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by Omar G. Encarnación
Omar G. Encarnación (encarnac@bard.edu) is associate professor of political studies at Bard College and the author of The Myth of Civil Society: Social Capital and Democratic Consolidation in Spain and Brazil (Palgrave/Macmillan, 2003). This article is reprinted from the Fall 2003 issue of Orbis, FPRI’s quarterly journal of world affairs.
Not since the presidency of Woodrow Wilson, whose administration eight decades ago was devoted to “making the world safe for democracy,” has democratic promotion been a more prominent feature of American foreign policy. One political observer notes that “Bush is becoming the most Wilsonian president since Wilson himself.” [1] Having jettisoned his pledge during the 2000 presidential campaign to pursue a hard-nosed, realist approach to international relations focused on “vital interests,” in recent months the president and his advisors have embraced the idealistic notion of spreading democracy across the globe as a key foreign policy objective.
Born out of the 9/11 terrorist attacks on America, Bush’s democratic crusade is animated by the belief that Islamic authoritarianism breeds terror and political extremism and that the answer to this dilemma is the forced and rapid democratization of the Muslim and especially Arab world. The ascendancy of this approach is best suggested in the current policy toward Iraq. As put by Lawrence Kaplan in the days before the American invasion: “Never mind disarmament: Bush’s true objective is to replace Iraq’s tyrant with a regime that might have pleased the Founding Fathers and which would serve as a model for the democratization of the Middle East.” [2] Bush himself underscored this point in his speech to the American Enterprise Institute on February 26, 2003, promoted by the media as a manifesto on democratic promotion. [3] Making the case for removing Saddam Hussein from power, Bush noted: “The world has an interest in the spread of democratic values. A new regime in Iraq would serve as a dramatic and inspiring example of freedom for other nations in the region.” [4] But how will democracy-building proceed in Iraq and other potential targets for democratization?
One thing seems certain: there will be a lot of talk about “civil society.” Since the demise of communism in the early 1990s, virtually the entire international development establishment concerned with promoting global democratization—including the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID, the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), the World Bank, and private philanthropic outfits such as George Soros’ Open Society Institute—has made civil society assistance a programmatic priority. [5] Their work is guided by the central and straightforward assumption that a vibrant and robust civil society and a successful democracy go hand in hand. In light of these developments, it is hardly surprising that although a democratic promotion strategy for the Middle East has yet to fully materialize, it already possesses heavy doses of reaching out to civil society. As part of an ongoing “Middle East Partnership Initiative,” the State Department has earmarked up to $10 million in 2003 for new projects in “civil society and the rule of law” across the Arab world. [6] Nor should anyone be surprised to learn that no sooner had the first bombs began to fall over Baghdad that calls for making civil society “an important building block in establishing democracy in Iraq” started appearing in the American media. [7]
Before rushing to embrace a civil society–based approach to democratic promotion, the Bush administration would do well to listen to the growing chorus of critics of the civil-society theory, especially the voices emerging from outside the narrow confines of the international aid community. Failure to do so could have grave consequences. A considerable body of evidence now suggests serious flaws in the celebrated and widespread association thought to exist between strong civil societies and successful democracies. Contrary to popular opinion, a vibrant and robust civil society is not a requirement or precondition for a successful democracy. More worrisome yet, such a civil society can actually undermine rather than advance democracy, especially if surrounded by failing or illegitimate political institutions. Mindful of these concerns, a new conventional wisdom about civil society and democracy is emerging, which suggests that civil society is best regarded as a neutral political force—neither inherently good nor bad for democratic politics but rather dependent upon its particular effects on the constitution and performance of the political system.
These findings demand a reconsideration of the enormous stock that has been placed on civil society, especially in connection to the promotion of democracy abroad. They also encourage us to restore the overlooked (if not altogether eclipsed) importance of political institutions to the democratic process. Whether intended or not, interest in civil society is premised on privileging voluntary organizations (be they trade unions, bird-watching clubs, or, most famously, bowling leagues) over political institutions (state agencies, political parties, and the government) in the creation and maintenance of democracy. This kind of thinking is sustained by a belief in the inherent pro-democratic virtues of civil society. But such assumptions fail to appreciate a critical point: civil society can only be of real assistance to democracy if encased in stable and efficient political institutions, from a credible government to political parties rooted in society. When these conditions are present, we sould expect democracy to thrive, with civil society working to bolster democratic legitimacy. In their absence, democracy is doomed to instability or failure, with civil society serving to undermine democratic legitimacy by fostering a host of negative forms of social capital, such as apathy, cynicism, and intolerance.
