Just World News with Helena Cobban – Page 126 – Info, analysis, discussion

How powers emerge today

Time was, major shifts in the balance of international power were cataclysmic, violence-wracked events. Not today. (And maybe, paradoxically, we have the existence of nuclear weapons and the broad knowledge of their fearsome potentialities to thank in some part for that.)
Today, what propels a rising power upward is something quite different from raw military power. It is intelligence (especially in the realm of alliance-building); patience; and focus.
Two cases in point: China and Iran. One rising at the global level, the other at the Middle East regional level. Both have “risen” to the point they are– and look set to rise even further over the years ahead– through pursuit of a policy that in my childhood we would have called something like “softly, softly, catchee monkey” (SSCM).
China, as I have noted numerous times here and elsewhere– and building in good part on Kishore Mahbubani’s excellent analysis– has risen in the modern world precisely by acquiring an excellent reputation as a rules-player within the set of international rules established by the US in 1945. It has not sought to do so through military expansion and confrontation with the “old”, US-dominated order, but by challenging (and otherwise interacting with) the US from quite within the US-established order.
By international standards, its military buildup has been measured and restrained. The nuclear arsenal it has built up has been designed to the requirements of a slightly-over-minimal deterrence capability. Beijing wisely chose not to take the route the Soviet Union pursued, of trying to “match” America’s weapons build-up and challenge the US and its allies militarily in various places around the world.
SSCM.
Now, China has regained Hong Kong and is on a good track for building stronger relations with Taiwan. It is certainly (and quietly) emerging as the dominant power around the Pacific Rim. Even if the US still has many bases and alliances there, China has considerable soft power assets in that whole region, as elsewhere.
As for Iran, many people might not think of Ahmadinejad’s Iran as marked by any display of diplomatic intelligence, patience, and focus. But AN with all his rantings is really the epiphenomenon there in Tehran. The big-picture decisions on regional and foreign affairs are made by the Supreme Guide and by others in the clerical and Revolutionary Guard hierarchies. I have to conclude that they’ve been playing a careful and extremely intelligent SSCM game in recent years– and now, it is showing some very tangible results.
One of the hallmarks of Iran’s allies throughout the Middle East has been their ability to deal very effectively with the soft, pliant men who were chosen by the Americans to be their chief henchmen in various theaters. Mainly, I’m talking about Lebanon’s Fouad Siniora (which is where I actually started this whole train of thought this morning), and Iraq’s Nouri al-Maliki.
Both men were chosen, by their US paymasters back in 2005 and early 2006, in large part precisely because of their political pliancy (rather than, say, any strongly demonstrated commitment to any particular set of political principles.) You can go back to what I was blogging here about Iraq in early 2006 if you want to be reminded of exactly how it was that Nouri al-Maliki became annointed as PM– as a last-ditch, compromise candidate who was acceptable to the Americans– back in those tumultuous days. Siniora’s emergence to the head of the anti-Syrian bloc was a little different.
Back then, I repeat, both men were chosen in good part because they were acceptable to the Americans.
Now, both men stay in power in good part because they are acceptable to the large bodies of anti-Americans (and pro-Iranians) within their national constituencies. Amazing, really, to see, how effortlessly the pro-Iranian constituencies seem to have “captured” these two men.
Amazing that is, until you realize that (1) Both men were chosen in the first place because of their political pliancy. That hasn’t changed. (Vide the unbelievably pliant Amin Gemayyel’s amazing political turn-on-a-dime in February 1984.) And (2), actually, a lot of systematic, patient, and well-informed political work was pursued by the pro-Iranian forces behind the scenes in order to arrive at their present positions of strengthening power in both countries.
So those are two intriguing examples of the SSCM capabilities of Iran’s allies in Lebanon and Iraq. (Including, the fact that they were smart and well-informed enough to be able to “capture” the previous US henchmen to become figureheads for their own cause without the American viceroys even particularly realizing what was happening.) Iran itself has also pursued a generally very effective SSCM policy in its relations with Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries…
I want to make a broader point here, though– one that links the two cases of Iran and China that I have mentioned. This is a point completely consonant with my own existing analysis of the rapidly decreasing value of raw military strength in today’s global environment. (As I talked about, for example, in my recent USIP appearance.) In our current era, powers seem to be most successful in increasing their regional and global influence when they rely not primarily on military strength and the projection of military power in foreign theaters. They are most successful when they (a) have a keen understanding of the diplomatic and political realities in the region(s) in which they operate, and (b) use that knowledge to pursue very smart and quite frequently deliberately non-confrontational policies that gradually, over time, bring to them increasing amounts of the other kinds of power– especially “soft” power– that matter a lot more in today’s world than military power does.

