UNDERSTANDING PAKISTAN Volume II

SPO DISCUSSION PAPER SERIES UNDERSTANDING PAKISTAN Volume II Democratic Governance Understanding Pakistan Volume II 1 In its endeavour to bring about a purposeful social change in the country, Strengthening Participatory Organization (SPO) is working for sustainable development by enhancing the capacities of individuals and marginalised communities. SPO is highly sensitive to the cultural, social, economic and political context of Pakistan. UNDERSTANDING PAKISTAN is a series of discussion papers covering a broad range of topics through which SPO intends to highlight the key issues faced by Pakistan today and facilitate a better understanding of the milieu in which we exist. The papers are written by eminent thinkers and researchers as well as SPO staff who use the extensive information gathered directly from their experience in development. Besides adding to the body of knowledge on Pakistan, SPO looks forward to contributing towards effective discussion at all levels leading to people-centred policy changes in the country. The views expressed in this publication do not necessarily reflect those of the Strengthening Participatory Organization. SPO has Published these discussion papers separately under Understanding Pakistan Series (1-20). This volume is published to mark 20 years of SPO Copyright © 2014 Strengthening Participatory Organization ISBN: 978-969-8699-47-5 Available from: SPO National Centre House 9, Street 51, Sector E-11/3, Islamabad 44000 Pakistan UAN: (92-51) 111 357 111 Tel: (92-51) 2228681-4 Fax: (92-51) 2228691 http://www.spopk.org Email: [email protected] Strengthening Participatory Organization (SPO) is a non-government, not-for-profit organization registered under Section 42 of Companies Ordinance 1984 on January 15, 1994. SPO is entitled to tax exemption under Section 2(36) of Income Tax Ordinance 2001. 2 Strengthening Participatory Organization CONTENTS 1. Pakistan: The Question of Identity 5 2. Challenges and Opportunities in the Post TRIPS Era for Pakistan -- An Overview of Amended Patents Ordinance 2002 19 3. Karachi’s Violence: Duality and Negotiation 37 4. A Review of Pakistan National Climate Change Policy 57 5. Solace for Balochistan? 71 6. Post 18th Amendment of the Constitution of Pakistan A Critical Appraisal 95 7. The Crisis of Federalism in Pakistan: Issues and Challenges 119 8. Cultural Diversity and Social Harmony 151 Understanding Pakistan Volume II 3 4 Strengthening Participatory Organization SPO DISCUSSION PAPER SERIES Pakistan: The Question of Identity Harris Khalique Understanding Pakistan Volume II 5 About the Author Harris Khalique has a master’s degree in development management and development studies from the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) and a bachelor’s in mechanical engineering from NED University of Engineering and Technology, Karachi. He has worked for development and human rights organisations in South Asia and Central and Eastern Europe, including NGO Resource Centre, Amnesty International and Save the Children UK, holding senior operational and management positions. He has been a consultant to different development projects in all the four provinces of Pakistan. Currently, he is SPO’s Chief Executive. Mr. Khalique has six books, five collections of poetry and a book of essays, which he co-authored, to his credit. His work has been published in Pakistan, India and the UK. He was born in October 1966. 6 Strengthening Participatory Organization PAKISTAN: THE QUESTION OF IDENTITY Introduction Pakistan entered the new millennium with an unresolved question of national identity. The search for identity has remained a recurrent theme throughout the country’s 55-year history. The authoritarian rule and successive martial laws from the early years, protracted suspension of fundamental rights of the people, inability of the political and economic institutions to deliver, and slow progress in social sector development increased the alienation of Pakistan’s citizens from their state. This trembling light, this night-bitten dawn This is not the Dawn we waited tor so long This is not the Dawn whose birth was sired By so many lives, so much blood. (From ‘An Elusive Dawn’ by Faiz Ahmed Faiz, quoted in Lamb, 1991) Carved out in 1947 from British India on the basis of Muslim nationhood, Pakistan itself was divided in 1971 when, after a bloody war, the biggest ethnic group chose to secede and formed a nation-state of its own. The rest of Pakistan was also home to many unique linguistic and cultural identities whose rights were continuously denied by the state for a long time in the name of national integration. Different ethnic groups— Sindhi, Punjabi, Seraiki, Balochi, Pakhtoon — have reasserted their identities since 1971 after Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto