Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final PaperObstacles to Ethics, Rights, and Development in Afghanistan:

Gender, “Stateness,” and Justice

Introduction

This paper will explore three major obstacles to ethical

development and consideration of human rights in Afghanistan: gender

has been identified as a cross-cutting issue and one with a lot of

international media attention; justice – of the lack thereof - has

been identified by Afghans themselves as an issue pervasive enough to

undermine all development and coexistence efforts of the past decade;

and stateness or national cohesion is one of the more overlooked

aspects of Afghanistan in my opinion, the misunderstanding of which

has been identified by noted Afghan expert Thomas Barfield1 as perhaps

the key issue undermining success in the mission in Afghanistan. Of

course there are many more obstacles and challenges in Afghanistan, a

comprehensive review would be massive. By focusing on three, I am

able to look at them in greater depth, discuss misconceptions and

recent history relevant to each, and provide reflections.

1 Lecture given to Civil-Military Relations Class, Fletcher School, 3/14/12. Personal Notes.10 March 2011 Page 1

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final PaperBrief Introduction to Afghanistan

Afghanistan is a landlocked country in South Asia, lying to the

west of Pakistan and to the east of Iran; to the north it shares a

border with Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and China. It is

one of the oldest and most continually conflicted areas of

civilization known, as it occupies a strategic territory just slightly

smaller than the state of Texas at the crossroads between Europe,

Asia, and the Middle East. The major ethnic groups and their relative

representation nationally are Pashtun (42%), Tajik (27%), Hazara (9%),

Uzbek (9%), Turkmen (3%), Baloch (2%) and others (8%). Official

national languages spoken are Dari/Afghan Persian (50%) and Pashto

(35%) while 30+ other minor languages are spoken by 15% of the

population; bilingualism is very common across Afghanistan.

Afghanistan’s ethnic makeup is a mosaic of dozens if not hundreds of

subdivisions of tribes2, each fiercely loyal to their clan or village,

and each suspicious of its neighbors.

Much of the rural population relies on subsistence agriculture

for survival, and agriculture accounts for 80 percent of the workforce

in Afghanistan. Expansion of the economy beyond industries of labor

such as agriculture is further hampered by widespread illiteracy. In

2 See Appendix: GIS Tribal Mosaic by Jill Kornetsky with Data from Anonymous at NPS10 March 2011 Page 2

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final Paper2008, male literacy rates by province ranged from 14-64% and female

from 1-17% and 31% in Kabul3. The staggering lack of human and

physical development creates a situation rife with conflict as the

leaders of each ethnicity, tribe, and clan scramble to divide limited

resources and limited power merely to survive. An influx of aid and

reconstruction dollars since 2001 has boosted the economy and provided

some work, however unemployment has only dropped from 40% in 2005 to

35% in 2008, and 36% of Afghans still live below the poverty line

today.

Based on minimum standards set forth by the Sphere project4,

Afghanistan has been and remains in a near-perpetual state of

humanitarian crisis. The majority Muslim (99%5) population of

Afghanistan numbers just under 30 million as of July 2011, up from

18.4 million in 1995. Nearly 43% of the population is under the age

of 14, and life expectancy hovers around 45 years for both males and

females, ranking Afghanistan at a reflection of just how severely

underdeveloped Afghanistan is. Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs)

number over 350,000 and over 3 million Afghan refugees currently

3 Afghanistan National Surveillance System and ICON Institute. (2008). See Appendix: Male and Female Literacy4 Sphere Project. (2011).5 99% Nationally with 90% Sunni, 19% Shia and 1% Other. CIA. (2011)10 March 2011 Page 3

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final Paperreside in Iran and Pakistan6. It is this abject poverty that

maintains Afghanistan in a cycle of despair and conflict, particularly

with respect to the post-2001 period; past battles were fought over

community-level or national sovereignty, to retain the national

heritage of Islam within a secularizing government, and other issues

of high importance to survival and identity. Insurgent forces in

central Asia today rely upon a combination of impoverished desperation

and brutal treatment of civilians to ensure subservience and adherence

to fundamentalist rule; vulnerable locals get a wad of cash or the

threat of pain and death in exchange for their victimization. If the

international community has any gift to give the Afghan people, it

will be aiding them in their quest for the security and capacity

required to achieve sustainable development.

