Rebuilding Sustainable Communities in Iraq : Policies, Programs and International Perspectives [1 ed.] 9781443811927, 9781847189271

Citation preview

Rebuilding Sustainable Communities in Iraq

Rebuilding Sustainable Communities in Iraq: Policies, Programs and International Perspectives

Edited by

Adenrele Awotona

Cambridge Scholars Publishing

Rebuilding Sustainable Communities in Iraq: Policies, Programs and International Perspectives, Edited by Adenrele Awotona This book first published 2008 Cambridge Scholars Publishing 12 Back Chapman Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2XX, UK British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Copyright © 2008 by Adenrele Awotona and contributors All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. ISBN (10): 1-84718-927-X, ISBN (13): 9781847189271

TABLE OF CONTENTS List of Figures List of Tables Preface

vii ix xi

Part I Cross-Cutting Themes Chapter 1.

Reconstructing Iraq: Massive Investment, Little Sustainable Results Adenrele Awotona and Michael Donlan

3

Part II Case Studies from Iraq Chapter 2.

Chapter 3. Chapter 4.

Chapter 5.

Chapter 6.

Creating a Sustainable Iraq: A Strategy to Restore Hope Gerald Paulus

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Fata Morgana and the Lure of Law Tom Syring

53

Successful Project Strategies in Iraq’s Kurdistan Region: Holistic Approach the Key to Effective Initiatives Douglas Green

75

Rebuilding the Iraqi Oil Industry: Legal and Constitutional Strategies for Sustainable, PostSaddam Development Justin Dargin

85

Towards Eco-Urbanism for all Iraqi Cities, Towns, and Villages Besim Hakim

101

vi Chapter 7.

The Place of Higher Education in the Development Process in Iraq Mohammad Sadik

117

Part III International Perspectives Chapter 8.

Chapter 9.

Community Participation in Nation Building: Lessons from the U.S. Experience Michael A. Burayidi and Craig Maher

127

Finding a Model Exemplar for Institutionalization of Public Planning for Sustainable Rebuilding in Post-War Iraq: The Boston Redevelopment Authority Michael Donlan and Muhammad Ali-Salaam

141

Chapter 10. Rebuilding Iraq: Theoretical Issues and Practical Approaches to Rebuilding Sustainable Communities after Disasters—Reconstruction Experiences from Afghanistan Najim Azadzoi and Michael Hicks

169

Chapter 11. Enhancing the Capacity of Women Leaders of Community Organizations toward Sustainable Development in Iraq: The Role of Women’s Groups in Rebuilding their Communities after Conflicts Yomi Oruwari

183

Chapter 12. Planning for Iraqi Women’s Empowerment in the Midst of Social Upheaval and Armed Conflict: Lessons from Eritrea Asgedet Stefanos

197

Appendix Notes Bibliography List of Contributors Index

263 265 291 303 311

LIST OF FIGURES 5.1 Iraq’s Oil Production and Consumption, 1980–2007 6.1 Diagrams illustrating Linear and Circular Metabolism for Cities 6.2 Compact Mixed-Use Nodes Reduce Journey Requirements and Create Lively Sustainable Neighborhoods 6.3 The Fina in Plan and Section and the Usage Allowed within it 6.4 Diagram Showing Elements Allowed within the Fina 6.5 Acceptable Locations of Proposed Doors onto Streets 6.6 Locations of Proposed Shop and Doors 6.7 Diagrams of Height of Window Relative to the Exterior and Interior 6.8 Examples of Mashrabiya and Chamfered Corner 8.1 The Fully Saturated Path Model 11.1 Islamic Views of Peace and Violence

88 103 104 110 111 113 114 114 115 138 187

LIST OF TABLES Table 1.1 Working List of Indicators of Sustainable Development Table 1.2 Commission for Sustainable Development (CSD) Indicators of Sustainable Development Table 8.1 Examples of Community Participation Requirements Table 8.2 Input, Process, and Outcome Variables in Path Model Table 8.3 Community Participation Index Table 8.4 Logistic Regression of Independent (Input, Process, and Community Characteristics) Variables on Citizen Power (Outcome Variable) Table 12.1 Residents’ Biographical Chart 1 Table 12.2 Residents’ Biographical Chart 2 Table 12.3 Residents’ Biographical Chart 3

