Engaging Egypt's Islamists? Easier Said Than Done
Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood registered a stunning success in the November-December legislative elections, winning 61% of seats it contested. Its achievement can be attributed to its extensive social networks, the weakness of registered opposition parties and the relatively open electoral process. The Brotherhood's gains and resulting legitimacy appear to add credence to calls for the West to deal with it. Domestically, the results suggest that the regime of President Hosni Mubarak may need to accept a cautious accommodation with the Islamists.

But international engagement may not be so easy. The Brotherhood has a mission, “at the forefront of which,” says its leader, is “confronting the corruption that comes to us from the west.” While nominally open to dialogue with the US, Supreme Guide Mohamed Mahdi Akef is “certain they want to engage in dialogue with us only to arouse people against us,” warning that “we will clash with them from the very first round.” “US democracy,” he insists only “seeks to intensify backwardness.”

“We don't think they have anything to offer us that will be in our interest,” Akef argues, insistent that efforts to engage Islamists are simply a ruse to protect the interests of the US and Israel, “a group of Zionists implanted here by the United States, the east, and the west so that they get rid of evil in their countries,” he maintains.

Akef blames the West for retarding the Muslim world's development in Israel's defense because “when the 300 million Arabs and the 1,500 million Muslims reach the same scientific, cultural, economic, and technological level, then neither Israel nor the United States will be able to do anything.” A Muslim Brotherhood government in Egypt would not recognize Israel, “an alien entity” in the region. “We expect the demise of this cancer soon,” he says.

Islamists are now Egypt's strongest opposition force, says Emad Shahin, a political science professor at the American University in Cairo and a leading expert on political Islam. The US must develop “a coherent, consistent policy toward dealing with political Islam,” he argues. “The possibility of political Islam maintaining good and strong showing in parliaments on the ground as political parties, in terms of social networks, realistic institutions is …a de facto situation,” he argues while cautioning against “undoing history or trying to prefabricate … or engineer societies.”

Akef's comments will disappoint those who believe engaging the Brotherhood through the political process will exert a moderating influence. Although Islamists tried to kill him ten years ago, Nobel Prize Laureate Naguib Mahfouz still expresses the hope that engaging in politics “would make the religious current more pragmatic.” Human rights activist Gamal Eid is less sanguine. ”If the Brotherhood assumes power, they will not adopt democracy,” he states.

Fearing that the early legalization of the Brotherhood – known as Al-Ikhwan in Arabic -- would enhance the further "Islamization" of politics, Hala Mustafa, wants to push the debate on reform beyond elections. “Change must take place through constitutional reform that will restructure political life to allow new and dynamic parties to compete with Mubarak's NDP,” says the editor of the quarterly journal al-Dimuqratia (Democracy). Egypt needs “a reshaping of the political elite to include a greater diversity of voices.”

Relatively moderate voices within the Brotherhood like Essam El-Erian point to Islamist political engagement in Jordan, Morocco, Iraq, and beyond the Arab world, in Pakistan, Malaysia and Indonesia, to highlight their democratic commitment and credentials. The Brotherhood has sought to play down its strength and prospects of seizing power. “Power? Not until another 50 years,” says politburo official Abdel Moneim Abul Futuh.

Yet the organization is demonstrably a mass movement, deeply-embedded in professional unions and syndicates, running an extensive “parallel state” of social services and welfare, and openly committed to the Islamisation of Egyptian society. It has all the trappings but not the status of a political party on the cusp of power. “The paradox today is that the NDP is only an organ of the current regime and the Muslim Brothers are organized like a proper party despite not having the right to be one,” says Egyptian analyst Amr Shubaki, from the Al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies.

The group's reinforced parliamentary presence “would make them practice politics, get accustomed to political participation and the public process and force them to mingle with other political forces,” argues Ahmed Thabet, a Cairo University political scientist. The process “could help them learn more about democratic traditions and believe in genuine pluralism.” But Akef's recent statements, echoing the inflammatory rhetoric of Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, suggest the moderating process has a way to go.

Other voices within the Islamic movement have stressed their respect for constitutional democracy and Akef accepts “rotation of power”, that “people are the source of authority”, and that rulers must be elected. But in doing so he insists on equating the civil and the religious. “Islamic is the same as civil,” Akef argues. “There is no such thing as a religious state in Islam, it just doesn't exist. It's a civil state. When Islam endorses a state it does so through the mechanisms that define the modern state today…. The principles of the civil state are the principles of Islam.”