The political sphere of post-2001 Afghanistan is large and

complicated7, with many former warlords starting their own political

parties and attempting something resembling legitimacy. Governance in

Afghanistan is a mixture of the post-Bonn Agreement constitutional

6 These first paragraphs synthesized with material from Blood (1994), the CIA World Factbook (2011), Library of Congress (2005), the National Vulnerability and Risk Assessment or NVRA (2008), the Afghanistan National Development Strategy or ANDS (2010), and UNHCR (2011). 7 See Appendix: COIN Dynamics slide from Joint Chiefs of Staff. To describe the dynamics in this image in prose form would result in a conflict analysis far longer than the scope of this paper…10 March 2011 Page 4

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final Paperdemocracy, which was modeled on Western democracies and a revision of

the old Afghan constitution from their quasi-secular era of the 1960’s

and 1970’s, and the tribal systems of governance, with its shuras,

jirgas, mullahs, maliks, and other roles and structures both unique to

Afghan culture and present in some form across Islamic states. Based

on the text of Bonn itself, the Afghan people should “freely determine

their own political future in accordance with the principles of Islam,

democracy, pluralism and social justice”8. More than a decade after

the start of Operation Enduring Freedom, Afghanistan is beginning to

coalesce as a nation with ambitious national and international

promises of institution building and reform, anticorruption measures,

and increased standards of living and security for everyday Afghans.

Yet in reality, constant violence and abject poverty maintain

Afghanistan in a cycle of despair and conflict.

Insurgent forces in central Asia today rely upon a combination of

this impoverished desperation and brutal treatment of civilians to

ensure subservience and adherence to fundamentalist rule; vulnerable

locals get a wad of cash or the threat of pain and death in exchange

for their victimization and complicity. According to Amnesty

International, Human Rights Watch, and the U.S. Department of State’s

8 Government of Afghanistan. (2001) 10 March 2011 Page 5

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final Paper2010 Human Rights Report, Afghanistan continues to face myriad human

rights abuses including

“extrajudicial killings; torture and other abuse; poor prison conditions, widespread official impunity; ineffective government investigations of abuses by local security forces; arbitrary arrest and detention; prolonged pretrial detention; judicial corruption; violations of privacy rights; restrictions on freedom of the press; limits on freedom of assembly; restrictions on freedom of religion including religious conversions; limits on freedom of movement; official corruption; violence and societal discrimination against women; sexual abuse of children; abuses against minorities; trafficking in persons; abuse of worker rights, and child labor.9”

These human rights abuses continue unchecked, past injustices fester

into blood feuds, corruption dries the coffers and the culture of

impunity in Afghanistan today is so pervasive as to leave most Afghans

hopeless for positive change. In order to help Afghanistan work

towards better times, we must first understand the culture, the

history, and the obstacles that the Afghan people are saddled with in

their struggle to forge new lives, better futures, and a more

representative and egalitarian nation.

The Burden of Gender

If the prototypical notion of an Afghan woman is in an arranged

marriage, burqa-wrapped, home-bound with kids; the archetypal Afghan

9 Taken from 2010 U.S. Department of State’s Report on Human Rights, Afghanistan. http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/160445.pdf 10 March 2011 Page 6

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final Paperman is a confident masculine warrior, sly and cunning enough to

outlast Soviet armies. The ease of recruiting young men into radical

Islamic groups have been examined recently by DFID-sponsored

researcher Sarah Ladbury in association with Cooperation for Peace and

Unity (CPAU) out of Kabul:

“Young unemployed men join Taliban groups for a variety of reasons, including to

earn an income and to increase their status… As they said: ‘We have been born during war, it has always been war, we know how tofight, fighting has become a profession’.10”

With the addition of external elements such as troops for the NATO-

ISAF international counterinsurgent campaign, international NGOs

working at all levels of society, and foreign fighters coming through

Afghanistan to join forces with Al Qaeda and the Afghan Taliban in the

Pashtun tribal belt and into Pakistan, there is a lot of testosterone

on the ground in Afghanistan.

