The Dilemmas of Democracy: Responding to Tainted Elections

After following Asian elections for the past year, I have noticed an emerging pattern that we are likely to see more of in the coming years around the world. Elections in Iran,  Afghanistan, and Sri Lanka have presented the international community with a thorny dilemma.

On the one hand, these elections were held under less-than-ideal circumstances. They were marred by inexcusable corruption, violence, vote rigging, and the silencing of opposition voices in the media and on the streets.

On the other hand, they also represent a process and an outcome that the international community and those living in these countries appear to have largely accepted and agreed with. While elections were not as free and fair as most would have liked or expected, they were elections that – for all their flaws – appear to have granted victory to the candidate who the most people voted for.

Yes, Ahmendinijhad in Iran, Karzai in Afghanistan, and Rajapaksa in Sri Lanka are all pretty unsympathetic figures and definitely played dirty to win the presidency in their respective countries. Yet there seems little doubt that they all won far more votes than their challengers – even given the doubts about the legitimacy of many of those votes. Even in Iran, Ahmendinijhad’s support has been widespread and not limited to rural areas.

So, what do we make of such elections? Foreign critics and the domestic opposition have good reason, as well as the right, to complain about the flaws and undemocratic tactics used by the winners to secure power. Their concerns after elections should certainly be heeded and investigated. Winning an election should not give the victor absolute power or the right to repress and persecute critics and minorities.

Yet, in the absence of evidence that an election was clearly stolen, the elected government – however odious – should also be respected and acknowledged as the legitimate voice of the people of that country. America’s strategic interests will surely color how the US government and public see such leaders (Ahmedinijhad = bad, a threat, Karzai = corrupt but tolerable, a needed partner, Rajapaksa = who cares?), but there should always be an awareness that elections often are contested, dirty things even the most robust democracies (in the US too – Florida 2000 anyone?).

The precarious balancing of these two realities will, I suspect, become essential as more countries embrace elections without being interested or even understanding the civil and human rights that many developed countries have traditionally expected to naturally go along with democracy. While the outcome of elections in places like the US, Canada, Europe, Japan, India (along with others) are not generally called into question, elections in many parts of the developing world are not as clear cut.

As citizens and as part of the international community how will we respond to such elections? How do such elections potentially change our relations with certain countries? Will the US government recognize such elections? How should we engage with corrupt leaders with no respect for the rule of law or human rights who have also won have seemingly won elections? How do we balance the importance of the process of having a free and fair election with the actual freedoms on the ground if one does not necessarily imply the other?

To deny the legitimacy of an seemingly fair election seems condescending and ignores the voices of millions of people who may legitimately disagree with us. To accept their legitimacy seems to deny the very real flaws of such a system and the hardships faced by its challengers. Such complex and obfuscated elections in many parts of the developing world who are beginning to experiment with democracy will undoubtedly complicate US (and other countries’) foreign policy in years to come.

Upcoming elections in places like Burma, Tajikistan, the Philippines, Sudan, Iraq, Egypt, Ukraine, and another in Sri Lanka, will test how the international community responds to potentially complicated and fraudulent elections. Democracy is far from robust in many of these countries, but it is still largely democratic compared to many neighboring countries. To challenge the legitimacy of these elections may risk indirectly leading to a collapse of any hope for future votes.

Of course, each election must be evaluated and responded to on its own terms, and it is important to consider democracy an ideal to strive towards, not a simple definition that invites a conclusive yes or no answer. Democracy is not black and white – there are many shades of gray. Elections serve a purpose, but are always flawed and complicated. Get used to it.

No Paradise: Rajapaksa’s Post-War Sri Lanka

Since the announcement last Tuesday that Sri Lankan President Mahindra Rajapaksa had defeated former army chief General Sarath Fonseka in the country’s first national election since the defeat of the separatist LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam) last May, we in the United States have heard little about the election’s aftermath. In the run up to the election, bits of valuable information reached our shores through The New York Times, The Phildelphia Inquirer, The Economist, The Christian Science Monitor and others, but since the election’s conclusion, Sri Lanka has faded into the background behind more dramatic stories in Haiti, Afghanistan, and China.

To some, Rajapaksa’s win signaled the triumph of democracy after decades of civil war, but it doesn’t take much looking to find that Rajapaksa resorted to some decidedly undemocratic methods to secure victory. Reporters Without Borders condemned the Sri Lankan government for blocking websites, intimidating critics, and possibly being responsible for the disappearance of opposition supporters. The Sri Lankan government had been preventing foreign journalists from entering the country to cover the elections, and the situation on the ground in Sri Lanka, especially in Tamil areas, had hardly been conducive to ensuring that the citizens’ right to vote would be protected. The election day bombshell that Fonseka was allegedly not registered to vote prompted Rajapaksa’s UPFA to loudly threatened to challenge his election if he were to win. This threat came despite the fact that the election commission had declared that Fonseka’s papers were in order and that not being registered to vote had no bearing on whether he could hold office.

Since the election, Rajapaksa has made drastic moves to consolidate his power and clamp down on journalists, the political opposition, and protesters in the streets. Earlier fears of post-election violence between supporters of Rajapaksa and Fonseka seem to have given way to fears of a coup, at least according to Rajapaksa, orchestrated by military supporters of General Fonseka. In response, Rajapaksa has ordered the biggest shake up of the Sri Lankan military in decades, purging the forces of high-ranking supporters of Fonseka. Many justifiably fear that Rajapaksa’s election will worsen the state of media freedom in Sri Lanka.

