DEMOCRATIZATION
POLS 258

Fall 2004

Final Paper - Due in class Tuesday Dec 7

This paper should be 12-15 pages long, with one-inch margins on all sides and 12-point font. All late papers will be graded down 5 points (1/2 of a grade) per late day unless the late submission is excused both by the professor and by the class dean. Anything more than a VERY SMALL NUMBER of spelling or grammatical errors will result in points being deducted from your grade.

WHEN SUBMITTING YOUR PAPER, put your name ONLY on a cover sheet that is stapled to the END of the paper, so that I can grade them anonymously. In other words, do not put a cover sheet with your name on it as the first page of your paper, and do not put your name at the top of any page of the paper. I also want you to email me the paper.

The Current Political "System" of Iraq and the "Roadmap" to Democratization Post-June 30, 2004

From the summer of 2003 until June 28, 2004, Iraq was ruled by a combination of the 25-member Iraqi Governing Council (IGC) and the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA), the U.S. occupation authority headed by Paul Bremer. The CPA was the final authority on all matters - Bremer picked the 25 members of the IGC after consultations with Iraqis, and he was able to, and did, veto resolutions passed by the IGC. The members of the IGC were primarily drawn from the ranks of Iraqis who had been living in exile outside Iraq, in many cases for decades prior to Saddam Hussein’s removal from power. Many of these IGC exile members were involved in the Iraqi National Congress (INC) headed by Ahmad Chalabi, which had been funded by the U.S. in the 1990s; the INC actively campaigned from exile for an American invasion of Iraq. Many local Iraqis were upset by this way of composing the council, pointing out that it favored exiles who had little understanding of the current state of the country, and often little or no popular support in Iraq, instead of giving power to people who had remained in Iraq throughout Saddam Hussein's rule and had an immediate understanding of politics on the ground. The IGC seats were distributed in a way that was roughly proportional to the relative size of the three main ethnic/religious groups in Iraq - Sunnis had 4 seats, Kurds 5, and Shi'ites 14 (two additional, much smaller religious/ethnic minority groups also each had one seat). 3 of the 25 members were women.

In early March 2004 the members of the IGC signed an interim constitution that set out the way that the permanent Iraqi constitution would be arrived at. This interim constitution, called the Transitional Administrative Law (TAL). 

The TAL  

The TAL calls for elections to be held by January 30, 2005, to elect a 275-person National Assembly. The TAL stipulates that 25% of the seats in the transitional national assembly should go to women.

The main task of the Assembly will be to draw up a permanent constitution that resolves the key questions of government in Iraq, including whether it will have a presidential or a parliamentary system, what its voting system will be, and whether and to what extent the country will adopt a federal as opposed to a unitary government structure. According to the TAL, this constitution must be drawn up by August 15, 2005, and will be voted on in a popular referendum no later than October 15, 2005. If the constitution fails to win a majority of the popular vote, or if two-thirds of the voters in three or more of Iraq's current 18 governorates fail to support it, then the draft constitution will be rejected and the National Assembly will be dissolved. Elections for a new Assembly will be held by December 31, 2005, and this new Assembly will draw up a new constitution within the following year which will again be sent to popular vote through a referendum. Until such time as a permanent constitution is adopted, the transitional constitution cannot be amended except by a three-quarters majority of the National Assembly and unanimous approval of the Presidential Council.

The TAL was almost rejected before its creation, primarily by Shi'ite representatives. They objected to two issues. The TAL says that the permanent constitution can be rejected by a two-thirds vote in three governorates, which in effect means that the Kurds alone could reject the constitution. The Shi'ite representatives said this gave the Kurds power disproportionate to their numbers in the population. Similarly, they argued that the presidential council to be created in the interim government - a three-person presidential council which presumably would be made up of a Sunni, a Shi'a, and a Kurd - did not reflect Shi'ites' majority status in the population and wanted instead a presidency that would rotate among five presidents - 3 Shi'ites, a Kurd, and a Sunni.

The major points of the TAL are as follows. Islam is to be a source of legislation (i.e. not the only source) of legislation, but no legislation can infringe upon the "universally agreed-upon tenets of Islam." Arabic and Kurdish will be the official languages.

