Comments on Rehman Sobhan's book From Two Economies to Two Nations: My Journey to Bangladesh

Professor Rehman Sobhan and his publisher Daily Star Books deserve our  congratulations for bringing out this collection of Professor Sobhan's writings which span a period of forty years from 1961 to 2000.The majority are in fact written between 1961 to 1971. Some of the articles are, academic published in academic journals, others are his popular writings published in news papers or weeklies. Professor Sobhan is one of those rare breed of academics who can also popularize complex arguments through writings in newspapers.

Though Rehman Sobhan often talks about not prioritizing academic publication, his writings in fact had a profound impact on political discourse as well as on academic work. Let me illustrate this point by discussing the influence Rehman's writings had on my own research and writings.

Though Rehman had been writing since the late 1950s, I became exposed to his writings from around 1967 when I started doing research for my PhD in political science at Harvard. His writings influenced my writings in multiple ways.They helped me get a theme, a thread to run through my arguments. They attracted me to a particular approach of analysis.In one specific subject his writings contributed to completely changing my initial understanding.And finally his writings taken as a whole helped me sustain a particular perspective, a prism so to say through which I interpreted the happenings of that particular period.

Let me then briefly elaborate these four different intellectual debts I owe to Rehman's writings. First, let me talk about the theme or the thread.When I was first looking for a topic for my Ph.D thesis my adviser at Harvard Professor Merle Fainsod suggested that I write on the relationship between the central and provincial governments in Pakistan and that I cover the period of 1947-1958. Professor Fainsod was a specialist in comparative administration. But I was not attracted to write a thesis on administrative relationship. I wanted to write more on the political aspect and focus on the contemporary period 1958-1968. I was looking for a theme,a thread to run through my thesis. Rehman's writings of that period which repeatedly focused on the issues of disparity, two economies, regional imbalanceswhich are included in part 1 of the book, helped me get a theme. Rehman was writing mostly on economic disparity. I thought what I could do is to expand on this theme and look at disparity in other areas such as politics and administration.However, ready made data was not available in these areas.So I had to compile tables on disparities in civil and military bureaucracy and political elite, and I managed to round up the discourse on disparity in my thesis which was later published as a book titled Pakistan: Failure in National Integration by Columbia University Press in 1972.

Let me now talk about Rehman's approach of analysis, which we all know is that of political economy. Rehman was writing on economics but he put that analysis in the context of politics. When I started writing my thesis I decided that I would write on politics but I would use a lot of economic data and analysis to explain the political and social changes. If I wanted I could have written my thesis mainly as a political history of that particular period. But I used a policy framework.Economic policies of Ayub regime and their impact on society and politics constituted a significant part of my thesis.In factchapter 4 of my book is devoted to economic policies and their impact.

However, the most direct influence of Rehman's writings was in completely changing my initial understanding of one important instrument of Ayub's rule and that is Basic Democracies and Rural Works Programme. When I first went to Harvard in the Spring of 1965 I found the faculty fullof admiration for Basic Democracies and Rural Works Programme. Harvard's Development Advisory Services who advised Pakistan government shaped faculty's perspectives on Pakistan. In fact my first seminar paper in 1965 was on Rural Works Programme where I gave apositive review of Work Programme based on what I readat that time. John Thomas, who was then finishing his thesis under the supervision of my advisor, Professor Merle Fainsod wrote a positive account of the programme and I initially accepted his version. Rehman's 1967 book on Basic Democracies and Works Programme presented a much more critical analysis. Two of his arguments had a profound impact on my writing. Rehman showed the differentiated impact of WorksProgrammeon different groups of people in rural areas, and that the poor farmers or landless were not gaining as much as the surplus farmers. His second argument about the political use of the WorksProgramme, its use as a patronage system to gain legitimacy for the regime was another revelation for me. One chapter of my book,chapter 6 which is on Basic Democracies and political parties heavily borrowed from Rehman's book.

Finally, let me talk about the impact of his writings in creating a perspective and a mood. Here I refer to mostly to his writings in the Forum. In fact we became personally acquainted with each other mainly because of Forum. When Forum was started in 1969. I was a post doctoral fellow at Columbia revising my thesis for publication by Columbia University Press. Quite by chance I got hold of a few copies of Forum and was so impressed that I sent money for an annual membership of the weekly. But then I was just waiting and not getting any copy of Forum by mail and felt very frustrated. I sent a few strongly worded reminders to Rehman.When we first met at a very historic conference on Pakistan organised by Professor Khaled bin Sayeed at Rochester in August 1970, before I could open my mouth to register my complaints Rehman produced all the copies of Forum from December 69 to August 70 and I was immediately pacified. I read those copies of Forum in the fall of 1970 when I was putting the finishing touches of my book. In those days when there was no internet and I had no phone it was so difficult to keep abreast of a very dynamic and fast moving political scene. Forum articlesgave me a blow by blow account of weekly happenings as I sat and read them in my office in New York. I could sense the pulse of the nation and they kept me going.They created a mood, a passion which was very important.In those days in New York I had no body to discuss with about what I was writing. As I kept reading Forum I felt connected to a fellow group of people far removed from me physically yet I realized we share the same perspective. 

Let me now make on comment on Rehman's later writings which appear in part V of the book. Here there are two excellent academic articles, the first one on our nationalism and the second one on Bangabandhu. Both are invaluable resource for students of current politics. 

Let meconclude with one final thought. As we all know no body is better than Rehman in popularizing an idea.Through his writings he made economic disparity a household word in the 60s and he endeared himself to Bengali nationalist political leaders. In recent years Rehman had been persistently writing about inequality, about our two societies. I do not know whether these ideas are being welcomed by our current political leaders. In the 1990s Rehman used to write regular columns in the Daily Star and the Prothom Alo under the title: my critic, my friend. I have heard many people did not quite get this concept. They asked how could a critic be also a friend? Rehman had stopped writing those columns. I think it is high time Rehman takes on the challenge of again popularizing a difficult concept and that is my critic is also my friend. I believe our democratic future hinges on how well our political leaders understand and embrace this concept. But of course Rehman has to at the same time complete writing the second volume of his memoir which will be a great resource for the current and future generation of historians and political analysits.