During the election, Rajapaksa was strongly supported by the ethnic Sinhalese majority in the south. Rajapaksa won over 65%, while Fonseka – also Sinhalese – carried less than 35% of the vote. The largest Tamil political party – faced with the option of  supporting the president who led a brutal war against them or supporting the general who carried out the president’s orders – chose to back Fonseka, hopeful that he would do more than Rajapaksa has to bring about a Sinhalese-Tamil reconciliation. In the Jaffna district, the Tamil heartland, 64% supported Fonseka and just 25% backed Rajapaksa. Since the end of the long and devastating civil war in May, Rajapaksa has aggravated ethnic tensions and has failed to demonstrate a desire or ability to reimagine Sri Lanka as an inclusive democratic society willing to accommodate the still-legitimate Tamil demands on the Sri Lankan government that originally led the country into war. His behavior since his election victory once again appears to reflect an insecure and greedy desire to remain in power rather than a strategy for rebuilding an island destroyed and torn apart by violence and social inequality.

This shortsightedness could backfire on Rajapaksa. The International Crisis Group still sees a need for international community involvement in reconstructing Sri Lanka and making sure Tamil grievances are responded to. Rajapaksa should also keep in mind that while the LTTE has been soundly defeated militarily in Sri Lanka, its organization still exists overseas, holding up to one billion dollars in assets. Despite its wealth, this network is, for now, beset by infighting and a lack of central leadership and fighters. Yet, Tamil concerns cannot be expected to go unaddressed forever, and a continued denial of rights, opportunities, and dignity to the Tamil people by the Sri Lankan government just might provide the motivation to unify and organize that today’s overseas Tigers are lacking.

President Rajapaksa believes that “Sri Lanka’s struggle is a victory for global democracy and demonstrates that a workable model exists for eradicating terrorism.” Optimists see this peacetime election as an opportunity for Rajapaksa and Sri Lankans to put the war behind them and to get on with creating an economically prosperous, politically inclusive, and socially harmonious nation. Yet, such a project will take time and will require rebuilding a constructive Tamil political voice, not merely a relatively free electoral win by a seemingly divisive and ethnically chauvinist politician. Based on Rajapaksa’s record since the defeat of the LTTE, I doubt that he is a leader capable of forging a new peaceful political future for Sri Lanka.

And I fear for the toll that fighting terrorism takes on democracy. While Sri Lanka may provide a “workable model” for defeating terrorism, it hardly provides us with a desirable model. As a country engaged in (perhaps indefinitely) fighting terrorism, we in the United States should see Sri Lanka as a warning. We must decide if we are willing to sacrifice our democratic ideals to possibly attain an all-out victory over terrorism.

Future of Afghanistan Complicated by Election Outcome

The Afghan presidential elections have ended. And I’m sure I’m not the only one to who finds the outcome thoroughly unsatisfying. After vehemently denying that his campaign had engaged in massive voting fraud, President Hamid Karzai essentially admitted to fraud, accepting the election commission’s revised vote tally. This revision dropped Karzai’s support from 54% to under 50%, triggering a runoff under the Afghan constitution. Karzai’s opponent in the runoff, Abdullah Abdullah, not in a position to actually win and fearing more fraud and violence with a second round of voting, dropped out of the contest, leaving Karzai the winner.

American officials act reasonably satisfied with these elections, though it’s hard to see why. They are now left with an Afghan partner in the escalating war against the Taliban that has run a shockingly corrupt and ineffective government, has garnered less than half the majority of votes cast in the election, and has committed large-scale fraud in a failed effort to win these elections. To sum up, Karzai has proven to be bad at governing Afghanistan, does not have the support of most of the Afghan people, and was caught trying to steal the election. While Karzai seems to have legitimately won a commanding plurality of the vote, his behavior indicates a blatant disregard for the electoral process and the rule of law that would be condemned by the US government had it occurred in a place such as Iran or Venezuela.

Though President Obama gave Karzai a scolding about improving his governance when he called to congratulate him on his victory, close US-Afghan cooperation is bound to continue. Indeed, if Obama has his way, it will increase (though he appears to be feeling less hawkish about Afghanistan than he was as candidate – perhaps because of this tainted election). And it should. The return of the Taliban poses a threat to Afghans, the region, and perhaps the world. After a decade of supporting violent religious fanatics (both Afghan and foreign) against the Soviets, and then walking away to let these extremists, drug kingpins, and warlords plunge the country into civil war, the US owes the Afghan people a serious commitment to rebuilding Afghanistan by providing security, promoting development, and nurturing a democratic government.

This means US military involvement is needed, but more importantly, it means overcoming the challenges of bringing things like water, electricity, roads, health care, education, and jobs to Afghans. Yet, hopes have been dashed that these elections would give Afghanistan a clear and legitimate democratic leader who was ready to work with the US and battle the Taliban with the support of the Afghan public. The muddied results will certainly make the work of the Afghan government, the US, NATO, and other foreign players more difficult. And the Taliban are already claiming victory, believing that their attacks stopped the second round of voting.

In the end, these elections give little hope for the immediate future of Afghanistan and the US mission there. By his own actions, Karzai has weakened his position vis-à-vis the Taliban, and the US will be hard-pressed to win Afghan hearts and minds while backing a largely discredited Afghan government and failing to follow through on efforts to improve the lives of Afghan people. US involvement is also becoming increasingly unpopular at home, and the longer US soldiers and aid workers are in Afghanistan, the more chances there are for casualties that may not be palatable to Americans who increasingly believe that there are unclear reasons to stay in Afghanistan.