For much of the last decade, the world has lived under the spell of civil society with the concept being touted among intellectuals and policy makers as the zeitgeist of the post–Cold War era and as nothing short of a panacea for virtually all the problems of the modern world. [8] Political commentator Fareed Zakaria captured this sentiment of euphoria about civil society when he observed in 1995: “In the world of ideas, civil society is hot. It is almost impossible to read an article on foreign or domestic policy without coming across some mention of the concept.” [9]
Aiding in the rise in popularity of civil society were the struggles against tyranny waged by resistance groups in Latin America, Africa, and the former communist world. During the 1980s and 1990s, a period that witnessed the advent of a global democratic revolution of unprecedented proportions, unions, women’s organizations, student groups and other forms of popular activism provided the empirical foundation for stirring accounts of the role played by resurgent and often rebellious civil societies in triggering the demise of many forms of dictatorship. These accounts, in turn, encouraged the rise of the alluring but problematic notion that if an invigorated civil society could force a democratic transition, it could consolidate democracy as well. [10]
In the United States, civil society’s rising stock is intimately linked to the disrepute of government, a process that may have culminated, at least symbolically, with President Clinton’s declaration after the 1994 elections that “the era of big government is over.” Indeed, the sense that government was untrustworthy, wasteful, and best kept to a minimum essentially drove the rise of civil society to the top of the agenda of politicians and scholars across the partisan spectrum.
A central theme in the conservative embrace of civil society is the sense that the national government in post-World War II America has grown too large and too intrusive, to the detriment of local communities and institutions—in other words, civil society. Evident in these voices is a yearning for America’s return to “the good old days,” a time when things were less complicated, when the reach of government was limited, and when citizens and local communities had greater control over their own affairs. The conservative critic Daniel Bell best expressed these sentiments when he contended that “the demand for a return to civil society is the demand for the return to a manageable scale of life,” one that emphasizes “voluntary associations, churches and communities,” where decisions are made locally, not by the state. [11]
Oddly, the liberals’ embrace of civil society is also rooted in the falling fortunes of government. While clinging to the notion that government is still relevant to people’s lives, in recent years their political engagement has been tempered by the reality of growing resistance from the general public toward the expansion of government. Thus, in embracing civil society, liberals hope to find answers to society’s vexing problems—from poverty to racism to environmental degradation—that do not invite further intrusion of the state and its institutions into the lives of the citizenry. As argued by the Hoover Institution’s Morris Fiorina, “liberals appreciate voluntaristic approaches as the principal ones available at a time when popular support for activist government is at a low ebb.” [12]
Further solidifying what has come to be known as the civil society revival is the work of a generation of thinkers that derives its inspiration from the nineteenth-century political theorist Alexis de Tocqueville. His classic Democracy in America, a contemplation of political life in the United States in the post-colonial era, was the first text to cast civil society in the lofty role of the engine of a successful democratic public life.[13] For “neo-Tocquevillean” scholars such as Robert Putnam, Francis Fukuyama, and Larry Diamond, non-state organizations of almost every size and purpose are the key to reviving moribund democratic political cultures in the United States and the developing world. [14] “Tocqueville was right: Democracy is strengthened, not weakened, when it faces a vigorous civil society,” asserts Putnam, in support of his claim that democracy thrives when it is anchored on a strong civil society, while in its absence it languishes. [15]
Such beliefs have provided the scientific rationale for the incorporation of civil society into the work of democratic promoters both at home and abroad. In the United States, Putnam’s warning that the weakening of America’s civil society poses a serious threat to the health of its democracy has led many philanthropic foundations and government agencies to support commissions and programs designed to boost levels of “civic engagement” across the country. [16] It is overseas, however, where civil society has made its biggest splash by aiding in the emergence of what some have termed the “democracy aid industry,” the cluster of development agencies engaged in democratic promotion abroad.
