Exporting Democracy: September 2007

The issue of religion in politics is indeed a wicked paradox, as Mack explains in his article. The concept of using religious zeal to create support for oneself (or ones cause) is not new, It has proved effective enough to win a presidency In the U.S for George W. Bush (that is If you believe in the fairness of the Florida supreme courts decision); it has proved a very effective method of generating support for wars and atrocities as was seen during the course of the Iranian revolution and the Soviet Afghan war, It has also been fundamental in the building of entire Nations as was seen in the formation of Israel and Pakistan.

Using Religion in politics is as old as politics itself, mind you even in secular states where there is a clear division between the church and the state, religion is still used as an effective force in politics and doing so is not seen as crossing the secular line. While it may garner support for politicians and clerics turned politicians, religious politics is indeed a double edged sword that sooner or later ends up cutting those who wield it.

An interesting case to illustrate this point would be the religious parties that now control the provincial government in the North West Frontier Province (NWFP) of Pakistan and form a coalition opposition against the federal government. The MMA or Mutahida Majlis-e-Amal came to power in the vacuum that was created when General Pervez Musharraf seized control of the country and exiled the leaders of the two main secular political parties in the country. Anti-American sentiment in the NWFP which borders Afghanistan and had borne the brunt of the American sponsored Soviet-Afghan war was also a major factor in getting the MMA elected to power. The MMA’s agenda was purely religious; their track record had shown no real interest in developing the infrastructure of the country or expanding in other key areas such as health care or education. They preached a return to religion and an imposition of Sharia law.

The arguments made by the MMA leadership in their campaign were based primarily on religious teachings, which is all of what most of the MMA’s mostly illiterate leadership knew. After several years of living under MMA rule, the people of the NWFP have seen the results of their decision in voting on religious grounds alone. Cinemas have been closed; billboards containing images of women banned, public entertainment such as concerts condemned, peoples houses raided and their televisons stolen and burnt in public places, the education and health sectors in the province are grossly under-funded, women’s rights and freedom of movement without “the veil” have been decimated, the province has seen a huge spike in illegal activity such as drug/arms smuggling, terrorism and militarism is at an all time high and the province has seen a return to a more hard-line and fundamentalist form of Islam to name a few of the fun facts of having religious scholars as your rulers.

Furthermore, the Pakistani Federal Government’s Pro-American stance and obligation in the war on terror have created further problems for the religiously motivated party that rules the NWFP. As Khalid Bhatti Writes

But other political forces have also been exposed by this operation. The role of Mutahidda Majlis-e-Amal, (MMA - an alliance of Islamic fundamentalist parties that did well in the last elections, winning an outright majority in the North West Frontier Provincial government) has been exposed in this crisis. Despite being the governing party in NWFP, they have sat back as the Pakistani military have bombarded people in the tribal areas of South Waziristan which is part of the province they are supposed to govern! The conclusion drawn by the poor peasants and tribes’ people is that the MMA is more interested in saving its position as governing party than defending their rights.

The double edged nature of religiously motivated politics is all too apparent in this case. It also shows that while the MMA preaches religious zealotry, it is a party made up of people who are politician’s first and religious zealots second, And while having religious opinions is all well and good, they do not mix well with the dirty game of politics. The mixture of religion and politics, as the inhabitants of that unfortunate province are experiencing, can be most unpleasant.

Although America is hailed as the oldest democracy in the world, it is drawing ever increasing criticism due to its policies on how to perpetuate its ideals and values to the rest of the world. It is now widely agreed that American foreign policy in Afghanistan and Iraq has failed miserably and the world is definitely not a safer place to live in. Among a rising tide of Terrorism and global anti-Americanism, it has become imperative that America re-evaluate its foreign policy and support the same ideals of democracy abroad as it does at home if it is ever to realize its dream of exporting democracy and freedom to the rest of the world.

There are many reasons why American policy has met with such disaster in places like Afghanistan and Iraq. One cannot help but notice a certain double standard when it comes to American interests and the interests of other sovereign nations. Too often, the greater ideals of freedom and justice that the American nation was founded upon are set aside in the name of strategic interests and politics when it comes to foreign policy. The current situation in Afghanistan and indeed the problem of global Terrorism that America faces are in part a consequence of these double standards. While it is unthinkable that any other country might try to interfere in American politics and support a dictatorship in the United States, it is considered perfectly acceptable for the U.S to support regime change and to influence the democratic process in other countries like Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan among others. As one writer notes

