Tag: Democracy and Rule of Law
Big trouble
No one should minimize the health impact of COVID-19, the corona virus originating in Wuhan, China. It is spreading rapidly and will likely make a lot of people sick. The death rate is high–over 2%. It hits older people especially hard and kills younger people much less. President Trump’s effort to portray the virus as not so bad is deplorable.
That said, the impact is likely to depend on how the world reacts as much as on the virus itself. This is obviously true for public health measures: getting sick people isolated and treated correctly will surely lower the risks both to others and to them. The virus has already tested the Chinese and Iranian public health systems. While the initial Chinese reaction in Wuhan was inexcusably slow, WHO is praising China’s vigorous response since. In Iran, the response appears to have been much less effective. In both countries, the publics are unconvinced of their respective governments’ veracity. Health epidemics are going to prove a tough test for governments unused to telling the truth.
That applies to the US as well. President Trump has wisely delegated responsibility to Vice President Pence, whose credibility is far higher than his own. But Pence did not do well as Governor of Indiana in responding to HIV. Nor will he be free to do and say what he wants. His primary responsibilities will be to prevent the American experts Trump boasts about from saying anything to contradict the President and to take the rap if the virus spreads widely in the US. He can’t be fired, but he can be denied renomination.
There is also a risk of overreacting. In retrospect, it is clear that Washington and most of the rest of the world overreacted to 9/11, not only by grounding all aircraft immediately thereafter for longer than necessary but also by launching two wars that each have killed about as many Americans as the initial attacks, plus many thousands of Iraqis and Afghans. In the aftermath of dramatic events, officials want to err on the side of caution–there is no reward for taking additional risks. The World Bank has already cancelled a big conference in DC for next week, despite the absence of COVID-19 here. I suppose the reasoning was that people would be coming from abroad, but remote participation might well have reduced if not eliminated the risk they would have posed.
President Obama handled the Ebola outbreak well: he reacted quickly and did what was needed to keep it in Africa and deal with it there. It is already too late for containment in the current outbreak. The initial Chinese delay eliminated that possibility, and in any event Trump had already dismantled the White House apparatus set up for early reaction. Now we need to try to isolate those infected and ensure that we don’t overreact in ways that cause unjustifiable harm.
The damage to the stock market is already gigantic, though not necessarily irreversible: US markets have declined more than 10%. Only time will tell if that reflects weakening economic fundamentals, caused by disruption of supply chains as well as dampening demand, or is an overreaction. Certainly it illustrates that the United States has a great deal to lose from Chinese economic failure. Maybe a good deal more to lose than from Chinese success, which is vital to American industry and agriculture.
The virus is also having a political impact. Whatever WHO thinks, Chinese are complaining bitterly about their government’s response, and Iranians won’t be far behind. There is nothing wrong with that: citizens should expect their governments to protect public health and criticize them when they fail. But neither Iran nor China permits a serious challenge to their autocratic regimes. Excessive rigidity there could spawn dissent and even cause collapse.
The United States does allow a political alternative to come to power. That is potentially the silver lining. Kakistocracy is only tolerable if it doesn’t appear to matter. If the corona virus makes it clear that we can ill afford incompetence and mendacity, the Trump Administration could be in big trouble.
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Consensus is hard
Following elections in September and October, Tunisia is having difficulty forming a government. Presiding is a populist president without a political party who has in the past proposed radically overhauling the entire system, abolishing political parties, and creating a form of direct democracy.
On February 19, the Middle East Institute hosted a panel discussion on “The State of Tunisia’s Democratic Transition and the Power and Perils of Consensus Politics.” The discussion featured four speakers:
Daniel Brumberg, director of Democracy and Governance Studies at Georgetown University and a senior non-resident fellow at POMED,
Sharan Grewal, an assistant professor of government at the College of William & Mary,
Mohamed-Dhia Hammami, a scholar at Wesleyan University in the College of Social Studies and Government, and
Sabina Henneberg, a postdoctoral fellow in the African Studies Program at SAIS.
William Lawrence, a visiting professor of political science and international affairs at American University, moderated
Current context
Hammami attributed the difficulty of forming a government to the fragmented parliament and the president, whose lack of party affiliation contributed to the disarray. President Said designated Elyes Fakhfakh as the new prime minister because of Ennahda’s inability to gain enough votes to form a new government. Fakhfakh excluded Heart of Tunisia from his coalition because of Nabil Karoui’s corruption cases, scandals, and lobbying with the Israelis. Ennahda withdrew its support from Fakhfakh to call for a government of national unity. A new parliamentary election would be risky. President Said thus invited UGTT, which is a labor union with political legitimacy, to act as a mediator between Fakhfakh’s government and opposing parties.
