Rifat’s Personal Mission
The writings
on this post fall into three groups: i) the evolution of what I’ve called my “personal mission”; ii) the evolution of my thinking over time; and iii) scanned material
from my efforts to undertake graduate studies.
They will provide a glimpse into my efforts to put things in the Maldives
The Evolution of My Personal Mission
My “personal mission” has evolved over time in response to successive challenges I found myself facing, and has gone through several stages. It began while I was still a student of architecture in Egypt in the mid-1970s, with the awareness of my huge responsibility as an architect in a nation, however small, then without any architects or civil engineers, and reached a crucial milestone a decade ago(***) with the awareness of the gravity of the conclusion that could be drawn from the overview of what I call the “development problem,” sketched out in “Integrative Planning” to begin with (October 1997) and later expanded in “Majlis Letter One” (April 2005) and an extended summary of it, labelled “Last Explanation.” (Subsequently, the third part of the post titled "2 – Positive Socio-Political Climate" below (2013) and the boxed piece just below, titled "The Evolution of My Thinking," also expound on the same illusive concept.) In a nutshell, this conclusion is that given that the world education system produces people with rather narrow specialized knowledge bases; given that national development is an all-encompassing endeavour that requires a command of a broad knowledge base; and given the discrepancy arising thereof, that there is hardly a person capable of coming up with viable, comprehensive policy in a broad, multifaceted endeavour as national development. (This lack is one root cause of many of our current problems; another being the lack of an enlightened and effective political leadership.) Once again I rose to the challenge (as I did way back in 1978 to the lack of a physical planning and design function in the Maldives Government, and in the Maldives in general; see “OPPD History and Challenges”) of addressing the mentioned discrepancy (also educating the political / technical cadre) by preparing myself for facilitating the formulation of viable national policy that can meet our future demands as well as solve our current problems and avert sizable hazards looming ahead – outcomes of misguided Government policies, many of which went against even basic common sense let alone any sophisticated theoretical analysis.
The effort began by striving for (see the scanned
docs below) and obtaining a masters degree with a focus on the development
of small island states (many policies viable for larger nations are not
suitable for smaller ones – this is another source of our inappropriate policies, since our school leavers by and large have to go abroad for college education in which the theories of numerous fields carry the implicit assumption that the economies they function in are large, and thus return home without understanding the difference) and a thesis titled Strategies
for Sustained Socioeconomic Development in Small Island States. Since then, I have come a long way on the
road of preparing myself to face current challenges (but, see the last sentence of this boxed piece for the final status in this regard). It includes efforts for expanding the scope
of my knowledge base through first gaining formal backgrounds in basic economics and finance and management in
the US (after completing graduate studies) followed by further efforts to gain
adequate backgrounds in other core areas such as sociology, psychology, social
psychology, communication, ecology, and other related fields. In addition, I also undertook a significant
amount of thinking and writing, which led to the transformation of my outlook radically. The post “5 – A Summary …” above captures the conclusions I arrived at; it also highlights the staggering
complexity of the “development problem” mentioned above.
The role I assigned for myself and its underlying
rationale is given in the post labelled “6 – Plan’g Min Role Redirection," above. While this would sound strange, the existing conditions at the top circles in successive Maldives Govts render such self-assignment necessary; for they have/had a rather retarded understanding of where the world is headed and the need for forward thinking. A case in point is the response I received from our government when I started studying architecture in the early 1970s after obtaining the needed qualifications through self-studies and financial support from a well-wisher, and requested financial support to supplement the meagre allowance of the scholarship provided by Egyptian Government (to the Maldives) (they call it "assistance," not a scholarship): "You were sent to study religion; we don't need architects in the Maldives; come back!" – my emphasis. (For many, this would be unbelievable now, after a mere four decades, and I may likely be accused of right-out lying.) Naturally, I did not return home as ordered but completed my studies, albeit under extremely difficult conditions, and went on to establish the physical planning and design function in the Maldives Government. This was, I have to add, with a positive attitude of mind from the then newly elected President Gayyoom – which attitude did not last very long, as pressures of office which he did not know how to cope with mounted, and gradually turned into a hindering and thus destructive force. A second case in point and reflective of my current effort is that Mr Gayyoom did not ask me to establish a physical planning and design function in the Government; it was I who suggested the idea to him and with his support (and the then favourable attitude) went about the task on my own initiative; not only that, many were sceptical of the need for the effort.