As an Islamic Republic, Afghanistan has a culture and long

history based within the tenets of Sharia law. Some aspects of

Koranic text encourage adoption of the typical or conservative

masculine and feminine gender roles, with women raising families and

tending the home while men act as providers and protectors. However,

it should be noted that through the 1970s and until the insecurity and

10 Ladbury, S. (2009). P10 March 2011 Page 7

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final Paperrepression provided by the Taliban regime, women were active and

unrestricted members of society, taking active roles in government and

for time, making up more than 70% of health workers11. The strict

masculine hegemony that is seen in Afghanistan, including the

practices of purdah or physical and social segregation of the sexes,

today was born under the austere leadership by the imposed regime of

the Taliban. While many Afghans are eager to see a return to

moderation, within the auspices of the Koran, ongoing insecurity and

fundamentalist presence throughout the country prevent women from

safely choosing to exercise modesty and temperance on a personal

rather than a societal level. A return to the pre-Taliban Afghan way

of life is a reasonable intermediate goal for culturally-sensitive

gender-integrated development.

Beginning with the administration of Bush II12, masculine themes

have continued to shape the situation on the ground in Afghanistan.

Despite the rhetoric of “liberating the women of Afghanistan,”

practice on the ground aims for cultural relativism, and from the

outsider’s perspective, the culture of Afghanistan is one where 11 USAID. (2005). P 3 Compare to the tables presented in the Appendixes for currentpresence, or lack thereof, of women in public life. Reviewing education, governmentpositions, and similar indexes we see that women are largely absent from Afghan public life.12 See Dissertation on Hegemonic Masculinity and Bush’s Public Addresses, Bellini (2010).10 March 2011 Page 8

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final Paperinequality and segregation of women is normal and appropriate.

Accordingly and outside of the relatively metropolitan and progressive

environment of Kabul, troops and aid workers work within the

restrictions of purdah, adopting the social customs of working with

and recognizing a village’s men as being in control of tribe and

tribal militia decisions, whose participation is considered a crucial

intelligence and deterrent component when international security is

the primary goal. Military-Humanitarian aid is a new and major

contributor to development in Afghanistan. Evolving military strategy

in the US and ISAF have led to the COIN or Counterinsurgency Strategy.

Slogans like “winning hearts and minds” and “clear-hold-and-build” are

thrown around, reflecting rhetoric of cooperation and development.

While there are numerous gender initiatives in Afghanistan13

focusing on the advancement of women, these programs necessarily

operate within a narrow scope; in order to empower women in an

insecure and gender biased situation, one must guise their efforts

within other development agendas. “Areas of focus include education,

literacy, health, economic opportunities, gender-based violence,

13 See USAID Website. Ambassador’s Small Grants Program (ASGP) sponsors >300 programs in all 34 provinces. The focus is on project support, gender mainstreaming, institutional development and economic development. 10 March 2011 Page 9

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final Paperadvocacy, access to justice, coalition building, public awareness, and

peaceful co-existence.” Any attempt at a burning burqua movement akin

to the burning bra feminist wave of the 1960s would be to directly

endanger intended beneficiaries; from a radical beginning it seems one

must make incremental changes so as to not exacerbate the situation.

It is important to note that the dramatic gender separation in

Afghanistan is not always a means of exerting misogynistic, abusive

practices upon females considered no more important that chattel.

