Tag: Democracy and Rule of Law
Constitutions count. What does tech do?
Constitutions count. In a democratic society ruled by law, they distribute power among institutions and determine how it is gained and how it is lost. The process of preparing one after civil war or dictatorship is particularly fraught, as we are seeing in the recent Arab Spring revolutions. Society is divided, who truly represents “the people” is unclear, how those who draft the constitution are chosen is problematic, and power still grows out of the barrel of a gun. How does a constitution avoid capture by armed elites and gain popular legitimacy in these difficult situations? What role can and should the public play? How can technology best contribute?
A group of experts on constitution-making and on technology met last week in DC to discuss these issues at a roundtable co-hosted by Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies and Google Ideas. Some conclusions on constitution-making were clear: the process should be seen to be transparent, it has to fit the particular context in which it is occurring, and it has to create or demonstrate a broad, inclusive consensus around main issues. The ways in which technology can contribute are still the subject of experimentation. It can facilitate public participation by enabling substantive citizen inputs to the text of a constitution, improving transparency, enhancing civic education and expanding inclusiveness. The drafting of a constitution can also benefit from technology that makes the body of all past constitutions discoverable and searchable.
The constitution-making experts see the process as a complex one that includes not only public participation but also judicial engagement and external assistance in deliberating, drafting, adopting, promulgating and implementing a new constitutional order. The South African process is often viewed as the best example and imitated elsewhere, because public participation ensured the post-apartheid constitution’s legitimacy, even though there was little apparent impact on the constitutional text, which remained virtually unchanged. Even where public participation has had an impact on the text, it is rarely extensive. Historically, relatively few provisions have attracted intense public scrutiny.
Legitimacy also depends to an important extent on the transparency of the constitution-making process as well as public understanding of the outcome. A good constitutional process lays the foundation for good implementation and the creation of a culture of constitutionalism. This is particularly difficult to achieve if the constitution is the product of an international intervention, as in post-war Bosnia, Kosovo and Iraq. There international officials actually wrote the initial constitutions, with little consultation with local citizens. What the internationals consider “universal” principles do not necessarily translate well. It might have been better to adopt a transitional or provisional constitution, (as in Tunisia and Libya) that can be used until the local population is in a position to conduct its own constitution-making process.
When the time comes for a locally prepared constitution, the process needs to be transparent but still allow for elite deal-making and technical drafting behind closed doors. Not everything can be done in public, as some compromises will embarrass participants with their own constituencies. Expectations need to be managed. The public should not be led to believe it will have an impact on the drafting if in fact it will not, which happened in Iraq. Over-promising in post-conflict situations creates big difficulties. So too does drafting that is piecemeal or uncoordinated. The pieces of a constitution need to fit together, without leaving gaps and overlaps that will create problems later. It is also important to provide a suitable mechanism and threshold for amendments, which are difficult decisions in post-war situations.
Technology-based experiments conducted so far in connection with public participation in constitution-making processes include those in Iceland, Tunisia, Egypt and Somalia.
The recent Icelandic constitution-making process included weekly publication of drafts and an extensive dialogue on Facebook, Twitter and Youtube conducted by members of the drafting committee. This enabled direct interaction with interested members of the public, who were able to comment on a website as the draft evolved. Out of a national population of 300,000, there were 40,000 visitors to the site, 12,000 views on the YouTube channel and 3,600 comments.
In Egypt and Tunisia, Google supported the creation of web platforms that provided YouTube videos for voter education and enabled the general public to comment on all the individual articles of the constitutions. On the Egyptian site, articles could be sorted by how happy users were with them and how hotly debated they were (using Face book ‘likes’ and ‘comments’, respectively). This gave the drafters clear input and enabled the public to verify that their views were taken into account, but it allowed for little nuance. Egyptians have made upwards of 150,000 “inputs” to the constitutional process.
In Somalia, Voice of America (VOA) and Google Ideas partnered in a telephone survey conducted by professional Somali journalists skilled in asking questions and getting answers. Each survey’s results were discussed on daily political talk radio, with call-in listeners and even directly on-air with the Somali Prime Minister. This allowed people living in a precarious security environment to give their opinions while remaining anonymous. The polling reached over 3,000 people.
