A revolution of consciousness is a shift in how we see the state, society and ourselves. It moves citizens from passive awareness to active responsibility, from entitlement to stewardship. Without this internal transformation, policies repeat, institutions stagnate and development remains superficial rather than genuinely empowering. What stirred this conviction in me was not theory alone but the quiet violence of everyday contradictions: a constitution that speaks of dignity while ordinary people still struggle to access basic services without pleading, connections or bribes; leaders who invoke “the people” but treat them as an audience, not as co-authors. Watching friends lose faith in public institutions, retreat into private survival, or simply migrate away created a kind of moral dissonance: if everyone withdraws into cynicism, who is left to demand better and embody it in practice.

Over time, exposure to debates on justice, democracy and the capability to live a life one has reason to value deepened this unease. It became clear that development is not only about higher incomes or more infrastructure, but about expanding real freedoms-freedom from fear of arbitrary power, freedom to question authority, freedom to organise without being dismissed as naïve or “too political”. Seeing how often talented, thoughtful people accepted a culture of low expectations from the state convinced me that the most profound transformation must begin in how citizens imagine their own agency.