Elections Prompt Rethink in NDP and Democratic Opposition
The recent elections, while marred by violence and malpractice, saw a six-fold increase in the Brotherhood's parliamentary representation. Its delegation will prioritize abolition of the emergency law and military courts, limiting presidential powers and amending Articles 76 and 77 of the constitution. It will pursue significant political and constitutional reforms, says Khairat el-Shatir the Brotherhood's vice-president.

The poor performance of the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP) has sparked internal recriminations and undermined the regime's legitimacy. The technocrats around Gamal Mubarak stress that NDP's old guard were in charge of the disastrous electoral performance (only 145 or 33.5% of 432 officially fielded NDP candidates secured seats) while veteran autocrats fault the reformist policies of the younger generation. Conceding the “appalling reputation” of “certain faces within the NDP,” party reformers like Hossam Badrawi are looking to civil society. Badrawi highlights “the need for political non-governmental groups” and expresses an expectation that “in the wake of the election results new ideas and new forms of organisation will emerge.”

The liberal democratic opposition was all but wiped out in the elections. “I do not believe there is a secular opposition to speak of today,” argues one reformer, taking some solace from the fact that “the political wasteland we face today can't last forever.” Reformers also find consolation in the low turnout -- only seven million of 32 million registered voters – to suggest that there is a large but latent constituency to be mobilized for a moderate centrist politics committed to reform.

But their defeat marks a victory for Mubarak and a vindication of Arab authoritarians' well-worn strategy of squeezing political space for bona fide democrats while allowing Islamists to organize on the terrain of Islam. “Mubarak's police state has made it nearly impossible for liberal and secular opposition parties to grow,” says Saadeddin Ibrahim, noting the emergency legislation which since 1981 has banned large gatherings, protests or demonstrations. “But the Muslim Brotherhood has weekly access to millions of Egyptians in the country's more than 100,000 mosques, as well as through the clinics and hospitals where it provides desperately needed social services.”

A new political party could “mobilise the silent majority that boycotted the election and is currently alienated from the entire political process," argues Abdel-Moneim Said, an NDP reformer and head of the Al-Ahram Centre. "We have political capital out there and we have to understand the concerns and aspirations of voters and rally them around new political ideas.” Such arguments have fuelled speculation about an emerging third force that would convene NDP reformers, liberal democrats and al-Wasat moderate Islamists.

Perhaps Egypt's beleaguered democrats should take a note out of the Islamists' book – and learn from the historical experience of Europe's democrats, of both right and left - and develop a “social democracy” that extends beyond constitutional reform to address the material needs and interests of Egypt's impoverished and immobilized masses. Their international supporters have a role to play too, suggests a recent analysis of the travails of Egypt's democrats. Beyond the poor electoral performance of different parties, “the proliferation of diverse platforms emphasises the lack of a mainstream organisation that can aggregate and coordinate diverging objectives and represent a coherent majority,” says FRIDE's Irene Menéndez. It is precisely here that groups like the recently-formed Egyptian Democracy Support Network could play a major role.

Arab Reform - Foundations Laid……
Notwithstanding the promising democratic portent of this year's elections in Iraq, Lebanon, Egypt, and the Palestinian Authority, the Middle East's "fossilocracies" continue to resist the growing impetus for democratic reform. The elections helped Lebanon, Iraq and the Palestinians join Israel and Morocco in the top five of a new Middle East freedom index and improved the region's standing in the Freedom House rankings (see below). But the region's autocrats and authoritarians combined to undermine the recent Euro-Mediterranean summit (see below) while Egypt, with the passive connivance of other Arab states, spoiled last month's Forum for the Future, effectively vetoing a final declaration over the issue of NGO autonomy.

The forum, hosted by Bahrain, was expected to launch a Foundation for the Future to promote democratic development within the region. A draft copy of the final declaration pledged delegates "to expand democratic practices, to enlarge participation in political and public life (and) to foster the roles of civil society including NGOs." But participants failed to agree the draft after Cairo insisted that NGOs be "legally registered in accordance with the laws of the country.” Egypt was supported by delegations from Saudi Arabia, Oman, Bahrain and Tunisia. Arab regimes were fearful of a provision in the proposed package of financial incentives that allowed unregistered NGOs to receive foreign funds.

The forum was not a vehicle for imposing democracy. “Democracy is not imposed, dictatorship is,” US Assistant Secretary of State Daniel Fried told a press conference. The forum creates space for consultations and co-operation, stressed Barry Lowenkron, assistant secretary of state for democracy, human rights and labour. “It is not a war council.”