The Obama administration is hopeful that Karzai will clean up his act and the UK is making threats that it can’t support a government that is so unapologetically corrupt. However, it is hard to imagine that the US or the UK – as heavily invested in Afghanistan as they are – will simply quit Afghanistan if Karzai continues running his government as is. The US certainly has some leverage over Karzai, but for now it has little choice but to put most of its eggs in one basket, hoping that he is the man best suited to improve life in Afghanistan and to fight the Taliban. Unrest seems sure to continue to plague Afghanistan, and US ability to win a counterinsurgency campaign in Afghanistan has been seriously compromised by this election’s outcome. How adeptly Obama’s strategy can adapt to today’s complex political situation in Afghanistan and how well US forces can work with other regional players (Pakistan, India, Russia, Iran, China) will be key to preventing Afghanistan and the entire region from becoming more dangerous and unstable than they are today.

This is the second article covering the Afghan election and the fourth in a series on major elections in Asia this year.

Prospects for Change in Burma: Too Many Wild Cards in the Deck?

From the US, Burma (more recently known as Myanmar) has appeared for the past two decades to be a global pariah, ruled by an isolated, paranoid, and  power-hungry military notorious for its suppression of human rights, government critics, and ethnic minorities. In the last few years it has made the news for all the wrong reasons – the continued imprisonment of opposition leader and Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi, the bloody crackdown on huge crowds of protesting Buddhist monks in 2007, the refusal to allow international aid agencies into the country after Cyclone Nargis killed at least 140,000 people in 2008, and holding a clearly illegitimate constitutional referendum in which 92% of Burmese supposedly supported the new constitution drafted by the ruling military junta.

US policy towards Burma under George W. Bush was to shun the military government and to stick to the strict international sanctions regime imposed on the junta. This did nothing to noticeably change Burma’s internal political situation. So now the Obama administration is trying a new tack of unconditional diplomatic engagement while continuing sanctions until the junta makes some significant concessions. The US and many Burmese would like to see three things – the release of Suu Kyi and other political prisoners, constitutional reforms, and assurances that 2010’s election will be free and fair. While committed to dialogue with General Than Shwe’s government, the US does not appear optimistic that change will happen quickly in Burma.

While this strategy alone may not bring quick or significant change to Burma, other factors are also shaking up the country’s political status quo. Aung San Suu Kyi – the incredibly popular and politically shrewd leader of the opposition National League for Democracy who has been under house arrest for most of the past 20 years after winning the 1990 elections, only to have the results ignored — has recently met with members of the junta, agreeing to help negotiate an end to sanctions on Burma by Western nations. While Suu Kyi likely believes that the sanctions have been ineffective and detrimental to the Burmese people (the standard argument for ending them), she is also making a political move.  This is based on the assumption that her favor to the junta will not go unrewarded, perhaps reminding the junta of the substantial power she still wields. Should the junta decide to release Suu Kyi, next year’s elections have a chance of being legitimate, with Suu Kyi’s NLD possibly coming to power.

In recent days, there have been hints that Suu Kyi may indeed be released by the government. This could be thanks to Suu Kyi’s recent cordial relations with the government, because of the change in US Burma policy or due to mounting international pressure. The US is leaning on other nations to put pressure on the Burmese government, and China, India, and Russia recently have joined the US and Europe in calling for Suu Kyi’s release. The calls of the three emerging powers are particularly significant given their relatively close ties and positions of influence with Burma. These new calls for Suu Kyi’s release accompany strained relations between Burma and its closest ally, China, because of border disputes and Chinese anxiety over the possibility of improved US-Burma ties.

Within Burma, politically active Buddhist monks continue to challenge the junta, pressing it to apologize for killings during 2007’s massive protests and threatening further protests if their demands go unmet. Monks inside and outside Burma have also demanded a timeline and clear benchmarks for US engagement with Than Shwe’s government.

The most likely change in the foreseeable future is the release of some political prisoners, including Suu Kyi, which could open a Pandora’s box for the junta. The more parties involved in 2010’s elections, the greater likelihood that they may, from the junta’s perspective, get out of control. Should the elections actually be held freely and fairly, countless other complicated political and constitutional issues will be raised. After this, a redrafting of the constitution could take place, which would likely deny the junta the constitutional protections that they now enjoy against prosecution for their actions while in power.

Of course, there are a host of other possible futures for Burma – the most likely being that not much will change. The junta may allow cosmetic political changes while retaining power and continuing to suppress its domestic critics, defying the international community. However, there seem to be enough wild cards in the deck now that a political shakeup in the next year is more likely than it has been for some time. Whatever happens, one hopes that life will improve for the Burmese people.

Why Another Karzai Government May be Bad for Afghanistan

If you read the news (in the US anyway) it is common knowledge that what is most important in the current Afghan elections is not necessarily who wins, but that the elections be seen as legitimate and transparent by the Afghan public as well as the international community. Now, almost three weeks after election day, it is highly questionable whether the election process this time around will be, in the end, seen as legitimate by Afghans or the international community. There have been widespread allegations of voter fraud, including among supporters of sitting President Hamid Karzai. The sheer volume of complaints has pushed back the announcement of the election’s official results by at least two weeks.

