Questions written for Comparative Politics readings

The State of the Discipline: Questions

1) A diverse methodology of comparative political analysis has increasingly developed since the time of Arend Lijphart’s text on the comparative method. What are the merits of the comparative method’s use of area studies, case studies, cross-case analysis to test theories? Are there any advantages to studying a small number of similar cases rather than a large number of data sets as quantitative research employs?

2) By and large, cross-method dialogues between political science subfields is not the norm, especially in terms of American politics. Pierson argues that the subfield of American politics has marginalized nonquantitative approaches and addresses increasingly narrow questions. Bennett’s overview of the subfields highlights the importance of using different methodologies for individual subfields and cross-method dialogues because in doing so new methodological techniques can be found outside one’s own subfield, shedding new light on methodological approaches to research topics and fields. How has IR and Comparative Politics’ incorporation of different methodologies along with cross-method dialogue improved and broadened its own research?

3) Levy makes the claim that contrary to popular belief, qualitative research is not more skeptical of universal generalizations or more sensitive to context because researcher’s aim of explanation, rather than description, necessitates simplified models leading to scientific generalization and falsification. However, Mahoney’s analysis of the advantages of qualitative research emphasizes the ability for qualitative analysis to develop “highly contextualized comparisons.” The method is by design suited to reject universalist assumptions due to the limited number of cases, its incorporation of deviant cases, its sensitivity to context and the level of conceptual development needed for theorizing about a small number of cases. Based on the readings, is the qualitative methodology better able to allow for complexity and context or is it in the end, still generalizing and homogenizing?


Questions: Presidentialism vs. Parliamentarism

1) Lijphart emphasizes the importance of consensus democracy as opposed to majoritarian democracy, especially with regard to societies with heterogeneous political culture and sharp cultural, ethnic, and religious cleavages. His work argues that presidential forms of government have strong inclinations toward majoritarian democracy (through a concentration of political power in the executive at the same time a deadlock exists between executive and legislative power) and thus have less of chance of supporting heterogeneous societies, like those found in Latin American countries. Considering that Mainwaring’s analysis of 31 stable democracies since 1967 includes 24 parliamentary democracies, is presidentialism infact inferior to parlimentarism as Lijphart claims? Are there any special conditions necessary for the functioning of a parliamentary system, institutional or environmental?

2) The nature of party systems determines in large part the success of the system of government, be it a presidential or parliamentary system. Mainwaring’s study finds multiparty presidential systems to be the least stable form of government due to heightened executive and legislative deadlock, little interparty coalition building, and the lack of legislative majorities needed to implement policy. Sartori makes a case against the two extremes, pure presidentialism and pure parliamentarism, opting instead for semipresidential and semiparliamental alternatives. Sartori goes on to argue that a pure parliamentary democracy cannot survive unless it is served by a stable party system (cohesive and disciplined parties). How important is the nature of the party system to each system of government?

3) Lijphart points out the distinction between government stability as mere duration (party dominance) and government efficiency (whether governments govern). Stable democracy is needed rather than stable government. Is this condition better met through Rigg’s view of democratic stability by way of representativeness and legitimacy rather than Mainwaring’s conception of stability as the length of party dominance (25 years or more of uninterrupted democracy)? Is Rigg’s assertion that parliamentarist regimes are more democratically representative to its citizens convincing? Can stability and representativeness be attained through presidential systems? What is the case for the United States?


Judicialization

Is rights activism and “the judicialization of politics” consolidating
democracy? In that the judiciary is coming to hold too much political
authority as opposed to the executive and legislative branches which are
the more traditional means of representation and legitimacy. Or is the
judiciary simply the few routes left for legal recourse for civil rights
and protections? As the Sieder texts pointed out, the judicialization of
politics has increasingly come to be recognized as a feature of modern
political development and democratic rule.

It has been shown that judicial decision-making leads to direct or
indirect public policy making. If this is true, is it no surprise that
legal mobilization has grown along with the scope of the judiciary? Does
the judiciary always have an overtly political nature, or has the
increasing power of the judiciary only resulted in its politicization?
It could be argued that the judiciary answers even more political
questions than traditional policy makers.

Has the growing importance of judicial decision making changed the
appointment process in any of the countries covered by the chapters?