Yet Egypt joined other regimes in attributing mischievous if not malign intent to G-8 efforts to promote reform. Egypt's foreign minister complained that the US and Europeans wanted “an open season for everybody,” a carte blanche for funding political NGOs through which “anybody can acquire anything from anybody at any time.” Cairo nevertheless only managed to postpone rather than sabotage the foundation's launch. "Discussions aimed at formalizing the declaration are due to take place soon in Jordan," said Bahieddin Hassan, director of the Cairo Institute for Human Rights, who attended as a member of Egypt's non-governmental delegation.

While the foundation is not yet fully operational, US officials joined local activists in feeling satisfied at the start made in Bahrain. "The foundation is not fully created. We don't have the Board of Directors, and we still have to work out the charter of the foundation," said J. Scott Carpenter, Deputy Assistant Secretary in the State Department's Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs. "What has been agreed is the principles that will guide the formation of that charter, so what we fully expect is that the foundation will be able to fund organizations in any country in the region.”

Foreign ministers of 30 states and the G8 industrial democracies attended the forum, alongside representatives of international and nongovernmental organizations. The forum is integral to the G-8 BMENA plan of support, incorporating practical initiatives to promote regional development. As UK foreign secretary Jack Straw noted, the Bahrain forum was notable for civil society's participation on an equal footing with governments.

The Foundation for the Future initially comprises a $54 million fund to support civil society groups promoting human rights and democracy. To date, committed financial supporters of the Foundation for the Future include Bahrain, Denmark, the European Commission, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Morocco, Jordan, the Netherlands, Spain, Switzerland, Turkey, Qatar, Yemen, the United Kingdom and the United States.

With over 100 million people expected to enter the Arab labour market by the year 2013, Bahrain also witnessed the launch of a new Fund for the Future to promote economic reform and innovation. “This foundation will help people with good ideas," said Charles King Mallory, senior adviser on Near Eastern Affairs for the US State Department. The fund will deploy an initial $100 million in equity investments and technical assistance to small and medium-sized enterprises. Although financed by G8 and other governments, the fund's board will be independent, comprising private sector representatives entirely. Egypt, Morocco, Denmark, the United States and Bahrain have pledged to support the Fund for the Future.

…… Despite 'Duplicitous' Regimes
The region's democratic reformers largely welcomed the Forum for the Future initiatives and showed little surprise at Cairo's machinations. The foundation would help civil society groups "achieve the common goals of promoting the values of human rights and democracy,” said Yemeni democracy advocate Ezzedin Alasbahi, and help meet popular aspirations “for human development, for liberty and for freedom." Arab civil society organizations are pursuing democratic reforms as a “necessity for us to catch up with modernization," argued Abdulnabi al-Akri, coordinator of a parallel conference of Arab NGOs. Local reformers accuse the region's governments of duplicity. “Arab leaders speak the language of human rights and freedom in international meetings,” argued one observer, but address citizens and civil institutions in a “harsh tone, which rejects reform.”

The Egyptian position “falls straight in line with their traditional policy vis-à-vis civil society and human rights," said Mahmoud Ali of the Association for the Development of Democracy. "They want to control all the aid to civil society," argued the Ibn Khaldoun Center's Saadeddin Ibrahim. “The Egyptians are always the problem with democracy. . . .They are the ones who spoiled the final democracy document by holding out.”

Some commentators suggest the regimes are running out of options at a time when the “old security valves are no longer operational” and emerging democracies like Iraq threaten to fracture the Arab League – “a pharmacy that owns nothing but good intentions, old drugs, and expired bandages.” The region's states appear caught between Iraq and a hard place. “Speeding up the reform could open the gate of the downfall,” says Al-Hayat's Ghassan Charbel. “Slowing the process deepens the feelings of frustration and compounds the lure of violence.”

While the Bahrain forum predated Egypt's parliamentary elections, the State Department's Daniel Fried anticipated their results by stressing that "there has been no place in most countries in the broader Middle East for the expression and development of liberal opinion and liberal parties." But he suggests that "as space develops, liberal parties of different varieties [will] fill the space that is newly available."

EU-US Help Secure Arab Freedom's "Fragile" Gains
The Middle East saw a “modest but notable” increase in political rights and civil liberties in 2005 even though no Arab countries “yet approach the status of a free society,” concludes the Freedom House survey released this week.

The ratings mark the region's best performance in the history of the survey. Interestingly, this progress has occurred “in an environment that many believe is not propitious for the spread of basic freedoms,” says Freedom House research director Arch Puddington, with growing terrorism, Israeli-Palestinian conflict, war in Iraq, high poverty and unemployment rates, and acute anti-Americanism. Such adverse factors help suggest why recent gains remain “fragile and could be reversed.”