This may have been the attitude of the fleeing mullahs and the

megalomaniacal Taliban leadership; one enforced so severely for so

many years that it has become ingrained for those who have lost

themselves under the thumb of radical insurgents.

Nasrine Gross, in an article for the Kabul Weekly in 2003 wrote

“Every time (Taliban spiritual leader) Mullah Omar proclaimed another

Fatwa against Afghan women, he chipped away at the authority and self-

respect of the Afghan men.14” Reasons of a more loving and logical

nature offered when moderate Muslim men in Afghanistan seclude and

14 Quoted in USAID (2005). P 110 March 2011 Page 10

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final Paperseparate their women arise from the insecurity and lawlessness that

come from three plus decades of international war:

“…the impact upon women and girls is even more debilitating sincea lack of security is considered a valid justification for restricting their movement and denying service provision and access… Afghan men, responsible for protecting Afghan women and their honor, are sometimes powerless to counter the risks women face outside the home. At times, the only response to threats against women is that men ask, sometimes demand, that women stay at home.15”

Given thirty years of protecting women by hiding them, it is of no

surprise that the social structure of Afghanistan, noted in the 1970s

to have shown remarkable gender equality in professional

representation16, has evolved into a strictly separated system. For

older women having experienced the anxiety of her nation perpetually

at war, and for middle-aged women who were born into the Taliban

Sharia system and know no different, gender separation is the natural

and safe social structure.

It is within reason for a people to practice social mores which

don’t coincide with the West’s view of normality; every nation and

culture has a unique identity and value structure. The argument,

15 OTI Afghanistan Program Evaluation. (2005). P 116 See OTI Afghanistan Program Evaluation (2005).10 March 2011 Page 11

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final Paperhowever, that the situation for women in Afghanistan is dictated by

holy text, and to change it would be to disrespect a billion people

worldwide is simply a fallacy. Looking to Afghanistan’s own history

we can see a rich and egalitarian history now overshadowed by 30 years

of darkness, oppression and death. The holy Koran does provide for

basic definitions of gender roles, for example placing the man at the

head of the house and affording him the option of polygamy; what’s

often forgotten by secular and Judeo-Christian societies are the high

ideals of the Koran - it also strongly emphasizes personal restraint,

justice, and individual rights.

As its population and external actors move towards a kinder, more

peaceful, prosperous and egalitarian Afghanistan, reliance on and

promotion of the purer tenets of Islam will act as a vehicle for

advancing both gender and development agendas. Separation of the

sexes is unlikely to end in the short term, but ensuring that programs

and activities are distributed equally among male, female, and mixed-

gender programs will work towards a state of equal opportunity and

justice within those divisions in the meantime. Incorporating

moderate amounts of gender rhetoric and dialogue, increasing as it

10 March 2011 Page 12

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final Paperbecomes more acceptable and commonplace, can accelerate the process.

Make no mistake about it, though; the road to gender equality in

Afghanistan is going to be very long and very bumpy.

The Burdens of Justice and Human Rights

It is nearly impossible to make strides on development anywhere

without accounting for the role that gender plays in a given society.

Yet gender inclusion cannot be achieved if there is no protections for

women in common practice, the rule of law, and the justice system.

While Afghanistan has been in “transition” since just after the fall

of the Taliban to U.S. forces in Operation Enduring Freedom, initially

the formation of a transitional government overlooked the need for

transitional justice. The Bonn Agreement makes scant reference to

reforming the justice sector, and only passing reference to promoting

“national reconciliation.” No mechanisms for this reconciliation are

suggested, and Bonn focused on the necessities of filling a leadership

void. The one major and lasting contribution to TJ at this point is

the formation of the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission

(AIHRC), which has since written key reports and seeks to collect

10 March 2011 Page 13

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final Paperevidence of human rights violations for posterity and potential

prosecutions.

