A few publications over the past week continue to highlight the importance of democracy promotion in the Middle East. Some have done a better job than others.
First up is Jackson Diehl’s piece in today’s Washington Post. Diehl makes one excellent suggestion — then diminishes it with a faulty assumption. His premise is that the Obama administration fails to understand that diplomacy in the Middle East is inextricably linked to timing. Diehl believes current geopolitical conditions suggest the White House should push for a democratic opening in Egypt, with elections looming this year to replace an aging president, and former International Atomic Energy Agency chief Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei building a credible reform movement in the country.
But as a consequence, Diehl believes that the Obama administration should set aside the larger Israeli-Palestinian peace plan that the Obama administration is cooking up to focus on Egypt.
The former is an excellent initiative and should be pursued despite America’s tricky, decades-long relationship with Egypt that has centered far more on regional military hegemony and diplomatic stability than democracy promotion. But Diehl treats Middle East policy as a zero-sum game, with Israel-Palestine being thrown by the wayside. According to Diehl, rather than focusing on Egypt:
Obama has focused most of his personal energy and diplomatic capital on the Arab-Israeli conundrum — where, for a variety of reasons, there is no immediate opportunity. …[T]he big challenge for the president is to set aside his preconceived notions about what big thing he can or should accomplish in the region — and seize the opportunity that is actually before him.
I ran this by my friend Andrew Albertson, executive director of the Project on Middle East Democracy, and he dismissed the notion that we can’t walk and chew gum at the same time. In an email, he responded:
I certainly agree that the U.S. can and should be doing more in response to events in Egypt. Egyptians view this year as an opportunity to push for important political reforms in their country, and I think we need to support that. But no — I don’t think this is an either-or proposition. In fact, on the contrary, I think we will be more credible — and more effective — if we convey our support for the region’s people and basic issues of human dignity across the board.
The point is that both democracy and Egypt and big initiatives on Israel-Palestine are worthy endeavors. The former seizes on the opportunity available, and the latter attempts to create a bit of opportunity over the long run.
So how is the Obama administration doing on promoting democracy? Albertson’s POMED has just put out a new report by Stephen McInerney that takes a hard look at the Middle East democracy budget. McInerney finds that “total funding for democracy and governance is up” with important programs that promote Internet freedom, as well as aid to Afghanistan/Pakistan and Yemen, emphasized.
One of the big concerns, McInerney says, closely echoes Diehl’s original point:
Controversial changes in U.S. assistance to Egypt have been reinforced.• Funding for democracy in Egypt remains at levels sharply reduced in March 2009, which included disproportionate cuts in funding for civil society. The decision to provide USAID funding only to organizations registered and approved as NGOs by the Egyptian government remains in place. Finally, the administration is now exploring the establishment of an “endowment” proposed by the Egyptian government to remove congressional oversight over future U.S. economic aid.
By all means we should address these problems. But doing so need not come at the expense of other Mideast initiatives.
