THIS IS NOT A GANG: Proxy Classes and Political Subjection in Lyari Restricted; Files Only
Suhail, Adeem (Spring 2019)
Published
Abstract
21st century Karachi, Pakistan. In the course of a decade the peaceful, working-class township of Lyari transforms into an urban warzone ruled by armed gangs. Once a repository for the city’s cosmopolitan culture and history, gang violence in Lyari, at its height, is claimed to have resulted in more casualties than the Taliban insurgency. However, based on ethnographic research in Lyari, this dissertation demonstrates that the gangs of Lyari conserved social order rather than disrupt it. The gangs were crucial doorways of access to basic civic amenities in Lyari. I argue that the gangs stabilized and legitimized state rule in their unacknowledged yet extensive function as resource brokers for Lyari’s residents, as much as in their wildly infamous violent practices.
The role of non-state violence in stabilizing social order remains subject to debate in anthropology. Scholars have highlighted how violent non-state operators challenge but also legitimize repressive state orders. Humanistic anthropology, conversely, chronicles the travails of lives exposed to precarity by the actions of these ‘violent operators. While state repression has been widely studied; the problem of suturing the objective and subjective dimensions of non-state violence into a coherent model persists. By attending to the violent and the redistributive practices of the gangs in Lyari, my work sutures state and non-state practices into a processual model for state-formation.
In the process of state-formation, I argue, the gang acts as a proxy class. Proxy classes extend state order in spaces where the groups that claim to be the state face popular challenge. In these contexts, proxy classes work on either side of the law, to legitimize and stabilize the dominant order. Lyari, has historically challenged the legitimacy of non-democratic Pakistani state formations. The gang was an instrument by which state institutions could implement their projects of rule in Lyari. In time, also emerge as a force of order by eradicating the gangs in the name of the restoration of law and order.
This study has larger implications for state theory, urbanology and the anthropology of violence. Firstly, it shows how the locus of political subjection lies outside the institutional matrix of the state, unfolding as a process that envelops proxy classes into itself. Secondly, it repositions the category of the gang as an emergent social form that conserves order. Finally, it sutures the objective and productive dimensions of violence to its subjective and destructive dimensions.
Table of Contents
TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION . 1
Preface: The edge of things. 1
The Argument: gang as proxy class. 15
The Context: situating Lyari in space and time. 19
The framework. 24
Apparatus. 24
Proxy Class. 30
Interventions: State, Urbanity, Violence. 37
State Theory. 37
Urbanity. 39
Anthropology of Violence. 46
Outline of chapters. 49
Sources. 51
ONE: Karachi Lyari Duality. 54
Brief Overview. 57
The Precolonial Period. 60
The Colonial Era. 67
The Long Partition. 78
Into the Nation-State Sequence: Praetorians, Parliamentarians, People. 81
Prelude to the Present. 97
TWO: The Name of the Gang is Order. 99
The Peculiar Practices of Gangs in Lyari. 102
The Long Shadow of the Gang From Chicago. 111
Beyond the Chicago Model. 115
A World of Gangs. 119
Finding The Name of the Gang in Lyari. 129
The Name of the Gang is Proxy Class. 133
Naming as a Statist Act. 140
THREE: Political Brokers and Proxy Classes. 145
From Brokers to Proxy Classes. 156
The Broker in Anthropology. 159
Power Brokers of Contemporary Lyari. 172
Baloch Unity: Wily Mr. Brohi. 173
Baloch Awakening: The Humble Lala. 177
Imagined States, Invented Societies. 181
The State Imaginary. 183
The Invented Society. 188
FOUR: Proxy Classes and Projects of Rule. 197
Crisis Apres Gang. 198
The undertaking of a Project. 202
The Facility. 204
The Testimony of Latif Baloch. 207
A Cast of Actors. 211
Bubbly. 213
Habib Jan. 216
Parvez and Umar. 222
Jamshed. 226
Rehabilitating the Facility. 229
The Camp. 231
The Conclusion. 238
FIVE: The Dreams of Death-dealers and Life-Givers. 240
Aslam Hero, Gangster, Vaccinator. 240
Before. 240
After. 242
Objectives. 244
The Protest. 246
Polio Workers in Pakistan. 251
Two Classes. 258
Labor and Proxy. 268
The Flag. 274
Sly Capture of Labor. 279
The End of the Tryst. 282
CONCLUSION. 285
NOTES. 289
WORKS CITED. 301
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File download under embargo until 20 May 2025 | 2019-03-20 15:01:35 -0400 | File download under embargo until 20 May 2025 |
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