Consensus politics
Brumberg indicated that social, ideological, political, and geographical divisions in the society show Tunisia’s divisions. Identity politics reflect concern of exclusion, make a majoritarian system difficult. For a diverse group to achieve consensus, parties have to postpone difficult issues, such as economic reforms, the need for a supreme court, and security reforms. Brumberg believes that there’s no alternative to deal with Tunisia’s pluralistic structure other than reaching a consensus. If Tunisians were to move beyond the consensus, to deal with the issues that have been postponed and approach a majoritarian system, it could be troubling for the entire state.
Grewal added that consensus politics was important from 2011 to 2014 during the establishment of the constitution. The transition to democracy should be done only once rules are set. The national unity government in 2015 continued the transition, thus postponing divisive issues. The parties thereby escaped blame for failed policies and avoided bringing back the polarization that plagued 2012-13.
Henneberg attributed the 2012-13 polarization to Ennahda’s inexperience, insecure domestic context, and the rise of opposition to the Egyptian Islamist government. She agreed that Tunisia required an inclusive consensus to write a successful constitution. This resulted in the establishment of the Tunisian National Dialogue Quartet to overcome the polarization.
Ennahda’s concerns
Hammami argued that Ennahda is in favor of sustaining consensus politics, which helps it to survive. Ennahda’s support for including Heart of Tunisia in the parliament was due to the lack of consensus to pass political, security, and economic reforms. Grewal noted that Ennahda also has concerns about Fakhfakh, who might repolarize politics.
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Normalizing impunity
President Trump has launched an all-out assault on judicial independence. In just the last few days, he has publicly attacked the prosecutors and judge in the case against his friend Roger Stone, tweeted his own control over the judicial system, and pardoned a few mostly white white collar criminals. Attorney General Barr has also reportedly intervened to end several investigations related to the President, including one focused on the President’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani.
Empathy is not the President’s strong point. He is not doing this because he thinks the people involved are innocent or even unjustly accused and convicted, though that is what he asserts. This is an attack on the justice system intended to normalize impunity, especially for the kinds of crimes his own coterie and he himself commit. Anyone who still thinks he won’t pardon Roger Stone and former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn is closing their eyes to the obvious: Trump is preparing the ground for those pardons and likely also one for himself, issued just before leaving office. He is also warning prosecutors that they should not bother with new cases against him or his friends.
His adversaries are another matter. Former Vice President Joe Biden is still in the crosshairs, despite his dramatic decline in the polls. Bernie Sanders is leading and will no doubt soon be the subject of Senate or Justice Department investigations, as will the fast rising former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg. Whoever rises to the top in the campaign for the Democratic nomination can expect the same treatment. Impunity for the President and his friends will be temporary if Trump loses in November.
Two thousand former Justice Department employees have signed on to a letter protesting what is going on and calling for the Attorney General’s resignation. There are rumors of rebellion among current employees in the Justice Department, and Federal judges are holding an emergency meeting to discuss the situation. But I doubt much will result. Trump is extremely sensitive to criticism, but his response to it is to attack his critics. Barr’s only achievement at the Justice Department is protecting the President, and his only complaint has been that the President’s tweets make that harder to do. Neither of these men can be expected to back down. Both will redouble their efforts.
There is not much that can be done about this. The pardon power is unlimited. The Justice Department’s supposed independence in criminal matters is more traditional than statutory. The courts are independent, but respect for their decisions and independence is not obligatory. A president can say pretty much what he wants about judges, prosecutors, indictees, and jury forepeople. Past presidents have generally avoided saying anything or getting themselves involved in individual cases. This one thinks he can get away with it.
The one avenue open to prosecutors that the president doesn’t control is the states. Their prosecutors and courts can pursue criminals without seeking or getting permission from the Federal government, except in cases where the Feds claim doing so could endanger their own investigations. That claim has been asserted in cases against some of Trump’s pals. I trust state prosecutors will not easily yield in the future, as it is clear enough that those assertions in this Administration are intended to protect criminality, not pursue it.
The world is watching this extraordinary attack on the rule of law. No American diplomat will be able to recite her talking points about corruption and abuse of power without a quiet giggle, and occasionally a big guffaw, from whoever she is trying to convince to pursue white collar criminals. The example America sets is vital to its diplomatic standing. President Trump’s normalization of impunity will be copied in many countries around the world. Putin, Duterte, Netanyahu, Orban and other would-be autocrats will be admiring the gall.