In similar fashion, hardly anyone seems to (or even wants to) understand the nature of the "development problem" outlined above and the kind of action that it demands – if we are to successfully face the challenges of our fast-changing and complex world. (This is, again, a situation in which existing states of mind are hard-put to comprehend what is being proposed, which state of mind may change again in another couple of decades – this is the nature of progress, to understand which one has to only contemplate the most famous of such cases: the Galileo fiasco.) My current effort is aimed at overcoming the limitations imposed by the "development problem" and paving the way for an optimal development effort. It can also be seen to operate on a very much larger scale than the earlier one, though both would be similar in many ways. Crucially, the new effort also would operate in a similar sociopolitical environment in which ignorance prevails and politicians are dug-in in their self-centred and short-sighted ways. Luckily, the current effort would also include effective measures for changing a large part of those long-ingrained destructive attitudes. And yet, in spite of a few sporadic successes, the new effort has a long way to go to realize its potential, which is currently being laid to waste – in spite of the fact that the long-term survival of this nation will almost certainly depend on it; for the logic underlying this last statement, see third part of "2 – Positive Socio-Political Atmosphere," the top of this piece, and last part of "6 – Plan’g Min Role Redirection," beginning with "Where I Fit In" and including the quote by Michael Crichton. In general, the top echelons in successive governments of the Maldives do not know what they should be doing, though everyone now talks loud about "development" and go about implementing action about the long-term negative consequences of which they have no idea. This is not surprising, given the difficulty of accurately assessing the outcome of any development effort (for a glimpse into this, see last paragraph of the post labelled "3 – Yameen and the Bridge," below) which in turn arises from the very nature and complexity of the "development problem" described above.
Outlines of viable policy can be found in numerous writings of mine – all of which were emailed to several hundred people on my local mailing list at the time of their writing. Particular mention should be made of the following: “Spatial Policy, Effective” (which laid the foundation for our current tourism development policy); “Education Curriculum, More Effective” (identifies some of the serious flaws of our current education system, which in turn are the root source many of our current ills, thus require urgent attention); “Viyafaari U’sool” (dwells on some of the serious downsides of indiscriminate leasing of our strategic infrastructure to foreign concerns); Habitat-II Report: Strategy for Sustainable and Equitable Development” (The Maldives National Report for Habitat-II Conference, Istanbul, 1996) which outlines an effective development strategy for the nation, little of which had been implemented to-date and the downsides of which failure can be seen in many of our current ills; and “OPPD History and Challenges” (OPPD is the acronym of Office for Physical Planning and Design). In addition, the articles on this blog to-date also must be mentioned; apart from this post, they are: “1 – Hulhumalé and the Bridge” (dwells on the meaning and dynamics of the development process and the role of the public and private sectors in it, in addition to the health and environmental hazards of building the said bridge); “3 – Yameen and the Bridge” (elaborates on the bridge aspect of the previous article); “2 – Positive Socio-Political Atmosphere” (underscores need for policies beneficial to the nation as a whole rather than those in the service of idiosyncrasies of the ruling elite); “5 – A Summary …”; and “6 – Plan’g Min Role Redirection (outlines theoretical basis of a guiding framework for effective national development in lieu of the currently prevalent haphazard and ineffective practices).
