The Struggle for Pakistan
The Struggle for Pakistan

Author: Ayesha Jalal

Publisher: Harvard University Press

Published: 2014-09-16

Total Pages: 448

ISBN-13: 0674744993

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Established as a homeland for India’s Muslims in 1947, Pakistan has had a tumultuous history. Beset by assassinations, coups, ethnic strife, and the breakaway of Bangladesh in 1971, the country has found itself too often contending with religious extremism and military authoritarianism. Now, in a probing biography of her native land amid the throes of global change, Ayesha Jalal provides an insider’s assessment of how this nuclear-armed Muslim nation evolved as it did and explains why its dilemmas weigh so heavily on prospects for peace in the region. “[An] important book...Ayesha Jalal has been one of the first and most reliable [Pakistani] political historians [on Pakistan]...The Struggle for Pakistan [is] her most accessible work to date...She is especially telling when she points to the lack of serious academic or political debate in Pakistan about the role of the military.” —Ahmed Rashid, New York Review of Books “[Jalal] shows that Pakistan never went off the rails; it was, moreover, never a democracy in any meaningful sense. For its entire history, a military caste and its supporters in the ruling class have formed an ‘establishment’ that defined their narrow interests as the nation’s.” —Isaac Chotiner, Wall Street Journal

The Battle for Pakistan
The Battle for Pakistan

Author: Shuja Nawaz

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

Published: 2020-04-10

Total Pages: 429

ISBN-13: 1538142058

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The Battle for Pakistan showcases a marriage of convenience between unequal partners. The relationship between Pakistan and the United States since the early 1950s has been nothing less than a whiplash-inducing rollercoaster ride. Today, surrounded by hostile neighbors, with Afghanistan increasingly under Indian influence, Pakistan does not wish to break ties with the United States. Nor does it want to become a vassal of China and get caught in the vice of a US-China rivalry, or in the Arab-Iran conflict. Internally, massive economic and demographic challenges as well as the existential threat of armed militancy pose huge obstacles to Pakistan's development and growth. Could its short-run political miscalculations in the Obama years prove too costly? Can the erratic Trump administration help salvage this relationship? Based on detailed interviews with key US and South Asian leaders, access to secret documents and operations, and the author’s personal relationships and deep knowledge of the region, this book untangles the complex web of the US-Pakistani relationship and identifies a clear path forward, showing how the United States can build better partnerships in troubled corners of the world.

The Army and Democracy
The Army and Democracy

Author: Aqil Shah

Publisher: Harvard University Press

Published: 2014-04-29

Total Pages: 416

ISBN-13: 0674728939

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In sharp contrast to neighboring India, the Muslim nation of Pakistan has been ruled by its military for over three decades. The Army and Democracy identifies steps for reforming Pakistan’s armed forces and reducing its interference in politics, and sees lessons for fragile democracies striving to bring the military under civilian control.

Frontline Pakistan
Frontline Pakistan

Author: Zahid Hussain

Publisher: Columbia University Press

Published: 2008

Total Pages: 236

ISBN-13: 9780231142250

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Veteran Pakistani journalist and commentator Zahid Hussain explores Pakistan's complex political power web and the consequences of Musharraf's decision to support America's drive against jihadism, which essentially took Pakistan to war with itself. Conducting exclusive interviews with key players and grassroots radicals, Hussain pinpoints the origin of the jihadi movement in Pakistan and Afghanistan, the long-standing and often denied links between militants and Pakistani authorities, the weaknesses of successive elected governments, and the challenges to Musharraf's authority posed by politico-religious, sectarian, and civil society elements within the country. The jihadi madrassas of Pakistan are incubators of the most feared terrorists in the world. Although the country's "war on terror" has so far been a stage show, a very real battle is looming, the outcome of which will have grave implications for the future security of the world.

The Ideological Struggle for Pakistan
The Ideological Struggle for Pakistan

Author: Ziad Haider

Publisher: Hoover Press

Published: 2010

Total Pages: 64

ISBN-13: 9780817910853

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Since its inception in 1947, the idea of Pakistan has been a contested one. Today, Pakistan faces a militant Islamist threat that its elected government is trying to combat in fractious collaboration with the army. As the country finds itself on the defensive against an array of groups claiming to wave the banner of Islam, it must counter their ideology decisively. This assessment of the struggle for Pakistan’s identity, from its birth to the present day, provides a political and cultural understanding of the role and use of Islam in Pakistan’s evolution. Author Ziad Haider, a Pakistani scholar, shows clearly how Pakistan’s viability as a state depends in large part on its ability to develop a new and progressive Islamic narrative. He identifies the key questions: How can religion in Pakistan be channeled as a force for progressive change, and what form should an enabling narrative of Islam in Pakistan assume? As the United States becomes more involved in Afghanistan and Pakistan, we shall need deeper understanding of both countries. This portrait of Pakistan is a valuable contribution to that endeavor. Zaid Haider is a Zuckerman Fellow and a MPA/JD candidate at the Harvard Kennedy School and the Georgetown University Law Center.

Karachi
Karachi

Author: Laurent Gayer

Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA

Published: 2014

Total Pages: 381

ISBN-13: 0199354448

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Argues that within the seemingly chaotic malaise of Karachi's politics, a form of "manageable violence" exists, on which the functioning of the city is based.

Partisans of Allah
Partisans of Allah

Author: Ayesha Jalal

Publisher: Harvard University Press

Published: 2009-06-30

Total Pages: 396

ISBN-13: 0674039076

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Today, more than ever, jihad signifies the political opposition between Islam and the West. As the line drawn between Muslims and non-Muslims becomes more rigid, Jalal seeks to retrieve the ethical meanings of this core Islamic principle in South Asian history. Drawing on historical, legal, and literary sources, Jalal traces the intellectual itinerary of jihad through several centuries and across the territory connecting the Middle East with South Asia.

Making Sense of Pakistan
Making Sense of Pakistan

Author: Farzana Shaikh

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2018-11-08

Total Pages: 295

ISBN-13: 0190929111

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Pakistan's transformation from supposed model of Muslim enlightenment to a state now threatened by an Islamist takeover has been remarkable. Many account for the change by pointing to Pakistan's controversial partnership with the United States since 9/11; others see it as a consequence of Pakistan's long history of authoritarian rule, which has marginalized liberal opinion and allowed the rise of a religious right. Farzana Shaikh argues the country's decline is rooted primarily in uncertainty about the meaning of Pakistan and the significance of 'being Pakistani'. This has pre-empted a consensus on the role of Islam in the public sphere and encouraged the spread of political Islam. It has also widened the gap between personal piety and public morality, corrupting the country's economic foundations and tearing apart its social fabric. More ominously still, it has given rise to a new and dangerous symbiosis between the country's powerful armed forces and Muslim extremists. Shaikh demonstrates how the ideology that constrained Indo-Muslim politics in the years leading to Partition in 1947 has left its mark, skillfully deploying insights from history to better understand Pakistan's troubled present.