UNEQUAL DEVELOPMENT IN A PERIPHERAL CAPITALIST STATE: A CASE STUDY OF KHYBER PAKHTUNKHWA PROVINCE OF PAKISTAN (1947-1977)

Abstract

My thesis explores the problem of unequal development within the federation of Pakistan with reference to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province from August 1947 to July 1977. In the development paradigm regionalism/provincialism is considered as a petty bourgeois phenomenon; my thesis refutes this viewpoint and considers the problematic of regionalism as inherent in capital logic. Maximization of profit engenders centralization of capital and concentration of resources thereby creating the dualism of core and periphery. The process of capital accumulation generates the contradiction of development and underdevelopment, Centre and periphery, core and hinterland. Development at the centre/core perpetuates underdevelopment in the periphery/hinterland. Poverty in the periphery is neither the poverty of natural resources nor the poverty of human resources; it is the enigma of capitalist growth. The problematic of core/periphery, centre/hinterland gains extra significance due to federal status of Pakistan where both the centre and the provinces derive power from the Constitution and neither one is subordinate to each other unlike a unitary state. My study however, unravels a different process, the State uses constitutional jurisdiction to legitimize power accumulation. In order to maintain hegemony over the civil society the state centralizes power, moreover this concentration of power is essential to fulfill accumulation and reproduction of capital as well. To do so the factors of production are mobilized to the areas with maximum return; as a consequence labour, capital and raw material from peripheral provinces is invested in the core regions. The state Legitimizes capital accumulation by concentrating political power in the centre through the Constitution, relegating the provinces to a subsidiary role. The second source of legitimation by the state is the academic and religious institutions as well as communication media (the ideological apparatuses). Besides the ideological institutions the state seeks support from the military, police, bureaucracy (repressive/coercive apparatuses) as well as landlords and bourgeoisie owning the means of production. Finally, hegemony is maintained by reorganizing the power bloc, hurting individual capitals in the process but protecting the total capital. My research is an holistic analysis of Unequal development in its historical, political and economic dimensions unraveling the Centre/Periphery problematic within the Federation of Pakistan with reference to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.