Annals of gender exclusion, Part XXXVI: Bloggingheads

It’s been nearly four years since I counted the proportion of women published on the op-ed pages of the WaPo over the course of a month and found it to be a measly 10 percent. I haven’t counted recently– has anyone else? My impression is it may have gone up a little, but probably not much above 20%.
Still completely outrageous.
And now, we have the “new” media… And once again the male professional elevator and those effortlessly sharp elbows wielded by the ~~boys~~ guys have still been keeping us females largely excluded.
Today’s exhibit: “Bloggingheads TV”, which I guess presents itself as some form of an “edgy”, low-tech public discussion forum– and gets handsomely free-advertised on the NYT’s op-ed page as a way, I suppose, for the Grey Lady to make herself appear a little more edgy and modern… (But it is also, really, really good for BHTV, too. I call this kind of reciprocal image-enhancement the “Rolex watch-ads phenomenon.”)
On the front page of BHTV, when I checked there just now, I found: the names of 20 featured contributors, all of whom are male!
C’meon, guys, what kind of a world do you think you are representing, modeling, or building???
One in which men’s voices and opinions are valued quite disproportionately over those of women, it seems…
I still have to write the longer analysis I have been thinking about for a while, of how the male professional elevator actually works in practice in modern American society. There are elements of lateral cronyism; elements of mentor-protege relationships; and elements of broader social attitudes in which these guys simply assume that the women in their lives can do necessary things like the shopping, childrearing, elder-care, etc, and thus they themselves have the free time left over to engage in cutting-edge things like BHTV.
I have frequently thought it would be nice if I, like so many of my male colleagues, had a wife at home to do those things. But as it happens, I’m very happy with the mutually supportive relationship I have with my spouse.
But for now, let’s just all look at this BHTV example and figure out what we can learn from the rampant gender exclusion (sexism) on open display there…
Note: when I talk about ‘gender exclusion’, in general I don’t mean the total exclusion of females from any particular forum of public discussion. Generally, I mean only their rampant under-representation. It has been amazing, sickening, and disappointing to me in recent years to see how the gains that we made through the 1980s and 1990s in achieving a higher degree of gender inclusion in the public discourse on foreign-policy issues have in the present decade been so effortlessly rolled back. (I have some explanations for that, too.)
But this BHTV example of total female exclusion was just too blatant to ignore.

Israel ups the ante for US sitting-duck troops in Iraq

I have long argued– most recently here— that if an act of war is launched against Iran by the US or by Israel, then one of the most obvious ways for Iran to engage in the war that ensues would be to attack, or surround and cut off, the US troops distributed broadly throughout Iraq, very close to Iran’s borders and at the end of agonizingly long and vulnerable supply lines.
My argument has always been that if Iran suffers any aerial (or naval) attack– even if only Israeli forces participate in it directly– then it could easily demonstrate that that attack could not have been launched without the active and premeditated collusion of the US, whose military dominates all the airspace around Iran, especially from the east, as well as the waters of the Gulf.
That would make the US’s forces in the region legitimate targets for an Iranian counter-attack.
And now, Israel’s Y-net website tells us, quoting unnamed “sources in the Iraqi Defense Ministry”, that,

flying over Iraqi territory for over a month

the aircraft have been landing in American bases following the overflights.

