Jalal Alamgir
Published by openDemocracy on 13 Feb 2009.

The homegrown embrace of democracy in Bangladesh represents both a historic demonstration of its people’s will and an injunction to the west.

It is part of the hyperbolic tendency of the age to wield the word “historic” rather loosely in describing election victories and defeats. The national election in Bangladesh on 29 December 2008 is one of the rare such events that truly deserves the term.

There are three reasons for this. First, the election marked a resounding verdict for democracy. The last two years, Bangladesh was ruled by a military-led caretaker government backed by the west. This administration kept its crucial word of holding elections, but had made a mess of governance, with political machinations, judicial interference, and widespread human-rights abuses.

Bangladeshis took notice, and offence. A pre-election survey reported that 87% of voters thought that any elected administration, regardless of party, would govern better than the caretaker government. So, on election-day a huge number of citizens showed up to vote, and with extraordinary enthusiasm.

Second, the election delivered a landslide victory for the Awami League (AL), a centre-left party that promoted progressive policies and religious freedom. In the previous election, in 2001, the United States had tacitly opposed AL, partly because of the league’s cautious approach to foreign investment in Bangladesh’s oil and gas. BNP, the centre-right party that won in 2001, became steeped in massive corruption, and western companies had a good share of many underhand deals.

Third, the vote was a decisive rejection of the BNP alliance with Jamaat-e-Islami, the largest Islamist party in the country. Their combined rule between 2001 and 2006 was marked by unprecedented violence and terrorism against progressives, leftists, cultural icons, and religious and ethnic minorities. By 2005, extra-judicial killings by government agents rose to 396 (there had been just one in 1998). Bangladeshis handed this rightwing alliance a thumping defeat in the election, with Jamaat-e-Islami in particular decimated.

The rise and fall of political Islam

The experience of Bangladesh since independence helps explain how momentous is this outcome. Bangladesh has always had an uncomfortable relationship with political Islam. Its secession from Pakistan in 1971 was the result of its refusal to accept religious identity as the primary basis of nationhood. The Pakistani army and local Islamist collaborators, justifying their actions by invoking religion, then committed the swiftest genocide in history, slaughtering at least 1 million Bengalis in nine months before surrendering – a scale of killing matched subsequently only by the Rwandan tragedy in 1994.

After a rightwing coup in 1975 killed the left-leaning Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the father of the nation, the Islamist war criminals were slowly re-established by successive pro-west military governments. In the 1980s, Islam was made mandatory in the school curriculum, then brought into national political discourse; in 1988, it was named the state religion by General Ershad in a bid to garner support among Bangladesh’s Muslim majority.

Middle-eastern funds, labour flows to the Saudi peninsula, and US political backing to these generals – all these helped Jamaat-e-Islami spread quietly across the country. When democracy was restored in 1991, the main political parties (the Awami League and the BNP) also cavorted with various Islamist outfits to increase their share of votes.

Jamaat, once tainted with genocide, had nonetheless by 2001 become an official part of government. More radical groups, some with connections to the Taliban, also appeared. Waves of terrorist attacks were unleashed and went unaccounted for – and it seemed that the Islamists had not only reinstated themselves, but achieved impunity in a country that was born on a secular-progressive platform.

All this was happening in the post-9/11 world, and under the patronage of a rightwing Bangladeshi government supported by the George W Bush administration.

Then, in 2007, the military took over again, and initiated a sweeping anti-crime drive, eventually detaining half-a-million, often without charges. Hundreds of politicians were awarded lengthy prison terms in speedy tribunals, but mainstream Islamist leaders and war criminals were largely left out. Powerful interests in the government, clearly, continued to protect them. After the Bangladeshi election, they may be a bit worried.

The lesson for the west

The defeat for Islamism in Bangladesh did not come from western intervention, nor from suppression by authoritarian governments aided and equipped by the west. It came from an election, from mainly Muslim voters in a Muslim-majority country.

The lesson for the west is familiar if yet to be fully appreciated: that it needs to support the democratic process in Muslim countries, rather than cherry-pick winners and losers. Islamists increased their influence in Bangladesh since 1975 mainly under governments backed by the west. As in Pakistan, these governments politicised Islam to strengthen their position against progressive democratic alternatives. But time and again, western policy has prioritised those who seem pro-west or pro-investment, rather than those who are pro-democracy.

In the post-9/11 world, both the BNP government and the caretaker government skilfully sold extremist threats to the west. There is evidence that parts of the government materially supported terror attacks during 2001-06, which in turn helped demonstrate the urgency of the threat. Then, with a polished approach bred of authoritarian pedigree, they impressed western diplomats as the efficient, organised types needed to combat extremism. The security systems they built with western aid became additions to the state’s repressive apparatus, used liberally against citizens of all political hue.

Here, then, is the fourth and final way the return of democracy in Bangladesh made history: it demonstrated the futility of the west’s conventional approach of fighting extremism. After thirty years of meddling, which only bolstered Islamist groups, it’s time the west left Bangladeshi politics on its own, except for supporting the democratic process – and the democratic process only, regardless of who wins and who loses.

Mridul Chowdhury

Published in the Forum (September 2008 )

American elections have always fascinated me — somewhat analogous to the suspense and the excitement of seeing an Olympic race, with the added benefit of following it for several months and then watching the finale over a bowl of pop-corn or chanachur, depending on whether I am over there or at home.

The fact that I am not an American and cannot vote gives me more reason to take only an “academic” interest in US’s elections, with the implicit notion that it is not going to make too much of a difference as to who wins or loses — they are all beholden to the same interest groups anyway.

This time, however, my personal experience in following the race has been strikingly different — I feel that the stakes for the world may be much higher than any of us may imagine. The results of the US’s elections this year will have far-reaching consequences on peace and stability across the globe, and Bangladesh will inevitably be affected as well.

Since World War II, the human race has been gradually moving towards a more stable world. With the end of the Cold War, there is a much smaller chance that conflicts can spread beyond the particular geographic location it starts in, also helped by the presence of organisations such as the United Nations and NATO, which provide more avenues for external pressures when a nation takes a belligerent action.

However, the one nation for which external pressures do not work well on is obviously the US — hence the ever-increasing importance of having a responsible person at the helm of this nation. A good choice can lead to a world that is more stable, and a bad choice can reverse much of the progress made over the past decades, excluding the setbacks caused by the Bush family.

While it is true that on many issues, the difference between the two presidential candidates is nothing more than rhetoric, there are some critical distinctions that set them apart. Senator John McCain, a former navy officer and Vietnam War hero, stresses that he has the critical national security experience and the background to win wars for the US. Senator Barack Obama, half-Kenyan and partially raised in Indonesia, stresses that his multi-dimensional background gives him the credentials to help rebuild diplomatic relations with the rest of the world, even with belligerent states.

Their contrasting emphasis on various foreign policy issues, and their divergent perspectives of the US’s role in global politics, are telling barometers for deciding who is better suited to lead the US in contributing to a safer and cleaner world.

The war on terrorism: Calls for a new strategy
I was sitting in an office in Boston when the Twin Towers came crashing down in 2001. I still remember the horrifying feeling when I launched CNN’s website that morning which showed nothing but a picture of the burning towers with the caption: “America Under Attack.” It was a rude awakening to the fact that we are now living in an era when countries are not only prone to attack from other countries, but also from non-state actors.

A fight against another country and a fight against non-state actors call for different strategies and “weapons.” A country is beholden to economic interests, and its government has some level of vulnerability to its citizens’ adverse public opinion, no matter how autocratic it is. On the other hand, a non-state actor is neither tied to economic interests nor is it accountable.

In today’s age of globalisation and economic inter-dependence, there are many economic and diplomatic “weapons” at one’s disposal to fight countries. It is imperative that the commander-in-chief of the country leading the war against terrorism understands the fundamental distinction between these two kinds of war in today’s world, and is more cautious about loosely labeling countries as “enemies.” McCain clearly falls short in demonstrating this understanding.

McCain’s rhetoric presupposes that he has figured out who the bad guys are. He is making aggressive attempts to prove he can be the tough commander-in-chief who can take bold decisions to subvert “enemies.” His speeches are full of the words “winning” and “losing”: no doubt a manifestation of his military background that spans several generations — his father and grandfather were both decorated military officers. McCain insists that a military victory in Iraq is an essential component of the war on terror and strongly supports greater military build-up in Iraq to ensure it. Since his 2002 co-sponsorship authorising the use of force in Iraq, he has repeatedly stated that he is willing to lose a campaign rather than lose the war in Iraq.

Obama, on the other hand, takes a much more nuanced view — he is critical of McCain’s attempts to divide the world into good and evil camps. He has been thoroughly critical of the US’s intervention in Iraq from the beginning, and has never moved from his position against military build-up in Iraq. He often reminds American citizens of the blatant foolishness behind the war and in labeling Iraq, the country, as an “enemy.”

In a speech in West Lafayette, Indiana on July 16, he asked Americans to take a step back and think strategically about the national security problems facing the nation. He said: “After 9/11, we invaded and occupied a state that had no collaborative relationship with the al-Qaeda. We have spent almost a trillion dollars to occupy a country in the heart of the Middle East that no longer had any weapons of mass destruction.”

In contrast, McCain insists on linking the war on terrorism with the war in Iraq, even though the premise on which Bush started the war has been proven to be false. McCain’s display of “toughness” is also demonstrated by his uncompromising stance Iran. He proposes tough economic sanctions and political isolation, and if these do not make Iran adhere to US-imposed restrictions on its nuclear program, he will consider military action. In order to justify his stance on Iran, in a speech in Amman, he said: “It’s common knowledge and has been reported in the media that al-Qaeda is going back into Iran and receiving training and are coming back into Iraq.” He forgot the reality that the Sunni-dominated al-Qaeda has cold relations with the Shi’ite Iran. A day after his speech, McCain spokesperson publicly announced that his boss “misspoke.”

