores of day-to-day life.

Technology will require human effort in ways that keep life as mentally and physically challenging as possible as people age. Environments shall be created that help people live long and healthy lives in their homes; reduce resource consumption and integrate learning into their everyday activity in the home

Computer technology shall be ever-present but in a more subtle way. Information will be presented to people at precisely the time and place they need it. The pervasive technologies to empower people with information will help people make decisions; they will not be stripped of their sense of control as psychologically and physically debilitating.

There will be an environment that uses pervasive computing technology to save energy by automatically controlling the heater-vent-air conditioning system. The environment’s embedded sensors will infer context such as where people are, what they are doing, and what the inside environmental conditions are. The home will contain computer-controlled appliances, windows, and blinds.

To reduce resource consumption homes will be designed that control environmental conditions. The home’s occupant will inform the system via some type of user interface that he or she wishes to stay comfortable while saving as much energy or money as possible. The home will then use a set of optimization algorithms to simultaneously maximize savings and comfort by automatically controlling the systems, windows, and blinds. For instance, on a day when the temperature is predicted to shift from warm to cool, the home might determine that the optimal cooling strategy is to shut down the AC and automatically open a set of blinds and windows so as to create an efficient cross breeze.

There appear to be many situations in which the automatic system might succeed in optimizing temperature comfort yet fail in “doing the right thing”: something noisy is occurring outside, someone is smoking outside the window, someone in the home is allergic to pollen and the pollen count is high, it is raining outside, it is too quiet for a person reading when the hum of the air conditioner is off, someone did not want the blinds open because it throws glare on a computer screen, and so on. No matter how hard the system designer tries to program contingency plans for all possible contexts, invariably the system will sometimes frustrate the home occupant and perform in unexpected and undesirable ways.

In the home of the future, the windows include a tiny light that is either embedded in the window frame (for example, a light-emitting diode) or projected on the window using display technology (for example, an IBM Everywhere Display). The home’s embedded sensors and optimization algorithms compute a strategy for cooling the home by opening a particular set of windows, but they do not proactively implement the strategy.

Imagine that the light on the window subtly illuminates. It does not interrupt the home occupant. When someone in the home notices it, he or she knows the light means “it might be a good idea to open this window right now.” The home thereby unobtrusively informs the user of actions that might be taken to conserve energy or money. In this way, the home teaches the occupant, in an unobtrusive way, how to achieve the optimal settings. The home can take a similar approach when the goal is to improve health or introduce learning into everyday life.

The labor and material cost ratio is irrational today. This will be altered in making future homes. More money shall be devoted to materials, design, engineering, safety, and technologies in the home. Borrowing from recent innovations in the automobile industry, an integrated “chassis–infill” construction system shall be developed capable of rapidly installing with minimal labor. In one integrated assembly, composite beams and columns provide structure, insulation, sensor arrays, lighting, signal and power cable raceways, and ductwork. The beams use special connectors that lock together easily. Infill sections that form the structure’s interior and exterior walls are then “snapped in” to the chassis structure without requiring skilled labor. Finally, interior finishes are snapped on to cover joints and wiring raceways.

The resulting structure will be easier to change than conventional housing, require less expensive labor during construction, allow more money to be spent on higher-quality materials and technologies, and easily accommodate sensing infrastructure and new output technologies. Asif J. Mir, Organizational Transformation

Some Stray Thoughts on Pakistan

Each dawn comes but once: It announces another opportunity to right the wrongs and build on the success of yesterday.

Like any other country, the sun rises in the morning in Pakistan. Nevertheless, this sun rises behind the dark thick clouds and its rays do not reach the mother earth where innocent people live, suffer—committing suicides, dumping their lived children or becoming the victims of terrorism, bad governance. It is painfully observed that the national dailies are publishing voluminous editions on non-issues but no column depicts public debate on real problems.

More than two thousand years ago, Diogenes walked down a dusty road in ancient Greece. According to the legend, as he walked, he carried a lighted lantern in his hand. He carried the lantern because even in broad daylight it wasn’t easy to find what he was looking for: an honest man.

Today, after all the passing centuries, in Pakistan one reads the morning newspapers or watches the TV news and wonders if Diogenes would find the search any easier. With so many signs of unethical behavior in the society at large, one may question if ethics have any place.

