Short Abstract:
This panel will rethink the role of institutions in South Asian through the concepts of historical institutionalism and path dependence. It will re-examine the post-colonial experience and its contribution to the theory of historical institutionalism and path dependence.
Long Abstract:
Scholars working within the tradition of historical institutionalism have sought to examine how and why 'history matters' when it comes to explaining the different factors and processes that trigger and underlie institutional development over time, focusing on the choices actors make under the constraints imposed by particular historical contexts, and how these choices can have an impact on subsequent outcomes. The related concept of path dependence has been employed to analyse the emergence and maintenance of unique institutional configurations, as well as explain institutional variation across time and space.
South Asian states shaped by colonialism and shared common histories are ideal cases for comparative analysis. Although historical institutionalist approaches have been increasingly used to examine the processes of democratization, affirmative action, militarization and the role of elites, there is still very limited self-reflection on the use of these methodological and conceptual tools.
This panel brings together scholars from political science, sociology, economic history and religious studies working within historical institutionalism and path dependence on South Asian to contribute to developing new and comparative insights into contemporary political, social and economic phenomena. It will reflect on the methodological issues that arise when employing this mode of analysis, and assess its strengths and weaknesses within South Asia and beyond.
Accepted papers:
Session 1
Rethinking the role of institutions in South Asia: historical institutionalism and path dependence- an overview
Gurharpal Singh
(SOAS)
Paper short abstract:
The paper will provide and overview of the use of institutionalism in South Asia and the strengths and weaknesses of historical institutionalism and path dependence as frameworks for understanding contemporary policy debates in the region.
Paper long abstract:
Recent scholarship working within the frames of historical institutionalism and path dependence has refocused attention on the enduring influence of institutions in South Asia. This emphasis, which was common to an earlier generation of specialists working on South Asia across the disciplines of political science, history, and sociology and economic, both revisits and revises our conventional understandings. This paper will provide an over view for rethinking the role of institutions in South Asia by assessing earlier scholarship and drawing on the new departures provided by historical institutionalism and path dependence. It will review, in particular, the strengths and weaknesses of earlier studies in providing a comparative framework for the study of South Asian states. The paper will also reflect on the contemporary challenges of operationalizing historical institutionalism and path dependence in different fields of study - democratization, affirmative action, militarization, elite politics and economic policy. The methodological and conceptual issues that arise from employing this mode of analysis, it is suggested, have significant implications for South Asian studies and beyond.
Continuum of counter-revolutions: rethinking the origins of Pakistan and their post-1947 impacts
Imran Ali
(Karachi School of Business & Leadership)
Paper short abstract:
As opposed to established explanations of Pakistan's creation, an entirely revised interpretation emerges from contradictions and reactions that pre-1947 growth generated in the Pakistan area. These dynamics also fundamentally explicate configurations of political economy in post-1947 Pakistan.
Paper long abstract:
Analyses of creation of Pakistan continue to be dominated by narratives of political history, maintaining that notion of separatism among Indian Muslims originated from unease of Muslim elites over competition and mobility by emergent Hindu professional groups in the Gangetic plain. However, this discourse sits uncomfortably with an adequate explanation for how and why the seemingly continued indifference of Muslims in Muslim majority provinces was finally converted to a homeland for Muslims. The outcome, emergence of Pakistan, is indeed negotiated as apogee of process of communal separatism. Little analysis is attempted to try and understand nature of the 'great divide' through deeper historical forces in actual areas that became Pakistan.
This paper explores long-term trajectory of economic change and its socio-political repercussions in Indus basin. This region now constitutes the largest contiguous canal irrigated zone in the world, yet its political economy ramifications and social impacts are hardly comprehended by analysts of 'Muslim nationalism'. The paper will argue that an entirely revised interpretation of creation of Pakistan emerges from contradictions and reactions that growth generated in this region, during colonial and even late Mughal periods. Moreover, these responses also fundamentally explicate configurations of political economy in post-1947 Pakistan. Could a 'continuum of counter-revolutions' have effectively reversed emerging market forces, thereby retarding modernizing institutions and in turn further embedding incumbent pre-modern formations that display such historic resilience?
