Power and Authority in Afghanistan

Anna Larson is an independent analyst and writer. She has worked in Afghanistan since 2004, writing and teaching at SOAS, University of London and Tufts University. Dipali Mukhopadhyay is Associate Professor at the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University and Vice President of the American Institute of Afghanistan Studies. Omar Sharifi is a President’s Postdoctoral Fellow at the Humphrey School of Public Affairs, University of Minnesota and Assistant Professor in the Department of Social Sciences and Humanities at the American University of Afghanistan.

List of Figures
List of Contributors
Acknowledgements
Abbreviations
General Maps


Introduction: Rethinking Power and Authority in Afghanistan
Anna Larson

Section 1: Logics of Rule and Institutional (Dis-)Continuities

1. Stability as Strength in the Musahiban Era
Thomas Barfield

2. The Taliban, Women and the Hegelian Private Sphere (previously published, 2003)
Juan Cole

3. Legitimizing Power in Afghanistan
Haroun Rahimi

4. Unlocking the Taliban Puzzle: Traditions and Fundamentalisms
Mujib Abid

5. Neopatrimonial Perspectives on Political Structures in Afghanistan
Zinab Attai, Maryam Jami and Boshra Moheb

6. Civil-Military Relations, Battlefield Performance, and the Disintegration of Afghanistan's Security Forces
Basir Yosufi

Section 2: Intervention and its Legacies

7. Ghost Schools: Imperial Debris and the Erasure of Educated Women
Marya Hannun

8. Peace Building and State-building in Afghanistan (previously published, 2006)
Barnett R Rubin

9. Afghan Subjectivities and U.S. Foreign Policy: Postcolonial Perspectives
Nasema Zeerak

10. Leased Power and Vague Authority: The Political Culture and Economy of Rule in Afghanistan
Nazif Shahrani

11. Legitimacy by Design
Astri Suhrke

12. Brokerage, Business and the Continuities in Power
Noah Coburn and Arsalan Noori

13. Power, Ideas, and the 'Taliban 2.0' Myth
William Maley


Section 3: The Politics of Recognition and Resistance

14. The State, the Clergy, and British Imperial Policy in Afghanistan during the 19th and Early 20th Centuries
Senzil Nawid

15. The Pushback against the Hazara Rise in Afghanistan
Ali Yarwar Adili

16. Minority Games: Intergroup Power Imbalances in a Nation of Competing Identities
Annika Schmeding

17. Inheriting Hegemonic Nobility: Urban Elite Lineage and Legitimacy
Adam H. Dehsabzi

18. Failed Democracy in Afghanistan: Rethinking Deliberation and Pluralism
Omar Sadr

19. Mujahidin Memory and the Legacies of Wartime Governance in Afghanistan
Munazza Ebtikar


Afterword
Dipali Mukhopadhyay