None of these experiments is definitive but some have already been transplanted from one context to another. All illustrate the potential of technology to open the constitution-making process and build legitimacy and trust in the public eye. But they tend to favor the technology-enabled part of the society, which may amplify the influence of some parts of society at the expense of others. They also favor individual contributions and may disadvantage some technology-poor civil society organizations. Direct democracy is not necessarily good democracy. Especially in post-conflict societies, there is the real possibility of illiberal results. We need to be careful not to harm the democratic process. Technology should enable constitution-making, not drive it.
There is also an important role for technology in supporting the drafting process. More than anything else, drafters want examples of how to deal with their problems. They often turn to the constitutions of countries that share their geography, culture or language, to find possible models and appropriate solutions, even sometimes copying typographical errors. No easily retrievable central repository of these documents currently exists. The Constitution Explorer project, run out of Stanford University and the University of Texas, aims to change that, by collecting and coding the world’s constitutions for the past two hundred years. This kind of toolbox is what those charged with drafting most need to avoid pitfalls and improve their own product.
This applies more broadly as well. There is no definitive solution to the problem of how technology can contribute to public participation in constitution-making. There is a growing variety of tools that may be appropriate—or not—in particular contexts. Where they work well, they can improve not only substantive input but also transparency, accountability and civic education, leading eventually to a democratic and constitutional culture.
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The unlikely parade
According to Serbia’s constitution, all citizens have the right to a peaceful demonstration. Homosexuals appear to be exempt from the rule. Even though LGBT activists announced several months in advance their plan to stage the Gay Pride events, including the parade, September 30-October 7. Serbian prime and interior minister Ivica Dačić recently stressed that the demonstration could be banned if the police assess the security risks as too high. Dačić added that he basically supports human rights of all people, including homosexuals, but is not going to risk the lives and safety of his policemen and potential participants of the parade.
Last year the Pride Parade was banned at the eleventh hour. The official explanation was that far right extremists were planning terrorist actions. No further information has been released since, nor has anyone been arrested in connection with these allegations. Organizers now fear the government will use the security risks as an excuse to ban Pride once again.
The issue is weightier than a few demonstrators in Belgrade. Now a candidate for EU membership, Serbia is hoping to get a date to start accession talks, which brings with it substantial financing. U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Phillip Reeker was among the first foreign diplomats to state public support to the Pride organizers. Several EU officials – including Jelko Kacin, the European parliament rapporteur for Serbia – have confirmed their attendance. While this year’s Gay Pride may not be crucial for Serbia’s further progress toward EU membership – at least not to the extent that improvement in relations with Kosovo is – the Europeans will certainly take it into account when deliberating on whether the country merits the date.
The first attempt by LGBT organizations to hold the parade was in 2001. The event ended in chaos, with participants brutally battered by football hooligans and militant ultranationalists. The organizers accused the police of deliberately failing to protect them. Scenes from television reports suggest they may well have been right.
Frightened of violence, LGBT activists were not even thinking of organizing the parade again until 2009, but the government eventually decided to disallow it. The decision has been declared unconstitutional by the Constitutional Court only recently, which gives the LGBT community some hope that this year the tide might be turned.
In 2010, hundreds of Serbian lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transexuals were finally allowed to occupy a strictly enclosed area of the capital for about an hour, completely surrounded by cordons of police. Whether the demonstration was a success is debatable however. While the participants suffered no attack during the rally thanks to the immense security presence, the rest of the town saw a series of clashes between hooligans and riot police, who were ordered to show as much restraint toward rioters as possible. Belgrade was trashed. Of about 200 injured, a large majority were policemen. The government was believed to have allowed the demonstration only to improve its chances of getting EU candidate status.
Serbia is a conservative society and people generally oppose the gay parade. Although most of them disapprove violence against the LGBT population, they also believe that homosexuals should not express their sexual identity in public places. Homophobia is mainly present among younger generations. Teenagers are the most violent members of extreme nationalist and football hooligan groups.
