The Future of Democracy in Pakistan

About the Seminar
Pakistan’s general election, held on 8 February 2024, has both reinforced the dominant role of the military and underlined the potentialities for upheaval on the back of a youthful population facing a bleak economic future. Despite significant repression, candidates affiliated with the Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf, the party of jailed former prime minister, Imran Khan, secured a majority of seats in the lower house of parliament.
Post-poll machinations ensured that a weak coalition government was cobbled together by the established bourgeois parties, Pakistan Muslim League-N and Pakistan People’s Party, led by the Sharif and Bhutto families, respectively. In the face of a huge debt burden, International Monetary Fund-imposed austerity, the huge shadow of the military on economic, social and political life and many other long-term structural crises, the incoming government is likely to face growing backlash from a population with a median age of 23 years.
What is the future of democracy in Pakistan and, indeed, the rest of the world? The historical imprint of a powerful and praetorian military aside, is Pakistan the only country afflicted by majoritarianism, repression and intensifying economic-ecological crises?