The global picture shows how 2005 was one of the most successful since the organization began measuring global liberty in 1972, notes Puddington. The survey, Freedom in the World, shows the number of countries rated as Not Free declined from 49 in 2004 to 45 for the year 2005, the lowest number of Not Free societies in over a decade. The status of Ukraine and Indonesia saw improved from Partly Free to Free; Afghanistan from Not Free to Partly Free; and the Philippines' status declined from Free to Partly Free.

"The modest but heartening advances in the Arab Middle East result from activism by citizen groups and reforms by governments in about equal measures,” says Thomas Melia, Freedom House's acting executive director. “This emerging trend reminds us that men and women in this region share the universal desire to live in free societies."

The United States has made the promotion of democracy a greater foreign policy priority, notes Puddington's analytical essay accompanying the survey. “As is often the case when governments set forth far reaching and visionary objectives, the actual implementation has often fallen short of the leadership's bold words,” he argues. Nevertheless, the administration of George W. Bush, has “pushed forward an agenda in which the advancement of freedom plays a tangible role.”

Similarly, by insisting that new member states adhere to democratic standards and human rights, the European Union has “played an immense role in the process of democratic consolidation” in former communist states. Although the impact of democracy promotion policies is notoriously difficult to measure, “it is by now clear that the efforts by the established democracies to expand freedom's reach are paying dividends.”

Reflection and Critique at Barcelona Process Anniversary
Some 25 European Union heads of state or government attended the recent Euro-Mediterranean conference to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Barcelona process or Euro-Mediterranean Partnership. But only two of their counterparts from the EU's southern periphery bothered to turn up – Turkish premier Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the Palestinian Authority's Mahmoud Abbas. It was not lost on observers that Turkey is eager to join the EU while the PA is a recipient of EU largesse.

Most Middle Eastern and Maghreb countries sent lower-level delegations. "It was not just impoliteness on a grand scale," said a senior EU official. "It was insulting." One diplomat described the event as “an impasse of civilizations,” an irreverent allusion to the “alliance of civilizations” initiated by Spanish premier Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero to promote dialogue between Islam and the West.

The event marked 10 years of a partnership considered to be a paradigm of Europe's “soft power” long-term approach to development and democratization. The EU joined with Arab regimes in dismissing the Greater Middle East Initiative proposed at the Sea Island G8 summit as a heavy-handed, hectoring and externally-driven approach. But, as the Financial Times recently noted, while Europeans complained the US initiative “was ignoring what the EU had achieved over the past 10 years with its neighbours around the southern and eastern rim of the Mediterranean,… one has to ask, what achievement?”

Soft Power -- or Soft Touch?
The EU “speaks softly and carries a big carrot," argues Robert Cooper, Javier Solana's Director-General for Common Foreign and Security Policy, preferring positive incentives for institutional and economic reform and a partnership approach with southern Mediterranean partner states. But one of the EU's “most ambitious and innovative foreign policy initiatives” has generated “widespread and pervasive disappointment," according to a recent analysis. “The EMP has helped neither governments to develop and grow their way to modernization, nor civil society forces to pressure their way to reform,” suggests a report from FRIDE, the Madrid-based think-tank.

Inspired in part by the Helsinki Process, the EMP sought to link three interdependent “baskets” on economic, security and political reform. But, as Roberto Aliboni notes in the FRIDE study, EU democratization initiatives in the region have been “uncertain”, overly focused on human rights, and the 10-year outcome “not entirely satisfactory”. EU democracy promotion policies, he argues, “must be upgraded and better articulated and structured.” He suggests that European credibility in promoting democracy depends on linking democratization to “Arab security concerns vis-à-vis Israel” (a curious insistence when the region's democrats are increasingly rejecting the established regimes' standard excuse for postponing reform).

Over-institutionalized and afflicted by a “predominance of procedure over content”, the EMP needs to be modernized, argues an influential British parliamentary committee. Welcoming the proposal for a Democracy Facility to reward partners with a demonstrable commitment to political reform, it nevertheless demands a closer link between disbursement of EU aid and partner countries' performance.

Elements within the EU clearly remain suspicious if not dismissive of partnership with the US in promoting democratic reform, reflecting a Euro-Gaullist insistence on carving out a specific and distinctive role within its “neighborhood.” Yet such an approach, highlighted by the EMP's failure, has left the EU increasingly ineffective and isolated in the region, or at best confined to the role of payer, not player.

The Helsinki strategy worked due to the “close complicity between Europe and the United States and the spelling out of a clear and unashamed political and strategic goal,” argues Joseph Bahout of the Paris-based sciences-po, or Institute of Political Studies. It is less likely to work when “Middle Eastern political as well as economic elites are much more attracted… to the lights of Washington, DC, than to the labyrinths of the Brussels bureaucracy.”