Is the “bottom up” approach to a rights revolution problematic, as in
the case of the U.S.? Can the rights revolution be explained primarily
by a sustained support structure from rights advocates, foundations, and
the general political economy of litigation? The multiple factors and
long-term interaction between the constitutional framework, judicial
leadership, rights consciousness movement, along with legal mobilization
through support structures could serve as a complex, protracted
democratic force/process that varies from country to country.
Essentially, why has the U.S. had to home-grow so many of its rights and
protections? Could we find some explanation for the rights revolution in
terms of the beginning of “judicialization” for business interests
starting around 1870, like Epp suggests? Litigation campaigns by
business led to new judicial interpretations of law and changes in legal
mobilization strategies. Maybe the democratization of access and the
ensuing rights revolution was, in part, a consequence of/reaction to the
wave of judicial protections of private property.

And just to be annoying, what are rights? Are they essentially
"interests," "entitlements," a "claim" on society; something that can
not be violated? Where do they come from? Civilization/ the individual?
Should the emphasis for rights be placed on the individual or the
collective and how are they interrelated? Do our rights interact with
others; do they conflict? What are collective/social rights?
Discriminated groups have looked to the state for recourse despite the
fact the state has been one of the primary causes of disenfranchisement
(broadly defined). Although formal rights set strong messages, produce
direct changes, are they effective? Any tension between private property
rights and individual/collective rights?


Questions: Citizen Politics

Dalton’s data suggests that even as formal, conventional means of political participation (voter turnout, partisan campaigns for office) have decreased in recent decades in the advanced industrial democracies, informal political participation has increased (political sophistication has increased along with referendums, citizen initiated campaign and community activities). “The self-mobilized individual favors referendums over elections and communal activity over campaign work.” Although direct action and grassroots activity has increased, it is the waning institutionalized forms of political participation that is equally or especially more important. If it is true that informal citizen participation is on the rise, why has it not changed the nature of electoral participation? If wide-spread power is in the hands of elites and political systems and institutions, how effective can self-mobilized political activity be without also instigating change at the institutional level? Should political leaders and institutions continue to drive and mobilize political participation, since this is where broader political decisions are made?

When discussing Ingelhart’s materialist/postmaterialist value model, one has to wonder why he constructed such an oppositional model of value priorities. It’s as if people prior to the 1960s had no ideals and concepts of what is important in life aside from simply material security and war. And Putnam’s study actually shows that older generations have more social capital and continue to be apart of more social organizations, suggesting that “postmaterialist” values did not just recently emerge, but might have become more institutionalized since the 1960s. Furthermore, it is doubtful that every culture’s value change model is the same: materialist concerns plus affluence leads to postmaterialist concerns. Low levels of “postmaterialist” values in poor countries might have to do with the fact that not all cultures have the same conceptual systems and value priorities as Western countries would like to think. Ingelhart’s model neglects religiosity (Layman and Carmines), and the HUGE role religion plays in the Third world, along with increases in global and local environmentalism and concern (Brechin 1999). Is the materialist/postmaterialist model used to explain the changing value priorities of the public in the text convincing? (I know I kinda biased the question a little….).



Diamond’s lecture concerns the global phenomenon of democracy that has expanded dramatically in the world since 1974. He asks if any country can become a democracy and substantiates the question with a thorough overview of the growth in electoral democracies worldwide—what is called the third wave of democratization. By 1987, democratization had spread to all of Western Europe, much of Asia, and most of Latin American and after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, most of Eastern Europe and Africa began to democratize, leaving only the Middle East out of the loop. Using quantitative analysis of the newly democratized states, Diamond’s tables present extensive findings on the characteristics of third wave states that serve to qualify his primary determination in the text: “the overwhelming bulk of states that have become democratic during the third wave have remained so, even in countries lacking virtually all of the supposed ‘conditions’ for democracy” (Diamond 2003; 3). His data repeatedly amasses findings that demonstrate the predominance of democracy in the world, nearly three-fifths of the world’s states are democracies, and overall only 14 of the 125 democracies existing since the third wave have regressed back to authoritarianism (although many of the listed states only democratized since 1990) (Diamond 2003; 6). Using annual freedom ratings and the always-empirically-popular public opinion survey, Diamond further supports his argument for democratization and democracy as a widely accepted universal value. Diamond uses findings to mandate the prospects for democracy in the Mid East, yet without considering the higher level of secularization in many of the non-Arab states with Muslim majorities that he cites. Overall, Diamond’s evidence overwhelmingly supports his theory, however, his statistics neglects to consider harder to quantify realities that the other texts explore: the longevity involved in true democratization for the new democracies, the foundational conditions for democratic culture in each state, the quality and levels of accountability in each new democracy, and the level of international democratic assistance received by what are mostly dependent democratizating states.

