Promoting Democracy in the Middle East
In a lecture Wednesday at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, Joshua Muravchik, resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, said democracy promotion must continue to play a major role in U.S. foreign policy for the next presidential administration. CFR.org contributing editor Joanna Klonsky filed this report on the lecture:
- Muravchik said that the United States has “implanted democracy by military force successfully in a number of countries,” naming Austria, Germany, and Japan as three examples from the post-World War II period.
- Initially a supporter of the invasion of Iraq, Muravchik said he now has “grave doubts that it was a wise idea.” He said he does not think the “method that got us to where we are in Iraq is the method that will be or should be repeated anywhere else,” but said President Bush’s “rhetoric about the need for democracy in the Middle East” has stirred unprecedented interest in democracy in the region.
- Muravchik said the United States should “find peaceful ways” to help pro-democracy forces in the Middle East to fight for their rights. He also said covert action by U.S. intelligence services has historically helped support emerging democracies abroad, and cited U.S. support for Italy’s Christian Democratic Party after World War II as an example.
- Muravchik also stressed the importance of international broadcasting and the works of media outlets like Radio Free Europe and Voice of America, as well as cultural exchange programs, which he credited with helping to turn El Salvador into a democracy.
- Muravchik argued that domestically, U.S. democracy has not been “appreciably degraded or lessened” as a result of the war in Iraq, although he acknowledged that there have been some infringements on civil liberties. He attributed those infringements to the “very problematic” nature of the “terrorist enemy” facing the United States.
Read about the candidates’ stances on democracy promotion in the Arab world in this CFR.org Issue Tracker.
May 25th, 2008 at 10:51 am
Muravchik seems to be saying that Arabs were not interested in democracy until President Bush mentioned it. The problem is not lack of US backing for democracy in the region, but rather continued backing for autocrats. As for his suggestion for covert support for opposition groups, that worked well in Iraq and Iran, didn’t it? Oh, wait…
Finally, the example of Italy is interesting: the US-supported right-wing governments of Italy between the 1940s and 1980s were in bed with the mafia and carried out political assassinations of leftist dissidents.
Well at least he’s sorry for having backed the invasion of Iraq.