A Question On “Winning” The War

If there is one thing upon which libertarians, of whatever stripe, can all pretty much agree, it’s that a highly centralized government is a problem, not a solution. Why, then, is it that success in Iraq is so dependent upon the establishment of what we all agree is a problem?

I’m not an anarchist, and therefore I find a minimal level of government tolerable, so long as it is frequently held to account by the electorate. But government itself is not so much a “success” as a necessary evil. The relative “success” of a people, therefore, should not be based on the institution of a government, and certainly not on a highly centralized one, but on the people’s ability to maintain and support themselves and their successive generations. Accordingly, this observation of Tom Donelson’s seems to be quite insightful:

Every bit of strategy that is being discussed is based on the idea that we are losing. The Democratic opposition is based on the idea that we are losing. The media mantra is that we are losing. What if we are not?

In my December 10th entry, I observed that the Iraqi economy is doing quite well. I wrote, “[what] This economic news also shows is that [the] Iraqi nation may be slowly evolving into three federal sections since most of the economic progress is happening outside the Baghdad.” Newsweek is now reporting what others such as Strategypage.com have been showing for the past couple of years, the Iraqi’s economy is booming. [...] Newsweek added, “[...] However it’s spent, whether on security or something else, money circulates. Nor are ordinary Iraqis themselves short on cash. That’s boosted economic activity, particularly in retail. Imported goods have grown increasingly affordable, thanks to the elimination of tariffs and trade barriers. Salaries have gone up more than 100 percent since the fall of Saddam, and income-tax cuts (from 45 percent to just 15 percent) have put more cash in Iraqi pockets.” What Newsweek is describing [is a] supply side economy and guess what, it works in the United States, and it works in Iraq!

One meaning of all of this is that we may not be losing after all. If most of the country is prospering and Iraqis are forming new businesses, then can we assume that overall, we are indeed winning? Another meaning is that Iraqis are showing that they can operate in a liberated economy and if they can work in a free market economy during a war time setting; imagine what they could do if the insurgency is defeated? One important aspect of a liberal democracy succeeding is a liberal economy that frees entrepreneurs from the shackles of government. And Iraqis, with lower tax rates than even seen in the United States, have the money to form new businesses and spend money on new goods.

I’m not prepared to jump on the party train just yet, as I don’t think things are going as well in Iraq as they could or should be. However, I think Donelson’s observations suggest something important here: measuring success in Iraq by the institution of a highly centralized government, instead of the success of people at the individual level is highly suspect. Allowing people to govern themselves at the local and regional level seems to promise greater rewards in the long (and possible near) term, as it likely based on the ingrained cultural norms that offer a trusted means of living and working together without the outside influence of a Baghdad government, much less a coalition-backed government. [UPDATE: See, e.g., this proposal for winning the War (via Patterico)] If security can be provided from outside forces long enough to allow local councils, etc. to develop, maybe success in Iraq is more obtainable than appears at first blush. Certainly the facts on the ground regarding Iraq’s economy challenge the presumption that establishment of a centralized government is what’s necessary right now, since it would appear that the economy is the one thing with which the government (as it is) has very little hand, and it’s thriving!

In the same vein, Ilya Somin notes that federalism has been recognized as an important inhibitor to totalitarian government:

Hitler and the Nazis rightly saw German federalism as an obstacle to the realization of their aims – which required a highly centralized state. And it is not surprising that they quickly stripped the German states of most of their authority after taking power in 1933. Other things equal, a totalitarian government is more difficult to establish in a federalist state than in a unitary one, because in the former state and/or local governments will retain greater ability to resist a totalitarian movement that comes to power at the center. If the totalitarians are unable to stifle the autonomy of state governments, then their vision cannot be fully implemented, even if they remain in power at the center. In Hitler’s words, federalism makes it harder for a totalitarian movement to “impose its principles on the whole . . . nation.” Furthermore, relatively autonomous state and local governments might make it more difficult for the totalitarians to seize power at the center in the first place.

[...]

The degree to which federalism impedes totalitarianism remains an open question. But if it does so to even a small extent, that fact alone might justify establishing a federalist system with strict limits on central government power – even if a unitary state would be preferable otherwise. The choice between unitary government and federalism is an important issue in many new democracies, including Iraq. In making their decision, they should take due account of Adolf Hitler’s insight.

Ilya also rightly observes that, “The fact that Hitler didn’t like federalism is not in itself a reason to support it,” but I think it does indicate that federalism can be a significant ingredient in concocting a successful democracy in Iraq. So much so that one must ask, “would there be so much sectarian violence if there were no centralized government, but instead, autonomous regions in a loosely federated system?” Leaving aside the question of oil in Iraq (which I will address in a moment), I would venture that the current level of violence would decrease dramatically. If the central government is limited in what it can force on your “state” what point is there in risking your life to fight it?

Of course, this leaves the giant viscous elephant prancing about the room — what do you do about Iraqi oil? The oil trust idea is the best that I’ve heard, and something along those lines is likely the only workable solution outside of simply privatizing the property and the industry in some way (which creates another whole host of problems in a land dominated by tribal and familial ties, where corruption and favoritism is the norm — i.e. how can you fairly decide who has the initial property rights without causing a huge backlash?). But I think this could be handled outside of a centralized government. Each federalized “state” or region would have some proportionate interest in governing the trust, but there could also be outside deliberators/trustees involved who would break all ties and facilitate compromises without taking any financial or other interest in the oil itself. But I digress.

Pegging “success” in Iraq to the establishment of a highly centralized government seems to be a losing cause no matter how you draw the rules of the game. Allowing each region to determine for itself its political and legal structures, and then afterwards the form of political affiliation between those autonomous regions, has the advantages of self-determination and anti-totalitarianism that seem to be lacking under the current system; a bottom-up system as opposed to a top-down one.

To be clear, there is no magic bullet here, and even if our focus shifted from the top-down to the bottom-up approach our military presence would still be necessary for some time to come (albeit, I would posit, on a decreasing scale). But I do think we need to challenge our presumptions about success in Iraq, and what that will look like. My suggestion is that the establishment of a highly centralized government not only should not be included in the metric, it may very well be antithetical to achieving any sort of success. If we want the Iraqi people to decide for themselves what sort of country they want, we should devolve that decision to the greatest number of people possible, and that is at the local and regional level, not at the nationwide level.

[tags] Iraq, War in Iraq, Iraq government, oil trust, Iraq economy, success in Iraq, totalitarianism, federalism [/tags]