Bangladesh 2.0: The blueprint for national renewal
A hard reset, a new dawn, a v2.0 of the nation state. How to build back better?
July 20th, 2024, Dhaka: It’s Day 2 of the government-imposed internet and communications blackout for 170 million people and the ‘shoot-on-sight’ curfew imposed by the then Sheikh Hasina government to crack down on protestors. I’m at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport returning from my employment holidays. It’s utter and total chaos with multiple flights grounded (unsurprisingly the airlines need the internet to run their systems) and mobs of angry men and women. For the next 72 hours, I couldn’t communicate with my family. Not knowing if they are alive or dead. In the ‘darkness’ that ensued, the then Bangladesh government forces would go on to kill hundreds of students and children and knock on door-to-door to illegally detain thousands.
Fig 1.1: Rising Sun in a New Bangladesh
August 5th, 2024, London: I’m sure you’ve heard the news by now. As I write this, Goliath has been brought down. King Louis XVI’s female incarnate in many ways, Sheikh Hasina, the former Prime Minister of Bangladesh, has resigned and fled the country.
Fig 1.2: Former Prime Minister of Bangladesh, Sheikh Hasina
The citizen-led student protestors stormed the ‘Gono Bhaban’ the PM’s residence, just like the French (in their battle to establish democracy) did in the 18th century, storming and ransacking King Louis XVI’s palace. We’re probably not too proud of the vandalism and the looting. But the big picture is: it’s a win for democracy, it’s a win for the people.
Fig 1.3: Bangladeshi protesters stormed the palace of the fallen Prime Minister
For quick context for the unaware reader, after 3 sham ‘elections’ the Bangladesh government of Hasina struggled for legitimacy. The background to that is also, in the last 15 years, her government conducted thousands of extrajudicial killings, illegal arrests, detentions, etc (with many draconian laws that were passed not limited to but including the Digital Security Act (DSA), which allowed the government to incarcerate citizens for speaking online against the government).
Fig 1.4: Digital Security Act - The Tool of Abuse in Bangladesh
It's a classic dictator’s playbook, though; no surprises there. However, without going into too much context, I’ll give the short version to you, the reader. A student-led protest against government job quotas turned into a massive national uprising against Sheikh Hasina and her cronies. The internal ‘Khob’ we call it in Bengali, or pent-up grudge and frustration of the people, was bottled up. But it just required the right situation to present itself. That situation was enabled via these heroic student-protestors (i.e., Bangladesh's population has a median age of 27, a very young country).
Much like what the Nobel-prize-winning American economist Milton Friedman mentioned:
"Only a crisis—actual or perceived—produces real change. When that crisis occurs, the actions that are taken depend on the ideas that are lying around. That, I believe, is our basic function: to develop alternatives to existing policies, to keep them alive and available until the politically impossible becomes politically inevitable." (Milton Friedman)
It was politically impossible just a month ago, but now it's an unmistakable reality. Bangladesh has a once-in-a-generation opportunity to 'clean up' its act: get rid of authoritarianism, corruption, and incompetence and trigger a national renewal (with strong functional institutions and honest, legitimate leadership).
We’ve won this race, but the tournament is still up for grabs. There are, rightly so, question marks about the ultimate trajectory of the country.
Now that the dictator has been toppled, I’m sure an interim government will be formed (with consensus-based participation of the student protestors too) along with some sort of transition to fresh democratic elections. One of my boyhood heroes Nobel Laureate Dr.Muhammad Yunus has been confirmed as the head of the interim government.
Fig 1.5: Nobel Laureate Dr. Muhammad Yunus in 2017. He’ll have his hands pretty full.
But in this piece, I shall outline my hopes, dreams, and aspirations for a ‘new’ Bangladesh. I shall outline some ideals and activities that we must do and cannot, in any way, compromise on.