In similar fashion, hardly anyone seems to (or even wants to) understand the nature of the "development problem" outlined above and the kind of action that it demands – if we are to successfully face the challenges of our fast-changing and complex world. (This is, again, a situation in which existing states of mind are hard-put to comprehend what is being proposed, which state of mind may change again in another couple of decades – this is the nature of progress, to understand which one has to only contemplate the most famous of such cases: the Galileo fiasco.) My current effort is aimed at overcoming the limitations imposed by the "development problem" and paving the way for an optimal development effort. It can also be seen to operate on a very much larger scale than the earlier one, though both would be similar in many ways. Crucially, the new effort also would operate in a similar sociopolitical environment in which ignorance prevails and politicians are dug-in in their self-centred and short-sighted ways. Luckily, the current effort would also include effective measures for changing a large part of those long-ingrained destructive attitudes. And yet, in spite of a few sporadic successes, the new effort has a long way to go to realize its potential, which is currently being laid to waste – in spite of the fact that the long-term survival of this nation will almost certainly depend on it; for the logic underlying this last statement, see third part of "2 – Positive Socio-Political Atmosphere," the top of this piece, and last part of "6 – Plan’g Min Role Redirection," beginning with "Where I Fit In" and including the quote by Michael Crichton. In general, the top echelons in successive governments of the Maldives do not know what they should be doing, though everyone now talks loud about "development" and go about implementing action about the long-term negative consequences of which they have no idea. This is not surprising, given the difficulty of accurately assessing the outcome of any development effort (for a glimpse into this, see last paragraph of the post labelled "3 – Yameen and the Bridge," below) which in turn arises from the very nature and complexity of the "development problem" described above.
Outlines of viable policy can be found in numerous writings of mine – all of which were emailed to several hundred people on my local mailing list at the time of their writing. Particular mention should be made of the following: “Spatial Policy, Effective” (which laid the foundation for our current tourism development policy); “Education Curriculum, More Effective” (identifies some of the serious flaws of our current education system, which in turn are the root source many of our current ills, thus require urgent attention); “Viyafaari U’sool” (dwells on some of the serious downsides of indiscriminate leasing of our strategic infrastructure to foreign concerns); Habitat-II Report: Strategy for Sustainable and Equitable Development” (The Maldives National Report for Habitat-II Conference, Istanbul, 1996) which outlines an effective development strategy for the nation, little of which had been implemented to-date and the downsides of which failure can be seen in many of our current ills; and “OPPD History and Challenges” (OPPD is the acronym of Office for Physical Planning and Design). In addition, the articles on this blog to-date also must be mentioned; apart from this post, they are: “1 – Hulhumalé and the Bridge” (dwells on the meaning and dynamics of the development process and the role of the public and private sectors in it, in addition to the health and environmental hazards of building the said bridge); “3 – Yameen and the Bridge” (elaborates on the bridge aspect of the previous article); “2 – Positive Socio-Political Atmosphere” (underscores need for policies beneficial to the nation as a whole rather than those in the service of idiosyncrasies of the ruling elite); “5 – A Summary …”; and “6 – Plan’g Min Role Redirection (outlines theoretical basis of a guiding framework for effective national development in lieu of the currently prevalent haphazard and ineffective practices).
Importantly, the path for initiating an effective
development process also became clear in 1997 with the crystallization
into a sharp focus of a long-standing dense fog of perceptions regarding the
nature of the “development problem,” namely, the realization that
people with specialized education (not to mention those without any formal
background in any relevant field, as is often the current practice) cannot
by themselves, and without a clear and overarching guiding framework, generate
effective national development policy; for the logic of this statement, see the documents cited at the beginning of the first paragraph above.
