Political and economic prospects for Pakistan and Syria

Political and Economic Prospects for Pakistan and Syria

Main Elements of political prospects of Pakistan and Syria

General comparison: Syria and Pakistan

Level of political stability

Level of economic prosperity

Role played by history

Other intervening factors

Commonalities and differences between Syria and Pakistan

Political and Economic Prospects for Pakistan and Syria

The political and economic prospects for third world countries like Pakistan and Syria are neither encouraging nor can be called dysfunctional. As in case of majority of the third world countries, both Syria and Pakistan are two of the most troublesome states not only for their neighboring countries but for the regional and international stability as well. While extended authoritarian rule of Hafez al-Assad crippled the free economy of Syria, so did the extended military rule in Pakistan. Nonetheless, recent developments in Pakistan indicate towards increased stability of institutions and state but Syria to date goes through an extended civil war. With such backdrop to this paper, the researcher will explore different factors that have impacted the progress of third world countries like Syria and Pakistan. Section II of this paper will describe different elements having a direct or indirect impact on stability of these countries. These factors include level of political stability in both the countries. Factors such as degree of prosperity, influence of political culture and the role played by the historical perspective of both these countries will be discussed in section II. Intervening factors such as military rule, insurgency, colonial and neo-colonial influence, and the impact of transnational bodies such as the UN and IMF on politics and economy of each of these countries will also be made part of this section. Section III of this paper will highlight the commonalities and differences between Syria and Pakistan. Style of leaderships in both the countries will be followed by a description of role of political parties in nation building. The paper will be concluded in section IV by restating the main points of this paper.

II- Main Elements of political prospects of Pakistan and Syria

General comparison: Syria and Pakistan

Both Syria and Pakistan have little common in context of area covered, population size, and the total Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of each country. Pakistan is a much large country with respect to all the aforementioned factors. Having an area approximately 796, 095 Km2, Pakistan's estimated population as of year 2012 was 183 million (The Economist 2012). The country got its independence from British rule in 1947 and could not make it's finally agreed upon constitution until 1973. Syria on the other hand is comprised of an area equaling 186, 400 Km2 and a population size of 22 million approximately. The country got independence from Ottoman Empire in 1918 whereas independence from France was achieved in 1946. Syria has an estimated $107 billion of GDP in 2012 whereas Pakistan's GDP for the same year was $230 billion approximately. The legislature of Pakistan consists of upper and lower house, President as the head of State whereas Prime-Minister is the head of government. Being a bicameral parliamentary democracy, Pakistan has been unfortunate in being subjected to repeated military takeovers in recent and distant past. Syria on other hand is unicameral state having Peoples Council of Syria composed of 250 members elected for four years term. President is name-appointed by the parliament. Despite having stark differences in the aforementioned fields, both the countries are Islamic and have been administered in similar styles during the past.

Level of political stability

Pakistan: Political stability in Pakistan has been somewhat existent during the last one decade. Although Pakistan went through a military takeover in 1999 that lasted for three years before general elections were held in 2002 under the military ruler, the successive elections in 2008 and 2013 have granted significant political stability to Pakistan. There is least threat of a civil-war like situation as experienced by Syria although the number of insurgency and terrorism related killing are equally high in Pakistan as well as Syria. Despite repeated elections to choose political ruling elite, Pakistan can hardly be called 'consolidated' democracy as considerable inequality within social classes of the country exists. The country has a transitional democracy, identical to democratic transitions in Turkey and Thailand (Stephen, 1995), where military is now stepping back into its mandated role of protecting borders and security only. The most significant source of political stability has been the influence of foreign powers like the U.S. And coalition forces that may not allow deterioration of political stability as it may harm their operations in neighboring Afghanistan. Syria: Syria has remained at the center of Islamic Empire and has gone through repeated invasions, occupations, and foreign rule by Mongols and Turks. The country has had repeated tenures of political instability and is currently going through one of these extended years of instability whereby President Basher al-Assad clings on to power through coercive measures. The power within the political apparatus has been long held by Alawite elite faction of Syrian population. Since the Arab Spring events in adjoining countries such as Libya and Egypt, a continuous civil-war like situation prevails in Syria. By and large, Syria is now highly unstable both politically and economically as the entrenched president Assad refuses to seize fire against rebels. As observed by Ben Judah, an international security correspondent of Zurich-based ISN that "Despite the Iraq war having strengthened dictators across the Middle East, al-Assad's regime is like any economically feeble and undemocratic state -- a fundamentally fragile creature" (Judah, 2008).

