For more of the Prospect's debate over democracy promotion and progressive foreign policy, see Shadi Hamid's initial two-part essay here and here and Spencer Ackerman's reponse here.
Spencer Ackerman makes a compelling case for the importance of separating human rights outcomes from democracy promotion, which may not advance liberalism. He is right to be skeptical of Shadi Hamid's wishful thinking that through engagement in democratic politics Islamists will necessarily moderate themselves. However, he falls short of offering a foreign policy doctrine for the United States that would champion human rights, falling back instead on a doctrine of contingent balancing of human rights and other interests that will not reassure human rights advocates anywhere.
Ackerman seems to have a poor understanding of the diversity of Islamic political groups, not all of whom, by any means, are inimical to democracy and human rights. This detracts from his analysis of how the United States can respond to the threat of Islamist terrorism and extremism. He appears too swift to ignore that chronic, real-world problems in the broader Middle East lie at the root of the narrative of Muslim victimhood and humiliation that fuels ideological extremism and anti-Western violence. Mohammed Siddique Khan may have been British, and Muhammad Atta may have had an elite Western education, but it was the suffering and perceived injustice imposed on Muslims in Lebanon, Palestine, Iraq, Kashmir, Chechnya and elsewhere that fed their militancy.
Ackerman is most wrong when he asserts that democratic processes in various Arab countries "have strengthened precisely the religious extremists" that the United States must defeat. Elections in Egypt, for example, have certainly strengthened the Islamist political movement the Muslim Brotherhood. But precisely by pursuing its objectives through constitutional, political means, the Muslim Brotherhood has demonstrated that it is different from militant Islamist armed groups that engage in acts of terrorism against Western interests. That is not to say that Islamist groups that participate in elections are made up of liberal democrats: obviously they are not. But they fundamentally differ from groups like al-Qaeda or Islamic Jihad that are openly hostile to democracy.
A vital debate is underway among Muslims and within Islamism about whether participation in democratic processes and the observance of democratic norms and standards, including human rights, is worthwhile. An improved U.S. policy to counter the threat of Islamist terrorism should focus on affecting the outcome of this debate. One obvious way the United States can do better in this regard is by not giving the impression that electorates who choose Islamists have somehow made the wrong choice. U.S. policy has become fixated on seeking to ostracise, isolate, and (in the case of Hezbollah) destroy hybrid Islamist movements that, while associated with terrorism and political violence, have earned some electoral legitimacy. Such an approach strengthens extremists within these movements and undermines those with a stronger commitment to peaceful electoral politics. A more nuanced approach is needed that would engage, strengthen, and reward the more democratic elements.
Assertions that all Islamist movements are intrinsically and immutably anti-democratic and opposed to human rights can become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Ackerman's analysis, moreover, goes particularly awry when he asserts that a "democracy under threat" like Turkey has "grown more reactionary in recent decades." One wonders which country he is talking about. Does he think that the Turkey dominated by the military in the 1980s, or the one wracked by civil war in the 1990s, was less reactionary than is the aspirant member of the European Union that we know today? Despite the illiberal sentiments of some of the ruling Islamist AK party's members, there is a strong argument to be made that it has been a positive force for democracy and human rights in Turkey, shepherding through parliament many long-awaited reform measures that secular nationalist parties had proved unable to advance.
While Ackerman is right to focus on the importance of outcomes -- in the form of tangible human rights protections -- one cannot disregard the question of means. Democratic governments, however imperfect, are more likely, over time, to advance and protect human rights. There is no future in a policy that would rely on the goodwill of benign dictators. To be fair, Ackerman makes this argument himself with respect to Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan. Ackerman recognizes that there are Pakistani institutions that promote human rights and strengthen the rule of law, and thus deserve American support -- like a strong independent judiciary, a free press, and a strong non-governmental human rights movement.
But what is true for a partially benign dictator should also be true for partially benign elected movements like Hamas and Hezbullah. In fact, there is much to be gained by bolstering the democratic superstructure under which they operate. By contributing to the success of such democratic experiments we strengthen the hand of those in the Muslim world who would mitigate the politics of hate and destruction that threatens us all.
Neil Hicks is the director of international programs at Human Rights First.
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