With 90% of the vote counted, Karzai appears to have won 54% of the vote, with runner-up Dr. Abdullah Abdullah with 28%, and the remainder of the vote being split among 36 other presidential candidates. However, these results are not official, hundreds of thousands of votes have been thrown out, and there have been persistent allegations of massive voter fraud. It appears that there is substance to many of the allegations, raising the possibility that enough votes could be disqualified to drop Karzai’s tally to under the 50% that he needs to avoid a runoff with Abdullah. Investigations into voter fraud could last months, delaying any eventual runoff and threatening to plunge Afghanistan into more violence and perhaps a constitutional crisis as competing groups and candidates jockey for a position in whatever government eventually comes to power (or alternatively, strive to discredit and destabilize the government elect).

The reason for the strong opposition against Karzai has been his government’s extreme corruption and his political amorality in being willing to team up with unsavory former warlords like Abdul Rashid Dostum, accused of human right atrocities against Taliban captives under his control. The Afghan people also have seen Karzai largely as the candidate of the US and the international community which has generated distrust concerning the outcome of the vote, believing that his victory has been preordained without concern for Afghan opinion. If Karzai wins a majority in a flawed election process, his adminstration is sure to be dogged by accusations that it came to power illegitimately. Should he fail to win over 50%, his position would be confirmed as relatively weak while he would be subject to repeated opposition attacks (during and between election campaign) highlighting his corruption and poor administration. If Karzai were to win the runoff election, he would be returning to office with a poor record, a weak administration, and no mandate from Afghans. If on the other hand, Abdullah were to win the run off, there may be a public sense of hope for a new direction in Afghan politics, and a belief in the legitimacy of the electoral system. Nor would Abdullah have the amount of negative baggage that is holding Karzai back. While Abdullah’s backers are also likely to have engaged in vote fraud, the most serious allegations appear to be against the Karzai campaign. An Abdullah win would more likely be perceived as representative of a fair and legitimate electoral process.

The biggest difference between Karzai and Abdullah is that Karzai supports a government with power concentrated in the office of president, while Abdullah sees a parliamentary system as a more appropriate system for representing the diversity of Afghan beliefs and communities. An Abdullah win would mean a fundamental restructuring of the Afghan government with unpredictable results. In governing, Abdullah would probably need to rely on supporters as shady as Karzai’s, and his government would face the same difficult challenges to improving life in Afghanistan that Karzai’s would.

But it may just be time for a change. Karzai may have been the man for the job when the Taliban fell. He had an admirable history of brave opposition to the Taliban and al Qaeda. He challenged Presidents Bush and Musharraf on many aspects of his country’s rebuilding and advocated strongly for the Afghan people. He may have been the best chance to hold Afghanistan together after 2001, but now, his rule has become a liability for the Afghan state. A new leader is needed to bring legitimacy to the election process and to restore faith in the Afghan government itself. Bringing progress in Afghanistan will be a difficult task for anyone, but should Karzai win, it will be harder than need be.

This article is the third in a series about major elections taking place in Asia this year.  Part one and two covered the recent elections in India.

Prisoner of the State, and Why It’s Relevant Today

I hate to follow up my last article about the twentieth anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre with yet another Tiananmen Square-related article. I realize that there is more to China than Tiananmen Square (and human rights atrocities against religious and ethnic minorities–no upcoming articles on Tibet or the Uighurs, I promise). I am also wary of writing from dissidents within Communist countries. Not that their stories aren’t compelling, but because I always suspect that these stories are being crassly exploited by good, commie-hating, free-market-loving American publishers with an ideological axe to grind. But the newly published secret diary of former Communist Party General Secretary and moderate reformer Zhao Ziyang was described to me as a rare and fascinating look into the secretive world of Chinese politics, and so I thought it would be worth my time.

As it turns out, the partially read copy I checked out from the library is now long overdue and since I can’t renew it, my intended “book review” must be much more limited than I hoped. More complete reviews and information about the book can be found here, here, and here. I will provide a limited review, but what is even more interesting to me is that much of what played out in China in 1989 looks in certain ways similar to what has been happening in Iran since last month’s disputed presidential elections. Consequently, Zhao words take on a gravity and relevance beyond the events he discusses in his book.

Prisoner of the State is the journal of former Communist Party General Secretary Zhao Ziyang. Zhao was General Secretary at the time of the crackdown at Tiananmen Square and was placed under house arrest for his determined opposition to the violent, repressive action ordered by the Party’s hardliners. While in seclusion, Zhao secretly recorded his journal onto tapes smuggled out of the country after his death in 2005. These tapes were then complied and published as Prisoner of the State.

Zhao’s journal begins with a vivid description of the weeks leading up to the June 4 massacre in Tiananmen Square. He details the political back and forth between himself and other Communist Party leaders as they struggled over how to deal with the unprecedented protests which gained strength daily. The demonstrations began as a chance to mourn the death of a popular reformer within the Communist Party. They quickly became a chance for students, and later all segments of urban Chinese society, to vent their frustration with political corruption and to demand democratizing reforms. Zhao’s position was that by empathizing with the students’ demands, making limited reforms, and treating protesters with a soft touch, the protests were sure to die down and that they did not pose a serious threat to the Chinese state or the Communist Party. Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping was swayed by the party hawks, who saw a show of force as the best way to end the protests, reassert the Party’s power, and strengthen Deng’s standing.

