THE year of transitions in Pakistan is over. We have a new government, new chief justice, and new army leadership. The conventional wisdom is that things will be different.

The Sharif government has had time to settle into its groove and may now give firmer shape to its overall policy direction. So much of the judicial behavior was attributed to the personality and individual agenda of Iftikhar Chaudhry. And people say retired Gen Kayani’s procrastination left his successor no choice but to make quick changes.

So fresh faces, fresh approaches? I think not.

There’s no real reason to believe that you’ll see the civilian government transform into something different. Yes, they have taken time to settle in but their agenda and priorities have been fairly clear and unsurprising. A pro-business economic policy, focus on energy, efforts to revamp the national security structure without taking the military head on, outreach to India, a more removed position on Afghanistan, a desire to settle scores with Musharraf, and overly centralised decision-making were expected. The tone that has been set will continue, with constant tinkering on the edges.

A new judge? Yes, some changes are inevitable there. The media will have less to do at the Supreme Court premises, you probably wouldn’t hear as much controversy about the judiciary, some dissenting decisions may begin showing up, etc. But none of this will feel like a new judicial direction. One, for a major shift, you’d have to wait for a chief justice with at least 12-18 months of tenure. Justice Jillani doesn’t have that luxury.

More importantly though, there has been a tendency to see virtually everything happening with the higher judiciary as Iftikhar Chaudhry’s agenda. True, he did often pretend to be larger than the institution. But let’s not forget the very real institutional tussle that has underpinned the transformation Pakistan has gone through since Musharraf’s ouster. The judiciary has made real gains in this process, ones it is not about to give up.

The country has been in a period of institutional recalibration whereby the various power brokers — principally parliament (and the civilian government), the judiciary, and civil society led by the media — have been seeking to usurp as much of the space opened up by the army’s modest retreat as possible. This is natural for periods when long-standing power balances, in our case marked by a veto-wielding army, are shaken and new equilibriums begin to be defined.

Moving forward, any time a new judicial leadership seeks to go into passive mode, there will be those from within the fraternity who’ll stand up and say they are being forced into oblivion again. Indeed, as the other power brokers sense a softening judicial tone, they’ll also not feel shy of trying to put the institution back in the dock.

The efforts to increase parliamentary oversight over the judiciary versus the judiciary’s fight to stay ‘supreme’ are all part of this tussle. Corollary: the status-quoists within the legal fraternity will continue to have greater say than we think.

Finally, the army. Not too much seems to be known about Gen Raheel Sharif but those with access say the same things about him: good professional, mainstream in his views, and no political ambitions. If this is true, he’ll be like his predecessor in one crucial regard: he won’t seek to win back the political space the army has lost in recent years.

I’d throw in one caveat however. He may be thoroughly tested if Musharraf’s trial for treason seems poised to take the former general down. Gen Sharif will have a very hard choice to make: take a stand for his former boss and thus push the army into the political domain, stoking all sorts of debate about his overreach; or distance himself and let Musharraf fight it out on his own.

I doubt it will get to that though since the Saudis — who are not agnostic to this at all — are already working to find a way out.

Second, if he’s mainstream, the army’s long-term threat perception will keep moving in the direction it did under Kayani: terrorism is the most urgent and India the most important long-term threat. He’ll have to decide whether he unleashes his forces in North Waziristan; and how long he puts up with the talks façade; and what he does with the Afghan sanctuaries.

Again though, these are decisions that have been debated for sometime and on which there’s a fair amount of consensus within the top brass.

The military will likely give the talks a chance as it prepares for the inevitable. We are not talking of any one military operation. They’ll be multiple and repeated. But the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan’s total defeat will remain an elusive goal well beyond 2014. So again, more of the same!

The writer is a foreign policy expert based in Washington D.C.