Picking Up The Trash

by hilzoy

This is a wonderful story:

"A group of young Pakistani friends, sick of hearing their families complain about the government, decided to spite them by taking matters into their own hands: every Sunday they would grab shovels, go out into their city, and pick up garbage.

It was a strange thing to do, particularly for such students from elite private schools, who would normally spend Sunday afternoons relaxing in air-conditioned homes.

But the students were inspired by the recent success of the lawyers' movement, which used a national protest to press the government to reinstate the country’s chief justice, and their rush of public consciousness was irrepressible.

"Everybody keeps blaming the government, but no one actually does anything," said Shoaib Ahmed, 21, one of the organizers. "So we thought, why don't we?"

The fact that these students are well-off matters a lot. Class divides run deep in Pakistan, and this is an unusual thing for students at good schools to be doing. Actually, it's an unusual thing for anyone to be doing unpaid:

"A long-term cycle of corrupt, weak governments interrupted by military coups has caused Pakistan's political muscles to atrophy, leaving Pakistani society, particularly its poor, hopeless that it will ever receive the services -- education, water, electricity, health -- that it so desperately needs.

“People say, 'This is nice, but things will never change,'" Mr. Khwaja said, pointing to a hamburger seller who he said was particularly pessimistic. "There is a hopelessness."

That is where the trash cleaning comes in. Locals find it perplexing and helpful in equal measures. One enthusiast who met the group on its first outing in March, Muhamed Zahid, has come to every one since. One man passing by in a rickshaw dismounted to help them shovel for a while. (...)

That brought the students to the most serious discussion of the day, one that is arguably Pakistan’s biggest problem: the gap between rich and poor. Generations of poverty and a system of substandard education that keeps people in it have created fertile ground for Islamic militancy, which now poses a serious threat to the stability of the country.

"Here, if you're poor, you're not even a human being," said Pavel Qaiser. "It's the culture we have -- one landlord and the peasants working under him."

And here was a revelation: the trash picking, which the students had intended as an example for shopkeepers and residents, was actually an exercise for themselves.

"The rich don’t care, the poor can't do anything, so it's up to the middle class to make the change," Mr. Khwaja said, as a group of friends standing near him nodded in agreement. "We have to lead by example. To change it from inside."

Pakistan is a wonderful country, with some of the kindest and most hospitable people I've ever met. Moreover, unlike a lot of very poor countries, it has enormous reservoirs of talented and decent people with good educations and professional training. The problem is that the system as a whole seems so corrupt as to be beyond the power of any single individual to change, or even to improve. (This has everything to do with the fact that Pakistan has never been allowed to have a civilian government for long: self-government takes practice, and the Pakistani civilian governments have never been allowed to just make their own mistakes and be voted out of office. The military always steps in and takes over instead.)

That young people are taking matters into their own hands and just picking up the trash themselves is one of the most hopeful things I've heard in a while.

Comments

[joe from Lowell]

What a wonderful find, Hilzoy.

Thanks for this - you made my day.

[d'd'd'dave]

Wow. Individuals taking personal responsibility for improving things and not relying on the government to solve things. And it works! What a concept.

[russell]

"Wow. Individuals taking personal responsibility for improving things and not relying on the government to solve things. And it works! What a concept."

You know, this is so predictable that it borders on the tedious.

It's great that middle class kids in Pakistan are taking the initiative to pick up the trash. They need to do so because they live under a corrupt, failed, crappy government.

In some places, governments aren't corrupt, failed, or quite so crappy. In those places, people can trust their government to pick up the trash.

And in fact in those kinds of places it's not some nameless, faceless entity out there somewhere called "the government" that does these things. It's people who live in your community, that you vote for, and that you might even know personally, who figure out what the requirements are for picking up the trash, and who figure out if it makes sense for your community to do this for itself or to hire an outside firm, and who put the bids out for outside firms, and who hire the companies and oversee their work.

And depending on where you live, the folks in your community might decide to not hire anyone at all. They might decide to just load up the pickup on Saturday morning and take their own stuff to the dump. They might decide to just let folks burn it out behind the barn.