Structure, conjuncture, and disjuncture: protests, elections, and the persistence of elite power in Pakistan
Hassan Javid
(Lahore University of Management Sciences)
Anushay Malik
(Lahore University of Management Sciences)
Paper short abstract:
This paper will compare the elections of 1970 and 2008, as well as the movements that led up to them, and identify the combination of causes and events that allowed for these potentially transformative conjunctures to emerge in Pakistan.
Paper long abstract:
The 1970 and 2008 elections in Pakistan, both of which took place following popular protest movements against military regimes, arguably represent moments at which the established political status quo could have been altered, initiating a more progressive and participatory process of democratization. Instead, the radical promise of these events proved to be short-lived as the very forces they displaced, both in the military and the political elite, successfully re-embedded themselves within the structures of governance and power. By employing a historical institutionalist approach, and drawing on archival sources and electoral data, this paper will compare the elections of 1970 and 2008, as well as the movements that led up to them, and identify the combination of causes and events that allowed for these conjunctures to emerge. The paper will then seek to explain why these instances failed to deliver on their potential for disjuncture, focusing in particular on the economic, electoral, bureaucratic, and ideological mechanisms that have historically underpinned the reproduction and persistence of military and elite power in Pakistan. In a context where the elections of 2013 represent the first ever democratic transfer of power from one civilian regime to another, this paper highlights the deep-rooted constraints that impede a move towards more substantive and participatory democratization in Pakistan, and also advances a few propositions about the circumstances under which more radical institutional change and reform can potentially take place.
Pakistan and the Afghan Jihad: violence and path dependency
Yunas Samad
(University of Bradford)
Paper short abstract:
The Afghan intervention developed a path dependency normalizing high levels of violence and proliferation of militant organizations. This remains an escalating problem irrespective of whether Security Establishment makes radical change in strategy in relations to the numerous militant groups.
Paper long abstract:
This paper will look at General Zia-ul-Huq's takeover as a critical juncture where for strategic reasons, internal and external, led to an alliance between the military and the Islamic groups. The Islamization process and the intervention in the Afghanistan legitimated religion and the use of violence. The close collaboration between the military and militant groups in the intervention in Afghanistan and later Kashmir initiated a path dependency, which the military now finds difficult to disengage with and led to the proliferation of high levels of violence in society. Recent evidence from fieldwork indicates that high level of violence has become normalized and that there is a correlation between support for militants and negative attitudes to women. This makes the anti-terrorism strategy of the government problematic for a number of reasons. The National Action Plan targets selectively certain groups but ignores other as assets. This selective approach has limited potential success, as there is constant flow of disgruntled youth who are attracted to militancy and raise the further danger of new groups such as Daesh attempting to make inroads. Path dependency of violence means that violence whether in the shape of religious extremism or criminal behaviour will remain an escalating problem irrespective of whether the Pakistani Security Establishment makes radical change in strategy in relations to the numerous militant groups.
Civil-military relations in post-2013 Pakistan
Ian Talbot
(University of Southampton)
Paper short abstract:
The May 2013 Pakistan elections have not been followed by a re-balancing of civil-military relations.The paper contextualizes these contemporary developments through a reflection on Pakistan's political culture and the institutional barriers to democratic consolidation.
Paper long abstract:
In May 2013 Pakistan held landmark elections in which for the first time in the state's history a government had served its full-term in office. Despite inheriting challenging economic and security legacies, commentators saw Nawaz Sharif's return to power for the third time as representing an opportunity for further democratic consolidation as a result of the re-balancing of civil-military relations. These expectations have failed to materialize as the army has consolidated its power. The paper will set the contemporary developments in a theoretical and historical contextualization. In the course of its analysis, it will reflect on Pakistan's political culture and the institutional barriers to consolidating democracy.
A study of Council of Islamic Ideology: an institution for the 'Islamisation of Pakistan'
Mansoor Ahmed
(l'École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (EHESS))
Paper short abstract:
By analyzing the role of Council of Islamic Ideology as a refuge for both the government and the religious parties in Pakistan, this paper contextualizes the influence of its recommendations on the legal system of the country.
