Conflict Between State and Society in Pakistan: An Analysis of Psychosocial Dimensions

Abstract

The state and society emerged simultaneously on 14th of August 1947. Before that day, Pakistani society had no shared existence and was only an “imagined community” in the literal sense of the phrase. The state of Pakistan became an administrative arrangement put in place by the British rulers to ensure their hold through a coercive dispensation. The change of regime did not immediately and fundamentally alter the nature or structure of the state. The psychosocial dimensions of values, attitudes and behaviour of the central authority and its structures remained colonial. The state, its institutions and officials were not “Pakistanized”; and the basic paradigm of relationship between state and the people has remained that of the “rulers and the ruled”. The state has manifested anti-people behaviour and shown proclivity to use coercion against the society. Judiciary, civil and military bureaucracy and police along with the co-opted clergyhave become deeply interwoven in maintaining their hold over the society. On the other hand, the institutions of society have not been able to develop values, attitudes, and behaviours that could create a caring, progressive, and pluralistic national state. This conflict in incompatible values, hostile attitudes and behaviours between state and society institutions and individuals is continuing. Consequently, the state has become fragile and the society has become more fragmented. The resolution of this conflict requires psychosocial transformation in individuals and institutions of the state and society.