19 24 129 134 136 138 202 203 204

PREFACE The scene in Iraq is rife with a troubling and destabilizing vacuum; and, at the moment, Iraq is unsustainable—by reason of a host of calamities, and prodigious internal polarities. Regardless, Iraq must be rebuilt with sustainable communities; and a heavy onus falls upon the United States of America to that end. While, on the one hand, the principal U.S. government agencies currently occupying Iraq are exerting Herculean and seeming protean effort toward rebuilding Iraq; on the other hand, it is believed that such efforts will fail without proper augmentation of missing expertise (especially at the community redevelopment level); without refocus toward holism (by bringing synergy amongst top-down and bottom-up experts); and, without a better concentration toward indigenous benefit (vice concentration on the occupying power’s national agenda). Clearly, the failure of rebuilding sustainable communities in Iraq will compound all the tragedies of Iraq and affect many beyond. According to the most recent Quarterly Report to the U.S. Congress by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (SIGIR), the amounts “contributed for the reconstruction program” in Iraq totaled $112.52 billion USD between April 2003 and March 31, 2008. This included the following: $46 billion which was appropriated by the U.S. Congress as U.S. aid for Iraq, $50.33 billion in Iraqi funds, and $15.89 billion in international support.1 Approximately half of the U.S. aid was expended on “hard” infrastructure (large-scale construction) while the rest went into the development of “soft” infrastructure” (non-construction programs such as “supporting democracy and governance, operations and maintenance, training and equipment”). However, Iraq continues to be unstable and there are escalating condemnations of Iraq reconstruction efforts from many and varied quarters (Tarnoff, 2007).2

So why have reconstruction efforts in Iraq, and billions of dollars of investment, yielded such little and problematical results? Many questions come to the fore. For example, to what degree have these reconstruction efforts taken in and focused upon the support of social, economic, and infrastructural development in a sustainable way? To what extent has institutional support been provided for community-based organizations? What are the politics of state reconstruction and conflict management?

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What is the regional and global impact of rebuilding Iraq? Where are the intersections of the humanities and legal structures? To what extent have the international community and the U.S. gone beyond the upgrading and refurbishing of the infrastructure to empowering community-based grassroots organizations and capacity building for sustainable development? What is the function of the arts in rebuilding communities— art (literature, the visual arts, theater, music) as a mode of giving form to aspirations for the self, community, and nation and as a vehicle for recording the process of rebuilding? And, what approaches should be adopted in order to ensure more positive outcomes? The aim of this book is to examine many of these issues from multidisciplinary and cross-disciplinary perspectives. Amongst the topics that the contributing authors have explored are the following: the role of organizations and institutions in defining strategies for sustainable rebuilding of community infrastructure; the theoretical issues in, and practical approaches to, the rebuilding of sustainable communities after disasters; the social, cultural and technological aspects in the reconstruction of war-torn societies; the role of women in defining the needs of families and children in a post-disaster environment; the role of higher education in rebuilding sustainable communities; institutionalization models for public planning and policy; rebuilding the Iraqi Oil Industry; successful project strategies in Iraq’s Kurdistan region; reconstruction experiences from Afghanistan; and the prospects and limits of state building in the aftermath of the war. This book is based mainly on some of the papers that were presented at the International Conference on Rebuilding Sustainable Communities in Iraq: Policies, Programs and Projects which was held at the University of Massachusetts Boston from July 23 to July 26, 2007. A central objective of the Conference was to provide an intellectual forum for scholars and practitioners from Iraq and everywhere else in the world, including the U.S., to explore how the reconstruction of Iraq could be carried out in a way that promoted social justice, economic and political sustainability, and the full participation of all stakeholders. Indeed, to the best of our knowledge, it was the first academic Conference where senior political, professional and academic leaders from Iraq have met with their counterparts from around the world (Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Spain, U.S., etc.) to discuss and consider the wide range of issues affecting the sustainable reconstruction of Iraqi communities within the context of a social justice agenda. Similarly, lessons from the Gulf Coast Recovery in the U.S. and disasters in other parts of the world, and how these could be applied to Iraq, were a recurring strand in the Conference agenda.

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At the conclusion of the conference, special committees of conference experts drew up specific plans of action for the implementation of the visions discussed under three main themes. These were: Action Plan for Economic Expansion and Stability; Action Plan for Recreating Infrastructure; and Action Plan for the Higher Education Sector and Education Facilities. Summaries of their recommendations are set out below. Action Plan for Economic Expansion and Stability Although Iraq is potentially a rich country, it is in need of outside help in the short- and the medium-terms. The International Compact with Iraq, which was adopted recently by the international community, demonstrates the needs of Iraq for grants and soft loans, as well as in-kind technical assistance. Economic development is much dependent on regional security. Correspondingly, in most cases, insecurity causes economic stagnation and lack of job opportunities; hence, that conundrum highlights the importance of economic expansion. Requirements for Achieving Facilitating Conditions for Economic Development The essential elements of sustainable economic development include the following: prepare sound strategies, policies, plans and programs; modernize the legal and regulatory systems, including taxation; adopt a market-oriented and private sector-driven economic system; ensure diversification of the economy for less dependence on the energy sector; develop banking and insurance infrastructure; revitalize and expand quality assurance institutions; expand production of electricity and fuel; and build capacity for all institutions supporting economic development. Action Plan for Recreating Infrastructure The purpose of this Action Plan is to develop sustainable infrastructure that meets the needs of society while respecting its cultural values. We must ensure inclusion of all stakeholders in the process and development—notably including women, and other individuals

