The narrative of the middle class — I

Certain circles in Pakistan are conceptually endorsing the recent movement in India by Anna Hazare against corruption of politicians. Mr Hazare’s protest is great except that it does not talk about the corruption of corporate India or the civil bureaucracy, which represent the middle class. Sadly, since the middle class has tools to dominate the narrative, they are viewed as drivers of change. Meanwhile, this class loves to criticise politicians because they are easier to target and also to remove when we don’t like them. In India, this process of removing politicians takes the form of election and, in Pakistan, it means military coups or socio-political engineering. In any case, the politicians are under greater microscopic examination than the middle class bureaucracy or other actors. A massive propaganda against bribe-receiving civil bureaucrats in India and military bureaucrats in Pakistan is a rarity.

The problem at the moment is that, despite being as predatory as the traditional elite, the middle class presents itself as rather angelic, mainly due to its ability to control the narrative of both the state and society. Since it is educated, it monopolises media and communication within the country and with the outside world. It uses this influence to knit the myth of the imagined progressive tendencies of the middle class. Progress for them basically means neo-liberalism and economic development. This class posits itself as an alternative to the redundant traditional elite, one which will rescue the uneducated masses who have no capacity to bring change.

In Pakistan, like in India, this upcoming middle and upper-middle class, is highly opportunistic and politicised while being extremely apolitical at the same time. This means that they do not have the patience to struggle through the political system. In Pakistan, for instance, the majority will not even bother to vote but is very critical of politics since they consider this traditional. The political system is shunned because it comprises of dynastic systems. Interestingly, they don’t consider it dynastic behaviour when senior bureaucrats get lucrative jobs or dole out opportunities for their kith and kin. Or even when they are in the political system, power is sought through getting embedded with authoritarian elements of the state or through the power of the gun. The MQM in Pakistan is an example of this. Actually, the middle class has no problem with authoritarianism so long as it installs its members in power.

One of the issues with the middle class in most post-colonial states is that it is more in tune with western social and material development and is frustrated by the slow pace of local politics, which is built around the less-lucky common man. But the change over time is that, in the past, this middle class would turn into Jawaharlal Nehru and muddy their hands in mass politics. The present-day middle class is more elitist and colonial in its attitude and more authoritarian in the way it perceives political change. It does not want to admit that the middle class massively contributes towards the clientelistic orientation of the political system, like everyone else in the country. In fact, clientelism becomes imperative in a society with huge natural disparities.

In Pakistan, this upcoming middle class, estimated at 30 million, proposes to challenge the existing political system through authoritarian means, popularly called the Bangladesh model. In Dhaka, the middle class tried bringing change through building a partnership with the military. The common man, however, did not give up on the political system.

Referring to Pakistan, the middle class narrative expresses frustration with politics because the latter has been unable to deliver true democracy. Such a notion does not bother to remind the people of the fact that Pakistan did not have democracy after 1977. The 1990s were not a decade of democratic rule but of democracy in transition as democracy constantly being ejected by the military, controlling the system from the backseat.

The years under Musharraf were no different except that the style was altered. Instead of sacking the entire parliament, Musharraf kicked out the prime minister and his cabinet. The middle class narrative conveniently ignores the fact that Musharraf parachuted a Citibanker into the political system from constituencies he had never visited. The banker disappeared into oblivion as soon as he lost his job. But I guess he had the right label — middle class.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 17^th, 2011.