Others suggest that security considerations are paramount and that the EMP owes little to the Helsinki process but is rather an “heir of the European experience with peace through integration and democratization.” This interpretation is in line with what some consider Panglossian expectations of Europe's ability or inclination to spread peace and democracy to its south and east.

Diffident Debutante?
The EU has transferred roughly €1 billion ($1.2 billion) a year, plus €11 billion in European Investment Bank loans, to its southern neighbors since 1995 without generating the anticipated quid pro quo of economic and democratic reform. The Barcelona declaration commits signatories to “develop the rule of law and democracy.” But, admits EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana, “Nobody at the time was thinking we had to democratize the Middle East. Nobody was thinking we had to democratize anywhere.” Indeed, beyond EU accession candidates, the EU has been a “reluctant debutante,” demonstrating more diffidence than diligence in promoting democracy in its own backyard.

Certainly the beneficiary regimes have not been inclined to reciprocate with political liberalization. “We find it humiliating that the Europeans demand reforms from us in exchange for a few euros,” said the Algerian foreign minister at the Euro-Med summit. “Let them keep their euros as we want reform within the framework of sovereignty,” he told reporters. “It is not for them to demand efforts [from the Mediterranean states].”

National interests, political pragmatism and security-conscious 'realism' amongst EU member states have militated against the realization of a Euro-Mediterranean Community of Democratic States. Consciously avoiding discussion of democratization, the EU and members states expected economic liberalization to generate political reform.

But the EMP has damaged the hypothesis that economic development gives birth to democracy, says Hélène Flautre, chair of the European Parliament's human rights subcommittee. Lebanese journalist Michael Young even argues that the EU should reverse order of precedence. “Rather than focusing on economic and institutional amelioration among its Mediterranean partners to open up closed political spaces,” he suggests, the EU should demand greater “democracy and accountability to open up economic spaces monopolized by political elites.”

Respect for human rights in the Euromed zone “leaves a lot to be desired,” says Flautre. Indeed, despite prioritising human rights over democracy promotion, the Barcelona process did not significantly help improve the human rights situation in the region, according to the Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Network. The network wants to develop detailed criteria, bench marks and indicators for implementing the human rights articles of the association agreements between the EU and signatory states and for the Action Plan human rights commitments under the EU's new Neighbourhood Policy. It wants an independent budget line for the European Initiative for Democracy and Human Rights for funding independent NGOs' human rights projects without the prior approval of host governments.

Review of European Democracy Promotion – Your Views?
Countries suppressing fundamental freedoms, civil society and political pluralism could be prioritized as targets for democracy assistance under the European Commission's provisional program for democracy and human rights. The consultative document cites Myanmar, Belarus, Cuba, Zimbabwe, Iran alongside several countries in Central Asia and the Arab world as countries where “great care has to be taken in involving local civil society organizations” and where international or regional partners could play an appropriate intermediary role.”

The consultative document invites comments on four proposed strategic objectives: enhancing respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms where most fragile, through campaigns on specific issues in particularly serious situations; strengthening the role of civil society in promoting human rights and democratic reform; buttressing the international framework and specific international instruments for the protection of human rights, rule of law and democracy promotion; and enhancing confidence in electoral processes through developing EU electoral observation and capacity-building for observation at regional and national levels. The commission aims to rationalize but “provide continuity with” the various financial instruments and programs that have developed in an ad hoc manner under the current European Initiative for Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR).

The Commission has proposed a single 'facility' on the promotion of democracy and human rights common to all four existing instruments covering pre-accession assistance, the European neighborhood and partnership, development and economic cooperation, and stability in third countries. It notes that the European Parliament and “strong civil society voices” suggest a “much enhanced role for democracy assistance,” including greater engagement of “political society.”

The new program could transcend single issue campaigns against torture or for free media, for instance) and emphasize the “preconditions for normal civil society activity and any advance towards democracy,” namely the fundamental freedoms of association and expression, and the protection of their defenders.

Noting that EIDHR partners are primarily civil society organisations (CSOs), the commission appears sensitive to the criticism that democracy assistance has been over-dependent on CSOs to the detriment of engaging with political parties and other state-related actors and institutions. It stipulates as a strategic objective strengthening the role of civil society in promoting democratic reform through a more integrated approach, encouraging cooperation, and broad coalitions. It seeks better CSO engagement of “socio-economic actors in supporting common agendas,” suggesting awareness of the unrepresentative, elitist nature of CSOs in certain contexts, including many Arab NGOs that have failed to match the mass support of Islamist counterparts.

