We need to move from basics to serious reform

Once in a while, it is worth taking a step back in order to understand what is happening in Kenya today, against what could be happening. Let’s begin with a couple of hopeful reflections.

Imagine a responsible government providing efficient and equitable public services, promoting appropriate incentives for private initiatives, undertaking carefully chosen public investments and advancing real science, technology and skill formation for productive use.

This is the language Nobel Economics Laureate Amartya Sen used in a recent Times of India op-ed in which he worried that his own government’s “penchant for development by magic” and “pursuit of the paranormal” was driven by “fairy tales from an imaginary past”, in the absence of sound public policy.

Put differently, until we truly align our politics-policy-planning (growth and development)-service-fiscal agenda, then we shall continue to helplessly and hopelessly lament the state capture, looting, grand corruption, bribery and petty corruption — basically “thievery” as a habit, not an act — that is its flip side.

Let’s then imagine what inclusive economic growth that we all feel in our pockets might mean, by thinking about what it doesn’t mean. First, it would be growth that isn’t “jobless”, only offering returns to capital while creating inadequate income opportunities. Second, it wouldn’t be “ruthless” where the benefits of such growth are skewed towards the welloff while many wallow in poverty.

Third, it wouldn’t be “voiceless”; that is, lacking public participation or the peoples’ empowerment, and resistant to alternative views. Fourth, we can’t afford growth that is “rootless” in its failure to embrace and celebrate our cultural diversity. Finally, it definitely shouldn’t be “futureless”, driven by a present generation squandering resources that future generations will need.

These are the scary growth descriptions the United Nations’ used in its 1996 Human Development Report, which it summed up thus, “growth that perpetuates today’s inequalities is neither sustainable nor worth sustaining”, with the reminder that while “short-term advances in human development…are not sustainable without further growth, growth is not sustainable without human development.” This rhymes with the human development lens and capabilities approach that defined Sen’s own work.

Stepping away from aspirations, and eschewing numbers, where is Kenya today? On the face of it, an opportunistic private, especially financial, sector and expanding infrastructure cast against basic challenges — food, health, education, shelter, jobs, security and justice.

Digging a little deeper, we might observe little problem-solving policy (and a preference for projects), short-termism in planning, mixed but improving public services and a discombobulated fiscus.

Yet, isn’t the “Big 4” being implemented, the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) team’s work almost done, and a census, referendum and boundaries review all due before we get to 2022? Aren’t we rolling out a Competency-Based Curriculum (CBC) to transform our education, training, and hopefully, learning?

Allow me to take a walk on the wild side, and imagine three versions of Kenya. Think of Kenya 1.0 (the state of entropy or disorder) as everything before the 2010 Constitution (ranging from Kenya 0.5 in the 80s and 90s to Kenya 1.2 in the 70s, from Kenya 0.9 in the 60s).

Consider the Constitution as the Kenya 2.0 marker for our reform destination (state of effectiveness —doing the right thing), and Kenya 3.0 as the modernity that follows, and is no substitute for, reform (state of excellence as sum of effectiveness (doing the right thing) and efficiency (doing things right)).

So the question again, where is Kenya today?

This week alone, we made progress on Digital Kenya (Kenya 3.0) through partnership with the Singaporean government at the same time that concerns grew that Devolution 2.0 is under threat (a rejection of Kenya 2.0 for Kenya 1.0); 50 years after Devolution 1.0 departed Kenya.

Our Kenya 1.0 bureaucrats this week couldn’t tell how much maize we have in store. No surprise that the World Economic Forum competiveness index rates us highly on innovation and poorly on the basics.

Meanwhile, Global 4.0 is now talking post-digital distributed ledgers, artificial intelligence, extended reality, quantum computing (DARQ), when we’re not even close to its SMAC digital prerequisite (social, mobile, analytics and cloud technology), even as we imbibe our endless Politics 1.0 cacophony.

This week, let’s reflect and ask — as leaders and Kenyans at large — which version of Kenya we want.

I suspect that the human aspirations I began with—which our Constitution espouses—are a great place to decisively step away from Kenya 1.0, fully embrace Kenya 2.0, and eventually get to Kenya 3.0.