Perceptions About America in Pakistan

Abstract

Attitudes toward America developed in Pakistan out of a variety of patterns of interaction between the two countries over the last five decades. Most typically this interaction has been characterized by the one-way flow of American influence, and much less, if at all, the other way round. There were both positive and negative factors involved in strengthening PakistanAmerican relations. At the heart of the positive factor lay the American capital and technology that Pakistan direly needed and that the United States was ready to make available to a significant level in different phases of the countryOs history. Negatively speaking, the two countries were relatively free of any baggage from the past in terms of hostile relations, being as they were geographically distant and historically and politically irrelevant to each other, especially as Pakistan had emerged as a distinct entity only in 1947. That means that Pakistan-American relations operated essentially from a pragmatic perspective, because both looked at each other as being engaged in a mutually beneficial relationship with no hangovers from the past. The remoteness of the American public and private life from the experience and imagination of Pakistanis in general lent a peculiarly reductionist character to their attitudes toward the United States. At the bottom of it lay a state-to-state relationship, which was largely understood by Pakistanis in terms of their security and development. For example, the general public in that country looked at relations with America essentially as part of its security framework, conceived and operationalized for defense against the perceived threat from India. Not surprisingly, Pakistani perceptions about Washington often took a turn for the worse in the wake of the latterOs perceived tilt in favor of India. In the case of the U.S. withdrawal from active involvement in the region, such as after the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1988, Pakistan felt betrayed in terms of its heavy investment in the resistance movement against the Red Army in Kabul. At the other end, the development orientation of the ruling elite in Pakistan has kept it tied up with the idea of a close economic and financial relationship with the United States as well as global financial institutions controlled by Washington. Apart from the two pillars of Pakistan-U.S. relations, namely strategy and economic development, there have been very few patterns of exchange between the two countries in such fields as art, music, law, literature, sports, diplomacy, and fashion, as well as morals and manners covering vast areas of public and private life. In this sense, PakistanAmerican relations are far less comprehensive and meaningful than the relations between the United States and various European countries across the Atlantic. Accordingly, the attitudes