Basic Security Comes First
Robert Kagan’s argument that “Free Elections come First” (Washington Post, Oct 28) is based on an elementary logical fallacy: that two negatives make one positive. Kagan shows that sheer economic development does not pave the way to democratization (see China). Furthermore, he demonstrates that the rule of law—by which he means a fair, even handed law, not the one that protects people from violence, terror, and anarchy (see China)—cannot be established in non-democratic nations. However, it does not follow, as he suggests, that free elections per se can produce a liberal democracy.
Democratic history shows that political development must include freeing of the press, the introduction of competitive political parties, a growing middle class, and increasing respect for a fair law, in addition to free elections—all of these measures have to be introduced more or less simultaneously, albeit gradually (See the US, Western Europe, and India). When free elections do come first, as Kagan wishes, we see the election of the representatives of terrorist organizations (e.g., Hamas), unstable governments and failing states (in Lebanon, Iraq, and Afghanistan), increasingly authoritarian governments (e.g., Russia ), and the rise of populist movements but not liberal democracy (e.g., Ukraine and Kyrgyzstan).
Most importantly, political development can thrive only after basic security is established first. When people cannot go to work, children to school, or citizens to the streets, without an ever-present fear that they may be killed, then the rights to vote, speak, and assemble are going to be far from their minds. Indeed, even if they gain freedom, they will rush to sacrifice it when they do not feel safe in their homes and communities, as we have seen in Russia in the early 1990s. People do not look for a risk-free or crime-free world, but one in which most people most of the time can live without a sense that they and their loved ones are under constant attack. To seek free elections before elementary safety is provided, will leave a people neither safe nor free.
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Amitai Etzioni is Professor of International Relations at the George Washington University and the author of Security First: For A Muscular, Moral Foreign Policy (Yale University Press, 2007) www.securityfirstbook.com
Is it simply me or is this list of what a Democracy needs in order to develop the antithesis of what OUR Democracy now is? This is precisely why I have such a problem with our nation sticking it's nose and fingers into other nations development - we don't practice what we preach.
1) free press - I'd argue that our press is far from free anymore. It's owned by large interests and it's power is then sold to the highest bidder or used to further an individuals particular view. It's certainly not functioning in the role implied here which is as it was during our formative years.
2) competitive political parties - I see nothing competitive about our two-party-only system. It's exclusive and operates with a propensity to maintain it's two-party preeminence (the status quo). This brings the word monopoly to mind rather than competitive.
3) a growing middle class - Fingers should have seized up and ceased functioning at typing this one. There's no need for me to comment on the state of affairs of OUR middle class.
4) increasing respect for a fair law - Right. And exactly how many laws has our sitting president and vice president violated in their terms of office so far? More than a few. Big ones too, not "shoplifting a comic book as a 7 year old" variety either. How about the volume of corruption cases past and present that this Republican administration finds itself mired in. It would be an easier task (and a shorter list) to simply list what they've done that WASN'T illegal.
5) free elections - Yep, we're masterful in our execution of this basic of basic functions in a Democracy. There's the Bush election fiasco, our Supreme Court's questionable involvement, DIEBOLD, robo-calls, voter disenfranchising (racial, criminal, etc), rampant gerrymandering, phony vote fraud cases, and of course the Electoral College... Yep, sounds like it's working just fine here.
I'm sick of stuffed shirts in our broken government pontificating on what a "good" democracy is supposed to be and how other nations need to get on board with it. We can't even get it right ourselves. We may have done it right at one time but we've broken it and seemingly have no intention of fixing it. I can also tell you this, if our Democracy WERE functioning according to these benchmarks in the above quote then I'd bet those doing all the pontificating now wouldn't be anywhere near our government. They'd probably be in prison.
Basic security my left foot. It's also been my observation that people who pontificate on "basic security" for democracy tend to care about humanitarian issues about as much as they care about being complete and utter hypocrites (which isn't a hell of a lot).
Sorry but I really am sick of the double standard.
November 9, 2007 2:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
Actually, security is killing our democracy. On the national level we are experiencing kidnapping, torture and the loss of essential habeus corpus rights. Also loss of privacy, with wiretapping, mail-reading, library-snooping and cameras everywhere. On the open highway I have to stop in line for a mandatory border patrol check, with a dog sniffing the car. The president has signed an order extending the "national emergency" authorizing all these powers, and another order jeopardizing the property of anyone questioning the Iraq fiasco.
