Reams of pages have been written in all the local dailies since then. Apparently, the frequency of hartals has continued unabated. Calling hartal is now the first resort instead of the last. Because the ruling BANJIP (BA= Bangladesh, N= Nationalist, JI=Jamaat-e-Islami, P=Party) instead of taking a conciliatory posture doggedly resolved to confront the oppositions with lathi charge and tear gas -- a trait reminiscent of infamous Governor Monayem Khan's rule by repression. The oppositions' resolve to boycott the parliament further deepened and the BANJIP's disregard of the rule of law went unimpeded.

Another issue on which many of us wrote passionately is corruption. Like hartals, they not only had no deterring outcomes on BNP's malfeasance and sleaze, the modus operandi of governance progressively turned into a kleptocracy. Two latest cases that truly took some life out of my pen were the alleged $230 million money laundering scam of the PM's son (yet to be confuted by the PM or the Malaysian government, but still, I must emphasize, unproven) and the kitschy story about the Chief Whip's use of the parliament cafeteria for his family's grocery supplies and cash taking to supplement groceries not sold in the cafeteria.

In a democracy, the voters elect politicians to lead them to prosperity through production and delivery of political goods (those due to the existence of government). Unfortunately, our politicians work to lead only themselves and their party functionaries to prosperity.

One of the most important concepts in economics is production function -- a technical relationship between inputs (factors of production such as land, labour, physical capital, technology, entrepreneurship, and raw materials) and outputs (real GDP). Obviously, the quality of output will depend on the quality of inputs. The productivity of labour (goods produced per hour of work), for example, depends on workers' education, skill, and experience under a given working condition.

Analogously, the production function for political goods (PFPG) is a technical relationship between politicians (as one of the inputs) and goods and services (outputs) that are produced by the politicians. Here politicians are inputs in a PFPG as workers are in a GDP production function defined above. In economics, we often say, what you get depends on what you put in: "garbage in, garbage out" is a popular phrase.

The delivery of political goods is central to the formation of mass opinion about democracy. Citizens form opinions about politicians' performance in implementing public policies (to create jobs, control inflation, and distribute incomes) in judging whether democracy is functioning as promised.

A hierarchy of political goods by John Robb ("Weak, failed, and collapsed states," May 1, 2004) is presented below. My assessment of the current stance (MACS) of these political goods in Bangladesh is noted in parentheses.

-- Security of life and property: This is the state's primary function. It provides a framework through which all other political goods can be delivered. (MACS: security of life and property is considered weak in Bangladesh).

-- Rule of law: A system of codes and procedures which regulate the interactions of the population and set the standards for conduct. (MACS: System is there but the application of law is highly discriminatory. Party people can get amnesty for murder).

-- Medical and health care. (MACS: very poor, only the rich have priority access).

-- Schools and educational instruction. (MACS: Very poor, private tutoring at SSC and HSC is the norm nowadays)

-- Critical infrastructure (roads, railways, airways, water ways, electricity, gas, quality water and sewer, waste management, etc. (MACS: many of these nearly in collapsing state mostly because of political corruption and mismanagement).

-- Money and banking system (MACS: a dual banking system in operation; private banks in good standing, nationalized banks are inefficient and poorly managed because of government borrowing and loan defaulters).

-- A business environment (MACS: very poor, Hawa Bhaban allegedly collects toll for any new business venture PMO approves, also collect toll from existing businesses).

-- A forum for civil society (MACS: Good, but BANJIP is indignant of most deliberations of civil society discourse, media is always under threat).

-- A method of regulating environmental commons (MACS: very poor, almost whimsical and bribe driven).

A more descriptive taxonomy of the health of a state based on its ability to deliver the political goods are assessed by examining three categories: Strong States, Weak States, and Failed States.

-- Strong States are in full control of their territories and provide high quality political goods to their citizens. They perform strongly in GDP per capita (and its growth), the UNDP Human Development Index, Transparency Inter-national's Corruption Perception Index, and Freedom House's Freedom of the World Report.

-- Weak States suffer from religious, ethnic or other tensions, such as political unrest and regional conflicts that limit or decrease the state's ability to deliver political goods. Poverty reduction becomes ineffective, small minority benefits from GDP growth, corruption becomes the way of doing state and private businesses, and application of the rule of law is discriminatory and is weakly applied to favoured ones. Examples: Iraq (under Saddam), Belarus, North Korea, Libya, and, I would argue, Bangladesh.

-- Failed States are incapable of providing much political goods. Examples: Nepal, Congo, Liberia, Afghanistan, and Iraq (today).

Bangladesh plainly fits the taxonomy of a weak state as described. How can the situation be improved? Educating the voters through civil society forums and making them understand that delivery of expected political goods is a function of the type of people elected for political offices. In this context, Professor Yunus's "competent candidates" formula should receive serious consideration.

The formation of a civil society group on March 21, is a first in our nascent and troubled democracy. The three important missions, articulated by Dr Debapriya Bhattacharya, namely:

-- Prepare a mid-term (15 years) development vision and make it a national manifesto,

-- Exchange views among a cross-section of political parties and civil society organizations across the country to create public awareness, and

-- Analyze election platforms of major political parties, hold national policy forum meetings and initiate post-election follow-up activities, if followed through, may ultimately save the country from further ruin.

Long-term solutions would involve targeting academically gifted students to study law and economics and draw them into politics. Economics and law are to be emphasized, not to the exclusion of other fields, based on the western models, where nearly 90 percent of the lawmakers have law degree with economics, in most cases, as undergraduate major or minor subjects.

The parliament is the ultimate forum for accountability for all activities of political appointees and public servants. A well qualified breed of lawmakers with impeccable integrity and an independent ACC would be the most effective deterrence against public policy mismanagement, and malfeasance thus guaranteeing delivery of political goods to the citizens.

With the current breed of politicians and those waiting in the pipeline, any hope for better governance seems to be something of an illusion.

Dr. Abdullah A. Dewan is Professor of Economics at Eastern Michigan University.