In addition to the issue of human rights in general and gay rights in particular, the government’s hesitancy raises the question of Serbia’s institutional capability to guarantee its citizens an elementary level of safety. There is a widespread belief that the militant far right groups consist entirely of “kids” from the margins of society who use violence merely as a way to express frustration. While that may be true for some of the low-level operatives, the bulk of their leaders – especially of football hooligan groups – are well situated individuals with criminal records that involve serious offenses such as armed robberies, drug trade, extortion, murder attempts and so on.
Despite their criminal activities, most of these extremists have rarely, if ever, been brought to justice. The support they enjoy from the Serbian Orthodox Church (SPC), which is the most popular and influential institution in the country, helps them gain legitimacy among ordinary people and portray themselves as the “ultimate guardians of the Serb Orthodoxy and heroic tradition.” Outgoing Russian ambassador Aleksandr Konuzin – who is almost as popular here as SPC – was photographed with members of far right groups on several occasions, including his visit to the Serbs from northern Kosovo.
Militant ultranationalists were most privileged during the prime ministry of former conservative nationalist prime minister Vojislav Koštunica of the Democratic Party of Serbia (DSS), which ended in 2008 after an attack on the U.S. embassy building in Belgrade amid riots against Kosovo’s declaration of independence. The order for security forces to withdraw could not have been issued except by a top police or government official, but even four years later it still remains a mystery who was in command that day.
Several other cases have also clearly illustrated the strength of Serbian far right militants. During the 2010 gay parade, they demonstrated not only surprisingly high organizational capabilities, but also considerable knowledge of guerrilla tactics in their battle with police. Last year evidence appeared in some media of young Serbs attending Russian camps to learn military skills. Perhaps the most notable example was a few years ago, when leaders of a football hooligan group managed to wiretap police communications prior to a derby match and thus learn about police plans to prevent them from fighting with rival fans.
The overal number of militant extremists in Serbia is estimated to be between ten and fifteen thousand. Most, if not all, of them are well known to the police and intelligence agencies. Professor Zoran Dragišić, a prominent security expert, has asserted that it would have taken the Gendarmerie no more than seventeen minutes to arrest the vast majority of violent militants. So far there has been no indication of political will to order such a nationwide police operation. It’s high time.
PS from Daniel Serwer 2 October: Milan is not the only Serbian citizen who sees possible cancellation of the parade as reflecting badly on the security services.
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This week’s peace picks
The dog days of summer are over as far as DC events are concerned
1. A Conversation with Rudwan Dawod on his Incarceration in The Sudan, Tuesday September 4, 2:00pm-3:30pm
Venue: Woodrow Wilson Center, 1300 Pennsylvania Ave., NW, Washington, D.C. 20004, fifth floor conference room
Speakers: Rudwan Dawod, Tom Prichard, Michael Van Dusen
The Africa Program of the Woodrow Wilson Center would like to invite you to a presentation by Rudwan Dawod on Tuesday, September 4. Rudwan has been the facilitator for reconciliation and humanitarian projects with Sudan Sunrise since 2009, and is the project director for a reconciliation project in which Muslims from Sudan, South Sudan and the U.S. are rebuilding a Catholic Cathedral in Torit, South Sudan. In late May, Rudwan left his wife and home in Springfield, Oregon to travel to South Sudan to direct this inter-faith reconciliation project. During a lull in the project, Rudwan took a side trip to visit family in Sudan, and renew his Sudanese Passport. Concerned for the future of his country, and dedicated to peace and democracy, Rudwan attended a peaceful demonstration on July 3rd to protest the Sudanese government’s recent austerity policies, and ongoing violence in the Nuba Mountains, Blue Nile, and Darfur. Subsequently, Rudwan was arrested, beaten until unconscious, tortured, charged with terrorism, and retained in prison for 44 days. With the help of the advocacy community, the US government, and the media, Rudwan was eventually acquitted and released. Please join us to welcome Rudwan home and hear him tell his remarkable story.
Register for this event here.
