12-15-2004, 12:17 PM
http://www.hindu.com/br/2004/12/14/stories...21400071600.htm
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--> GOVERNANCE AND THE SCLEROSIS THAT HAS SET IN: Arun Shourie; Rupa & Co.,
7/16, Ansari Road, Daryaganj, New Delhi-110002. Rs. 395.
THIS IS a book that could be written by only one man named Arun Shourie â passionate, intelligent, opinionated, totally consumed by his own self-image as the only man who knows what is wrong with the Indian system and how that system can be repaired.
He regales the reader with miles and miles of details of stupid babus, stupider politicians, and stupidest ministers, all of who engage in this benumbing, time-consuming, energy-sapping, creativity-draining charade called "governance". He calls it a "mindless, endless shuffling in slow motion;" it is now a collective habit and has come to infect every aspect of governance.
For an `enabling state'
The system is almost beyond redemption; the only thing that can be done to save it is by debunking it. His moral is that "the way to reform this system is not to tinker with this procedure or that institution, but to just jettison the function, to hack away the limb where this is possible."
The rub is defining "where this is possible" because politicians and bureaucrats pitch in (often on behalf of the unwholesome economic forces) to prevent the "possible" from taking place.
Status quo has its rationale as well as its beneficiaries. Rather passionately Shourie points out the cumulative effect of the sclerosis that the country earns a "reputation", an image that slows down and even discourages the foreign investor. This has to change. The very nature of the Indian state has to change; it must become an "enabling state."
Administration
Shourie was a minister for nearly five years in the National Democratic Alliance Government. In that capacity he was privy to a zillion files, documents â secret, confidential, official â useless papers, which routinely get stamped "confidential". He is thus well armed with reams of details from which to pick and choose to make his indictment of the Indian political system.
And, like an experienced polemicist, he chooses the convenient facts to make a good and impressive case. The reader feels overwhelmed, but not necessarily becomes any wiser.
This would have been a far more useful, even insightful book if the author had opted to name the names or given a flavour of some of the celebrated policy fights he was involved in, in the Union Cabinet. We must perhaps wait for another book, a less hurried enterprise from him.
Politics and power
He was part of a political crowd that saw itself different than the Congress-oriented regimes that allegedly mucked up the governance. But he gives no insight if his government tried to do things differently or had any idea how to fix it. The problem is that governance is about power â its most deadly manifestation being economic power â and political parties and their disputes are used to camouflage this unvarnished fact.
Political leaders who claim to be infused with ideology, ideals and idealism often turn out to be front-man for this or that economic interest. A bad, ungovernable system survives because those with economic clout invariably manage to cut the corners, bend the rules, slow down the procedures, or simply abuse the procedure, or define the issues and set the agenda as to what the public servants and political leaders should do.
Those with economic power control the levers of public discourse; and, soon, "enterprise" is confused with bribing the babu, hosannas are sung in honour of those who built fortunes by bending the rules and corrupting the system. Shourie does not share with the reader his experience in the government of how the powerful corporate interests would defeat the very purpose of de-bureaucratisation and would not permit the transition to a regulatory regime.
Even the intelligence agencies are used to manufacturing "security concerns" in order to prevent/promote foreign investments in this or that "strategic sector". Alas, he does not offer any insight on this count. Nor does he acknowledge the difficulty in bringing about drastic and dramatic changes, especially in the context of prevailing political disputes and disagreements.
Culture of accusation
A culture of accusation â beginning perhaps with the Bofors episode â has made everybody wary of doing things differently, because there is nobody to defend the honest against a frivolous and motivated accusation. We have neither had strong nor stable prime ministers who would inspire the government- administrators to be creative.
Strong economic interests do not prefer strong and stable governments. What is even worse is that the Indian political class has achieved a near "consensus" â that debilitating instrument of the status quo â that it would not look too deeply into cases of leaders' corruption and malfeasance.
The government, of which the author was a part, has destroyed a myth that it takes only a handful of dedicated deshbakhts to turn things around. This passionate book, then, invites a question. Supposing there were a dozen honest, hard working, sincere, intelligent Arun Shouries available to a prime minister, would they have been able to make a dramatic difference? Perhaps.
