Democracy

by Condoleezza Rice

  I would later witness the same phenomenon. As secretary, I decided that we had to try to end the isolation of the Iranian people, even if we could do nothing about their government. With the president’s blessing, we established a modest exchange program. The first installment brought members of the Iranian equivalent of the Centers for Disease Control to Atlanta to meet their counterparts. Then we brought a group of young artists, all below the age of forty, to exhibit their work. I greeted them at the Meridian International Center in Washington and made remarks about the universality of the arts—careful to avoid anything political that might embarrass or endanger our guests.

  Finally, the Iranians agreed to allow Americans to come to them in the person of the U.S. wrestling team. On game day, the fans waved American flags. At first I thought that the government must have encouraged it. That was decidedly not the case. After that show of affection for the United States—a spontaneous one, it turns out—Tehran decided that it had had enough of “people to people” exchanges.

  The Iranian people crave freedom. The theocratic regime of the Ayatollah Khamenei refuses to bend. While some in the government seem to seek a more moderate course, they too are not truly moderates. They may want to shave the hard edges from the regime’s relationship with its people: Perhaps women should not have to fear the religious police if an ankle shows; certainly there ought to be enough trade with the West to fill the shops with foodstuffs and other goods; and why shouldn’t Iranians travel and study abroad? But the context is the same. Service in the Iranian government requires fealty to the tenets of the regime—religious orthodoxy; brutal repression of dissent; and a foreign policy that is messianic, reckless, and xenophobic.

  No single revolutionary development could transform the Middle East more than the end of theocracy in Iran. While there appears to be no democratic opening on the horizon, regimes of this kind are brittle. Aging men head the theocratic regime. Khamenei, the only real power in the country, is nearly an octogenarian and is reportedly ill. The regime’s base of support is outside the cities with older people, the less educated, and rural populations. The Revolutionary Guard Corps and its fist, the Quds Force, protect the interests of hard-liners at home and abroad.

  Prior to the nuclear arms deal with the United States and other international powers, the Iranian economy was in terrible shape, suffering from mismanagement and the effect of a decade of sanctions. GDP shrank by almost 10 percent between 2012 and 2014.25 Unemployment hovered around 20 percent, although many believed it was underreported. Prices rose for everyday goods as the value of the rial plummeted. The mullahs undoubtedly believe that they have bought time with a promise of reentry into the international economy.

  Whether that greater engagement staves off decline and dampens pressures for change or accelerates them is impossible to know. But one thing is certain—if a democratic opening comes, Iran has an educated and young population that could take advantage of it. It does not, however, have independent institutions to help channel change. That is why the regime is determined to prevent the rise of civil society. This may for a time prevent the Iranian people from rising against their government, but it almost ensures that when they do, the landing will not be a soft one for the regime or the country.

  Chapter 8

  ARE AUTHORITARIANS SO BAD?

  I was driving home from school with my uncle Alto that November afternoon. It was Election Day and we passed long lines of black citizens standing in line waiting to vote. George Wallace, the segregationist candidate for governor of Alabama, was on the ballot. I had heard my parents talk about him and I knew, in my innocent way, that he was bad news for us.

  I turned to my uncle and asked, “If all those black people vote, how can Wallace win?” My uncle answered that blacks were still the minority (a large minority to be sure) and wouldn’t be able to stop Wallace from being elected.

  “Then why do they bother?” I asked.

  “Because it is your duty to vote,” he answered. “And one day that vote will matter.”

  I asked him, “Are you going to vote?”

  “I did this morning,” he answered, “and so did your mother, daddy, grandmother, and Daddy Ray.”

  Seems like a waste of time, I thought. But I never forgot that sentiment. One day that vote will matter.

  Voting for the first time can be an emotional experience, especially if it has been a right denied for a lifetime. “At last, we are human!”1 That’s how one elderly woman from Kandahar explained her feelings as she stood in line to vote in the first presidential election in Afghan history in 2004. Millions of men and women braved Taliban threats to cast a ballot. From the poorest rural villages to the neighborhoods of Kabul, citizens waited through long lines and unseasonable cold to make their voices heard.

  Moqadasa Sidiqi, a nineteen-year-old student, cast her first vote. “I cannot explain my feelings, just how happy I am,” she said.2 Among her options on the ballot was Masooda Jalal, a pediatrician and mother of three. Just a few years earlier, women had been prohibited from working, getting an education, or leaving their house alone. Those who ran afoul of the Taliban’s strict moral codes were publicly executed in a soccer stadium. Now they were voting and running for president.