A 2004 conference in Berlin outlined a “Workplan for the Afghan

Government” which included provisions to improve electoral processes,

political rights, security, good governance and public administration,

rule of law and human rights. Since then successful if controversial

elections have been held twice, and the AIHRC continues to operate

diligently. Even seven years later, however, good governance is

something of a farce, security conditions continue to vacillate

locally, and the rule of law itself can be used to violate human

rights, evidenced by a 2009 law stating that Shiite men are allowed to

starve their wives to death should she refuse him sex. Some actually

considered this revised law a step up from one that legalized marital

rape17.

The AIHRC formed under the Bonn Agreement had been undertaking a

massive study and in 2005 presented President Karzai with a report

detailing experiences of conflict and public opinions about a path

forward. This document is called A Call for Justice: A National

Consultation on Past Human Rights Violations in Afghanistan.

17 Boone, J. (2009). 10 March 2011 Page 14

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final PaperGenerally speaking, Afghans believe that there can be no peace without

justice and accountability, and that human rights depend on justice

being more than mere rhetoric. This report discusses at length the

popularity and spectrum of opinion on the many possible approaches to

TJ, and could potentially serve as the rationale for a holistic TJ

process; five months later a June 2005 conference was convened at The

Hague to from an Action Plan on Peace, Justice and Reconciliation.

Afghan Government officials met with representatives from the

UN’s Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) and members of the AIHRC to

develop this Action Plan, a five-point framework for Transitional

Justice. These include:

1. Acknowledgement of the Suffering of the Afghan Peopleo National Day of Remembrance, National Memorials and a

National Museum2. Ensuring Credible and Accountable State Institutions

o Strengthen the Civil Service Commission and establish an Advisory Panel for political appointments

o “Develop an inclusive strategy for the general reform of thejustice sector”

3. Truth-Seeking and Documentationo Start a consultative process to understand Afghan views of

truth-seeking, recommend a mechanismo Have conferences on truth-seeking in other countries, gather

lessons learnedo Increase documentation efforts, especially for Gender-Based

Violence

10 March 2011 Page 15

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final Papero Determine a truth-seeking structure

4. Promotion of Reconciliation and National Unityo Initiate a public debate about national reconciliation, hold

a conference on reconciliationo Support conflict resolution programs and explore peace and

reconciliation educationo Encourage support for DDR, DIAG, and other reintegration

mechanisms5. Establish Effective and Reasonable Accountability Mechanisms

o Form a Task Force to advise the Afghan President of international legal obligations

o Clarify the issue of Amnesty as un-Islamic in cases of humanrights abuses

o Capacity Building to ensure implementation of this Action Plan

This is an Action Plan that understands well the methods and means of

Transitional Justice. Unfortunately progress on these stated goals is

slow, frustrating and controversial. Even as a majority of the Afghan

public supports these kinds of initiatives, evidenced by A Call for

Justice, 2006 saw a dramatic spike in the violence across Afghanistan.

Anti-government militias, perhaps spooked by the possibility that real

change was forthcoming, used suicide bombs, IEDs, intimation tactics,

and in areas where they operate freely, harsh imposition of Sharia law

as interpreted by radically conservative clerics or members of the

Taliban.

10 March 2011 Page 16

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final PaperSince 2005, the issue of prosecutions for past crimes including

crimes against humanity was debated widely and hotly, all across

Afghanistan. While a conference on Rule of Law was being organized in

early 2007, legislation officially called the National Stability and

Reconciliation Resolution was being written in Afghanistan, and

quietly left on Karzai’s desk. After 15 days without a veto, proposed

legislation is considered law. That March saw what later would be

called the Amnesty Law, legislation granting blanket amnesty for any

crime committed before 2001. Perhaps the new Afghan Government was

doing to the international community in 2007 what the warlords were

doing to NATO forces in 2001; making promises publicly while

maintaining their modus operandi behind the scenes.

