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 Evaporation Drops the Temperature
by Bilal Musharraf

The working class of Pakistan, basically those who are not part of the ruling/owning class have to bring about the much needed and much awaited long-term progressive change in Pakistan. However, individuals who feel that they have the ethical/moral fiber and the financial and political clout to help and guide the working class must play their part in mobilizing the masses. Bear with me, as I try to explain an analogy that is somewhat related to these thoughts.

In Physics, we call the average kinetic energy of a body, its temperature. Let's imagine a liquid contained in a vessel with innumerable colliding molecules forming the body of the liquid. They engage in elastic collisions, gaining and losing their kinetic energy. The Central Limit Theorem (The Law of Large Numbers) in statistics tells us that given a large enough sample, all distributions will tend to a normal distribution, i.e., a significant majority of molecules in the liquid possess energy levels that are right around the average kinetic energy of the liquid (the bell shaped curve). A small minority possesses very high energy and a very small minority possesses very low energy. It is the high energy molecules that possess enough impetus to break the surface of the liquid and escape into the rarer medium above. This has a significant impact on the temperature of a liquid, because the escaping molecules have higher than 'average' energy levels.

A country like Pakistan, containing its teeming masses, is very similar. The entropy of Pakistan, or its potential to change itself is reflected by the empowerment level that the average Pakistani possesses. The overwhelming majority of people feel powerless in the scheme of things in Pakistan and in their desperation are blinded to reasoning and rationale and continue to project their ambitions on to individuals that have little to show from their past and fall short of such a responsibility. I highly recommend reading: 'Leaders, Fools, and Imposters'… a well respected book on the psycho-analysis of individuals in leadership positions.

[The author of 'Leaders, Fools, and Imposters', Manfred F. R. Kets de Vries is a practicing psychoanalyst and Raoul de Vitry d’Avaucourt chair of human resource management at the European Institute of Business Administration (INSEAD) in Fontainebleau, France. He is the author of eight books on such topics as leadership, career dynamics, and organizational diagnosis and intervention. Kets de Vries has been an executive development consultant to major corporations in the United States, Europe, and Asia.]

As Ayaz Amir wrote in Dawn some time ago:

"The tragedy is not Nawaz Sharif's who has already known more than his share of glory. The tragedy is that of the Pakistani people who while yearning and indeed waiting for heroes have always had to settle for less than heroic figures. In the present case the tragedy is two-fold because the people of Pakistan have deluded themselves. Far from anyone else betraying them, they have been betrayed by their own expectations. Nawaz Sharif was no stranger to them. They knew his strengths and weaknesses as also the history of his rise to political greatness. But driven by their own desires they saw things in him that were not there. Who is then to be blamed: Nawaz Sharif for being true to form and character or the people of Pakistan for living out another chapter of their unchanging tragedy?"

Who are the people at the two ends of the bell-shaped empowerment curve for Pakistan? At one end is a minority of individuals who possess the political/professional/financial clout to influence progressive change, and at the other is a self-centered wealthy ruling elite, that resists change and thrives on status quo.

Since the 60's, flocks of professional Pakistanis have migrated. The loss is not simply of a monetary transfer of assets or a brain drain. It is a loss in the entropy of Pakistan. The nation is increasingly left with a ruling class that is indifferent to the priority in which the fundamental needs of Pakistan need to be addressed.

In the presence of a rarer medium, a liquid will eventually dry up.

The working class of Pakistanis, inside and abroad... need to WAKE UP and influence change!

  The author works as an Actuarial Analyst, quantifying financial contingency. An avid follower of South Asia’s socio-economic and geo-political reality.
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 #23 by tariqlodi on August 22, 1999 0:01am PT

Ref:#24,
Jay.
The story of maxwell may be partly true. The reason that you don’t find every body bothering about it is that the institutions charged with the duty are performing their job to the maximum. The Britons do not have to clamour for justice. They have confidence in their legal system and there are little loopholes. The difference a criminal would find in the two societies is that there he knows that if his crime is reported, may be he can stay at large for some time. But once apprehended he does not have any chance of getting away whereas here the criminal is sure that he can stay free for ever and if apprehended his chances to freedom are numerous, although the degree and ratio of crime may be somewhat equal both areas.
tariqlodi.

 #22 by jay on August 9, 1999 6:09pm PT
saaf-go, on corruption again. Here is story from england.
nearly seven years ago, the empire that maxwell built, collapsed under a debt of 6 billion dollars. The son maxwell, said he has no money to pay, he was declared bankrupt. He registered for the unemployment benefit, turned up in a mercedes. He stayed in a 60 room manor house, in his wifes name. His children continued in the boarding school at $8000 a term, paid by the relatives. His relatives supported in him establishing a telco company and four years later he is a billionaire.
Nobody in England is palking about corruption, in a third world country it would be termed monumental corruption. Is it possible that people who have no oppertunity to amass wealth through `corruption` keep talking about corruption.