“Lack of interaction between civil society and political parties and the weak sense of accountability or responsiveness” not only undermine civil society initiatives, the commission argues, but “give impunity to political elites and lead to contempt for politics.” Human rights advocacy tends to bypass elected representatives and engage directly executive power, with “little sustained improvement in democratic processes or impact on the political culture." Civil society organizations should be more sharply politicized, encouraged to focus more attention on political processes, to accentuate demands for representation, responsiveness and accountability.

The commission discounts direct support for party development but is interested in supporting political pluralism, perhaps through civil society programs with parliamentarians, necessarily through a multiparty approach. It envisages supporting national forums in “blocked” or closed societies and is also interested in initiatives for inter-communal and interfaith dialogues, an increasingly salient factor in democratic development.

The commission is inviting comments on the consultative paper. Reactions and comments should be sent by 12.00h Monday 2 January 2006 by e-mail to: RELEXHUMANRIGHTS@cec.eu.int.

Iraq's "Untold Story" -- Resolute Democrats, Resilient Civil Society
The long-term impact of Iraq's dramatically successful election -- a “glorious success” even to the most skeptical -- may well depend on the main parties' ability to negotiate a sustainable and inclusive government and possibly renegotiate the constitution. While the media conveyed inspiring images of Iraqis streaming to the polls, less evident was the huge investment of commitment and courage on the part of Iraqi democrats and their supporters, from a broad spectrum of opinion, including trade unions and business.

"It is like night and day from 10 months ago in terms of level of participation and political awareness," said an election specialist with the National Democratic Institute. "It's been sort of an untold story," said Les Campbell, NDI's Middle East director. "We've seen remarkable progress of Iraqis involved in political organization, particularly when you consider the security environment in which it's occurred." NDI provided campaign training to over 100 Iraqi parties and trained most of the 15,000 domestic observers on the ground.

While largely successful, the election nevertheless “suffered from very many problems,” Campbell told a Washington meeting this week, citing election monitors' documentation of widespread intimidation by party-affiliated militia. "Especially in the south, there have been many reports of coercion to vote for the 5-5-5 Shiite coalition parties," he said. "In the north, there is no doubt that Kurdish security forces exerted intense pressure."

Rand al-Rahim, executive director of the Iraq Foundation, confirmed the "climate of intense pressure” by armed groups as an undeniable fact.

At the time of writing, Sunni groups are contesting the election results in Baghdad and demanding a rerun in certain areas. There is little doubt that malpractices occurred. Former government spokesman and NED program officer, Laith Kubba, who led a small list of independent candidates, was approached by men who offered to boost his vote by prematurely closing a polling station and falsely completing ballots in his name.

NDI chairman Madeleine Albright cautions that negotiations for an inclusive government will be very difficult given the pre-election “level of intimidation in the south by the Shia, and also in the north by the Kurds.” “There was more contention in the lead-up to the election than was evident to those not on the ground,” she notes.

The elections confirmed the cautious optimism and resolution of ordinary Iraqis, characteristics they seem to share with troops active in the arena but not with many western media commentators and politicians. A recent survey by the BBC and other news agencies found that 69% of respondents expected Iraq to improve, while only 11% suggest it will worsen. A BBC correspondent expressed surprise at the degree of optimism at variance with the usual depiction of a country in total chaos. Another recent survey, from the International Republican Institute, found that some 56% of Iraqis thought things would be better in six months with only 16% believing they would be worse 47% of Iraqis said their country was headed in the right direction, with 37% suggesting it was going in the wrong direction. Some 56% thought things would be better in six months with only 16% believing they would be worse.

Half-hearted Solidarity Criticized
Europe's conventional wisdom "distorts constructive thinking" about Iraq's reconstruction, argues a European constitutional expert. The country's democratization "must begin where we are, not in one of Jurgen Habermas's 'ideal speech situations,' or John Rawls's 'original position,'" argues Irish political scientist Brendan O'Leary, an adviser to the Kurdistan government. Berating European intellectuals for their critical disengagement, he contends that Iraq's democratic prospects "lie in a multi-national, multi-regional federation"-- that "tries to resolve past antagonisms through a mixture of loose power-sharing and profound autonomy."

Former exiled dissident Kanan Makiya goes further, charging that "the United Nations' and European hearts are just not in the Iraq project" and that any future efforts will be halfhearted. "In that sense," he argues, "the European countries, and particularly France, Germany, and the U.N. have actually given succor and assistance indirectly and unwittingly to the insurgents."