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No surprise
Attorney General Barr’s decision to overrule prosecutors who had asked for a 7-9 year sentence for one of President Trump’s cronies should be no surprise. Barr is a vigorous advocate of a unitary executive, which means he believes the President has complete authority over the entire executive branch and can do as he likes
The President Barr serves is someone who likes to protect his friends and supporters, regardless of their legal infractions. He has pardoned an Arizona sheriff convicted of criminal contempt of court and racial profiling as well as a Special Forces officer convicted of a war crime. He is packing the Federal courts with unqualified toadies. What more do you need to know about President Trump’s respect for the rule of law?
The much-vaunted “independence” of the Justice Department is a tradition, not of particularly long standing. Deference to professional prosecutors has proven politically advantageous to many presidents. It relieves them of the burden of deciding controversial issues and enables them to stay above the fray.
Trump however knows that independent institutions will not put up with his multitudinous lies. He cannot afford to let professionals make decisions that put his friends in prison. They might turn against him.
He prefers to enter the fray and frighten the government’s professionals into submission. An FBI director who won’t agree to protect the President? Fire him. A whistle blower in the National Security Council? Out him. An ambassador in Kiev who is not subservient? Fire her. A much-decorated military officer and another ambassador who testify in Congress when subpoenaed? Punish the former and fire the latter. Intelligence analysts who fail to support the President’s views? Deny their unanimous conclusions about Russian interference in the 2016 US election and praise President Putin’s denials.
The objective here is clear: it is 100% control over the entire executive from top to bottom. That can’t be achieved if there are people who can make decisions independently. So purges are necessary, not just to punish but also to warn those who remain in place that toeing the line is not optional. For every professional fired, many more are intimidated.
The people Trump targets will not be assassinated or even jailed. But they will live the rest of their lives fending off threats from the President’s over-zealous supporters, who can rely on not being prosecuted so long as Trump holds office. Some of the professionals will get book contracts, but most will suffer dramatic declines in income and difficulty finding jobs. The three prosecutors who resigned yesterday to protest the Attorney General’s decision to reverse their recommendation on sentencing will not be getting good assignments at Justice. They’ll likely all soon join the one who quit.
None of this will be apparent to people who get their news on Fox, which will portray the President as the victim of secret cabals, the “deep state,” plotting to unseat him. The Republicans in Congress know what the President is doing is wrong and would vigorously object if he were a Democrat. But their concerns about being “primaried” (challenged in Republican primaries this year) or dissed by the President outweigh their sense of decency. Senator Mitt Romney and Congressman Justin Amash stand alone in protesting Trump’s abuse of power. There is no sign anyone else will join them.
The November 3 election will be judge and jury on President Trump’s claim of complete control over the executive branch and his efforts to protect himself and his friends from punishment for their criminal offenses. Bernie Sanders looks to be the front runner in the Democratic primaries so far, but these are early days. Super Tuesday March 3 will give us a much better indication of who is likely to carry the Democratic standard.
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Accountability now
During Syria’s conflict, the Assad regime has continued committing many war crimes. Although de-escalation zones were established to mitigate conflict violence, the number of displaced Syrians increased. On February 5, Arab Center Washington DC hosted a panel discussion and a book review on the topic of Accountability in Syria: Achieving Transitional Justice in a Postconflict Society. The discussion involved three speakers: Radwan Ziadeh, a senior fellow for the Arab Center Washington DC, Mai El-Sadany, the legal and judicial director at the Tahrir Institute, and Mohammad Alaa Ghanem, a Syrian academic and pro-democracy campaigner.
War crimes
Ziadeh noted that because justice and accountability are left out in the Geneva and Astana talks, he wrote the book Accountability in Syria to call for attention to war atrocities and raise the issue of accountability. He listed five crimes that the Assad regime has committed in the last eight years.
- Use of air force: Opposition areas have been exposed to heavy, systematic, widespread, and indiscriminate bombing. While only 1% of victims killed by barrel bombs are opposition but 99% of victims are civilians. Other governments have failed to prevent the Syrian government from utilizing barrel bombs.
- Use of prohibited weapons: The Assad regime has utilized prohibited chemical weapons 37 times.
- Siege: Half a million of Syrians live besieged by Assad’s “surrender or starve” strategy.
- Torture and sectarian crimes: The regime carried out systematic torture at its secret prisons.
- Forced displacement: Displacement aims to remove people who have been disloyal. Forced displacement induces both the demographic change and the flight of Syrian refugees.