  Ahmed Rashid, a journalist who had spent many years covering bloodshed in Afghanistan and was no cheerleader of U.S. policy, described the election as “the most moving and memorable day of my life.”3 The emotion of the event was inescapable, he wrote, as he visited polling places with a fellow journalist. “We were so amazed by the huge turnout, the orderly queues, the patience of the women holding little children, the good humor and joking as people waited, the stories they told of their loss and hardship, that we burst into tears,” he wrote.4

  Similar scenes were evident in Iraq during the elections for a transitional government in January 2005, the country’s first free vote in five decades—if ever. Despite sporadic violence and a boycott by some Sunnis, voter turnout was high across the country, with voters even queuing in the volatile city of Fallujah. Some families went to the polls together, sometimes bringing elderly relatives along in wooden carts. Parents stood in line while children played soccer in the streets. Voters emerged from polling booths and dunked their fingers in indelible ink to prevent fraud. “A hundred names on the ballot are better than one,” said Fadila Saleh, a middle-aged engineer in central Baghdad, “because it means that we are free.”5 It could not have been more different from the “elections” held under Saddam Hussein.

  As I have watched long lines of Afghans and Iraqis and Liberians waiting to vote, I understand that deep inside they believe that one day that vote will matter. By the way, I have never missed the chance to vote. It would be an insult to my ancestors who struggled for almost a century after emancipation to gain that right.

  There is an emotional attachment to “the vote,” and it has to be satisfied. It means that the first condition of democracy has been met. People can choose their leaders and change them peacefully if necessary. It is an important beginning—but just a beginning. The time when that liberating moment is translated into functioning institutions and effective governance is still in the future. The opening for democracy is just that—an opening—and it can be fleeting if it is not used well.

  Most would agree that a functioning democracy is preferable to an authoritarian fiat. The skeptics would say, though, that democracies are failing while some authoritarians are delivering for their people. For skeptics, the preference for democracy is not so obvious, at least in the short term. Perhaps it is better to govern effectively. Democracy can come later.

  Two countries come to mind in support of this argument: Singapore and China—one of the world’s smallest countries and the largest. Singapore is a city-state of about six million people, and it was governed for decades by the iron hand of Lee Kuan Yu, the father of the country. He transformed a resource-poor plot of land into a prosperous state. And today Singapore is freer, clean, and safe. The retort
, of course, is that it is tiny and that Lee Kuan Yu was a wise man, ruling in another time when democratic values had not spread across the world.

  The Asian Tigers, also admired for iron-fisted rulers who modernized their economies, are in reality a mixed bag. South Korea eventually succeeded in building a stable democracy. But there was nothing benign about the military rulers who led the country for three decades. And the South Korean people do remember that dark past.

  I attended the inauguration of South Korean president Lee Myung-Bak in 2008. The ceremony was an affirmation of democracy, celebrated at the end by a stirring rendition of Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy,” from the Ninth Symphony. Yet nothing linked the past to this triumphant moment like the troop review. The South Korean president stood at the podium, units of his troops saluting him one after another. I noticed the emotional response of everyone around me—especially the foreign minister, who was a few seats away. South Koreans knew that they were affirming democracy. From now on, civilians would command the armed forces, laying to rest a time when violent and repressive military rulers helped to make them prosperous, but at a price—the loss of freedom and national dignity.

  In fact, most countries have failed to find benign, wise autocrats to rule them. Just ask the people of Zimbabwe or Venezuela. Cambodia and Laos are neither democratic nor particularly prosperous. The myth of the authoritarian who transforms his country, makes it rich, and then steps aside is rare in reality. Most of the time, as in South Korea, the country has struggled—often violently—before people have gained political rights and enjoyed economic prosperity. And there have been plenty of corrupt tyrants who can’t govern at all.

  China is, of course, the most obvious case of authoritarians who have delivered well-being. The Chinese communists have lifted hundreds of millions of people out of poverty, built gleaming cities, created excellent infrastructure, and launched world-class companies. By all measures, the country has had effective leaders who can get things done.

  In a sense, China made a successful transition—not to democracy but from totalitarianism to authoritarianism. After the revolution, China fit perfectly Mussolini’s totalitario. In the 1960s, everyone had a copy of Mao’s “Little Red Book,” chanted his slogans, and wore his iconic tunic—both men and women. Color choices were pretty much limited to gray and blue.

  In 1982, our first contingent of Chinese scholars arrived at the Stanford program on Arms Control and Disarmament. One of them was Madame Zhou, whose scholarship interests were always a little vague. She showed up every day in her navy Mao jacket but didn’t seem very interested in intellectual exchange. She walked into my office one day and said that she had seen Gone with the Wind the night before. It was, she said, a perfect representation of the capitalist oppression of black people. Not wanting to get into an extended conversation on slavery, I simply asked if she found the plight of black people interesting. “Not really,” she said and walked away. We later figured out that Madame Zhou was the political commissar—sent to keep an eye on everyone else in the group. She was the quintessential product of totalitarian China.

  Several years later, in 1988, I visited China for the first time. Mao jackets had been replaced by colorful clothing and no one mentioned the Little Red Book. But our trip to the opera demonstrated that the “red” arts were still very much in vogue. The story was something about the Long March, the legendary victory of Mao’s troops against the Kuomintang. I didn’t understand the words—even with translation—but the message got through: The glories of the Communist Party were to be celebrated in every aspect of life.

