The History of Imposed Democracy and the Future of Iraq and Afghanistan

Abstract

What does history tells us about the prospects for democracy in post-invasion Iraq and Afghanistan? American policy makers frequently referenced the post-World War II success stories of Germany and Japan as plausible futures for the imposed democratic regimes in Iraq and Afghanistan. To evaluate the historical validity of this comparison, we examine the durability of 43 imposed democratic regimes during the period 1800–1994, given several political, economic, and social dimensions, as well as the long-term impact of these foreign cultivated regimes on subsequent polity performance. Our analysis suggests that the survival of imposed democracy is by no means assured. Instead, the survival of democracy is strongly conditioned by the process by which the regime is imposed and the social and economic conditions present in the state hosting the imposed polity. We discuss the prospects for the survival of democracy in Iraq and Afghanistan in light of these findings.