Forced displacement
Ghanem says that ceasefires, such as the Idlib and Daraa de-escalation zones, are a prelude to liquidation. Political analysts in Washington misunderstood ceasefires, which they thought would constitute a win-win solution that could empower local communities. Instead, ceasefires emboldened and benefited Assad’s regime, which used them to induce demographic change. He presented three purposes of ceasefires:
- Ceasefires have helped the Assad regime to conquer more territories by setting up a 1-2 year de-escalation period to relinquish oppositions’ heavy weapons and evacuate fighters.
- Ceasefires serve to relieve shortage of Assad’s manpower by freeing up regime resources to focus on other priority areas.
- Ceasefires provide an illusion of political process by designating areas for reconstruction while permitting the regime to commit systematic sectarian cleansing.
Remedies
El-Sadany argues that it’s time for justice now. Three tools are available for accountability:
- Documentation: Civil society, journalists, and lawyers should act together to preserve history and contribute to truth. For example, the New York Times utilizes open source investigation.
- UN Mechanisms: The United Nations has disappointed Syrians because of UN Security Council vetoes and the failure to make a referral to International Criminal Court (ICC). However, the UN Human Rights Council’s commissions of inquiry serves accountability by fact-finding and investigating crimes and perpetrators. In addition, the International, Impartial and Independent Mechanism (IIIM) was created to prepare files and assist the investigation and prosecution of crimes.
- Prosecution outside Syria: Syria is not a party to the Rome Statute and the UNSC has failed to refer its crimes to the ICC. But prosecution in other states is still possible.
El-Sadany proposes that the international community needs to amend, strengthen, and improve accountability mechanisms. Advocates should lobby their governments for more funding for accountability efforts and improved human rights laws. Lawyers should translate materials, especially on universal jurisdiction, into Arabic to reach Syrian victims and civil society.
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Tunisia looks for a government
Nine years after the revolution, although the Tunisian government brought effective democratic change, little economic or social progress has been made. In October, Kais Said, a political newcomer, won the presidential election with 73% of the vote, beating Nabil Karoui, who was previously jailed for corruption. Ennahda won the parliamentary election and selected Habib Jemli to be prime minister-designated. However, on January 10, Habib Jemli stepped down as he failed to win a vote of confidence.
On January 14, Carnegie Endowment for International Studies hosted a discussion on the topic of what Tunisians are expecting from their new leaders and what will happen if those expectations are not met. The discussion included three young Tunisians: Amir Ben Ameur, a social activist who advocates for youth development and democracy, Aymen Abderrahmen, a program coordinator in the Leadership Division at IREX, and Oumayma Ben Abdallah, a human rights research and Tunisia analyst. The discussion was moderated by Sarah Yerkes, a fellow in the Carnegie Middle East Program.
Why the government failed to form
Abderrahmen explained the political system in Tunisia and emphasized that Tunisians are sick of the replication of political phases. They lack trust towards the previous government because it failed to fulfill its reform and anti-corruption promises. They also believed that the government was too weak to deliver economic reforms.
Abdallah attributed the failure to the lack of administrative transparency, parliamentary consensus and participation, and detailed reform guidelines. Ameur blamed lack of transparency and the lack of common ground between Jemli and rival parties. He pointed out the government’s failure to tackle real problems. Corruption galvanized doubts among Tunisians.
Remedies
Ameur thinks Tunisia needs a government with greater accountability. The government should bring out detailed, grassroot reforms in a long-term vision. Tunisians need more confidence in government despite current hardships . Abdallah wants more transparency and conviction. She also noted that since the current parliament is fragmented, the new/proposed government should result from political consensus.
To fix unemployment, the government needs a clear strategy for social and economic reform. Abderrahmen noted that the government has recently publicized some plans, but further work in this direction is needed.
Enthusiasm for the transition
All three guests indicated that Tunisians feel deprived of dignity because revolutionary demands were not met. Ameur claimed that young people still have some hope for the government because launching another revolution would be a devastating move. He and Abdallah acknowledged that Tunisia is overall a free country, but economic challenges are still severe. Politicians need to fulfill their promises.
Why the President won
Abderrahmen noted that President Said didn’t try to cater to young people. People were not voting for Said, but against Karoui. Ameur underlined that the younger generation likes Said because he made no promises. Although other candidates had more political and government experience, people were not confident in them as they previously failed to deliver. Abdallah is concerned that since the president ran as an independent, he has no parties backing him, which will make it hard to tackle corruption problems.
The next government
Abderahmen hoped to see another election so that different parties may come up with a consensus. Ameur expressed a desire to have more young people lead the government. Abdallah was not enthusiastic about a new election, which can generate political risks. Instead of presenting a new election, it is urgent to find solutions to economic and social problems.
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