Pakistan: A Fourth Coup?

[Sbane]

Pakistan is one of the two successor states to British India - India being the other one. India, by the standards of developing Asian countries, is a success story as far as functional democratic institutions and political stability. It's by and large a more ethically-challenged version of Westminster. Pakistan, by comparison, has been run more like a Central American banana republic or a post-monarchical Middle Eastern state. It's had a revolving door of reactionary military strongmen, occasionally punctuated by a populist civilian leader like one of the Bhuttos or their allies.

Both countries became independent with the same democratic and civil institutions - structures that had been put in place during British rule. So why did India end up being so much higher functioning than Pakistan? How did Pakistan end up having more in common with its neighbor to the west than with its neighbor to the east?

I don't like the direction Nehru took India on the economic front (which India is paying for till the present day) but I must give him credit where credit is due. He laid the foundation for a stable democracy and thankfully that has continued to this day. Why Jinnah failed at doing that is a very good question and I don't have a good answer to that. It should also be noted that after independence from Pakistan, Bangladesh has also been a fairly stable country despite facing much greater challenges than Pakistan.

[Sbane]

Pakistan is one of the two successor states to British India - India being the other one. India, by the standards of developing Asian countries, is a success story as far as functional democratic institutions and political stability. It's by and large a more ethically-challenged version of Westminster. Pakistan, by comparison, has been run more like a Central American banana republic or a post-monarchical Middle Eastern state. It's had a revolving door of reactionary military strongmen, occasionally punctuated by a populist civilian leader like one of the Bhuttos or their allies.

Both countries became independent with the same democratic and civil institutions - structures that had been put in place during British rule. So why did India end up being so much higher functioning than Pakistan? How did Pakistan end up having more in common with its neighbor to the west than with its neighbor to the east?

Well for one thing, India had something like 90% of the subcontinent's industry before the partition, and much of the financial reserves from the colonial government. Not to mention the fact that there were already several thriving major cities in India...

Also keep in mind all of the refugees who were resettled n Pakistan in the years after the partition. There was a lot of violence and chaos in that process.

An unfair comparison, really.

That's not true. Pakistan had Karachi and Lahore, which were major cities before partition. And don't forget that refugees went both ways. There were plenty of refugees who flooded into India from Pakistan and what would later become Bangladesh. Delhi, for example, grew at an extraordinary rate during the time of partition as Sikh and Hindu refugees from Pakistani Punjab flooded in. In the east, the state of Assam has a massive Bengali population, many of whom moved from Bangladesh. The movement occurred slower on that front though, as the level of violence was also lower.

[Sbane]

Pakistan is one of the two successor states to British India - India being the other one. India, by the standards of developing Asian countries, is a success story as far as functional democratic institutions and political stability. It's by and large a more ethically-challenged version of Westminster. Pakistan, by comparison, has been run more like a Central American banana republic or a post-monarchical Middle Eastern state. It's had a revolving door of reactionary military strongmen, occasionally punctuated by a populist civilian leader like one of the Bhuttos or their allies.

Both countries became independent with the same democratic and civil institutions - structures that had been put in place during British rule. So why did India end up being so much higher functioning than Pakistan? How did Pakistan end up having more in common with its neighbor to the west than with its neighbor to the east?

Well for one thing, India had something like 90% of the subcontinent's industry before the partition, and much of the financial reserves from the colonial government. Not to mention the fact that there were already several thriving major cities in India...

Also keep in mind all of the refugees who were resettled n Pakistan in the years after the partition. There was a lot of violence and chaos in that process.

An unfair comparison, really.

That's not true. Pakistan had Karachi and Lahore, which were major cities before partition. And don't forget that refugees went both ways. There were plenty of refugees who flooded into India from Pakistan and what would later become Bangladesh. Delhi, for example, grew at an extraordinary rate during the time of partition as Sikh and Hindu refugees from Pakistani Punjab flooded in. In the east, the state of Assam has a massive Bengali population, many of whom moved from Bangladesh. The movement occurred slower on that front though, as the level of violence was also lower.

It should be noted that pre-partition, the business industries and professional spheres were largely dominated by Hindus, particularly in Karachi and Sindh as a whole. When many of these Hindus left for India, this was essentially an exodus of the middle class, which has crippled Sindh's economy.

That was a very interesting article. I was shocked to learn Sindhis had a reputation in Pakistan of lacking entrepreneurship. That is the exact opposite impression of Sindhis that people have in India. Why was this particularly the case in Sindh and not in Punjab? Although I should note Punjabi refugees do form a large part of the business community in Delhi.

[Sbane]

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Right, I knew what you meant. Generally, whenever the army stages a coup, its able to do so by presenting itself as a competent alternative to the democratically-elected government for dealing with whatever national crisis. With the bin Laden raid, the army was utterly embarrassed and looked ridiculous. The fact bin Laden had (seemingly) lived undetected for years right across from Pakistan's equivalent West Point was embarrassing, and so was the idea that American troops had entered Pakistani airspace undetected. So the army couldn't really present itself as a competent alternative, and so there wasn't really popular support for a coup (like there have been in previous cases).

This article is related to this topic, and I found it fairly interesting. If you're unable to open it due to paywall, let me know, and I can forward the text to you.

So why do you think Pakistan's military is more willing to grab political power than the Indian military. It's not as if India has always been ruled by competent leaders and obviously there is a high level of corruption. Yet the Indian military has never even given the inclination that they would want power, much less actually trying to enact a coup. Maybe it is because Jinnah died too early and there was no tradition of democratic governance established in Pakistan like it was in India by Nehru. What are your thoughts?

[Sbane]

What was that absurd Raj term? Warrior Races? Too many of those in Pakistan (as in: too much pride in the army).

Martial race. I guess the Pashtuns and the Punjabis were considered as such. I think they constitute a majority of the population. Still, the Indian military is also highly represented by such "races" such as Punjabis and the Gorkhas.