The original reports of Iraqi defense officials reporting seeing Israeli military aircraft using US bases in Iraq seem to have come from the Iraqi news agency Nahrainnet. (That was also what AFP reported.) They have also been carried by the website of Iran’s international Press TV station.
But it is interesting that Israel’s Y-net carried the report– even if attributed to those non-Israeli sources. The Israeli media is, like the old Soviet media, subject to heavy censorship on all military matters. But as in the old Soviet Union, when the Israeli military censors kind of want to “get the news out” about one of their own military developments, they allow a news medium to run the item– but with attribution to foreign sources.
Update 4:20 p.m., July 11: After I wrote the main post here, Y-net updated their article, on the same URL, to feature an IDF denial that they had been doing any “training” activities in Iraq. I note this is not a categoric denial that they’ve been doing anything else, such as reconnaissance or prepositioning of materiel.)
(The second update, at 4:25 p.m. on July 14, is reflected in the new language (underlined) in the next paragraph, with the deleted material struck through. ~ HC)
The fact that Y-net carried the report, even with– at first– no confirmation or denial from their military sources close to home, ~~indicates strongly to me that it’s true. Also, that the Israeli defense authorities want us to know that it’s true.~~ indicated to me at the time that it was true– or, that some portions of the Israeli defense authorities wanted us to believe that it was true. Otherwise, wouldn’t they simply have squashed or denied the whole report from the get-go?
So that’s even more interesting. It means they want the US to know that, at one level, they have us over a barrel. Our 157,000 troops spread widely throughout Iraq are not only hostages to any Israeli military adventurism, but those of them running the air-bases where the Israeli jets have been reported as landing have, in addition, been forced to support Israeli acts that greatly increase the risk to themselves and their G.I. buddies.
Where is the national leader in Washington who can put his foot down, who can tell our Israeli blackmailers that they can no longer play around in this extremely risky way with the security of our men and women in uniform in Iraq and throughout the Gulf; tell them that their military and special-force provocateurs are no longer welcome in the US-controlled battlespace of Iraq; and thereby restore the integrity of US national defense planning?
I will quickly add a few more thoughts.

stated

posited this explanation

shaky situation

Finally, we should remember that it has all along been Pres. George W. Bush who has pushed to place scores of thousands of US servicemen and -women into the position of sitting ducks for Iranian retaliation, in Iraq. In December 2006 the bipartisan group headed by Baker and Hamilton recommended strongly that the US should withdraw a sizeable portion of its troops from Iraq and concentrate the remainder into a small number of more easily defended (and supplied) bases. But Bush’s response to that was to pump large numbers of additional sitting ducks into the potential duck-abbatoir, and to spread them out thinly into many distant parts of the country under the logic of his so-called “surge.”
It is time to end the madness, end the Israeli blackmail, end or substantially reduce the tensions with Iran (which could still flare out of control any day), and end the very vulnerable and counter-productive US troop deployment in Iraq.
We have a pretty good idea how to do all these things. But please God get on with it. This reminder from Y-net about the presence and muscle-flexing propensities of the Israeli wild card makes the whole task of de-escalation much more urgent.

From that same Monticello portico: a sale

Amid writings about Jefferson and Bush, a friend alerted me to a compelling essay in our local “The Hook” weekly paper — about another irony on the very portico where President Bush spoke. The essay’s author is David Ronka, a gifted guide at Monticello.
In his tours, “Professor” Ronka provides brilliant, well chosen phrases to describe the reasons why we still celebrate Jefferson. Yet David also helps us contemplate his unfinished work, the perplexing paradoxes of the human named Jefferson:

“For as this year’s honored guests are called one by one to the mansion’s West Portico to be welcomed into a future bright with America’s promise, I’ll be reminded of a starkly different event 181 years ago at that same portico.”