Total spending by international aid organizations on civil-society assistance programs topped US$4 billion by the mid-1990s, or 8.6 percent of the $46.5 billion total official aid flowing to the developing world. [17] This is a small percentage of the overall aid budget, but it is striking how rapidly civil society assistance has come to dominate international donors’ agendas. Support for civil society initiatives within USAID has grown steadily and significantly, going from $56.1 million in 1991 to $118.1 million by 1993, to $181.7 million by 1998. [18] This aid is being used to support a vast network of NGOs engaged in a wide range of endeavors, from human rights to the environment to governmental transparency.
Having reached unprecedented popularity, the concept of civil society currently finds itself the object of considerable cynicism and disdain, if not a full-fledged backlash. Attacking civil society has become a sport among scholars and political commentators, as evident in the many articles, conferences, and books devoted both to deriding both the term (for its ambitious assumptions about politics and the economy) and its proponents (for their unrestrained idealism). [19] Thomas Carothers of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, a critic of civil-society assistance programs, notes: “As with Internet stocks, civil society’s worth as a concept has soared beyond its demonstrated returns. To avoid a major disappointment in the future, would-be buyers should start by taking a close look at the prospectus.”[20]
Telling, too, is the onslaught of criticism being leveled against nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), which in the eyes of many are the very embodiment of civil society. A recent flurry of studies accuses them of fostering the very ills they are meant to alleviate: authoritarian behavior, corruption, and lack of accountability. [21] In light of this sorry state of affairs, many who once embraced civil society as a new paradigm of doing politics and conceptualizing a democratic society have begun to distance themselves from the concept. One grassroots activist writes that he and many other community organizers “cringe at the ritualized, ubiquitous usage of the phrase. We shudder at the thought that we might be mistaken for being part of it.” [22]
There is no shortage of explanations to account for civil society’s seemingly sudden fall from grace. The roots of its travails rest, first, with the concept’s ambiguity and elasticity. Over the last decade, the term “civil society” has been appropriated by a diverse cast of characters, from new left radicals to rightwing communitarians. Each has endowed the term with a different meaning, purpose, and representation to suit its particular agenda.This in turn has occasioned a veritable sea of confusion surrounding the issue of what precisely civil society stands for.
In contemporary times, civil society has been generally understood to encapsulate the “third sector” of society and a complement to the first two: the state and the marketplace. More specifically, civil society is meant to represent the complex universe of associations, ranging from civic institutions to religious organizations to recreational groups, created by individuals to advance mutual goals and values. A consensus on the kind of groups that reside within the organizational walls of civil society, however, remains highly contested.
The first fault-line among conceptualizations of civil society is whether or not civil society organizations are political in nature. For scholars such as Putnam, civil society is understood in Tocquevillean terms as essentially voluntary, non-political groupings.[23] These groups are believed to be central to the democratic process by socializing the citizenry into the ways of democracy. According to Putnam, voluntary associations instill into the citizenry democratic habits such as trust, cooperation, and reciprocity. This social capital greases the wheels of democracy, allowing citizens to apply what they have learned through their participation in civil society groupings to the betterment of government. Therefore, in countries in which civil society is weak or faltering, Putnam argues, we should not expect democracy to flourish. Instead, clientelism, corruption, and economic backwardness are thought to loom in the future for such societies.
