Search

Begin New Search Political Geography Pakistan

701. Beijing's Balancing Act: Courting New Dehli, Reassuring Islamabad

Author:
Jingdong Yuan
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of International Affairs
Institution:
School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University
Abstract:
The “all-weather” Sino-Pakistan relations, characterized especially by Beijing's position on the Kashmir issue and its long-standing and close defense ties with Islamabad, continue to affect New Delhi's threat perceptions and Sino-Indian relations. Beijing's need to sustain friendly relations with Pakistan stems from its desire to mitigate ethnic separatist problems, improve energy security and execute its policy of hedging against a rising and future rival in India. Despite the changing international and regional security environments and Beijing's more balanced South Asia policy, this need is viewed in New Delhi as a major obstacle to enhancing mutual trust and improving bilateral relations between China and India. Conversely, without de-hyphenating Sino-Indian ties, the Pakistan factor will remain a point of contention in fully developing the increasingly important relationship between Asia's two rising powers.
Topic:
Security
Political Geography:
Pakistan, China, South Asia, India, Beijing, Asia, Kashmir, New Delhi, and Islamabad

702. The Tibet Factor in China-India relations

Author:
Rajiv Sikri
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of International Affairs
Institution:
School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University
Abstract:
Tibet is a key factor in India-China relations. It is only after the 1950 Chinese occupation of Tibet that India and China came to share the now disputed common border. In recent years, China's military buildup and infrastructure development in Tibet, as well as reported plans to divert or dam rivers that rise in Tibet and flow into India, have raised India's anxieties. Conversely, China's insecurity about Tibet is an important driver of its approach toward India. India has been unable to assuage China's fears about its possible use of the presence of the Dalai Lama in India and its large Tibetan refugee population of about 120,000 to create trouble for China in Tibet. The presence of the Dalai Lama and a large community of Tibetan refugees in India has kept the “Tibetan question” alive. Given India's open democratic system and long tradition of giving refuge to persecuted peoples, India will find it politically impossible to meet China's expectations on the Tibet question without a significant quid pro quo. The breakdown of talks between the Chinese government and representatives of the Dalai Lama does not augur well for the future, and a post-Dalai Lama situation could become much more complicated. Of late, China's aggressive territorial claims on India, the deepening of the China-Pakistan alliance and a shift in China's position on Kashmir has led to a hardening of India's position on Tibet. India is now seeking satisfaction on what it considers to be the core issues relating to India's sovereignty and territorial integrity. India-China relations are unlikely to be on an even keel until this tangled knot is unraveled.
Topic:
Sovereignty
Political Geography:
Pakistan, China, India, Kashmir, and Tibet

703. Getting the Military Out of Pakistani Politics

Author:
Aqil Shah
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Foreign Affairs
Institution:
Council on Foreign Relations
Abstract:
The United States has a major stake in Pakistan's stability, given the country's central role in the U.S.-led effort to, in U.S. President Barack Obama's words, "disrupt, dismantle, and defeat" al Qaeda; its war-prone rivalry with India over Kashmir; and its nuclear arsenal. As a result, U.S. policy toward Pakistan has been dominated by concerns for its stability -- providing the reasoning for Washington's backing of the Pakistani military's frequent interventions in domestic politics -- at the expense of its democratic institutions. But as the recent eruption of protests in the Middle East against U.S.-backed tyrants has shown, authoritarian stability is not always a winning bet. Despite U.S. efforts to promote it, stability is hardly Pakistan's distinguishing feature. Indeed, many observers fear that Pakistan could become the world's first nuclear-armed failed state. Their worry is not without reason. More than 63 years after independence, Pakistan is faced with a crumbling economy and a pernicious Taliban insurgency radiating from its Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), the semiautonomous seven districts and six smaller regions along its border with Afghanistan. It is still struggling to meet its population's basic needs. More than half its population faces severe poverty, which fuels resentment against the government and feeds political instability. According to the World Bank, the Pakistani state's effectiveness has actually been in steady decline for the last two decades. In 2010, Foreign Policy even ranked Pakistan as number ten on its Failed States Index, placing it in the "critical" category with such other failed or failing states as Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Somalia. The consequences of its failure would no doubt be catastrophic, if for no other reason than al Qaeda and its affiliates could possibly get control of the country's atomic weapons. The Pakistani Taliban's dramatic incursions into Pakistan's northwestern Buner District (just 65 miles from the capital) in 2009 raised the specter of such a takeover.
Topic:
Government
Political Geography:
Pakistan, Afghanistan, United States, Washington, Middle East, India, and Kashmir

704. Next Steps for Pakistan Strategy

Author:
Daniel Markey
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Council on Foreign Relations
Abstract:
U.S.-Pakistani relations are in crisis. For Washington, Osam a bin Laden's safe haven in Abbottabad raises questions about Pakistan's complicity and/or incompetence. For Islamabad, bin Laden's killing shows its vulnerability to U.S. operations on its own soil .
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Terrorism, War, Armed Struggle, Insurgency, and Bilateral Relations
Political Geography:
Pakistan, United States, and Washington