As the main if not sole functioning body working on behalf of

Transitional Justice in Afghanistan, the AIHRC released a new Action

Plan for 2010-2013. Their five new “Strategic Objectives” resemble

the Key Actions of the 2005 Action Plan, yet the language used

intimates at the failure of the central government to live up to its

human rights obligations as promised at Bonn 2001:

1: Exercise a Leadership Role on Human Rights Issues in Afghanistan

10 March 2011 Page 17

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final Paper2: Support all Afghans to Understand, Exercise and Respect HRs3: Strengthen AIHRC’s Capacity and Empower Government, CivilSociety, and Individuals to Protect and Promote Human Rights4: Advocate at Nation, Regional, and International Level forHR Realization5: Hold Individuals, National and International Institutionsand Government Accountable for the Protection, Observance, and Fulfillment of their Human Rights Obligations

These objectives are directed at the AIHRC, a wise shift from the 2005

model of creating an Action Plan for a government not yet ready to act

upon it. The AIHRC has operated for ten years, remains active and

diligent through research, collecting evidence and stories, and

generating reports and recommendations. It has proven its expertise

and dedication to Human Rights by shaping the language of Transitional

Justice in Afghanistan.

The culture of impunity18 that continues even today in

Afghanistan finds its roots in ineffective and often corrupt

leadership; national conciliation is impossible while criminals are

left unprosecuted and promises of government reform aren’t realized.

Successful Transitional Justice in Afghanistan must be rooted in

reformation of the judiciary and other state institutions, enforcing

18 Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit. (2003). Ending Impunity and Building Justice in Afghanistan.10 March 2011 Page 18

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final Paperrule of law and international standards. As of 2011 progress in

achieving the promises of these initiatives has been disappointing.

Conflict, violence, and human rights violations continue unabated in

the South and Southeast, while additional pockets have sprung up in

previously quiet areas. Legislation has passed limiting the rights of

women and granting amnesty for past transgressions. Despite billions

of dollars and ten years of investment in “transition” through Afghan

Government and International agreements, commitments and initiatives,

it is difficult to find any evidence of Transitional Justice in

practice in Afghanistan.

The Burden of “Stateness”

In order for the disparate groups within Afghanistan to reach a

functional democracy, the literature points to the problem of

stateness, or the potential a coalescing society has to form the

institutions and structures associated with being a nation-state. In

this new millennium where the definition of a state has been

challenged by the dissolution of the USSR, the former Yugoslavia and

even the former state of Czechoslovakia, “Presumably, a truly

sophisticated state theory covering the state in its totality, at the

10 March 2011 Page 19

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final Papersame time not relying on any general or essentialist assumption to

grasp its uniqueness, its processional nature and historical

contingency may be a interesting and demanding intellectual challenge.

However, such a theory would most likely also be a highly complex,

cumbersome and elusive construct. The state and its features could

become fuzzy and diffuse.19” In the case of Afghanistan, the issue of

forming a democratic state cannot be resolved without understanding

the potential Afghans have to form a socially cohesive, functional

democracy, that is, we must understand the unique potential for

stateness in this case. “Before you can have a democracy, you must

have a state, but to have a legitimate and therefore durable state you

eventually must have democracy. The two are intertwined, but the

precise sequencing of how and when to build the distinct but

interlocking institutions needs very careful thought.20”

Zhidas Daskalovski, in studying the democratic consolidation in

ethnically diverse Macedonia, notes the complexities of building a

collaborative democracy in pluralistic settings.

…a country is only democratically consolidated when democracy is the only game in town… [that is] when no significant political groups seriously attempt to overthrow the democratic regime… The main problems for achieving consolidation in pluralistic

19 Pfister, T. (2004). 20 Fukuyama, F. (2005). 10 March 2011 Page 20

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final Papersocieties arise due to a ‘stateness’ problem, namely the disputesover the boundaries of the state, its character… the more the population of the territory of the state is comprised of plurinational, lingual, religious, or cultural societies, the more complex politics becomes because an agreement on the fundamentals of [the] democracy will be more difficult… how difficult it is to consolidate a regime if a significant group ofits citizens is actively disobedient21.

