Democratization as instant coffee, part deux
"Navy wife", commenting on Yankeedoodle's Today in Iraq blog, recommended this story from today's Boston Globe.
In it, reporter Anne Barnard writes about how Vassil Yanco, an Iraqi-born American and employee of North Carolina's Research Triangle Institute sought to bring democracy to the Iraqi town of Rutbah (pop.7,000) in the course of a two-hour drop-by appearance:
- To reach Rutbah, Yanco... and two Iraqi colleagues drove to the US base at Asad.
The next day, they flew 90 minutes in a Black Hawk helicopter to Forward Operating Base Byers. The team wanted Rutbah to hold a 100-member public caucus that would choose a new local council and two delegates to the provincial council. They knew little about local politics in the town of 7,000, known as a smugglers' hub...
Yanco's team traveled to Rutbah's youth center, nearly an hour's drive from the base, in a convoy of a dozen Humvees backed up by tanks. The last leg was a winding, off-road jaunt to avoid roadside bombs.
About three dozen city administrators sat on worn sofas in the town's youth center. The three-member city council -- largely inactive since November, when a bomb went off at the mayor's office where they met -- sat in back and asked no questions.
A young Iraqi working for the institute gave an impassioned speech on the workings of council subcommittees and public meetings.
But afterwards, locals were unclear on their connection to the process. Jassem Mohammad Raja, head of the youth center, said he didn't think he had a right to participate, saying the mayor would pick the delegates.
Because troops bundled Yanco back into the convoy after the meeting, he had little time to chat -- an essential ritual in a country where much is decided through conversation and personal relationships. The mayor agreed to hold the caucus when Yanco returned in a week or so, and said two days' notice would be enough time to organize it...
It also reminded me of my November 24 post here, which chronicled an earlier RTI "instant democracy" mission.
It all makes me want to weep, really. I'd burst out into hysterical laughter if it weren't so darn' tragic.