State of disarray.

AS TV ratings and social media hits go, Pakistan's unending game of thrones is second to none. The pitched battles between the authorities and PTI supporters outside Imran Khan's residence in Lahore had millions glued to their screens. Prior to this Rana Sanaullah and Maryam Nawaz sent ratings sky-high by publicly attacking ex-spy chief Gen Faiz Hameed. More is likely to unfold.

The political soap opera has sharpened conflicting opinions amongst the commentariat. Some argue that Khan is a blight on our emaciated democratic process and should be met with state force for refusing to present himself for arrest and using his party workers as 'human shields'. Others argue that there must be solid principles which underlie any democracy, and sanctioning state coercion represents a caving into familiar logics of the establishment-centric system.

But very few are deliberating what bearing the obvious divisions within Pakistan's structure of power will have on the teeming millions trying to navigate inflation, lack of employment and the indignities of state and class power. Because this is ultimately what matters. Or has this basic imperative gotten lost amidst the noise?

Three interrelated theses about Pakistan's current political predicament merit our attention:

There's little focus on how the divisions will hit the people.

There has never been greater public disclosure about the grimy realities of the establishment-centric system. Khan is, in fact, a microcosm of all half-brained khaki manipulations of Pakistan's political process over the past 75 years; the establishment's inability to contain the blowback that his deposal has engendered leaves it not only exposed for the world to see but also constrains its ability to carry on with business as usual. Indeed, the otherwise open secret about Khan's close ties with individuals like Gen Hameed and the support he apparently enjoys within segments of the military rank-and-file suggest that the establishment is increasingly more fragmented within. Similar fragmentation appears to afflict institutions like the superior judiciary.

Whatever the internal contradictions of the system, potentialities for substantial change will only come to fruition if there is a popular and substantial politics of the masses from below. Anyone who is willing to see the writing on the wall must acknowledge that the PDM/PPP government is not the saviour of democracy that it claimed to be almost a year ago when it took over...