Constitutionalizing a Perpetual Transition: The ‘Integration’ of the Pashtun ‘Tribal Areas’

Abstract

This article charts the historical marginalization of Pashtun tribal areas to the periphery of the Pakistani state and undertakes an analysis of the recent movement for their integration in Pakistan’s constitutional structure. It also analyzes contemporaneous developments in Pakistan’s constitutional system, in particular the accommodation of a stronger form of federalism and the emergence of a powerful judiciary brandishing robust judicial review and fundamental rights jurisdictions, which have provided both the backdrop and impetus to the integration of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) in Pakistan’s constitutional system of governance. The article asserts that this case study of FATA’s integration demands an acknowledgment of the deeply political and inherently transitional nature of constitutionalism in Pakistan, and arguably many other parts of the Global South.