Asian mobilities and state governance at the geographic margins: Geopolitics and oil tales from Karachi to Taftan
Asian mobilities and state governance at the geographic margins: Geopolitics and oil tales from Karachi to Taftan
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地理边缘的亚洲流动性和国家治理：从卡拉奇到塔夫坦的地缘政治和石油故事
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发表时间：
2016
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通讯作者：
Nausheen H. Anwar
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作者：
Nausheen H. Anwar
这篇文章的核心问题是考虑在巴基斯坦国家治理的关系的地理“边缘”。在这样做的过程中，它的姿态更广泛的理论教训，可以通过民族志的探索卡拉奇的周边和巴基斯坦-伊朗边境城镇，如塔夫坦位于俾路支省。讨论的核心是流动性的概念。文章认为，在更广泛的背景下，中南亚的历史连接性在巴基斯坦设置三种不同类型的流动性。首先是“非法”商品的流动，如巴基斯坦与伊朗边境的柴油，巴基斯坦西北地区与反恐战争有关的被迫移民，最后是公路网络在调解流动性方面的作用：简而言之，流动性被认为是商品，流离失所和基础设施。这些亚洲的流动性如何为国家带来启示？边缘的概念在理论化国家的角色时特别有帮助。这些都是创造力的边缘地带，可以赚钱，但也充满了风险和冲突，因为它们超出了正式治理的范围。文章开篇介绍了卡拉奇及其周边地区的历史，包括其殖民历史和印度河的形成，印度河一直具有地缘政治的重要性。然后讨论该地区的柴油贸易。伊朗柴油通过俾路支省的塔夫坦等城镇流入卡拉奇，这代表了雇佣军、贩毒者和柴油商人的混合，以及巴基斯坦政府未能充分控制这一流动，这已经成为俾路支省和卡拉奇周边地区一些人的有利可图的生意和其他人的生命线。然后，文章序言基础设施的作用及其与现代性和巴基斯坦国家的关系。最后，本文认为，边缘不应该被视为“外部”的民族国家或某种“例外”的空间。相反，它们应该被理解为国家“内部”的组成部分，正是因为它们超出了国家的范围。
This article’s central concern is to consider the geographic ‘margins’ in relationship to state governance in Pakistan. In doing so, it gestures toward wider theoretical lessons that can be drawn through ethnographic explorations of Karachi’s periphery and of Pak–Iran border towns such as Taftan located in the province of Baluchistan. Central to the discussion is the idea of mobility. The article considers three different types of mobility across Pakistan set in the broader context of Central-South Asian historical connectivities. First is the movement of ‘illicit’ commodities such as diesel across Pakistan’s border with Iran, forced migrations across Pakistan’s northwest region in relationship to the war on terror, and finally, the role of road networks in mediating mobilities: in short, mobility is considered across commodities, displacement, and infrastructure. How do these Asian mobilities shed light on the state? The idea of the margins is particularly helpful in theorizing the role of the state. These are liminal zones of creativity where money can be made but are also fraught with risk and conflict because they are beyond the reach of formal governance. The article opens with a history of Karachi and its surrounding regions, including its colonial past and the making of the Indus River which has always been of geopolitical importance. It then moves to a discussion of the diesel trade in the region. The flow of Iranian diesel into Karachi via towns like Taftan in Baluchistan represents a mingling of actors—mercenaries, drug traffickers, and diesel merchants—and the Pakistani state’s failure to sufficiently control this flow, which has become a lucrative business for some and a lifeline for others across Baluchistan and in Karachi’s periphery. The article then prefaces the role of infrastructure and its relationship with modernity and the Pakistani state. In conclusion, the article argues the margins should not be seen as being ‘outside’ of the nation-state or as some kind of ‘exceptional’ space. Rather they should be understood as constitutive of the state’s very ‘inside’ precisely because they are beyond its reach.