For the international aid community, as well as the large part of the philanthropic world that is engaged directly in the promotion of democracy abroad, civil society is a decidedly political construct. It is populated primarily by resistance social movements fighting dictatorship and by NGOs serving as watchdogs for a variety of pro-democracy causes such as human and political rights, minority rights, election monitoring, the environment, and governmental transparency. These orientations of civil society are evident in the definition of civil society adopted by USAID, which anchors its many development programs on the expansion of civil society. In the agency’s view, civil society represents “non-state organizations that can or have the potential to champion democratic/governance reforms.” [24]
A second and more problematic divide is whether civil society is limited to groups whose ends, whether political or otherwise, are laudable, or whether it should be understood in neutral terms, in which case civil society can be good, bad, or something else. For champions of civic engagement such as Putnam and democratic promotion outfits such as USAID, civil society is a uniformly good thing. For their critics, however, making civil society synonymous with virtuous organizations debases the concept by stripping it of its analytical utility. Equating civil society with high-minded groups, writes political commentator David Rieff, renders the concept “a theological notion, not a political or a sociological one.” [25] In his and others’ view, such “evildoers” as the Mafia, the Ku Klux Klan, and the militia movement belong squarely within civil society, since they also seek to advance citizens’ values and interests, however repugnant they might be.
To be sure, confusion about the precise meaning of civil society is part of the allure and lore of the concept’s long and tortured history. Over the years, political philosophers as diverse as Ferguson, Hegel, Marx, Tocqueville, and Gramsci have appropriated the concept of civil society to articulate particular points of view about the relationship between state and society. [26] But as the concept of civil society moves from the realm of abstract ideas to that of policy-making, and as we consider the significant consequences of this migration, such as public spending on civil society promotion programs, it becomes imperative to define the concept of civil society more precisely. Otherwise, how do we know what groups in civil society are most deserving of public assistance and which are most likely to bring about all the good things ascribed to civil society? A growing number of civil society critics, even from quarters thought to be sympathetic to the many policy agendas wrapped around the notion of civil society, have begun to voice these concerns. The Economist notes that civil society “is universally talked about in tones that suggest it is a Great Good, but for some people it presents a problem: what on earth is it? Unless you know, how can you tell if you would want to join it?” [27]
The 9/11 attacks created harsh political realities that further complicate the picture for civil society. At first glance, these tragic events appear to have been a boon for many segments of civil society. Church attendance, for one, rose significantly in the immediate aftermath of the attacks, as Americans and others turned to religious institutions for solace in the midst of chaos and help in comprehending the incomprehensible. September 11 also renewed Americans’ interest in volunteering with organizations ranging from Americorps to local soup kitchens. Such developments have led Putnam to ponder whether one unintended outcome of 9/11 will be the restocking of America’s social capital. If so, he argues, the senseless horror of that day will have at least one positive legacy: reviving American civil society. [28]
The long-term picture for civil society both at home and abroad, however, is less sanguine. Arguably, the most notable impact of 9/11 in connection with the decline of civil society is the dramatic manner in which this event has resuscitated government, historically civil society’s principal nemesis. Since 9/11, government is by all accounts back and apparently stronger than it has been in recent memory. [29]
The rising fortunes of government are best attested in the public’s increasing trust in political institutions, from the presidency to the Congress to the local fire station. Post-9/11 polling suggests that trust in government is the highest it has been in decades. An October 12, 2001, poll conducted by the Gallup organization revealed that following the events of 9/11, the public’s wariness of the federal government and the role it should play in the nation’s daily life had decreased. According to the Gallup organization, six out of ten Americans say they trust their government, a level not seen since 1968. This finding mirrors widespread satisfaction with the government’s handling of 9/11. Americans also want more, not less, government. According to the October 2001 Gallup poll, more than half of Americans want a government that provides more in services, even if it costs more in taxes. This percentage is the highest it has been in the nine years that Gallup has been tracking public perceptions about government.
The consequences of the new appreciation for government and its functions arising from the events of 9/11 are readily apparent. The recent legislation that federalized airport security added thousands of jobs to the federal payroll and created a vast new bureaucracy to supervise homeland security, something virtually unthinkable prior to 9/11. This suggests the general public’s willingness to tolerate the creation of new government functions. In turn, its desire for government to expand and do more has curbed enthusiasm for civil society–inspired legislative efforts. Witness, for instance, the declining appeal of plans for incorporating businesses, religious organizations, and private charities in the delivery of social services traditionally in the domain of the government, from education to drug rehabilitation programs.