British prime minister Tony Blair remains one of the few European politicians resolutely committed to Iraq's democratization and to the further reform of the region's dysfunctional states. "This is a global struggle," he recently told his Labour Party's conference. "Today it is at its fiercest in Iraq [where] it has allied itself there with every reactionary element in the Middle East." The way to protect the innocent, he argued, "is not to retreat, to withdraw, to hand these people over to the mercy of religious fanatics or relics of Saddam, but to stand up for their right to decide their Government in the same democratic way the British people do."

Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, a former Kurdish guerrilla leader, recently reminded us that "Ba'athist Iraq was the longest lived fascist state in history." Chastising those who refer to a nationalist resistance in Iraq (despite its atrocities), he insisted that "those sabotaging Iraq's first democracy bear no resemblance to the resistors of foreign occupation in wartime Europe," but, "in their ideology and record, contemporary representatives of the fascism that wreaked such havoc 60 years ago in Europe."

Yet surprisingly few of Europe's intellectuals and commentators share this view of the Iraq conflict as a latter-day Spanish Civil War or inspiring liberation struggle, as the leader of one such liberation movement recently lamented. "Time and again as I watch the barbarity inflicted on innocent Iraqi civilians .... pass with seeming silence and indifference from the rest of the world, I ask where are those who are so quick to take to the streets to protest every alleged US sin, be it real or imaginary?," says Nobel laureate Jose Ramos-Horta, foreign minister of East Timor.

"What of the liberals and leftists who were the generals, the officers or even the foot soldiers in the something-must-be-done brigade?" demands John Lloyd, one of Europe's leading center-left commentators. "When push came to shove, most have melted away, without, it seems, a backward glance at the ideals they once espoused." While some European activists are rallying to show solidarity with Iraq's democrats, they are thin on the ground. It is a sad spectacle, says Lloyd. "Liberals and leftists who spent decades demanding that something must be done to end all sorts of repressions and foreign horrors, and denouncing theirs and other governments for refusing to end them, now denounce the British and US governments for having removed one of the great monsters of the late 20th century because blood was shed (and is still being shed) in the course of it."

The transatlantic intellectual elite is not only unrepentant but claiming the moral high ground if US-based British historian Tony Judt is at all typical. He berates leading dissidents Adam Michnik and Vaclav Havel, as well as their fellow Ossi, Angela Merkel, for manifesting “basically the reversal of the old communist instinct”. “It was clearly observable in the Iraq War,” he argues. “In the East, there is this instinctive desire to believe in the good in Washington and to presume that anyone who is critical of Washington has dishonourable motives,” he told the Süddeutsche Zeitung. “It makes no difference whether you take the daughter of an East German pastor, a Polish intellectual like Adam Michnik or the son of the Czech bourgeoisie like Vaclav Havel.”

Yet despite demands that the US and UK devise an exit strategy, and renewed criticism of the war from realists and formerly pro-war liberals alike, Iraq's democrats and their allies appear resolved and resilient. Observing that "the robustness of the Iraqi commitment to the political process is beyond remarkable," an observer for London's Times newspaper suggests that the "defeatists and cynics who said that this couldn't be done, shouldn't even be attempted" should "lay off the Iraqi people. They are not the benighted fools you took them for; and their courage puts us all to shame."

Engage Civil Society? Yes, But…..
Democrats should beware the presumption that a vibrant Arab civil society can force the region's authoritarian regimes to instigate reform, argues a new analysis. “Never before has so ambitious an external campaign for regime change enveloped the MENA states,” notes Harvard University's Sean Yom, “much less one that imbues civil society as the fundamental prerequisite of democratization.”

An “armada of international diplomatic, financial, and moral support” endorses civil society organizations as a “pivotal force in stimulating the collapse of Arab autocracy.” But the link between civil society and democratization is far from clear or direct, he notes. The region's regimes have employed a cyclical strategy of liberalization-repression to control civic activism. “As a result, the much-celebrated resurrection of Arab civil society has signaled not the retreat of autocratic regimes,” says Yom, “but rather their stubborn instinct for survival.”

Expectations of civil society's political potency are flawed in part due to a failure to distinguish between different forms of civil society organization, specifically between membership-based professional groups, trade unions, NGOs, informal social groups like youth clubs and mutual aid networks, and public interest advocates like human rights lawyers, women's groups or think-tanks. Islamists tend to be stronger in informal social groups which are communally-oriented and have a stronger purchase on the allegiances of the poor (the form of CSO identified by the UNDP as an “invisible social hand” and the most vital form of civic organization).

By contrast, most secular, legally-recognized and reform-oriented CSOs lack the critical mass of support required to challenge the state. They often function as a safety valve, allowing opposition groups blow off steam through a state strategy of “controlled liberalization.” Arab regimes have generally been able to control and constrain CSOs through repression, legal constriction and co-optation.