The absolute increase in population in Pakistan, coupled with such trends as urbanization and greater mobility clearly presents serious threats. If the current population growth rate of Pakistan continued for the next 130 years, its population would be equal to that of the whole world today. Needless to say, this will not happen. Either its birth rate will drop or its death rate will rise. Somehow the growth rate has to stop.

Some foreign industries are growing more competitive than their Pakistani counterparts. For the Pakistan as a nation to be competitive, however, it is not required that all Pakistani companies remain competitive in all areas. It however does mean that Pakistan’s business and entrepreneurs must be able to take advantage of opportunities offered by economic developments in other countries to move into other product lines.

Good infrastructure services are essential to achieve economic growth and improve the quality of life. But for Pakistan, despite improvements in access the quantity and quality of services are well below what is demanded.

The state of education in Pakistan is depressing. Today it simply cannot compete with even third-rate countries in standard indicators of academic achievement. Weak curricula and discipline have guaranteed educational failure for tens of millions of our children. In its most extreme manifestations learning literally has come to a halt. This is not to criticize present or past governments. All the same, the nation should look at itself and conclude that something must be done. It is not, however, that the government should reform education fundamentally. Real reforms come from the people.

The health sector requires offensive for offering an inadequate remedy for the serious problems of an outdated and basically unsound system. People must be offered a vision of a revitalized healthcare system that provides incentives for increased quality and technological innovation. While at the same time, reducing costs and uncertainty. Pakistanis today need a system that gives them control over healthcare decisions, while encouraging them to set aside the resources they need to purchase this care.

The poverty rate in Pakistan is increasing fast. Economic expansion can only nullify this trend. Any welfare policy cannot conquer poverty, nor can government alone. To rid Pakistan of poverty, there must be continued economic growth, deregulation, devolution of power, smaller government, elimination of policies that discourage self-improvement, and a stronger focus on education. The importance of the family in keeping poverty at bay may now be widely accepted, but programs are also needed to strengthen the family.

It is hard for Pakistan to win a successful war on poverty when it is so hard to identify the “enemy.” Even leaving aside such complicated notions as “relative” versus “absolute” poverty, the measurement of poverty is a crude process. The root cause of this defect is that the baseline official poverty rate is badly flawed measurement of what is generally understood to be poverty. It is based on reported cash income. Thus, unreported income is not measured. There has to be consumption standard in place of the income standard, quantity and quality of the food, housing, clothing, and other essential items needed to keep a family just cost of obtaining these items locally would then be the benchmark for determining whether the family’s income was below the poverty level.

Any system of laws that is too complex or expensive for people to understand and use, does not deliver justice. This increasingly has become the case with Pakistan’s legal system. It lacks increased use of mediation, conciliation, mini-trials, and where appropriate, arbitration. Decision makers in Pakistan should think about the dilemma to ensure that access to justice is available to all. Efforts to seek alternatives to litigation throughout the legal system need to be forged.

Terrorists, attacking non-combatant targets in Pakistan, threaten the society today. Their fundamental threat is to innocent citizens, social stability and ultimately, to the legitimacy of the elected regime. The threat from terrorism is growing. Terrorists are being organized, better equipped, and more professional than they were some years ago. Modernity should be used in countering terrorism. Multilateral treaties should also be worked out for effective handling of the threat.

By defining these main items designed to spur Pakistan’s progress, prosperity and competitiveness, the Pakistani intelligentsia can suggest solutions, alternatives, innovative ideas and utilitarian actions to help achieve prosperity. It can recommend means for increasing nation’s ability to sell more overseas through increased productivity. It can imply more efficient production techniques in business through new technology, better methods of industrial organization, cheaper sources of capital goods, or more efficient labor. Through increased productivity standards of living will rise, consumer choice will increase, and more opportunities for well-paying jobs will become available. Similarly, solutions can be recommended to miscellaneous problems that are degenerating the vitals of our national life.

Beyond doubt, the resources of knowledge, experience and expertise if harnessed and suggested means for the revitalization of the dormant energies in all sectors of human endeavor, Pakistan can emerge as a land of opportunities and haven of peace. Asif J. Mir, Organizational Transformation

A Dehydrated Future is coming

Water resources are declining and different UN reports confirm that serious shortages are occurring soon. Thus we see a future when there will be no or less drinking water.

