The dialectical constitution of mobility and immobility: recovering from the Attabad Landslide disaster, Gojal, Gilgit-Baltistan, Pakistan

^†This research was conducted under the auspices of Brock University, St. Catharines, ON, Canada.

Abstract

This paper contributes to the critical mobilities literature by analysing local mobilities in Gojal, northern Pakistan in the aftermath of the 2010 Attabad Landslide, in order to develop new insights regarding the dialectical relationship between mobility and immobility. The landslide destroyed a large section of the Karakoram Highway, the region's arterial roadway. Among its disastrous effects was prolonged disruption of the accustomed movements of 20,000 villagers stranded north of the slide. To show how mobility is constituted dialectically in relation to immobility in this context, we detail the social and economic demobilisations Gojalis faced when the highway became impassable, and outline new mobilities they developed to mitigate the disaster of protracted strandedness. Gojalis responded to demobilisation by remobilising, at different scales, along new routes, in different directions and via new mobility platforms, thereby re-establishing circulation as a paradigm of everyday life and demonstrating the paper's argument that disasters are social processes that have simultaneously demobilising and remobilising effects. We conclude that nurturing a multiplicity of mobile relations and practices in several directions and across scales during the disaster recovery process will help Gojalis avoid a similar mobility disaster in the future.

Keywords:

• road infrastructure
• disaster
• mobility
• immobility
• Pakistan

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to our Gojali research collaborators and research participants, especially Noor Pamiri, Zulfiqar Ali and Adil Shah.

Notes

^† This research was conducted under the auspices of Brock University, St. Catharines, ON, Canada.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council [grant number 410 2009 0579], and the Brock University Council for Research in the Social Sciences.