The tragic events of June 4, 1989 resulted in the deaths of hundreds of protesters and the end of Zhao Ziyang’s life as a respected politician. While Zhao endured nearly two decades of confinement, China advanced along the liberalized economic path he had championed. Unfortunately, Zhao’s silencing after Tiananmen Square also meant the silencing of those politicians who had advocated political reforms and the continuing rule of a small political elite within the Communist Party who resolved to remain in power no matter how ruthless the means. By the end of his life, after years under house arrest, Zhao had come to support political ideas far more radical than those he held in 1989. In Prisoner of the State, Zhao argues that China must have a free press, an independent judiciary, additional political parties, and ultimately parliamentary democracy.

Reading Zhao’s words against the backdrop of the popular political unrest roiling Iran made them even more relevant, shedding light on what might currently be going on in Iran. The two situations are similar and quite revealing, though probably not in the ways most Americans think. Most Western media accounts of the recent Iranian protests have interpreted events extremely sympathetically, and as a grassroots uprising against reviled President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the religious conservatism of Iran’s Shiite clergy, and the repressive security forces of the Iranian state. The truth is quite a bit more complicated however. Serious political analysis of the crisis has been eschewed for glowing personal narratives and the drama of violent clashes between students and government militias. I would even go so far as to say that the picture painted by the Western media is one that it desperately wants to believe – that wants its own fantasies of a secular, non-threatening, US-friendly Iran sans loud-mouth anti-American leader to be validated by the opinions of the Iranian people.

However, what has been happening in Iran, and what happened in China in 1989, is not a full-scale popular revolt aiming to overthrow an existing government. In Iran and China, domestic protesters have had different goals and motivations for opposing their political leadership than outsiders have. Both sets of protests were possible only because there was an existing political split within the ruling powers over how to govern their respective countries. In both cases, the protests began as a show of support for political factions that showed more tolerance for dissent and change within the existing political framework. In China, Zhao represented a moderate, reformist political group of the ruling Communist Party. In Iran, presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi claims to represent a similar reformist, moderate wing of the political elite. However, what is happening in Iran may just be factional fighting with little real ideological change at stake. Mousavi – who appears more interested in fighting for his own political advancement – doesn’t appear to be the reformer Zhao was, and Western hopes that Mousavi would magically give up Iranian nuclear ambitions and live in peace with Israel and the US appear completely misplaced. Mousavi has been strongly supported by certain members of Iran’s ruling Shia clergy (particularly Ayatollah Rafsanjani) who detest Ahmadinejad for his attacks on their corruption and privilege. And though foreign media sources depicted Iran’s protests as massive public outpourings of discontent, it is fairly obvious that the protests were limited to educated upper-class students in Tehran and a handful of larger cities. Their demands are certainly not insignificant, but their point of view doesn’t seem to represent a majority of Iranians. The rural poor seem to have again backed Ahmadinejad at the polls. And, despite Western desires, demonstrators are hardly calling for a toppling of Iran’s religious leadership or an overthrow if the ideals of the 1979 Islamic revolution. Indeed, Mousavi’s strongest backers are certain members of the clergy themselves.

In any case, Prisoner of the State illuminates the hidden political complexities that can exist in any country at any time – be it China, Iran, or the US. It also provides a powerful lesson for those who wish to create simple, moralizing narratives out of events that are vastly more complex than most people know at the time they are occurring. We live in a mediated world, but the story the media tells us is rarely the whole story. Zhao has done us all a great service by smuggling his words out of China. They remain relevant as a challenge to repressive regimes that deny their citizens basic human rights, and as a reminder to each of us to think more critically about the world around us.

Reactions to China’s Tiananmen Blackout: Can’t Live With Them, Can’t Live Without Them

This June fourth marked the twentieth anniversary of pro-democracy protests in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square. These protests were violently put down by China’s government, resulting in the deaths of hundreds of (usually nonviolent) protesters and iconic photos and videos showcasing the inhumanity and intolerance of Chinese communism in the midst of the Cold War. The so-called Free World howled with outrage about China’s brutal violation of its citizens’ human rights.

While the Cold War has ended and China has become a capitalist powerhouse, China’s government has retained its iron grip. Strikingly, any acknowledgment of this week’s historic anniversary was blotted out in China (with, for legal reasons, the exception of Hong Kong where over 100,000 people gathered to mark the occasion). Any news of the event – via television, internet, radio, press, even Twitter! – was blacked out and any demonstrations commemorating the event and its victims were forbidden. And this has not been the beginning of Tiananmen Square’s erasure from public memory. Many of China’s under-20 generation know nothing about what happened there in 1989, and students do not learn anything about the incident in their classes.

Many in China and the outside world remember, however. And although world leaders and citizens spoke out this week to condemn the 1989 crackdown as well as China’s silencing recognition of the event, these words were uttered in a different context, in a different world. China and the world are so different from 1989 that these words, coming from the mouths leaders who have become increasingly friendly with China, ring somewhat hollow. For example, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton suggested that China “should examine openly the darker events of its past and provide a public accounting of those killed, detained or missing, both to learn and to heal.” To which Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang responded, “We urge the U.S. to put aside its political prejudice and correct its wrongdoing and refrain from disrupting or undermining bilateral relations.” It is hard to see Clinton’s statement as anything besides political rhetoric. This is the same Secretary of State who visited China just this spring and refused to discuss “marginal issues” like human rights in favor of issues like the economic crisis and environmental concerns.