There will be a presidential council of a president and two deputy presidents, picked by the Assembly. The National Assembly elects the president from among its own members by a two-thirds majority; the person with the greatest number of votes becomes president, the second largest number of votes first deputy president, and the third largest number of votes second deputy president. All decisions of this presidential council will be made by consensus. The presidential council can veto legislation passed by the Assembly, which can then override the veto by a two-thirds vote. The council will also have powers of appointment, including appointments to the high court in consultation with the Higher Judicial Council. The presidential council nominates the prime minister, in whom most political power resides, including the all-important post of commander-in-chief of the armed forces. Candidates for the National Assembly or the presidential council cannot simultaneously be serving in the armed forces. The National Assembly can reject a prime ministerial nominee or call a vote of no confidence in a standing prime minister and her government. The National Assembly can also remove any member of the presidential council for incompetence or lack of integrity by a vote of three-quarters of its members. Members of the National Assembly can previously have been high-ranking Ba'ath members if they are willing to sign a statement denouncing the party and renouncing all ties to it. Former members of the "former agencies of repression" or those who participated in the persecution of the Iraqi people cannot run for the Assembly or the presidency. Candidates for the presidency cannot have been members of the Ba'ath Party within the last ten years and must not have participated in repressing the uprising of 1991 or in the anti-Kurdish Anfal campaign. Neither any member of the National Assembly or of the Presidential Council can be currently serving in the armed forces.

The Federal Supreme Court, whose members are picked by the presidential council, is the highest Iraqi court and has powers of judicial review. All Iraqis, regardless of religion, gender, or ethnicity are equal before the law, and free speech, freedom of association, the right to demonstrate and go on strike, and the right to a fair trial will be guaranteed. Police need a judicial warrant to search private homes.

The interim constitution seems to call for a fairly weak form of federalism in which the key powers are retained by the central government, which maintains control over foreign policy, fiscal policy, and management of oil. The major exception to this is the Kurds - the Kurdistan Regional Government that has administered the Kurdish areas since 1991 is recognized as the official government of those areas, and the Kurds will at least initially retain their own armed forces and judiciary, although these at least in theory should be subject to the orders of the Iraqi army and the Federal Supreme Court. The boundaries of the 18 governorates will not be changed during the transitional period.

On June 28, 2004 the Iraqi Interim Government assumed authority. It is made up of a President and 2 deputy vice presidents, a prime minister, and a 100 member Interim National Council. The prime minister, Iyad Allawi, was chosen by the U.S. Coalition Provisional Authority, the old Iraqi Governing Council, and a U.N. representative. The Transitional Law called for a National Conference of at least 1,000 people to select the members of the INC. This Conference, attended by 1,300 people mostly picked by others in their local area, was held in late August, 2004, after a 2 week delay. The Conference occurred during fierce fighting in Najaf against Muqtada al-Sadr, and Sadr as well as a major Sunni organization boycotted the National Conference. One quarter of the members of the delegates to the National Conference were women, as are 25 of the 100 members of the new Interim National Council. The INC cannot make laws but can veto executive orders of the government by a 2/3 vote of its members.

Your Job

Answer in 12-16 pages EACH of the following questions. Assume in answering the questions that a reasonable degree of security has been established in Iraq, that crime has been decreased to "manageable" levels and that suicide bombings and other politically-motivated violence have largely ended. In other words, YOU ARE NOT BEING ASKED to offer a political or military strategy for ending the current violence, only to speculate on what would be the best decisions on structuring the political and economic systems of the future Iraq.

• What social, economic, cultural, or other factors currently exist that make you optimistic about the prospects for successful democratization in Iraq? What factors make you pessimistic? (You need both optimistic and pessimistic factors). Does Iraq's political history in this century - particularly the experience of the Kurds between 1991 and 2003, when they had almost complete control over Kurdistan and thus were free to fashion the kind of government that they liked - provide reasons for pessimism or optimism? (The way Iraqi Kurdistan was run during Kurdistan's de facto "independence" between 1991 and 2003 is discussed in the McDowall readings; a few extra pages of very concise explanation of this period can be found in the article "Almost Unnoticed: Interventions and Rivalries in Iraqi Kurdistan," Isam al-Khafaji, Middle East Report Online, January 24, 2001 (http://www.merip.org/mero/mero012401.html)). Explain why you believe the factors that you have chosen are positive or negative harbingers for democratization.

2) As an experienced student of successful and failed democratizations, do YOU think a presidential or a parliamentary system, and a plurality or a proportional representation voting system, would be best for Iraq?  