September 11 jolted the foreign policy establishment in ways that just a few years ago would have seem highly unlikely. In making the advancement of democracy “the bedrock of the war against terrorism,” the United States is entering uncharted territory in foreign affairs. [30] Unlike its policy in other parts of the developing world, such as Africa and especially Latin America, the United States’ Middle East policy has never had promoting democracy as an explicit goal. Over the years, both Democratic and Republican administrations have actively discouraged democratization in the Middle East on the grounds that friendly tyrants in places such as Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Egypt provide the best defense against the spread of radical Islam. The conventional wisdom also held that the political liberalization in the Middle East could also serve to aid in the rise to power of radical Islamic groups. Thus the beneficiaries of democracy in the region would be forces likely to oppose United States’ interests, a scenario vividly realized in Algeria in the 1990s. During this period no other country in the Arab world took a more decisive turn toward democracy than Algeria, but the outcome could not have been any less encouraging. Attempting to prevent the all-but-certain electoral victory of the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS), the military staged a coup in January 1992, opening the way for a horrific civil war that has claimed the lives of 150,000 people.
September 11 has also cast a very harsh light on the social conditions of the Middle East, especially the nature of civil society in this region. Many Americans were shocked to learn that some of the same civic organizations that in the United States are praised for their contributions to a democratic public life (charities, religious groups, and students associations) actively support terrorism in countries like Saudi Arabia. This is the most telling and extreme example of the growing radicalization of Arab civil societies ensuing from multiple failures of political development. As observed by Sheri Berman, a critic of neo-Tocquevillean democratic thinking, across the Arab world a plethora of civil society organizations has in recent years moved in to fill the void left by “local states’ declining effectiveness and legitimacy,” offering social services ranging from education to transportation to healthcare. [31]
But the engagement of civil society in public life in the Arab world has thus far contributed little to the advancement of democracy. Quite the contrary: it has led to the general “Islamization” and radicalization of society stemming from the rigid religious and often intolerant character of the civil society organizations now performing functions previously performed by state authorities. In Egypt, for example, the rise in influence of organizations such as the Muslin Brotherhood is “Islamizing Egypt from below,” by among other things, attacking secularism and promoting Islamic sharia as the law of the land. A lesson Berman finds in this development is that “if civil society is promoted in the context of weak and illegitimate states, Western donors may find themselves unwillingly or indirectly furthering the cause of revolutionary movements, rather than assisting in a benign process of democratic development.” [32]
Civil society’s decline was ensured by its inability to live up to its reputation as the key to a successful, democratic public life. For all of its presumed goodness, civil society, even as manifested in its most laudable organizations, is nowhere as virtuous and pure as currently presumed. The glorification of the golden days of the American civic community evident in the work of Putnam and others conveniently glosses over the many imperfections of its institutions, such as the exclusion of women and racial, ethnic, and sexual minorities. Indeed, the traditional willingness of many voluntary groupings in America to tolerate (and at times even promote) racism, sexism, homophobia, and other social pathologies seriously challenges the notion that they had anything do to with the advancement of the democratic virtues currently being attributed to them.[33] As contended by political theorist Jean Cohen, “it is bizarre to present the adult generation of the 1950s as a paragon of civicness since this period was the heyday of McCarthyism, institutionalized racial segregation, and exclusion of women from a wide range of economic and political institutions and associations.” [34] She adds that: “Civil privatism, authoritarian cultural and social conservatism would seem a more apt characterization of that period than civic virtue.”
As for the widely presumed critical importance of a strong civil society to the creation and maintenance of democracy, this may well amount to myth, or at very least an extrapolation about the American political experience that is of little resonance in the rest of the world. The widely-held assumption that a vibrant and robust civil society is either a prerequisite or precondition for the successful consolidation of democracy brazenly flies in the face of mounting evidence from a wide range of national experiences spanning various historical timeframes. Research into the rise of democracy in nineteenth-century Europe, a time of significant expansion of both civil society and democratic governance, finds that “the idea that a dense associational landscape is more likely to be a democratic one appears highly questionable.” [35] The study arrives at this conclusion by juxtaposing nineteenth-century dramas of democratization that succeeded in erecting stable democracy (Britain, France, the Netherlands, and Belgium) with those that descended into communism, fascism, corporatism, and other political evils (Germany, Italy, Russia, and Portugal). In all of these cases, the particulars of the constitution of civil society proved to be a poor indicator for predicting the development of democracy. Rather ironically, some of the nations in possession of the densest civil societies in the nineteenth century, such as Germany and Italy, found it most difficult to develop effective and enduring democratic institutions in the twentieth century.
