Roots of Violence in Pakistan

To say that Eqbal Ahmad was as a political sociologist, par excellence, would be to describe only one aspect of this scholar, writer, activist, humanist and thinker of rare quality. This aspect was perhaps fundamental to his ability to see so much clearer and further in to political events and developments than most political scientists and analysts could hope to. We are reproducing an article here that he wrote for Dawn, in January 1998, in which he not only analyses the roots of Pakistan’s present predicament, but also predicts it.

Roots of Violence in Pakistan
[Dawn, 25 January 1998]

Proliferation of violence has become the most serious social problern in Pakistan today. Not a week, often not a day, goes by without some terrible act of violence shaking public confidence in the state’s ability to protect citizens, and reminding us that a serious decline in civility has occurred in our country. Officials announce ever?strong measures as the cure while citizens wonder over the causes which underlie our descent into insensate savagery such as the recent massacre of mourners in a Lahore cemetery.

This and subsequent essays offer but one man’s perspectives on the roots of contemporary violence in Pakistan.

I should begin with five simple observations: One, apart from war and aggression as defined under international law, nine forms of violence may be identified as among the most commonly observed world?wide. The degree of their incidence differs in place and time. They are: domestic, criminal, official, ethnic, chiliastic, political (protest oriented), religious?sectarian, terrorist, revolutionary violence, and warfare.

Often these forms overlap. For example, official violence can be as terroristic in nature as revolutionary and criminal violence. Officially sponsored death squads and foreign covert operations arc examples. Similarly sectarian violence frequently takes terrorist forms as Pakistan has been witnessing with some frequency. And revolutionary violence nearly always involves the use of protest, terrorism, and warfare.

Two, of these forms of violence only one, the revolutionary type is not currently in evidence in Pakistan. Typically, revolutionary violence differs from the other forms in that it seeks system change and tends to be practised in a sociologically and psychologically selective pattern. The other eight forms not only prevail in Pakistan today but have also been on the rise in the last two decades. However, one should note that conditions for revolutionary violence have been gathering in Pakistan since the start in 1980 of the internationally sponsored Jihad in Afghanistan.

There are indications that we might be on the threshold of the outbreak of organized violence aimed at system change. If it does occur, it is unlikely to be selective in the manner practised earlier by the secular revolutionary movements in China, Vietnam, Cuba, or the Algerian struggle for independence. This lack of selectivity shall be ascribable to the fact that revolutionary violence in Pakistan is likely to be employed by religious and right?wing organizations which have not set theoretical or practical limits on their use of violence. In the countries where Islamists have so far engaged in violence with revolutionary objectives, i.e. system change, they have tended to be quite indiscriminate in its use. Contemporary Afghanistan, Algeria, Egypt and, increasingly, Pakistan are examples.

Three, the convergence and accentuation of multiple forms of violence, such as now exists in
Pakistan, has historically signalled the decline of the state, Its legitimacy, and its institutional will and
capacity to govern. Violence?practising groups emerge as the weakened state’s competitors. As such, in countries where the phenomenon persists the state gradually loses the attributes of authority, and anarchy ensues with power passing to a myriad of militias, warlords, and other more or less lawless and predatory groupings.

The Indian sub-continent experienced this process in last century of Mughal power and the early years; of British state formation in India. In recent years, this development occurred in Lebanon, Somalia, Rwanda, and Liberia. On a safe-to-critical scale of 1-10, Pakistan falls, in my estimation, somewhere between 6 & 7 among contemporary states. In other words, it is not quite there but is moving perilously toward a critical zone from where it will take the state and society generations to, return to a semblance of normal existence. When such a critical point of hard-return is reached, the viability of statehood depends more on external than internal factors.

Four, durable and efficient governing structures and mechanisms often develop when there is a timely and meaningful response to the challenges posed by the enfeeblement of state institutions, and the growth of an environment of generalized violence. A meaningful response is normally one that is based on precise understanding of the roots of the violence and character of its perpetrators; it also requires a certain taming of the repressive instincts that favour augmentation in the coercive capabilities of the state as the best way to deal with violence in society.

Needed then is a two-fold and simultaneous policy: a carefully planned and methodically executed programme of reform aimed at removing the root causes of the proliferation of violence in society, and improvement in the investigative, preventive, and prosecution capabilities of security and intelligence agencies, and the administration of justice. The enactment of harsh laws and tolerance of extra judicial practices rarely contribute to solving the problem. More frequently they blur the distinction between law and crime. .

Five, throughout history violence has served as a principal weapon of domination and final arbiter of disputes and discontents. While social attitudes toward and expressions of violence have not significantly changed in many societies, modern technology has totally distorted the traditional equation of means and ends in the uses of violence. Countries and cultures which fail to narrow the gap between their traditional instincts and the modern reality run the risk of self-destruction.

For example, Afghanistan’s was always a warrior culture in which the tribal balance of power, the individual’s social mobility, and authorities’ power shifts were defined by a groups or individual’s mastery of violence. The ‘Saur revolution’, the religious uprisings against it, and superpower involvement in the Afghan conflict transformed Afghanistan’s arms environment. The instincts and styles of a warrior culture became linked to modern technology. The outcome, literally, is the destruction of a state which had earlier survived many violent challenges including three colonial wars, and countless local conflicts. \par

\par A similar process was at work also in Somalia and Rwanda. Social peace and ultimate survival requires that governments, the educational system and news organs such as radio and television should refrain from reinforcing traditional hatreds, ideologies of difference, outlook on violence. It is a simple, civilized demand which is not being met in this country.