Pakistan's Stability Paradox

Ashutosh Misra is Research Fellow at the Centre of Excellence in Policing and Security at Griffith University. He is the author of India-Pakistan: Coming to Terms, and Pakistan: Engagement of the Extremes. Michael Clarke is an ARC Research Fellow at the Griffith Asia Institute. His most recent publication is Xinjiang and China’s Rise in Central Asia, 1949-2009: A History (Routledge 2011).

• Part 1: Domestic Dimensions 1. Understanding the Unstable Nature of Pakistan’s Triadic Politics 2. Judicialization of Politics in Pakistan: Constitutional and Political Challenges and the Role of the Judiciary 3. What are they teaching them at Schools Nowadays? Understanding Pakistan’s Social Revolution and Seminary Education 4. Women, Media, Equity and Equality: The Pakistani Context 5. The Militants’ Landscape: Pakistan’s Islamist Organizations and Their Impact on the Body Politic Part 2: Regional Dimensions 6. The India-Pakistan Peace Process 7. The State of Jihadi Organisations in Pakistan and Their Regional and International Linkages 8. Pakistan-Afghanistan Relations 9. The Evolution of the Pakistani Taliban Part 3: International Dimensions 10. Pakistan-US Relations: An Inconvenient Partnership of Convenience 11. Testing China’s Rise: China-Pakistan Relations 12. Pakistan and the ‘Four Faces’ of Nuclear Terrorism: A Preliminary Assessment

"This book has gone into considerable depth in a number of aspects. We have a mixture of international, Indian and Pakistani scholarship within the covers of one book and that is actually extremely important…We have got a book that combines a number of key issues and concerns that all of us would have over Pakistan. It is not tossed off journalism. It is serious scholarship with primary as well as secondary sources…I hope that particularly scholars and policy makers will dwell into the heart of the work both (editors) have done in producing this volume".—Dr. Shashi Tharoor, Indian Member of Parliament and former United Nations Under Secretary General while launching the book in New Delhi on 1 December 2011."This book succeeds admirably in putting forward something new which always is a challenge. Let me congratulate the editors and contributors for the substantial body of scholarship. The breadth of the work is impressive and likewise the specialist expertise of the authors spanning, Australian, American, Pakistani and Indian institutions and individuals. Clearly the academic linkages informing this book are strong. Collectively the chapters shed light very well on the complex interplay of socio-economic and geopolitical factors which lie behind and not just shape developments in the region and beyond. A volume drawing together this variety of perspectives from a range of institutions and reflecting regional views is very much to be welcomed not only as a contribution to scholarship on contemporary South Asia and its recent history but also as a resource for policy makers in refining Australia’s policy setting on critical issues such as terrorism and on South Asia region more broadly. We have read into this book with a great deal of interest in Canberra and I am sure it will have an impact on those of us who work on South Asian policies". – Mr. William (Bill) Paterson, Australia’s Counter Terrorism Ambassador while launching the book in Brisbane on 24 May 2012.