November 29, 1981

ONE popular mayoral anecdote on public behavior concerns residents of a poorly paved street. Being human they complained. Being responsive, the mayor paved. The road now being smooth, people speed. The residents, still human, complain. The mayor, still responsive, sends out the radar. The police apprehend the speeders who turn out to be mostly other neighborhood residents who in turn complain about being arrested for driving only slightly over the foolishly low speed limit. Then in the spring all residents together complain about the higher taxes that resulted from paving the road and paying for the radar units. Fingers of doubt begin to massage the mayoral mind as to why he bothered to pave the road in the first place. Then as to why he bothered to run in the first place. Each mayor has a different answer to that one, mostly high-flown. Many, perhaps most, are motivated chiefly by desire to improve the world. Others relish power. Some praise the roar of the crowd. Every politician has some portion of each of these set upon a solid base of ego. Even a public servant as mild-mannered as I must admit that a great engine of self-esteem lurks just beneath the surface of a quiet public personality. Politics is no job for a soul plagued with self-doubt.

A closed shopping center built as an oldtime village with shops located in a grist mill, a tavern, a schoolhouse and other period buildings is being converted into condominium apartments in this community just west of Summit. A model was recently opened for what will eventually be 50 condominium houses and apartments. The shopping center, Murray Hill Square - on six acres on the outskirts of New Providence -was planned and constructed by Natale G. Conti, a builder who lives in New Providence. The mall opened in 1976.

NASSAU, the Bahamas H IS religion prohibits magic. Muhammad Ali mentions this as he performs some sleight of hand in his hotel room while waiting for a fight some people say he shouldn't attempt, and others suspect may never come off. While waiting it out, Muhammad Ali takes three unequal ropes and makes them the same length without being detected. He stuffs a handkerchief into his huge fist and makes it disappear. He turns a half dollar into a nickel with a flick of his hand. But after that trick, he deliberately exposes the device that allows him to switch the coins. He says in the hoarse voice that worries his friends: ''Muslims don't believe in magic. That's why I've got to explain what I do. I believe in God, and I believe in knowledge, in education. No magic, no voodoo.''

Poland's Communist Party leadership, responding to Friday's initiative by the nation's leader, Gen. Wojciech Jaruzelski, demanded tonight that Parliament approve ''extraordinary measures'' to curb labor unrest. These were said to include a law that would permit the banning of strikes. The right to strike was at the heart of the August 1980 agreement on civil and labor rights between the Government and Solidarity, the independent union movement. The call by the Central Committee, the party's policy-making body, did not specify in its resolution tonight the kind of legislation that it had in mind. But an authoritative source who attended the committee's closed, two-day meeting here said the plan included a measure to ban strikes.

Saudi Arabia's fellow Arabs last week succeeded where Israel had failed. They derailed a Middle East peace plan that traded tacit recognition of Israel for a Palestinian state. A partial boycott of an Arab League summit in Morocco that the Saudis had hoped would endorse their first peace initiative led King Hassan, the host, to adjourn the meeting only four hours after it began. He and the Saudis apparently decided that would be less damaging to Arab prestige than another prolonged display of disunity. King Hassan said Arab foreign ministers would set a date for the ''next part'' of the meeting, but gave no indication when that might be.