Resultados de las preguntas

The Theoretical Idea

The theoretical argument for democracy by force is that authoritarian regimes oppress their people. Topple the regime and the people will welcome democracy. This conclusion is based on assumptions concerning political legitimacy which authoritarian regimes rarely have if the populations widely support democratic values, making the ‘democracy by force’ mission a relatively easy sell. A connected point is that weak and fragile states are threats to the security and the stability of the international order (Fukuyama 2005). Therefore, prospective regime change operations are likely to target poor and fragile states or states that have been defeated in war such as Japan and Germany. The fundamental notion in democracy by force is that the state exists, and the mission is only to change regime, not to build the state anew.42

The probability of ‘snowballing’ provides another theoretical option for regime change through democracy by force and suggests that replacing an authoritarian regime in one state is likely to have a knock on effect in other authoritarian regimes with similar contexts. A linked idea is found in the regional-policy argument, first advanced in the early 1990s. In the aftermath of the Gulf War in 1990, it was argued that if the United States were to sustain a large military force in the Gulf, with time, that would build the momentum toward democratisation. This argument evolved into an assumption that unless some movement towards democracy occurs, such a military deployment is less likely to be sustained over time (Huntington 1991: 15). To keep vital interests in the region and ensure stability, the US had to have a military presence, which was

42 _{The following section on democracy through the effort of state-building will make this distinction} clearer, providing a concise explanation of what is ‘state’ and what involves the process of ‘state building’.

acceptable only in the context of promoting democracy in the region and by targeting regimes, such as that of Saddam that had made the Middle East unstable.

General Patterns: Previous Empirical Studies

In the literature on democracy by force, two main points emerge; the nature and style of imposition, and the conditionality and context of the target country. The empirical findings, however, suggest that democracy by force is less likely to produce self- sustaining democratic regimes.

Historically speaking, it has been the case that the US has frequently carried out the promotion of democracy by force of arms. Laurence Whitehead (1996: 59-91) discusses the US attitude towards democracy promotion in Latin America and, in doing so, he identifies three different forms of the imposition of democracy in the case of the Caribbean. First, the promotion of democracy through ‘incorporation,’ where the US has played a consistent, sustained, and determining role in the democratisation process.43

Second, democracy promotion through ‘invasion.’44

Third democracy promotion through ‘intimidation.’45

Out of those three methods, only in the first instance, Whitehead argues, ‘the result has been a fully consolidated democratic regime of Puerto Rico’ (Ibid: 64).

Empirical studies have examined the cases of foreign interventions in relation to democratisation with a focus on the method of intervention (i.e. imposition). An examination of a global sample of states in the twentieth century have shown that a distinction can be made between the impact of ‘fully externally imposed’ and ‘weakly externally imposed’ democratic regimes. It is argued that the fully imposed cases do not stimulate democratisation, while the weakly imposed cases undermine democratisation (Enterline and Greig 2005). If a US imposed democracy, in any given country in the Middle East was successful, it would not necessarily stimulate

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The case of Purto Rico. 44

The case of Panama, in November 1903, Panama broke away from Colombia under the US protection, the new republic received immediate recognition and financial assistance, and in return, the US was granted large concession over the proposed canal route. In a similar instance, a second invasion of Panama protected the authorities chosen in the 1989 elections and terminated a tyrannical rule.

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The case of Nicaragua, the intimidation forced them to accept a high degree of International supervision of the 1990 elections.

democratisation in the region. If unsuccessful, however, the very process of intervention and imposition of democracy would undermine democratisation all together. This is diametrically opposed to the expectations of the United States.

In a similar vein, it has been argued that externally imposed democracies rarely lead to democratisation, and military intervention tends to be ineffective in spreading democracy. A statistical examination of seventy cases of foreign-imposed regime changes in the twentieth century, suggests unless conditions in the target country are favourable to democracy, those intervening meet with little success in promoting democratisation (Downes and Monten 2013). Such favourable conditions include high levels of economic development and societal homogeneity, as well as previous experience with representative governance. Given that interventions tend to target countries that are economically poor, fragile and subject to conflict, due to their deeply divided societies, with little experience of representative government, the outcome of democracy by force remains uncertain at best.