Eckstein’s essay uses a historical-comparative perspective to compare the first wave of democratization occurring in the late nineteenth century with the third wave of democratization of the late twentieth century. A key difference between the waves is the direction of political inclusion: the first wave of Anglo-American countries developed mature institutions of representative government before large scale political inclusion, or the extension of citizen-rights to all citizens. Arguing that the loss of traditional legitimacy of the old order occurred during socio-economic changes that coincided with the corruption and decay of an established order, a parallel can be made between this and the forces currently underlying the third wave of democratization. Eckstein’s basic argument for both waves essentially maintains that effective democratization requires far more than a process of formal inclusion and constitutional/institutional design; it requires the proper managing of democratic transition, which can take an indefinite amount of time and essentially hinges on the foundations for a democratic culture and the perception of regime-crisis (Eckstein 1996; 1). By transition-management, the author means a regime-crisis of the established authoritarian order must be present with the societal perception of its bankruptcy (Eckstein 1996; 8). Mutual reconciliation between the old, bankrupt order and the new one is needed if democratic transitions are to survive. He renders the debate between economic liberalization and democracy tenuous, as something that should develop gradually and adaptively over time. Another criterion above and beyond the formal-legalism perspective of democratization involves the gradual, incremental, and syncretic change needed for effective democratization: social transformation can only be accomplished successfully if the transition is gradual, sequential, and grafted to what already exists in society, without destroying and excluding old or marginalized parties (Eckstein 1996; 12).

Rakner’s brief on international democratic assistance summarizes the main challenges and recommendations for democratic assistance and processes in the developing world. She advocates self-generating democracy from within with the assistance of international donors, recommending that donors support political parties and the political nature of assistance; fashion the right institutions and reforms to the context and realities of recipient countries; counter executive dominance by strengthening instrastate accountability and continued progress and long-term commitment beyond the founding elections; reaching out and working with civil society across all levels (central, regional, local); and the need for donor alignment with a country’s priorities and needs to strengthen the effectiveness of the aid. Like Eckstein, Rakner further argues that the outcome of democracy promotion is difficult to assess due to the long-term nature of the effects, the multiple and varying internal and external influences, the interlinked democratic processes with social, economic, political and historical conditions, and the limited picture of reality that quantitative indictors provide (Rakner 2007).

Mainwaring’s introductory chapter conducts a compare and contrast literature review of works regarding democratic accountability in Latin America and competing conceptions of accountability. Accountability, one of the key problems and barriers to democratic legitimacy in most of the region, is defined by Mainwaring as the legalized authority of an actor to request answerability by way of imposing sanctions on public officials. Two kinds of accountability are then defined: electoral (vertical) accountability between elected public officials and voters and intrastate (horizontal) accountability between state agencies and public officials and bureaucracies (Mainwaring 2003; 8). It is also an important concept in explaining the difference between third wave democracies and advanced industrial “polyarchies” (Mainwaring 2003; 6). He renders the debate between electoral and intrastate accountability to be mutually interactive and reinforcing rather than either/or. Lastly, Mainwaring discusses the state of intrastate accountability in Latin America and ways to repair the deficiencies in the mechanisms of oversight and corruption.

Suhrke’s article gives a context to the third wave of democratization with the example of Afghanistan. As a dependent, fledgling democracy Suhrke shows the missteps taken by the U.S., international donors, and international organizations that led to foreign dependence, political exclusion and an institutional design that lacked sovereignty and legitimacy (Suhrke 2007; 2). Critical decisions were openly made by the U.S. to back Karzai as interim president of the transitional government and the loya jirga confirmed the decision, a presidential rather than parliamentary system was chosen with considerable U.S. influence along with a Single Non-Transferable Vote (SNTV) election system that allowed for individual candidates to be chosen in multi-member districts (some of which were war criminals or associated with armed groups) and barred the established 60 registered political parties from representing constituents in parliament (Suhrke 2007). Furthermore, the legitimacy of the newly established democracy was further undermined due to the government’s dependence on foreign economic and military assistance which limited the parliament’s ability to make independent decisions (Suhrke 2007; 14).

Suhrke’s study gives a clear context to the difficulties inherent in democratic transitioning and nation-building. Rakner’s recommendations for effective democratic assistance demonstrate some of the limitations and faults committed by the international support and highlights where and how improvements could be made. It also speaks to the inflated prospects for democracy demonstrated in Diamond article, in that it insufficiently explains the discretion needed and contextual attention involved in democratization. The U.S.’s influence over Afghanistan’s democratization process effectively denied a voice to the old order and ethnic minorities in the political arena, at the interim stage, during the formulating of the constitution, and at the electoral level. “How to democratize at a proper pace, on a proper scale and in a sensible sequence” (Eckstein 1996; 17) seems to be one of the key questions aside from the most effective constitutional and electoral design for a given country.


