{"id":{"repo_id":"cambridge","oai_identifier":"oai:www.repository.cam.ac.uk:1810/291810"},"canonical_url":"https://search.dev.ndltd.org/etd/cambridge/oai:www.repository.cam.ac.uk:1810/291810","repository":{"repo_id":"cambridge","name":"Cambridge University","base_url":"https://api.repository.cam.ac.uk/server/oai/request"},"display":{"title":"Destruction as Rule: Containment, Censuring and Confusion in Pakistani Balochistan","abstract":"This dissertation explores the contour and content of state-ordered destruction in the construction of state, territory, and subjects. To do so, it carries out a historical and ethnographic study of state violence, from the colonial era until today, in Pakistan’s southern province of Balochistan. Through this study, the dissertation argues: Where the construction of state, territory, and subjects requires a rendering of society as legible in order to create it and make it manipulable for the purposes of rule, the destruction of politics, places and peoples requires a rendering of networks opposing the state as obscure in order to dismantle them and make them docile for the same purpose. These networks, or “counter-societies,” are collective identities that transgress and resist the state’s version of society proper, e.g. through the collective identities of the anti-colonial rebel, the revolutionary communist, or the separatist ethnonationalist. In turn, society proper is constituted by state-sanctioned identities considered necessary for rule, like the “tribal” colonial subject or the loyal and growth-minded Pakistani citizen. Through a close reading of three cases of state violence in the colonial, early post-colonial, and contemporary era–a 1918 colonial-era military expedition, a 1973-’77 counterinsurgency campaign, and post-9/11 displacements, disappearances, killings, and army raids–the dissertation argues that the state sought to contain the “infection” of “fanaticism” in the colonial era, censure alternative ideas of Pakistan as socialist and multi-national in the early post-colonial era, and confuse attempts to articulate a counter-hegemonic front against the violence of the state in the contemporary era.","abstract_html":"This dissertation explores the contour and content of state-ordered destruction in the construction of state, territory, and subjects. To do so, it carries out a historical and ethnographic study of state violence, from the colonial era until today, in Pakistan’s southern province of Balochistan. Through this study, the dissertation argues: Where the construction of state, territory, and subjects requires a rendering of society as legible in order to create it and make it manipulable for the purposes of rule, the destruction of politics, places and peoples requires a rendering of networks opposing the state as obscure in order to dismantle them and make them docile for the same purpose. These networks, or “counter-societies,” are collective identities that transgress and resist the state’s version of society proper, e.g. through the collective identities of the anti-colonial rebel, the revolutionary communist, or the separatist ethnonationalist. In turn, society proper is constituted by state-sanctioned identities considered necessary for rule, like the “tribal” colonial subject or the loyal and growth-minded Pakistani citizen. Through a close reading of three cases of state violence in the colonial, early post-colonial, and contemporary era–a 1918 colonial-era military expedition, a 1973-’77 counterinsurgency campaign, and post-9/11 displacements, disappearances, killings, and army raids–the dissertation argues that the state sought to contain the “infection” of “fanaticism” in the colonial era, censure alternative ideas of Pakistan as socialist and multi-national in the early post-colonial era, and confuse attempts to articulate a counter-hegemonic front against the violence of the state in the contemporary era.","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Ahmad, Mahvish"],"institution":"University of Cambridge","degree_name":"Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)","degree_level":"Doctoral","degree_discipline":null,"degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":[],"advisors":["Desai, Manali","Navaro, Yael"],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2019,"date_issued":"2019-07-15","date_published":"2019-07-15","updated_at":"2026-07-22T22:23:57Z","subjects":["Balochistan","Pakistan","South Asia","violence","state","sovereignty","citizenship","political subjectivity","hegemony","counter-hegemony","colonial violence","British India","indirect rule","colonialism","post-colonial violence","counter-insurgency","Cold War","communism","National Awami Party","Baloch Popular Liberation Front","Pararis","Jabbal","confusion","opacity","destruction","censorship","containment","illegibility","legibility"],"languages":["en"],"rights":[],"rights_urls":["https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/bitstreams/5c4da25b-355e-4301-9afa-f2572723ea91/download","https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/"],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.38970","outbound_label":"DOI","outbound_source":"dc:identifier.doi"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor.advisor","label":"Advisor","values":["Desai, Manali","Navaro, Yael"]},{"key":"dc:contributor.sponsor","label":"Sponsor","values":["Research for this thesis has been sponsored by: - Cambridge Political Economy Society Trust - Department of Sociology, University of Cambridge - The Cambridge Commonwealth, European & International Trust"]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Ahmad, Mahvish"]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date.issued","label":"Date","values":["2019-07-15"]},{"key":"dc:publisher.institution","label":"Dc Publisher Institution","values":["University of Cambridge"]},{"key":"dc:relation.isreferencedby.uri","label":"Dc Relation Isreferencedby URI","values":["https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/291810"]},{"key":"dc:type","label":"Dc Type","values":["Thesis"]},{"key":"dc:type.qualificationlevel","label":"Dc Type Qualificationlevel","values":["Doctoral"]},{"key":"dc:type.qualificationname","label":"Dc Type Qualificationname","values":["Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)"]}]},{"id":"subjects_keywords","label":"Subjects and Keywords","entries":[{"key":"dc:subject","label":"Dc Subject","values":["Balochistan","Pakistan","South Asia","violence","state","sovereignty","citizenship","political subjectivity","hegemony","counter-hegemony","colonial violence","British India","indirect rule","colonialism","post-colonial violence","counter-insurgency","Cold War","communism","National Awami Party","Baloch Popular Liberation Front","Pararis","Jabbal","confusion","opacity","destruction","censorship","containment","illegibility","legibility"]}]},{"id":"language_rights","label":"Language and Rights","entries":[{"key":"dc:language","label":"Dc Language","values":["en"]},{"key":"dc:rights","label":"Dc Rights","values":["https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/bitstreams/5c4da25b-355e-4301-9afa-f2572723ea91/download","https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier.doi","label":"DOI","values":["10.17863/CAM.38970"]},{"key":"dc:identifier.uri","label":"Identifier URI","values":["https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/bitstreams/65d39a65-2d53-4fac-adcf-65320573bd4f/download"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description.abstract","label":"Abstract","values":["This dissertation explores the contour and content of state-ordered destruction in the construction of state, territory, and subjects. 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In turn, society proper is constituted by state-sanctioned identities considered necessary for rule, like the “tribal” colonial subject or the loyal and growth-minded Pakistani citizen. 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