Reviewing Iraq's Shiny New Democratic Blueprint

BEIRUT, Lebanon--If the "Agreement on Political Process" recently signed by the U.S. occupation authority in Iraq and the American-appointed Iraqi Governing Council were a commercial Web site, I would gladly put all its shiny democratic values into my shopping cart.

The United States gets an A+ for intent. But it gets a D- for implementation.

The document embodies powerful principles of democratic pluralism, equality before the law, representational federalism, and the consent of the governed. It is audacious in the sweep, speed and clarity of the proposed democratic transition. In just 66 lines, it offers a blueprint to wipe out three decades of Iraqi-engineered Baathist tyranny and the previous five decades of British-made post-colonial incoherence, and replace them with an American-inspired Thomas Jefferson on the Tigris.

The specifics are impressive, and hard to argue with. The document is packed with references to "freedom‚" "equality‚" "rights‚" "due process‚" "independence of the judiciary‚" "transparency‚" and other fine political values. Its democratization procedures include selection of representative individuals to regional bodies that will ultimately draft a national constitution, ratification of the constitution by the citizenry, caucuses to select individuals for a transitional national assembly, a constitutional convention of directly elected Iraqis and other ringing aspects of accountable democratic governance as practiced for so many decades in America.

In short, the document encapsulates the best and worst of America today. It spells out and offers others the finest American governance traditions. But the manner of Washington's attempt to transform Iraqi despotism into Iraqi democracy is naïve and unrealistic, and its realization will be bumpy, for at least four main reasons:

1. The plan totally ignores the points of tension, even incompatibility, that will surface during the meeting of American and indigenous Iraqi-Arab-tribal-Islamic-Kurdish-etc. cultural values. These tensions will be resolved over time by Iraqis, just as they were resolved in the European and American transitions from feudalism-and-slavery to democracy from the 16th to the mid-20th centuries. Forging a new Iraqi nationalism and democracy with the crucible and moulds of American republicanism is as unrealistic as it is noble.

2. It is fundamentally imposed by the United States, and includes numerous explicit American veto powers over implementation. This "democratization" process is peculiarly undemocratic, and at second glance seems more colonial than collegiate.

3. The Interim Governing Council itself was appointed by the U.S. occupation authority. Many of its members are credible national or tribal leaders, but the council collectively enjoys very mixed legitimacy and credibility among Iraqis. (Flash back to the Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands: two decades ago the Israeli occupation authority created Palestinian "village leagues‚" tried to reach political accords with them, and failed miserably and predictably. Why? Because political bodies appointed by an occupying military power and designed to achieve the occupier's strategic goals enjoy no indigenous legitimacy or credibility, whether in Palestine, Iraq, South Vietnam, Afghanistan -- or 18th century Virginia.)

4. The agreement reflects American policy-making by panic, which is dangerous for all concerned. The agreement's content, power balance and hasty promulgation suggest that it aims more to get the United States out of Iraq than to allow Iraq to define itself. Intent and credibility usually drive implementation in the adult world, and Washington's intent and credibility here -- just as before its war on Iraq -- remain culturally confused, politically simplistic, motivationally suspect and diplomatically hasty. Washington has taken a good idea -- transforming tyranny into democracy -- and implemented it badly, because it largely acts unilaterally, militarily and through narrow American worldviews.