Anyhow, democracy is not freedom. According to the democatically-chosen ruler who was elected he has the “right” to do anything he wants to his own people—well, as long as it’s part of the “war on terrorism.” President Bush feels that he has the power to order his loyal military and police goons to round up, incarcerate, and torture Americans as enemy combatants, and to spy on Americans, and to ignore the Constitution and the laws enacted by Congress. Anybody that is not with the president is against him. That's not freedom.
In the case of the USA one could argue that first came the freedom earned in the Revolution, then came democracy and now comes "security"--the security state which is limiting the freedoms gained in step one. An example of the ridiculous extent to which this security state is going can be seen here.
ecotourism
WeGoEco.com
November 9, 2007 8:35 PM | Reply | Permalink
I don't think that we can claim any specific set of conditions is necessary for a democracy to come into existence. Furthermore, it is patently false that the rule of law conceived of as fair law cannot exist in a non-democratic society. See for example England at any point prior to 1911; Germany prior to WWI; and Republican France under Napoleon III or before universal suffrage. I think there are good reasons to say that none of those countries were democracies and yet each had a fair law. The common law has been developing for nearly a thousand years while France and Germany both had civil codes that were explicitly designed to be fair.
I don't think you can say that something was introduced both simultaneously and gradually. Or at least it is not immediately clear that those two adverbs don't contradict each other. In any case, I doubt the US would be a good example of gradual introduction of elections, free press, and political parties. So, I find this argument to be a little curious.
For what it's worth, I am not concerned by the election of terrorist groups. Democracy does not mean that other countries will elect our friends.
November 10, 2007 6:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
I guess if you kind of aim the mirror at this
whole thing, and point out stuff like where our
country, the USA, puts more people in jail than
just about any other country, how would YOU feel
if you were in China? So, there you are,
enjoying your won tons or something, and here's
a story on the news telling how this superpower
from halfway around the world is criticizing
your country, which is thousands upon thousands
of years old, got victimized by the Axis powers,
is juuuust getting going with its' modern
industry, is trying like hell to stave off
disaster and still feed 1.3 billion people,
and now you're getting lectured on your elections
and stuff while your leaders probably make
life-or-death decisions on a regular basis
trying to keep the lights on etc. You make
most of their stuff because their people are
too lazy to do it for themselves, have a
political environment that prohibits it, or
have just plain forgotten how because no one
practices such skills there anymore, but
their currency, which is starting to look
like it has red ink dripping off of most of it,
is still valued highly against yours. But
they're telling you how to run your country.
Would you be listening very attentively to
that, or dismissing it as aggressive propaganda?
How'd that song go, 'you never know just how
you look through other people's eyes....'
Meanwhile, it sure seems like we're adopting
East Germany's citizen surveillance habits,
you've got Bush giving voice to gems like 'its
just a goddamn piece of paper',
http://www.counterpunch.org/leupp12142005.html
, yeah, you gotta kind of wonder how it looks
on the other side of the 'fence', there. Then
you've got the energy thing, then you've got
the escalation thing with Iran and whatnot,
and it bears remembering that China and India
aren't stationing warships off of our coast
but rather vice-versa, well, a good third to
1/2 of the world's population lives 'over there',
and likely not too terribly happy about the
current status quo, and if we manage to
piss em off, maybe the world's largest democracy,
India, might just decide to take us to school,
there. Now that they've had a couple decades to
take notes, they're liable to make hash out of
some of all of that policy and it wouldn't be
too surprising to see both China AND India
becoming the economic and military superpowers
of the 21st century. Can't we all just get along?
LOL
November 10, 2007 9:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
What do you suppose he means by "security?"
November 11, 2007 7:15 AM | Reply | Permalink
Why does a democracy necessarily have to be a liberal democracy in order to be legitimate? It's possible that not everyone shares the same Enlightenment-era goals. It's possible that people will freely choose other forms of government. They might elect terrorists or people that the US is uncomfortable with -- it's their right to do so.
What you're really talking about is establishing a bunch of guiding principles that will limit the options of people in a new democracy, giving them the illusion of choice but making their choices inevitable.