I’m sure that Clinton, Obama, and other outspoken world leaders and heads of state are uncomfortable with China’s lackluster human rights record. Who isn’t? But now China doesn’t fit quite so easily into the box that it used to. It was easy to condemn its human rights shortcomings and to demonize China as a godless commie dictatorship when it didn’t supply most of the cheap consumer products that we are so addicted to in the US. Or when it didn’t finance much of our ballooning national debt. It is still easy to condemn Burma’s similar 1988 and 2007 pro-democracy crackdowns because Burma still remains politically and economically insignificant on the global stage. China now occupies center stage.

These days, words condemning China are generally just that – words. Discomfort with China’s disregard for democratic values and basic human rights will not stop our businesses – or US consumers – from buying cheap goods from China. It will not stop businesses from moving factories there. Nor will it stop the US government from stepping up diplomatic and economic engagement with China, an important rising global superpower. Barring a shockingly egregious misstep on the part of China’s political leadership, relatively small issues like the Tiananmen Square blackout and even bigger concerns such as Chinese policies regarding Tibet, the rest of the world will be eager to be a part of China’s stunning rise.

Really, China is a new manifestation of an old dilemma for US foreign policy. We (and here I use “we” to stand in for the US government) claim to stand for democracy, freedom, liberty, human rights, the right to free speech, freedom of religion, etc., etc. And sometimes we do, but often we don’t. We support a Saudi monarchy/dictatorship because they ensure our access to oil. We supported the mujahaddin in Soviet-era Afghanistan because it was anti-Soviet. Then we supported a military dictatorship in Pakistan because it was anti-mujahaddin (kind of). We supported South Africa’s apartheid government for years. We armed, trained, and funded death squads and dictatorships throughout Central and South America during the 1980s and beyond (and before too). This list goes on.

China is just the latest challenge to applying lofty American ideals to the nitty-gritty of national foreign policy and bilateral relations. Perhaps one day, China’s government will give in (willingly or unwillingly) to global and domestic concerns about human rights and political freedom in China. It doesn’t look likely to happen soon however. And neither the US nor other countries have the political will to really stand up to China on such issues. In fact, conflicts with China over such issues could very well undermine the material benefits we enjoy thanks to our growing relationship with China. And, in all honesty, the compromises that the US and China are compelled to make to maintain a working, if imperfect, relationship are certainly better than another Cold War. Diplomacy and relationship building are always more complex, muddled, and morally ambiguous than outright hostility.

Indian Elections: Good News for India’s Future

It’s over. India’s marathon national assembly elections, after five phases of voting spread out over the past month, have finally been completed. And, as usual, the Indian electorate has surprised the experts, pundits, and commentators once again. The common knowledge was that this was anyone’s election – the Congress-led UPA coalition, the Bharatiya Janata Party’s NDA coalition, and even the Third Front, a motley collection of communist and regional parties, all had a chance to win. There was a feeling that the UPA held the edge, but no one expected a clear winner.

After the votes were tallied on March 16, the UPA did emerge victorious. And by much more than anyone had thought. To form a government in India, a party or coalition must win 272 seats to claim a majority in the Lok Sabha, the lower house of Parliament. The Congress won 206 seats on its own, and its five pre-poll allies won an additional 52 seats, putting the UPA within reach of 272, needing to pick up only a few more independent and smaller party representatives. To American ears, this may sound like less than a mandate. However, in most national elections, only about half of Indian voters vote for the two parties with a national presence – the Congress and the BJP. The last time any single Indian party won over 200 seats was in 1991. And the most optimistic Congress members predicted 180 seats at the most. The BJP finished a distant second, claiming 116 seats, and no other party gained more than 23 seats. The last UPA government didn’t even have 272 members and had to rely on support “from the outside” from India’s communist parties – known as the Left. When the Left withdrew its support over the Indo-US nuclear deal, the Congress was forced to enlist the support of an on-again off-again ally, the Samajwadi Party, who also supported the UPA from the outside. So the fact that the Congress was able to nearly cross 272 with its rather small pre-poll alliance was definitely a surprise. It also means that it will not need to coddle temperamental allies while governing.

So, why the outpouring of support for the UPA? There are a number of early theories. Many commentators have asserted that voters chose the harmony and stability of another five years of UPA rule. Electing the NDA or the Third Front would certainly have brought policy changes and more unpredictable relations with other countries. Yet a mere desire for stability does not convincingly explain the results in my mind. Indian voters are notorious for kicking incumbents out of office. Indeed, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is the first PM to be reelected since India’s first PM, Jawaharlal Nehru, nearly 50 years ago.

Other commentators give more positive reasons for the UPA’s success. Many credit Dr. Singh’s honest, able, deliberate, and understated style of governing as an asset that appealed to voters in a time of regional instability and rapid economic change within India. This seems plausible, especially since the NDA decided to attack Singh as a weak PM beholden to the Nehru-Gandhi family dynasty, while projecting their PM candidate, LK Advani as stronger and better able to respond to the threats India faces. This macho saber-rattling may have worried voters who perhaps appreciated Dr. Singh’s thoughtfulness and restraint in response to events like the terrorist attacks in Mumbai last November.

