Nation-building imposed from outside was bound to fail

Aug 24, 2021 Letters

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Dear Editor,

Reference is made to Shamshun Mohamed’s brief letter on Afghanistan (Aug 20). There is limited relevance to Guyana. As soon as the US withdrew from Afghanistan, the regime collapsed. That should have been expected. A somewhat similar situation was played out in Libya and Iraq, where utter chaos has been the manifestation post withdrawal of US troops. The US has maintained an interest but not kept troops in Guyana.
As a student, teacher, and analyst of American foreign policy, the US made a serious errors in Afghanistan (and also in Iraq) in deciding to remain in the country after ‘dismantling’ the terror threats that impacted on American national security interests. In 1990, the US invaded Iraq to remove Iraq forces from Kuwait and quickly withdrew after mission achieved. That was a success. The US also erred in toppling the Jagan administration in 1953 and 1964 but that was a different circumstance when communism posed a threat.
With regards to Afghanistan, the invasion was to remove a terror threat that not only posed a danger to the US but the globe as well. However, US policymakers decided they would stay on and pursue nation building and impose democracy. In Guyana, the US was only interested in removing Jagan and keeping him out till communism collapsed in 1990 and then demanded a restoration of democratic governance.
Afghanistan and the Middle East region never had a history of democracy. A strong leader was historically in control of geographic areas that allowed for stability not democracy; people historically accepted authoritarian rule. In addition, the local people historically resented foreigners and rejected imposition of outside ideology on them. Thus, nation building imposed from outside was bound to fail especially when it was dependent on military intervention.
Afghanistan, like Iraq and other countries in the region are multi-ethnic states with a history of enmity among the different groups. They resented being controlled by another group and did not seem to object much about being governed by authoritarian figures within their own group. Even if an outside group were to offer them the best form of governance, as democracy is touted, such features as equal rights, free press, first world status, etc. would all be rejected in favour of governance by their own even if it is the worst form of governance. We have seen such attitude displayed right here at home at various times in our history.
The twenty years experiment to institutionalise democracy and purse nation building in Afghanistan has failed, and it has largely failed in Iraq. It has also failed in Libya and in several other countries in the region. The US, and no outside power, did not, cannot and will never succeed in imposing democracy or an alien political culture in historically feudal or authoritarian states in Asia, Middle East, and Africa. Democracy imposed from outside cannot be institutionalised in these kinds of nations. The nature of these countries, with multi-ethnic groups, makes it virtually impossible for democracy to survive and take root through outside intervention. The people themselves have to demonstrate a yearning for democracy and fight for it locally and seek outside assistance as we did in Guyana between 1966 and 1992. And even so, democracy is not absolute in Guyana as we saw the kind of governance that played out in 2019 and 2020, authoritarianism can be imposed. Democracy was restored in Guyana in August 2020 because Guyana is in the US backyard and Washington was not prepared to tolerate defiance of its demand for democratic governance. Middle East and Africa are too far away for US to impose its will demanding democratic governance.
In the case of Afghanistan and Iraq, the US (and the West) sought to impose democracy thinking the locals would appreciate it because it is the best form of government. The US and the West apparently did not understand the fractured nature of the country in which each tribe and geographic unit that it occupies wants to be governed by their own. A ruler in the capital cannot impose his will in far off areas on people not of his ethnicity. What the US should have done was to decentralise power away from the capital city and of the dominant groups – similar to what exist in the US and Switzerland, Belgium, etc. Let each region or area run its own affairs – with maximum local autonomy. In this way, The Tajik, Uzbek, or Turkmen would not feel threatened and oppose the Pashtun, etc. The Kurd would not feel threaten by Arabs. The Sunni should not or would not be worried of Shia marginalising him, etc. Such decentralisation of power should also have been introduced in Guyana at the time of independence to reduce ethnic animosity – if each group were allowed a degree of autonomy to run and manage its own affair, Guyana would have been better off. Such autonomy would have addressed the cries of discrimination and marginalisation.
So while promoting democracy in Middle East and Afghanistan was/is morally right, clearly it has not worked. The US will have to look to encourage another form of government. Perhaps it should consider a system that would give each group autonomy without carving out new independent states.

Yours truly,
Vishnu Bisram

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