Works Cited

Diamond, Larry. 2003. “Democracy” UC Irvine Center for Democracy. 1-26.

Eckstein, Harry. 1996. “Lessons for the “Third Wave” from the First: An Essay on Democratization.” UC Irvine Center for Democracy. 1-28.

Mainwaring, Scott. 2003. “Introduction: Democratic Accountability in Latin America.” Democratic Accountability in Latin America. Oxford University Press. 3-33

Rakner, Lise. 2007. “International Democracy Assistance: Key Lessons.” CMI Brief.

Suhrke, Astri. 2007. “Democratization of a Dependent State: The Case of Afghanistan.” CMI Working Paper. 1-15.


my polemic making sense with democratization literature

Iraq war: Competing explanations

Several competing explanations have been offered by the Bush administration in the decision to invade Iraq and thereafter. I will explain and assess several of these explanations and contending arguments to weigh the relevancy and accuracy of each explanation. Three primary explanations include the threat posed to the U.S. by Saddam Hussein’s alleged programs of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and connections to Al Qaeda, regime change and the liberation of the Iraq people, along with the “democratic peace” justification of spreading democracy throughout the Middle East initially through the example of Iraq. I will also theorize about U.S. motivations for oil in the Middle East, the neoconservative movement’s influence in the Bush administration, and discuss the Bush administration’s massive privatization agenda and its effects on postwar reconstruction.

In addition, I will explain how the choice over the particular institutions of government plays a major role in the stability and survival of democracy. Institutional choice must be carefully attuned to the history and current context of any state with the potential to democratize. Using the example of Afghanistan, I argue that the U.S.’s choice of institutional design for the country was fundamentally flawed, leading observers to question whether or not democracy was the primary motive of U.S. foreign policy, and thus contributing to suspicions over the motives for democracy in Iraq.

I will further argue that America’s failure to rebuild Iraq and restore order stems from a fundamental crisis within the administration’s policy that has excluded primary government actors such as Congress, key government agencies, and the world community at large that might have assisted the U.S. in rebuilding Iraq successfully. All these factors suggest that the Bush administration’s construction of an “alternate reality” of the war both for itself and the public at large has produced a reality on the ground in Iraq that is hardly intelligible, much less navigable.

Weapons of Mass Destruction and ties to Al Qaeda

The first official justification for the decision to invade Iraq used by the Bush administration was the weapons of mass destruction argument. This phrase used by the administration to represent the possibility of nuclear proliferation abroad generated support for the war among the American public and the world community. Regardless of the United Nations repeated weapons inspections in Iraq in the 1990s and during the lead up to the war (in spite of persistent Iraqi obstruction), the WMD argument was the primary justification used for the war in Iraq. Like the U.N. inspectors search for WMDs between November 2002 until March 2003, U.S. officials and inspectors (the Iraq Survey Group) similarly confronted the absence of any weapons after the war. Former weapons inspector Scott Ritter of the United Nationals Special Commission on Iraq (UNSCOM) stated in a 2002 interview with Time Magazine that as of 1998, “90 to 95 percent of Iraq’s nuclear, biological and chemical capabilities had been destroyed”.

Even the Iraq Survey Group, a multinational fact-finding mission set up to specifically find WMDs produced no such evidence. Yet the United States and other countries apart of the “Coalition of the Willing” asserted that Saddam Hussein possessed stockpiles of WMD that justified military action until the facts pointed to the contrary.

The failure to find any WMDs in postwar Iraq begs the question as to why the administration decided to use the mere scenario as justification for war. Essentially, a self-defense scenario (based on a preemptive strategy) seemed to be pursued by top administration officials by constructing a possible preemptive strike by Iraq on the U.S. Without any positive evidence of such a scenario, the administration convinced millions of the possibility of weapons of mass destruction not by proving it but by simply asserting the possibility. Perhaps the administration’s own paranoia and Packer’s observation of the administrations’ “long-term view of history” could account for how the administration was able to convince itself at the same time. In an interview with Vanity Fair magazine in 2003, Paul Wolfowitz offered three fundamental concerns apart of the administration’s decision to remove Saddam from power: weapons of mass destruction, support for terrorism, and the criminal treatment of the Iraqi people. After the truth about the WMDs was revealed, British Prime Minister Tony Blair continued to support the war despite being wrong about weapons of mass destruction based on previous convictions that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction. The circular logic of the official view should illuminate the fact that WMDs was not the primary true explanation for the Iraq war but rather the primary false explanation.