Through a focus on the significance of an organised social base for democratisation, empirical findings indicate the limited success of external democracy building in post- war societies including Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, and Iraq (Hippler 2008). This study reaches a similar conclusion, that without the necessary preconditions for democratisation in post-invasion societies, external attempts will be of little success. Parallel to those findings, an examination of the longevity of 43 imposed democratic regimes, from 1800 to 1994, suggests that the survival of democracy is firmly conditioned by factors that are all conducive to one particular socio-economic context of the recipient country (Enterline and Greig 2008). The above empirical findings not only indicate the uncertainty of democracy by force, but also highlight the centrality of context to the emergence of democracy and the extent of success in sustaining it.

The Specific Case of Iraq: Previous Empirical Studies

The Middle East, being perceived as the last stronghold of authoritarianism in the world (Huntington 1991), was where the US aimed to achieve the next triumph of liberal democracy. It was President George W. Bushes’ belief that the establishment of ‘a free Iraq in the heart of the Middle East would be a watershed in the global democratic

revolution (Bush 2003). According to the US Army General Tommy Franks, one of the primary objectives of intervention was ‘to help the Iraqi people create conditions for a transition to a representative self-government’ (Sale and Javid 2013). Regime change, therefore, was an end in itself and a means to secure a transition to democracy in Iraq.

The early days following the regime change seemed promising to many scholars. Part of the literature argued for the feasibility of democracy, and Iraq was regarded as having the greatest potential for realising a transition. Therefore, it was believed that Iraq’s democracy, if established correctly, could increase the chances and likelihood of becoming ‘a successful model’ of democracy for the Middle East (e.g. Alterman 2003: 158; Byman 2003b: 72; Baracati 2004: 158; Ryan 2010: 65).

Empirical studies have also examined the belief that forcing Iraq to democratise could propel the Middle East to greater democratisation. Empirical findings on similar historical cases, however, do not support such an assumption (Enterline and Greig 2008) and have shown that the likelihood of success of democracy by force is subject to the contextual conditionality of the host country. Iraq’s context is unfavourable for democracy.

The existing literature addresses the structural factors as challenges to the feasibility of democracy in Iraq. The lack of a vibrant civil society, the weakness of a national identity, and the presence of a deeply divided war-torn society all contribute to creating a situation that is ‘extremely unfavourable for democracy’ (Moon 2009: 147) and indicate that Iraq is a long way from meeting most of the social pre-requisites for democracy (Diamond 2005: 319; Mokhtari 2008).

An analysis of examples of the imposition of democracy reveals that there was not one case in which the primary goal of military action was, in fact, to bring democracy to an authoritarian state. Consequently, it has been argued that the military imposition of democracy in Iraq is likely to fail for reasons that go beyond the particular circumstances of Iraq or the Middle East (Beetham 2009). This argument is based on the US discourse that the prime objective of the United States military intervention was

to build a democratic regime but since regime change was involved, democracy was introduced under-military occupation and therefore viewed with scepticism.

The Bush administration was both overly ambitious and unduly optimistic concerning the consequences of democratisation by force, both in Iraq and for the greater Middle East. Two factors, in particular, account for such optimism: the crisis of legitimacy and snowballing. Those two factors have been identified as having contributed significantly to the wave of the third-wave transitions to democracy (Huntington 1991: 13). The increasing crisis of legitimacy in authoritarian regimes in the Middle East came, it was believed, from a preference for democratic values. Iraq’s pivotal position in the Middle East between the two pillars of Islam, Iran and Saudi Arabia, led to an assumption that should it become a democracy, others in the region would follow suit. It has, however, been argued that those neighbours whose regimes are hostile to democracy have undermined the democratic process in Iraq (Fawn and Hinnebusch: 2006). Not only was Iraq unable to influence other authoritarian regimes to democratise, on the contrary, those regimes had a negative impact on the process of democracy building in Iraq.

Conclusion

The empirical findings for cases of democracy by force showed that general conclusions about the outcome of democratisation cannot be made. Military invasion, even with the specific objective of democracy building, is unlikely to result in a democratic regime. The military intervention in Iraq was successful in toppling the authoritarian regime, but it was not successful in establishing a democratic regime. However, Iraq does now have, thanks to the military invasion and occupation, a representative government, an elected assembly proportionally representing different groups. Nonetheless, Iraq has a long way to go before it is a fully fledged democracy.

Moreover, the hope that the democratisation of Iraq by force might be the catalyst to democracies in other parts of the Middle East has proved to be a chimera. Indeed, events such as the emergence of Daesh indicate that Iraq’s process of democratisation has been a major cause for instability in the region. Even more telling is the fact that having large numbers of both Sunni and Shia within its population, Saudi Arabia and Iran have been able to use the country as a proxy to continue their own feud.