While “the sage” of Monticello was profoundly wise in many realms, personal finance was not one of his better suits. After he retired from public life, various schemes to make his estate prosperous, to train and emancipate his own enslaved community, foundered amid repeated economic downturns. Former Presidents then received no pensions, did no speaking tours, had no Presidential libraries. Jefferson knew before his death that he had become insolvent.

“Thus on a frigid January day in 1827, six months after his death, crowds of people flocked to the mountaintop from near and far, drawn by the prospect of purchasing something that had belonged to America’s third president and author of the Declaration of Independence.
On the auction block that day, and highlighted in large boldface on the bill of sale published in the local newspaper: 130 VALUABLE NEGROES, Thomas Jefferson’s slaves.”

Oh ironic wretched fate indeed, that the most valuable “asset” in Jefferson’s failed estate was human flesh. (See actual reproduction of the bill of sale)

“This Fourth of July, from Monticello’s parlor…. I’ll see the ghosts of those 130 men, women, and children huddled against the bitter cold of that distant January day, waiting for their names to be called, not to the promise of “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” as Jefferson famously declared, but into an uncertain and foreboding future.”

Thank you David for the sobering reminders:

“The Fourth of July celebrates America’s birthday, but it also reminds us that there’s still work to be done in perfecting our Union. And that work demands nothing less than our persistent willingness to open our arms– and our hearts– to each other.
We owe that much to the men, women, and children who answered the auctioneer’s call at Monticello 181 years ago. We owe that much to the people we’ll welcome there as new American citizens this Fourth of July. And we owe that much to America’s Founding Fathers, who pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor in the cause of the freedoms we enjoy today.”

Bush misquotes Jefferson

Stirred by President Bush’s actual comments at Monticello on July 4th, Ruhi Ramazani and I (sh) published a comment in today’s Richmond Times-Dispatch: Bush’s War Betrays the Sage of Monticello’s Vision for Liberty.
As we suggested last week, President Bush’s decision to speak at Monticello, the first visit of his life, sought a Jeffersonian stamp of approval for his own foreign policy legacy. (Here’s the WhiteHouse link to the speech.)

Ironically, President Bush sought to don the Jefferson mantle by claiming that, “We honor Jefferson’s legacy by aiding the rise of liberty in lands that do not know the blessings of freedom. And on this Fourth of July, we pay tribute to the brave men and women who wear the uniform of the United States of America.”

As the often forgotten founder of the US Military Academy, Jefferson likely would not object to honoring a professional American military. Yet we also contend that Jefferson would have turned over in his grave at the thought that his beloved country had justified “a war of choice” and occupation in the name of promoting democracy.
Having recently been a Jefferson Fellow focused on Jefferson’s reflections on the Declaration of Independence, I was particularly startled when I heard President Bush misquote a 24 June 1826 Jefferson letter, written just before his death, to Robert Weightman. The full passage in the original reads:

May it be to the world what I believe it will be, (to some parts sooner, to others later, but finally to all), the Signal of arousing men to burst the chains, under which monkish ignorance and superstition had persuaded them to bind themselves, and to assume the blessings and security of self government

This is the same letter cited accurately last Monday by Bill Kristol in his New York Times column.
But President Bush’s speech tellingly deleted the clause referencing “monkish ignorance and superstition.”

This omission matters because the full quote reflects Jefferson’s long-held doubts about democracy taking root elsewhere. Unlike Bush, Jefferson believed that before democracy can flourish, citizens and their culture must be receptive to democratic principles, including the rule of law and respect for minority rights.

Our essay then highlights means Jefferson endorsed for exporting democratic ideals — leading by example, via information, and through education.
We close with a reference to a theme I wrote about here at jwn last year — about the simple, yet so often forgotten original purpose of the Declaration:

More than a listing of grievances and abstract principles, it was crafted to declare independence — to proclaim America’s determination before a “candid world” to govern itself.
As the world granted America that liberty to choose its own path, so too “The Sage of Monticello” would see wisdom in America granting other countries the same freedom

What a concept.