The universe gives us chances, but we as humans have to use our energies and intelligence to convert that into winning outcomes. We should be wary of the fumbles and mistakes of ‘1/11’, where in 2007, the then Bangladesh Army Chief Moeen U Ahmed, found himself in a similar position as the current Chief Waker-uz-Zaman. But in the end he ‘dropped the ball’ as one might say i.e ended up doing some backroom deals with ill-intentioned politicians and missed a great opportunity to clean up the country and set it on a new positive trajectory (unfortunately that’s when Sheikh Hasina did come to power).
In outlining my points, I must tell you, beloved reader, that I’m no policy expert or politician. I’m merely a commoner who loves to read, write, and build technology-enabled institutions (both public and private). But this is, precisely why also I’m best placed to share this with you. Too much compromised punditry and over-reliance on career politicians is what brought us here to this mess in the first place 53 years after independence.
I’m here to give you fresh, creative ideas for what I hope will be a national renewal. A 2nd independence for Bangladesh.
Also, in reading these, I want you to get rid of your biases about the art of the possible for the future. No state-building is ‘one size fits all’.
I’ve sat down and spoken to world leaders who’ve built the most amazing institutions. There are some good heuristics and frameworks to guide, but there is no ‘silver bullet.’ So, we don’t need to limit our thinking to the models of the past. We can creatively problem-solve our own while learning from the past but not being limited by it. We’ve shown we can do this already with the bottoms-up toppling of a dictator.
For myself personally, I think we need to focus the following things to initiate a permanent national renewal:
National Reconciliation and Healing: the country has suffered a lot not only in the last few weeks of protests (dead bodies of young protestors are still discovered as we speak) but also in the last 15 years, thousands of extrajudicial killings, murders, arrests, etc. To have a ‘clean slate’ and a fresh start, we need to bring every single person responsible for these transgressions to justice. We also won’t be the first people to do this; we should look to the amazing work that smaller countries like Rwanda have done in setting up their own commissions after a civil war and trying the perpetrators.
Transparency and Anti-corruption measures: there is no halfway house on this one. There are many reasons governments fail, but the primary one is corruption, and we’re doing badly in this (Bangladesh ranks 149th out of 180 countries in the Corruption Perception Index). Not just an ‘Anti-corruption Commission (ACC)’ to solve our problems, but we should create a hub and spoke model of anti-corruption fighting wherein the ‘hub’ would be the strongly fortified ACC with legally backed tools but also have a ‘spoke’ which would be a branch of ACC in every single institution of the country (from police to government departments). This special group of honest, forthright, and ingenious men and women will be equipped with the intelligence, data, and legal remit necessary to ‘eliminate’ corruption from the soil of the country. Examples should also be made from the last 15 years of corruption by the Sheikh Hasina government and the billions of dollars that were corrupted away. In the medium term, in every government institution, we should utilize ‘open data’ (a fancy term for putting things online) to enhance transparency. For example, it should be made a law that every government department and institution publish their yearly audits (of revenues and expenditures including all line items) online on their websites for the public to review, verify, and hold them accountable.
Anti-brain drain measures: Due to the draconian laws, killings, and illegal detention by the previous government, a lot of the talented and patriotic Bengalis have left the country. Bengalis are the 3rd largest ethnicity in the world. There are so many of us spread out everywhere. But the nation-state is only as good as the people living in it. It’s tough for the government to make top-down changes if the constituency itself lacks quality. The interim government should aim to create a commission that speedily facilitates the usage of these brilliant minds no matter where they are in the world. They don’t even need to be physically present in Bangladesh. We live in a post-COVID internet-pervasive age as the American technologist Balaji Srinivasan says “You might be geographically landlocked but you are not cloud locked”. In other words, the ‘cloud’ or the internet is our tool for freedom and prosperity. We should create online communities and online citizen assemblies that act as a ‘shadow’ help and consultation team for every government department. These best minds will be doing pro-bono (and sometimes paid) research, gathering data, and giving world-class advice to all government departments and institutions (think of it like an advisory ‘shadow cabinet’ that the UK government has.)