Obama has maintained restraint in using belligerent language aimed at Iran, and has even questioned whether Iran actually wants to build nuclear weapons. On his campaign website, it states: “Iran has sought to build nuclear weapons” as opposed to making a provocative statement such as “Iran is seeking to build nuclear weapons.” In one of his speeches, he stated that he would try to engage the Iranian regime in diplomatic and economic dialogue by offering Iran membership into the World Trade Organisation, and even offered to meet Iranian President Ahmadinejad. In response, McCain launched a shrill criticism aimed at Obama’s “lenience” with Iran — again proving that McCain unfortunately lacks strategic understanding of today’s global political dynamics and the forces of economic inter-dependence supported by globalisation.

Is the “my way or the highway” approach a solution?
The world is shifting in another fundamental way — the hegemonic power of the US is gradually eroding, economically rather than politically. Economic powerhouses are growing in Asia and Latin America, and countries such as China are rapidly gaining political and diplomatic strength with the use of soft power. A visionary President of the US should adjust to this emerging reality to avoid conflicts while still retaining a leading voice in global politics.

Both Obama and McCain have stressed on moving away from Bush’s largely unilateral foreign policy of the last eight years. But here again, they diverge in important ways. Obama’s approach to multilateralism has the United Nations as an important component. While he stresses on the importance of reform within the organisation, particularly the UN Security Council, he contends that the US should play a leading role in the UN, in sharp contrast to Bush’s policy of ignoring the UN for the most part, and allowing roughly $2 billion in debt to the UN to remain unpaid. Obama has been a sponsor of the Global Poverty Act which would require the US president to develop and implement a comprehensive strategy to further the UN’s Millennium Development Goals, and also to insist that Congress “pay the US dues on time, in full, and without improper conditions.”

McCain, on the other hand, has downplayed the importance of the UN and has dodged media queries about the huge amount of US dues to the UN. He has instead chosen to initiate the concept of a new international organisation called the “League of Democracies,” whose membership will be made up of democratic governments. Some noted analysts, including the well-respected Washington DC-based think-tank, Citizens for Global Solutions (CGS), argue that this will severely undermine the UN.

By restricting its composition only to democratic countries, McCain may end up recreating schisms that ended with the Cold War. McCain’s propensity to form coalitions with the countries he likes, and leaving out the ones he does not, can have far-reaching consequences with respect to destabilising the globe yet again. Of particular importance are McCain’s repeated indications that he wants to politically isolate Russia and China from the “free world.” It is a reversion towards treating the world not as a diverse, organic whole, but turning it into a clear divides of “us” and “them.”

During McCain’s major public policy speech in March, in a blatantly belligerent statement, he said: “We should start by ensuring that the G8 again becomes a club of leading market democracies: it should include Brazil and India but exclude Russia.” The G8 is a group of industrialised countries that meets to discuss not only economic issues but also global politics and other issues of common interest. Insisting that Russia be kicked out of such an organization and conspicuously ignoring China are likely indications that McCain is more hawkish than even Bush when it comes to forcibly maintaining the US political hegemony. While Obama wants to increase diplomatic ties and economic inter-dependence and pursue an inclusive foreign policy with Russia and China to jointly tackle the world’s problems, McCain clearly has exactly the reverse isolationist strategy with a misdirected hope that keeping them away from global elite bodies will make them want to change their policies and political ideologies.

Leading by example or instruction?
Over the decades, the US has earned a global reputation for hypocrisy, and took a particularly bad beating during the last eight years under Bush. The US government has consistently “instructed” other countries to cut back on nuclear weapons programs, while refusing to ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT). With regards to environmental measures, it has asked other industrialised countries to reduce harmful emissions, while consistently refusing to ratify the Kyoto Protocol. A recent comment from McCain, after the Russia-Georgia crisis, stood as yet another ironic instance of US foreign policy hypocrisy when he said: “In the 21st century, nations don’t invade other nations” — conveniently forgetting that the US invaded Iraq and Afghanistan in this century. The American president who will take over in 2009 will have to work hard to reverse this perception of the US government’s duplicity. McCain certainly does not evoke the image or the personality needed to reverse this perception.

AFP

Obama seems to follow the concept of “leading by example” better than McCain does, particularly in cases of nuclear proliferation and environment. McCain, while pursuing an aggressive rhetoric of restricting other countries’ nuclear ambitions, has voted against the US ratification of the CTBT, has strongly supported the missile defense programs, and has used language that would leave scope for building new nuclear weapons. On the other hand, Obama has consistently tried to create bi-partisan consensus in ratifying the CTBT, has opposed developing new nuclear weapons, and has promised steps to ultimately move towards a “world where there are no nuclear weapons.” McCain has also been strongly in favor of significant build-up of the US military, by adding 150,000 soldiers if he is elected, while Obama has promised adding 65,000 soldiers — an indication that both candidates may be beholden to the interests of military contractors, but that Obama exercises noticeably more restraint.

In environmental matters, both McCain and Obama seem determined to make up for past errors, but the difference in the degree of determination is striking. For instance, Obama would like to see the US reduce its greenhouse-gas emissions by some 80 percent by 2050, while McCain supports cutting back by 65 percent. However, in general, McCain has been far less transparent about environmental issues than Obama. The League of Conservation Voters, America’s leading voice for environmental advocacy within electoral politics, has given Obama a lifetime score of 87 (out of 100) and McCain a score of 24, based on their voting behaviour in the Senate on environmental issues.

Choosing between two worlds: The world’s fate in hands of American voters
In this year’s presidential “duel,” we have in one corner, John McCain, who embodies many of the elements that stir up negative emotions in people across the globe when they look at the US’s current role in global politics — elements of isolationism, perverse demonstration of military might, and hypocritical stance on global issues. He wants to hold on to a world that does not exist any more — a world from his father and grandfather’s period, when the US army had significant relevance in dealing with rogue nations. While the American Foreign Service remains vastly short-staffed, the army is ever increasing. As Nicholas Kristof, the New York Times columnist puts it: “The United States has more musicians in its military bands than it has diplomats.” Under McCain, in all likelihood, this situation will worsen.

AFP

It is not inconceivable that McCain’s isolationist policies towards Iran, Russia, and China may create a situation where China and Russia may more directly aid Iran’s nuclear ambitions, which they have already been silently supporting through various deals. This may very well lead to yet another military confrontation, which can have far worse consequences than the Iraq War. McCain seems to ignore, or consciously chooses to overlook, the fact that if countries like Iran have to be contained diplomatically, strategic cooperation of Russia and China must be ensured.

Skeptics such as Noam Chomsky and Arundhati Roy would say that the US always needs a war to keep its military-industrial complex alive and growing, and perhaps McCain is the latest puppet in that demonic scheme to justify impending military action through the “holy cover of democracy” — a maneuver that the US government has already demonstrated well-developed skills in. More pragmatic political analysts such as Fareed Zakaria, the editor of Newsweek, would suggest that isolationist and heavy-handed policies under current global dynamics could not lead to fruitful results.

On the other corner of the “duel,” we have Barack Obama, who is better suited than McCain to lead the US in the emerging World Order — someone who speaks in terms of trying to “understand the enemies and their motivations,” talks about building coalitions with governments regardless of whether they share American values of democracy and civil rights, and wants to demonstrate commitment on global issues through leading by example.

It is true that Obama is not a saint — he possibly could not come this far if he was — as the game of politics is much too harsh. For instance, his stance on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has particularly disappointed many of his well-wishers. While being open about talking with the Iranian president, he has maintained a “no-negotiation” policy with Hamas, the democratically elected representative of the Palestinians. Despite such shortcomings, when the choice is between Obama and McCain, the answer is overwhelmingly clear.

However, many Americans prefer a macho leader who can “scare” the world into submission if need be, and McCain certainly fits the profile. Many view Obama’s emphasis on diplomacy and soft attitude towards mortal enemies such as Iran as signs of weakness and political naiveté.

Johnmccain.com	AFP

If the US’s election was open to all citizens of the world, Obama would perhaps win hands down. But unfortunately, it is not, and the stability and peace of the world is for the American people to decide — most of whom understandably care more about domestic issues rather than foreign policy ones.

However, I certainly hope that they live up to this grave global responsibility and choose the candidate who aspires to use America’s influence on global affairs with more grace and humility or what the US Declaration of Independence calls “a decent respect to the opinions of mankind.”

The author acknowledges comments on early drafts by A.M. Choudhury, Carlie, Cindy, Mary, Maya, Muhit, Rubayat, Rupert, Shafique, Shehzeen, Yuko, and members of Drishtipat Writers’ Collective.

Published in the Forum (May 2008 )

These are difficult times for the global economy. Economic growth is weakening around the world, reflecting the fallout from the sub-prime mortgage crisis and associated financial market turbulence. A recession appears to be imminent in the United States — the question now is about its severity and length. Other developed economies are also expected to slow. As are, to a lesser extent, major emerging economies in Asia. And the slowdown is happening in a period of significant inflationary pressure, complicating the job of macroeconomic policymakers.

What has caused the slowdown? What is the global economic outlook? What is the outlook for Bangladesh? If the global slowdown is much more protracted than the current forecasts, what would be the impacts on Bangladesh? I try to explore these questions in what follows. I also touch on some difficult macroeconomic policy choices facing our policymakers.

Global economic outlook
The International Monetary Fund published its latest World Economic Outlook (WEO) in early April. It began with this sentence: The global expansion is losing speed in the face of a major financial crisis.

Table 1 shows the IMF’s latest economic growth forecasts for the major economies.

Source: IMF WEO April 2008, http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/weo/2008/01/pdf/tables.pdf.

(a) Asian newly industrialised economies are Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore. (b) ASEAN-5 are Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines, Malaysia and Vietnam. (F) Forecasts.

The proximate cause of the US recession is its housing sector. Construction of new houses has fallen sharply, reflecting an unwinding of an oversupply of houses. Exacerbating the construction downturn are rising mortgage default rates — particularly the sub-prime ones — and falling house prices. Flowing on from all this is an intensifying credit squeeze — put simply, banks and lending institutions have become extremely cautious, denying loans to some borrowers who have projects that would have been funded in other, less turbulent, times. The housing and financial market developments are mutually reinforcing. As a result, the IMF’s baseline scenario has the US economy dipping into a mild recession in 2008.