The second connected explanation in the lead up to the war includes the professed link between Iraq, Saddam Hussein, and Al Qaeda. Although no direct assertion between Hussein and Al Qaeda was made by administration officials, evidence was used linking Iraq to Al Qaeda. Some of the allegations included secretary of State Powell citing intelligence information connecting Ansar al-Islam to Saddam’s regime, senior officials citing intelligence that Iraq provided advice and training to Al Qaeda regarding chemical weapons, and Vice President Cheney’s multiple media interviews suggesting but not providing a direct link. These potential links were met with skepticism from many due to the ideological differences between Saddam Hussein’s secular regime and the Islamic fundamentalism apart of Al Qaeda’s ideology and goals. Nevertheless, the connection of Saddam Hussein to Al Qaeda, even the mere mention of Al Qaeda, was presumably a strong argument that drove the nation to war.

To make sense of the disinformation and contending interpretations of WMDs explanation, another perspective is needed. Media framing may be the best alternative explanation as to why and how the weapons of mass destruction explanation prevailed despite its controversy, even though it was directly misled by the administration. Although the WMD explanation can be characterized as propaganda created by the administration to embolden support for the war among the public essentially by capitalizing on post 9/11 fears, the media’s hand in perpetuating the contentious information is equally as puzzling. However, why the media did not weigh contending evidence against the existence of WMDs is beyond the scope of this study. Simply put, the administration and U.S. government along with the media failed to effectively assess the justifications for the invasion of Iraq. And as history has shown, if the press simply states something enough times, such unreality has a habit of becoming truth.

It is now known that the Bush administration’s rationale for war was false, that contrary to the projections given by the administration, no weapons of mass destruction were found in Iraq. The decision to go to war was an elective decision that could have occurred at any time. What is clear now is that the blatant untruths and lies from the administration in the lead up to the war has diminished confidence in the justifications for and handling of the war the world over, however debatable the intelligence was regarding WMDs.

Regime change and the liberation of Iraq

Regime change constitutes the second explanation in the justifications for the Iraq war. Packer’s explanation includes Wolfowitz’s desire to atone unfinished business in Iraq from the first Gulf War along with neoconservative’s desire to protect Israel. Plans for military intervention in Iraq were outlined in documents written by Wolfowitz long before 9/11 explaining the need for resource access to Persian Gulf oil along with preventing nuclear weapons proliferation and other terrorist acts. These ideas were adopted as concepts apart of the U.S. National Security Strategy, and were heavily influenced by the conservative think tank Project for the New American Century (PNAC) that set goals and created plans for a “a more permanent role in the Gulf regional security.” However, the regime change argument from the administration and other neocons always entailed appeals to the besieged Iraqi people. Their well-being was always portrayed as a fundamental reason for regime change in Iraq, despite evidence that many administration officials were largely complicit overtime with Hussein’s treatment of his people.

The essential arguments for the overthrow of Saddam Hussein’s Baathist regime included both the human rights violations of the regime and the threat the regime posed to the world. Liberation from an oppressive regime for the Iraqi people was perhaps the closest the administration came toward advocating humanitarian, ethical arguments for war. However, if the administration was really so concerned about the Iraqi citizens, why did members of the administration support Hussein in so many instances in the past? Arguments about Hussein using chemical weapons on Iraqi citizens in 1988 crept into the debate, despite the fact that members of the Republican Party supported Hussein’s regime during this time. It is hard to imagine this could act as the primary or best reason the administration had to go to war. However, declarations about the evil nature of certain dictators can prove to be a strong and effective tool to wield public opinion in support of war; so strong that this explanation, although largely false and based on weak reasoning, can account as one of the primary explanations given to the public in the decision to invade Iraq.

Prospects for democracy in the Middle East

Arguments for installing a democratic government in Iraq that would foster democracy in the Middle East constitute the third justification for the Iraq war. The idea hinged on the administration’s proposal that installing a new regime in Iraq would foster the spread of democracy in the Middle East. Yet the ensuing realities of botched post-war plans reveals that this explanation too may have been used less than truthful in order to gain support for the war.

Looking to the past, considerable evidence suggests that the war in Iraq was imagined within the various neoconservative think tanks such as the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) and the Project for a New American Century (PNAC) with members including Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle, Elliott Abrams, James Woolsey and William Bennett. These think tanks used strong arguments based in political philosophy while fusing together a realist perspective with liberal American interventionism and human rights arguments for regime change. Paul Wolfowitz in particular “saw national interest and the spread of human rights as inextricable” creating for the neoconservatives a moral rationale of spreading democracy amid more concrete national interest rationales.