After the wedding

I am still in post-wedding mode, after the extremely moving wedding held Saturday of my son Tarek and his lovely, talented bride, Liz Jackson. Liz and Tarek had put a lot of loving care into the ceremony itself, and into a series of activities that brought families and friends together for a weekend in northern Vermont.
The wedding was marked by huge optimism regarding the future, though with a few notes of sadness. (Isaiah Berlin once wrote, “There is no community without loss.” In Tarek and Liz’s case, one of the sad notes– for us east-coasters– is that they will soon be moving to the west coast of the USA for a few years.)
The ceremony was held in an open, grassy meadow surrounded by wildflowers, overlooking spectacular views of nearby mountains and under a broad blue sky. At the end, those present sent the couple off with successive shouts of “Mabrouk!”, ” Mazel tov!”, and “Huzzah!”
I give thanks to the Almighty that these two beautiful, and wonderfully complementary, spirits found each other.
As for me, I’ll be back blogging toward the end of the week.

Bush at Monticello: The Irony

Dan Jordan, outgoing and venerated President of the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, is getting more “love” than usual this past week. Many were dismayed that Monticello, Jefferson’s historic home, had invited George Bush to speak at its annual naturalization ceremony on July 4th. Others were miffed that the Foundation “permitted” the audience to include “indecent” demonstrators who were less than impressed by the President. (See this link for debate within the local activist community on the propriety of protests.)
To clarify, the Foundation every year issues an invitation to the sitting President to speak at Monticello. This year, President Bush accepted the invitation.
Previously scheduled speaker Kenneth Burns deferred to the President. Burns would have been following last year’s outstanding speaker, actor Sam Waterson. I commented on Waterston’s magnificent “Commencement Speech for America” here.
As for the many hecklers in the audience, the Foundation released 1,000 or so free general audience tickets on Wednesday morning. To its credit, no attempt was made to restrict who could get those tickets. Early birds got those worms. How refreshing it was that the President encountered some “free speech,” unlike so many other venues where potential protesters are kept far, far away.
**********************
I too was moved to comment upon the profound irony of the spectacle — the 43rd President belatedly getting around to visiting with the 3rd President, known to many as the “author of America.” My commentary with Ruhi Ramazani was distributed via Agence Global. I can now post it here, with notes and links we couldn’t put into the original:
Bush’s Last Fourth
by Wm. Scott Harrop and R. K. Ramazani Released: 5 Jul 2008

Irony abounds in President George W. Bush’s decision to speak at Monticello, the home of Thomas Jefferson, on the last July 4th that he will occupy the Oval Office.
For it was Jefferson who wrote in America’s Declaration of Independence that “a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires” the colonies to set forth the reasons for their rebellion before a “candid world.” America’s founders agreed — international legitimacy mattered. Two hundred and thirty-two years later, the conscious disregard for the “opinions of mankind” has come to define the Bush presidency.

If that sounds a little strong, it’s calmer than an earlier draft, which wondered if Bush came seeking to wrap his foreign policies in the cover, the perceived legitimacy that speaking from Jefferson’s porch would afford to his controversial legacy.

In the Bush view, the world commonly reduced to being either “with us or against us.” His former press secretary Scott McClellan illustrates the problem in his recent book, What Happened. Lacking respect for international opinion, Bush created alliances with leaders of a “coalition of the willing,” not their citizens. Bush praised those leaders who stood with him for being “tough” and “strong” despite intense criticism from their own publics.
This disregard for the opinions of mankind yielded a bitter harvest. In the aftermath of 9/11, most of the world sympathized with America. But America’s reputation abroad plummeted since 2002, as documented by multiple international public opinion surveys.

Continue reading “Bush at Monticello: The Irony”

Whither US Public Diplomacy?

