Features
Feather-brained project of trading rights for growth
In the South Asian region countries such as Bangladesh have over the years proved that they are very much in the forefront of development. Therefore, it comes as no surprise that they have been divested of the LDC label by the UN.
Bangladesh has soared far ahead of Sri Lanka, for instance, and in an ironic turn of developments, Sri Lanka could be considered as having reverted to the condition of an LDC, while Bangladesh is proving that it is perhaps South Asia’s second most economically-dynamic country.
Bangladesh’s vital economic statistics speak for themselves. We have it on the authority of Bangladeshi Foreign Minister Dr. A.K. Abdul Momen that the per capita income of his country has tripled within a decade, poverty has been reduced from 41.5% to 20% over the last 14 years and that she is ranked as the world’s 5th best COVID-resilient country and South Asia’s best performer.
We need to add that equally importantly, Bangladesh is today a thriving democracy. That is, she is in no way sacrificing the rights of her people on the altar of economic growth. Unfortunately, this is not so in Sri Lanka, which is seen as one of Asia’s ‘oldest democracies’. Today, Sri Lanka’s rulers are not hesitating to compromise people’s rights for perceived short-term economic gain.
As could be seen, public protests in Sri Lanka growing out of keenly experienced economic grievances are being quashed brutally by the country’s authorities. It is the belief of the current regime that the rights of the people need to be in a veritable state of suspension until economic growth is achieved. ‘Wait until the IMF bailout arrives and sooner rather than later Sri Lanka will be out of the dire economic straits it is in’, is the official credo.
In short, the bailout is the ‘magic bullet’, so to speak. However, the seasoned development thinker would have none of this. Nowhere in the world has development, correctly understood, come at the cost of people’s rights. Sri Lanka’s rulers only need to study the world’s most flourishing democracies and they would learn, if they are sincerely educating themselves, that it is a people who are keenly desirous of exercising their fundamental rights who keep governments in check and thereby ensure that the country’s resources and assets are used for development and development only.
In successful democracies, it is the people, rights-conscious and eagle-eyed, who guard against the risk of its political class living-off public money, for instance, in the form of bribery and corruption. Accordingly, a regime that believes in repression could in no way be having the best interests of the country at heart. On the contrary, it could be focused only on perpetuating its power.
It is difficult to see how any IMF bailout money could be of use to Sri Lanka as long as nothing substantial is done by the authorities about corruption and resource-misuse in public life. In other words, what assurance does the public have that the dearly longed-for IMF bailout money would not end up in the private bank accounts of corrupt politicians and public officials?
While Sri Lanka’s rulers, hopefully, ponder on the above matters, it is all too plain to see that in parts of the world state repression is continuing to take a heavy toll on people’s rights. What Russia’s Putin regime is finally aiming at in Ukraine is anybody’s guess currently, but the progressive-minded watcher of international politics is likely to be disturbed by allegations that the Russian authorities are in the process of abducting some of Ukraine’s children and taking them away to Russia for what is described as ‘rehabilitation’.
Likewise, the allegation is being made in some sections of the international media that thousands of Iranian girls are being subjected to gas attacks. These are apparently revenge attacks on these girls for their participation in the recent wave of anti-government protests in Iran.
It is up to the Russian and Iranian authorities to put the record straight on the above allegations if they do not have any foundation in fact. They would need to work cooperatively with UN agencies, such as UNICEF, to establish their credibility and ensure that the best interests of the vulnerable population groups in question are served.
In fact, the current times should be seen as an opportunity for the UN to come to its own once again in the affairs of the world. Considering that the principal powers of both West and East are at present being seen as deficient in democratic development, it is up to the UN to ensure that states, both big and small, live up to their commitments towards their publics. Population groups, vulnerable or otherwise, must be protected by their governments and making this happen comes within the purview of the UN, since most states are signatories to the cardinal conventions of the UN.
The current focus on LCDs could also have the happy result of socially-conscious governments of the South in particular once again taking up for discussion issues at the heart of development, provided the UN continues to play a catalytic role in the process.
For some decades now, development in the true sense of the word has been all but forgotten. The world’s infatuation with economic liberalization and market-led growth since the crumbling of the Cold War in the nineties, has had the effect of exiting from public discussion the true meaning of development. The latter has by and large been equated with growth.
But economic growth or a mere increase in goods and services in a country, is not synonymous with development. Development occurs when a rise in goods and services combines with re-distributive justice. That is, when goods and services are equally and fairly distributed among a country’s populace.
The latter function needs to be carried by the state and by virtue of this responsibility the state plays a principal role in development. It is a catalyst in development, which in turn decides whether a desperately poor country would qualify to be divested of LCD status or not.