It's basically their choice, within certain common sense limits, like if you live in Manhattan, having everyone burn their trash out on the front stoop is probably not a good idea.

Isn't that great? It's kind of like people taking responsibility for themselves THROUGH THE AGENCY OF THEIR GOVERNMENT!!

What a splendid idea!!

So let's all be happy that we live in a place where our government is not so freaking corrupt, failed, and crappy that we have to rely on school kids to pick up the damned garbage.

In fact, let's see if we can keep it that way. Let's not vote for people who think that government sucks, or is inherently corrupt, failed, or crappy. Because if we do, that's the kind of government we'll get.

[Turbulence]

It is amusing to watch russell try to demonstrate the point by engaging in some intellectual trash hauling himself. Bonus points. Alas, I fear he will have to labor for many centuries in order to make a dent in the trash heap that dave so assiduously generates.

[stonetools]

Its great to hear some good news from Pakistan. Its one data point against an ocean of bad news, but it is one point.
Thanks hilzoy.

[John Miller]

Thank you hilzoy for this. It was the first thing I read this morning and started the sday off right.

When I read it, however, I was wondering how long it would take for Dave to spout some sort of inanity. Didn't take long.

[d'd'd'dave]

Government succeeds WHEN individuals take personal responsibility for improving things and don't rely on the government to solve things. Government fails when it suppresses individual responsibility and seeks to make them reliant on the government.

It is tedious to have to continually point this out.

[spk]

"Pakistan is a wonderful country, with some of the kindest and most hospitable people I've ever met. Moreover, unlike a lot of very poor countries, it has enormous reservoirs of talented and decent people with good educations and professional training."

Having lived and studied in Pakistan, I'll offer my own, wholehearted support for the quote above. Sabrina Tavernise, who wrote the excerpted article, wrote another good one published May 2 in the "Week in Review" ("Pakistan: Struggling to See a Country of Shards"). When so much one reads about Pakistan concerns only nukes, the "Pakistani Taliban," civil unrest, etc., the Tavernise articles and whatever one finds about the lawyers movement (a very effective, relatively peaceful civil disobedience campaign) add some much needed perspective to any understanding of Pakistan.

[John Miller]

Dave, I have to admit, you had me fooled all this time. I didn't realize that you were a big Obama fan, but based on that last statement I presume you are.

[fledemaus]

Government succeeds WHEN individuals take personal responsibility for improving things and don't rely on the government to solve things.

That's right lets all go pick up trash so government can focus on the important work of protecting and coddling the rich and powerful. Don't forget to pay your taxes, the banks are hurting, don't ya know.

[Catsy]

I'm sorry, but russell wins the intartrons today.

[A.J.]

Government succeeds WHEN individuals take personal responsibility for improving things and don't rely on the government to solve things.

Government is one of the tools which responsible individuals use to solve problems.

Honestly, claiming that government only gets in the way is a bit like claiming that we could all build wonderful houses if only we'd foreswear hammers.

[watchinginwonder]

I would hope that even 3dDave has the understanding that indeed it is the role of government to provide for the basic security and safety of the people it governs.

We all shouldn't have grenades and rocket lauchers in our garages just in case of the invading masses. No, we depend on our government to protect via an army to protect us.

Similarly, should we all just start a landfill in our backyards?

I always thought that the idea of our representative government was that we elect officials who will create and maintain the government to provide safety and security in our own interest. The problem is that these representatives end up creating government for the benefit of only a few, the wealthy and powerful.

[knowdoubt]

Pakistan like Egypt has a six day work week (Saturday thru Thursday) with Friday being "Prayer Day". Sunday is just another work day as I remember it. Just noticing, maybe my memory has failed or they have changed.

[joe from Lowell]

Everyone loves the idea of the people of a community coming together to take personal responsibility for the provision of public services.

The existence of a vibrant democracy depends on there being a public space where people from all walks of life come together as equals, to work together towards a common end.

These guys are community organizers. They're building a constituency around a problem, and bringing people together into an effective unit in order to address that problem.