ABSTRACT

This chapter focuses on a typology that situates Islamist militants in Pakistan in one of four categories: belligerence, collaboration, benign neglect, and coopetition. It begins by describing the two most common typologies currently employed to categorize militant groups in Pakistan, sectarian orientation and loci of activity. The chapter introduces the major Pakistani militant organizations and situates them in terms of where they operate. It discusses Pakistani threat perceptions, and presents a new typology that situates groups based on these perceptions in one of the four categories mentioned above. The first way to comprehend the dynamics of Islamist militancy in Pakistan is to categorize militant groups based on their Islamic school of thought. Alignments between the positions of a militant group and state toward one another are common, but not assured. Militants who shared the aim of establishing 'local spheres of Sharia' in Pakistan's western frontier formed the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP, also known as the Pakistani Taliban) in December 2007.