Although the direction we should be taking – especially the
first critical/vital steps towards a more effective development process – has
been clear for a decade now (***) and in spite of the
evident and dire need of the nation for adaptive changes to face our complex
world, Mr Gayyoom has been adamantly blocking the path to progress and turning a blind eye to our very real problems
– as if they are non-existent or as if tackling
minor headaches can take precedence over the long-term wellbeing of the nation. For the past eight years (since 1999) I
have been trying, through explanations and clarifications, to get him to
understand the logic of the situation outlined above and to get him to act on
it – but to no avail. As a result, I have
been forced to take this issue to the Majlis (Parliament) (to members
individually) in April 2005; see "Majlis Letter One." (It should be mentioned that this latter effort also was in vain, akin to “drawing lines on a watery surface,” as goes our old adage.) It could be stated with fairness that it
was the cumulative outcomes of such inappropriate and inflexible behaviour on the part of Mr Gayyoom that
was largely responsible for the subsequent massive public unrest, which ultimately led
to his downfall – much like the gradual build-up of pressure and final blow-up of a steam engine when all pressure-release valves are blocked.
It would be appropriate to mention here that in view of the foregoing behaviour on the part of the elected representatives of the nation, namely, the head of state and Majlis members (in fact, successive heads of state and successive rounds of Majlis members) and also a significant number of young people with higher education, plus several elderly statesmen and an article to the general public – to all of whom various facets of the case had been put forth, and after having tried to put things on the right track for the better part of my adult life, in particular over the past 20 years on a purely voluntary basis, there is nothing further I can do if the short-sighted indifference about the future continues to be the behaviour of our rulers – even if the nation goes under, which will most likely be the case the way things are going. (And once critical mass is achieved in the momentum in that direction, absolutely nothing we do can stop it.) This process of destruction will be vastly and irreversibly accelerated by the farce of a bridge currently under construction – its hugely negative impacts will keep mounting over the years and decades to come, and in all likelihood will push the nation to the brink of collapse. And given this, the inevitable futility of any efforts to remedy the situation practically and effectively precludes any of my future involvements with any Maldives governments.
It would be appropriate to mention here that in view of the foregoing behaviour on the part of the elected representatives of the nation, namely, the head of state and Majlis members (in fact, successive heads of state and successive rounds of Majlis members) and also a significant number of young people with higher education, plus several elderly statesmen and an article to the general public – to all of whom various facets of the case had been put forth, and after having tried to put things on the right track for the better part of my adult life, in particular over the past 20 years on a purely voluntary basis, there is nothing further I can do if the short-sighted indifference about the future continues to be the behaviour of our rulers – even if the nation goes under, which will most likely be the case the way things are going. (And once critical mass is achieved in the momentum in that direction, absolutely nothing we do can stop it.) This process of destruction will be vastly and irreversibly accelerated by the farce of a bridge currently under construction – its hugely negative impacts will keep mounting over the years and decades to come, and in all likelihood will push the nation to the brink of collapse. And given this, the inevitable futility of any efforts to remedy the situation practically and effectively precludes any of my future involvements with any Maldives governments.
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(***) This piece was originally written in September, 2007; updated several times, latest being March 2016.
The Evolution of My Thinking
[Regarding Societal Interactive Processes]
Ever since I returned home after my first degree and started working in the
I began with a physician – how he/she manages to achieve
positive results, ie, cures an ill patient.
Obviously, the answer lies in his/her ability to understand the
intricacies of the functioning of the human body and how outside agents
intervene to disrupt the physiological functions of its systems. It is therefore the theoretical knowledge and
practical experience acquired by the physician via academic education and
training that enables him/her to solve the problem of the patient’s
illness. The same basic/simple logic is
applicable for professionals in other fields of specialization.
Given that it is the high-level knowledge we gain that
enables us to unravel the complexity of any situation at hand, it follows that
a person without the appropriate knowledge will not be able to bring about such
positive outcomes. As a result, persons
versed with knowledge in one field also cannot apply it to other fields to
bring about positive outcomes. Stretching
this logic further, it should be now clear that there would be significant
barriers, at the very least, for people knowledgeable in specialized fields to
engage in meaningful / constructive high-level dialogue that are necessary for effective cooperation among themselves to solve complex problems of today’s
world, since each person’s knowledge would be limited to his/her specialized
area and since their over lapping areas would be hazy for most of them – as
they are usually unlikely to have knowledge of those areas.