“Global distrust of American leadership is reflected in increasing disapproval of the cornerstones of U.S. foreign policy. Not only is there worldwide support for a withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq, but there also is considerable opposition to U.S. and NATO operations in Afghanistan. Western European publics are at best divided about keeping troops there. In nearly every predominantly Muslim country, overwhelming majorities want U.S. and NATO troops withdrawn from Afghanistan as soon as possible. In addition, global support for the U.S.-led war on terrorism ebbs ever lower. And the United States is the nation blamed most often for hurting the world's environment, at a time of rising global concern about environmental issues.”(Manicarver 1)

Sadly this failure of foreign policy and growing tide of anti-Americanism has served to lower the image of the U.S as the leading superpower in the international arena. While the policy of containment during the Cold War era may have served U.S strategic interests, there was a tremendous cost of implementing that policy. One such disaster was the Soviet Afghan war in which America, still reeling from its defeat in Vietnam, decided to use the situation to support the Islamic Mujahideen in a proxy war that later resulted in the capitulation of the soviet army and its withdrawal from Afghanistan. Another much less publicized consequence of this war was the arming and training of Islamic extremists that afterwards went on to form groups like Taliban, Al-Qaeda, The Northern Alliance and sowed more than a decade of bloody civil war in the memories of Afghans to come. The U.S had an opportunity to support a democratic solution in Afghanistan that would have allowed for power sharing between the different factions in Afghanistan and given the Afghan people their much deserved chance at a peaceful existence but instead the U.S, after training and arming the Extremists to the teeth decided to cut and run once the Soviets were defeated. The current culture of terrorism stemmed, in part from this feeling of betrayal and a ready supply of American provided arms, ammunition, funding and military training that has allowed these people to wreak havoc in the decades to come.

Americas support for Israel is another such sore point that has turned the tide of global public opinion against the U.S. Most Muslims the world over see the creation and the continuation of the state of Israel as a theft of Muslim land previously controlled by the sovereign state of Palestine. The Overwhelming amount of foreign financial and military aid that Israel receives from the United States has allowed it to engage in the genocide of the Palestinian people. While freedom of speech is a fundamental right of every American, that same right usually not afforded to the international media if it tries to go against America’s policy on the middle-east and the atrocities of the state of Israel. As witnessed by one report,

“A monstrous war crime that Israel has tried to cover up for a fortnight has finally been exposed. Its troops have caused devastation in the center of the Jenin refugee camp, reached yesterday by The Independent, where thousands of people are still living amid the ruins. A residential area roughly 160,000 square yards about a third of a mile wide has been reduced to dust. Rubble has been shoveled by bulldozers into 30ft piles. The sweet and ghastly reek of rotting human bodies is everywhere, evidence that it is a human tomb. The people, who spent days hiding in basements crowded into single rooms as the rockets pounded in, say there are hundreds of corpses, entombed beneath the dust, under a field of debris, criss-crossed with tank and bulldozer treadmarks.”(Hoffman 2)

While the United States may condemn ethnic cleansing in places like Bosnia and Rwanda, It turns a blind eye to the events in Israel due to its need to have a friendly government in the middle-east in order to keep “anti-American” states in check.

To say that the American government only fails to support democracy abroad by not intervening would also be a mistruth. Indeed there have been instances when supporting democracy has produced such unexpected results that America has had to completely rethink its position. As David Makovsky points out in “Democracy: A Journal Of Ideas”

“It seems a very long time ago that President George W. Bush gave his second inaugural address. In January 2005, he proclaimed that "the best hope for peace in our world is the expansion of freedom in all the world." With this soaring idea, deeply rooted in America's Wilsonian political tradition, Bush defined the organizing foreign policy principle for his second term in office. However, exactly a year after uttering those words, Bush's Middle East democracy initiative came to a halt when Hamas won a parliamentary victory in the West Bank and Gaza in January 2006. Suddenly, it became clear that the United States had erred by equating democracy with one election and by not forming policy around the establishment of liberal institutions, which would ensure that liberal means would not lead to an illiberal end.”(3)

The U.S realizing its mistake in equating democracy with pro-Americanism quickly moved to impose heavy sanctions on the new Palestinian government. Whatever the reason may have been, it was certainly not to promote democracy or the Palestinians right to choose their own leaders. As Ismail Haiyeh reporting for the Voice of America observed

“Israel has cut off $50 million in monthly tax payments to the Palestinians, and the United States and Europe are re-assessing donations of nearly $1 billion a year because they consider Hamas a terrorist organization.

Arab states have promised Hamas $55 million a month, but they have rarely met their commitments in the past, and so far, they have not delivered….