assumed power followed by General Zia’s martial law. The last development in this respect was the emergence of a ‘Mohajir’ identity defined in ethnic terms. ‘Mohajir’ was the term used for the Muslim inunigrants from India from the early years of Pakistan but their representative political party chiefly consists of those who were born in Pakistan after 1947. The first section of this paper, entitled ‘Identity’, provides a theoretical framework to discuss and understand Pakistan’s identity crisis and the new politics of ethnicity. The second section, ‘Pakistani Identity’, presents and analyses the historical development of the identity debate in Pakistan. It begins with the creation of Pakistan and concludes with the question of ethnic identities today. It also offers a summary of the problem statement and hints at the future course the Pakistani state may consider for the economic and social well-being of its people in relation to its identity. Identity - The Framework The Concept of Identity The word ‘identity’ is defined in dictionaries as ‘who or what somebody/something is’. According to Manuel Castells (1997),1 the search for collective or individual identity is people’s source of meaning and experience. This search becomes the fundamental source of social meaning in the face of global flows of wealth, power and images. Castells explains the process of construction of meaning on the basis of cultural characteristics, which he considers more important than other sources of meaning. Identities are sources of meaning for the social actors, individuals or groups. Identities can emerge from dominant institutions of state and society but they can only become identities in the true sense if social actors internalise them and construct their meanings around this internalisation. Castells maintains that, from a sociological perspective, all identities are constructed but he emphasises that the real issue is how, from what, by whom and for what purpose any identity is constructed. Moreover, since the social construction of any identity always takes place in a context marked by power 1 See, in particular, Vol. 1: pp. 1-13 and Vol. 2: pp. 1-12,27-67 and 469-477 for a detailed discussion on the concept of identity, with special reference to ethnic identity. Understanding Pakistan Volume II 7 relationships, he proposes three different forms and origins of identity building, namely, (i) legitimising identity, (ii) resistance identity and (iii) project identity. Legitimising identity is introduced by the dominant institutions of society to extend and rationalise their domination vis-a-vis social actors, collective or individual. Resistance identity is produced by those social actors whose position in society is undennined by the dominant institutions or stigmatised by the logic of domination. Resistance identity survives on the basis of principles different from, or opposed to, those on which institutions of society are established. Project identity is created when social actors, on the basis of whichever cultural materials, traditional or modern, are available to them, build a new identity. This identity attempts to redefine their position in society and also aspire for the transformation of the overall social structure. These three different forms of identity building will be referred to in the discussion of Pakistani identity in the second section of this paper. Ethnic Identity The concept of ‘ethnicity’ came about as an attempt to understand the changing post-colonial world politics and the increase in ethnic minority rights movements in industrialised countries. Since then the term ‘ethnicity’ is increasingly used as a tool to explain race relations, nation building, identity formation of communities, etc. Solovski and Tishkov, quoting from Despres and Cohen, state that the intellectual history of the term only goes back to the mid-1970s. Before then, it was neither mentioned in any anthropological literature nor defined in textbooks (Solovski and Tishkov, 1996:190). Allen and Eade are of the view that, although the term was being used by some scholars since the 1940s, it gained wider currency in the 1970s. Meanwhile, during the 1960s, the association between ‘ethnic’ and ‘racial’ and, likewise, ‘ethnicity’ and ‘race’ had become more and more problematic to deal with (Allen and Eade, 1996-97: 219-222). To look at the widely held contemporary definitions of these terms, we can start with some of the Oxford dictionary definitions for the words ‘ethnic’, ‘nation’, ‘nationality’, ‘race’, and ‘tribe’ (Oxford University Press, 1998). They are: ethnic: (1) of or invoking a nation, race, or tribe that has a common cultural tradition; (2) (of a person) belonging to the specified country or area by birth or family history rather than

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