State Response to Social Movement: A Case Study of the Pashtun Tahfuz (Protection) Movement in Pakistan

Abstract

The states' response to social movements varies depending on the regime type and how the state perceives a social movement. Given the institutional leniency toward dissenters and the increased level of political opportunity in a democratic state, social movements are more likely to emerge, thrive, and fade away by accomplishing their goals. Nevertheless, social movements in authoritarian states are more likely to be suppressed. The case of the Pashtun Tahafuz (Protection) Movement PTM, on the other hand, shows that the state's response to social movements in post-colonial states experiencing national identity crises, such as Pakistan, is harsher. The PTM case also demonstrates that it is unique in that the state does not recognize it as a social movement in the first place. Instead, the state associates it with a long-standing desire for a distinct national identity, threatening Pakistan's statehood. Given the military's dominance in Pakistani affairs and their pursuit of a single ideological national identity, social movements based within a specific ethnic group are deemed to face oppression, regardless of whether their demands are constitutional. Social movements in the periphery, such as the PTM, face suppression due to the conflict of interests between the core and periphery communities where the elite members of the core community enjoy more power and resources at the expense of excluding the members in the periphery. To analyze the state response to PTM, the response can be looked into from three viewpoints. PTM in the eyes of the state, PTM as a threat to the military's domination, and PTM as a challenge to the national identity of Pakistan.