Do We Need Philosopher Kings in Pakistan?

Starting the debate on government of the educated, by the educated

“Democracy is a certain form of government in which Men are counted but not weighed.” — Allama Iqbal

It is natural to think that the wise ought to rule. This thinking was behind the idea of “Philosopher King” propounded by Plato in his “The Republic”. Plato argues that kings should become philosophers or that philosophers should become kings, or philosopher kings, as they possess a special level of knowledge, which is required to rule the Republic successfully. The crux of Platonic idea is that the political authority of a state ought to be in the hands of those most capable of exercising it wisely and justly because making political decisions requires judgement and skill. After all, if some political outcomes count as better than others, then surely some citizens are better than others with regard to their wisdom and good faith in promoting the better outcomes. If so, this looks like an important reason to leave the decisions up to them. And, this is what epistocracy, the rule of the knowledgeable, is all about.

During the recent years, we have seen an unprecedented rise of bigots, xenophobic and Islamophobic demagogues on the political scene in almost all parts of the world. These people just exploit public sentiment to get votes and once they come into power, they do what they want. And, also remember that for getting into power, they just need a fraction of percentage of the votes cast more than the opponent. With a cursory look at the figures related to voter turnouts in recent years, we find that in the Brexit referendum, out of nearly 46,500,000 eligible voters, only 17,410,742 (51.9%) voted to decide the fate of their country against the wishes of the remaining majority. In addition, US presidential election 2016, Indian general elections 2014, Pakistan general elections 2013 speak volumes about the dangers popular democracy entails. And, a more recent example is the Turkish referendum in which President Erdogan got only 51.4 percent ‘Evet” (yes) votes to get sweeping powers – though the results have been challenged, as these lines are being written.

This, perhaps, is the biggest factor why popular democracies all around the world have largely failed to achieve the goal of human development through good governance. When democracy becomes a tool lying at the disposal of the economically-dominant and ruling classes, it becomes an elitist version of democracy which provides ample opportunities to the dominant elite to manipulate the system and turn it into an authoritarian rule. This gives birth to a pertinent, critical question: why not try another system?

A suitable answer to this question is to change the voting system and allow only the educated and well-read people to vote or at least fix some qualification for those who aspire to run their country. Jason Brennan, political philosopher from Georgetown University and the author of a recent book “Against Democracy” has suggested something like that. He proposes ‘epistocracy’ which is a political system in which only educated people have the right to vote, and literally means the rule of the knowledgeable.

We often see that those who come to power through popular vote either don’t give a damn to what their voters really need or even if they legislate on some issues of public importance, they do so only to please their voter base. This, inevitably, leads to short-term planning which ultimately causes miseries and sufferings in the long run. Pakistan’s acute energy crisis, burgeoning foreign debts, insufficient spending on human development, soaring unemployment, rising poverty levels, are all manifestations of poor planning of elected people, including the military rulers who held referendums to give a tinge of legitimacy to their long tenures.

And, no sane person would deny that democracy, which should have been a boon for a developing country like Pakistan, has actually become a bane. Being a continuous process, democracy should have moved from ‘less’ to ‘more’ through regular performance reviews and through steady reforms. But that has not been the case with Pakistan. Here the ruling elite prefers to spend large sums of money on big and glamorous projects like motorways, Greater Iqbal Park, Metro Bus and Orange Line Metro Train even if it is at the cost of health and education. Major areas of service delivery like education, healthcare, poverty eradication, creation of employment opportunities, civic amenities, remain neglected.

And, this makes a strong case for introducing a system wherein people are weighed, not counted only. We need to move toward an epistocracy and get rid of popular democracy.  In the past, only General (Retd) Pervez Musharraf tried to take steps in this regard when, in June 2002, he issued the Conduct of General Elections (Amendment) Order, 2002. Through this order, he made condition graduation minimum required qualification for members of the Parliament and Provincial Assemblies. Five petitions on the subject were heard by a full bench of the Supreme Court which upheld the graduation condition. But, later, the Supreme Court thought otherwise and in 2008 it struck down the law requiring candidates for Parliament to have at least bachelor’s degree.

At present, the situation is that you have to be, at least, graduate — in most cases — if you want to apply for a government job. But, you can become a lawmaker even if you have been to school.

Admittedly, it is a fundamental right of everyone to vote in a democratic society, but what to do with a system that only favours the rich and wealthy and poor keep on getting poorer with every passing day.

So, maybe, it’s time to consider epistocracy as an alternate to the form of democracy we have at present. It is especially required because a vast majority of our people lack even basic political knowledge. In addition, they only tend to knowingly fall into the trap of tribalism or some ethnic or racial prejudices.

One major question in this regard is what counts, and who decides what counts, as political competence or basic political knowledge. One solution would be to use widely accepted test system as is adopted for recruitment to government jobs. Candidates for National Assembly as well as provincial assemblies must be required to pass the tests. No doubt, educational standards of our country are not so encouraging, yet those having graduation or higher qualification level will be better able to govern the country rather than the illiterate ‘angootha chhaps’.

Some would object that epistocracy is essentially inegalitarian as in this system not everyone will have the same voting power. But, what’s so wrong with that? 

What is Epistocracy?

The word ‘epistocracy’ has been derived from ‘episteme’ and ‘kratia’ the Greek words for “knowledge” and “rule,” respectively. Estlund coined the word “epistocracy,” meaning “government by the knowledgeable.” We can think of epistocracy as an alternative to letting the wealthy rule (plutocracy), the property-owners (timocracy), a few prominent families (oligarchy), the military (stratocasy), clerics (theocracy), or indeed to democracy, a “rule of the people”.

In an epistocracy, political power is to some degree apportioned according to knowledge. An epistocracy might retain the major institutions we see in republican democracy, such as parties, mass elections, constitutional review, and the like. But not everyone has equal basic political power; an epistocracy might grant some people additional voting power, or might restrict the right to vote only to those that could pass a very basic test of political knowledge.