Fukuyama says Neoconservatism is Dead

One of the architects of Neoconservatism, Francis Fukuyama, says in a Sunday New York Times Magazine article that thanks to Bush, neo-conservatism is dead. He also says that his contribution to the movement was misunderstood, and that those implementing neoconservative policy in the Bush Administration were extremely naive. It is all worth reading, but I particularly liked this quote:

We need in the first instance to understand that promoting democracy and modernization in the Middle East is not a solution to the problem of jihadist terrorism; in all likelihood it will make the short-term problem worse, as we have seen in the case of the Palestinian election bringing Hamas to power. Radical Islamism is a byproduct of modernization itself, arising from the loss of identity that accompanies the transition to a modern, pluralist society. It is no accident that so many recent terrorists, from Sept. 11's Mohamed Atta to the murderer of the Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh to the London subway bombers, were radicalized in democratic Europe and intimately familiar with all of democracy's blessings. More democracy will mean more alienation, radicalization and — yes, unfortunately — terrorism.

But greater political participation by Islamist groups is very likely to occur whatever we do, and it will be the only way that the poison of radical Islamism can ultimately work its way through the body politic of Muslim communities around the world. The age is long since gone when friendly authoritarians could rule over passive populations and produce stability indefinitely. New social actors are mobilizing everywhere, from Bolivia and Venezuela to South Africa and the Persian Gulf. A durable Israeli-Palestinian peace could not be built upon a corrupt, illegitimate Fatah that constantly had to worry about Hamas challenging its authority. Peace might emerge, sometime down the road, from a Palestine run by a formerly radical terrorist group that had been forced to deal with the realities of governing.

If we are serious about the good governance agenda, we have to shift our focus to the reform, reorganization and proper financing of those institutions of the United States government that actually promote democracy, development and the rule of law around the world, organizations like the State Department, U.S.A.I.D., the National Endowment for Democracy and the like. The United States has played an often decisive role in helping along many recent democratic transitions, including in the Philippines in 1986; South Korea and Taiwan in 1987; Chile in 1988; Poland and Hungary in 1989; Serbia in 2000; Georgia in 2003; and Ukraine in 2004-5. But the overarching lesson that emerges from these cases is that the United States does not get to decide when and where democracy comes about. By definition, outsiders can't "impose" democracy on a country that doesn't want it; demand for democracy and reform must be domestic. Democracy promotion is therefore a long-term and opportunistic process that has to await the gradual ripening of political and economic conditions to be effective.

As I said in a recent post, we want democracy in the Middle East and around the world; it's a good thing. But it is going to be a rocky road in the short term. And I agree with Fukuyama that "Radical Islamism is a byproduct of modernization itself, arising from the loss of identity that accompanies the transition to a modern, pluralist society." We see the same phenomenon in fundamentalist Christianity, but for the most part without the same violent response. It is going to take time for it to work its way through the system.

I agree also that we can't impose democracy on other countries, and we particularly can't do it using the barrel of a gun. If we want to promote democracy around the world then we need to act like a democracy and uphold the highest standards of human rights, participate respectfully in the family of nations, and use our considerable financial and human resources to build relationships and improve the lot of suffering humanity around the world. If we plant the right kind of seeds, we stand a much better chance of seeing the flowering of a democratic world.