Democratization in the contemporary period poses no less of a challenge to prevailing assumptions about civil society, as suggested by the evidence gathered in the World Values Survey (WVS, 1993–95), the most extensive empirical study of the composition of civil society across national boundaries. [36] It provides national indexes of the density of civil society calibrated by the percentage of the public that belongs to one or more of 16 voluntary groupings thought to comprise civil society. The data regarding the spate of new democracies born out of the democratic revolution of the last three decades demonstrates that a stable democratic public life can in fact be attained even absent most of the conditions usually attached to a vibrant and robust civil society. Moreover, it suggests that a strong civil society does not in and of itself guarantee democracy, much less a consolidated one.
Democracy is struggling in societies possessing some of the most vibrant societies in existence in the democratizing world (Brazil and Peru), and thriving in some lacking the requisite civil society (Spain, Uruguay, and Hungary). Especially telling among these cases is the experience of post-Franco Spain, widely praised by leading scholars of democratization as a model new democracy given the dazzling speed in which democratic processes and principles appear to have consolidated in the aftermath of nearly forty years of authoritarian rule. [37] Spain undertook to democratize in 1977, with the country’s first democratic elections since the end of the Spanish Civil War in 1939. By 1982, the country was being hailed as a paradigm of democratic consolidation. This democratic success, however, stands in stark contrast to the current characterization of Spain as a society afflicted by an acute “civil society deficit.” According to the WVS, only one-third of the Spanish public belongs to a civil society organization, versus three-quarters of Americans.
Recent research also exposes the fallacy sustained by neo-Tocquevillean scholars that democracy is always strengthened, not weakened, when it faces a vigorous civil society. This assertion presumes that effective and credible political institutions surround civil society. Absent such conditions, the combination of a highly mobilized and organized civil society and a decaying or discredited political system can be a recipe for disaster. Critics of Putnam’s work delight in pointing out that Northern Italy, Putnam’s prototype of a thriving civic community, gave birth to a fascist, corporatist state in the 1930s and more recently spawned the racist Northern League. The Weimar Republic possessed interwar Europe’s densest civil society, one brimming with all the kinds civic, voluntary groupings thought to signal a healthy, lively civil society. But this associational density did not prevent the rise of the Nazi party and the horrors of anti-Semitism; quite the contrary. As argued by Berman, the very richness of Weimar’s civil society paved the way for the Nazis’ rise to power, since it served to fragment society and to provide a ready-made network of citizens that the Nazi party could exploit.[38] This was facilitated by the disenchantment of the general public with the failure of political institutions.
Similar scenarios can be found in an uncomfortably high number of societies around the world, especially in Latin America. The recent collapse of successive governments in Argentina and the failed military coup in Venezuela in 2002 are telling examples of what can happen when an invigorated civil society meets a failing and discredited political system. Rather than boosting the political establishment, as presumed by many, civil society is likely to seek to address the situation in ways that are not necessarily favorable to democracy. This point is best captured in the New York Times’ assessment of contemporary Latin American politics following Hugo Chávez’s brief removal from power by the Venezuelan army on April 13, 2002:
In Argentina and Venezuela the agglomeration of civic and community groups known as “civil society” moved to fill the vacuums left behind by the discrediting of traditional parties. Though that phenomenon has been hailed as a refreshing manifestation of democracy, it also heightens the risk of disputes being settled in the streets instead of the courts or congress.
As enthusiasm about civil society wanes, it is imperative to ponder the consequences upon democratic promotion, a complicated proposition even before the surge of interest in civil society. Despite its ubiquitous presence in U.S. foreign policy, democratic promotion is one area in which the United States government has thus far claimed precious few successes. Boosters of President Bush’s democratizing agenda in the Middle East often point with pride to the successful installation of democracy in postwar Germany and Japan. But the broader history of attempts by the United States to construct democratic systems in other countries is decidedly less encouraging and indeed quite disturbing.
