Between Tradition and Change: Mapping Inclusion and Exclusion in Imran Khan’s Populism
摘要
In 2022, all opposition political parties of Pakistan made an alliance to oust the sitting prime minister through a no-confidence vote. That PM was Imran Khan, who casts himself as a third force, an alternative to this incompetent, unpatriotic, corrupt, and dynastic political class that has failed to fulfill the dream of democratic governance in the country. The chapter applies the model of inclusionary and exclusionary populism, introduced in Chapter 1 , to study Imran Khan’s populist discourse. The chapter begins by highlighting the social, political, and economic situation when Imran Khan established his political party, PTI. It specifically discusses the relationship of Khan with the military elite—the most powerful institution in the country—and details the argument against Khan’s populism built on this exclusion of the military elite from his definition of “the other.” Based on the conceptualization of populism as a discourse, the chapter points out the populist attributes in Khan’s political discourse such as pitting “the people” against the mainstream parties and the dynastic and patronage politics, anti-pluralism and anti-institutionalism and the ambiguity of the political call.