While this notion is intuitive for anyone with a familiarity with the

scope and complexity of the Afghan situation, Daskalovski has produced

anecdotal evidence from the Macedonian case to warn practitioners that

the process of developing a democracy in Afghanistan will be highly

complicated.

Fukuyama notes that in cases where capacity for statebuilding is

absent often the international community must supply some of the basic

functions of the state, in order for progress to begin. However he

notes that the scope of assistance is not a blanket policy and

assisting nations must use caution when supporting the democratic

process outside of its borders. “Outsiders are driven to supply

sovereign-state functions because of the internal weakness of the

countries in question. But stateness that is provided by outsiders

often undermines the ability of domestic actors to create their own

21 Daskalovski, Z. (2004). 10 March 2011 Page 21

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final Paperrobust institutions. Too much state-building builds long-term

dependence, and may ultimately come to seem illegitimate to the

locals.” This is exactly the case in Afghanistan, whose people

initially embraced the assistance of a liberating force who promised a

better life under Western-style society than under the Taliban. Ten

years of stalled or insufficient progress has eroded the confidence

Afghans may have had in their international friends. It is essential

that the programs being completed in Afghanistan today contribute to

self-sufficiency alongside statebuilding; a tangible return of power

to Afghan hands is the only means of keeping anti-Western sentiment

and the blame game in check.

International “interference” is a source of much regional

discontent and global controversy about the approaches used by the

ISAF in assisting the Afghan people. While an international military

force adds another layer of complexity to the social mix,

Afghanistan’s problems of stateness and social cohesion are not a

construct of the West.

Afghanistan is a fragmented country, with its people divided along carious tribal, ethnic, linguistic and religious lines. The diverse and complex ethnic and linguistic structures of Afghan society have created many points of friction and flashpoints for violence… Only in times of crisis or when faced with a threat from the outside has a sense of national unity

10 March 2011 Page 22

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final Paperexisted… These attempts [at a central authority] have failed, largely due to the resistance of and loyalty to local tribes and religious structures already in place. The vast diversity found in Afghanistan has produced many obstacles to building a liberal democracy and a strong and integrated nation22.

This is not to say that a state cannot be formed uniting the people of

Central Asia; in the past Afghans have embraced a monarchy and for a

time succeeded in building a communal Afghan identity. As Young

notes, the unity in Afghanistan is dependent upon collective

recognition of an external threat requiring collaboration to repel.

The problem in Afghanistan at the moment is the lack of a collective

opinion about who the “bad guys” are, and until the ISAF and its

civilian counterparts can demonstrate any kind of progress – towards

stability, improved livelihoods, security from violence, towards

Afghan independence – “the West” will continue to be just another

interloping force to contend with. Progress in good governance and

development will allow recategorization of NATO as friend, and of the

Taliban as foe, to the population.

Since contact with the West, Antonio Giustozzi argues the tribal

way of life has been threatened in Afghanistan, for better or for

worse. Tribalism finds its roots in geographic isolation and scarcity

of resources around which kin can gather to share and protect. The

22 Young, D.O. (2007). 10 March 2011 Page 23

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final Paperinflux of education, healthcare, new government institutions, travel,

media, and international military action has exposed Afghans to ideas

and opportunities previously unknown to them. He cites the presence

of the Taliban itself as an arbiter of the end of the tribal way’s

steady decline. Giustozzi sees statebuilding in Afghanistan as

adhering to one of three interestingly categorized frameworks:

Hobbesian or pessimistic-conservative-fatalistic, Kantian or liberal-

progressive-hopeful, and Machiavellian or practical-self-interested.