Role played by history

Pakistan: The role of history in current economic and political prospects of Pakistan is significant. The country never had a smooth democratic government running the affairs of the state. After coming into existence in 1947 as an independent Muslim state, the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, the first military rule was enforced in 1958 that lasted around 10 years. Thus, the political leadership that surfaced during the tenure was nurtured by the military rulers. The country enforced two constitutions before abandoning them for a more agreed upon and politically drafted constitution of 1971. In 1977, the military ruler again usurped the civilian powers and assumed the government. Political leaders such as Z.A Bhutto were hanged and human rights being curbed. The third martial law of country was enforced in 1999 and the military ruler remained in power for 10 years despite having handpicked the bicameral legislature in 2002. Thus, weak institutions, frequent military takeovers, and corruption in government ranks, both civilian and military has resulted in present state of affairs of Pakistan. Syria: Syria's history has been one that was dominated by family rule, foreign interventions, and inability to successfully run the affairs of the country by the ruling elite. The Assad family has held the power in Syrian since last four decades and this has caused significant deterioration in institutional and other forms of governance (Zisser 2003, 15-19).With independence from the French forces in 1946, Syria remained internally polarized and externally vulnerable to the tensions of Middle East. Her confrontation with Israel and support for Hezbollah has considerable historical background. Thus, the issues today being faced by Syria are a continuation of its acts of historical omissions and commission by ruling elites.

Influence of leadership: Influence of leadership on both Syria and Pakistan has been largely negative in its nature. Pakistan has only produced leaders who have generally remained oblivious of their responsibility towards their population. Internal differences due to population diversity and external pressures both military and diplomacy related has caused Pakistan to progress very slowly on economic and political aspects. Pakistan still remains a procedural democracy as opposed to a consolidated democracy. Syria also has been unfortunate in having Assads as leaders. These leaders have not paid heed to changing realities of commerce and technology and only remained entrenched in their ruling the country through coercive use of power.

Other intervening factors

There have been numerous intervening factors in Syria and Pakistan as is the case with third world countries. The geo-political situation of both these countries, specifically Syria (Nasrallah 2011) has usually invited significant foreign intervention, both from colonial and non-colonial powers in the region. The influence of U.S. over both these countries is also considerable. Use of religion by extremists groups and religious political parties has played a considerable role in stifling the social and economic progress of Pakistan. Syrian however has remained a largely secular state under the Assad family. Insurgency has also caused widespread loss of life and property in Pakistan as well as Syria. While Pakistan today struggles with fighting Islamists and Baloch scenarists, the Syrian regime is fighting the Islamist rebels and anti-state elements struggling to end the rule of Assad. This has caused sustained human and capital flight from both these countries since the year 2000.

Colonial and neo-colonial powers: The role of colonial powers in influencing the economy and power politics of third world countries has been immense. Third worldism is associated with struggle against the proxies of colonial powers and the inherent gap between first world and the third world countries (Berger 2004, 9-15). While Britain and U.S. have significantly shaped the events taking place within Pakistan, in form of military takeovers and change of regimes, U.S., France, Britain, and Israel have influenced the internal and external situation of Syria by supplying arms, personnel, and expertise to de-stabilize the Assad regime. Hardly there have been few years of good relation between Syria and the U.S. that too lasted for few years. Military rule has been significantly detrimental for the economic and political progression of Pakistan. Syria also underwent successive military takeovers in the beginning life of the country but was replaced with authoritarian rule of Assad family since 1970s. The military rile in Pakistan also decreased the pace of social independence and caused the military to establish deep economic interests in managing power. The use of manufacturing institutions was used to increase social and economic clout of military in the civil domain.

Commonalities and differences between Syria and Pakistan

Differences: Syria sill ranks better in terms of Human Development Index (HDI) ranking that is being published each year by the United Nations Organization (UNO). Syria ranks 116 out of 180 whereas Pakistan ranks at 146 out of 180 (UNDP, 2013). This indicates that despite having a war like situation from last two years, the fewer population level allowed the country to have better HDI measure than Pakistan. The other difference is in the perception and use of religion in state of affairs. Pakistan state has hardly convicted the Islamist terrorists and fails to contain Al-Qaeda and Taliban attacks on military and civil personnel. On the other hand, Syrian government has come hard over the Islamist parties and terrorists linked to acts of violence.

Commonalities: The most important commonality between the two third countries, Syria and Pakistan remains the failure of state and governance system alike. Pakistan while having numerous resources, both capital and human, is unable to provide socially safe environment along with opportunities of prosperity and progress. Syria also fails in same categories and could not convince the general population regarding the use of government structure and political and military elites of both countries have failed their states to a point to no return in short-term.

III- Conclusion

The economic and political prospects for the third world countries are challenging and remain contingent to performance of governments and the potential influence of foreign governments and colonial powers on internal matters of these countries. Pakistan and Syria are two such third world countries facing myriad of chronic issues related to economy and political stability. While both countries have Sunni dominated population, the increased level insurgency related killings has caused economic prosperity to halt. Sustained human and capital flight is faced commonly by both these countries. While Pakistan can be called 'transition' democracy, Syria is far from even becoming a procedural democracy, let alone consolidated democracy.