NEWS IN BRIEF

European Democracy Assistance
Germany's party-based foundations account for the lion's share of the combined annual budget of Europe's democracy assistance foundations, with some €358 million (US$430 million) from a combined annual budget of €400 million (US$480 million). Only seven foundations have an annual budget over €10 million and 12 get by on less than one million, according to a new study, Mapping European Democracy Assistance.

Swedish Solidarity with Israel
The Swedish parliament is to cut bilateral ties with Iran's national assembly, the Majlis in a show of solidarity with Israel. The Swedes are responding to threatening and controversial anti-Israel comments made by Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Strengthening Philippines' Democracy: Civil Society Solutions
It has been almost 20 years since the Philippines overthrew a dictatorship and re-established democracy. But after a promising first decade, the country has been lurching from one crisis to another. Recognizing the problems democracy was facing, the Institute for Solidarity in Asia (ISA) designed a program that brings together public officials and civil society groups to improve governance mechanisms at the local level. City mayors work with civil society groups to identify priorities, design solutions, and implement concrete programs to improve the economic and social standing of their cities. In the process, they improve political institutions by strengthening participatory mechanisms. The program has been a success, ISA President Jesus Estanislao recently told a meeting at the Center for International Private Enterprise, and continues to expand into cities across the country. Further details here.

Hungarian Party Foundations Political parties in Hungary's parliament have established state-sponsored party foundations, similar to the German model.  Some foundations appear to be investing in international relations, while others are more domestic in focus, investing resources in training candidates and campaign staff.  Legislation establishes a fund for apportioned to parties represented in parliament according to the number of seats: the Mihaly Tancsics Foundation, affiliated with the Hungarian Socialist Party receives approximately US$2 million; the Fidesz/Hungarian Civic Union-affiliated Foundation for a Civic Hungary, approximately US$1.85m, while the Free Democrats' Miklos Szabo Foundation and the Jozsef Antall Foundation, affiliated with the Hungarian Democratic Forum, each receive approximately US$475,000.

Hungary's commitment to promoting democracy was recently highlighted by Paula J. Dobriansky, US Under Secretary for Democracy and Global Affairs, while opening Budapest's new Center for Democratic Transition.

Intelligence Agencies to 'Bolster Democracy'
The US intelligence community seems set to join the growing numbers of NGOs and think-tanks entering the 'democratization industry.' Efforts to "bolster the growth of democracy" will be among the three top priorities for US spy agencies, according to a new strategy document. The strategy requires "collectors, analysts and operators" within the 15 branches of the US intelligence to "forge relationships with new and incipient democracies" to help "strengthen the rule of law and ward off threats to representative government." Practitioners in the field, long dogged by malign and conspiratorial accusations of intelligence links, will hardly welcome the announcement.

Network of Democrats in the Arab World (NDAW)
The Network of Democrats in the Arab World (NDAW) was launched by CSID and Partners for Democratic Change on December 16-17, 2005 in Casablanca, Morocco. For more information about the network, please contact Radwan Masmoudi at Masmoudi@islam-democracy.org, Aly Abuzaakuk at Aly@islam-democracy.org, or Mokhtar Benabdallaoui at mokabdal@hotmail.com.

RESOURCES

Democracy in the Arab World
IDEA has released the Arabic version of three country reports compiling the findings of its project on “Democracy in the Arab World,” for Jordan, Egypt and Yemen. The reports provide comparative analysis and information on women's political participation, political party development, and electoral system reform. All three reports are also available in English. A synthesis report, Democracy in the Arab World – An Overview of the International IDEA Project, is available in English and Arabic. To order the reports, visit IDEA.

Political Parties and Democracy
The National Democratic Institute for International Affairs (NDI) is publishing Political Parties and Democracy in Theoretical and Practical Perspectives, a new research series available for download on NDI's website. The papers explore four topics central to the role and function of political parties:

• “Political Finance Policy, Parties and Democratic Development,” by Dr. Michael Johnston, offers an analysis of political finance policy, with a primary focus on societies where democracy is relatively new or emerging from crisis.

• “Adopting Party Law,” by Dr. Kenneth Janda, provides cautions leaders should heed and outlines questions to consider in devising party law. In addition, a database of party laws created by Dr. Janda will soon be made available via NDI's website.

• “Implementing Intra-Party Democracy,” by Dr. Susan Scarrow, discusses the advantages and risks of intra-party democracy and examines some of the questions parties may face in developing more inclusive decision-making procedures.

• “Developments in Party Communications,” by Dr. Pippa Norris, focuses on communication channels parties can use to strengthen their linkages with citizens, and communication policies governments can adopt to improve free and fair party competition.