However, significant divisions within the Bush administration existed over the “democratic domino theory” and the State Department repeatedly addressed doubts and disbelief with the democratic theory rational. One passage of a State Department report on the subject warned, “Electoral democracy, were it to emerge, could well be subject to exploitation by anti-American elements.” The document pointed out that Middle East societies are characterized by political, economic, and social problems that undermine the stability of either externally influenced or internally influenced democracy.

Regardless of the improbability for a sustainable Iraqi democracy, the Bush administration’s third explanation in the decision to invade Iraq represents a broad, long-term goal and explanation for the invasion. Perhaps more plausible than the contentious WMD rationale, promoting democracy abroad has become a focus of American policy for decades to come, and a primary argument in President Bush’s speeches. With sweeping assumptions and value-loaded language, Bush explained the need for democratization in the Mid East in a speech to the National Endowment for Democracy in 2003, “The establishment of a free Iraq at the heart of the Middle East will be a watershed event in the global democratic revolution. Sixty years of Western nations excusing and accommodating the lack of freedom in the Middle East did nothing to make us safe—because in the long run, stability cannot be purchased at the expense of liberty. As long as the Middle East remains a place where freedom does not flourish, it will remain a place of stagnation, resentment, and violence ready for export.”

Bush’s arguments for a liberal international order and the triumph of democracy and modernization are a staple for most politicians in the Western world, one that continues what our political philosophers argued for, the battle over worldviews and the triumph of liberal democracy. Yet liberal democracy is premised on a view of progress and universal view of humanity that homogenizes our own morality and worldview onto all other cultures, at the same time sovereignty is (contradictorily) professed as if it were the gospel. These arguments assume that democracy is possible, yet my contention is that most elites know full well the impossibilities of establishing true democratic regimes in the Middle East, and instead use the arguments as powerful moral rallying points for a new world order.

Interestingly, a case can be made against the democratic theory using an institutional perspective of Afghanistan’s imposed democratic regime in 2001. In empirical research by Astri Suhrke, Afghanistan’s recent history of democracy assistance is analyzed in the context of the “third wave of democratization.” As a dependent, fledgling democracy Suhrke showed the missteps taken by the U.S., international donors, and international organizations that led to foreign dependence, political exclusion and an institutional design that lacked sovereignty and legitimacy. Critical decisions were openly made by the U.S. to back Karzai as interim president of the transitional government and the loya jirga confirmed the decision, a presidential rather than parliamentary system was chosen with considerable U.S. influence along with a Single Non-Transferable Vote (SNTV) election system that allowed for individual candidates to be chosen in multi-member districts (some of which were war criminals or associated with armed groups) and barred the established 60 registered political parties from representing constituents in parliament. The Single Non-Transferable Vote, which featured lengthy, confusing lists of individual candidates, may be one of the key reasons voter turnout in Afghanistan has declined dramatically since the first elections held under the new regime. Furthermore, the legitimacy of the newly established democracy was further undermined due to the government’s dependence on foreign economic and military assistance which limited the parliament’s ability to make independent decisions. Not surprisingly, similar results have transpired in Iraq.

Suhrke’s study gives a clear context to the difficulties inherent in democratic transitioning and nation-building. Recommendations for effective democratic assistance demonstrate some of the limitations and faults committed by the international support and highlights where and how improvements could be made. The article also speaks to the inflated prospects for democracy largely believed by Western societies, in that it insufficiently explains the discretion needed and contextual attention involved in democratization. The U.S.’s influence over Afghanistan’s democratization process effectively denied a voice to the old order and ethnic minorities in the political arena, at the interim stage, during the formulating of the constitution, and at the electoral level. One of the key questions aside from the most effective constitutional and electoral design for a given country seems to be how to democratize at a proper pace, on a proper scale and in a sensible sequence. Afghanistan may constitute a country confined by a “democratic domino theory” through both the imposition of a presidential system of government and a peculiar, unpopular electoral system that did not suit the history or demographic background of Afghanistan.

The privatization of war

Recent journalism of the Iraq war and the broader war on terror has pointed to the growth in the privatization of the military. This competing alternative explanation may most accurately represent the underlying goals of the administration’s decision to go to war, both because the Bush administration came to power with and implemented a radical privatization agenda and because these goals are specifically outlined in the neoconservative think tanks that came to embody the Bush administration’s policies.