Others give credit to the political blossoming of handsome, young Nehru-Gandhi heir Rahul Gandhi, who was a tireless campaigner and who spearheaded Congress’ campaign strategy in India’s largest state, Uttar Pradesh (UP), where the Congress recorded its best showing in two decades. Rahul worked hard for the Congress campaign and began to show some political savvy while presenting a fresh, young face to voters – in contrast to the elderly leadership in other political parties. Given the Indian media’s obsession with glamour, celebrity, and the Nehru-Gandhi family, Rahul’s influence may be overblown, but it does seem to have made a positive difference in the way voters – especially young ones – view the Congress. And his bold political strategy in UP was indeed a success.

The last major reason for the UPA’s success was voter support for its unprecedented and substantial welfare policies that poured billions of rupees into programs to improve rural development, agriculture, health, and education. The NDA’s 2004 campaign slogan – “India Shining” – backfired on them spectacularly when voters reminded them that most Indians had not joined the hallowed ranks of the middle class. It appears the UPA learned from the NDA’s mistake. India is changing fast, but not everyone has gained from the country’s new found prosperity. The UPA’s programs targeted the country’s poorest and most disadvantaged, aiming to improve lives, the country, and their election chances. And it worked.

In my previous article about the Indian elections, I stressed the importance of coalitions. With the Congress’ spectacular showing, coalition politics will be less significant than in the past. This hardly marks the end of coalition politics, however. The Congress was fortunate that its coalition partners did very well, particularly in West Bengal and Tamil Nadu. It also seems significant that most of the UPA’s support came in states that were also fielding Third Front parties. Perhaps the voters’ rejection of this anarchic hodge-podge brought voters to the UPA in greater numbers. In others, it is entirely possible that Congress benefited from voters’ rejection of a new, untested coalition.

Confused? Well, that’s how it goes with Indian elections. The question is: What will happen now? With the Congress’ strong showing, there are now high expectations for significant improvements in India’s governance and policies, some of them wildly unrealistic. Will the UPA be able to deliver? Does their win herald a new direction for Indian politics? Don’t expect dramatic changes, though the UPA may now act more boldly in pursuing certain favored policies. For example, there is frequent speculation that without needing to rely on support from the Left, the UPA will accelerate India’s economic liberalization (even though some are making the argument that India’s protected markets and regulated banks have saved it from the worst of global economic implosion). The neighborhood is also changing quickly. Worries about Pakistan’s stability have risen dramatically. The Obama administration is scaling up the war in Afghanistan. Rebuilding society after a long civil war in Sri Lanka presents a new challenge. These changes may compel the UPA to make some new foreign policy choices.

However, barring a political catastrophe, the UPA’s reelection will provide 10 years of relative political stability at the national level. At this point in time, when India is being touted as an emerging global superpower, this stability should only help legitimize its global ambitions, particularly in the able hands of Manmohan Singh. Despite the UPA’s shortcomings, their reelection gives India the political opportunity to take the next steps toward being a global leader.

This is the second of two articles about this year’s Indian national elections and the second in a series of pieces about major elections in Asia this year.

Sri Lanka: Winning the War, But What About the Peace?

A dozen years ago, while in India, I became intrigued by the civil war raging in Sri Lanka. Encouraged by my Sri Lankan meditation teacher and an Australian Buddhist monk who had resided for years in Sri Lanka, I planned a research trip to the small tropical island nation. With a book full of good contacts and a head full of warnings about being careful what I ask, how I ask it, and who I ask it of, I eagerly prepared for my trip. But just two weeks before my departure, Tamil rebels detonated a series of bombs in the Sri Lankan capital, and I was advised to cancel my trip. I wavered, but the monk’s argument won me over. Who wanted to be worried about being killed every time they got on a bus or went to the market or left their hotel room? Reluctantly, I canceled the trip, but over the years continued to follow developments there.

This week, the Sri Lankan military has finally defeated the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) after over 30 years of armed conflict, killing the LTTE’s leader Vellupillai Prabhakaran and wiping out most of the LTTE leadership. In the early 1980s the LTTE emerged as the strongest and most ruthless of the Tamil separatist groups, upset with the discrimination and violence directed against the island’s Tamil-speaking Hindu minority by the Sinhala-speaking Buddhist majority. Sri Lanka’s Buddhist clergy rabidly supported the war despite its high cost, heavy civilian casualties, and questionable effectiveness. The LTTE (and other armed and unarmed Tamil groups), fighting for a Tamil homeland in the north and east of Sri Lanka, was supported from abroad and from the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu despite being labeled a terrorist organization by the US and other nations. For decades the conflict dragged on without an end in sight, and was presumed to be unwinnable by either side. Up to 100,000 people died. But in the last few years, Sri Lanka’s government launched an all-out assault on the LTTE, and the LTTE was split by infighting. The Sri Lankan military’s final push in the last few weeks precipitated a humanitarian crisis in which hundreds of thousands of terrified Tamil civilians were caught in the crossfire between the Sri Lankan military and the LTTE, and 7,000 were killed. But Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa won his war.

Now that the Sri Lankan military has emerged victorious, it remains to be seen how well the government secures the peace. The struggle for a Tamil homeland has perhaps been dealt a final blow and Sri Lankans are undoubtedly weary of war. But if, in the wake of the war, the Sri Lankan government treats Tamils as conquered subjects and fails to address the conflict’s root causes, resistance may again grow. This week’s national holiday celebrating the government’s victory over the LTTE must have seemed like insensitive gloating to many of the country’s Tamils, and it makes one wonder if the Sri Lankan government truly grasps what needs to happen next.

