Local politics of reconstruction along and across Azad Kashmir's border with Pakistan.

With reference to anthropological approaches to state borders as processes, this paper examines ‘the border’ between Pakistan and Azad Kashmir through the window of reconstruction politics after the 2005 earthquake in Muzaffarabad, the capital of Azad Kashmir. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork, I analyse how ‘the border’ became inscribed into politics and power relations in Muzaffarabad through a locally contested ‘reconstruction bureaucracy’ which provided Pakistan with the means to dominate reconstruction in Azad Kashmir. Activists from Muzaffarabad politicised the delay of reconstruction by addressing Pakistan's interference in Azad Kashmir's affairs. Local politicisation of reconstruction, however, revealed contradictory effects of ‘the border’ on power relations in Muzaffarabad. From the activists’ perspectives, political boundaries between Pakistan and Azad Kashmir were characterised by domination as well as cooperation that undermined local concerns such as the reconstruction of Muzaffarabad. Thus, local activists also opposed ‘their’ government and transgressed ‘the border’ into Pakistan through the creation of alliances with national actors in order to put pressure on the government of Azad Kashmir. In taking advantage of power disparities between Pakistan and Azad Kashmir, these alliances, however, not only reproduced but also undermined the nation state's domination over the region by manipulating and circumventing the ‘reconstruction bureaucracy’. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]