The filthy masses of Pakistan are political agents and they are ready for democracy.

People are always ready for a healthier, more vibrant civil society, but for me the question is what you should prioritize–electoral or social democracy. At first glance, I always go with the latter on the assumption that if elections and electoral democracy are meaningful they have to be a codification, a formality that shows the underlying vibrancy of the social democracy, not a thing unto themselves. So, if I had as much power as George Bush has at his hands, my approach would be markedly different in a society like Iran, which has a strong culturally democratic tradition, than it would in Iraq, where it needs to build (and elections can be part of that–they’re just not the thing by themselvces).

I guess what I’m asking is, what’s the path in Pakistan? What are the steps that lead into Pakistani “democracy” and what can outsiders do to support it?

Saurav: I see that you take your Fareed Zakaria seriously. But, again, that throws the Pakistani masses into the “not yet” camp. The codification is there. Pakistan is not Iraq - it has a constitution, constituent assemblies with a judiciary and legal frameworks. Electoral politics is not everything but it is the necessary thing.
As for the path: US support for Musharraf has to go. With it, all this is just academic.

If the U.S. didn`t support Musharraf, he`d probably be dead by now. (I hope that doesn`t sound too mean). Of course, if he stays in power too long and the militants can get closer enough to him, he`ll be dead anyway. Of course, Musharraf has survived a number of assassination attempts, so maybe he is doing Allah`s will.
I think the U.S. has no real interests in seeing a democratic Pakistan because it wouldn`t serve their purposes. And we all know the land of milk and honey is all about maintaining & protecting their self interests in this `war on terrorism.`

That is my 500 yen on a topic I`m barely qualified to comment on but in another life I was really into Pakistan (don`t ask).

No, just my primers and my classist desi backgorund. That doesn’t speak very highly of him, though, considering how little i know and his rep.

Electoral politics is not everything but it is the necessary thing.

No, this is ass-backwards (pardon my English). Electoral politics is the last thing, no? I know that Pakistan is not Iraq, but it is not Iran either–it has a horrible history of religious schisms, ethnic schisms, language schisms, etc. I really hold out hope for something better, but this alternation of corrupt electoral rule and army dictatorship doesn’t exactly inspire optimism.

As for the path: US support for Musharraf has to go. With it, all this is just academic.

Only until the Shah gets overthrown.

I’m more looking to see if I understand things correctly than commenting, so forgive any gross errors on my part. As far as I understand things, Musharraf has the U.S. by the short and curlies because of the implicit threat, “If you don’t give me unconditional support, then jihadis will take over the country and then you’ll have nukes going of in New York City.” If my understanding of the arrangement is correct, it makes sense that Musharraf isn’t going anywhere any time soon.

Umm, I do. I guess that’s why my blog is called Dark Days Ahead… :)

My grossly uninformed read is that I don’t think he needs to hold it out–the idea is obviously present in the minds of these people and he just has to invoke it once in a while. Anyone who knows that Indonesia and Saudi Arabia both exist and can think in terms of “the Muslim world’s capacity for democracy” is obviously missing a few pages from their social science texts and/or life experiences (i.e. most americans). Sometimes that serves the interests of petit elites like Musharraf’s crew. I imagine a lot of neocons and other Administration foreign policy people are a little more sophisticated, but how much so is a good question.

But I still hold that this power dynamic works the way it’s always worked–the U.S. has all of it, and Musharraf has a little. That’s why he and his coworkers gets fighter jets and Americans get everything else…and Pakistanis get next to nothing.