Over the past two years, each time I have returned to the United States after visiting family and colleagues in Pakistan, I have been struck by a deepening sense of hopelessness. It is impossible not to notice that many roads still bear the same potholes they did when I was a child, and that some public hospitals are now in worse condition than New York City subways—hallways reeking of urine and neglect. This decay has become normalized, no longer treated as a temporary failure, but as a permanent condition of civilian life.

On one such flight back, I listened to Fatal Invention by Dorothy Roberts, where she argues that race was historically constructed not to describe biological difference, but to justify hierarchy and domination. That argument clarified something I had long sensed in Pakistan: askari privilege functions as a system of hierarchy in much the same way—not biologically, but politically and socially—designed to preserve power rather than serve the public.

Unlike in many societies where privilege hides behind euphemisms or institutional neutrality, military privilege in Pakistan was never subtle. Cantonment areas were always clearly marked, fenced, and guarded. While initially justified in the name of national security, these spaces were never merely symbolic; they were physical manifestations of a hierarchy that elevated military personnel above civilian society, not accountable to it.

For decades, military-run parks, neighborhoods, schools, and hospitals have remained clean, orderly, and well-maintained while surrounding civilian infrastructure crumbled. Access to many of these facilities required validation by a serving or retired officer. I still remember asking a retired military colonel neighbor to sign off so I could go for a walk in the Polo Ground in Lahore Cantt because that was the place where everyone wanted to go for a walk. Today, this separation has expanded far beyond cantonments, with DHA developments now dominating nearly every major city as the most prestigious, secure, and resource-rich neighborhoods.

The scale of this imbalance is not anecdotal; it is........

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