Pakistan Journal of Social Research ISSN 2710-3129 (P) 2710-3137 (O) Vol. 3, No. 4, December 2021, pp. 104-112 www.pjsr.com.pk PERSPECTIVES ON RACE, GENDER AND POWER DIFFERENTIALS IN LIVED EXPERIENCES OF FAILED SUICIDE BOMBERS IN PAKISTAN Munir Ahmad Zia Rao PhD Scholar, Institute of Social and Cultural Studies at University of the Punjab Lahore Pakistan raomunir@gmail.com Rubeena Zakar Institute of Social and Cultural Studies at University of the Punjab Lahore Pakistan rubeena499@googlemail.com ABSTRACT The study documents lived experiences of failed suicide bombers in Pakistan. It describes the influence and impact of social structures like gender, geography race and ethnicity with reference to their experiencing of suicide bombing. The study also characterizes the power relations in their interactional contexts entailing in unquestioning submission and support to militant organizations. Owing to ideological charged conditions and overwhelming existence of terrorist organisation certain regions and ethnicities in Pakistan exhibit unusual inclination to suicide terrorism. The article also argues the strategic necessity and ideological under pining of feminizing suicide terrorism in Pakistan by terrorist outfits. Feminizing of suicide terrorism in Pakistan is driven by out of strategic and political expediency. Women in Pakistan are enlisted mostly by means of physical and emotional coercion, exploitation of familial ties and patriarchal influences. The lived experiences of the male and female suicide bombers gathered from in-depth interviews and secondary data delineate the factors and process of ‘zombification’. Keywords: Female suicide bombers, Suicide bombing, gender, race and ethnicity, terrorism, power. INTRODUCTION Suicide bombing is carried out for achieving pre-designed objective both at individual and organizational level wherein the subject lays down his or her life. It is not a recent phenomenon rather a recurring strategy employed by different militant outfits throughout human history. Sheehan (2014) held that on account of its lethality and effectiveness the worrisome trend is on rise in the modern era. The paper characterizes the experiences of the failed suicide bombers, based upon their perspectives and perception of the phenomenon with reference to geography, gender race and ethnicity and power. The objective is to investigate the impact and influence of social structures and power differentials in the social and militant settings of the failed suicide bombers. The findings offer an insight into the radicalization and indoctrination grounded in power differentials in the socio and militant setup. The findings endorse those tribal social settings, regions and ethnicity have a dominant role and presence in terrorist organisations and leading role in this extreme radicalization. The analysis of the Pakistani suicide bombers profiles illustrates that Khyber Pukhtun Khwa Province with 16% of country population has contributed 58.6% of suicide bombers with Pushtoon ethnicity whereas the erstwhile Federally Administered Tribal Area with 03% of the total population has caused 28.6 % of total suicide blasts. The paper also reflects the negligible role of feminine gender in terror suicidality as out of 15 in-depth interviews of failed suicide bombers there was only one female perpetrator. This insignificant display of feminist violent talent can be traced to hypermasculinity, and patriarchal influences embedded in social settings of Pakistan wherein perpetration of violence is deemed as male prerogative. METHODOLOGY Qualitative studies examining the lived experience of failed suicide bombers (particularly in Pakistan) are hard to come by and the purpose of this study is to examine their experiences in militant milieu of Pakistan. For this study, Phenomenology was used as methodology describing the suicide terrorism 104