If a society can achieve equality of condition, then it no longer requires an equality of opportunity.
ISLAMABAD: The preamble of the Constitution to Pakistan promises equality of status, equality of opportunity and social justice for all citizens. It expresses a resolve to create an egalitarian society. But for multifarious reasons, including absence of continuity of democratic process, inefficiencies of the electoral system, dynamics of party politics which favours wealth and age-old social hierarchy, we have been practically unable to make any headway towards achieving the constitutional objective of promoting egalitarianism.
After six decades of chequered sociopolitical progression, the recent developments like the rise of a free media and judicial activism have offered a new hope for social reformation, without which any material development would be of not much significance.
Creation of a just and egalitarian society as promised in the constitution requires political will and a policy response from government, but before that, a clear understanding of the concept of equality is of utmost importance. The constitution provides for the opportunity of status, which enshrines equal rights and obligations under the law. While the equality of condition means equality in the enjoyment of all things that people value in a society, but it is generally argued that attempts to attain equality of condition lead to a sacrifice of either liberty or efficiency or both. The constitution promises equality of opportunity as a workable compromise between social ideals and material realities. This means that rather than pursuing a utopian society where all are equal, a level playing field should be offered to all citizens so that they can make use of individual talent for upward social mobility. A practical example of equality of opportunity is the modern occupational structure, which encourages recruitment by competition. But to what extent this idea of equality of opportunity offers fair chances to all in our existing social environment is questionable.
Equality of opportunity does not try to eliminate social distinction; it tries only to enable individuals to progress based on merit. A bit deeper examination of the idea of equality of opportunity reveals a catch-22 scenario because a social system promoting equal opportunity does not eliminate social inequalities. Rather it replaces the traditional social hierarchy-based inequalities with other inequalities based on differences of natural endowment like unequal human intelligence, distinct social background and circumstances, and the element of chance. If mental ability be considered as nature’s gift and occupational standing as society’s reward, then it is logical to expect that social inequalities will express natural inequalities. But practically it is not the case as the biological incident of birth into a specific social background remains an additional pivotal determinant in our societal structure of inequalities. Therefore it may be wrong to attribute success or failure in competition solely to natural endowment without paying due attention to social circumstance or to chance.
When people talk about social inequalities as an expression of natural inequalities, they make use of fiction and mistake it for the truth. It makes very little sense to talk of distributing rewards according to capacity when it is well known that the capacities of some are stunted and that of others pampered by their social environment. How are we to ensure that every member of the community has equal chances of using his natural endowments to the fullest without first creating equality of condition?
The complexity of problem lies in the fact that without equality of condition, the equality of opportunity remains an elusive idea. If a society can achieve equality of condition, then it no longer requires an equality of opportunity. It requires to be settled whether there is a societal will to compromise efficiency for compensatory opportunities to reduce prevailing gaps between different social layers, which means helping the neediest by protective discrimination, or whether the society wants to adhere to Darwinian weeding-out of the less fit, either by virtue of natural or social reasons.
Jehanzeb Awan
Published in The Express Tribune, April 21st, 2014.
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