What's funny is that the US founders would rather disagree with you on one key point -- the importance of political parties. Sure, they had their uses back in the day but people like Washington worried that they'd be abused and that they'd ultimately be bad for democracy. Washington turned out to be correct, though the parties are now so entrenched in American politics that they can't be removed.
You're also critical of populist movements. Why? If the masses in a country are suffering, why shouldn't they organize and use their power to vote in order to make their lives better? I wonder if you're thinking of Hugo Chavez on this one. There's a guy that the US really doesn't like but that can rightly take credit, especially in his early years, for trying to help the majority of oppressed Venezeualans.
Has Chavez gone overboard and left democracy in favor of some sort of dictatorship? Jury is still out but things don't look good. Of course, he might never have strayed so far into extremism if the US had supported him at the start. Instead we isolated and marginalized him and left him with little choice but consolidate his power against US threats.
The attitude that you show in this post is the same attitude that led to the US making mistakes throughout Latin America for decades. We should acknowledge as legitimate any elected government A government shouldn't have to be elected under rules that we approve of or to implement policies or administer justice in the way we would like to see.
A liberal democracy is only one type of democracy. It is not the only legitimate form.
thosethingswesay.blogspot.com
November 11, 2007 12:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
And if you read Frank Rich today, "The Coup at Home", we don't exactly have a liberal democracy here anymore either thanks to both major parties! But then Etzioni would probably agree with the Liebermans and Feinsteins that democracy at home is something we no longer can afford until we are "secure" once again.
November 11, 2007 1:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
This whole "Security first" broken record is getting a bit tiresome, isn't it?
thosethingswesay.blogspot.com
November 11, 2007 2:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
I have to admit that I'm more fearful of Etzioni & other "security" types then I am of al-Queda. Extreme some may say. But in my mind these fear-mongers really are here, spreading false fear and trying to whip up panic & terror. They are trying to make Americans forget about what America means. These people are the real terrorists. In fact I'd say our nation has been under continuous terrorist attack (from these unstable people) since 9-11.
I suggest we take all the fear fanatics and get them medicated and into some rubber rooms. And don't worry Mr. Etzioni, we'll make sure there are nite-lites in there so the boogyman shouldn't be too much of a problem.
November 11, 2007 2:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'm rights-oriented (and eurocentric) enough not to worry too much about asserting as goals and values such things as a free press that Etzioni places under liberal democracy. To that extent, I don't fully agree with the comments. But I do agree with those concerned that his "security first" line is a threat.
I'd go further and say that his lumping them together is illogical. They may even be at odds, and certainly the democracy talk has often been a lame and not entirely honest excuse for toughness, especially when for so long human rights were derided when they stood in the way of an "assertive" America. Oh, you see, we're not militarist. We're just looking out for their interests. That's, after all, the wingnut line after WMD as an excuse ran out of credence.
John
http://www.haberarts.com/
November 11, 2007 5:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
"I don't think you can say that something was introduced both simultaneously and gradually. Or at least it is not immediately clear that those two adverbs don't contradict each other. In any case, I doubt the US would be a good example of gradual introduction of elections, free press, and political parties. So, I find this argument to be a little curious."
It only makes sense in a post-regime change scenario.
November 11, 2007 7:48 PM | Reply | Permalink
Implicitly, Etzioni appears to maintain that a secure society with a free press and those other attributes (let's call it the "civic package") will inevitably be a good society.
Which ,presumably he thinks describes the United States for all or much of its existence.
But those fathers of the country besides writing eloquently in the Federalist Papers either owned slaves or at the very least tolerated slavery.
And their children subjected the native americans to near genocide.
And in 1930s Europe the "civic package" was consistent not only with Hitler but with the UK Mosleyites, the Spanish Falange and near majority fascist partes nearly everywhere.
And here the "greatest generation" lived comfortably with both Jim Crow and Joe McCarthy.
As we do with Waterboarding and Gitmo.
And Isreal , which surely manifests the "package", just as surely manifests behavior in the occupied territories which is troubling to many Isrealis.
Quite possibly I'm putting words in his mouth and his actual contention is that the "package" is a necessary but not a sufficient condition for a good society.
Probably true.
But I wish not only that he recognized how insufficient the "package" is and always has been but also that he addressed the more important question of what other things are required to produce a truly humane society.
November 11, 2007 8:23 PM | Reply | Permalink