I’ll be sharing more about the book in the coming weeks, but as always, I welcome comments and critical feedback!

It’s also available from Amazon in various editions, including Kindle. 9/9 www.amazon.com/Vigilante-Is...

I’m very pleased that the book is available both in hardcover, and an economical softcover edition from Oxford. 8/9 global.oup.com/academic/pro...

And I argue that decisions by Islamist organizations to endorse, or quietly undermine, anti-state militants matter for the future of Pakistan, and provide lessons for studying Islamist movements in the Middle East, Southeast Asia, and elsewhere. 7/9

Ultimately, I argue that structural vulnerabilities (to the military, and to more radical groups) rather than ideological orientations best explain the complex decision-making of Islamist parties in the face of anti-state violence. 6/9

…the rise of the anti-state TTP, particularly between 2007 and 2014; and the emergence of new forms of violent Barelvi activism with the TLP and other groups. 5/9

The book includes five chapter-length case studies: the TNSM uprising in Malakand in the 1990s; the MMA’s relationship with vigilantism in the Frontier after 2002; the Red Mosque crisis in Islamabad in 2007; 4/9

And — at a moment when anti-state violence in Pakistan is again on the rise — the book examines the sometimes-symbiotic, sometimes-conflictual relationships between Islamist parties and militant organizations. 3/9

The book explores how a range of Islamist parties have grappled, from the 1990s to the present, with anti-state violence & vigilantism. It delves into both ideological and organizational pressures that shape Islamist groups’ responses to anti-state violence… 2/9

Reminder for folks who might be living through their first South Asian crisis: there’ll be a tremendous amount of disinfo, claims of targets being hit/not hit, and it’ll take a while to sort through what actually happened. In 2019, it took us about 3-4 days after the strikes to get a clear sense.