HARISH KHARE <!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--> GOVERNANCE AND THE SCLEROSIS THAT HAS SET IN: Arun Shourie; Rupa & Co.,
7/16, Ansari Road, Daryaganj, New Delhi-110002. Rs. 395.
THIS IS a book that could be written by only one man named Arun Shourie â passionate, intelligent, opinionated, totally consumed by his own self-image as the only man who knows what is wrong with the Indian system and how that system can be repaired.
He regales the reader with miles and miles of details of stupid babus, stupider politicians, and stupidest ministers, all of who engage in this benumbing, time-consuming, energy-sapping, creativity-draining charade called "governance". He calls it a "mindless, endless shuffling in slow motion;" it is now a collective habit and has come to infect every aspect of governance.
For an `enabling state'
The system is almost beyond redemption; the only thing that can be done to save it is by debunking it. His moral is that "the way to reform this system is not to tinker with this procedure or that institution, but to just jettison the function, to hack away the limb where this is possible."
The rub is defining "where this is possible" because politicians and bureaucrats pitch in (often on behalf of the unwholesome economic forces) to prevent the "possible" from taking place.
Status quo has its rationale as well as its beneficiaries. Rather passionately Shourie points out the cumulative effect of the sclerosis that the country earns a "reputation", an image that slows down and even discourages the foreign investor. This has to change. The very nature of the Indian state has to change; it must become an "enabling state."
Administration
Shourie was a minister for nearly five years in the National Democratic Alliance Government. In that capacity he was privy to a zillion files, documents â secret, confidential, official â useless papers, which routinely get stamped "confidential". He is thus well armed with reams of details from which to pick and choose to make his indictment of the Indian political system.
And, like an experienced polemicist, he chooses the convenient facts to make a good and impressive case. The reader feels overwhelmed, but not necessarily becomes any wiser.
This would have been a far more useful, even insightful book if the author had opted to name the names or given a flavour of some of the celebrated policy fights he was involved in, in the Union Cabinet. We must perhaps wait for another book, a less hurried enterprise from him.
Politics and power
He was part of a political crowd that saw itself different than the Congress-oriented regimes that allegedly mucked up the governance. But he gives no insight if his government tried to do things differently or had any idea how to fix it. The problem is that governance is about power â its most deadly manifestation being economic power â and political parties and their disputes are used to camouflage this unvarnished fact.
Political leaders who claim to be infused with ideology, ideals and idealism often turn out to be front-man for this or that economic interest. A bad, ungovernable system survives because those with economic clout invariably manage to cut the corners, bend the rules, slow down the procedures, or simply abuse the procedure, or define the issues and set the agenda as to what the public servants and political leaders should do.
Those with economic power control the levers of public discourse; and, soon, "enterprise" is confused with bribing the babu, hosannas are sung in honour of those who built fortunes by bending the rules and corrupting the system. Shourie does not share with the reader his experience in the government of how the powerful corporate interests would defeat the very purpose of de-bureaucratisation and would not permit the transition to a regulatory regime.
Even the intelligence agencies are used to manufacturing "security concerns" in order to prevent/promote foreign investments in this or that "strategic sector". Alas, he does not offer any insight on this count. Nor does he acknowledge the difficulty in bringing about drastic and dramatic changes, especially in the context of prevailing political disputes and disagreements.
Culture of accusation
A culture of accusation â beginning perhaps with the Bofors episode â has made everybody wary of doing things differently, because there is nobody to defend the honest against a frivolous and motivated accusation. We have neither had strong nor stable prime ministers who would inspire the government- administrators to be creative.
Strong economic interests do not prefer strong and stable governments. What is even worse is that the Indian political class has achieved a near "consensus" â that debilitating instrument of the status quo â that it would not look too deeply into cases of leaders' corruption and malfeasance.
The government, of which the author was a part, has destroyed a myth that it takes only a handful of dedicated deshbakhts to turn things around. This passionate book, then, invites a question. Supposing there were a dozen honest, hard working, sincere, intelligent Arun Shouries available to a prime minister, would they have been able to make a dramatic difference? Perhaps.
HARISH KHARE <!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->