Political Silence: Strategic Omission and the Power of What Is Left Unsaid
In the cacophony of political slogans and televised debates, one might assume that Pakistan’s political sphere is saturated with speech. But often, what shapes political reality most profoundly is not what is said—but what is strategically left unsaid. Political silence is not absence; it is presence concealed. It is a rhetorical choice, as potent as any declaration, shaped by fear, calculation, and control.
In Pakistani political discourse, silence serves multiple functions. At times, it is a shield—used to avoid controversy or responsibility. At others, it is a sword—deployed to marginalize, erase, or delegitimize. Consider how major political actors remain conspicuously mute on enforced disappearances, minority persecution, or intra-institutional tensions. These are not linguistic oversights but deliberate acts of omission—discursive shadows that veil deeper truths.
Van Dijk’s socio-cognitive framework helps us understand this mechanism. Silences function through presupposed mental models—shared understandings so normalized they do not require articulation. For instance, when political actors avoid naming the military in discussions of national security policy, it is because the audience is expected to fill in the blanks. This “silent consensus” reinforces dominant power structures without confrontation.
There is also grammatical silence: the careful crafting of statements that omit agency or consequence. Phrases like “issues have been raised,” “concerns were noted,” or “events unfolded” appear innocuous but strategically remove causality and accountability. The absence of a subject is not accidental; it is protective.
Another form is selective commemoration—the silence of forgetting. Some political anniversaries are celebrated with pomp; others are ignored into oblivion. The exclusion of certain histories from national discourse is a political act that reshapes collective memory.
Silence also stratifies discourse by class and identity. Marginalized voices—particularly from Balochistan, Gilgit-Baltistan, religious minorities, and transgender communities—are often excluded not through rebuttal but through sheer neglect. Their political realities are unspoken in parliamentary language, unprinted in policy briefs, and untelevised in mainstream coverage. This omission constructs a discursive invisibility that reinforces material marginalization.
And yet, silence is not always oppression. It can also be resistance. In repressive environments, refusal to speak can challenge the legitimacy of imposed narratives. Silence, in the hands of the subjugated, can become a refusal to consent.
To restore political accountability in Pakistan, we must listen not only to the loudest voices but also to the silences that surround them. Journalism, academia, and civil society must learn to read the gaps, to ask: Who is not being named? What truths are hidden in the unsaid? Whose stories remain unspoken?
In a country where even syntax is a battleground, the politics of silence is not a passive absence—it is a meticulously curated presence. And it is only by breaking this silence, word by word, that Pakistan can begin to articulate a politics grounded in truth.
