There are ingredients that together combine to create the societal and economic storm that is a prelude to the collapse of a state. Or in other words, a state the institutions of which are unable to bring the collapse to a halt. Phase by phase, these ingredients first appear in the economic fabric. They may be listed in order to forecast the initial and then the accelerating signs of state collapse. We may begin with a currency that is losing value, by the month, and finally the day, and thereby causing soaring prices for commodities that the different strata of society have long taken for granted. The result is a lower and lower living standard for the ordinary citizen that eventually crosses the mark of penury. At the same time, in their quest for maintaining their surpluses, wages and salaries get trimmed and cut. The rising curve of prices meets and crosses the falling curve of wages and salaries, leading to the deprivation of more and more within the population. Savings deposits in banks erode in value and translated into Purchasing Power Parity, shrink in value. Eventually, the savings deposits become worthless, while often the banks offering them get denuded of reserves and surpluses by a corrupt and greedy government seeking to maximise the flow of money to them. In large part, such funds get used for the purchase of items that are of little value, because the bribes paid by the manufacturers is higher than competing bribes from other manufacturers. Select imports are given preference above local manufacture, not because of higher quality but because the bribes paid are higher. More and more, local manufacturers serve only as facilities for assembly of imported parts. The final product may have a domestic label but often that label is among the few items locally made, and in exceptional instances, even the labels get imported.
The annuities on deposits containing hard-earned money often over a lifetime of work secure less and less on the market. Eventually, in order to get by, properties get sold one by one until the stock of properties available for sale reaches zero. From then onwards, increasing penury that eventually moves to poverty becomes the life and lifestyle of the unfortunate victim of such a situation. By that time, assets such as gold that may once have been plentiful end up with moneylenders who are less interested in getting repaid by the borrower than in getting legal title to the assets, including gold. Larger and larger dwellings get sold and replaced with smaller and smaller ones. Eventually, the younger generation (Gen Z) in each family begins to experience an urge to revolt. As for the ruling elite, they would by now have exchanged almost the entirety of their domestic assets for foreign ones. The more canny among them sense that the breaking point of society is being reached, and make their getaway. The unlucky get caught by the rampaging Gen Z, and lose their lives, to the mob, often in a cruel way.
Once the mob gets effective control of essential elements of the machinery of the state, out goes such features as due process or habeas corpus. Often more and more of the elements of the mob develop a lynch mentality. The mob deals with those formerly in state power who lacked the foresight or the resources to escape to foreign nests built up out of moneys stolen from the population at large; then they turn their attention to others innocent of wrongdoing by the erstwhile state machinery. Lynching follows, often through setting the victims and members of the family on fire. They die a fast but agonizing death. After that comes the turn of innocent victims, often on the basis of their faith. They get lynched in public, to chants of encouragement and approval from bystanders who too hate those of a different faith. In place of movie theatres and sports stadiums, such lynching becomes the preferred local entertainment mode.
The only problem is the future facing such mobs. The economy goes from slowdown to halt to freefall, except for thievery and loot, other opportunities for securing the means of livelihood dwindle, eventually into nothingness. A government structure controlled by fanatics finds it impossible to attract investment. For one, there is no safety in such investments, for someday a lynch mob may come for the properties newly built and their owners. The domestic currency would by now have become worthless scraps of paper, leading to currency notes of higher and higher numerical value getting produced. Such may seem to be a horror movie, but it is what is being played out now in real time in Bangladesh. What is taking place in Bangladesh ought to serve as a cautionary example to those in power across the world. Whether it will, is doubtful, for such leaders never learn. The people of India are fortunate in having a stable National Democratic Alliance government at the Centre led by the able and determined Prime Minister Narendra Modi. By its resilience and rapid development, India has shown a contrary governance mode to the flailing, failing states of Pakistan and Bangladesh.
