Death of an
Immortal
By JONATHAN POWER
LONDON--When Mahbub ul Haq died in New York last week the
traffic did not stop, nor did the United Nations, for which
he had done so much, lower its flag. But all over the world,
people who have been touched by the special wisdom of this
astonishing man, felt their hearts miss a beat. He left
behind one of the few great ideas of the twentieth century.
When he died he was preparing to join Mikhail Gorbachev, the
former president of the Soviet Union, in San Francisco in a
private seminar with some of the world's most influential
minds.
Simply put, Dr Haq was the greatest living expert on
measuring human progress. Formerly Pakistan s minister of
finance, for seven years he was the creator and continuing
intellectual force behind The Human Development Report ,
published annually by the United Nations Development
Program.
In his years in ministerial office he became convinced
that amid the jargon of modern government, finance and
accounting we lose sight of the main direction we are going
in. (What better example than today's Asian crisis.) Too
often we attempt to measure progress by statistical
aggregates and technical prowess. We overlook that the main
goal of life is to insure survival and, beyond that, to
enable the pursuit of well-being, achievement and as the
American constitution (not without a great debate at the
time) so aptly puts it, the pursuit of happiness . (The
opposition wanted the pursuit of wealth .)
This debate reaches back at least to the time of
Aristotle. Wealth is evidently not the good we are seeking,
for it is merely useful and for the sake of something else ,
he wrote. Even the nineteenth century philosophers of
political economy never were gross national product
absolutists after the fashion of today. Adam Smith, David
Ricardo, Karl Marx and John Stuart Mill, from very different
perspectives, all saw the creation of wealth as only one
part of a complicated organic whole.
Haq was convinced that the contemporary obsession with
increased income per head blinded both observers and
participants to the tremendous advances that could be made
in social well-being, even in quite poor countries, with
only a modest rise in incomes. He produced sophisticated
tables in which countries were not ranked by income per head
but on yardsticks which he considered more revealing
longevity, knowledge and a decent standard of living. In
these tables Japan came out on top, followed by Canada,
Norway, Switzerland and Sweden. Later, he factored in the
status of women and produced an even more accurate profile
of well-being Sweden and Norway came out on top with Denmark
not far behind , and Japan fell to 17th place.
Then he did the same exercise for Third World countries.
Barbados came out first, followed by Hong Kong, Cyprus,
Uruguay, Singapore, Taiwan, Trinidad and Tobago, Malaysia
and South Korea. They, quite poor until relatively recently,
had dramatically lowered infant mortality rates that used to
be at present day African rates and insured life spans, only
a generation ago 50 years or less, that today are up on the
levels of the richest countries.
Haq's two favorites were Malaysia and South Korea.
Malaysia, instead of being traumatized by the race riots of
1969, used the bitter experience to formulate a 20 year plan
to raise growth and human development, reduce poverty and
racial discrimination and improve education and health
standards.
South Korea, likewise, surged from rags to well-being in
a single generation. In 1945 only 13% of adults had any
formal schooling. By 1950 the average years of schooling for
all reached 9.9 years, higher than for the industrialised
countries.
The challenge, argued Dr Haq, which these countries met,
is to combine high levels of human development, low
unemployment and rapid economic growth, creating a virtuous
circle in which productivity rises and triggers an increase
in real wages which, in turn, attracts more investment in
human capital, in education, and in access to social
services.
Not surprisingly, Dr Haq was a strong critic of the
tactics of the International Monetary Fund during the
current Asian crisis. The IMF has effectively downplayed
many of these Asian accomplishments while playing up the
weaknesses of crony capitalism , unregulated banks and
nepotism, even though, if it chose, the IMF could easily
fault France, Italy, Spain or Brazil on such scores. At the
same time the IMF has ignored that most of these Asian
crisis countries have budget surpluses, high savings rates
and low inflation. Why press them, Haq asked, to so
dramatically raise their interest rates and cut so sharply
government spending?
Dr Haq was an ascerbic but always witty critic. Not
least, were his sharp words for the arms race between
Pakistan and India and the lack of flexibility shown by both
countries over disputed Kashmir. To the anger of many of his
friends at home he suggested a clever and thoughtful interim
arrangement for Kashmir that would, he argued, diffuse most
of the tension.
Dr Haq was also a poet, and a translator of Urdu poetry
into English. He was a doting father, a loving and loyal
partner to his wife and, for many, including myself, one of
life's few great inspirers.
Above all he taught that the essential purpose of life is
not to manufacture a further abundance of artifacts, but to
ensure long, healthy, creative and fulfilled lives. To quote
a poet he admired, Robert Burns, Man's reach must exceed his
grasp or what is heaven for?
July 22, 1998,
LONDON
Copyright © 1998 By JONATHAN POWER
Note: I can be reached by phone +44 385 351172
and e-mail: JonatPower@aol.com
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