hen crafting the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, John Adams made a proclamation that should serve as guiding light for our understanding of democratic governance: democracy is “a government of laws and not of men.” Notwithstanding the fact that democracy in the United States of America at the time was indeed limited to (white, land owning) men, the dictum, understood for our purposes, should be a reminder that constitutional democratic governance is based on the idea that it is the rules that should determine the outcome of political processes and not the judgment of persons who are from time-to-time entrusted with power to govern under these rules.

In Pakistan’s case, unfortunately, there are two factors that have held back our democratic development and effective governance like none other – our inability to agree on rules that govern our polity; and seeing rules an impediment to the personal visions and ambitions of the powerful when a consensus on rules is achieved. There is no clearer manifestation of collective disregard to rules than that expressed in institutional overreach.

Over the past year, unending political crisis in Pakistan has resulted in a near economic meltdown and uncertainty regarding the electoral and political future of the country. The crisis has been caused in large measure by institutional overreach perpetrated by people who believe their judgment to be superior to rules under which they are supposed to conduct the affairs of the state. It is difficult to single out one institution or individual for this breach. Taking advantage of the crisis, the institutions through the entire spectrum and people working within each of those have attempted to expand their personal and institutional powers beyond those prescribed by rules and conventions.

The previous chief of army staff has insinuated in a recent interview that the establishment, or at least he himself, had decided that the continued existence of the PTI government would be detrimental to the security of the country. Not for the first time, the establishment acted on in its judgment.

Once the motion of no confidence against Imran Khan was initiated, the offices of the National Assembly speaker and the president tried to thwart the process laid down under the rules. It has been argued in the defence of the speaker and the president that they acted in the belief that the process against their government was an attempt to subvert the will and the mandate of the people. The problem is that our leaders consider their judgment to be the criterion for fairness rather than follow the rules. The manner in which the proceedings in the august house were carried out made a mockery of constitutionalism and legality.

Since then, after the dissolution of the provincial assemblies of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and the Punjab – the latter with much needless drama – the government is intent on postponing the elections to these assemblies for practical and legal reasons, depending on the audience.

The political volatility has been further exacerbated by the overreach and the continued bickering in the Judiciary. Partisan politics is predictably divisive. However, once the same can be said of the judges – of the highest court in the land, no less – there is little hope for sanity to prevail. On the one hand, we hear daily reports about how the system is coming unhinged, and on the other, about how one court or the other has pronounced a decision that can only be made sense of by reference to the manner in which the bench was constituted or by suggestions to political predilections of the judges involved. The role of the Election Commission of Pakistan has been a little less conspicuous but equally questionable.

As things stand, we are in an unholy mess, getting messier. There are reports and rumours that the government might try and rein in the top judiciary by curating it to their comfort. The honourable judges are calling out one another publicly, diminishing public trust in the neutrality of the institution. Civil and military bureaucrats are, wittingly or otherwise, dragged into the political circus. The caretaker governments, which are supposed to facilitate the conduct of fair elections, are issuing partisan statements that can make the federal government look more restrained.

Rules constitute the standards around which we measure whether certain behaviours or actions are legitimate or not. Once the sanctity of these standards is undermined, we might as well be living in anarchy – increasingly, it feels like we may already be.

The writer is an assistant professor of political science at the University of Peshawar. He can be reached at aameraza@uop.edu.pk