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Georgia: A study in democracy
exportation
By Stephen Blank
If one attends enough conferences on the subject
of democratization in Central Asia and the Caucasus, an
almost incessant refrain is that America does not do
enough to foster democracy in these areas or to support
those organizations, governmental and non-governmental
alike, that are doing so.
Though Washington's
record is hardly unblemished, as it now has to balance
vital security objectives against the possibilities for
such intervention in sovereign states' internal affairs,
Georgia's "revolution of the roses" illustrates not only
some of the difficulties involved in democracy
promotion, but also the real possibilities for promoting
democracy and democratization, which are not the same
thing and these critics often fail to consider.
First of all, it is noteworthy that ex-president
Shevardnadze blamed American diplomats and institutions
like George Soros' Open Society Institute (OSI) for his
departure. He did not blame Russia, despite all the
abuse and pressure heaped on him and Georgia from
Moscow. The reason is simple. As President Vladimir
Putin has made clear, Russia is not interested in
exporting democracy. Russia finds that supporting
dictators who rule in fear of their opposition and thus
depend on Moscow to survive or to arrange their
succession are more to its taste and more congenial to
its sense of its self-interest in the Commonwealth of
Independent States (CIS).
Therefore, helping
these countries liberalize their economics and/or
politics is not on Russia's agenda, though the
stabilization of this region would most certainly better
assure Russia's stability, prosperity and democracy than
do its current policies.
Secondly,
Shevardnadze's post-resignation interviews display
another aspect of the problems inherent in democracy
promotion. These relate to the apparent universal
tendency of dictators or despots to lose contact with
reality and blame others rather than their own misguided
policies for their ultimate failure. Denial appears to
be an occupational hazard for these rulers, but
Shevardnadze is by no means the worst offender among
these dictators.
Indeed, he was rather tolerant
and never closed down Georgia's free media, which
existed thanks to the support of Western institutions
like Soros' OSI and due to Western pressure for a free
media. Thus, there always existed a space and a channel
through which accurate information could reach the
public and which allowed for the formation of an aroused
public opinion because of its accurate reportage of the
corruption of the regime.
However, such
forbearance is rarely the case. One need only read a
simultaneous interview with Turkmenistan's dictator
Saparmurat Niyazov, or the so called "Turkmenbashi"
(father of all Turkmen), to realize that in regimes
which approach the condition of sultanism, the dictator
soon becomes perhaps the most misinformed member of the
society and one who lives in a permanent state of
denial. Moreover, in such harsher regimes, the
opportunities for any kind of democracy promotion or for
the sponsorship of more liberal economic policies is
much more restricted than in more tolerant states like
Georgia.
In states like Uzbekistan and
Turkmenistan, hardly any room for opposition is allowed.
And while Washington needs Uzbek support to prosecute
the "war against terrorism", its diplomats both
privately pressure the regime during their meetings with
it and publicly are held accountable to Congress for
shortcomings in democracy promotion. Yet even so, the
results of this pressure are discouraging. Here the task
is much greater given the enormity of the scope of the
changes that need to be made in economics and politics.
In these states, liberal economics and politics are
under assault in virtually every respect, making it
necessary to fight from the defensive on virtually every
issue in the entire agenda. Such a setting confers
innumerable advantages on the local despot, particularly
in a situation where Washington and other powers need
support from such states for the conduct of a war in
which their vital interests are fully engaged. Thus in
Azerbaijan, despite widespread election illegalities and
repression of protesters, both Moscow and Washington,
who value stability in a vital state over everything
else, restrained their criticisms.
But the
impending signs of state failure and possible violence
in Georgia had been seen in Washington long ago, as was
the danger of its falling under Russian control and
becoming even more stagnant and backward, if not
violent, as a consequence of that "takeover". Washington
had sent high-ranking emissaries to Shevardnadze to
pressure him to conduct fair and free elections and he
disregarded them. The bankruptcy of the state and the
utter corruption of its regime, despite repeated
warnings, also led Washington to support the opposition
in innumerable small, discreet, but telling ways.