Building strong institutions: If we do 1, 2 and 3, then point 4 will become way easier. Strong functional institutions are the bedrock of a strong state. Politics and the culture of ‘dirty politics’ that we have, should all ideally over time go ‘into the background’. Institutions like the courts, defense forces, and government departments should independently work (with non-corrupt highly capable civil servants) no matter which political party comes to power. This is quite a key distinction that I’ve noticed in more mature democracies (in the US, UK, etc) versus newer ones. This is something that quite surprised me too, but all civil servants in the UK are ‘politically neutral’. They do have a one-on-one social contract with the state (they vote in elections). But they are empowered, and the institutions are empowered to carry on functioning without any overreach of power by politicians. (if anything, in the US, one has the opposite problem, e.g., career-tenured state civil servants end up having tremendous control over the political class, i.e., you might have heard about the US CIA and allegations of the ‘deep state’).
Obsession with KPIs and getting better: How will you know if you’re doing well if you’re not measuring your performance? How will you know you’ve achieved your goals if you don’t have well-set goals in the first place? There are lots of lessons we can learn from small turnaround states. Estonia is a great example, going from a small Soviet backwater to one of the most technologically advanced societies in the world. In my recent podcast interview with the former Prime Minister of Estonia, Taavi Roivas, who spearheaded these initiatives, he mentioned something that I found quite interesting. Basically, every Estonian is obsessed with KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) and rankings or measurement targets. And all of them, irrespective of their industry, are singularly focused on hitting and bettering those. Whether it be KPIs/rankings in law and order (human rights index, corruption index, judicial independence rate, crime rate etc), economy (GDP growth, unemployment rate, inflation rate) to infrastructure (housing affordability index, logistics performance index etc). For us to develop, every institution in the country should set yearly KPI/ranking targets and publish them online for everybody to scrutinize. They can be reviewed quarterly but if they don’t hit them, all ministers and leaders should conduct ‘retrospectives’ on why that was the case and what actions are we to take to remove blockers so we can do better next quarter. The entire exercise should be transparent (unless it includes national security issues) and should be part of the government’s open data initiative.
Renewing the national identity: What does it mean to be a Bangladeshi? I’ve always asked myself that question. Are we ‘just another Indo-aryan aka Indian-type folks’. How do we reconcile the majority Muslim persuasion that the country has? I think the question of national identity is a fundamental one that we need to sort out. I’ll give a version here of what I feel it should be. Bangladesh is broadly ethnically homogenous (~98% ‘Bengalis’) and heterogeneous in terms of ideas, religion, and how they feel. Bengal also, unlike then West Pakistan, had a culture of tremendous tolerance for minorities (e.g Hindus enjoyed peace and freedom historically as the author Richard Eaton explains in his book ‘The Rise of Islam and the Bengal Frontier’). I think that’s our biggest strength, it’s the strength of diversity of ideas and religious persuasions. Unlike India or Pakistan, both of which were created under religious lines (so if you’re an Indian Muslim, you tend to suffer from a sense of deep identity crisis unfortunately). We don’t have the same baggage as Bangladeshis.
Some in the country feel they are more Bengali as they adhere to the traditional Sunni values of Islam.
Some others in the country take pride in being more progressive agnostics/atheists and have a love for the Bengali folk culture.
For some others, being a practicing Hindu or Christian is an important tenet of their identity as ‘Bangladeshi’.
I’m saying all the above is perfectly compatible with being a Bangladeshi. You are free to choose your persuasion and personal ideology you adhere to. Whether you are practicing Muslim, Hindu, Christian, Athiest etc: this country is for you if you work hard, are honest, and are interested in solving problems in collaborative ways (even when sometimes it means you disagree with others, you respect and empathize with their point of view and deeply defend their right to have an opinion). Every subscriber of an ‘ideology’ (from the Quran to the Vedas to even Sam Harris/Dawkings fans) should bring their best ideas to the table from their school of thought to create a collaborative and prosperous society. No one should be excluded in the ‘new Bangladesh’.
