Will the beneficiaries of Afghanistan’s hastily designed electoral system give ground in the interests of long-term stability, asks Dr Norm Kelly?
The ruins of Kabul’s Darul Aman Palace stand as stark testimony to the conflicts that have torn Afghanistan apart over the past fifty years. Built in the 1920s by King Amanullah Khan, the Palace reflected a desire to westernise and modernise the country along democratic principles. But it has been gutted by fire, and bombed and shelled as part of communist uprisings and civil war. More recently the Palace, which occupies an imposing position on the southern edge of Kabul city, has been used as an observation post by NATO troops.
Like plans to restore the Palace as a home for the national parliament, which appear to have stalled due to a lack of foreign investment, Afghanistan itself stands at the crossroads. In one direction lies a country based on democratic institutions, international support and a steadily developing economy. In the other direction lies a return to the past, with conflict based on religious ideology and ethnic divisions. Are Afghanistan’s democratic institutions strong enough to support the first alternative, a transition to a more free and tolerant society?
The fragility of Afghan democracy can be observed in the attitudes of Afghans. The Asia Foundation has been conducting public opinion surveys of the Afghan people over the past four years, and their latest results show declining confidence in the efficacy of elections (down from 75 per cent in 2006 to 52 per cent in 2008). The survey also found declining tolerance for alternative political views, with two-thirds of people opposed to the idea that all parties should be able to hold local meetings, presumably preferring that only parties with local support should be allowed to have meetings. While 40 per cent say they feel free to express their political views, almost the same number (39 per cent) believe they do not have that freedom due to fears for their own safety, security concerns or a Taliban presence. These results underscore the difficulty of establishing democracy in the current environment of conflict and violence that is evident across the country.
Ethnicity remains the most significant factor in Afghan politics, and the strongest determinant of how people will vote. At around 40 per cent of the population, the Pashtun are the largest ethnic group, though they do not constitute a majority. The Tajiks constitute about 30 per cent of the population, and the Hazara and Uzbeks about 10 per cent each. Several other ethnic groups, including the Aimak, Turkmen and Baluchi, make up the remainder.
This piece continues at Inside Story: http://inside.org.au/winners-and-losers/
Norm Kelly, an associate of the Centre for Democratic Institutions at ANU, spent two weeks in Kabul and Herat in February 2009 assessing political parties for the Washington-based National Democratic Institute for International Affairs.
Inside Story is edited at the Institute for Social Research at Swinburne University of Technology in association with The Australian National University. Selected articles from Inside Story appear in the Forum section of the Canberra Times.
