Dr. Ghulam M. Haniff

July 26 , 2013

The World Is Changing … Fast!

It is hard to believe that the world is changing so fast. The changes are found in all the dimensions of the planet, those that can be seen and those not observable. For us human beings the most important ones are power relationships between nation-states which can be measured by the level of productivity of a given country. Each nation produces material(s) which can be measured by the values of various currencies. As we go along the productivity of various nations increases as new technology is incorporated into the economy or it decreases through misapplication or its absences.
In recent years the developed countries and underdeveloped ones have been compared and the reasons for underdevelopment are the absence of technological devices which in turn is due to the shortage of learning.
Generally speaking, education or learning in general contributes a lot towards the increments of what is known as productivity. If learning is enhanced and it’s ancillary such as technology, tools, etc., the productivity goes up; if not, then it goes down.
In this article only the nation’s productivity will be dealt with, and even that in most general terms. As noted above productivity will be compared with various sets of nations. The main comparisons will be between the developed and underdeveloped nations.
At the time of writing this article China was emerging to be a strong nation. Right at the heels of China was India, perhaps destined, to be the second most powerful nation in the world by the end of this century.
At one time both of these nations were maligned and subjected to humiliation but now their counsel is eagerly sought. During the past five hundred years they were subjected to colonialism and brutality but increasingly more and more respect is shown to the two and the others like them. At one time people from the two countries (and many colonized) were forbidden to walk on the grass of the “white-man’s” lawn (warning: Chinese and dogs not allowed) but today they want to have that ugly incident forgotten.
Many countries in the Third World are moving ahead such as Brazil, Indonesia, South Korea, Mexic, and others. The old superpowers, all white and generally colonial, such as Britain, France, Germany and Italy are gradually slipping in the power potential, some fast and some slowly.
Those people of the colonies, once they are educated, acquire skills and experience and become ever so productive. Unlike the previous talk of “civilization” as the marker of superiority there is now the catch phrase of “production.” But any nation can be productive, it requires no particular blood line. That can be seen in several Third World nations such as Singapore and South Korea, hardly white, have amassed wealth to the point where these two countries have shot up to the top of the social structure in productivity and are moving further ahead.
China and India may have come along in productivity though those others mentioned earlier have had an easier time. The old powers were built on stolen natural resources but the present powerful nations are built on the efficient utilization of the input into the productive process.
The Muslim world has not been able to build viable nation-states which is the first task of countries in the post-independence period. In fact, the entire Arab world is still struggling trying to define what a state is. Some of the Arab nations are as primitive as one can imagine ,such as the countries of Oman or Yemen. The countries of Qatar and UAE are also very primitive though they have been able to cover it up with money (obtained from the sale of oil — a natural resource, given to a nation for free) in the form of massive buildings or infrastructures. Some other countries such as Afghanistan are as far away from both as one could imagine. It is very hard to imagine that Afghanistan would become a modern nation-state by the end of this century. The Muslim world has not made much progress along the lines of the other countries and has been left behind. The only exceptions are two or three countries - Malaysia, Turkey and Indonesia - which have pulled ahead due the education of the people. Others have been left to their own elements such as to wage internecine warfare with real or imagined enemies which have not done them any good.
On the whole, Muslim nations have little education and therefore their productivity is low and some have found oil which is a disincentive to education. Others are waging warfare which is also an impediment to education.
One of the reasons for the United States to be endowed with productivity is because it has the highest levels of education, producing up to 40,000 doctorates each year. It produces more than any other nation in the world, more than the rest of the world combined. In fact, the initial immigrants were well educated and they have valued learning ever since.
Many scholars argue that these two countries, China and India, will be the dominant ones by the end of this century owing to the massive efforts they have put in educating their people.
The re-arrangement in the global social structure is due to the educational levels of the people making the natives emerge to the top, and the masters will slide to the bottom. In the colonial world the natives sank to the bottom by the action of the white men and they elevated themselves to the top.
That’s why the natives suffer from such intense inferiority complex. The next generation of post-independence descendants would be able to do a better job of being able to even more productive.