In writing on the symbolic irony in President Bush’s visit to Monticello, (above) I took note of James Glassman’s recent statement that “our mission is not to improve America’s standing in the world.” Glassman’s comment, as the new Assistant Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy, deserves more context and question. Glassman was appearing on June 23rd, with Shibley Telhami, on the PBS NewsHour, responding to recent bashing of the American government’s al-Hura Arabic language broadcasting program. Criticisms had been particularly pointed on the CBS 60 Minutes program and in the Washington Post, with the most intense fury focusing on al-Hura broadcasting speeches by Hizbullah leader Nasrallah.
Glassman had tried to short-circuit Telhami’s contention that US broadcasting has so little to show for itself, if the money was wisely spent, or if it had any chance of improving world views of America. Thus Glassman’s statement that “improving America’s image was not its mission.”
But just what then is the mission of Public Diplomacy and its broadcasting board of governors? Glassman answered that,

“Our job is to be professional broadcasters, to show the world, to show people in places like Tibet, and in Burma, and Tajikistan what a free press is like and to tell them what’s happening in their own countries.”

This is difficult terrain, as within seconds, Glassman contends that broadcasting Hibzullah’s Nasrallah was a mistake, because he’s a terrorist. Yet were al-Hura to be a “free press” impressing “the other” with how free America’s media really is, then by Glassman’s guideline, it should be able to report Nasrallah’s comments. For better or worse, Nasrallah is a “happening” in Lebanon.
I have some empathy with Glassman. He follows Charlotte Beers, Karen Hughes, et. al. into a thankless, intensely controversial role. Critics, including those within the US government, commonly proclaim that its US policies, not the medium of broadcasting, that are to blame for poor perceptions of America in the world.
Yet if anything, Mr. Glassman, perhaps reflecting his recent roles at the American Enterprise Institute, has been quite enthusiastic about the role of public diplomacy in “winning” hearts and minds abroad – in itself. Indeed, Glassman in February 2005, defined public diplomacy as,

“the promotion of the national interest by informing, engaging and influencing people around the world. … Of course, policy counts most, and many foreigners simply disagree with our policies – in Iraq, on the environment, on trade. But we have a better chance of winning them over if we explain ourselves well.” (from 2/21/05 Scripps Howard News Service oped)

Glassman, as of 2005, was an enthusiastic proponent of US public diplomacy actively endeavoring to “influence” foreign publics – the “opinions of mankind.” His department’s own web site still quotes him as saying, “The task ahead…. [is to] engage in the most important ideological contest of our time – a contest that we will win.”
But when faced with the enormous difficulty of the task, we have the new Secretary declaring that, “our mission is not to improve America’s standing in the world.”
So which is it? To influence or not to influence; to engage or not; to “win” but “not improve America’s image?” Hopefully Mr. Glassman will help us untie the knot in the near future. Til we get that clarity, any readers want to take a crack at resolving this apparent tension? Am I being more dense than usual?
For discussion, two documents: First, a still excellent 2003 Harvard Review article by legendary US Ambassador Chris Ross, who offers “seven pillars of public diplomacy.” Much “wisdom” herein; Move over Lawrence. I especially think Mr. Jefferson would approve of Ross’s #7:

“The final pillar of public diplomacy recognizes that the United States must build the foundations of trust and mutual understanding through a genuine commitment to dialogue. We must listen to the world as well as speak to it. The failure to listen and to provide more avenues for dialogue will only strengthen the stereotype of the United States as arrogant, when, in fact, we are often only being inattentive.”

Secondly, consider the important 2003 Study, “Changing Minds: Winning Peace,” a report of the Congressional Advisory Group on Public Diplomacy for the Arab and Muslim World. Chaired by another former Assistant Secretary of State, Edward Djerejian, the report helped lay the groundwork for dramatic increase in spending and reorganization of America’s “public diplomacy” efforts.
The report’s very title speaks of “changing minds” — presumably that would include improving America’s standing in the world. Members of the advisory group included Chris Ross, Shibley Telhami, and… James Glassman.

