Sailing in a sinking political ship

A key test of a nation is how it renews its political life, which has to happen every so often as time takes its toll: maybe the government in power runs out of ideas, or the leaders become old, or a new party emerges with a brighter vision.

However, when peaceful transition fails to happen as a matter of course, a nation's politics gets stuck.

Eventually the need for change becomes so great that a dangerous instability creeps into the system, and unless it is solved quickly, violence can be used to promote a revolution, or in very rare cases external violence is used to force regime change, such as happened in Iraq.

What is important for the long term success of a country is that any change of government happens in a managed and transparent manner. People need to be reassured that the new incoming government is one that will allow their lives to continue, their investments to remain productive, and their ambitions can stay on course.

The benefit of regular elections in a mature and functioning democracy is that this change happens as a matter of course within the expectations of all political players, and the population knows what is happening.

It is very important that the rules governing political change are obvious, made public well before any change happens, and are largely accepted by the population at large.

Not happening in Pakistan

This is not happening in Pakistan at present. An election is not just about the act of voting, as Pakistanis hope to do in January. They have to know well in advance what parties they will be voting for, who will lead those parties, and what policies are on offer.

In addition, the leaders of those parties need to have been able to campaign to publicise their policies and allow people to make an informed judgment.

The long-standing exile of the two leading politicians which only ended in a very haphazard manner recently has meant that campaigning has not happened properly, and even the participation of the parties in the elections was only agreed very recently.

This confusion added to the turmoil of emergency rule, the change of the former military president into a civilian one, who then changed the members of the Supreme Court to suit himself.

In addition to the political confusion, there are curbs on the media and the pro-Musharraf Supreme Court is not considered to be fair enough to have the final say on any challenges to the elections.

However, the January elections look likely to go ahead, with both Nawaz Sharif's and Benazir Bhutto's parties taking part so to give Musharraf's party competition.

Any election in these conditions will be flawed, and it should be treated as providing a temporary result till political life becomes calmer, and another more open and fair election can be called.

Experience shows that any winner is very reluctant to give up power, but the restart of Pakistan's political life means that the politicians will have to show that they are rebuilding and are ready to trust the system. They should all agree to hold new elections soon in order to strengthen their mandate.

Another country going through a failure of the political structure is Lebanon. Over a year ago, the incumbent government of the prime minister lost the support of Hezbollah, which has a substantial number of members of parliament, and was able to reduce the government to impotence.

The requirement of the former president to retire at the end of his term in November, allowed the various parties to seek a way out of the long impasse, but they have failed.

After much agonised discussion, a compromise candidate to replace the president has been found, although importing the head of the army into the job requires changing the constitution.

Such a change has opened up a new round of debate and now all the discussion is stuck on how a new government should be formed, as each party seeks its own advantage.

And this failure is despite the memories of the decades-long civil war which frighten everyone by reminding them what can happen when the political structure fails to provide a working government.

Pakistan and Lebanon have very different challenges, and have very different political forces at work, but they both share a failure to make the political structure work. Both countries have the potential to be very successful, if they had more dynamic and confident governments. But they are certainly not rich enough to survive political inertia.

That will mean that the political players will have to commit to allowing the opportunity of regular change. They will have to welcome the fact that their terms in office will be limited and that their records should be challenged openly.

They may well be re-elected if they persuade people of their success, or they may have to adopt different policies to seek success, but they should not allow a political vacuum to swamp responsible government.

The new era of globalisation and the knowledge economy means that countries will only do well if they allow their populations and businesses to embrace the skills and transparency that the new world requires.

Although this sounds like an economic doctrine, it also applies to political life as well. A key test of any government is how it is facing globalisation, and to manage well, it has to be able to offer stability and continuity, while also encouraging change.