Access to water is a human right. Current declarations on human rights include basic water needs sufficiently. Basic water rights focus only on water for domestic use, and speak only of amounts of the order of 30-50 liters per person per day. Nonetheless, for many poor people, access to water for productive purposes is a crucial basic need as well. This is because water is a key factor of production in agriculture and for most other forms of economic activity that are vital to the livelihoods and opportunities of the poor.

Some question the wisdom of providing water of drinking quality at great expense, only to have a large share flushed down toilets, to carry waste, where after it is cleaned again for the few that can afford this costly practice. Opinions differ: some water experts advocate ecological sanitation, others dry toilets, some people argue that only bottled water should be of drinking quality and piped water quality should be limited to fit all other use made of it. All these alternative approaches deserve more attention.

Water infrastructure of Pakistan is turning into archaic. Reservoirs are silting up irrigation networks and turning disrepair. Groundwater levels are falling in important aquifers that have contributed substantially to food security in recent years by providing water-on-demand to millions of farmers that tapped them using tube-wells to grow their crops. This situation has impacted adversely causing a serious scarcity of water resources. This scarcity has hit the poor and vulnerable-first and hardest.

Pakistan’s per capita water availability in 1951 was 5,650 which has fallen to around 1,200 cubic meters 1,200 and with current population growth rate, it will be reduced to 1,000 cubic meters by the year 2012. So the hard reality that we as people faced today is that Pakistan in the past fifty years has turned into a water-scarce from a water-sufficient country and the situation continues to go downhill. This is the specimen of a mismanaged case.

Pakistan is the victim of repeated wrong planning of its land and water resources to produce food. All this is due to the pathetic and inert attitude of the technocrats, bureaucrats, politicians and the government as no national policy on water development was framed.

Large-scale development of river and groundwater resources is less acceptable today, for environmental reasons. It is also less cost effective than it was in the 1960-1990 period, when the large majority of the world's 45,000 large dams were built.

Water can be distributed through government institutions or the market. Privatization of water service provision, however, does not imply privatization of water resources. Water is a public good, which should be treated as an economic good where it is used for economic purposes. The public-private sector role nevertheless does not imply the role of multinational companies but the role and significance of the small-scale private sector.

In agriculture, private farmers have been largely responsible for the major investments in groundwater development. This groundwater use has contributed significantly to food production and the creation of wealth in rural areas. But government has failed to elaborate rules and mechanism ensuring that groundwater is used in a way that minimizes the risks of over-use and protects groundwater quality.

Increasing the efficiency in irrigated agriculture can result in large water savings. The UN Secretary General once rightly uttered: We need a Blue Revolution in agriculture that focuses on increasing productivity per unit of water. Indeed, at the farm level, the focus on water productivity in physical terms, crop output per unit of water, is a necessary and useful framework. Likewise, appropriate soil fertility and plant nutrition management can be a way to achieve more crops per unit of water. Water productivity at the basin level must be defined to include crop, livestock and fishery yields, wider ecosystem services and social impacts such as health, together with the systems of resource governance that ensure equitable distribution of these benefits.

For sustainable development, it is clear that better water management should be a means to reduce poverty. Strategies to address water-poverty relationships need to improve the different capabilities of the poor in their battle against poverty. These strategies also need to address the pervasive gender issues in water. Those affected by water problems are too often women, while those deciding on solutions tend to be men. Building gender-equitable capabilities of the poor to manage their water resources should also be at the heart of capacity building in the water sector.

The Provinces should formulate a water supply master plan and continuous planning process to estimate demand for drinking water and identify alternative ways of meeting that demand.

They should also establish and allocate resources to local governments for the preparation of provincial-mandated water supply plans. The Provinces should also enact legislation requiring local governments to formulate and administer comprehensive watershed protection programs in designated future water supply watersheds.

A system needs also to be evolved to promote the adoption of best management practices to minimize agricultural erosion in designated future water supply watersheds by funding and extending existing state cost-sharing programs to those watersheds and by targeting federal, state, and local technical assistance programs to them. A framework also has to be in place to increase technical assistance to local governments to help them prepare and administer watershed protection programs for designated future drinking water sources.

In evaluating alternatives for conjunctive use, water managers should also view ground water as more than a supplement to surface supplies. In particular, managers should assess the value of ground water in optimizing storage capacity, enhancing transmission capabilities, and improving water quality of the system. Asif J. Mir Organizational Transformation

Emphasizing Well-being

In recent years, psychologists studying measures of life satisfaction have largely confirmed the old adage that money can’t buy happiness—at least not for people who are already affluent.

