Editor in Chief: Moh. Reza Huwaida Thursday, March 28th, 2024

Understanding Social and Political Changes

Social and political changes are inevitable and the societies that are able to understand these changes and guide them towards or closer to the intended destinations are the most successful ones. It is not possible to keep on resisting changes and the ones who have opted to resist changes for long have not been able to do so without using force and violence. And, that has resulted in the backwardness of the society and the eruption of conflicts and wars.   
There are two important aspects of social and political changes: context and scope. The changes cannot be understood without their contexts; in fact, they cannot happen without them. Understanding the context would make the changes easily comprehensible and may even help the societies adjust themselves as per the context. The scope of the changes basically determine the extent of influence. Some changes are very minor and they are not easily detectable; however, there are certain changes that redefine the whole social and political structures and may lead the societies towards annihilation or a magnificent victory. In most of the cases, the small changes that keep on happening within the society ultimately result into big changes and even revolutions. Therefore, it is important that these changes should be pursued properly and their possible influences should be predicted beforehand so as to save the societies from facing surprises.
Another essential aspect of social and political changes is that they follow a certain process. Within this process, there is a period called transition period, which is an ongoing phenomenon between two states of affairs. Within transition period it is not yet decided where the changes are going to end ultimately. It is most chaotic, uncertain and ambiguous stage and, therefore, the societies that are passing through a transition period, experiencing changes with a wide scope, are difficult to manage or govern and require true, dedicated and wise efforts from all the members of society. 
Social and political changes are always difficult to prognosticate. Human beings have been in constant struggle to comprehend their nature and have control over them. In this regard there are researches, studies and mechanisms in societies, with the objective of curbing them appropriately. One of the basic reasons of the formation of a political system was to introduce control within states. This control mechanism is guaranteed by the government in a political system along with other pillars of state. A part from that, the political parties and institutions also play a major role in addressing these changes. Controlling here does not necessarily mean stopping the changes; rather it refers to guiding the changes towards the wellbeing of most of the people living in the state. If on certain occasions changes are blocked on many other occasions changes are promulgated by the government or political parties.
At the present scenario our country Afghanistan is going through a transition period. Transition period here does not mean the transition of the security responsibilities going on in the country; rather here transition is mentioned with much broader perspective. Afghanistan is moving, though to a very limited extent, from a tribal society to a democratic one. Though the real democratic signs are yet to be found in most parts of the country, there have been movement in that direction to a certain extent.
Unfortunately, this transition period is facing myriads of hurdles. The instable political and social setups have further made this period uncertain. The control mechanism itself seems to have lost the focus and devotion. It seems perplexed in the interwoven web of frequent social changes and has been contaminated with intense corruption. It lacks clear vision itself, so how it is possible for it to guide the social and political changes towards a definite goal. The country at the moment is marked with swelling wave of terrorism. Even the securest of all the people are insecure, most of the international forces have withdrawn, the national forces are facing serious challenges to shoulder the security responsibility, the political system is marked with certain incapacities to deal with the diverse political requirements and all these changes have been magnified because of their occurrence during a transition. So, the economic future is clearly uncertain and the most tragic fact is that we are completely unprepared.
This transition period has to be over one day, as happens with every transition period; but what could this period lead to is of immense importance. This period can either lead us to another chaotic state of affairs wherein we have to wait for a couple of more decades for the same transition or it can lead us to position from where we can move towards a successful democratic state. Definitely, the second option is what most of Afghan people desire for, but that is achievable only after prudent, agile and above all sincere efforts on the part of the control mechanism.