Present political scenario in Pakistan and many other
Muslim countries is dominated with the discussions and practical struggles as
to how existing state institutions in respective Muslim countries may be
replaced with such just and effective institutions which should be more responding to religious and social needs
of the people. The driving forces behind
this scenario are two types. The first are those who believe in armed struggle;
these militant forces believe in weakening of existing state institutions to
such an extent that respective state would become dysfunctional and resultantly
be taken over by the militants. The second are those who are non-militant forces
and their stated objective is just to reform existing institutions.
It may be appreciated that weakening an institution is
a phenomenon when the institution is prevented from or fails in performing its
assigned functions in just and effective manner; resultantly such institution
is deprived of public backing. Whereas in the process of institutional
reformation, the institution is not prevented from performing its assigned functions;
rather, in the process, institutional structure
is either modified or is erected altogether on new foundations. It may also be
appreciated that reformation of state institutions can be done only by the
state itself whereas weakening of state institutions may be done by non-state
actors as well. As stated above, militant forces’ objective is to replace existing
state institutions and for the purpose they strive to weaken the existing
institutions, it is obvious they cannot succeed in their objective unless they
acquire state power to reform the existing institutions. In other words, merely
weakening of institutions would be meaningless and destructive only, if such
weakening of institutions cannot be followed with constructive approach of reforming
of institutions and reforming of institutions is not possible without state powers.
It seems that both militant and non-militant forces
are unable to draw a clear distinction between the policy of weakening of state
institutions and reforming of state institutions. We can see that militant
forces often adopt policy of weakening of state institutions in the name of
reforming of state institutions. The glaring example are Taliban who conduct
destructive policy of weakening of state institutions in Pakistan in the name
of reforming of state institutions. As mentioned earlier, because policy of
weakening of state institutions is meaningless, if policy of reforming of
institutions does not follow, and because state power is required to conduct reforming of state institutions, it is obvious Taliban’s policy of weakening
of state institutions in Pakistan is meaningless because Taliban would never be
able to take over State of Pakistan and assume state powers in Pakistan. The militants’ policy of weakening of
state institutions may be fruitful in countries like Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan
and Libya- the countries where militants may assume state powers- where policy
of weakening of institutions may be followed with policy of reforming of
institutions through assuming state powers. Similarly many non-militant forces
tend to adopt policy of weakening of state institutions in the name of
reforming of state institutions. An example of this phenomenon is Qadri’s campaign
we are currently witnessing in Pakistan. Despite all the noble objectives
stated by Maulana Qadri, it is an obvious fact he cannot takeover State of
Pakistan, which is an essential condition to conduct policy of reforming of
state institutions. Any attempt to prevent state institutions from performing
their assigned functions would be weakening of state institutions, and policy
of weakening of state institutions is meaningless and destructive only, if it
cannot be followed with policy of reforming of state institutions; as state
power is essential to adopt policy of reforming of state institutions, and
Qadri is unlikely to grab state powers in Pakistan, Maulana Qadri’s attempts
may only be seen as policy of meaningless weakening of state institutions which
would be destructive in nature.
From the foregoing, it should not be adduced that
non-state actors may not play any role in reforming of state institutions. Reforming of state institutions is
the job of state authorities but non-state actors may give their inputs and
build up public pressures to make the state authorities reform the state
institutions according to peoples’ aspirations and social, political and
economic needs.
No comments:
Post a Comment