The US accounts for a quarter of the global economy, and has important trade and financial linkages with every economy around the world. Historically, US recessions have caused slowdowns in other major economies. Hence the adage: when the US sneezes, the world catches cold. That’s why the IMF forecasts sluggish economic growth projections for the other developed economies.

The IMF does not, however, forecast quite as dramatic a slowing in the emerging Asian economies as it does for the developed world. This is broadly consistent with the “decoupling hypothesis,” which holds that major Asian emerging economies — China and India, but also the smaller ones such as the NIEs or the ASEAN-5 — have matured enough so that the US recession might not affect them as much as was the case in the past.

In its latest Asian Development Outlook (ADO), published in March, the Asian Development Bank examines the decoupling hypothesis using a number of techniques. The ADB concludes thus: Developing Asia is not immune to global developments, but neither is it hostage to them. Citing structural transformations, robust productivity growth, and favourable policy climate, the ADB forecasts that the Asian economies will experience a moderation in growth, rather than a sharp downturn.

Source: IMF WEO

(A) Asian newly industrialised economies are Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore. (B) ASEAN-5 are Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines, Malaysia and Vietnam. (F) Forecasts.

The IMF also forecasts inflationary pressures to continue in both the developed and developing worlds (Table 2). There are two reasons for the recent rise in inflation around the world. Firstly, the robust growth of the developing world — particularly the large economies of India and China — has been causing rapid rises in demand for food and energy commodities. With supply lagging demand, their prices have risen to record highs. With growth expected to continue in the emerging Asian economies, the prospect for commodity prices are still high. Subsidies to bio-fuels are the other major reason for the recent rise in global food price inflation.1 These subsidies are politically popular, and it is unlikely that they will be removed, particularly in an election year in the US.

The inflationary environment makes the macro-economic policy-makers’ job — the restoration of stability in housing and financial markets without setting off a spiral of inflationary expectations — in the US and other affected economies all the more challenging. Plus, history gives grounds for pessimism. The last time the world economy experienced inflationary shocks generated by a commodity boom was in the 1970s. It ended in a period of high inflation coupled with high unemployment and sluggish growth, an episode dubbed as stagflation. And recessions that involve major damages to the financial systems and housing markets tend to last much longer than other recessions, with the Great Depression of the 1930s being the most extreme example of how bad things could get.

On the plus side, the Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke — who spent much of his stellar academic career studying the Great Depression — appears to have the confidence of the market, and neither a depression nor a stagflation is on anyone’s baseline scenario, yet.

Economic outlook for Bangladesh
The global economic environment described above sets the background to the projections contained in Table 3. While the pace and extent varies, all forecasters project a slowdown in the Bangladeshi economy in 2008 and a recovery in 2009, with inflation expected to remain high throughout the forecast period. When the Budget is brought down in mid-May, the official forecasts are unlikely to be substantially different from these.

Source: Asia-Pacific Consensus Forecasts, April 2008; ADB ADO March 2008, http://www.adb.org/Documents/Books/ADO/2008 /statapps.pdf); the Economist Group.

(a) Financial year (for example, 2008 refers to the year ending 30 June 2008). (f) Forecasts.

According to the ADB, the slowdown in economic growth in the 2008 financial year “is attributed to the erosion of business confidence and the effects of the natural disasters.” The projected recovery in 2009 rests on the assumptions that business confidence will return and there will be “substantial external assistance” to mitigate the effects of the natural disasters.

Looking into the sectoral components of GDP, the economic slowdown is most evident in the industry sector. Growth in production and exports of garments and knitwear has been much weaker in the current financial year. In addition to business confidence, a combination of other factors has been responsible: labour turmoil in the previous years; very weak demand from the US; and higher raw material import costs. A sharper than expected US recession and continued price rises in the global market are of course likely to dampen industrial production and export growth even if business confidence were to be restored.

Agriculture has been hurt by the natural disasters, and its recovery is to a large extent at nature’s mercy. In contrast, the service sector is expected to experience a much more modest slowdown, as strong remittance flows are expected to continue to shore of up consumption.

The ADB expects inflation to remain high throughout the forecast period. Higher inflation is attributed to: rising commodity prices — particularly foodgrains and oil — in the global market; the domestic foodgrain shortfall; and the lagged effect of higher than programmed monetary expansion. In addition to the perennial threats of political upheaval and natural disasters, rapidly growing inflation is listed as a major near-term risk to the outlook. The ADB warns: the failure to rein it [inflation] in could seriously undermine political and economic stability.

Implications for Bangladesh of a worse-than-expected global slowdown
The ADB projects the US economy to grow by 1.5 per cent in 2008 and 2 per cent in 2009. This is much stronger than the 0.5 and 0.6 per cent growth forecast by the IMF. The IMF’s gloomier outlook for the US translates into the projection of a sharper slowdown in the Bangladesh economy. What if the US recession, and the associated global slowdown, turns out to be more severe, or last longer, than is currently anticipated?

There are three major channels through which a worse-than-expected global slowdown could affect Bangladesh: investment, exports, and remittances.

Let’s consider investment first. Should the credit squeeze worsen in the global financial markets, interest rates are going rise even more. Further, at times like this, there is a “flight to quality” — that is, lenders seek the relatively less risky borrowers. As a result, credit spreads will widen, and Bangladeshi businesses will find it harder to borrow. This, in turn, will hurt investment. The flight to quality will also mean foreign direct investment might dry up.

In the near term, sharp slowdown in investment will hurt employment and household income, with flow on effects on consumption. In the medium term, slowdown in investment, particularly foreign direct investment, will hurt industrialisation, technology transfer, and productivity growth — all very important factors for poverty alleviation through sustained economic growth.

The second channel through which a worse-than-expected slowdown could affect Bangladesh is exports. About a quarter of Bangladesh’s exports are to the US, with Germany, the United Kingdom, France, and Italy accounting for another third.

If the US recession is worse than anticipated, or if one or more of the major European countries enter a recession, exports will suffer. A sharp slowdown in exports will have additional impacts on investment, employment, and household income.

Remittances will also suffer, especially if the credit squeeze worsens. This is because most non-resident Bangladeshis, particularly those living in the developed economies, will have to pay higher interest payments in their house mortgage, credit card debt, or personal loans. Remittances have shored up household income and boosted consumption in recent years. If remittances were to start drying up, consumption will hurt, and the service sectors such as financial services, property, and telecommunications will suffer.

Macro-economic policy options
The task of macro-economic policy-maker in Bangladesh is never easy. But it is a particularly difficult balancing act to stimulate a flagging economy at a time of inflationary pressures. This is just as true for our Ministry of Finance and the Bangladesh Bank as it is for the US Treasury or the Federal Reserve. As long as inflation, particularly food price inflation, remains at the current highs, the government will come under pressure to subsidise foodgrains and/or widen social safety nets.

Some possible policies — food for work programs, greater government investment in rural infrastructure projects to generate rural employment — are worthwhile in their own right, regardless of the inflation situation. However, to the extent that they cost money, their implementation is problematic, as the government’s coffers are already in the red. The ADB forecasts a budget deficit of 4.8 per cent of GDP in the 2008 financial year.

The Economist puts the number at 5 per cent. Unless the food subsidies and related programs were financed by external assistance, the government will have to make some difficult choices. Other policy options — liberalisation of foreign investment regimes to encourage new energy projects, or policies aimed at improving agricultural productivity — may not require much government expenditure, but will not yield results immediately.

And in an environment of 40 taka per kg of rice, calls for subsidies that assist the poor here and now will be very difficult to ignore for the government. If significant external assistance is not forthcoming, the government will have to either cut expenditure elsewhere and/or raise taxes, or finance the widening deficit somehow. The former option presents obvious political difficulties. The latter presents significant macro-economic risks. In an already tight global credit market, government borrowing to finance widening budget deficit will crowd out private investment. Alternatively, if the Bangladesh Bank were to finance the deficit by printing money, we would be taking the first steps to hyper-inflation.

Even the most optimistic scenario — one of a very mild US recession and a quick global recovery — still leaves our macro-economic policymakers with little wiggle room. As long as inflation remains high, our policymakers will have to balance difficult policy trade offs. If the worst should happen — a protracted global slowdown with continued inflation — we could be looking at the worst economic crisis since the 1970s.

This is indeed a very bleak outlook, with no good policy options. It is in this environment that the budget will be brought down. And quite possibly, the newly elected government will inherit a more challenging set of tasks than any of its predecessors in decades. No matter what happens in the political arena, it is important that this grim situation is understood.

1. See here: http://www.thedailystar. net/forum/2008/February /food.htm
2. Full details of the ADB’s outlook for Bangladesh are available here: http://www.adb.org/ documents/Books/ADO/2008/BAN.pdf

Asif Saleh

Published in the Forum (December 2007) 

Two months ago, when I went to see Imran Khan present his case to an audience in England, my prime interest was in asking what made him support General Pervez Musharraf in the first place? I did not have to wait very long. When the Q & A started, that was the one of the first questions asked.

Khan’s reply to the question was short and apologetic: “I was conned.”

“I thought he was the messiah who had come to save us from the political corruption that ruled our country for years. But pretty soon I realised that was not the case.” ”When I was close to Gen Musharraf, the ISI would come to me and show me the detailed file on all the politicians and all their corruption. But soon I saw that the very same information was used not to try them but to extort them so that they would join his political party.”

As General Musharraf emerges as the latest military messiah-turned-dictator to face a possibly inglorious end, perhaps the lessons of Imran Khan are lessons for all those who look towards the military to offer quick fire solutions and meaningful “democracy.”

Here are Imran Khan’s replies to a number of other crucial queries that day:

On the background of his joining politics
Man, by nature, is political. Aristotle said two and a half thousand years ago that if there were injustice in a society, all members of the society would join politics except two kinds — the most materialistic people and the timid ones with vested interests. I was someone who never thought I would join politics, as I could never do any public speaking or was a people person. But once I started building the hospital and collecting money I went to the richest people of Pakistan, I got a lot of encouragement but no money. In the end I ran out of steam. I needed 4 million dollars to open the hospital.