Governmental and non-governmental agencies like
the OSI supported the independent media and worked with
the armed forces to train them and possibly imbue them
with some notion of democratic civilian control over the
armed forces. These institutions arranged for the
opposition to study the Serbian opposition, which
similarly threw out Slobodan Milosevic after he ran a
similarly corrupted election. The US ambassador to
Georgia, Richard Miles, played an effective role in
working with the opposition and in putting pressure on
Shevardnadze to continue to hold elections.
Under those circumstances, the holding of
elections offered the opposition opportunities to
protest its corruption as well as a host of Georgia's
current policies. And when Shevardnadze's efforts to use
this corrupt election as a basis for a new parliament
were made public and official, Washington weighed in
with a strong denunciation of that corruption, that
signified that Shevardnadze no longer enjoyed the Bush
administration's support. These moves, taken in their
totality, show a rather effective if understated program
to foster democratic change in Georgia. While it is true
that such a policy is not possible in Uzbekistan or
Turkmenistan or the other countries of Central Asia, it
is quite likely that similar initiatives, to the extent
that they are possible, are under way.
Those who
criticize the US might do well to remember that politics
still remains the art of the possible and that not
everything which is done may or should be talked about
openly.
A third sign that emerges from Georgia's
revolution and one that is already making itself felt is
that such revolutions create a dynamic that can and
often does spread to other similarly despotic regimes.
There is no doubt that Central Asian regimes are now
looking nervously at Georgia and that democratic
factions in other states like Azerbaijan have taken
heart from it. This fear of democratization also applies
to Russia, where Putin has done everything possible to
dig the grave of Russia's democratic revolution and
stifle democratizing reforms in the CIS. The last thing
they want is democratization in the CIS since Russian
history clearly shows that such uprisings in the
periphery inevitably reverberate in Moscow and/or St
Petersburg, as was the case in 1985-91 and after.
Finally, a fourth encouraging sign is that
Georgia appears to have galvanized European and American
support for democracy and for the real sovereignty of
the post-Soviet states. The European Union and the
Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe have
blocked the imposition of a Russian protectorate and
virtual partition on Moldovia and backed public protests
to that end. These protests and that opposition forced a
Russian retreat.
Similarly, the US now went
public, warning the Central Asian governments that only
if they hold genuinely and credible democratic elections
can their regimes be considered to be fully legitimate
and implicitly secure governments. Though it is unclear
whether or not this represents a new line of policy and
America, as we noted, must balance conflicting
imperatives, such an admonition is to be welcomed
because as the Georgian revolution shows, only
democratizing governments can ultimately ensure the
security, liberty, independence and prosperity of their
peoples.
If there is a "Great Game" in the
former Soviet Union, and Russian statements indicate
Moscow's belief that there is such a game, and that it
is being played for the highest stakes, it is still the
case that Washington, albeit inconsistently, is on the
side of democracy and liberal economic reforms while
Russia is all too often on the other side. This posture
did not augur well for the citizens of the Soviet Union
before and it will not do so again.
If these two
states and other interested parties would like to get
beyond traditional inter-state rivalries for influence
across this expanse, they could do much worse than to
get behind a general demand that the misrule which
characterizes this region be reversed and turned into
liberalizing and ultimately democratizing policies that
not only benefit the local populations, but which almost
certainly ensure the general security of those
populations. After all, the belief that democracies do
not go to war with each other has been characterized as
the nearest thing to an axiom in contemporary political
science. Georgia's experience suggests that for the
entire post-Soviet world, there is substance to this
axiom, especially if the democratic potential of the
revolution of the roses can be maintained.
Stephen Blank is an analyst of
international security affairs residing in Harrisburg,
PA.
(Copyright 2003 Asia Times Online Ltd.
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