  If one visits China today, these vestiges of totalitario are long gone—cast aside some three decades after Deng Xiaoping opened the economy to capitalism. Chanel, Armani, and Nike dot the major boulevards, and their customers are well-to-do Chinese. Pianists and violinists from the country grace the world’s concert stages, playing the occasional Chinese folk song, but mostly delivering exquisite renditions of Brahms and Beethoven. Alibaba and Tencent are among the world’s most highly regarded tech companies. So far the leadership has managed to open cultural and economic space and protect its monopoly in politics. The question is whether that separation can be maintained.

  On the one hand, the last real threat to the party’s authority perished at Tiananmen Square in 1989. The movement of students and intellectuals—mostly young people—was crushed, literally. The iconic images of a young man standing in front of a tank and the makeshift replica of the Statue of Liberty belong to the past. Widespread purges and arrests sent a very strong message: Politics is the purview of the Communist Party. Do not cross that line again.

  Since then, the regime has faced no organized challenge. The party leadership is fortunate, because it is playing a strong hand in two important ways. First, it enjoys legitimacy based on prosperity. In today’s China, almost all people are better off than their grandparents—even their parents—were. Yet expectations continue to rise and the regime is always chasing them. Hu Jintao once told us that he needed to produce ten million jobs every year just to keep up with migration from rural areas to the cities.

  The second source of strength is the population’s aversion to chaos. The Chinese people have strong memories of the horrors of the Cultural Revolution.

  One evening I was invited to dinner in Beijing by a former foreign minister who had been my colleague when I was in government. Somehow the conversation turned from geopolitics to personal stories. I talked about growing up in Birmingham and the changes I had witnessed in America. He talked about the Cultural Revolution.

  “I was just about to go to college,” he told me. “And because I was good at languages and China needed that, I was allowed to go ahead. Every night the Red Guards would come to the dorms and make us recite slogans. We just did it and they left,” he continued. “But sometimes they would take someone away just to prove that they could. We would never see that person again.”

  My friend went on to explain that his sisters were older and thus suspect in the eyes of the regime. They were not allowed to finish college. Instead, they were made to work in factories in order to become truly proletarian in spirit. “They were better students than I was,” he told me. “And now they still work in factories because they were never able to finish their education.”

  He concluded his story by explaining that his language skills had allowed him to be assigned to duties in Africa, where China was beginning to build a diplomatic presence. There he waited out the Cultural Revolution until it was safe to return to the Foreign Ministry.

  Another colleague told a different but equally compelling story. He knew that I was a student of Russia and he asked for my views—“Do you prefer Dostoyevsky or Tolstoy? Have you read War and Peace in Russian?”

  I answered Dostoyevsky and yes. Then I asked him, “What prompted your interest in Russian literature?”

  “Well,” he said, “I had a lot of time in the countryside during the Cultural Revolution. Russia was our friend.” He let the last word hang in the air. “It was okay to study the language and the literature.” I thought to myself that it was a clever way to get through that great national trauma.

  Many Chinese suffered greater indignities than these men—and many lost everything, including parents and siblings who were killed. As one Chinese friend said to me, “We value order because we do not need another national nervous breakdown.”

  The Chinese people value stability—especially those who came of age during the Cultural Revolution or who saw the Tiananmen Square protests crushed—and many seem willing to forgo individual liberties to sustain it. Still, there are pressures on this neat division between politics and the rest of life. The first strains result from the regime’s desire to unleash market forces in the economy. China’s successful economic model was built on being the low-cost provider of labor in the international system. That attracted manufacturing capital from around the world and helped create an export juggernaut. But now Chinese incomes are incr
easing rapidly—another case of the government chasing rising expectations. Indeed, when there has been labor unrest the response has been quick, decisive, and often to raise wages. So manufacturing costs are higher, driving production into Southeast Asia.

  Government investment was the other engine for growth—infrastructure development and the creation of new cities to accommodate the largest movement of people from rural to urban areas in history, at least 250 million so far. Now too many regional airports and highways are chronically underutilized. Rapid construction of housing is finally outpacing demand. Several provinces that borrowed heavily to finance these booms are in debt and together with state-owned enterprises (SOEs) have unhealthy balance sheets. A potential Chinese bubble has become a source of concern for the regime and for the international economy.

  The top-down model of economic growth has run out of steam. A new engine will have to rest in large part on freeing market forces. But that means ceding control to multiple actors—and that has been very uncomfortable for the regime. The economic reforms announced at the last Party Plenum have been carried out in fits and starts. Reforms that can be imposed from the center—pension and health care reform, and better environmental stewardship, for example—are moving ahead. However, the government is fearful of rapidly closing inefficient SOEs because people will be put out of work. The brief experiment with encouraging ordinary people to invest in the stock market produced a serious crisis. Markets can go up, but they can go down too. The regime seemed determined to vitiate this law with intervention, only making the situation worse. People still protest outside the offices of China’s version of the Securities and Exchange Commission.

  The new model also depends on getting people to spend and the development of a service sector. Older citizens have largely been cared for by their extended families. Labor mobility has broken this pattern as children venture out to the cities, leaving their elders behind. In the old model, people hoarded their savings and were reluctant to consume. Now the government wants them to spend, but they won’t do so without reliable savings for retirement—a pension.