• Assume the Iraqi state will be a federal state. Should the number or shape of the current 18 provinces be changed? (one thing to consider here is whether the state boundaries should be drawn in such a way that most of the states have a Kurdish or Shi';a or Sunni majority, or in such a way that people of different groups are intermixed within as many states as possible.)
  
  (Note: You should spend the most time, and pages, on your answers to questions 3 & 4).

• Many of our readings this semester have argued that heavy dependence of a country's economy on oil generally hinders the development of democracy. While oil has been and will continue to be a major source of Iraqi income, successive Iraqi governments beginning in the 1950s also developed a strong industrial sector. In the 1950s government funds were used to develop transportation infrastructure like roads and ports, and subsequently much of the oil money was spent on industrialization. Many of these industries were state controlled, but Saddam Hussein's government engaged in significant programs in the late 1980s and early 1990s to privatize both agricultural and industrial enterprises. Building both on the readings below on the 1980s-1990s period, and the discussions in the Medani and CSIS readings on the Iraqi economy today, what is your assessment of the chances for the creation/rebuilding of a strong Iraqi private sector outside of oil (in other words, what are the chances for building a more diversified economy in which oil is not the only source of wealth?) What would this require? Who should be in charge of spending the oil money?

How should distribution of oil monies among the states be handled?

Readings 

The Immediate Situation  

• " Iraq's Chaos: Why the Insurgency Won't Go Away," Ahmed Hashim, Boston Review, October/November 2004  

• "Progress or Peril? Measuring Iraq's Reconstruction," Center for Strategic and International Studies, September 2004, ii-xi, 4-78  

Human Rights Watch, "Climate of Fear: Sexual Violence and Abduction of Women and Girls in Baghdad," July 2003, pp. 3-15

Background on the Pre-War Political Situation, and the Major Issues Currently Facing Iraqi Women, Sunnis, Shi'ites, and Kurds

• Dr. Phebe Marr's testimony at the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, August 1, 2002, pp. 170-177 of the text (ER, but because the document is over 200 pages long, it may take a long time to load on ERes. It may be quicker to just go directly to (http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=107_senate_hearings&docid=f:81697.pdf)

• International Crisis Group, " Iraq's Shi'ites Under Occupation" (ER)

• International Crisis Group, "War in Iraq: What's Next for the Kurds?" March 19, 2003, pp. 10-22 (ER)

• Human Rights Watch Briefing Paper, "Background on Women's Status in Iraq Prior to the Fall of Saddam Hussein's Government," November 2003 (ER)

• "The Next Iraqi War? What Kirkuk's Struggle to Reverse Saddam's Ethnic Cleansing Signals for the Future of Iraq," George Packer, The New Yorker, October 4, 2004 (ER)

• Craig Smith, "3 Groups Already Squabbling Over Oil-Flush North Iraq," New York Times, September 12, 2002

Economics - Then, and Now 

• Isam al-Khafaji, "State Incubation of Iraqi Capitalism," Middle East Report, Sept-Oct 1986

• Kiren Chaudhry, "On the Way to Market: Economic Liberalization and Iraq’s Invasion of Kuwait," Middle East Report, May-June 1991, pp. 14-23

• Khaled Mustafa Medani, "State-Building in Reverse: The Neo-Liberal ‘Reconstruction’ of Iraq," Middle East Report, Fall 2004

• David Bacon, "Saddam's Labor Laws Live On," The Progressive, December 2003

Prescriptions: What, Specifically, Should A Democratic Iraq Look Like?

• International Crisis Group, " Iraq's Constitutional Challenge," November 13, 2003, pp. 1-2, 10-18

• Kurdistan Regional Government, "Constitution of the Federal Republic of Iraqi" (sic), Sat Feb 14, 2004, www.krg.org/docs/Federal_Const.asp (Note: this is the Kurdistan Regional Government's ideal Iraqi constitution; it is included here not because it is actually in force but because it demonstrates the Kurdish political parties' ideal stance.)

• Adeed and Karen Dawisha, "How To Build A Democratic Iraq," Foreign Affairs, May/June 2003

• Chappell Lawson, "How Best to Build Democracy: Laying A Foundation for the New Iraq," Foreign Affairs, July/August 200-3 (response to the Dawishas' article)