More on coercing confessions at Gitmo

The NYT’s Scott Shane has an excellent piece of reporting today, on how,

copied verbatim

many of them false

So let’s spool back what happened here. Someone in the military (or the CIA?), wanting to use a quick and handy chart on coercive techniques that can generate “confessions”, finds one in the Biderman article and copies it verbatim. Do we assume that whoever copied the chart from the article, read the rest of the article and thereby became fully informed that the “confessions” generated by these techniques were, for the most part, quite false?
False ‘confessions’ have consequences, and not just in a courtroom (where they can rapidly lead to the collapse of the whole case against the individual who was tortured.) If the ‘confessions’ obtained in Gitmo through these coercive techniques were taken at face value and believed by members of the relevant US government agencies, then that would have led to actions that, being based on false information, would place in extreme jeopardy not only the US campaign against the terrorists but also the lives of many US service-members.
Therefore, whoever advocated and went along with the use of these coercive techniques should be investigated and perhaps even tried on charges of placing the lives of U.S. service-members at risk.
The FBI, for its part, has long known the risks and dangers– both inside the courtroom and outside it– of any reliance on coerced ‘confessions’. Some of their agents expressed their deep professional concern at the coercion they saw being applied in Gitmo and other US detention centers.
These coercive techniques– torture, as we should call them– are not only deeply, deeply, anti-humane and anti-humanitarian.
Not only has their revelation been deeply harmful to the US’s reputation around the world.
But in addition, their use– and any reliance the US and its allies might have had on the “information” obtained from them– have spread false “information” throughout the whole US intelligence system and put American lives at additional risk.
End it. Now. Close Guantanamo and all the US’s extraterritorial prisons. Return our country to the rule of law.

Some quick thoughts about democracy

Remember back in 2005, how George Bush and his acolytes provided us with a series of “purple finger moments”, using the record of the three successive nationwide polls that the US and UN had organized in Iraq as “proof” that the US invasion had led to democracy there?
I was reminded of that when Robert Mugabe produced his country’s own “purple finger moment” in recent days…
Elections on their own do not a democracy make.
In Iraq, the last of those three polls, in December 2005, cemented in place a very heavily sectarianized party system in the country. And because the US occupiers had previously demolished just about all of Iraq’s institutions of national administration and governance, the elected leaders had no levers through which they could even have hoped to govern their country. People should look at Roland Paris’s important work on post-conflict priorities, in which he concludes that the best approach is “institutionalization before liberalization.” What Bremer and Co did was quite a novel approach: “institution destruction before liberalization.” Almost enough to give the whole project of political (and economic) liberalization a bad name.
Like probably all other Quakers, I am strong adherent of democracy in all forms of decisionmaking. But here’s something worth thinking about: In our own internal governance, we never have votes at all! We decide everything by seeking “the unity of the meeting,” and in the event of differences we simply carry on discussing and deliberating together until we arrive at it. In the event of a lengthy stalemate, the holdouts may choose to “stand aside” and allow a decision they’re uncomfortable with to proceed. (Or they may not.) But our version of democracy is based on the idea that any individual, even if she is only one person in a large gathering, may be the one who has the right idea; and therefore everyone should be fully and respectfully listened to and engaged with.
Maybe in the broader world, that kind of lengthy deliberation is not often possible, and hence voting may– on some basis– be the best way to proceed. Though even then, you want to make very sure you don’t get a “dictatorship of the majority” that rides rough-shod over the concerns and needs of any minority.
In international diplomacy, consensus is nearly always a better way to proceed than through factionalism and voting.
So if voting– and all those purple finger moments– do not, actually, tell us anything particularly useful about whether a country is truly democratic or not, what does democracy actually consist of?
In my view, it rests on two core convictions:

If we can promulgate adherence to these two principles in all the communities of which we are a part– including the community of all humankind– then surely our communities will flourish!
But the idea that “democracy” can be exported to other countries through violence and war is quite bizarre. War and invasion demonstrate that it is quite okay to resolve policy differences through violence and coercion.