Eventually, desperate, I decided to tour Pakistan from one end to another in an open jeep and collect money that way. I found that people who had nothing, any time they saw the truck coming, they came by and gave me whatever they had in their pockets.

There are moments in life that change your direction. This was one of those moments. Here I saw the real Pakistanis on whose hard work the country was functioning and there sat a tiny elite who hogged all the resources, went to all the good schools but didn’t give anything back to the society or never thought about the poor people.

Practically, the elites did not care. Whoever came to power, whether it is military dictatorship or democratic government, they became close to them and became part of the power structure. The majority would always be deprived from their very basic needs. They would go to Urdu medium schools, and then become unemployed once they got their degrees. The best jobs would go to the elites who went to the best English medium schools.

Similarly if you could afford bottled water, you were fine. But 500,000 children died of waterborne diseases last year alone. Ninety-five percent of the taxation was indirect which meant that the poor were subsidising the rich. Same thing is true with the justice system. You wouldn’t find any rich person in jail.

That’s when I decided that if I wanted to bring about a change in the country, it was not going to be

through social work. It had to be done through politics.

On the motto of justice instead of more basic needs
When I started thinking about what is that one thing that can change Pakistan, I realised it was an independent judiciary that can bring justice and equity to society. If we look at the history of Pakistan, the judiciary has remained subservient to the executive throughout its life. So whenever someone comes to power, they know that the justice system will never be able to touch them. And the system has evolved over a period of time where every criminal wants to come to power regardless of which party is in power not only to make money but to protect corruption. This system meant that we could not have a general democratic system. When you don’t have rule of law, criminals are allowed to contest elections.

In my own constituency, all four members from different parties who ran against me have now joined Musharraf’s party — simply because they cannot afford to be on the wrong side of the power structure. The biggest example is our very own Asif Zardari. He switched between the prime minister’s house and jail as his party went in and out of power.

This is where the problem lies. You cannot have proper democracy in a country where the judiciary does not touch criminals because they are close to the power. Because of that, all criminals then want to be in power and they will use power to plunder the country. Hence we started Tehriq-i-Insaaf the movement for justice.

On the backdrop of the current crisis
When I started the party, a lot of people asked me why I didn’t start a popular campaign on roti-kapra-aur-makan like other politicians. I was soon vindicated on my conviction though. In March this year, something interesting had happened. President Musharraf called in the chief justice and asked him to resign, showing some minor offenses he supposedly had committed. Then a miracle happened in Pakistan. The chief justice refused. He stuck to his position that the charges had to be proved. Now this took the general completely by shock. There was no Plan B. Plan A was that he was in uniform and he orders the judge to resign and he resigns. That’s how things work in Pakistan,

But once the judge refused to resign, a series of events started happening in Pakistan, which in my opinion are the most exciting things to happen in recent history. Three top intelligence agents came to him, he was under house arrest for three days. When he attempted to go to the Supreme Court, everyone saw that a policeman pulled his hair and shoved him in the car.

Now the real heroes who made these incidents into defining moments for Pakistan politics are the independent television media. What has changed in Pakistan and what Gen. Musharraf did not realise is that the independent television channels have changed the country. The level of political awareness is at its peak in Pakistan now. This is where the miscalculation took place. After the chief justice refused to resign, these television channels highlighted every single mistake committed by the government.

The leadership in this movement for justice was provided, sadly not by us politicians, but the lawyers of the country. All the elected bar associations stood by the chief justice. Instead of the movement getting dissipated, it grew and grew. The journey to Lahore by the chief justice, that normally takes 4 hours, took him 28 hours because so many people came to greet him.

On why this is an exciting time
So many lawyers are now firmly behind the chief justice that there are very few judges now who will go against him. They will always be my heroes because the judiciary actually fought for its own independence under the leadership of the chief justice. For once we have now a chief justice who will stand up to authority and dictatorship. The impact of this is going to be in the upcoming election.

Because once the judiciary is independent, that is what is going ensure an independent Election Commission, which we have never had in our history. The Election Commission has always been influenced by the military establishment. Whenever we have an election, we don’t get the results right away — because the results first go the ‘General’s Headquarters,’ where they are vetted and then released. As we are close to having an independent judiciary, which will then lead to an independent Election Commission, we will then have a truly free and fair election.

On the importance of a free election
The elites like to think illiterate people in rural Pakistan are ignorant and always vote for thugs. But if you go to rural Pakistan, you will be amazed to see the political sense people have there. When I was in college, I used to think (reading The Dawn newspaper) that the only problem in Pakistan is with literacy. The uneducated people do not understand who is good for them. But when I actually started campaigning in the election and went to the rural areas, I discovered that even the political awareness among the children in rural areas is often more than adults in urban areas.

Because, you see, their lives depend on politics. So, everyone in the rural area understands the political issues. I firmly believe if they could vote out of their free will, they would have voted for the people who they felt would be good for them. The problem is that they are too scared to vote for the right people because they are often subjected to political victimisation. After the election in my constituency, a lot of people came to me and said we want to vote for you but we know you will not be in power. So how will you protect us?

This is where the problem lies. This is why you need a democratic system and you cannot have a general democratic system without an independent judiciary. You cannot imagine the sort of political victimisation that goes on. They will cut the water supplies of villages. Schoolteachers will suddenly be transferred. So you can’t have a proper democracy in the country unless people are protected from political victimisation and that can only be done by an independent judicial system.

On Musharraf’s future
Gen. Musharraf will struggle for a while and then he inevitably will fall. A structure that is built on brute force cannot survive once that force starts crumbling. Cracks have already started appearing. People in his own party are already looking for the next power bloc, as they know that the ship is sinking. In my opinion, Gen. Musharraf is not going to last this year. What will happen after that is, under our independent chief justice, we will have our second free and fair election.

On post-Musharraf scenarios
Once we have a free and fair election, we should not worry what happens. I have been speaking to British MPs and they all ask me that what will happen if Musharraf goes. Gen. Musharraf has successfully managed to convince the Western governments that if he goes, the country will be swamped by terrorists and “extremists” like me. This is an argument often put forward by tinpot dictators in Muslim countries. Hosni Mubarak has been able to do that for the last 24 years and Musharraf is doing the same.

But in reality we would have a better chance of fighting extremism post-Musharraf than we do right now. Because, if you look at the situation since 2001, extremism has risen up and up. There is more radicalisation in Pakistan than ever before. If the military was the answer, surely extremism should have decreased. The truth is extremism cannot be fought by a general with a gun in his hand. Extremism can best be fought by a comprehensive democratic system where you have freedom of expression, where you have an open society, where you allow the people to marginalise the extremists.

In the last two dictatorships under General Zia and General Musharraf, extremism has exacerbated and the religious parties have taken a big chunk of the pie. But whenever you allow people to vote in a democracy, they always vote for the moderate parties. So the answer to all the fearful Bushes and Blairs of the world is that they are barking up the wrong tree by backing military dictators. The way to deal with extremists is when you allow people to sideline the extremists, and not by holding a gun to their head.

A final word to the audience
In the end, I must ask all of you to participate in politics. The country’s direction can only be changed when young and thoughtful people like you join politics. Because our country has tremendous potential, which can only be realised if there is political activism from the young and educated.

Mashuqur Rahman and Asif Yousuf

Published in the Daily Star (August 16, 2007)

The right to petition your own government is a fundamental principle in a democratic society. Recently, however, there have been a number of high profile cases of expatriate Bangladeshis petitioning foreign governments to influence government policy within Bangladesh.

The campaign against the detention of MK Alamgir, the campaign against the deportation from the United States of AKM Mohiuddin Ahmed and a letter from a US Congressman to the ACC in support of a business tycoon are three examples of expatriate lobbying efforts that have appeared on the media’s radar.

Barring exceptional reversals in global communications and migration trends, expatriate lobbying is something that we can only expect to see more of in the future. A long term view of this trend is necessary. As such this is not an issue solely for the current government to consider, but for all successive ones as well.

Supporters of such campaigns generally argue that human rights issues are at stake. Sometimes, an issue is framed this way because the supporters believe that, should the campaign succeed, a precedent would be set that would discourage future violations of rights. These campaigns can thus make the implicit claim of speaking for broader societal interests.

However, while claiming to achieve these broader objectives, these campaigns simultaneously address the narrower interests of a specific constituency, be they the family of the person in question or a group with a specific agenda.

Skeptics of such campaigns tend to focus only on the individual in question, concentrating on his/her innocence or guilt. Further, they feel that such campaigns privilege people well-connected to and capable of using the global communications and/or rights protection networks. However, as mentioned above, there is no reason why such campaigns cannot be sustained beyond the context of the individual to the broader context of society, ensuring justice for people not connected to the global systems.

Petitioning or lobbying foreign governments by Bangladeshis is not a recent development, nor is it limited to expatriate Bangladeshis. During the Liberation War, representatives of the Mujibnagar government lobbied foreign governments to garner support for the independence movement and to spotlight the atrocities of the Pakistan army.

More recently private Bangladeshi corporations as well as political parties have hired lobbying firms to lobby the US government. The government of Bangladesh has also hired lobbyists in the past to lobby foreign governments to influence bilateral relations.

Whereas government lobbying efforts aim to further official Bangladesh government policy in foreign capitals, lobbying efforts by expatriates are often at odds with Bangladesh government policy. It is this aspect that makes expatriate lobbying controversial.

Lobbying efforts, whether by political parties or by corporations or individual expatriates, are not inherently good or bad, nor are they monolithic. Though foreign lobbying is generally viewed through the prism of human rights campaigns, the motivation for expatriate lobbying is varied — they range from human rights causes to furthering business or economic interests to advancing political goals.

They do however have one thing in common: they all seek to bring foreign pressure to bear on the Bangladesh government instead of solely working through the institutions and mechanisms available within Bangladesh.