2. Organizing the U.S. Government to Counter Islamist Extremism, Wednesday September 5, 12:00pm-2:00pm
Venue: Hudson Institute, 1015 15th Street, N.W. 6th Floor, Washington, D.C. 20005
Speakers: James Glassman, Will Marshall, Douglas J. Feith, William A. Galston, Abram N. Shulsky
Lunch will be served. For all the progress the United States has made in fighting terrorist networks, there has been a general failure to confront the terrorism problem’s ideological center of gravity. A new Hudson Institute study examines how the U.S. government could mount an effort to address this failure by working to change the ideological climate in the Muslim world. The study identifies which types of governmental and nongovernmental organizations should be created to conduct this effort. Produced by Douglas J. Feith and Abram N. Shulsky of Hudson Institute and William A. Galston of Brookings, the study argues that the various Islamist terrorist groups around the world are linked by ideology— common beliefs about their duties as Muslims that spawn and intensify hostility to the United States and to the West in general. You are invited to a panel discussion in which two distinguished commentators will discuss the report with its authors: Commentators: James Glassman, Executive Director of the George W. Bush Institute and former Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs in the George W. Bush Administration Will Marshall, Founder and President of the Progressive Policy Institute Authors: Douglas J. Feith, Hudson Institute Senior Fellow and former Under Secretary of Defense for Policy in the George W. Bush Administration William A. Galston, Brookings Institution Ezra K. Zilkha Chair in Governance Studies and former Deputy Assistant to President Clinton for Domestic Policy Abram N. Shulsky, Hudson Institute Senior Fellow and former Defense Department official.
Register for this event here.
3. An Egyptian Point of View about the Arab Uprisings, Wednesday September 5, 7:30pm-9:00pm
Venue: Al-Hewar Center, 120 Cherry Street, S.E., Vienna, VA 22180
Speakers: Ashraf Al-Bayoumi
A conversation with Dr. Ashraf Al-Bayoumi. Egyptian professor and activist, about “An Egyptian Point of View about the Arab Uprisings.” (in Arabic)
Register for this event here
4. Infrastructure and Business Opportunities in North Africa, Thursday September 6, 8:30am-11:ooam
Venue: City Club of Washington, DC, 555 13th Street, NW, Washington, DC 20004
Speakers: Carl Kress, Randa Fahmy Hudome, Steven Mayo, Deborah McCarthy, Cenk Sidar, Curtis Silvers, John Duke Anthony
A discussion on “Infrastructure and Business Opportunities in North Africa” featuring Mr. Carl Kress, Regional Director for the Middle East, North Africa and Europe Region, U.S. Trade and Development Agency; Ms. Randa Fahmy Hudome, President, Fahmy Hudome International; Mr. Steven Mayo, Business Development Officer, Project and Structured Finance, Export-Import Bank of the United States; Ms. Deborah McCarthy, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary and Deputy Assistant Secretary for International Finance and Development, Bureau of Economic and Business Affairs, U.S. Department of State; Mr. Cenk Sidar, Founder and Managing Director, Sidar Global Advisors; and Mr. Curtis Silvers, Executive Vice President, National U.S.-Arab Chamber of Commerce; moderated by Dr. John Duke Anthony, Founding President & CEO, National Council on U.S.-Arab Relations; Member, U.S. Department of State Advisory Committee on International Economic Policy and its subcommittees on Sanctions and Trade and Investment.
Register for this event here.
5. CISSM Forum: ‘The Future of Indo-Pak Relations,’ Thursday September 6, 12:15pm-1:3opm
Venue: University of Maryland, College Park, 7950 Baltimore Avenue, College Park, MD, 1203 Van Munching Hall
Speakers: Stephen P. Cohen
‘The Future of Indo-Pak Relations’, Stephen P. Cohen, Senior Fellow, Brookings Institution
Register for this event here.
6. When ‘Ordinary People’ Join In: Understanding Moments of Mass Mobilization in Argentina (2001), Egypt (2011), and Ukraine (2004), Thursday September 6, 4:00pm-5:00pm
Venue: Elliot School of International Affairs, 1957 E Street, NW, Washington, D.C. 20052, Voesar Conference Room
Speakers: Olga Onuch
Olga Onuch, Newton Prize Fellow in Comparative Politics, University of Oxford This presentation examines the differences between moments of mass-mobilization and the long term process of activist mobilization that precedes them. Ukraine in 2004, Egypt in 2011, and Argentina in 2001 represent cases where a history of activist coordination was the basis for, and key instrument in, the mobilization of ‘ordinary’ people. The presenter will argue against the predominant focus on exogenous and economic factors and instead emphasize local actors and political variables in explaining the presence or absence of mass-mobilization. Part of IERES Petrach Program on Ukraine. Sponsored by the Institute for European, Russian, and Eurasian Studies.
