UNDERSTANDING NATIONAL SECURITY: A PAKISTANI PERSPECTIVE

Abstract

National Security essentially remains a Western-centric and Western-dominated concept. Not much work has been done in the context of South Asia, which hinders meaningful scholarly advancement in the discipline. In Third World countries national security is misinterpreted as regime security. The era in which Pakistan gained independence was the time of power politics and theory of realism was reigning over international intellectual landscape, however in the meantime United Nations Organization (UNO) was being formed. Formation of UNO reflected emergence of counter thought of realism and termed as liberalism. However Pakistan opted to follow the doctrine of realism. Presumably the existential issues forced the infant state to align herself with the world power centers of the time, i.e. either the United States or the Russia. Pakistani leadership made a convenient choice, and joined the United States. An appropriate decision keeping in mind the international environment, however subsequently country’s leadership failed to incorporate changing international political and security trends in state policies. The paper outlines the post war and prevailing international trends in the national security and describes environments wherein country failed to incorporate these intellectual findings in state policies.