While most of us struggle between Hobbes and Kant, short-term versus

long-term goals and outlook; Giustozzi poses that in the case of

Afghanistan, Machiavelli’s The Prince would provide better insight.

“…The only realistic option for the evolution of a strong Afghan state

is the self-interest of Afghan political elites, either the current or

future ones. When they will see that institution bulding enhances the

survivability of the political regime, they will start investing in it

seriously.23”

A rush to presidential rule and unification into a single nation-

state overlooks the notion that while democracy is the best known way

of governing free people in the modern age, the cooperative and

centralized nature of democracy is something that evolves naturally

23 Giustozzi, A. (2011) 10 March 2011 Page 24

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final Paperfor each culture. The United States didn’t start out with the legal

and governmental structures of today’s democracy. Settlements had to

coalesce into colonies; colonies had to establish collegial trade and

movement between one another; a common foreign enemy acted as the

impetus to unite forces and start a revolution; a consensus that the

people of the New World would no longer find itself under the thumb of

the crown and instead would form a More Perfect Union finally led to

the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United

States of America. The freedom embodied within America is indeed a

beautiful labor, but the same as with any birthing processes it

requires work, pain, time and blood.

Rome was not built overnight and over three hundred years later

America is still in the process of building and refining “a more

perfect union.” How then, logically, can the international community

expect the Afghan people to adopt and perfect their own democracy in a

decade or less? Afghanistan can be assisted in its efforts to

democratically consolidate and form a sovereign state; when doing this

however, special attention must be taken to ensure that the structures

and institutions being built are suited to and owned by the people of

Afghanistan.

10 March 2011 Page 25

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final Paper

Conclusions

The many obstacles being faced within Afghanistan are

interrelated and interdependent such that progress cannot be made on

any one front if efforts are not underway across the system as a

whole. Development requires effective governance depends on security

is influenced by visceral notions of justice left incomplete without

the input of women is complicated by diversity of culture which has

been tainted by a radical ideological insurgency which cannot be

ousted without governance, capacity or unity. Only through greater

coordination and dialogue between all stakeholders, beneficiaries and

service providers, with sufficient unity of purpose, can Afghanistan

find stability, growth and sustainable development.

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Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final PaperReference List

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Bellini, Michelle E. (2010). “Wanted: Dead or Alive” Masculinities and US Military Intervention in Afghanistan. University of Denver Dissertation. Retrieved on 30 March 2011 from http://gradworks.umi.com/34/11/3411893.html

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Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final PaperGovernment of Afghanistan. (2010). Ministry of Information and Culture Homepage. Retrieved on 19 March 2011 from http://www.moic.gov.af/?lang=en

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Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final PaperUNHCR. (2011). UNHCR Country Operations Profile – Afghanistan. Retrieved on 16 September 2011 from http://www.unhcr.org/cgi-bin/texis/vtx/page?page=49e486eb6

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Varshney, A. (2003). Nationalism, Ethnic Conflict and Rationality. Retrived on 10 October 2011 from http://www-personal.umich.edu/~satran/PoliSci%2006/Wk%204-2%20Sacred%20Values%20Varshney.pdf

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Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final PaperAppendix: GIS Map of Tribal Mosaic by Jill Kornetsky

Data from Anonymous at the Naval Postgraduate School: Overlaid TribalSubdivisions

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Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final PaperAppendix: Afghanistan COIN Dynamics Chart from Joint Chiefs of Staff

PPT24

24 10 March 2011 Page 31

Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final PaperAppendix: Human Development Index (HDI) and Components of HDI

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Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final PaperAppendix: Literacy Rates (from NVRA 2007/8)

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Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final PaperAppendix: Conferences and other Major Events

-

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Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final PaperAppendix: Development Strategy Structure (ANDS Page 18) and

Implementation Phasing (ANDS Page 167)

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Jill Suzanne Kornetsky ERD Final PaperAppendix: Baseline Gender Statistics - Professional and Government

Positions

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