Doctoral Dissertation Research: Local and global in a Pakistani market

University Of Texas At Austin, Austin TX

Investigators

Abstract

University of Texas at Austin doctoral student, Noman Baig, with the guidance of Dr. Kamran Asdar Ali, will investigate how increased global financial surveillance affects local and customary mercantile practices. The research will be carried out in Bolton Market, the largest wholesale bazaar in Karachi, Pakistan, where customary networks of informal money transfers were once the cornerstone of financial autonomy and independence. In the last decade, the Pakistani state has intensified its efforts to monitor and discipline such mercantile practices, and to replace them with the tools and techniques of modern finance. These efforts, and others like them, may have set off dynamics that will transform the nature of such popular trading spaces wherever they occur. To obtain empirical data from the merchant community, the researcher will employ a mixture of social science research methods including semi-structured interviews, oral histories, and participant-observation. The researcher will collect accounts of merchant adapting to and navigating this challenging terrain at the vortex of three interrelated dynamics: forces of globalization, rising religious extremism, and state surveillance. Framed in the post 9/11 era, the research speaks to contemporary issues of terrorist financing and national security as well as academic debates on Islam and modernity. Findings from this research will contribute to generating a greater awareness of the cultural logic of the marketplace and inform the design of culturally sensitive financial reforms. Supporting this research also supports the education of a graduate student.