Redefining civil society’s role
The idea of social development is as old as human civilisation itself, with a perennial objective to promote the welfare of the common people in a polity. Social development has…
So shall you reap
Part - III We are where we are. Forces of history, international order, ideological confusion and the lust for power and wealth of our own dominant classes have together created…
Dreaming of one-party rule in India?
“All politics is local”, said American politician Tip O’Neill. Under Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), nothing is local anymore. Writing for Aljazeera, Prof Apoorvanand Jha…
For a liberated civil society
Pessimism sets in as the world undergoes uncanny political changes in the aftermath of Brexit, rise of Donald Trump and declining popularity of social democrats across the Western hemisphere. Ruthless…
Blame game
The spate of attacks by Pakistani militants in recent days has prompted Islamabad to hurl accusations at Kabul while the fragile Afghan coalition government of President Ashraf Ghani has already…
Moving beyond the jargon
Social entrepreneurship is the new mantra of development economics that tends to shape the development policy discourse as a counter-narrative to the conventional participatory approaches of rural development. Conventional bottom-up…
Who’s afraid of Dr Riaz?
Over the weekend, news reports came in that an ‘MQM-London member’ had been arrested by law-enforcement agencies (LEAs) in Karachi. The accused was en route to the Karachi Press Club,…
The paradox of civil society
The notion of civil society has essentially remained a Western concept that was introduced during the colonial period as an instrument of social legitimacy for colonial rule. This is a…
Education beyond literacy
Literacy, education, information and knowledge are used interchangeably in our popular discourses as means of material and intellectual transformation and as sources of empowerment. However, they are discernibly different concepts…
The power of the ordinary
This year’s May Day celebrations are taking place at a moment of unprecedented uncertainty. The rise of ultra-nationalism threatens the very foundations of liberal societies. Most recently, in the French…
