Bloodless Coup

Promoting Democracy Through Economic Reform

This post by Publius is important in that it directly confronts two points we typically don’t highlight often enough when discussing how democratic government can be spread around the world. First, successfully developing democratic institutions and norms usually depends on a country adopting significant economic reforms. Secondly, accomplishing and maintaining such reforms demands major structural shifts in most societies. These are matters that we should generally consider when making foreign policy, and matters that should be at the front of our mind if we attempt to democratize the world through the use of force. An invasion alone cannot accomplish democratization. Publius believes that economics is the key to transforming the Middle East, and while that might be a tad simplistic, there is a lot of truth in that statement.

There are some other key points in this post. One is that in most cases successful democratization requires engagement with elements of the ancient regime. Yes, ideologically and emotionally we find working with or buying off these elements to be distasteful, but the simple fact of the matter is that such actions have almost always been necessary to establish the stability that is required for a systemic change in the structures of government. It is unsavory, and perhaps ethically it forgives to much, but if we wish to achieve our goal we have little choice.

He also discusses some of the basic structural reasons why Iran should emerge as the next successful Middle Eastern democracy (of course Deputy Secretary of State Armitage has already referred to it as a democracy, but I presume Publius means a liberal democracy). These are excellent points, and they highlight key reasons why the invasion of Iraq can be viewed as a costly blunder, and why we should be extremely reluctant to attack Iran and foment anti-Americanism there in the near future.