If all goes well Pakistan's parliamentary system will see a technological uplift in a matter of months. Speaking at the UNDPs conference on Technology and Strengthening Democracy, Marriyum Aurangzeb, PML-N MNA, said that by the spring of 2015 Pakistani parliamentarians will have computers on their desks in the parliament - a measure that will (hopefully) help smoothen their work flows.
She added that the parliament's website will also be upgraded, where the parliament's proceedings will also be webcast, whereas arrangements are also being made to ensure that PTV televises those proceedings for better outreach.
That is a good development, which needs to be appreciated. However, that alone isn't going to make democracy work, or bring transparency into the system, which brings up what Asad Umar, the PTI vice president, calls the human or the mindset problem.
The human problem has two ends. At the one end, you can put up as much information online as you want, and you can make many rules and regulations to put up all that information, but at the end of the day, if the person in charge doesn't want to share particular piece of information, then you can try as you might, but transparency will remain a victim.
The second part of the human or the mindset problem pertains to the demand side of the information. Using economics terms, the supply of information isn't going to create its own demand. As Pakistan's first of its kind research column, we can assure that there is already tons of data and information already available on the Internet - and not all of it is in a difficult-to-use format. Yet the trouble is there is seemingly very little demand for it.
Social media observers often lament that consumers of information resort more to trolling than making an informed opinion. An evaluation of independent Pakistani blogs or those managed by several newspaper organizations (sans those run by select few journalists & other public figures) will also show that there isn't much to write home about.
What then is needed to increase the demand or useful consumption of information? This column would reiterate three things. First, as Telenor Pakistan's CEO Michael Foley said at the conference, unless technology doesn't penetrate deep into masses, we are only talking amongst ourselves (see Technology and inequality in today's column for more details).
Second, there is a need to roll out local government to ensure active citizenry, and to use technology as a bridge between provincial governments and those residing in those respective provinces. In a devolved Pakistan, the fate of millions of Pakistanis is tied with provincial and local governments. Aside for the big national issues, promoting active citizenry needs the opening of democracy at provincial levels. And third, the country needs a vibrant local-level media, to mediate and to consume all that information.
It would have been great if the UNDP Pakistan had a dedicated panel that talked about embedding the creation and use of technology at provincial and local levels. Hopefully, there would be one the next time. And in the meanwhile, lets keep the conversation going.
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