One reason why a growing number of expatriate lobbying campaigns are initiated and sustained beyond our shores is the erosion of faith in our judicial system, our law enforcement agencies and any institution that is supposed to safeguard citizens’ rights against abuse. In other words, while greater migration and easier communications have no doubt facilitated such campaigns, this erosion of faith in the efficacy of our institutions is a major driver of expatriate lobbying.

Restoring faith in the consistency, neutrality and accountability of these institutions would lessen the incentive of expatriates to work outside the system and increase incentives to bring change within, at least on matters of human rights. In this regard, the recent decision to expand voting rights to expatriates is a step in the right direction.

Expatriate lobbying, like governmental and corporate lobbying, is a development that is likely to grow as global communications develops further and as national and international interests continue to collide. While development of government institutions in Bangladesh will encourage redressing of grievances without recourse to foreign pressure, there will always be foreign lobbying. Nonetheless, as institutions within Bangladesh develop, the government will be better equipped to deal effectively and positively with foreign lobbying efforts.

Asif Saleh

Published in the Forum (August 2007)

It is time for the NRB community to flex its political muscle, argues the writer.

“Dear Asif Bhai, after careful consideration, I am sorry to let you know that I cannot be part of your organisation as my parents think that it is too political. My parents are not comfortable with the fact that your organisation talked about minority rights and other controversial issues. Although, I care deeply about these issues, I have to respect their decisions, and join an organisation which is not too politically controversial.”

This was the letter sent to me from one of my most hard working volunteers in Boston in my organisation. That got me to think and re-evaluate what I was doing with our human rights organisation. I thought long and hard about what was deemed political and what was non-political in Bangladeshi and to the Non-Resident Bangladeshi (NRB) context.

The answer was strikingly depressing. In the past 10-15 years, in the years of dysfunctional politics, one thing our politicians and intellectuals have successfully been able to do is to completely dilute the definition of politics, both home and abroad. Politics are not defined as a medium to discuss policy, inequity or social issues, but rather it has been deemed a dirty mode for individuals to get a share of the loot of national wealth. The issues of human rights which are by nature very political have been confused by people as being partisan issues. Similarly, anything with the slightest political context have been deemed controversial and out of bounds for the “bhodroloks.”

However, along with the spring cleaning back home, times are changing abroad as well. With the advent of internet and a growing willingness among the established Bangladeshi diaspora community to engage in tougher issues, there are signs that expatriates are more and trying harder to be catalyst of changes in Bangladesh. With the increasing economic and lobbying muscles and their soon to gain voting rights, the question remains: how directly should NRBs get involved with Bangladeshi politics? If and how should they influence “deshi” politics or national bread and butter issues with political overtones?

History of diaspora involvement in political issues
When we discuss the Bangladeshi diaspora, without getting into too much statistical breakdown, we can divide them into two main classes that I will define as the must-sends vs the must send-nots. To clarify, the “must-sends” are those who regularly send money to their home base every month to keep their families surviving. They are mostly the migrant workers to Middle east, Malaysia and other developing economies and the biggest contributors to our foreign reserves. The migrants from the must-send community are often too busy struggling their way through the foreign land. Being charitable or being involved in local deshi issues is not really an option for them even if the presence of strong passion is there.

Some from the must-send section struggled their way through to become hugely successful entrepreneurs and they look to expand their influence in the political arena in Bangladesh by spreading their wealth as a natural progression. This is the business community i.e. the political funders of deshi politics among the expatriate community. This is the group of people who get regular visits from the politicians every five years before election time. The “donations” in general have been used by these expatriates to either get nominations from local constituencies or to purchase influence among the political parties.

Just like home, the absence of political ideology or philosophy among these political involvement is striking. The most popular TV show on London’s Bangla TV is a show where the local leaders of AL and BNP duke it out on live TV. The discourse is mostly about how one netri is superior to the other and all the tired, old rhetoric that we hear back home between the two parties.

However, the expatriates do have a rich history in getting involved in key political changes. The role of expatriates in generating funds and mobilising international opinion during 1971 liberation war has been one of tremendous impact. The few that were abroad around that time had impact many times more than their numbers could have justifiably achieved, by organising and agitating in support of the Bangladeshi freedom struggle.

Similarly, the seed funding to mobilise the Ghatok Dalal Nirmul Committee in 1991 took shape in the cities of New Jersey. However, as things took turn for the worse politically back home, people with genuine passion abroad increasingly tried to shed the political label. Along with the typical don’t stir the pot mentality of the bhodrolok class, the post 9-11 polarisation made some expatriates ultra image conscious and super-sensitive to criticism of the state. The BNP government also to a certain extent successfully was able to convince people that talking against the government policies is synonymous to anti-state activity. But it goes beyond saying that nothing stirs up the Bangladeshis like deshi politics no matter wherever they are. The Bangla TV programs in UK are still abuzz with viewers who call in to give their opinions by paying premium calling charge. But in spite of all these chattering, the migrant community had yet to find the most effective way to influence politics for the better back home — until the internet and mobile phone spread widely home and abroad.

Growing activism of the expatriate community
As communication mediums spread in Bangladesh, over the last few years, Bangladeshis are showing more inclination towards getting more hands-on with grassroots issues. What was previously limited to just non-stop discussions has now moved into the implementation phase. Not only is there an inclination towards affecting the policies of their adopted land, established expatriates are now willing to engage on various politically sensitive issues like that of workers’ rights, religious tolerance, environmental disaster, etc.

With the lack of response from political parties who have so far been unwilling to engage with the NRBs other than for the purpose of collecting donations, the expatriates have formed non-profit organisations abroad that have successfully partnered with local grassroots organisations in raising awareness on key issues.

Bangladesh Environment Network (BEN), created mainly by diaspora environmentalists has successfully helped form and fund Bangladesh Poribesh Andolon (BAPA) which has been very effective in creating an environmental movement in Bangladesh. Along with the activist angle of BAPA, BEN has also provided key policy papers on energy and coal reserves and water sharing of our rivers.

The BEN-BAPA model is one of great success where a handful of diaspora Bangladeshis have contributed towards raising awareness among the mass on a difficult issue and at the same time has influenced policy decisions of the government of Bangladesh.

Similarly, organisations like Drishtipat, working in the field of human rights, has been able to raise critical awareness on difficult issues where the local organisations were muted by the fear of government retaliation. The geographical and financial independence has proved effective in terms of not only just raising awareness but also in directly raising monetary aid which otherwise would not have been possible to obtain.

Recent initiatives like Phiriye Ano Bangladesh, which is aiming to engage the Bangladeshi youth to be more politically aware and have them speak from a single platform to have their voices heard in policy making, is seeing active association from NRB and RB community. Similarly, very thought provoking and powerful op-eds aimed towards influencing the policy makers are being written by NRBs .

Of course, none of this would have been possible without the advent of communication technology. With internet and SMS messaging, mobilising a world-wide movement has become a lot simpler than before. Internet not only has opened up the barrier of geographical boundaries, it has made possible for the expatriates to be abreast of local issues in details through the online editions of Bangladeshi newspapers and organise quickly based on that.

The recent deportation trial of convicted killer Mohiuddin saw a full-fledged fight in the international media between two opposing sides. Both sides managed to fight an organised battle in the media quickly and effectively within a short span of time thanks to blogs and online newsgroups.

Having seen the fruits of the success recently of citizen journalism, expatriates are now aggressively using internet and blogs to raise awareness on political issues. While it can certainly be debated how much interference, if any, the foreign countries should have in policy makings, it is certainly beyond question that international lobbying by expatriates has proved effective in recent days in swaying international media and the political leaders.

How to be most effective in the new era?
With the expatriates getting direct voting rights for the next election, the time is ripe for them to exert more direct influence in policy making. Now that they can have a say on who gets to run for office in their own local constituencies, it will be a good chance for people to get involved on more hands on local issues.

The key impediment in this case has been lack of information flow. While we are now getting up to the news on the national scene via internet and the electronic media, it is more or less impossible to get news on the local level for people who want to be more involved. A more fundamental question to ask is whether someone who has decided to migrate from their home constituency would have had enough engagement with the community to run for office to represent them.

As evidenced from Bangladeshis forming their region-oriented Bangladesh organisations in the foreign land, their appetite for getting involved with local issues is limitless. They have been working to help build schools, mosques and hospitals in their villages. However, to change politics as we know it, there is no better way than to get directly involved. Expatriates who have lived under matured democracies and who have followed the democratic practices in the foreign land can lead by example by planting new ideas in Bangladeshi political scene by getting involved in politics. For that, however, a key logistical impediment remains in place as Bangladesh still bars dual passport holders to run for office. In this era of global migration, such discriminatory rules are counter-productive indeed.

For those are who are not ready to get directly involved, the best way still is to get involved with the change makers in the local community and empowering them and partnering with them via the expatriate organisations. At the end of the day, expatriates have the geographical and financial independence which gives them a lot of leverage in pushing through their ideas.

Hopefully, after years of aimless bickering, NRBs will be able to follow the Non-Resident Indian (NRI) example of contributing in key issues by becoming powerful and cohesive stakeholders. Until that happens, the global conversation that is now taking place between Bangladeshis worldwide on national issues through media outlets and internet is bound to open up new doors of opportunities and help shed the negative label that we have been associating with being political in Bangladesh.

Naeem Mohaiemen

Published in the Forum (August 2007) 

“They have always been here”- the writer’s journeys to the heart of the Bombay Bangladeshi community

Bombay. Mumbai.
Contested name, conflicted ethnography.
Some friends (Indian leftists) still hold on to the old name, a solitary act of defiance against soft Hindutva.

Bombay. “Maximum city” that leaves me craving, by comparison, the “cleaner” air of Dhaka. It was towards the end of the BJP’s horrific tenure (their shock defeat still a pipe dream for Indian progressives), and I was visiting a friend who was in Bombay writing his novel. After days of bemoaning the specter of militant Shiv Sena workers, I decided go exploring the town.