Register for this event here.
7. The Arab Awakening and its Implications, Thursday September 6, 6:oopm-7:oopm
Venue: Georgetown School of Foreign Service, 37 St NW and O St NW, Washington, DC, ICC Auditorium
Speaker: Dennis Ross
Returning PJC faculty member, Ambassador Dennis Ross, will present a lecture on ‘The Arab Awakening and its Implications’.
RSVP requested. A light reception will follow.
Register for this event here.
8. Will the Ongoing Nuclear Talks with Iran Yield Better Results than Past Efforts? Friday September 7, 10:00am-12:00pm
Venue: Woodrow Wilson Center, 1300 Pennsylvania Ave., NW, Washington, D.C. 20004
Speakers: Trita Parsi, Mustafa Kibaroglu, Monica Herz, Michael Adler, Robert S. Litwak
The pursuit of an agreement on Iran’s nuclear program remains at the top of the nonproliferation agenda. The unsuccessful mediation effort led by Brazil and Turkey in May 2010 was followed by the adoption of more economic sanctions by the international community. Last April, the government of Iran resumed negotiations with representatives of the five permanent members of the Security Council, plus Turkey and Germany. Four meetings have taken place in Switzerland, Turkey, and Russia. Talks are expected to continue after the U.S. presidential elections. Five experts will take stock of the negotiations in comparison with earlier efforts. Experts who participated in a February 2011 seminar on the Brazilian-Turkish mediation will return to the Wilson Center to assess the ongoing negotiations and possible outcomes.
Register for this event here.
9. Road to a Free Syria: Should “Responsibility to Protect” Apply to the Syrian Conflict? Friday, September 7, 12:00-2:00
Venue: Hudson Institute, 15 15th Street, N.W. 6th Floor, Washington, D.C. 20005
Speakers: Marah Bukai, Naser Khader, Nasser Rabbat, Kert Werthmuller
‘Responsibility to Protect’ (R2P)—a widely acknowledged principle of international relations—holds that the State carries the primary responsibility for the protection of its population from mass atrocities and, moreover, that the international community has a responsibility to assist States in fulfilling this responsibility. A panel of distinguished experts will discuss the applicability of R2P to the Syrian conflict while shedding light on current events inside Syria, international reactions to those events, and projections for securing a stable and prosperous post-Assad Syria. Panelists: Marah Bukai, Syrian poet, Consultant, U.S. Department of State, and political activist involved in the Syrian revolution
Naser Khader, Adjunct Fellow, Hudson Institute, and former Member of the Danish Parliament
Nasser Rabbat, Aga Khan Professor and the Director of the Aga Khan Program for Islamic Architecture, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Moderator: Kurt Werthmuller, Research Fellow, Hudson Institute’s Center for Religious Freedom
Register for this event here.
10. Stabilizing the Sinai, Churches for International Peace, Friday September 7, 12:00pm-1:30pm
Venue: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1779 Massachusetts Ave. NW, Washington, D.C. 20036
Speakers: Art Hughes, Geoffrey Aronson
Rising lawlessness and violence and an increasing death toll in the Sinai Peninsula by terrorist and criminal elements since the fall of the Mubarak regime threaten the security of Egypt, Israel, and their 1979 peace treaty. The unresolved competition over governance in Egypt between the Muslim Brotherhood government led by President Mohammed Morsi on one hand and the Egyptian army on the other are complicating factors, as is the continued Israeli closure of Gaza, whose Hamas government has strong ties to the Egyptian Brotherhood.
Ambassador (ret.) Art Hughes and Geoffrey Aronson will discuss the stakes for all the parties, including the U.S., and suggest what is needed to restore peace in the Sinai.
Register for this event here.
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This week’s peace picks
Another quiet week in DC as the summer nears its end
1. U.S. Drones Policy: Strategic Frameworks and Measuring Effects, American Security Project, Monday August 20, 12:00pm-1:30 pm
Venue: American Security Project, 1100 New York Avenue, NW, Suite 710w, Washington, DC
Join us for a fact-based discussion with leading experts on counterterrorism about how we can better understand the effects and effectiveness of America’s drone campaign.
