Does Iraqi democracy stand a chance?

Eddie Dane

Philosopher
Eddie Dane
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Aug 18, 2007
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I do not have an educated opinion on this so I'm wondering what JREF forum members think of this.

Will democracy start functioning in Iraq?
Or will the country fall apart and see the return of some kind of strongman?
 
That's a good question. Time will tell I guess. I'd like to think it'll work out just fine.;)
 
they have to make it work, they owe it to all the people that died to make it possible.
 
It stands a chance. A much better chance than democracy in Afghanistan. But if the elected leaders can't pull together and put what's best for their country ahead of bickering then it will slowly backslide. I don't foresee a dictatorship returning but it's also possible though I think less likely than say Iran exerting its power to involve itself further in Iraq's affairs.
 
Well, granted it's only two data points, but statistically, there's a 50% chance. The "Big Mo" from Vietnam, though, might suggest failure more likely than not.

I suggest looking to see what the local US "collaborators" are doing -- are they staying, or packing up and leaving? They, more than any talking head, are putting their money, and their lives, where their mouthes are.
 
I think things are going to get a bit nasty after we leave. Agents like Moqtada al Sadr may very well be biding their time.
 
Unfortunately the Arab world has only ever known rule by force and violent transfers of power. Combine that with three decades of Fascism under Saddam. Bush and Blair were right to remove Saddam but it's going to take a long time before Iraq resembles a normal country.

Arab liberals, the people who really could make the sort of transition we want in the Middle East, are weak and democracy isn't necessarily going to empower them if people end up voting for Muslim Brotherhood clones.

Iraq is not going to be a beacon of freedom any time soon, but an imperfect democracy riddled with corruption is a big step up from totalitarian rule by a deranged, utterly insane family.
 
Virus said:
Iraq is not going to be a beacon of freedom any time soon, but an imperfect democracy riddled with corruption is a big step up from totalitarian rule by a deranged, utterly insane family.
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Sadly realistic.

Of course, the useful idiots who completely ignored Saddam's family terror rule over Iraq will be perpetually outraged about any case of an Iraqi official feather his nest with bribe money.

Because, you see, that would be something the Americans could be blamed for.
 
I knew some of the folks that died fighting in Iraq and I am pretty sure Democracy in Iraq was not the last thing on their minds when their time came.
 
No farging way. Democracy works when you get off your butt and take it, set it up from within. It doesn't survive when some outside force comes in and hands it to you. Look at that sterling example of South Vietnam -- Chicago during the Capone era looked more civilized, organized, and respectable.

My prediction is that Iraq will go the way of the Philipines under Marcos, unless some rabid Medievalist-level religious Quran-thumper has his jihadis seize power and they slide back into the dark ages.

Beanbag
 
Beanbag said:
No farging way. Democracy works when you get off your butt and take it, set it up from within. It doesn't survive when some outside force comes in and hands it to you.
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Japan says otherwise. Iraq would have even less chance of democratic reform if left to fend for themselves under Saddam's acid-bath family.
 
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Beanbag said:
My prediction is that Iraq will go the way of the Philipines under Marcos, unless some rabid Medievalist-level religious Quran-thumper has his jihadis seize power and they slide back into the dark ages.
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That's what's in my very fuzzy crystal ball, too. But I don't necessarily see those two options as being mutually exclusive is the backward slide is not quite so far backward.
 
Democracy in Europe and the USA has only come through two ways:

1. led by truly enlightened and intelligent individuals, who truly believed in liberty, freedom, democracy, and justice.

2. after the total destruction of your existing system. democracy and liberty then come in to pick up the pieces.

Iraq, neither was totally destroyed, nor is being led by truly enlightened individuals, like Jefferson, Washington, and Adams.

Therefore, I fear Iraq's democracy is on very very shaky ground. A crisis here...or a disaster there...could take them right back to dictatorship. The people have not been drinking democracy and liberty from their mothers' milk, like we have in the USA, Canada, and Western Europe.
 
Depends what you mean by "democracy".
Any political system must adapt to the cultural reality of the nation it is in.
The reality of Iraq is the Sunni / Shia divide, the wish for self determination of the Kurds in the north (both in Iraq and neighbouring states), the geopolitical reality of Turkey, Iran, Saudi Arabia and (of course) Israel and the power vacuum left by the Baath Party.

The closest thing to a "Western Democracy" in the middle east, is Israel, which is not much like either Hampshire or New Hampshire.

My guess is that the country will fragment.
 
One thing that most Americans have trouble understanding is that the concept of a massive and possibly total change of people in power every four years WITHOUT total social unrest and destruction is completely unfathomable to the majority of the people in the world. It just doesn't happen there. Here, in America, if your candidate or party or incumbent loses, while you might feel bad and be upset, you don't automatically grab your AK-47 and go out in the streets to set things right.

You have to have some basic faith and trust in democracy (even with its daults) to allow democracy to take hold and work. There has never been a functioning democracy in Iraq (or any of the countries in the middle east with the possible exception of Israel, which strikes me more as a constitutional theocracy than a democracy), and there is no functioning example to point to in the area and say "See? It works." The Iraqi common citizens have been crapped on and abused enough to where they (quite rightly, in my opinion) distrust ANY form of government. That's why I think it's more likely to turn into either a fundamentalist theocracy or a corrupt "democracy" headed by a political machine boss system.

Beanbag
 
I don't think America will leave until it's stable. And I don't mean "leave" like we supposedly did recently, I mean actually leave. There's too much at stake. If things start to go way south, I suspect the US will rush in to help out. Just how democratic things will get -- and when -- I haven't a clue.
 
Define democracy.

Elections alone do not make a functional democracy, that requires the people to be able to vote the party currently in power out of office.

Iraq is nowadays deeply divided between Kurds/Sunnis/Shiites. And to a lesser extent those factions themselves are divided too.

I think the majority of Shiites will eventually unite around a Shiite party/leader - they have to unite in some kind of constant coalition to remain dominant against the Kurds and Sunnis, eventually that's likely to lead to a single Shiite party.

At that point the elections will be decided by who dominates the Shiite party's backroom, since Iraqis vote along ethnic/relgious lines.
 
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