Paper long abstract:
Council of Islamic Ideology (Council) is a permanent constitutional body under the 1973 constitution of Pakistan. It is composed of 'ulema', 'technocrats' and 'legal experts' numbering eight to twenty and appointed for 3 years stint, to advise the President and the Parliament on laws that are inconsistent with Quran and Sunnah. Its founders envisioned body to open the 'flood gates of Ijtihad'. Since the creation of Pakistan there have been divergent debates that what role should Islam play in its politics? The response of each government has been different to the question of Islam and in this quest Pakistan had vacillated between 'Basic democracy' of General Ayub Khan to 'Islamic socialism' of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto and 'Islamic democracy' of General Zia ul haq to 'Enlightened moderation' of General Parvez Musharraf and Council's recommendations were apparently the retrospect of this attitude. During all these regimes Council emerged as very intriguing institution that needs to be studied scientifically as it served as a refuge for both the government to introduce the 'vague Islamic legislations' and as a platform for the traditionalists to influence the government. My paper will argue that Council had played more significant role in Islamisation of laws of country as is commonly perceived due to more visible manifestations.
Path dependency and the liberalization of the media: reassessing the Musharaf regime
Kiran Hassan
(School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London)
Paper short abstract:
By analysing the emergence of Pakistan's highly unregulated private television industry, this paper compares the Pakistani media system to Mediterranean countries in the light of Hallin and Mancini's (2004) theory of media models.
Paper long abstract:
Political communications is determined by who controls the media. Unlike a democracy, where media control and content is dispersed and pluralistic, dictatorships tend to monopolize the control of media. However, General Musharraf liberalized Pakistan's broadcasting sector in 2002 for three reasons. First, in the aftermath of the severe press restrictions imposed by Nawaz Sharif's civilian government in 1998, and 1999, the local media welcomed his coup . Second, under the irresolute and inconsistent governments of Nawaz Sharif and Benazir Bhutto in the 1990s, a policy paralysis had taken hold. Neither civilian government was interested in or capable of passing a broadcasting privatization bill - leaving it for a military government to initiate this much needed policy change. Third, by ignoring sections of PEMRA policy, and allowing media houses to operate, General Musharraf obliged and earned early support from the biggest newspaper group in the country. While PEMRA regulations specifically barred cross-media ownership, this newspaper group was allowed to establish its first private television channel in August 2002.
This paper will discuss how the liberalisation of the media under Musharraf set a new form of path dependency for media regulation in Pakistan.
The Untouchables: questions of immunity, corruption and criminality in India's parliament
Ronojoy Sen
(National University of Singapore)
Paper short abstract:
The paper seeks to understand the historical institutional development of Indian parliament through its persistent association with corruption.
Paper long abstract:
This paper analyses criminality and corruption in India's parliament, which pose a serious challenge to the legitimacy of an institution that is central to Indian and indeed any democracy. It does so through the lens of the privileges of parliament and its members. A disconcerting feature of India's parliament is the significant number of MPs with criminal charges against them. In 2008 opposition MPs said they had been offered bribes to vote for the government during a no-trust vote. Such acts bring up the question of how far privilege and immunity to MPs should extend. This issue goes as far as back as 1951 when an MP was accused of receiving money to ask questions and move amendments in parliament. The 2008 cash-for-vote scandal raised troubling questions about the behaviour and accountability of MPs. Thanks to public interest litigation, the courts have periodically stepped in and imposed regulations on the eligibility of election candidates and the levels of transparency they should be subject to. The paper seeks to understand the historical institutional development of Indian parliament and its persistent association with corruption in the context of the following set of questions: Do the privileges of the House and its members perpetuate the poor image of representatives? Are the privileges an impediment to accountability? Does parliament have adequate mechanisms to ensure that the privileges are not abused? What is the role of the courts, civil society and the media in highlighting and regulating these abuses?
United Progressive Alliance (2004-14), Muslims and the anti-communal violence bill
Heewon Kim
(SOAS, University of London)
Paper short abstract:
The paper examines the policy process of the United Progressive Alliance government's attempts to legislate a model anti-communal violence bill by focusing on the draft bills of 2005 and 2011.