A nation is successful not when it’s rich but when its people are happy. If you are very poor, there is no doubt that greater income can improve your life. But once the basic needs are secured, well-being does not necessarily correlate with wealth. The social and psychological needs of human beings also shape our cultures, and help to determine whether our civilization is sustainable or not. Good life is redefining prosperity to emphasize a higher quality of life, rather than the mere accumulation of goods.

The Prime Minister is busy sketching up plans for making continuing increases in gross domestic product (GDP) as a chief priority of domestic policy, under the assumption that wealth secured is well-being delivered.

Whether due to curbs on hundi business as a post-9/11 scenario or owing to connoisseur planning, foreign exchange reserves (FER) of Pakistan touched highest levels ever in the previous government. With increased GDP and FERs the number of suicidal deaths also grew larger when poverty ridden people take their lives. This situation demonstrates that some link was broken somewhere. And that’s about social moorings and calls for a shift in paradigm.

The government must focus on delivering what people most desire. Indeed, a new understanding of good life can be built not around wealth but around well-being: having basic survival needs met, along with freedom, health, security, and satisfying social relations. Consumption would still be important, to be sure, but only to the extent that it boosts quality of life.

Pakistani society if focuses on well-being will involve more interaction with family, friends, and neighbors, a more direct experience of nature, and more attention to finding fulfillment and creative expression than in accumulating goods. It should emphasize lifestyles that avoid abusing our own health, other people, or the natural world. In short, it will yield a deeper sense of satisfaction with life than many people report experiencing today.

What provides for a satisfying life? The disconnection between money and happiness in wealthy countries is perhaps most clearly illustrated when growth in income is plotted against levels of happiness. In the United States, for example, the average person’s income more than doubled between 1957 and 2002, yet the share of people reporting themselves to be very happy over that period remained static.

Happiness is best predicted by the breadth and depth of one’s social connections. People who are socially connected tend to be healthier—often significantly so. More than a dozen long-term studies in Japan, Scandinavia, and the United States show that the chances of dying in a given year, no matter the cause, is two to five times greater for people who are isolated than for socially connected people.

International development professionals also now acknowledge that strong social ties are a major contributor to a country’s development. The World Bank, for instance, sees social connectedness as a form of capital—an asset that yields a stream of benefits useful for development.

Creating a higher quality of life requires us to help create new political, physical, and cultural infrastructures of well-being. Pakistan has no such infrastructure and is thus ranked 167 out of 180 countries in Well-being Index. Sri Lanka ranks 49 and Bangladesh 131. Interestingly, Nigeria ranks 133, a position better than Pakistan.

Year after year, the Human Development Index report shows Pakistan lagging behind the rest of the regional countries. Our investment in realizing the human potential remains the lowest in South Asia. The HDI report lists a shocking situation of the poor quality of life in Pakistan.

The standard tool used to measure societal health, GDP, is much too narrow to serve as a yardstick of well-being because it sums all economic transactions, regardless of their contribution to quality of life. It also ignores entire swaths of non-market activity that contribute to individual and society well-being.

A well-being society would offer consumers a sufficient range of genuine choices rather than a large array of virtually identical products. Businesses would be encouraged through economic incentives to deliver what consumers really seek—reliable transportation, not necessarily a car; or strong neighborhood relationships in lieu of a large house with a big yard. Choice would be redefined to mean options for increasing quality of life rather than selections among individual products or services.

If focused on well-being Pakistani society would ensure that everyone in it has access to healthy food, clean water and sanitation, education, health care, and physical security. It is virtually impossible to imagine a society of well-being that does not provide for people’s basic needs.

Making the transition to a society of well-being is a challenge to the new premier given people’s habit of placing consumption at the apex of societal values. All the same, any move in this direction starts out with two strong advantages. First, the human family today has a base of knowledge, technology that can be invested in well-being rather than in continued material accumulation for its own sake. A second advantage is simple but powerful: for many people, a life of well-being is preferred to a life of high consumption.

By nurturing relationships, facilitating healthy choices, learning to live in harmony with nature, and tending to the basic needs of all, the PPP Government will leave its indelible footprints in history if it shifts from an emphasis on consumption to an emphasis on well-being. This could be an apposite response to the growing number of suicidal deaths due to poverty, and to be his great achievement in the twenty-first century.