Making Sense of Federalism in Pakistan

Abstract

The nature of center-province relationship or federalism has been an issue which has persisted ever since the creation of Pakistan and has caused a host of very challenging problems to the state of Pakistan. Some of such issues are language issue, One Unit formation, sacking of different provincial governments at the behest of federal government, military governments’ special emphasis to grow democracy at the grass root level etc. The authors argue that the main cause of these problems is that the form of the state structure of Pakistan is federal however the substance is unitary. Constitutionally Pakistan has a federal form, yet the structures of the government, its orientation, and the thinking of the bureaucracies are unitary in nature, which was a colonial heritage. Provinces have demanded autonomy, due share in resources and freedom in decision making, however, centralist bureaucratic state structure trained in colonial traditions have resisted such claims, thus causing above mentioned problems.

Key Words: federalism, provincial autonomy, neo-colonialism, sense making