Religious Nationalization of Identity: Pakistan between Saudi Arabia and Iran, 1979-1988
Abstract
Abstract Views: 209
Zia ul-Haq, President of Pakistan (1977-1988), introduced Islam into the public and political realms. Once he grabbed power in Pakistan after ousting the elected government of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, Islam became his strategic choice to provide legitimacy to his military coup and to expand his role in the Muslim world. Since the independence of Pakistan, the state had used Islam on many occasions to serve its interests. The encouraging results in this respect further induced the state to use Islam more frequently to achieve its domestic and foreign objectives. Zia institutionalized Islam in every aspect of the Pakistani state and society. Religious nationalization was the cornerstone of the Zia regime’s internal and external policies. The Islamization of the regime in Pakistan during the 1980s was the zenith of the state’s gradual turn towards religion. Regional upheavals such as the Shi’a Islamic revolution in Iran and Soviet invasion of neighboring Afghanistan were incremental to continue Islam as a strategic asset in Pakistan’s domestic and foreign policy. As a result, Pakistan became the launching pad both for the Middle Eastern Sunni Arabs monarchies and Iran’s Shi’a clergy to furnish their political cum sectarian agenda that ultimately ravaged the Pakistani polity and society.
Keywords: Identity, Islam, Iran-Saudi rivalry, Middle East, Sectarianism, Afghan Refugee
Downloads
References
Ahmed, Khaled. Sectarian War: Pakistan’s Sunni-Shi’a Violence and its Links to the Middle East. Lahore: Oxford University Press, 2011.
Ahmed, Mumtaz. “Revivalism, Islamization, Sectarianism, and Violence in Pakistan.” In Pakistan: 1997 edited by Craig Bexter and Charles Kennedy. Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 1987.
—. “The Crescent and Sword: Islam, the Military, and Political Legitimacy in Pakistan: 1977-1985.” The Middle East Journal 50, (1966): 372-86.
Amin, Tahir. Ethno-National Movements of Pakistan. Islamabad, Institute of Policy Studies, 1988.
Bin Said, Khalid. “Pakistan in 1983.” Asian Survey 24, (1984).
Borthakur, Anchita. “Afghans Refugee: The Impact on Pakistan.” Asian Affairs 48:3 (2017): 488-509. DOI: 10.1080/03068374.2017.1362871. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/03068374.2017.1362871
Burgat, Francois, “L'islamisme en face” Translation [Face to Face to Political Islam]. (Paris: Discovery/Poche, 1996).
Cheema, Pervaiz Iqbal. “Impact of the Afghan War on Pakistan.” Pakistan Horizon 41, No. 1 (January 1988): 23-45.
Cornell, Svante E. “Pakistan Foreign Policy: Islamic or Pragmatic.” in Brenda Shaffer, The Limits of Culture: Islam and Foreign Policy. Massachusetts: The MIT Press, 2006.
Dabashi, Hamid. Theology of Discontent, The Ideological Foundation of the Islamic Revolution in Iran. New York: New York University Press, 1993.
Migdal, Joel S. Strong Societies and the Weak States: State-Society Relations and State Capabilities in the Third World.’ New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1988. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/9780691212852
Nasr, Seyyed Vali Reza. Islamic Leviathan: Islam and the Making of State Power. London: Oxford, University, Press, 2001 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/0195144260.001.0001
Nawaz, Shuja. Cross Swords. London: Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2008.
Rieck, Andreas T. The Shi’as of Pakistan: An Assertive and Beleaguered Minority. New York: Oxford University Press, 2015. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780190240967.001.0001
Sheikh, Naveed S. The New Politics of Islam: Pan-Islamic Foreign Policy in a World of States. London: Routledge Curzon, London, 2003. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203220337
Tahir-Kheli, S. The United States and Pakistan: The Evolution of an Influence Relationship. New York: Praeger, 192.
Vatanka, Alex. Iran and Pakistan: Security, Diplomacy and American Influence. London: I. B. Tauris and Co. Ltd, 2015. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5040/9780755609062
Weiss, Anita M. (ed.), Islamic Reassertion in Pakistan: The Application of Islamic Laws in a Modern State. Lahore: Vanguard, 1978.
Ziring, Lawrence, “Government and Politics.” ‘R. F. Nyrop, ed., Pakistan a Case Study, Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1984.
Copyright (c) 2021 Farrukh Faheem, Wang Xingang , Sajjad Hussain, Musarrat Iqbal, Farhat Iqbal
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) 4.0 License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work’s authorship and initial publication in this journal.
.png){kind=icon}