The nearly two-dozen military invasions launched in the name of democracy throughout Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean by American presidents (most notably Wilson, president from 1913–21) did not produce a single viable democracy. [39] More instructive still are the most recent instances in which the United States has forcibly removed dictatorial regimes with the implicit promise of creating democracy—Panama in 1992, Haiti in 1994, and Afghanistan in 2002. None of these experiences can be held up as examples of successful democratization. The case of Afghanistan is especially notable, not the least because this very recent and highly problematic experience is conspicuously absent from the Bush administration’s rhetoric about democratic promotion. As noted by one observer, President Bush’s February 2003 speech at the American Enterprise Institute “was most striking by what it did not mention: Afghanistan,” which today is “in considerably more perilous shape than it was a year ago.” [40]
This long list of failed missions at democratic promotion pointedly calls into question the United States’ talent for creating democracy where none existed before. More importantly, it reveals that whether a country’s process of democratization succeeds or fails depend upon local conditions over which the United States has limited control, such as the prevalent political culture. This is not to suggest that external agents cannot play a favorable, supporting role in encouraging the development of democracy, but rather that we should temper our expectations of what an external actor such as the United States can actually do.
Acknowledging this reality raises the issue of strategy with respect to democratic promotion. As presently configured, American programs of democratic promotion are woefully inadequate (and potentially counterproductive) for meeting the challenges of encouraging democratization at a global scale, especially in the Middle East, which traditionally has been a highly infertile soil for democratic governance. It is telling that the global tide of democratization that since the mid-1970s brought an end to tyrannical regimes in dozens of nations in Iberian Europe, Latin America, Africa, Asia, and the former communist world left the nations of the Middle East virtually untouched. At the present time there does not exist in the entire Arab world a single viable democracy.
The Bush administration’s policy of democratic promotion has already drawn criticism for being saddled with serious contradictions that hinder its credibility overseas. While promoting democracy in places such as Iraq, the United States continues to support friendly tyrants in Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, and other states, creating the impression that the United States only cares to promote democracy in places where it disapproves of the existing political regime. [41] Less obvious are problems of implementation: those in charge of democratic promotion must recognize the limits and potential dangers embedded in pursuing the expansion of civil society in the absence of functioning political institutions. Attention instead should be paid to crafting credible and viable political institutions. Giving up on civil society and shifting the focus to political institutions, however, will not be easy.
On the one hand, there is the significant transnational, institutional infrastructure constructed around the concept of civil society. It will certainly resist any downgrading of civil society as a democratic promotion tool. On the other hand are the reasons why the democracy aid industry has so intensely focused on civil society in the first place. Its embrace of this concept reveals a not-too-thinly-veiled reticence by international donors to immerse themselves in the messiness of nation-building, which by definition is a political operation. As contended by Carothers, a central factor in the appeal of civil society to international donors is its perceived non-partisan nature. Generally viewed as more interested in doing good than in gaining political power, civil society organizations allow donors to play a central role in the politics of new democracies without becoming entangled in the work of state agencies and political organizations such as parties or unions. Carothers writes that: “Aid providers often imagine the advocacy NGO sector as a pristine domain, free of the murky ties and tensions of ethnicity, class, clan and political partisanship that make the political fabric so messy and difficult to deal with.” [42]
Choosing to work exclusively through civil society while staying above the fray of politics with respect to democratization is a luxury the United States can no longer afford, especially in Iraq. Having occupied the country and destroyed the existing political regime, real political engineering must take center stage. Staging free and competitive elections leading to the establishment of a stable government is only the first step in a gradual and complex process of political institutionalization. This involves encouraging political competition and pluralism, developing an efficient state bureaucracy capable of promoting social and economic development, and fostering respect for the rule of law, recognition of individual rights, and separation of church and state. Whether Washington will effectively assume these awesome responsibilities remains to be seen. But only such a commitment to democratic promotion can provide the foundation for the emergence of democracy, not to mention a civil society willing and able to bolster democratic stability and legitimacy.
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