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A state fails when its polity is sick and in the grip of structural violence. According to famous Norwegian sociologist Johan Galtung, structural violence is a more insidious form of violence than the direct violence evidenced by wars and bloodshed. It is a system of inequity embedded in the social, political and economic structure of a country that perpetuates inequality between the dominant and the dominated. State writ atrophies when the iron grip of the structure of inequality asphyxiates access to equal opportunities, education and health to deprived segments of the population that keep getting poorer as the rich get richer.
A quick glance at Pakistan’s development landscape yields disturbing indicators about social polarisation and income inequality. Vertical inequality induced by apathetic governance is inexorably leading towards horizontal inequalities where communities are discriminated against on the basis of ethnicity, fuelling communal disharmony.According to a report by the US State Department, Pakistan’s Gini coefficient is 0.60, indicating significant income inequalities. A latest ER index that measured Pakistan’s social polarisation also yielded unflattering results about the gulf between the affluent segment and the middle class with a disturbing 10 percent of the middle class having joined the poor category by mid-2014. The above is corroborated by a recent household survey report that measured income disparities between the rich and the poor in the last 25 years. According to that report, the income of the richest 20 percent of the households has been a whopping seven percent higher than the poorest 20 percent in the last 25 years.
A quick glance at Pakistan’s development landscape yields disturbing indicators about social polarisation and income inequality. Vertical inequality induced by apathetic governance is inexorably leading towards horizontal inequalities where communities are discriminated against on the basis of ethnicity, fuelling communal disharmony.According to a report by the US State Department, Pakistan’s Gini coefficient is 0.60, indicating significant income inequalities. A latest ER index that measured Pakistan’s social polarisation also yielded unflattering results about the gulf between the affluent segment and the middle class with a disturbing 10 percent of the middle class having joined the poor category by mid-2014. The above is corroborated by a recent household survey report that measured income disparities between the rich and the poor in the last 25 years. According to that report, the income of the richest 20 percent of the households has been a whopping seven percent higher than the poorest 20 percent in the last 25 years.
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