Crafting & indoctrinating Pakistan’s foreign

policy
Intermittently, there remains a heated debate in Pakistan — arguing who is crafting Pakistan’s
foreign policy?Understandably, both in form and substance, a foreign policy of a nation is the
total representation of its internal strength organically exploited towards the conduct of its
external relations.And yet not surprisingly, as security- cum-democratic state, Pakistan’s foreign
policy seeks equal participation or role– of both the civil (Foreign Office) and military
establishment (the GHQ) –vis-à-vis crafting and indoctrinating the foreign policy priorities
framework.This appraisal suggests that so long as it is the domain of soft power part of our
policy, the managers of the policy are none but the custodians of our Foreign Office; and
whereas the hard power part of our policy is concerned the strategists of this policy are the none
but the managers of our security establishment.

By all reasonable and astute calculations, an overstretched Islamabad has that much-required
capacity to reorient the directions of our foreign policy with the mutual resourcefulness of our
civil-military planners. Undeniably, the present course of uplift in our foreign policy is positively
reflective of the result attainted via strategic thinking, credit of which goes to our security
establishment. If we examine the current positive features being reflected in our policy trends
that are the security of our borders, promotion of regionalism, fostering the principles of
pragmatism towards the US, globalism in terms of economic relations and positive
constructivism towards the revisionist powers, the driving exigencies of the geostrategic optics
and our uncompromising focus on an epic cause of the Kashmir freedom.

Security of our borders: The first and foremost priority goal of our policy like any other nation is
to gauge the security and safety of our borders. In this regard, the overall surveillance of our
territorial integrity is the prime responsibility of our armed forces who are vigilantly performing
this national task with an unflinching sense of commitment.

Promotion of regionalism: Whatever the expediencies entailed by the exigencies for Pakistan
have been in the previous decades, the current regional and global structures seem different and
very opportunistic for Pakistan. A former Foreign Minister of Pakistan writes, highlighting
foreign policy issues to the country, “The emerging new international economic environment
influenced in several different ways by the process of globalization has placed new
responsibilities on the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.” He also highlights the politico-economic
relationship becoming preeminent in the 21st century: “the term political economy now applies
both to the internal and external dimensions of politics and economics.” Another major trend that
paints the continuously changing global environment is “Regionalism”. States revise their
foreign policies according to their domestic needs and external crescendos and diminuendos.
Pakistan now, more than ever needs to set fiercely proactive goals and not just be on the
receiving end of matters but broaden its foreign policy goals and its execution.
The core principle of our foreign relations is to morally, diplomatically and legally support the
cause of the Kashmiri freedom from India. Our relations with India are primarily based on
India’s Kashmir policy

Fostering pragmatism: Islamabad has objectively decided to opt for a paradigm shift in its
foreign policy. It has also for the first time wisely used its strategic location for deriving long-
term economic benefits for the people of this country, particularly in the face of the heightened
risk of shrinking foreign capital flows from Western bilateral or multilateral sources. Peace in
Afghanistan and improved relations would also open up vistas for trade, energy corridors and
economic cooperation with the Central Asian Republics. During my tenure as World Bank
director for these countries, we had calculated that Gwadar would be the most cost-effective
route for transport of imports and exports for these countries. Islamabad’s policy gestures
suggest that it has adopted an “intermestic policy,” which can be defined as a congealing of
strategic and economic policies. On the strategic front, Pakistan is in the process of converting to
an Act East Policy, by using its geostrategic location to diversify its friends’ club. In relation to
this, the growing geostrategic ties with the former Cold War rival Russia suggest Islamabad’s
balancing strategy to cope with the rising Indo-US romance.Pakistan has maintained the core of
pragmatism regarding its relations with the US. This year’s visit to the US by Prime Minister
Imran Khan and the Army Chief Gen QamarJavedBajwa has been a result of the mutual
conviction ofboth the US and the Pakistani policy quarters. The degree of US continuous re-
engagement with Pakistan rests Islamabad’s civil-military rulers’ motivation to reform the
political system, root out corruption, restrain extremists, and pursue a conciliatory policy towards
economic reforms.

Evolution of positive constructivism: Bien entendu, realism argues that state behaviour is
essentially the pursuit of power and decisions are pragmatic calculations of self-interest, while
Constructivism advocates that ideas drive behaviour. Rather than being mutually exclusive, some
scholars argue that Constructivism in a state foreign policy could play a complementary role
within the realist worldview by focusing on the ideas that fundamentally drive the decisions of
actors– pursuing their self-interests, contextualizing foreign policy behaviour. Consequently.
Samuel Barkin’s realist and hybrid Constructivism seems to be better suited to explain the role of
ideology in state foreign policy. In this backdrop, we cannot ignore the role of Islamic ideology
in the formation of our policy.

Geostrategic optics: Today, we are living in an era of unpredictability-characterised by the

changing events frequently. Still, South Asia as a region remains at the forefront of
Washington’s regional interests and concerns. Trump’s administration has driven a mix of
change and continuity in American foreign and security policies, including those in South Asia.
It is here that Pakistan needs to review its position with the changing scenario. Needless to say,
political and economic stability could play a vital role in bringing Pakistan back to a strong
position and to overcome its regional challenges. A good relationship with its neighbouring
countries is also very important. Currently, Pakistan is busy on both eastern and western borders.
That’s why we need to build a good working relationship, at least, with our western border
countries-both Afghanistan and Iran. We should also utilize our geostrategic position vis-à-vis
CPEC expanding trajectory.
Focus on Kashmir: The core principle of our foreign relations is to morally, diplomatically and
legally support the cause of the Kashmiri freedom from India. Our relations with India are
primarily based on India’s Kashmir policy. For Islamabad, New Delhi is our only potential
nuclear target. Unfortunately, the costs for Pakistan of its relations with India highly exceed
those of its relations with any other country in the world. How to significantly reduce these costs
without compromising our principled stand on major outstanding issues– especially the core
issue of Jammu and Kashmir, remains an unremitting challenge for our foreign policy.