This thinking was dwelt-on in my 1997 paper labelled
“Integrated Planning” – in it I likened the behaviour of specialized people
trying to unravel a complex problem (in that paper, “planning”) to that of
seven blind men trying to describe an elephant after each one touches only one
part of it. This is a global problem in
today’s world in which education transcends national and geographical
boundaries. Thus a large part of the
problem has its roots in world education, which currently lacks the awareness
that such a problem even exists, let alone its devastating global impacts – for more on this topic, see my blog aimed at world educators www.rifatafeef.blogspot.com.
How world education is at least partially linked to this
problem is spelt-out in that paper.
Notwithstanding this awareness, and in spite of the awareness of the
psychological connotations involved (also explicitly dwelt-on in that paper) in
the earlier years following the paper, my efforts were limited to the local
context, in trying to convince the local political cadre as well as an
increasing number of people with college degrees from abroad of the nature of
the problem we have at hand. An
assumption implicit in that effort was that when the nature of the problem was
spelt-out explicitly and in irrefutable terms, people would begin to see the
light of the day. Not so,
definitely! Further, in spite of the
psychological and socio-psychological nature of the problem, both psychologists
and sociologists with whom I talked were not cognizant of the fact that a
significant part of the problem falls into their domain, thus that it is their
responsibility as well to find a solution to the problem. This failure in turn
led me to delve into psychology, and also sociology, with handsome
dividends.
It began to be clear that our problem has much deeper
roots than it appears. More
specifically, it became clear that the problem, although much aggravated by
specialized education, is fundamentally rooted in the way the human mind works. (But let's keep in mind that specialization is a necessary condition for human advancement, in spite of the increasing drawbacks as the world is becoming more complex and holistic thinking is increasingly called for – my complementary blog addresses this issue.) Given that what is in the third paragraph
above can be generalized further to state that humans make sense of the world
based on the information bases in their brains, the implications at societal/global level become
staggering. Not only are we born into different cultures and sub/microcultures with wide variations among them
and thus with different information bases due to them alone, each of us is also
different by virtue of our brains being structurally unique in spite of many
broad similarities. These structural
differences in turn lead to truly unique experiences; no two person’s
subjective experiences of a given event are thus likely to be the same. And such subjective experiences in their turn become an integral part of one's information base, and so on ... The sum
total of the variations among information bases arising from these process lead
to unique human beings and thus unbridgeable mental gaps among people. I can think of no way to counter the
downsides arising from these mental gaps than to equip people with the tools
needed to narrow those gaps in their encounters with fellow humans. This aim can be achieved to a significant
degree by instilling in young children an attitude to communicate with their
fellows and adults with empathy and by teaching the youth the basics of both
communication and associated psychology – both process are complementary; thus they
are highly unlikely to work in isolation, that is, when one or the other is implemented alone.
[But I’m not suggesting that the Maldives
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This piece was
originally written in April, 2012, and modified a bit subsequently.
Scanned excerpts from my application forms to the
Better legibility of the scanned material can be achieved by enlarging the webpage by pressing the “+” key on the keyboard while holding down the “Ctrl” (control) key; this can be repeated several times to achieve the desired magnification. The original size of the webpage can be reverted to by pressing the “-” key with the “Ctrl” key as many times as was done for enlargement.
It would be clear from these documents that I embarked on graduate studies (and continued with subsequent studies mentioned above) in order to be able to face the dire conditions in the Maldives and not merely to obtain a master's degree – for which I was in no need to practice my initial profession of architecture. Too bad all that efforts and knowledge and skills and experience – which I doubt anyone else in the world would have, especially as relates to the Maldives – are to be laid to waste.
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