Web article, Paris , France . November 10th 2006

By: George Chaya

Critics of the U.S. administration repeated until exhaustion two ideas: a) have finally abandoned the neoconservatives and have opted for diplomacy, yet even with the Iranian atomic case and b) its strategy of democratization has failed before the victories of Islamists in the various elections held in the Middle East .

The first, I think that is not necessarily so, although we can disagree, of course, so I will confine myself only to recall some significant events. In the previous legislature there was no neoconservative in government and now there is one, Bolton, the ambassador to UN, which in the United States has ministerial rank. Five years ago, the neo-conservative doctrine was one between Republicans and now is the most important, specific to the identity of the party in this new phase characterized by the War on Terror. The neoconservatives have never been opposed to diplomacy or the soft power; have been limited to claim the centenarian-European tradition that made the Old Continent the centre of the world-that diplomacy without the deterrent capability of a hypothetical use of force becomes a sterile exercise. They have nothing original, even though they may seem to Martians lax European today. The second Bush term was characterized by very different circumstances: we must consolidate the reconstruction of Afghanistan and Iraq and must be given time because there is, to try to steer the crisis in Lebanon , Iran and Palestine . Within a time, just around the American presidential, is festering to the point of taking difficult and important decisions.

The second part of a deliberate ambiguity: confuse democracy with elections. The latter are essential to form the first, but while the polls have an instrumental nature, democracy is something substantial, the result of applying a set of principles and values in community life. The U.S. government has never said that the solution to the Middle East to be able to call elections and sinister. What has requested or required where there was a need to establish new democratic political regimes of court-cases of Afghanistan and Iraq -or to resolve the problem of legitimacy of a negotiating party-Palestine. For the region as a whole, American diplomacy has requested the adoption of a set of measures to implement in conjunction with the European Union, ranging from the fight against corruption, respect for women's rights, development of a educational offer acceptable to the creation of regional markets open and, of course, a process of gradual democratization, which must go through an election cleaner that made so far.

Let us not forget the words, because they are not accidental. United States proposed in the summer of 2004, at the summit of the G-7, an "initiative for change." What it was, and is still trying, is causing substantial changes in different societies so that this set of principles and values that characterize the spirit of democracy take root, as they have done in other non-Western nations such as Japan or India , Or even Muslim, or as Turkey, with its many limitations, Indonesia. Democracy is a process and not reaches a certain stage if not before passing through certain seasons.

That electoral processes gives a grant opportunities for Islamists is something we already knew and was assumed. But that only goes to show the reality. The fundamental problem is that the Islamists have already won the street in many countries and are on track to achieve some others, including Europe . That triumph can not be understood if not taken into account the frustration caused by the failure of the various tracks of modernization followed so far. The man returns to the past when the hearing finds no expectations at present and no believe in the future. Islamism has emerged from the caves because there is no better alternative, people recognized his work in the field of charity and assistance and they are eager to finish-your-way with the corrupt Arab regimes that have them removed and hoping plunged into the misery for years.

 

When Islam was not forbidding election defeat and supporting dictatorships, but an expectation modern view, perfectly compatible with Islam and Western values.

The democratic transformation has only just begun and we are far from knowing whether triumph or fail. The bottom line, which we must not forget at any time, is that the alternative has already been tested for decades by Arab governments with catastrophic results. As Condoleezza Rice acknowledged in Cairo , "we sacrifice freedom for stability and, ultimately, we have neither stability nor liberty."

 

We will see this as follows democratizing adventure where the word democracy has not yet rooted in the sentiment and desire of rulers who fear losing their gifts and benefits.

 

* George Chaya is Professor and Political International Analyst, Lebanese origin, Expert in Middle East . Expert and Lecturer at the International Consulting in Policy on Middle Eastern and Latin America .

Official Web Site www.georgechaya.org