Ideally speaking, in Pakistan, we all are finding permanent solutions to our existing problems so that we may bring peace, harmony, stability and prosperity in our society. But it is also an awkward reality that we do not know how to adequately fix all the prevailing socio-political mess. When we get confused among our idealism and unwanted realism, we come up with confused and oftentimes short-term solutions to deal with our structural and institutional defects. This is both problematic and regrettable. More importantly, before presenting the solution of any problem it is mandatory, at least for a social scientist, to properly find out the relevant facts and properly study and analyze them to understand the root cause behind that very problem. This is what we call systematic/scientific study.
Let’s consider the Women Protection Act. There are those who passed it and are now defending it in a positive liberal way. There are also those criticizing the bill on religious premises. Also, some others, like me, who have some reservations but the main argument is founded upon social and cultural context of Pakistani society and not the religion only.
Although, I wrote a blog to shine some light on how this legislation contradicts the present Pakistan’s socio-cultural settings and discussed potential results of the bill being implemented, yet I felt a dire need to shed some light on the question: why women are being beaten/violated in our society and how to overcome this dilemma?
To begin with, I find it appropriate this time to establish my argument on some theoretical basis for two reasons. One, so that we can find out the real cause behind this horrific tragedy by collecting some facts and systematically analyzing them in a sound theoretical framework; second, so that we have a reasonable and workable solution to curb violence against women in our society.
My principle argument is this: domestic violence against the women in Pakistan is the result of both policy and institutional failure and we cannot, and should not, blame uneducated poor men for the prevailing state of affairs. And the solution lies in reforming our existing confused policies and polluted values not merely by passing laws which might cause more instability and disorganization.
Talcott Parsons, well-known for being a grand structural functionalist of twentieth century sociology, developed and proposed a paradigm to explain how a society (Parsons sees society as a social system) can smoothly function and attain peace and stability (what Parsons term as ‘social equilibrium’)? For this, Parsons proposes four principles, technically termed as ‘functional imperatives’ as adaptation, goal attainment, integration and latency and pattern maintenance (AGIL).
First, the most important functional prerequisite is associated with the economic institution. Parsonian functional imperatives known as ‘adaptation’ which means the capability/capacity of society to interact with the environment to adequately get and gather resources for the survival of its members.
Second, every society, argues Parsons, should have some set goals so that its members might work in a direction to attain those goal. This goal is often, and in general, set by the political institution.
Third, there are different and may be competing segments of a larger society which should be integrated into a coherent whole so that they might function without any difficulty in an appropriate framework for the sake of social stability.
Fourth, more importantly, shared values and patterns of social life, Parsons argued, need to be transformed from one generation to the other one and mostly it is done by the institutions of family, religion and education. This is how, according to Parsonian sociology, society as a system can attain and sustain stability and coherency.
If these aforementioned and institution-specific functions are not performed, both social instability and disorganization ensues in the society.
If all members of society have nothing to eat or live with, it is not as problematic as when a few have more than they need, and so many others have nothing. Nothing. Nothing to eat, drink and wear. In Pakistan this is what we have been witnessing for a long time. Bread has been a persistent and serious issue for the poor. This absence of any mechanism to provide basic human needs to the people and increasing sense of deprivation urged poor people to be criminals and delinquents. Is there any need to prove the hypothesis that the sense of deprivation and increase in crime rate has a deep and closer relationship? An interesting article titled Unemployment, Poverty, Inflation and Crime Nexus: Cointegration and Causality Analysis of Pakistan written by Pakistani economists Syed Yasir Mahmood Gillani, Hafeez-ur-Rehman and Abid Rasheed Gkill asserted:
“The main objective of the study is to identify and examine the economic factors such as inflation, poverty and unemployment responsible for promoting crimes in Pakistan. The results of the study reveal that the abovementioned economic factors have relationship with crimes.”
Also, in Pakistan, women who are abused by their husbands mostly belong to economically poor families and are dependent on their husbands. Saving Face (Oscar winning Pakistani documentary) directed by Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy also revealed the reality that the most of the victims were from economically poor rural areas.
There is a deep and serious relationship between domestic violence against women and absolute poverty in Pakistan. A dependent woman can do nothing except bear all the pain. What if she goes to court against her husband? Will she be able to earn independently in our sociopolitical system?
As Parsons argues, political institution sets the goal for which everyone in society works and struggles. In Pakistan, it is very unfortunate that we do not know what to do; what to achieve and what not to. Our so-called leaders both, religious and political, often claim that we are to create a modern stable society. I do not understand what they mean by words ‘modern’ and ‘stable’ – or even the very word ‘society’?
Look at Americans, we criticize them for not morally progressing and yet it is to be admired that they have one goal: to maximize individuals’ liberties. And they have had it. On the contrary, we are still a confused collection of wise and unwise who do not understand what the right direction is.
Integration, which is the business of ‘law’, seems a word almost unfamiliar to our society. Law serves as a tool to integrate different sections and sub-sections, who have conflicting and competing interests, into one coherent whole for a smooth stable society. In case of Pakistan, law has different – may be shocking, yet narrow – purpose that is to better protect and serve the rich—the ruling elite. Sociologically speaking, there is a visible gap between social and legal norms which sometimes contradict each other and ultimately result into social disorganization and political chaos. The present social legislation in Punjab is the latest example of it.
Religion has, throughout history (1950s onward), been a mere tool of so-called religious leaders who have been exploiting masses in the name of God. History books tell us that Allama Iqbal, after visiting Europe in 1905-1908, understood the evolving global political norms and dynamics and later in his writings and speeches focused upon the need to understand the existing socio-political dynamics and also the concept of ‘Ijtihad’ to preserve our identity. But after the creation of Pakistan we closed everything. We don’t like new ideas rather we oppose them. We not only disagree with certain people, we simply do not agree with their existence. This type of radicalization has brought our society to the edge where a young boy gets violent when someone disagrees with his ideas on the street. Our mullahs have also invented the idea that in Islam women are inferior to men so there is no harm if man beats a woman. This is the justification, particularly in rural areas of Pakistan, for the many defendants who victimize poor women. This is how our people have been misguided and misled.
Education is the most sophisticated and reliable tool to bring any permanent social or political change in any society. In our case, unfortunately, education has remained a tool of dominant political elite (both civil and military) to attain and sustain their narrow interest. More than 9 million children are out of schools in our county. What should we expect for them in future? Will they be able to get job and to earn some money with respect and dignity? Probably not. So, is this really unreasonable to expect a state of social disorganization and instability? Still, more women are beaten and killed in rural areas where people are poor and have no formal education or are semi-educated as compared to cities like Lahore and Islamabad. This is how educational institution remained unable to internalize positive and constructive values, like how to respect and equally treat a daughter, sister or wife, to the next generation which resulted in prevailing state of normlessness.
(I am not mentioning the institution of family here for one major reason that it works within the broader given social and political context and not independently)
To conclude: Pakistani society is confused. Here humankind seems selfish and brutal – if Thomas Hobbes was alive he would, most probably, have termed our present societal conditions as the state of nature. It is true that in rural areas our women are not as protected as the women in cities are, but by introducing laws which are contrary to prevalent socio-cultural conditions we are about to incite more violence and more instability in our already unstable society. The domestic violence in our social system is the result of poverty, political confusion, illiteracy, and misinterpretation of religion. Therefore, we need a proper, broader, fresher thinking to reform our whole social as well as political system. Mere confused social legislation may not help us in achieving our desired ends.