It’s back. That vague, all-encompassing term, ‘Islamic Welfare State’. Imran Khan has been advocating it loudly in his recent speeches; but so have been the Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam (JUI), Jamat-i-Islami (JI) and the like. During his party’s impressive rally in Karachi, Khan equated his concept of such a state with the celebrated welfare states of Scandinavian countries, albeit with a twist.
He said the state he is envisioning will be based on the dictates of collective economic well being and justice found in Islam. He said if the Scandinavians converted to Islam they’d consequentially become better Muslims than us. The question is: if one is able to achieve the task of making masses of people benefit from the many advantages of a well-oiled welfare state without involving religion, shouldn’t that be taken as an example instead of the social and theological complications that religion can throw up in this context?
Anyway, it can also be convincingly argued that the western concept of the welfare state that Khan is quoting emerged from economic manoeuvres of staunchly secular social democratic parties, and through a conscious effort by these parties to separate the church from the state. In other words, especially in Europe, the welfare state was a direct consequence of a strong secular tradition that was highly suspicious of the church (for being on the side of the aristocracy and capitalist monopolists).
The European concept of the welfare state offered itself as a middle-ground between radical Marxist anti-theism and dogmatic economic regimentation and the unchecked capitalism and aristocratic oligarchies. All the while many of these economic and political sections remained allied to the religious forces.
Organised religions have always had the tendency to side with (or be used by) those elites that attempt to halt reformist manoeuvres that may pull the people away from the orbit of religious institutions and of those economic sections that resist any kind of limits put on their profit-making. In Pakistan as well, religious institutions and parties have had a history of siding with the economic and political interests of the ‘establishment’.
This is an establishment that has tried to safeguard its interests mostly through military dictators or through a cosmetic democracy punctuated by constant interference in civilian affairs. It can do so by using religious parties which eventually end up endorsing the ways of this establishment as being something close to ‘Pakistan ideology’ and therefore, religion. Thus, the slogan of the Islamic welfare state is not exactly a culmination (as Imran suggests) of Jinnah’s original vision, but rather, it has evolved directly from the slogan of ‘Nizam-i-Mustafa’ first raised by the right-wing anti-Bhutto coalition, the Pakistan National Alliance (PNA), in 1977.
Interestingly, the ‘Nizam-i-Mustafa’ slogan was a reaction to Z A. Bhutto’s (and the PPP’s) slogan of ‘Masawat-i-Muhammadi’ (Islamic socialism), crafted to pad his socialist manoeuvres from the criticism he was receiving from the religious parties and the establishment. The two conveniently denounced Bhutto’s plans for economic and land reforms as being ‘non-Islamic’. It is thus not surprising that the PNA was a recipient of generous funds from traders and industrialists bitten by Bhutto’s (albeit badly managed) nationalisation.
The slogan of ‘Nizam-i-Mustafa’ was soon picked up by the Ziaul Haq dictatorship, and it was Zia who first expressed it as meaning to be the setting up of an Islamic welfare state. His model was Saudi Arabia — itself a 20th century theological dystopia with pretentions of being the Islamic Utopia initially visualised by political Islamists such as Abul Ala Maudoodi and Syed Qutb.
Religion is a moral guide. But when this guide is turned into a rigid political manifesto and used to derive social and political legislation from, it does not help one build a welfare state as such; it actually ends up strengthening the forces to which most modern economic and social reforms appear as being akin to imposition of heathen ideas. This is exactly what happened during Bhutto’s Islamic socialism and more so, during Zia’s era of Islamic state.
The Islamic welfare state that he promised only helped strengthen obscurantist sections of society, and gave birth to an enterprising but conservative bourgeoisie who are inherently opposed to the concept of the welfare state. To them such a proposition smacks of a state using their money to subsidise services to those who, to them, are not willing to work hard.
Thanks to Zia, the whole concept of Islamic welfare state is not only vague, but it has for reasons discussed come down to mean a populist promise but with an extremely elitist and at times, outright obscurantist agenda. This was also the slogan carried around by Nawaz Sharif’s PML-N in the 1990s, until one fine day he decided to get the parliament to crown him as ameerul momineen (commander of the faithful). And now here we are hearing that slogan again.
This not only proves that we have refused to learn from the economic, political and cultural debacles brought on by the state dabbling in legislation derived from what are basically moral guidelines, but also the fact that the establishment continues to use religion and political convolutions like ‘Islamic state’ as a way to safeguard its and its allies’ economic and political interests. This it does by keeping all thought of genuine economic and political reforms at bay.
