The Iraqi Intervention and Democracy in Comparative Historical Perspective

Abstract

Is military occupation likely to be the midwife of democracy? Can democracy be imposed by force from the outside? This is the assumption driv ing America's intervention in Iraq and posited as a potential new pillar of am bition for U.S. foreign policy elsewhere. But is this assumption historically grounded? The architects of the Iraqi intervention point to the success of America's occupation of postwar Germany and Japan as evidence that occupa tion can deliver on democratic objectives. But careful examination of the his torical record suggests that we should be tentative about drawing lessons from these cases to guide our endorsement of military occupation today. Germany and Japan began with a set of endowments, many of them anticipated by demo cratic theory, but others peculiar to the cases' unique historical context and time, that favored democratic outcomes. These endowments are not replicated in Iraq, nor does military occupation guarantee them elsewhere. Cases of occupation more comparable in initial endowment to Iraq suggest more pessimism about occupation's capacity to deliver democracy. Historical experience suggests that although military occupation may increase the likelihood of democratization, and wise policy choices certainly improve its chances, the outcome is largely shaped by factors, both domestic and international, that cannot be controlled by military engineers operating within the confines of current cultural norms and conventional limits of time and treasure.