The lion's share: elections and democracy in Pakistan. Issue 1 (2nd January 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Rollier, Paul
• Is Part Of: Commonwealth & comparative politics. Volume 58:Issue 1(2020)
• Page Start: 120
• Page End: 138
• Publication Date: 2020-01-02
• Subjects: South Asia -- Pakistan -- politics -- elections -- democracy; Comparative government -- Periodicals; Institutions politiques comparées -- Périodiques; 320.9171241
• DOI: 10.1080/14662043.2020.1700023
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1466-2043

Abstract

ABSTRACT: Focusing on the 2013 general elections in the electoral fief of the Sharif dynasty, this article seeks to account for the localised absence of violence and fraud that year. Here the clientelistic networks of Sharif's party facilitated the re-election of a family member, and enabled the party to dispense with thuggish tactics. But this pacification is not solely reducible to the logic of patronage. Force now had to be projected within the idiom of modern political rituals. Through performances and the saturation of public space, the party was able to extract political potency and to reproduce its position of dominance.