The Defiant Border

The Afghan-Pakistan Borderlands in the Era of Decolonization, 1936–1965

Elisabeth Leake

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Year: 2016
• Print ISBN: 9781107126022
• eBook ISBN: 9781316944387
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Indian & South Asian History
• Index: History

The Defiant Border explores why the Afghan-Pakistan borderlands have remained largely independent of state controls from the colonial period into the twenty-first century. This book looks at local Pashtun tribes' modes for evading first British colonial, then Pakistani, governance; the ongoing border dispute between Pakistan and Afghanistan; and continuing interest in the region from Indian, US, British, and Soviet actors. It reveals active attempts by first British, then Pakistani, agents to integrate the tribal region, ranging from development initiatives to violent suppression. The Defiant Border also considers the area's influence on relations between Pakistan, Afghanistan, and India, as well as its role in the United States' increasingly global Cold War policies. Ultimately, the book considers how a region so peripheral to major centers of power has had such an impact on political choices throughout the eras of empire, decolonization, and superpower competition, up to the so-called 'war on terror'.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half-title
• Series information
• Title page
• Copyright information
• Table of contents
• Preface and acknowledgments
• List of abbreviations
• Introduction
• 1 “Using a Crowbar to Swat Wasps”
• 2 The “Opening of Sluice-Gates”
• 3 “We Are One People and Ours Is a Land”
• 4 A “Friendly Point of Return”
• 5 An “Eye for an Eye”
• Conclusion
• Index