Are drones effective at containing al-Qaeda? Can we measure the social and political effects of a drone campaign? Is there a way to empirically determine what effects lethal drone strikes have on a country, on a terrorist movement, and on the broader global war on terrorism?
Speakers:
Aaron Zelin is the Richard Borow Fellow at The Washington Institute and the editor of Jihadology.net.
Will McCants is a research analyst at CNA, adjunct faculty at the John’s Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, and the editor of Jihadica.com.
Christine Fair is an assistant professor in the Center for Peace and Security Studies (CPASS) at Georgetown University’s Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service. She is a renowned expert on South Asia and Islamist groups.
Moderated by:
Joshua Foust
Fellow for Asymmetric Operations at ASP who researches the strategic uses of drones, terrorism, insurgencies, and national security strategy – focused on Central and South Asia. He is also a columnist for PBS and The Atlantic Monthly.
This discussion will be on the record
The discussion will begin promptly at 12:30 p.m. Please arrive by 12:15 p.m. for registration.
2. Three Elections that Might Change the World, Center for National Policy, Tuesday August 21, 12:00pm-1:00pm
Venue: Russel Senate Office Building, Room SR-485, Washington, DC 20510
In 2012, elections in the United States and Taiwan, along with the leadership transition in the PRC will all take place in less than a year’s time. What are the prospects for continuity and change in the complex triangle that is the US-PRC-Taiwan relationship?
Featuring:
Richard Bush
Director, Center for Northeast Asian Policy Studies
The Brookings Institution
Wei (Victoria) Hongxia
Visiting Scholar
Carnegie Endowment’s Asia Program
Anil Mammen
Fellow for American Government and Politics
Center for National Policy
*A light lunch will be served*
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Eid mubarak!
Today and tomorrow mark the end of the month of Ramadan, when Muslims fast during the day. Tonight and tomorrow night they feast.
It has been a truly terrible Ramadan in Syria, where Kofi Annan’s peace plan has died (along with thousands of additional Syrians) and the Asad regime has intensified military action, especially in Aleppo. Prospects are not good: Asad refuses to step aside and the opposition refuses to negotiate with him. We are not yet at Bill Zartman’s “mutually hurting stalemate,” when both sides see no gain in continuing to fight and decide instead to talk.
Egypt has taken another unexpected turn, with elected President Morsy taking over by decree the executive and legislative powers that the military had previously reserved for itself. He did it with savoir faire: previous military leaders were retired with medals and new ones chosen from just below them. It is impossible to escape the conclusion that the Muslim Brotherhood, from which Morsy hails, and the military have reached a mutual accommodation, leaving Egypt’s secular revolutionaries out in the cold, which isn’t very refreshing in Egypt at this time of year.
In Libya, Tunisia and Yemen, the revolutions are looking a lot better. Libya‘s General National Congress, elected July 7, convened on schedule and chose as President Magarief, who promises to be a unifying figure. Tunisia is struggling to produce a constitution, with final approval delayed at least to April 2013 rather than October 2012. Yemen has made a start with military reform and is now embarking on preparations for its national dialogue, to be held in November and followed by constitution-writing.
Elsewhere counter-revolution is winning. Bahrain has sentenced human rights activist Nabeel Rajab to three years in prison. I wonder if he would have attracted more attention if his name were Pussy Riot. Algeria, Jordan, Morocco and Saudi Arabia have stifled any serious reform moves. In Iraq, Prime Minister Maliki has weathered political challenges and continues to accumulate power even as frictions between Baghdad and Kurdistan grow.
It looks as if the Arab awakening will continue mainly in North Africa, where it began in early 2011. While Libya has ample oil and gas resources, none of the other countries in which revolutions have come to fruition does. Tunisia, Egypt and Yemen all have serious economic challenges ahead. Syria will be an economic basket case the day after Asad is gone. If we want anything like democracy to prevail in these places, there is going to be a substantial bill to pay.