Paper long abstract:
In India, special legislative provisions for vulnerable groups, such as the anti-discrimination measures in the Protection of Civil Rights Act (1955) and the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act (1989), have provided strong legal protection and security to caste groups in the wake of violence. In contrast, though religious minorities, especially Muslims, have been the target of violence during communal riots, they lack equivalent protection. Hindu-Muslim riots and anti-Muslim pogroms have become the defining feature of post-1947 collective violence in India, and the regular recurrence of such events presents a serious challenge to the principles of secularism and religious tolerance. Recognising this fact, and against a backdrop of 9/11 and Gujarat pogroms, the UPA government promised to 'enact a model comprehensive law to deal with communal violence'. This paper will assess the UPA's efforts to legislate a model anti-communal violence bill. These bills were the core of UPA's post-Gujarat anti-communal violence strategy for better security for minorities by increasing the likelihood of punishments for perpetrators of violence and negligent state officials. How were UPA's efforts to produce 'top-down' legislation frustrated by the institutionalised opposition to such a measure? This paper will argue that the patterns of policy formulation resulting from the institutional arrangement created at the time of critical juncture of constitution-making have fostered a conservative, path-dependent mode of policy-making by preferred key institutions, and faced with political, administrative and judicial opposition to these bills, the UPA eventually opted for symbolic implementation.
Historical construction of traditional authority in Chittagong hill tracts of Bangladesh
Fariba Alamgir
(University of East Angalia)
Paper short abstract:
The presentation aims to shed lights on the process of authority formation in Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh regarding land control with a focus on the historical construction of traditional authority.
Paper long abstract:
In Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) of Bangladesh, contestation over land by hill people is intertwined with their long political struggle against state. The armed struggle (1973-1998) of hill ethnic population in CHT ended with signing of CHT Accord in 1998. In the post Accord period, there are multiple institutions involved in the system of sanctioning property in land. In post-colonial and post-socialist societies property 'is one of the most important fields in which politico-legal institutions seem persistently to compete for authority' (Sikor and Lund 2009:10), According to Sikor and Lund (2009), recognition of property (in land) claims as legitimate also provides recognition to the institution of its own authority. Taking their argument in to account, it can be argued that in CHT multiplicity of institutions has resulted in overlapping claims of authority. This presentation focuses on historical construction of 'traditional authority' by looking at competition among institutions in legitimizing property in land. It is argued that 'Traditional authority' which was established during British colonial period through promulgation of Chittagong Regulation Act 1900 is a colonial construction. Secondly, based on the data collected through ethnographic fieldwork, it is argued that traditional authority of headman has been evaded and challenged by different institutions in different time periods (pre and post Accord). The competition among institutions is shaped by the political conflict and state's attempt to consolidates its control in CHT.
Corporations as political actor: perspectives of readymade garments industry of Bangladesh
Nandita Farhad
(University of Surrey, UK)
Paper short abstract:
This study investigates the political notion of corporate consciousness in health and occupational safety issues, and takes the Bangladesh Readymade Garments industry as its context to shade light on political CSR approaches of social connectedness.
Paper long abstract:
Political Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) defines corporations as political actors when they engage in new form of governance by engaging in social interaction and cooperation in the multi-stakeholder initiatives through applying self-regulation, in order to respond to social challenges such as human rights violation. Very little research has been conducted on 'Political CSR' in the developing country (host country) context where the corporations do operate their production activities. This study takes the Bangladesh RMG sector after 'Rana plaza' incident as the context to shed light on political CSR and initiates to investigate the political notion of corporate consciousness in health and occupational safety issues. This research is an 'explorative research' as formulated to perceive 'how' the current phenomenon of 'interaction' of corporations with different actors when they involve in political CSR in the context of Bangladeshi RMG industry. This study intends to amplify the current discourse on political CSR approaches of social connectedness. Moreover, in order to attain a deeper knowledge in solving ethical problems, this research initiates organizational level understanding of the political notion of corporate consciousness.
Key words: Political CSR, Social connectedness, Bangladesh RMG sector.