 #21 by tahmed321 on August 8, 1999 4:52pm PT
Actually, there is a much bigger wind of change than anything the expatriate Pakistanis can provide. This is the revolution in information technology and global communications which is making the progressive societies on this planet even more dynamic than before and furthermore makes the stagnant societies (like good old Pakistani society) part of the same gas tank. Of course the expat Pakisanis can and should do what they can (financial support to opening new schools, direct investments, and so on), and the global winds would seem to be on their side too.

 #20 by saaf-go on August 4, 1999 7:26pm PT
sorry for the repeat in my reply #20

 #19 by saaf-go on August 4, 1999 2:08pm PT
Re: Jay
I think corruption has an effect of undermining the economic system itself. When loans are approved without merit and the borrowers do not use it for the purposes it was meant for and the industries fail, losses mount it does have negative effect. When corruption is as institutionalized as it is in Pakistan it effects the legal and justice system. Public loses confidence in the system and govt. Long term investment dwindles. Strategic investment initiatives are passed over for ones that are more profitable for the corrupt decision-makers. That is the cost of corruption in Pakistan and other third world countries.
The cost of corruption in economic system is bad decision, which in the least leads to loss of efficiency and in the most loss of investment and failure of pubic policy. In the absence of public scrutiny (evidence of corruption of public office holders) the bank manager will pick the candidate who would provide the optimal benefit to him/her. This may not be from the two comparable competitors.

The cost of corruption in legal and justice system is citizen and human rights abuse and confidence lost in the system.
Ultimately it may lead to complete break down of the entire society.
This is when people wish for ‘GOD’ to save them because everybody else has failed them.

 #18 by saaf-go on August 4, 1999 2:08pm PT
Re: Lakhania # 18
I came here eleven years ago. For the first few years I felt much the same way that you do now. Although I am not as homesick as I used to be, I have not forgotten that home either. And I have a new home now. Success is not just material gain, it is the feeling of achievement and fulfillment. Don’t let the unnecessary guilt get in the way of your achieving your goals. If I had to do it over I will do it the same way.
Boond ko gohar bana deta hay zandane sadaff
Qaid-e-Tanhaai MaiN Ham nay Iss Liyae Katay Barass

 #17 by anajam on August 4, 1999 1:48am PT
If only it were as simple as that:
humm nay jabb waadi-e-ghurbat mein qadam rakha tha
douur takk yaad-i-watan aayee thii samjhanay ko

 #16 by macgupta on August 3, 1999 6:38pm PT
:Who are the people at the two ends of the :bell-shaped empowerment curve for
akistan? At one end is a minority of individuals :who possess the political/professional/financial :clout to influence progressive change, and at the ther is a self-centered wealthy ruling elite, :that resists change and thrives on status quo.
A wise man said that two fundamental mistakes are that people who lack external decorations -- wealth, power, education, connections -- consider themselves to be powerless or even worthless, and that society considers such people powerless or worthless.
The same mistake is being perpetuated in this article. It is a difficult mistake to avoid.
-arun gupta

 #15 by jay on August 3, 1999 6:38pm PT
saaf-go,
wait on, I was not talking about that type of corruption. I was talking about a situation where there are two `competing` investments, the one who pays bribe to th bank manager gets the loan. In such a situation, corruption is only a transaction cost, abank charge, collected by the manager, which effectively increases his pay, and has no adverse economic effect.
Now coming to your point, the type of system you are taliking about, can only exist at a relatively small level. For example, if the loans are not `invested` in an economically sound manner, it will be impossible to repay the loans, the non performing looans of the banks will increase and usually when it reaches around 40% of the loan portfolio, the bank will collapse.
The fact that there are still private and public sector banks still op[erating in pakistan is the proof that you are exagerating the level of corruption. Have you heard of `grmeen bank` in bangladesh, it is not a small time operation, more than US$ one billion has been lent with non performing loans at less than 5%.

 #14 by lakhania on August 3, 1999 6:38pm PT
It has been 1 year since I came to US for my education. I find it hard to explain how this year has been for me.. Saying that it has been the worst year of my life simply won`t do the justice. I sometimes think why am i doing this? I would have got addmission in a good university in karachi.. I had a good life in karachi.. friends.. parents.. i left them all to achieve the dream every student have. After 4 years of hard work, sleepless nights, haunting images of my college days.. when I get my degree and about half a doson good job offers.. what am i gona do..?? what am I supposed to do??? should i take a good offer and capatilize on four years of hard work or should i continue to suffer and come back to repay my country for the identity it has given me.. this is a question which is faced by a 1000 students of my university. A lot of them will probabbly go back. but i dont have those guts. it is hard to let go of success that you achieved of hard work. it doesnt mean that i dont love my country.. it is just that i am not a hero that my motherland wants me to be.

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