Journalist Jeremy Scahill has argued that the occupation of Iraq and the war on terror has brought the greatest privatization of warfare in modern history. It is estimated that private military forces comprise over 100,000 of the troops deployed in Iraq, in addition to the 160,000 U.S. troops serving in the war. The administration has outsourced nearly half of its military forces through the use of private war companies with almost no congressional oversight or public knowledge. Without these private contractors, it is not known whether or not the continued war in Iraq could even be possible. These private military forces work for Blackwater USA and the former Halliburton subsidiary KBR along with many other firms and are paid salaries well beyond the amount U.S. forces receive. In fact, House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Rep. Henry Waxman estimates that nearly $4 billion in taxpayer money in Iraq has been spent on these private security military forces. Not surprisingly, companies like Halliburton’s have seen its stock prices rose quadruple between the invasion and 2006.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld delivered a speech to the Pentagon one day before the September 11th terrorist attacks calling for a widespread overhaul and privatization of the Pentagon bureaucracy. This new private sector model of the Pentagon promoted an entrepreneurial approach to encourage Pentagon employees to behave “less like bureaucrats and more like venture capitalists” as he put it. This speech came to foreshadow the transformation in the nature of warfare and the widespread use of private contractors in the military and even in combat. Private contractors were a major part of the Pentagon restructuring and the Iraq war and arguably have significantly contributed to dooming postwar reconstruction plans.

The government’s funding of giant military contractors on the American taxpayer’s behalf has been called “the crime of the century” by U.S. House of Representatives candidate Alan Grayson. Meet the new military-industrial complex: the privatization of war. What this means is that war is increasingly profitable for many unaccountable private companies who are funded essentially on the shoulders of the American taxpayers presently and for years to come. The problem with privatization is that it undermines the power of government. By outsourcing government functions, only the spheres of public life that are privatized are those which can turn a profit. Thus, privatization of government also diminishes those spheres of public life controlled by government that are not as productive but equally as vital to society. In addition it undermines and subverts the accountability function of government to its people.

In addition to the dilemmas of privatizing the U.S. military has been what journalist Naomi Klein has called the “anti-Marshall Plan” launched in Iraq at the outset of the war’s reconstruction. Whereas foreign firms were banned from investing in post-World War II reconstruction plans, corporate America and multinationals were granted the majority of Iraq’s reconstruction funds by the U.S. government, not the Iraq citizens or its businesses. In fact, Iraqis had virtually no role in postwar reconstruction plans, instead U.S. contractors hired foreign workers to do the work. This decision may have greatly contributed to the problems and instability that have characterized postwar Iraq for the last five years.

Even more significant than the contending explanations for the war may well be The New York Times Article published two weeks before the 2004 election by journalist Ron Suskind who was told in a conversation with a senior presidential adviser in the summer of 2002 that “there was no longer any need for the ‘reality-based community” epitomized by journalists and vowed that the administration would create its ‘own reality’.” This admittance (or more accurately, threat) explains much of what happened thereafter, including the WMD scenario, the Iraqi links to Al Qaeda package, to the Bush’s famed “Mission Accomplished” speech. Clearly the administration was and continues to be convinced of its own unaccountable, undemocratic decisions and goals; it may indeed be true that within their “reality-based community” that evades the fundamental principles of the U.S. and its constitution, the administration continues to be correct in its judgments and justifications, at least while in office.

Failures of the administration’s postwar policy in Iraq

The primary reason U.S. attempts to rebuild an Iraqi state have failed is because the administration has resolutely excluded Congress and key government agencies in the postwar process, instead allowing the U.S. military to carry out postwar operations. By excluding and ruling out any cooperation and negotiation with other crucial players in Washington, government agencies, as well as the international community, multilateral efforts to stabilize and rebuild Iraq have failed to actualize. The dominance of the Bush administration over Iraq war decisions and its strict reliance on the Defense Department in postwar operations is a key determinate to the current situation in Iraq today. Clearly, the failures of the Iraqi occupation ultimately stem from a fundamental crisis in the administration’s postwar policies that must be identified and rectified.
In what ways did the beginning of the Iraqi occupation lead to the anarchy and brutality that characterize Iraq now? Aside from the excessive bombing in “Phase III” of the operations, a postwar operation, or what the military terms “Phase IV,” was the least prioritized of the operations. After Bush signed the National Security Presidential Directive No. 24 that effectively handed over postwar control in Iraq to the Department of Defense, Jay Garner, a man who knew little about the region, was appointed to oversee postwar operations for the Office of Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance (ORHA). It should be noted that a military is traditionally not meant to or capable of governing. These plans were not anywhere near sufficient and Garner’s progress stagnated until May 6 when President Bush announced former diplomat and counterterrorism expert Paul Bremer was to replace him and the ORHA was dissolved into the Coalition Provisional Authority. Bremer’s leadership would ultimately scrap plans for initial democracy in Iraq: an initial constituent assembly was cancelled, he appointed rather than elected the drafters of the constitution, cancelled dozens of local and provincial elections, and eventually cancelled the first national election. To make matters worse, the Iraqi army, comprised of hundreds of thousands of soldiers was disbanded, tens of thousands of former Baathists civil servants were fired, and the formation of an interim government was abandoned. With the succession of these disastrous (avoidable) decisions made by postwar officials, it is hard not to assume that key actors in the Bush administration wanted Iraq to descend into a hugely unstable war zone. As we will see, this is generally what has happened to Iraq. Yet the administration continues to persuade the public that one last “surge” could solve the problems faced in Iraq.