…In the meantime, the economic noose is growing tighter, and Hamas cannot find a bank to handle its finances. Hamas officials say the Jordan-based Arab Bank is no longer willing to handle Palestinian Authority accounts because of international pressure.” (4)

The Attacks on 9/11 only served to worsen the situation, ushering in a new era of American foreign policy that bordered on paranoia. Preemptive strikes against Afghanistan and Iraq set a new precedent in strong arm politics and warfare. What the U.S then failed to realize is that it is not always possible to impose your will just by military might alone, the current situation in Iraq is testament to this fact. Using the Threat of WMD’s and casting Saddam Hussein as the foremost threat to American security further deteriorated America’s credibility on the international stage. The War that followed and the current quagmire that is Iraq have further weakened the United States ability to influence other nations, as was evident by the Iranian nuclear situation.

The real threat to international nuclear proliferation due to India and Pakistan manufacturing their own bombs was ignored as both countries were in some part allied with the U.S and central to U.S strategic interests. This again turned out to be a mistake when Abdul Qadeer Khan, the self titled “Father of the Pakistani Bomb” was later implicated in an international nuclear proliferation scandal that may indeed have been responsible for handing over nuclear technology to North Korea and Iran among other anti-American nations.

All these instances underline a failing American policy and a lack of understanding of the international situation. America needs to decide once and for all if its role is to be the protector of American ideal of democracy or to become an imperial power. The Secretary of Defense Robert Gates raised the same question in his address to the world forum on the future of democracy

“ Still, we Americans continue to wrestle with the appropriate role this country should play in advancing freedom and democracy in the world. It was a source of friction through the entire Cold War. In truth, it has been a persistent question for this country throughout our history: How should we incorporate America’s democratic ideals and aspirations into our relations with the rest of the world? And in particular, when to, and whether to try to change the way other nations govern themselves? Should America’s mission be to make the world “safe for democracy,” as Woodrow Wilson said, or, in the words of John Quincy Adams, should America be “the well-wisher of freedom and independence of all” but the “champion and vindicator only of our own”? ”(5)

It is sad that while America itself continues to pursue the ideals of justice and freedom within its own borders, its policy somehow dramatically changes once it considers situations outside these borders. The only real way to rectify the situation is to uphold the same ideals of democracy and freedom abroad, as are upheld so dearly within Americas own borders. It has indeed become Imperative for the U.S to discard its attitude of realism and militarism in exchange for a more idealistic perspective. Its not a certainty that “If you do not fight them abroad, you’ll fight them at home.” The roots of terrorism are based in poverty and injustice, as long as these fertile grounds for dissention remain, there will be Anti-Americanism and there will most certainly be Terrorism.

If America pursues the same ideals of democracy abroad instead of supporting militarism and totalitarianism, it would meet with much greater success in eliminating injustice and promoting liberal societies abroad. The answer lies in alleviating poverty in third world countries, promoting education, social equality, providing freedom and security for the exploited populations living under oppressive regimes and supporting the people’s right to choose their own destinies and their own leadership rather than carpet bombing entire nations into submission. Ultimately it is up to the American people to decide that it is time for a change in policy and perspective, and to elect representatives that would bring that mentality of idealism that’s much needed in American politics right now. One can only hope that in the future, a more idealistic American foreign policy would usher in a new era of peace and prosperity, for Americans and non-Americans alike.

Works Cited

1. Manicarver. “Global Unease With Major World Powers” 19 Sep 2007.

Yahoo 360 http://blog.360.yahoo.com/blog-4ysGxcs7equsuMqoe51pfmli.2Aw?p=2234

2. Hoffman, Michael. “The Israeli Holocaust Against the Palestinians” 16 April 2002

<http://www.revisionisthistory.org/palestine52.html>

3. Makovsky, David. “Promote Liberal Democracy” Fall 07

The Washington Institute http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/templateC06.php?CID=1088

4. Haniyeh, Islmail. “Economic Sanctions Empty Coffers of New Hamas Government”

6 April 2006. Voice of America http://www.voanews.com/english/archive/2006-04/Economic-Sanctions-Empty-Coffers-of-New-Hamas-Government.cfm?CFID=129499194&CFTOKEN=69255450

5. Gates, Robert. “World Forum on the Future of Democracy” 17 Sep 2007

U.S Department of Defense http://www.defenselink.mil/speeches/speech.aspx?speechid=1175

6. “US is the No 1 risk to world economy: US prof” 19 Sep 2007