Nationalism: A Case Study of Pakistan

Abstract

The ideology of nationalism endows the nation with collective concepts regarding their socio-political and economic lives. It deals with the nation as a collective entity as a separate being from the other nations in the world. The increasing trend of fragmentation in Pakistani society on various bases is an alarming sign, and playing a pessimistic role in nation and state building as a whole. This article is an effort to investigate the causes of weak nationalism in Pakistan. The article highlights the important factors which contributed towards the weak formation of nationalism in Pakistan. The first major factor is 'ineffective role of leadership' in Pakistan that has always attempted to politicize the matter of implementation of Islamic ideology as a system; secondly the 'least priority to the economic interests of the common people' who exerted for a separate country in quest of a separate Islamic identity and an elevated economic status.