‘Common-sense’ foreign policy: To take nothing away from the liberation heroes who sacrificed their lives for our liberation war of 1971, the simple truth is that it would’ve been impossible without the help of our neighbors India (who are on all 2/4 geographical sides of Bangladesh). For that, we are eternally grateful and should work with them as partners who are interested in the shared prosperity of the subcontinent. However, as the founding father of the country (and ironically Sheikh Hasina’s father) Sheikh Mujibur Rahman mentioned to Indian officials after his meeting with Pakistani leadership :
“I know the difference between coordination and subordination.” (Sheikh Mujib)
The Bangladesh people have yet again shown that we are not going to be pawns to either Pakistan (i.e the 1971 wars) or India (i.e with the current ousting of an Indian-backed dictator). We want to work as partners and collaborators, each bringing our own unique contributions to the table to create a better continent and a better world.
The 20th century after the two World Wars and the fall of the Soviet Union was what we call ‘Pax-Americana’ or ‘The American Century’. The 21st century will be different. It will be a multi-polar globe with a somewhat declining USA (and allies) in many ways, and a rising Asia (including China, India, Russia) and Africa.
Also, big globally important players will become the host of middle-income countries which are fast becoming high-income countries (think MENA region and Southeast Asia). We should evaluate the best foreign policies that align with our national goals of prosperity irrespective of who the country in question is.
“Black cat, white cat: whatever catches mice.” as the late Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping mentioned.
The sovereignty and national interest of Bangladesh has to be the top-most priority, any country (including India) that wants to turn a country of 170 million into a ‘vassal state’ should be dealt with caution. Good capable leadership will help us navigate the 21st century.
Turbocharging the economy: The economy will be a big one going forward. Although, on paper, the former government has done a decent job in achieving 4.41% GDP growth per year on average since the country's independence, it’s simply not good enough. Given the lower base from which we started, we have to do more. There are also questions about the Gini coefficient (or the distribution of the growth), inflation, lack of foreign reserves hurting businesses, etc, in recent months (as I found from speaking to small business owners in Bangladesh). This would require an op-ed of its own. But I think two things we should focus on broadly:
We should double down on the industry specialization we have (being the 2nd largest producers of clothes and apparel) and, at the same time, create pockets of specialization in producing products/materials that are higher up the value chain (things that require higher-skilled labor vs the lower-skilled labor. For reference, think about China employment capacity today vs China employment capacity 30 yrs ago).
Relating to my previous points 4 and 5, we should create a high bar for ‘law and order’ to be fixed. One of the key things that affect the economy is TFP (Total Factor Productivity) and investor confidence, which is the quality of law and order of the country. This has to be a priority.
My hopes and aspirations for Bangladesh are also not based on mere empty euphoria, it’s very much rooted in data. Lots of countries, with little historical precedence of their prosperity, turn themselves around. For us, we do have the history backing us and I believe we should be able to ‘find ourselves’ again.
As the Indian politician and MP Shashi Tharoor mentions in his book, when the British first arrived at the shores of the Indian subcontinent in the 17th century (now composed of the nation-state: India, Bangladesh, and Pakistan), the ‘Indian subcontinent’ as a whole was 25% of the world’s GDP. Out of that Bengal Subah (composed of West Bengal and Bangladesh today) was the Indian subcontinent’s wealthiest and most prosperous province. That is simply incredible how (due to a variety of reasons including British colonial hostility etc), we found ourselves to be a ‘basketcase’ (read derogatory term) in the 20th century. As the Greek philosopher Aristotle mentions, living by their ‘potential’ is the noblest act a human can do. All I’m saying is, dear reader, we’ve been far performing below our potential in the last century. All we need to do is revert to the ‘mean’ of what we were before. The path to lasting peace, prosperity, and happiness is filled with challenges ahead of course. Nonetheless, we as Bangladeshis, have history backing us and now the future youth too on our side, who liberated this country once again. Let this be the real beginning of our national renewal and contribution to the world.
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Waheed Nabeel is a technologist, investor and podcaster of Bengali-origin based in the UK. You can reach out to him at waheed@empasco.com. For more on technology and institution-building, subscribe to his podcast here.
Excellent article! I sincerely hope the future forward for Bangladesh is along the lines you put out Waheed.