Bombay’s Bangla Town was on my radar. I had been hearing about floating Bengali populations. Some called them Bangali, some said Bangladeshi. Invisible, unwanted, and yet essential to the city’s smooth functioning. Same as migrants anywhere.

At Raey railway station, I started asking for Bangali-para. A few shop inquiries, and I was sent down a road with hundreds of shanty shacks. The men were all away at work — women and the jobless sprawled on roadside mats. Also visible were barber shops, where work kept them near home. Tomato, begun, cauliflower, chilis and deformed miniature potatoes in symmetric rows on a blue sheet. A stack of fish fry on a plate: glistening with oil. It looked like it was being prepared for a restaurant, but the lady firmly and sternly informed me she was cooking it for mahalla people. In one corner, a floppy yellow object was being dipped repeatedly into boiling water, it looked like fish but it was chicken skin. On another sheet, a stack of dried, smelly, shutki fish.

Fish everywhere, the trail was getting warmer.

In between cooking areas, girls crouched on the ground, washing themselves with minimal soap and even more minimal disrobing. On more blue sheets, a man was rubbing his head affectionately on a baby’s stomach. A crazy jumble of shacks. One-two-three-four, all on top of each other.

When I first approach people, the conversation that breaks off is in Bangla. But when I ask questions, the replies are always in Hindi. No one admits to being Bangali. Dr Choudhary is a Bangali name, the only doctor in the area. But his tiny shop is closed. There are only a few other shops where I can try my search. Trail growing cold again. I step into the last barbershop on the row.

The man sitting in the chair has a thinly shaved pencil moustache and black kohl around his eyes.

“Are you Bangali?”
He answers with a distinct Kolkata accent.

First question everyone always asks: “Apni kotha theke eshechen?”
“I’ve come from Bangladesh.”
Quick as a flash, he asks: “Mmm, passport korthe chacchen bujhi?”
“Bujhlam na,” oh, and a beat later, I realise he’s asking if I need to get an Indian passport …
“No, no, I’m visiting, I don’t want to stay here.”
His companion speaks up: “I’m from Assam, where are you from?”
“Dhaka.” They both nod their heads. It seems to have meant something.
“But my mother’s from Sylhet.” Now the second man perks up: “Oh, so you’re from my neighboring state.”
“Well, we used to be the same state,” I joke, trying to lighten the air.
The owner shows up. He has a bushy beard. His Bengali is accented. He says he’s from Haora. He starts talking animatedly about Bangladesh: “Yes I go to the Shahjalal mazaar in Sylhet all the time, and also the one in Chittagong.”
“You mean the one where you feed turtles bananas?”
“Na bhai, that’s Chittagong, in Sylhet you feed them pao fish.”
“How do you get there?”
“Oh, I just get a pass and go back and forth. It’s no problem, really easy to get through Benapole. Are you taking the bus too?”
“No, I’m flying.”
“Oh, apne tho thahole different category. That’s not for us. You put yourself in that seat and … nothing to worry about.”
After a few more minutes of conversation, they give me directions. I need to get to Wadala, where there’s another big Bangali colony. Okhane onek onek Bangali paben!
But does Bangali mean from West Bengal, or Bangladesh? Or is there no difference in the middle of basti community solidarity … that part I haven’t been able to figure out from these conversations

At Wadala, the environment is very different. The signs here are much more open. A huge slum sprawls on the other side of the train tracks, taking up a few street blocks. Everyone here knows where the Bangali-para is, no puzzled looks. There are blocks of Urdu signs, but every person I ask says, further, just a little further. But as soon as I cross the tracks (stopping to take one furtive photo), walk around the piles of garbage, and step into the area itself, there’s a very different reaction.

Although shops carry address boards that say “161 Bangali Para”, when I speak to people, no one will admit to being Bengali. Every person says “go over there,” sending me somewhere else. I start walking into narrower corridors. There are shacks on every side, tumbling in with barely enough space to squeeze through.

Suddenly I feel very conscious about the large camera I’m carrying with me. I can barely get through some alleys with the camera bag! What prompted me to make myself so conspicuous …

Finally an Urdu speaking shopkeeper says: “Go up the stairs to the jori factory, they’re all Bengali.” I climb up slowly with my load and make a bumbling entrance. My bag gets stuck on a pipe, and somebody jubilantly yells from downstairs: “Wo fas giya!” He climbs up to disentangle me and by the time I get upstairs, the jori factory workers are all staring at me. Red-faced, I begin a stumbled, rushed explanation.

“I’m from Bangladesh, I make films, I was here visiting a friend, I’m looking for Bangalis, especially people from Bangladesh …” my voice trails off as the awkwardness of the situation slowly comes home.
In a city where the Shiv Sena plays politics with the juju of “illegal Bangladeshi” migrants. In a volatile situation where “push back” has entered the sub-continental vernacular. Where election season means giving instructions to pakrao the “illegals.” Where Bangladeshi is also the BJP’s coded way of saying “Muslim.” Walking into a slum where the BJP-era police were rounding up and deporting suspected Bangladeshis, who will admit to being Bangladeshi to me?

“Who are you?” one of them asks, he can’t have been more than sixteen. I start my explanation again and halfway through, he interrupts and says in Hindi: “Speak to us in Hindi, we don’t understand Bangla!”

“But you just spoke to me in Bangla”
“No, we don’t understand Bangla, we speak only Hindi, we don’t know what you’re looking for.”
The music was turned down. One of them turns it back up. Hindi. Filmi. Loud.
I keep trying for a few minutes. The pathos of the situation seeps in and I give up. I start climbing back down, careful about my bag this time.
“What happened, bhaisaab?” asks the Urdu-speaker downstairs.
I explain, embarrassed, like a jilted lover.
“No, no, they’re lying, they’re all from Kolkata.”
“Hey,” he yells up, “Thum jhut kiu bola …why did you lie? “
Then turning to me: “Listen, no one wants to admit being Bangali, because the police are always looking for Bangladeshis. It means anyone who’s Bangali and Muslim is a suspect. Then they threaten to deport you, you bribe them 2,000 rupees, and they let you go. Sometimes they put them in the van for show and let them off a mile from here. It’s all about money.”

Someone else: “You need to tell them you are a journalist, you will print their photo.”
I hesitate: “I don’t think that will reassure them.” (I’m not a journalist anyway.)
Another man chimes in: “We’re not afraid, take our photo.”
“But you’re not Bangali.”
He breaks into a smile. “Yes, that’s why I don’t care if you take my photo. Listen go to that store. They are older, they are not as afraid as those kids.”
I climb up another flight of stairs. This time, puzzled looks again, but not as much hostility. They listen, and continue their jori weaving work. After the explanation, the man in front starts speaking. Very precise, with a strong Kolkata accent.
“Listen, no one will talk to you, everyone is scared. We’re not scared, that’s why no one has ever given us trouble.”
Another craftsman speaks up: “But even if they do, so what. Listen bhai, those who are scared are usually the ones they catch.”
They’re speaking in turns, filling in each other’s sentences with comfort: “But it’s all for bribery. They want a bribe, otherwise they’ll send you over the border. They even cut off your shirt label, so no proof of where you came from.”
“But when they get to the border, Bangladesh doesn’t want them either. Why should they, ey apod abar kottheke elo? And another thing, they separate families. Men are put in one camp, women in another, children in a third one. If you really want to push people out, this is not the way you do it.”
“So … do people here think I’m with police?” I ask at last.
“No, no — no one thinks you’re CID. But your clothes, your hair, your shoes, and the samal you’re carrying makes you look different, so people are nervous. What does he want, they are asking. You arrived suddenly, no one knows you. This is not the proper way to come to our area. Come with introduction.”

Another man joins in: “But you should be careful, coming here where you do not know anyone, with all that samal, anything could happen. Even in the daytime. You shouldn’t have come here with all this stuff.”
“But I have a passport. I’m carrying it with me!”

“So what, if police rip up your passport, what will you do? You’ll speak English, they’ll pretend not to understand. You’ll speak Hindi, they’ll pretend not to understand. It takes nothing to put you in jail.”

“But I’ll tell you what no one will admit. There are maybe 700,000 people here. At least half are from Bangladesh. Maybe they came now, maybe they came before partition, no one knows — how could they? They have always been here.”

They start to warm up, and get a little angrier too. “But now no one wants to admit it because you will get thrown out. It’s completely unfair, just politics and money. Some of these people have been here for generations, suddenly at night they are getting the knock.”

This goes on for a while. Hostility to the police, to the politicians, to the BJP. All seeping out, bit by bit.
“How long have you been in the jori business?” I finally ask.
“We Muslims have been in it for a long time, you could say this is our khandani. But now Hindus have also come in, so prices have gone down. You can barely eat on this. That’s why all our families are back in Kolkata.”

The first man looks up at me, staring for a moment, before asking his question.
“Are you Muslim?”
“Yes. And you …?”
He just points to the Arabic script on the wall.
“Yes, all the people in the jori business in this neighborhood are Muslim. So … you can celebrate Eid with us.”

A new person enters. He’s younger and seems to be the manager. He looks over at me, suspicious and watchful. The mood is broken, conversation withers away. Everyone goes back to work. A bottle of Pepsi arrives for me.

I ask permission and take a few pictures. We think of exchanging information. They have no address to give me.
“What about this factory?”
“No point giving you this address, tomorrow you may come back and I may not be here. Maybe next week, the whole slum will be gone. It’s happened before.”
“But take my address, and if you come to Bangladesh, please visit.”
They nod.
But we all know, they’re not coming to Bangladesh.
It takes a long time to say goodbye. I stay another hour. They give me Pepsi again. The conversation is light, scattered over the sound of work. But they seem mystified by my desire to leave.
“Why do you want to leave quickly?”
I explain that I am in Bombay for a few days, want to spend some time with my friend. They nod but don’t really pay too much attention.
Finally, it’s really time to leave. As I get up, he stops me, “Ok, one very important question for you.”
“Yes, go ahead …”
“Do you really think they got Saddam?”
I’m a bit stupefied. This? This is the big question?
The others join in enthusiastically, this is clearly the burning topic on their mind.
“We all think that’s a copy. Otherwise why do they have to check his teeth?”
“Saddam is not a hero, a woman! How did he get caught? Why didn’t he kill himself, that’s what I would have done.”
We argue about Saddam for a bit. Real? Copy?
Finally, I stop it. “Listen this conversation will never end. I really have to go. Getting late. Long way to my friend’s house. We’ll talk about it next time.”
“Yes,” he replies, “Next time.”

