The Pakistan Paradox

The idea of Pakistan stands riddled with tensions. Initiated by a small group of elite Urdu-speaking Muslims who envisioned a unified Islamic state today Pakistan suffers the divisive forces of various separatist movements and religious fundamentalism. A small entrenched elite continue to dominate the country’s corridors of power and democratic forces and legal institutions remain weak. But despite these seemingly insurmountable problems the Islamic Republic of Pakistan continues to endure. Pakistan Paradox is the definitive history of democracy in Pakistan and its survival despite ethnic strife Islamism and deepseated elitism. This edition focuses on three kinds of tensions that are as old as Pakistan itself. The tension between the unitary definition of the nation inherited from Jinnah and centrifugal ethnic forces; between civilians and army officers who are not always in favour of or against democracy; and between the Islamists and those who define Islam only as a cultural identity marker. About the Author Dr Christophe Jaffrelot is a senior research fellow at CERI (Centre d’Etudes et de Recherches Internationales) at Sciences Po (Paris) and research director at the CNRS (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique) professor of Indian politics and sociology at the King’s India Institute (London) and Global Scholar at Princeton University. He has been visiting professor at Columbia University Yale and SAIS (Johns Hopkins University). He is a member of the board of Ashoka University. Among his publications are The Hindu Nationalist Movement and Indian Politics 1925 to 1990s (1999) and India’s Silent Revolution (2003). He has also co-edited with Laurent Gayer Muslims in Indian Cities: Trajectories of Marginalization (2012).