Dhaka, Oct. 28 -- For fifty-four years, Bangladesh has been ruled by ideas - Mujibism, Bengali nationalism, secularism, military nationalism - yet for ordinary citizens, very little has changed.

Power has rotated among elites, but the everyday struggles of the poor have remained constant. Unemployment, inequality, environmental degradation, and the widening divide between city and village persist because every political era began with ideology, not with citizens.

Parties fought over belief systems while people waited for food prices to drop, for jobs to appear, for schools to work, and for justice to mean something.

After months of upheaval, reform, and the signing of the July Charter, Bangladesh now stands at a decisive moment - to fi...