For a country too often defined by headlines written elsewhere, Pakistan has just received something quietly transformative: a mirror of its own making. The State of Freedom Report Pakistan 2026 is the nation’s first comprehensive, homegrown assessment of freedoms, and it arrives not to rank or reprimand, but to establish a baseline. Published by Mishal Pakistan in collaboration with the Institute of Strategic Studies Islamabad, and authored by Amir Jahangir and Puruesh Chaudhary, the report does something genuinely fresh. It places the lived experiences of citizens, rather than distant institutional metrics, at the very centre of the freedom conversation.
This is a timely contribution. With a population surpassing 245 million and nearly 64 percent under the age of thirty, Pakistan’s demographic vibrancy makes freedom a tangible, everyday priority. The report’s survey data reveals a population that remains firmly committed to democratic governance and notably hopeful about the future. That hope, however, is grounded in clear expectations. Across the board, citizens link freedom to effective governance, accountability, access to justice, and above all, genuine economic opportunity.
One of the report’s most resonant insights is that for ordinary Pakistanis, the experience of freedom is deeply connected to economic well-being. Employment, entrepreneurship, financial security, and the ability to climb the ladder of mobility transform abstract rights into daily choices. While macroeconomic indicators suggest a path toward stabilization, citizens understandably measure freedom through the availability of dignified work, the ability to launch a small online venture with enabling digital infrastructure, and the prospect of building a secure future. Here, the report usefully grounds high-level policy discourse in the everyday realities of roti, rozgar, and respect. Pakistan’s expanding digital economy and its vibrant freelance workforce are already opening new corridors of economic empowerment, particularly for the young, quietly reshaping how a generation accesses global markets from cities and towns across the country.
This digital story leads to one of the report’s most thought-provoking dimensions: the rapid transformation of the information ecosystem. With over 145 million broadband subscribers and an estimated 70 million social media users, platforms have become the new public square. The TRUST survey finds that nearly a quarter of respondents now turn to Facebook as their primary source of information, with WhatsApp, online portals, and X each commanding significant audiences. Television, long the dominant medium, now shares space equally with individual digital platforms. This represents not just a shift but a generational expansion in how public conversation takes shape.
With over 145 million broadband subscribers and an estimated 70 million social media users, platforms have become the new public square.
It is against this backdrop that the report’s analysis of digital governance becomes so valuable. Pakistan’s engagement with major global platforms over 15,000 content and account-related requests submitted during the reporting period reflects a proactive effort to safeguard citizens from cybersecurity threats, hate speech, misinformation, and other online harms. Public transparency data indicates that roughly 46 percent of those requests resulted in content actions by the platforms. The report thoughtfully frames this as an evolving partnership between states, platforms, and citizens to ensure digital safety while upholding expression. As digital spaces continue to grow, the ongoing refinement of content governance and platform accountability frameworks will remain an important area of collaborative effort.
What elevates the report beyond a dry institutional audit is its steadfast focus on human perception. It assesses freedom not only through what the constitution promises, but through what people actually feel they can do: express an opinion confidently, pursue justice without delay, participate economically regardless of gender, and improve their quality of life in their own communities. This lived-experience approach brings a distinctly Pakistani texture to the findings. It recognises that trust in institutions is the quiet foundation upon which the exercise of rights rests, and that strengthening institutional responsiveness and transparency is essential to ensuring that legal freedoms translate into everyday confidence and dignity.
The lens of inclusion brings another crucial dimension into focus. The report acknowledges the legislative and policy strides made to promote equality and protect vulnerable groups, while also highlighting the significant opportunity for greater female participation in the economy. Women currently represent approximately 20 to 25 percent of the labour force, compared to 65 to 68 percent for men. Expanding women’s economic participation is framed not only as a social priority but as a powerful pathway to enhance overall national freedom and prosperity. Encouragingly, the majority of survey respondents already support expanded opportunities for women, youth, and marginalised communities, signalling a society ready to accelerate progress.
Pakistan’s media landscape, one of the region’s most diverse with over 120 licensed television channels and a rapidly growing digital sector, receives a forward-looking assessment. The sheer breadth of outlets represents a strength, and respondents rightly emphasise the growing importance of media and digital literacy to ensure that this diversity is matched by information integrity. This is a powerful reminder that freedom of expression in the digital age flourishes alongside the freedom to know, making investment in literacy and reliable information ecosystems a crucial policy priority for the years ahead.
Some may see the report as a reflective academic contribution, but its real power lies in offering a practical, forward-looking baseline. By deliberately avoiding a simplistic ranking, the authors have given the country something it has long needed: a tool for measuring whether governance reforms are truly being felt in the texture of daily life. The conclusion is neither complacent nor critical for its own sake. Pakistan possesses robust constitutional foundations, a hyper-connected and ambitious youth cohort, and dynamic reform potential. The journey ahead will be defined by the sustained strengthening of institutions, the deepening of public trust, and the steady expansion of opportunities that allow citizens to feel the benefits of progress in concrete ways.
The deepest value of this inaugural benchmark is its insistence that freedom is not a fixed trophy to be locked away. It is a living, breathing calibration between the citizen and the state, constantly enriched by each act of inclusion, each broadband connection, each new job created, each constructive step in digital governance, and each woman who enters and thrives in the workforce. For the first time, Pakistan has a framework to track whether that calibration is tilting steadily toward broader dignity and shared possibility. The opportunity now lies before policymakers, media, civil society, and citizens themselves to draw on this foundation and build a future where freedom is tangibly, visibly expanding for all.
The writer is MS Research Scholar at IIUI, a freelance content writer and a columnist.