Amer Ahmed

Published in the Forum (August  2007)

The article considers what steps we can take to ease the lot of the migrants who are so crucial to the economy

With the World Bank recently describing migration as the third pillar of globalisation, alongside trade and capital flows, it is no surprise that policy discussions on migration and its impacts are gaining importance in Bangladesh. From a few thousand in the 1970s, the number of Bangladeshi migrants has exploded to a gross figure of more than three million by 2002, with about $23.7 billion being sent back in remittances over that period (Kibria, 2004).

As of 2006, expatriate workers’ remittance flows were four times greater than Official Development Assistance (ODA) and eight times more than Foreign Direct Investment (FDI). The importance of the migrant workers and their role in the development of Bangladesh is not lost on policy-makers, with increased attention being paid to other temporary migration mechanisms such as those offered through the Temporary Movement of Natural Persons (TMNP) of the WTO’s General Agreement of Trade in Services (GATS). An understanding of the challenges to, and the potential gains from, increased temporary migration is thus imperative for Bangladeshi policy makers.

The GATS identifies four specific ways that services can be traded. One of these modes, Mode 4, is the TMNP. The GATS describes TMNP as the supply of a service “by a service supplier of one Member, through presence of natural persons of a Member in the territory of any other Member (GATS, 2007).” A liberalisation of TMNP would thus allow for greater movements of workers from one member country to another, for temporary employment, such as through a guest-worker program geared towards highly skilled workers.

Due to the politically sensitive nature of any migration policy, Mode 4 temporary migration has often been given lower priority in services trade discussions and, thus, has relatively limited commitments and scheduled concessions (Winters et al, 2003). However, given the declining labour forces and aging populations of developed countries, there is a growing global demand for workers (van der Mensbrugghe, 2006). Given this increasing demand and the decreasing financial and social costs of labour mobility, increased temporary migration has aroused the interest of policy makers in the North as a viable alternative to permanent migration.

During the Uruguay Round of trade negotiations when the GATS was signed, many Least Developed Countries (LDCs), including Bangladesh, were unfamiliar with the intricacies of the international trade in services. Also, GATS negotiations are often framed in a manner that highlights the differences between the North and the South, leading to defensive posturing by both sides (Grynberg, 2002). The result was an agreement that focuses on other forms of services trade such as increased cross-border supply, and commercial presence abroad — neither of which are areas where developing countries traditionally have an advantage. Specific agreements on TMNP at the WTO have so far only dealt with highly skilled personnel, such as skilled self-employed workers or intra-corporate transferees who move within the framework of agents such as large multinational companies.

The commitments have, thus, offered little to Bangladesh and other LDCs since their relative advantage lies in the services offered by low and medium-skilled workers. As the agreements currently stand, skilled workers like computer engineers and IT personnel have greater opportunities for temporary employment in the US, UK, or other major skilled labour “importers.” However, for less skilled workers — the majority of the developing world’s labour force — the TMNP channels into the labour markets of those countries are closed. These limitations are even more unfortunate given that, in the context of the developing world, increased temporary migration of low and medium-skilled workers can have much larger effects on poverty reduction and sustainable development that are greater than the immediate economic gains to the world arising from greater TMNP.

Bangladesh’s leadership among the LDC group at the WTO puts it in a special position to change the status quo and push for commitments that encourage TMNP liberalisation for less skilled workers. Indeed, the vast majority of Bangladeshi migrant workers are unskilled and low-skilled workers heading out to the Middle East or East Asia. However, the opening up of newer labour markets in the North for Bangladesh’s semi-skilled workers would provide a new and aggressive expansion of our labour exports. The LDCs’ revised request to the other members at the WTO on TMNP commitments now includes a list of services whose trade they want liberalized, with the key feature of this list being that the service categories go beyond the high-skill categories that had been discussed in previous negotiations. While not going so far as to push for a liberalization of the movement of all workers, the LDCs’ request features the

liberalization of the movement of workers who can be described as semi-skilled workers.

Bangladesh would have much to gain through the expansion of the TMNP market access commitments to include less skilled worker groups. Raihan and Mahmood (2007) consider the extreme situation where 200,000 skilled or unskilled workers were sent overseas. Based on these scenarios, the paper estimates the gains from the complete liberalisation of skilled service provider migration at $381 million, with the estimate for unskilled service provider category being $3.5 billion.

Aside from the challenge of negotiating these commitments under Mode 4, Bangladesh must also overcome domestic institutional challenges. The first institutional challenge is the fact that the bureaucracy of the government of Bangladesh suffers from systematic problems that reduce their effectiveness as cogent negotiators. The article “30 Get Training on WTO, Only 3 Remain in Post,” from the March 6 issue of The Daily Star clearly described the woeful human resource management of the country’s WTO cell and other supporting agencies, painting a sad-but-true image of a country with sub-par trade negotiating capacity.

Another, more elusive, institutional barrier is the matter of how authorities will persuade the workers taking advantage of the TMNP liberalisation to return to Bangladesh. As the name implies, the movement is meant to be temporary. Migration is a politically volatile topic in any country, and more so in developed countries with concerns about illegal immigration. Bangladesh and the other LDCs would need to demonstrate the will, if not the mechanism, to enforce the temporary nature of the Mode 4 movement before the developed countries agree to further TMNP liberalisation.

A successful restart of the Doha Round negotiations would give Bangladesh the impetus to successfully negotiate for greater temporary worker migration as part of the greater development agenda. However, as a prerequisite to successful negotiations, the government of Bangladesh needs to take stock of the challenges facing it, and come up with appropriate institutional reforms. If Bangladesh is able to facilitate the temporary migration of its significant semi-skilled work force into the hitherto restricted markets of the developed world, the payoff would not just be billions in remittance income and the development that it would bring, but also the significant secondary social effects of having a workforce that is decently employed and globally integrated.

REFERENCES
GATS (2007). http://www.wto.org /enlish/tratop_e/serv_e/gatsintr_e.htm (April 12, 2007)
Grynberg, R. (2002). “Liberalizing Global Labor Markets: Recent Developments at the WTO.” The Estey Centre Journal of International Law and Trade Policy, V 3, No. 1, pg. 82-105.
Kibria, N. (2004) “Returning International Labor Migrants from Bangladesh: The Experience and Effects of Deportation.” Working Paper #28, Mellon-MIT Inter-University Program on NGOs and Forced Migration.
Raihan, A. and M. Mahmood (2007) “Opportunities and Risks of Liberalizing Trade in Services: Country Study on Bangladesh.” Issue Paper No. 3, ICTSD Programme on Trade in Services and Sustainable Development, Geneva.
van der Mensbrugghe, D. (2006) “The Potential Gains from International Migration.” Global Economic Prospects: Economic Implications of Remittances and Migration 2006. The World Bank, Washington DC.
Winters, L. A., T. L. Walmsley, Z.K. Wang, Z.K., and R. Grynberg (2003). “Liberalizing Temporary Movement of Natural Persons: An Agenda for the Developing Round.” The World Economy, V 26, No. 8, pg 1137-1161.

Tazreena Sajjad

Published in the Forum (August 2007)

How does Bangladesh look from the vantage-point of Washington, DC?

Bangladesh’s strategic importance in international politics has become increasingly evident. Apart from its economic and cultural contributions to the South Asian region and its geographic location (proximity to India, Pakistan, China and Afghanistan), its rising prominence can be explained by the ever-expanding dimensions of the “war on terror.”

In short, the rising incidence of militant activities of extreme Islamist parties, the suppression of the rights of minorities in the name of Islam, the infiltration of exogenous religious entities, the setting up of training camps on the outskirts of the country, the enlistment of Bangladeshi men in the movements in Afghanistan, Iraq, and most recently, Lebanon, have all drawn attention to the potential dangers posed by this small country in a world that is defined by the “war on terror.”

Once described as a secular, moderate Muslim country (a description that is proudly accepted by Bangladeshis in general), Bangladesh is fast becoming a zone of “special interest” in the US State Department and in US foreign policy-making. It is time for the rediscovery of Bangladesh, this time as a Muslim country with a secular political platform.

In recent conferences on Islam’s compatibility with democracy, Bangladesh, along with Turkey, was held as a shining example of a successful marriage between secularism and religion. At the same time, the avid interest in the political developments in the country, and its role as a strategic partner in the “war to end all wars,” implies that there is growing concern about the general pattern that is emerging in the country. All of a sudden, Bangladesh presents itself as both, a threat and an ally, in this new global paradigm.

The shift from being a small South Asian nation of negligible importance to the realpolitik interests of the United States to one that has emerged as a partner in strategic, political and economic alliances has not happened overnight. The developments in

Bangladesh, and the concerns surrounding its militant activities, have been in the consciousness of policy-makers for quite a while.

Perhaps, the most prominent indicator evidencing these concerns comes in terms of the development of the Failed State Index, a newly developed comprehensive indicator that is designed to communicate the dangers of countries failing to constitute effective and operational state mechanisms.

The design of the Failed State Index was not developed in a vacuum. In July 2004, the US State Department opened the office of the Coordinator for Reconstruction and Stabilization (S/CRS). Its official mandate is to “help stabilise and reconstruct societies in transition from conflict or civil strife, so they reach a sustainable path toward peace, democracy and market economy.”

The idea of a standing nation-building office has garnered significant support in the Bush administration, along with many in the academic community and among foreign policy analysts, and key players in the Congress. One of the main points that favour such a rationale is the ingrained belief that failed states are a threat to US national security.