What does the situation in Iraq currently look like? The insurgency in Iraq is characterized by a complex pattern of ethnic and sectarian conflict between Sunni groups, Shiite militias, and foreign jihadists. It has become a broad and violent struggle for ethnic and sectarian control of political and economic space. Many of the communities have segregated between Sunni and Shiite groups. Iraqi political groups too are dividing further due to the instability and violence. Fragmentation seems to be the defining feature of post-war Iraq rather than the “reconciliation” the multiethnic democracy was supposed to foster in a liberated Iraq. Nearly 1.3 million Iraqis have been displaced since the beginning of the war in 2003, fleeing to border states around the region. The groups remaining in Iraq have largely consolidated, finding it safer to move into areas already inhabited by their sects. These population movements have substantially weakened the authority of the central government, what was supposed to achieve and maintain lasting stability and peace for a unified, reconstructed Iraq.

What has contributed to dooming the Iraq enterprise is the combination of insufficient planning, inadequate resources and poor execution. It will never be known for sure if turning Iraq into a functioning democracy was beyond the capacity of the U.S. or if it was in fact a possibility never realized due to the initial handling of the war that thwarted any prospect for democracy. Nearly five years of war primarily waged through military operations should by now suggest to the U.S. and the rest of the world that the current military solution in Iraq will not work. As Packer pointed out, “the key military tool in counterinsurgency is intelligence,” exactly what the U.S. military lacked all along. And because of the planning failures and the slow recovery (if it can be called a recovery) the U.S. lacked sufficient intelligence to combat the countless counterinsurgencies that plague war-torn Iraq to this day. Continuing the war in Iraq will only add to the suffering of the people. According to Iraqi Body Count, a U.K. based independent group, anywhere from 82,991-90,534 Iraqis have been killed since 2003. Larger estimates above 100,000 have also been cited but due to the handling of the war, such figures are highly debatable essentially because no official count is currently possible to conduct in war-torn Iraq.

Countless studies have indicated one of the main problems leading to the current situation in Iraq has been the administration’s go-it-alone approach to post-war plans for Iraq. A country engaged in war and occupation must have the support and input of the elected representatives in the legislature. Although a majority of Congress initially supported the war, it is imperative for the executive to work with U.S. representatives and government agencies to find a solution to Iraq. These players can and must be part of the process at all times. It should be obvious to most that it is insufficient and unwise to allow solely the executive and the Department of Defense to assume all control over the affairs in Iraq, but this is essentially how the story has unfolded. This situation has occurred largely because the American public was misled by a barrage of false arguments and justifications for the war that the press did little to investigate. Adding to this deception are the current reports of private military contractors in Iraq and the growing privatization of the military lead by the Bush administration that has created an enormous federal deficit for American taxpayers. The Bush administration’s failure to plan for a postwar Iraq (in what was a war of choice based on false misleading arguments) constitutes one of the most outrageous scandals in modern U.S. history.

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Citizenship rights: unit the nation-state
Multinational transnational citizenship rights/duties?
Corporations are now transnational legal citizens like human citizens?
Cosmopolitan corporate citizen
Duties minus rights
Private rights vs public rights
Well, corps have much more public rights and private rights than any citizen
Infact, they possess so many informal public rights its inconceivable. Private rights thus abound. No distinction btw the two?
Shit this doesn't make any sense
Link to Mancur Olson logic of collective action and organized groups
Goal: corporate accountability
Through new conceptions of transnational citizenship duties/rights?
Ecological corporate footprint
Modern morality is founded on individualism/rights