These roots dig deep
As a principle, changing the status quo requires the application of a certain amount of force. The principle’s appeal is nearly universal ranging from the sciences to governance. The issue of resistance is especially prevalent in the latter category, where reform of any sort is a process fraught with peril and susceptible to dying an inglorious, whimpering death.
Primarily, the reform process stalls when not enough political capital has been allocated to pushing the process forward. Seen as a process of production, reforming the government requires the allocation of political capital to manufacture a certain outcome – i.e.: improved governance. The wider the mandate of the process, the larger will be the amount of political capital required to attain the desired outcome. Reforming the bureaucracy, a substantially taxing reform, will exhaust substantially more political capital as compared to providing subsidies to farmers.
Of governance reforms, implementing an anti-corruption drive has been an especially arduous process chequered by failures the world over. Even more so for developing countries where the state has had a historically large role to play in citizens’ lives and where state patronage has been an accepted historical phenomenon. Pakistan’s state, as a case in point, has been a major source of succour for its citizens especially since the development of a vibrant private sector has been a recent phenomenon.
Given the country’s historical dependence on the state, Pakistan’s gatekeepers of state patronage have been involved in practices that will have breached the current standard definition for corruption, ‘The use of public office for private gain’ (some by a great degree, others not so much). Resistance to corruption reform then emanates primarily from such individuals, as they see their grip on state patronage shrinking with an increased emphasis on transparency leading to higher risk levels for rent seeking.
Resentment arising from an erosion of power is the source of resistance. The magnitude of resistance that the process faces will depend upon the expansiveness of the proposed chronological order of investigations. An expansive timeline which includes older cases is likely to be resisted by a larger number of individuals as they see themselves becoming potential targets for investigations. This will lead to a more concerted effort by affected parties to scuttle the process. This is often done successfully as these ‘affected parties’ belong to the upper most tiers in the power hierarchy.
This leaves us with a balancing act between two courses of action, one that brings greater moral satisfaction through prosecuting all who have committed a crime and the other which is more practical and allows for desired outcomes. Weighing in these two paths, the decision then is to fix a chronological starting point for whence to commence investigations.
As in the Panama TORs originally presented by the Government, the contention was that the scope of investigations ought to extend from inception of the state to present times. A theoretically sound proposition because any timeline chosen beyond the state’s inception is likely to be subjective. However, for all practical purposes such a timeline is not likely to be even remotely feasible.
Apart from being impractical there is the issue of resistance being greater as a more historically extensive timeline is chosen. Going farther into the past will result in a greater number of people being investigated, which increases resistance and chances of failure of the process. To get the process off the ground and allow it to build credibility in the eyes of the people, past crimes will need to be ignored.
In order to minimise resistance to the process, only crimes committed after the anti-corruption body’s inception ought to be open for investigation. Ensuring firstly: that the authorities in charge of investigations have an objective starting point, and that secondly: not as many people feel threatened by the anti-corruption body. When, in 2016, authorities start digging up cases from 2012, the circle of potential suspects grows, ensuring the opposition of all those who feel remotely threatened by the anti-corruption body.
Start in the present – have less people opposing the process. While there will still be opposition to the process, it will be less vocal than would be the case if the process started at some subjective point in the past. Smaller political capital will be required to overcome opposition with the balance being used to prosecute and investigate rather than fending off legislative and judicial threats to the process. Here, focus is key.
Hong Kong’s ICAC (Independent Commission Against Corruption) started off by having a wide ranging chronological mandate. Similarly, Indonesia’s successful anti-corruption body the KPK (Komisi Pemberantasan Korupsi) also had a similarly expansive mandate. In both cases. It became evident that the amount of resistance the organizations would face for scouring through older corruption cases had the potential to derail the projects altogether.
The main principle of economics, allocating limited resources to unlimited wants applies to governance too. Any government will have a number of priorities to attend to and each priority will require the allocation of both financial and political capital. For corruption reform, allocated political capital has the tendency to evaporate surprisingly quickly, thus it is doubly important that corruption bodies have a laser sharp focus on attaining outcomes. Design programs to attain outcomes and not get smothered in judicial and legislative challenges.