705. Video-recorded Decapitations: A seemingly perfect terrorist tactic that did not spread

Author:
Martin Harrow
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Danish Institute for International Studies (DIIS)
Abstract:
Video-recorded decapitations have an enormous impact, they are cheap and easy, and they allow the terrorists to exploit the potential of the Internet. With these advantages, the tactic would have been expected to quickly spread across the globe as a favored tactic. Yet, years after its invention in 2002, this has not happened. This paper using evolutionary theory finds that video-recorded decapitations have not caught on for locally specific reasons: in the West because the tactic is less accessible than one might expect; in Iraq because of the unwillingness to be associated with Zarqawi, and in the Afghan context, it has not spread because it is mainly relevant for mobilizing resources from abroad, which is not a priority for the Taliban. These are however situational variables, and just as suicide bombings took years to spread, there may be campaigns of video-recorded decapitations as conditions change.
Topic:
Terrorism, Armed Struggle, and Counterinsurgency
Political Geography:
Pakistan, Iraq, Middle East, and Taliban

706. Coping with a failing Pakistan

Author:
Stephen P. Cohen
Publication Date:
02-2011
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Norwegian Centre for Conflict Resolution
Abstract:
As a state and a nation Pakistan has been in trouble for many years, but both now seem to be in a downward spiral. As a recent Brookings study observed, it is very difficult to predict Pakistan's short-term future, or the impact on its neighbours, let alone the wider international community. Pakistan's nuclear arsenal, its history of irresponsible behaviour as a nuclear proliferator, the close ties between radical Islamists and Pakistan, and its continuing hostile relations with India and Afghanistan all complicate efforts to look ahead even five years, let alone to speculate about effective policies.
Topic:
Islam, Nuclear Weapons, and Politics
Political Geography:
Pakistan and South Asia

707. My Land, My Right: Putting land rights at the heart of the Pakistan floods reconstruction

Publication Date:
06-2011
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Oxfam Publishing
Abstract:
In the aftermath of the 2010–11 floods, the path to recovery and reconstruction in Pakistan will be long and full of challenges. However, there is also an opportunity to tackle crucial structural issues such as crippling inequalities in people's rights and access to land. A failure to do so would not only condemn millions of Pakistanis to continued and deepening poverty, it would also undermine the scope and sustainability of the country's recovery from this disaster and its ability to cope with the next.
Topic:
Agriculture, Political Economy, Poverty, and Natural Disasters
Political Geography:
Pakistan and South Asia

708. Land Rights and the Indus Flood, 2010-2011: Rapid assessment and policy review

Author:
Azmat Budhani and Haris Gazdar
Publication Date:
06-2011
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Oxfam Publishing
Abstract:
The Indus floods of 2010-2011 were the direct cause of over 1,700 deaths and the displacement of an estimated 18 million people across Pakistan. Official estimates of the economic costs of the damage caused by the floods range from $8.74bn to $10.85bn, which include the estimated costs, early recovery for the provision of relief, rebuilding destroyed infrastructure, and other economic losses to individuals, communities, firms, and the government.
Topic:
Political Economy, Poverty, and Natural Disasters
Political Geography:
Pakistan and South Asia

709. Bin Ladin's Killing and its Effect on Al-Qa'ida: What Comes Next?

Author:
Bruce Hoffman
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
CTC Sentinel
Institution:
The Combating Terrorism Center at West Point
Abstract:
Confronted with the sudden death of a leader, terrorist groups become cornered animals. When wounded, they lash out. Not only in hopes of surviving, but also to demonstrate their remaining power and continued relevance. Al-Qa`ida is no different. As its statement issued on May 6, 2011 confirming Usama bin Ladin's death declared, “The soldiers of Islam, groups and individuals, will continue planning without tiredness or boredom, and without despair or surrender, and without weakness or stagnancy, until they cause the disaster that makes children look like the elderly!”
Topic:
Islam
Political Geography:
Pakistan and America

710. The Great Arab Revolution: Challenges, Dilemmas and Opportunities?

Author:
Graeme P. Herd
Publication Date:
03-2011
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Geneva Centre for Security Policy
Abstract:
Beyond noting the fluidity, ambiguity and ambivalence associated with the revolutions in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya, there is little consensus on causes and likely consequences. Do these geopolitical earthquakes constitute an “Arab Spring” leading to transition democratization, akin to 1989 in Central and Eastern Europe? Or should we look to 1979 in Iran, and the prospect of Sunni rather than Shia theocracy taking hold? Might the wider Muslim world – Indonesia, Malaysia, Pakistan and Turkey – provide alternative potential governance models for the MENA region, given indigenous variants appear exhausted and no longer able to self-reproduce? What are the lessons which other MENA incumbent regimes and the international community will identify? How might those lessons be learned?
Topic:
Democratization, Regime Change, and Insurgency
Political Geography:
Pakistan, Indonesia, Turkey, Middle East, and Arabia