Pakistan’s 2018 general elections marked the second successful transfer of power from one elected civilian government to another—a remarkable achievement considering the country’s history of dictatorial rule. Pakistan’s Political Parties examines how the civilian side of the state’s current regime has survived the transition to democracy, providing critical insight into the evolution of political parties in Pakistan and their role in developing democracies in general. Pakistan’s numerous political parties span the ideological spectrum, as well as represent diverse regional, ethnic, and religious constituencies. The essays in this volume explore the way in which these parties both contend and work with Pakistan’s military-bureaucratic establishment to assert and expand their power. Researchers use interviews, surveys, data, and ethnography to illuminate the internal dynamics and motivations of these groups and the mechanisms through which they create policy and influence state and society. Pakistan’s Political Parties is a one-of-a-kind resource for diplomats, policymakers, journalists, and scholars searching for a comprehensive overview of Pakistan’s party system and its unlikely survival against an interventionist military, with insights that extend far beyond the region.

Pakistan’s 2018 general elections marked the second successful transfer of power from one elected civilian government to another—a remarkable achievement considering the country’s history of dictatorial rule. Pakistan’s Political Parties examines how the civilian side of the state’s current regime has survived the transition to democracy, providing critical insight into the evolution of political parties in Pakistan and their role in developing democracies in general. Pakistan’s numerous political parties span the ideological spectrum, as well as represent diverse regional, ethnic, and religious constituencies. The essays in this volume explore the way in which these parties both contend and work with Pakistan’s military-bureaucratic establishment to assert and expand their power. Researchers use interviews, surveys, data, and ethnography to illuminate the internal dynamics and motivations of these groups and the mechanisms through which they create policy and influence state and society. Pakistan’s Political Parties is a one-of-a-kind resource for diplomats, policymakers, journalists, and scholars searching for a comprehensive overview of Pakistan’s party system and its unlikely survival against an interventionist military, with insights that extend far beyond the region.

Pakistan's Political Parties examines how the civilian side of the state's current regime has survived the transition to democracy, providing insight into the evolution of political parties in Pakistan and their role in developing democracies in general. This overview is a one-of-a-kind resource.

Under what conditions are some developing countries able to create stable democracies while others have slid into instability and authoritarianism? To address this classic question at the center of policy and academic debates, The Promise of Power investigates a striking puzzle: why, upon the 1947 Partition of British India, was India able to establish a stable democracy while Pakistan created an unstable autocracy? Drawing on interviews, colonial correspondence, and early government records to document the genesis of two of the twentieth century's most celebrated independence movements, Maya Tudor refutes the prevailing notion that a country's democratization prospects can be directly attributed to its levels of economic development or inequality. Instead, she demonstrates that the differential strengths of India's and Pakistan's independence movements directly account for their divergent democratization trajectories. She also establishes that these movements were initially constructed to pursue historically conditioned class interests. By illuminating the source of this enduring contrast, The Promise of Power offers a broad theory of democracy's origins that will interest scholars and students of comparative politics, democratization, state-building, and South Asian political history.

This book is a result of research undertaken on the subject by the scholars associated with the IDSA project on Pakistan Occupied Kashmir (PoK) - also known as Pakistan Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (PoJK) - which includes both the so-called "Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK)" and Gilgit-Baltistan (GB). This was legally a part of the erstwhile princely state of Jammu and Kashmir, which acceded to India in October 1947. The authors of this book seek to provide a critical analysis of the politics of the above mentioned two regions within PoK; throw light on the genesis and evolution of various political parties and interest groups, and acquaint the readers with different personalities playing important role in politics therein. The main aim of the publication is to help the scholars, analysts, and policy-makers to understand the dynamics of the political systems in PoK, the complex interaction of these systems with the government in Islamabad and the responses of the local leadership to Pakistan's strategy of keeping them under strict control in the name of representative governance over the last 70 years.

What is driving political extremism in Pakistan? In early 2011, the prominent Pakistani politician Salmaan Taseer was assassinated by a member of his own security team for insulting Islam by expressing views in support of the rights of women and religious minorities. Benazir Bhutto, the former prime minister, was killed by gunfire and explosive devices as she left a campaign event in December 2007; strong evidence links members of extremist organizations to her slaying. These murders underscore the fact that religion, politics, and policy are inextricably linked in Pakistan. In this book, Haroon K. Ullah analyzes the origins, ideologies, bases of support, and electoral successes of the largest and most influential Islamic parties in Pakistan. Based on his extensive field work in Pakistan, he develops a new typology for understanding and comparing the discourses put forth by these parties in order to assess what drives them and what separates the moderate from the extreme. A better understanding of the range of parties is critical for knowing how the US and other Western nations can engage states where Islamic political parties hold both political and moral authority. Pakistan’s current democratic transition will hinge on how well Islamic parties contribute to civilian rule, shun violence, and mobilize support for political reform. Ullah’s political-party typology may also shed light on the politics of other majority-Muslim democracies, such as Egypt and Tunisia, where Islamist political parties have recently won elections.

In Pakistan at the Crossroads, top international scholars assess Pakistan's politics and economics and the challenges faced by its civil and military leaders domestically and diplomatically. Contributors examine the state's handling of internal threats, tensions between civilians and the military, strategies of political parties, police and law enforcement reform, trends in judicial activism, the rise of border conflicts, economic challenges, financial entanglements with foreign powers, and diplomatic relations with India, China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan, and the United States. In addition to ethnic strife in Baluchistan and Karachi, terrorist violence in Pakistan in response to the American-led military intervention in Afghanistan and in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas by means of drones, as well as to Pakistani army operations in the Pashtun area, has reached an unprecedented level. There is a growing consensus among state leaders that the nation's main security threats may come not from India but from its spiraling internal conflicts, though this realization may not sufficiently dissuade the Pakistani army from targeting the country's largest neighbor. This volume is therefore critical to grasping the sophisticated interplay of internal and external forces complicating the country's recent trajectory.

Sindhi nationalism is one of the oldest yet least studied cases of identity politics in Pakistan. Ethnic discontent appeared in Sindh in opposition to the rule of the Bombay presidency; to the onslaught of Punjabi settlers in the wake of canal irrigation; and, most decisively, to the arrival of millions of Muhajirs (Urdu-speaking migrants) after Partition. Under Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, Benazir Bhutto and Asif Zardari, the Pakistan People's Party has upheld the Sindhi nationalist cause, even while playing the game of federalist politics. On the other side for half a century have been hardcore Sindhi nationalist groups, led by Marxists, provincial autonomists, landlord pirs and liberal intelligentsia in pursuit of ethnic outbidding. This book narrates the story of the Bhutto dynasty, the Muhajir factor, nationalist ideologues, factional feuds amongst landed elites, and the role of violence as a maker and shaper of Sindhi nationalism. Moreover, it examines the role of the PPP as an ethnic entrepreneur through an analysis of its politics within the electoral arena and beyond. Bringing together extensive fieldwork and comparative studies of ethno-nationalism, both within and outside Pakistan, Asma Faiz uncovers the fascinating world of Sindhi nationalism.