bucheon bum
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
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 Posted: Wed Dec 21, 2005 9:58 pm Post subject: Exporting Democracy: U.S. Ideals Meet Reality in Yemen |
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Thinking that the idea of spreading democracy is good, but not so keen on the way we've gone about it in Iraq? Think "soft power" is the way to go? Sorry folks, but I think "spreading democracy" in any form is a lost cause. Can't change a society unless the major players are willing to go along with it.
The Washington Post did a 3-part series this week, profiling a US gov't funded NGO, and its attempt promote some type of development in Yemen. Basically due to our gutless administration and politics, it failed. And when I say gutless, I do not mean to single out President Bush. No, I don't want to bash him specifically. I'm 99.9% sure that Clinton or any other American president's administration would have done the same thing. I should also note that the Yemeni gov't certainly had a big role in the failure of the policy.
Point being: democracy ain't going to happen anytime soon in the Arab world. I should note that Yemen is the poorest country on the arabian peninsula, but unfortunately a lot of its problems are prevelant throughout the Middle East.
Link to part one of the series:
US Ideals Meet Reality in Yemen
It is very long (each part is 5 pages).
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On the first day, which would turn out to be the best day, the one day of all 180 days when everything actually seemed possible, the president of Yemen hadn't yet dismissively referred to an American named Robin Madrid as an old woman.
The president's foreign minister had yet to insist that a program of Madrid's -- funded by the U.S. government to bring democracy to Yemen's most lawless corners -- had to end immediately.
The president's interior minister had yet to restrict her from traveling to these corners.
The official newspaper of the president's political party had yet to publish a story suggesting that she was a spy.
On the first day, June 15, 2005, none of the 14 tribal sheiks who gathered in a conference room to meet with Madrid about her program had been followed by the internal police. None had been called by the police in the middle of the night. None had been summoned to the president's palace and told that Americans aren't to be trusted. And none had been hurt, killed or nearly killed, which would happen to one of the men on the 88th day of the program when he would be ambushed by three carloads of men with machine guns in an ongoing tribal war, the very thing that Madrid and the men hoped the program could end. |
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