FROM FRONTIER TO FORTRESS: CAUSES OF THE SECURITIZATION OF PUBLIC SPACE IN PESHAWAR (2015–2025)

Abstract

This paper outlines the structural, historical and institutional factors which led to a frontier city of public spaces in Peshawar being increasingly secured and closed for trade and commerce between 2015 and 2025, and from then on, the frontier city was increasingly transformed into a highly controlled urban space dominated by the logic of defence, surveillance and risk management. It rejects the notion that the city's security context is a product of terrorism alone and proposes a more complex interpretation of the security context as the culmination of geographical vulnerability, colonial history, long periods of regional insecurity, cross-border militancy, mass displacement, and a lack of a centralized government. This, in the broader context of the paper, is looking at the effects of insurgency and counter-insurgency operations, administration improvisation and institutional adaptation on urban form in conflict-affected societies, and how the strategic location of Peshawar at the Afghan border increased its vulnerability to violent extremism, pushing successive governments to focus more on security than urban functionality. The study shows that physical security measures, such as checkpoints, blast walls, fortified compounds, surveillance systems, limited mobility, and poorly coordinated zoning practices, are not individual countermeasures against particular threats, but are a visible expression of a broader structure of fragilities that exist in governance, planning and state capacity. They slowly changed patterns of mobility, economy, public interactions and perception of safety, thus changing the relationship of urban space and citizens. Finally, the paper considers a series of policy recommendations to tackle securettization's long-term spatial, social and psychological impacts through integrated urban planning, institutional coordination, community engagement and security-sector reforms that can revive Peshawar as an accessible, vibrant and welcoming gateway city, underpinned by sustainable public security provision.