Marc Lynch has called this a cruel summer. It has certainly been that and worse in Syria. But those of us who have experience with transitions, especially in post-conflict environments, set the bar low. There has been progress elsewhere, even if halting and slower than hoped.
The big open questions are these: is Egypt getting back on track, or are we seeing a new, Islamist autocracy in the making? Can Saudi Arabia manage the succession to next-generation leadership without upheaval? Can the regional war that has begun in Syria be ended before it engulfs several other countries? Can Iran‘s nuclear ambitions be ended at the negotiating table, or will Israel or the United States attack?
No answers are needed today. It suffices to salute those who observe Ramadan with “Eid mubarak!”
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No lipstick for this pig
Yesterday’s Project on Middle East Democracy (POMED)-hosted discussion about Iran’s Green Movement critiqued the movement’s leadership and condemned current US Iran policy as riddled with misconception and opportunism.
Allreza Nader, a Senior International Policy Analyst at the Rand Corporation, focused on the internal dynamics of the Green Movement. Since the unsuccessful 2009 protests, there is a widening schism between the movement’s leadership and the Iranian rank and file. Mousavi, Karroubi and Khatami (MK&K) have been effectively neutralized by the regime. The first two sit under house arrest, and Khatami does not represent what the Green Movement wanted. Many of the people who took to the streets seek an Iranian republic instead of an Islamic republic. MK&K don’t support this goal. They want to throw Khamenei out but keep the system enshrined by Khomeini. Khatami went so far as to deny a link between the Green Movement and other secular nationalist movements.
Iranians have lost faith in the Green Movement and in the reformist leadership, whom they don’t see as effective. Attitudes toward Khatami in particular have soured. People ask why he isn’t under house arrest. His advocacy of reform damages his reputation. People see him as belonging to the regime.
Most Iranians feel that the Islamic Republic is not reformable. They crave democracy and separation of religion from the state. This is the true Green Movement in Iran: not the leadership, but the rank and file who reject unreal reform and call for democratic norms to prevail.
Jamal Abdi, Policy Director at the National Iranian American Council, condemned Washington policymakers for forgetting the Green Revolution. Those who remember treat the revolution either as a nuisance or an opportunistic instrument to advance pre-conceived goals. The last time the Green Movement was invoked in the mainstream media, it was a Wall Street Journal article calling for more crippling sanctions on Iran. The thinking is that if we punish the Iranian people economically, they will join the movement.
This rhetoric, so common in Washington, shows a complete misunderstanding of the situation on the ground. The Green Revolution is not about angry bread mobs. It is about people demanding their civil rights. It is about the Iranian middle classes, fed up with eroding liberties. But the sanctions have weakened this same middle class, and distract them from demanding their civil rights. The net effect of US policy on Iran has been damaging. We can put lipstick on this “ugly failed policy” of sanctions, but it has eroded the very middle class that could bring about real change.
Suzanne Maloney, Senior Fellow in Foreign Policy at the Saban Center for Middle East Policy, echoed Jamal Abdi’s criticisms of the US and expressed confidence in Iran’s future as a functioning democracy. The fact that the event was not focused on nuclear war or sanctions against Iran makes it unique in Washington circles. Very few policymakers focus on what is going on inside Iran today. We are blind to the internal political realities. Our information is stale and limited. Inability to see what is going in Iran is a huge problem for good policy.
Why did the Green Movement fail? It was a historical moment, but it did not bring us the change we would like to see and that many Iranians would like to see. We need to understand what went wrong: why did Egyptians keep coming back to Tahrir square, but Iranians went to their homes? How does that change? How can Washington encourage that change?
The schism between the leadership and the rank and file is a good place to begin to understand what happened. Iranians want more radical change than people like Moussavi were willing to support. But the US doesn’t know how to advance real change in Iran any more, and the current nuclear-focused policy is opportunistic and doomed to failure.
Don’t just blame the Obama administration for this. It is doubtful that a Romney policy would be substantially different. Perhaps it would be worse. Perhaps the best thing the US can do in Iran is to recognize that we are not going to be the authors of change through sanctions or through any other policy mechanism. When change happens, we are probably not going to see it coming. Iran will become a functioning democracy long before almost all of its neighbors, but we can’t know when that will be.
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