The challenge facing the Sri Lankan government is complex and substantial – to heal the wounds inflicted over the past three decades of war, to substantively address Tamil grievances against the Sri Lankan government, and to build a new inclusive Sri Lankan state and society. Can a government that has been on a war footing for so long accomplish these delicate tasks? Can a government that has for so long demonized, distrusted, and assaulted nearly three million of its own people move towards a just and peaceful future? I fear that it will not. Without doing this, the island’s Tamils will continue to flee Sri Lanka and those left will become increasingly marginalized. This may or may not result in renewed violence on the part of Tamils against the Sri Lankan state. Either way, the future for the country’s Tamil population looks bleak unless the Sri Lankan government is pushed to rebuild their war-torn country in a manner that includes those who once rejected its legitimacy.

Indian Elections – A Multiparty Masala

This will be the first of two articles about this year’s Indian national elections and the first in a series of pieces about major elections in Asia this year.

The largest democracy on Earth is presently in the middle of national elections. In India, three out of five phases of voting have been completed, and in only two weeks the final results will be known. Indian elections are always rambunctious. The democratic process itself is chaotic, accommodating dozens of political parties, thousands of candidates, and around 700 million voters who live in the world’s biggest cities and most remote villages, speak dozens of languages, and represent thousands of castes across a shockingly wide socioeconomic spectrum. Corruption, violence, and outlandish campaigning are a part of elections in any given year. Newspapers and news channels flood the cities and countryside with relentless election news and gossip while politicians crisscross the country in frenetic campaigning that can draw crowds of hundreds of thousands of people. The frequent involvement of cricket and film stars lends an air of celebrity and glamour to the proceedings. Hindi-speakers frequently use the word tamasha to describe elections and politics – a word meaning a “spectacle” and “amusement.” It also connotes rowdiness and a sense of being outside of normal life.

This year’s national elections are no different. But last November’s terrorist attacks in Mumbai have raised concerns about serious violence interfering with the elections. Indeed, after a right-wing Hindu nationalist candidate made inflammatory anti-Muslim remarks in public speeches, a Muslim mafia don allegedly threatened to kill him. But, this is really just par for the course. So far, the press has said little about (presumably Pakistani-based) Muslim militants planning any attacks during the elections. The larger threat – during the first two phases of polling at least – were Maoist guerrillas known as Naxalites, active in many of India’s poorest rural regions, who called for an election boycott and carried out murderous attacks on police forces, detonated bombs, and hijacked a train, leading to the deaths of over two dozen people.

With that said, the chance that India’s elections will be derailed by any violent organization or event is exceedingly small. Barring an unprecedented attack in India, this year’s National Assembly (Lok Sabha) elections will be completed relatively smoothly and on time. With the counting of votes on May 16, the election will come to a climax, and it is difficult at this point for anyone to imagine what is likely to happen. By all accounts, this election is a toss up, and the Election Commission’s ruling that exit polls and post-poll surveys be banned have made it even more difficult to predict what may happen. Complex coalition politics, which have dominated national politics in India since the 1990s, makes this election more unpredictable than the typical close US election, and this year’s addition of a third and an even smaller fourth coalition of regional parties makes these 2009 elections more jumbled than the last national elections five years ago. The stunning emergence of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) since 2004 has also complicated matters.

Consider: The ruling United Progressive Alliance (UPA), led by the secular, centrist Congress Party, is currently a coalition of 16 parties. The UPA has ruled since 2004 and can claim a rather ho-hum record that is neither impressive nor a failure. The alliance that ruled from 1999-2004, and which has sat in opposition since, is the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), led by the right-wing Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which has recently been beset by serious infighting and an unclear message for voters. It now contains 10 parties. Until now, these two alliances were the only ones to wield enough power to gain control at the center. The Congress and the BJP have been the largest parties since the 1990s, but their support has gradually been chipped away by communist, regional, and caste-based parties. Until recently, these smaller parties had no choice but to ally themselves with the Congress or the BJP if they wanted to play a part in national politics. However, this year a Third Front has emerged, gambling that a coalition of such parties can perhaps capture as many seats as the UPA and the NDA. This would enable these parties to take power without bowing down to the two parties that have dominated national politics for the past two decades.

With this development, parties are jockeying for power and weighing their options before and after the elections. While some parties have committed to one alliance or another, other parties are waiting until after the votes are counted to pick a side. And whichever alliance is asked to form a government will, with some serious political wrangling, likely attract new parties to its side – whether they have committed to another or not.

In this day and age, this is how elections in India are won and lost. The mathematics and the political sticks and carrots necessary for building a winning coalition have all but drowned out issues, personalities, and ideologies. For evidence of this, just follow the Indian news. The vast majority of election coverage is currently speculation about likely alliances or defections, not about issues. Of course, certain events and issues may shape an election, but they must be extraordinary. Though this is a national election, voters are choosing local candidates (in India’s parliamentary democracy, the party or coalition with the most candidates elected forms the central government). And these local candidates must address local issues – issues which often don’t change a great deal in much of India. Who can ensure electricity, drinkable water, better roads, better health care facilities, and better schools? And with such a plethora of political parties catering to specific caste and religious sensibilities, many voters will simply vote their caste or religious identity. For this reason, I doubt that, aside from Mumbai and maybe other large Indian cities, the issue of terrorism will be important. Nor will the global economic crisis. What will be most important in these elections are the alliances that are negotiated. For now, those alliances have yet to cohere. And there are enough wild cards in the deck that the final outcome is anyone’s guess.

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