According to Senator Richard Lugar (R-In) of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee: “International crises are inevitable and, in most cases, US security interests will be threatened by sustained instability.” The notion that failed states are indeed direct threats to the United States has grown stronger since the September 11 attacks, and with the release of the United States National Security Strategy in 2002 and the National Intelligence Strategy document released in 2005. The latter states: “The lack of freedom in one state endangers the peace and freedom of others, and failed states are a refuge and breeding ground for terrorism.”

The bandwagon for the new policies toward actively promoting democracy-building in “failed and failing states” has never been so full. In 2005, Foreign Policy magazine published the first comprehensive Failed State Index, devised by the US Fund for Peace. With categories such as mounting demographic pressures, criminalisation or delegitimisation of the state, progressive deterioration of public services, widespread violation of human rights, uneven economic development, and sharp or severe economic decline, the index intended

to capture the full breadth of the political and economic crises that overcome countries and contribute to their instability; in the context of 9/11, they are also the breeding grounds for “terrorism,” and, hence, the nesting-grounds for anti-US threats.

How are failed states defined? In layman’s terms, they are generally categorised by what they do not, or cannot, do. Failing and failed states do not control their territory or their borders, creating the scope for groups to move in and out without hindrance. Such states also do not control many areas, which can be under control of rebels and warlords, and do not provide basic services (health, nutrition, infrastructure, public services). Finally, they cannot fulfill international treaty obligations, and agreements of international concern. The most extreme examples are, of course, places like Somalia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sudan, Haiti and, increasingly, Iraq and Afghanistan.

In 2005 and 2006, the two years in which the Failed State Index came out with its full list, Bangladesh occupied the 17th and 19th positions, respectively. The countries that were higher than Bangladesh were mostly those engaged in full blown conflicts, such as Iraq, Afghanistan, the Congo, and Somalia, and those that had high levels of political tension, such as Sierra Leone, Colombia, and North Korea.

Granted the economic performance in Bangladesh, and the existence of a legitimate centralised administration, it was weak political performance, corruption, political tension, growing marginalisation of minority groups, and the rise of militant groups that contributed to its position in the ranking system. The question then is, how far is the Failed State Index relevant to understanding the interest that Bangladesh supposedly arouses in the United States?

There are many who will contend that failed or failing states are potentially dangerous for US national security. Yet, with the trans-national nature of militant activities, as a backlash of the Afghan and Iraq wars, the grounds have been clearly established for considering the militant face of Islam as being a key reason for a closer look at Bangladesh politics. And Bangladesh has delivered. Because of allegations of jihad training camps, national bombing campaigns, threats to embassies and international NGOs, greater radicalisation of madrassas — the stronghold of political Islam — Bangladesh has made itself increasingly prominent. In the end, the existence and expansion of these networks contribute greatly to an understanding of

Bangladesh as a country that manifests some of the most critical indicators of state failure.

The response of the United States to countries labeled as failing states is many-fold. The most prominent, of course, is the enforced package of democracy under the gun. It is believed that the imposition of democratic institutions will overnight create an entrenched democratic culture; an enforcement of electoral democracy will establish viable democratic norms. While the results of these experiments are unfolding in Iraq and Afghanistan, other efforts are also underway, the newest of which is madrassa reforms in Pakistan.

It is only a matter of time before this package will also be offered to Bangladesh. Then, too, is the strategic national decision for co-optation and rejection. While Turkey has historically marginalised political Islam, Afghanistan has begun making overt efforts to integrate the Taliban into the political mainstream. In both these cases, and cases in between, the challenge is to uphold the legitimacy of some political Islamic parties while ensuring that more virulent forms do not sabotage their mandates.

In each of these cases, the cost of the choices and the mistakes made will be borne by the constituents. In the case of Bangladesh, it is well within speculation that the rise of extreme religious movements will be monitored closely, and evaluated within the new paradigm of state failure or success. While the caretaker government attempts to clear the decks, and the elected party in 2008 responds to the economic and political challenges in the country under the watchful eyes of Big Brother, the task of “managing” political Islam will perhaps be the most daunting, and most critically observed of all.

Asif Yousuf

Published in New Age (July 4, 2007)

The UN in general – and the UNDP in particular – emphasises transparency and accountability in governance. Indeed, these two are the pillars of democratic governance, one of the Millennium Development Goals. By setting this awful example that embodies neither, the UN and its agencies have simply lost the moral authority to advocate for democratic governance. Worse, the same dynamics which drive people to lose trust in opaque and unaccountable governments might undermine the people’s trust in UN agencies as well.

IN THE wake of the declaration of emergency, a lot has been written in the media about the conduct of Western diplomats in Dhaka and a mini-debate has taken place over the rightness or wrongness of their conduct. However, very little has been said of the statement issued on January 11 by the resident coordinator of the United Nations Development Programme, Renata Lok Dessallien, the highest ranking UN official in Bangladesh. Debate on this has been entirely absent in the Bangladeshi media.
The statement reiterated the concerns of the UN secretary general about the political situation prevailing then. It also declared that the UN would regard elections as non-credible and illegitimate. The curious part of the statement is towards the end: ‘The United Nations appreciates the traditional role played by the Bangladesh Armed Forces in support of previous, fully contested elections through the maintenance of law and order, so citizens can exercise their right of franchise. However, should the 22 January Parliamentary Elections proceed without participation of all major political parties, deployment of the Armed Forces in support of the election process raises questions. This may have implications for Bangladesh’s future role in UN Peacekeeping Operations.’
There are two issues at stake here. The first is the transparency and accountability of the UN system itself, while the second is the issue of Bangladeshi sovereignty.
The UNDP resident coordinator wears two hats, one formal and another somewhat informal. She not only coordinates all UN development activity in her formal role but also acts as a representative of the United Nations to Bangladesh in an informal capacity. This statement was obviously made in her latter position, because as the resident coordinator she has no say over any aspect of peacekeeping operations, which fall under the Department of Peacekeeping Operations. The question then arises as to who at the UN took the decision to link the role of our armed forces to their participation in peacekeeping operations. Needless to say, the answer to this will be highly difficult to find, given the UN’s lack of transparency and accountability to Bangladeshi citizens or, at times, their government.
Then comes the question of why such a link has been made in the first place. It makes little sense for the UN to do so for its own self-interest, in the backdrop of rising peacekeeping missions and the UN’s perennial trouble in attracting greater numbers and better quality of peacekeepers. It makes even less sense for such a link to be made for Bangladesh, which has been not only one of the biggest contributors to UN missions but has also provided peacekeepers widely regarded to have one of the best disciplinary records. Dhaka has volunteered its troops for some of the most dangerous missions even when no one else had (for instance, Rwanda) and has remained committed in the face of extreme adversity (for instance, Bihac in Bosnia during the Serbian blockade).
Even leaving these questions aside, one is forced to ask if the domestic role played by a country’s armed forces really affects their prospects of participating in UN peacekeeping operations. Given that the Pakistani armed forces staged a coup in 1999 and the leader of their armed forces is still running the country, that the Indian armed forces have regular accusations of human rights violations against them in Jammu and Kashmir, and that these two states along with Bangladesh are consistently among the top three troop contributors to the UN, one would have to answer with a resounding ‘no’.
Yet, the UN took it upon itself to make exactly such a linkage at a delicate time in Bangladesh’s history. Once again, answer to the ‘why’ of it will not be more forthcoming than the answer to the ‘who’. Once again, the lack of transparency is to blame.
Such a link between the domestic role of the armed forces and their peacekeeping role can be considered a breach of sovereignty. Indeed, that is part of the reason why the UN has been hesitant to bar South Asian peacekeepers in the past despite accusations of human rights abuses (the other reason is because it simply cannot afford to lose almost 30,000 peacekeepers). Historically, sovereignty has been a cornerstone of the UN system, and the UN has generally been reluctant to undermine it, except under extreme circumstances such as genocide, ethnic cleansing or other humanitarian crises. The situation in Bangladesh on January 11, though politically unviable, had not reached a stage where it could be classified as a (man-made) ‘humanitarian crisis’. Perhaps, I echo the sentiments of the American right-wing when I worry about the UN undermining state sovereignty. But the truth is that the UN does not have the capabilities to undermine US sovereignty, and has historically restrained itself from violating the sovereignty of its weaker member states. Bangladesh 2007 could indicate a major policy shift.
Without going into heated arguments about the UN’s accountability and transparency, and its ‘right’ or lack thereof to intervene in our domestic politics, let me outline some future, long-term consequences of this particular UN stance for the UN’s own development priorities.
The UN in general — and the UNDP in particular — emphasises transparency and accountability in governance. Indeed, these two are the pillars of democratic governance, one of the Millennium Development Goals. By setting this awful example that embodies neither, the UN and its agencies have simply lost the moral authority to advocate for democratic governance. Worse, the same dynamics which drive people to lose trust in opaque and unaccountable governments might undermine the people’s trust in UN agencies as well.
The lack of respect for state sovereignty by a more powerful actor sends yet another negative message. A healthy respect for those less powerful, for those over whom one has authority, is the very basis of the ‘bottom-up’ development agenda advocated by many (though not all) UN agencies. Such an agenda sees governments discussing issues with stakeholders to hear their concerns and get their inputs before making decisions. The only reason for Bangladeshi elites to do this would be out of respect for those over whom they have power.
True, the UN itself might regard their January 11 statement as a piece of foreign diplomacy (although once again, whose interests they would/should be pursuing is especially open to question), while its development work falls into the domestic sphere. But not everyone might be willing to make that distinction, especially for an international organisation that is highly involved with both spheres and thus comes across as a unitary actor.
Needless to say, its agencies’ credibility as an advocate of ‘listening to the grassroots’ in the domestic sphere will take a beating, if not in the eyes of the general populace, then at least in the eyes of the Bangladeshi bureaucrats and politicians for whom this message is most important. This is a pity, for true development takes place only when everyone from the grassroots above is heard, as Amartya Sen and Mahbubul Haque have argued for years. After having been witness to such an example set by the global elite, will our local elites be willing to follow UN agencies’ suggestions about ‘human development’ or ‘democratic governance’?