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irrespective of their economic or physical ability e.g. youth, the elderly and the disabled. Their human capital and the community are the target of this infrastructure. We define infrastructure as pertaining to: 1) the built environment, including the physical aspects of the human environment including but not limited to roads, water, sewer, electricity, and data utilities, housing, buildings and facilities; 2) the institutional structures of society which include the management and governance aspects of the community and its settlements—e.g. mayor’s office, public works department, redevelopment agencies, governing councils and community outreach organizations; 3) socio-economic and human capital services such as health facilities, education facilities, banks, private businesses, and other social services. We recommend the use of “safe” areas (free from lawlessness and terror) within the country as hubs for capacity building for Iraqis. Start the rebuilding process in the safe areas; focus more on development of rural areas to ensure equitable distribution of development and to be sensitized to overtaxing of urban areas; the process of rebuilding sustainable communities in Iraq should involve active participation of local citizens in partnership with the programmers from the building industry to accommodate the socio-cultural needs of the community. Simply stated— do all planning in concert with local Iraqis; a broad base of coordinated programs needs to bring together professionals from a cross section of the country (health care, community/development planners, architects, government); and, infrastructure reconstruction and development must be undertaken through a partnership between all stakeholders such as government, NGOs, donors, professionals, etc.—whose policies and strategies must guide the process. Actions must be based on strategy and sound policies guided by the stakeholders at different levels, including national, urban and rural. One key to success will be a focus on the requirements of the local community—as the implementation of policies and strategies must respond to local needs; and, similarly, priority must be given to empowering the local community and strengthening its economy,

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by maximizing the utilization of resident human and business resources, as well as developing enhanced local capacity. Action Plan for the Higher Education Sector and Educational Facilities From the conference discussions and presentations, the following needs were identified for rebuilding higher education in Iraq: A- An assessment of the current status of Iraqi Universities by a team of U.S. and international experts in the field for the establishment of a modern system of higher education in Iraq. Essential in this is the assurance of the autonomy of the university governance so as not to impede university functions by a government bureaucracy. B- Establishment of a strategy and a time line for the implementation of the recommended actions defined by the Committee. C- Defining a plan for the training of Iraq’s senior universities’ management teams in the U.S. on how to build a modern university infrastructure in Iraq. D- Defining the needs for curriculum and faculty development in the various colleges and programs of the universities. E- Defining the needs for building the college infrastructure from the classroom to the laboratories and libraries necessary for firstrate teaching and research universities. F- Defining the needs for establishing a research and development infrastructure that can be utilized by faculty and graduate students in their research programs. G- The establishment of a first-rate information technology resource to be available to the students, faculty and administrators, linked to the many international libraries and the U.S. Library of Congress. H- Establishment of a network of collaborative agreements with International Educational Institutions around the world, particularly in the U.S. and Europe. I- Establishment of a network of linkages for graduate studies with U.S. institutions, as well as a network of research collaboration with U.S. faculty and students.

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J-

An action plan for the recruitment of highly qualified and experienced teaching and research faculty from around the world to help jump-start teaching and research at the universities. K- An action plan for the establishment of an interconnected library system for the service of the faculty and students in the different Iraqi universities.

Structure of the Book This book is aimed at scholars, public and private sector officials, non-governmental organizations, consultants and practitioners in the following areas (amongst others): international relations; Middle Eastern studies; social sciences (political science, sociology, psychology, cultural studies, anthropology, economics, etc.); multidisciplinary studies; liberal arts; sustainable community development; land economy; community studies/planning; public policy; urban studies; urban planning; urban design; architecture; dispute/conflict resolution; legal studies; women’s studies; post-war reconstruction; and environmental studies. It consists of 12 chapters, which are divided into three sections. Section 1, which has one chapter, examines some cross-cutting themes and conceptual issues. Section 2, with six chapters, reports case studies from Iraq. Section 3, with five chapters, presents a number of international perspectives and their lessons for Iraq. These studies spring from Afghanistan, the U.S. and Africa. In chapter 1, Adenrele Awotona and Michael Donlan describe the disaster caused in Iraq by reason of the U.S. invasion and by reason, as well, of a wholly unsatisfactory and unsustainable process of top-down anecdotal rebuilding. They therefore advocate a wholly new mindset: whereby rebuilding becomes holistically, professionally planned—so as to be balanced between top-down and bottom-up with empowered indigenous institutions working at both top levels and local levels. They propose a major reorientation of the process of rebuilding so as to appreciate and embrace sustainability. Awotona and Donlan then define sustainability. They establish a distinction between immediate and ultimate sustainability. In the case of ultimate sustainability, they marshal and summarize the many worthy studies issued out and taken in by the United Nations on sustainability over the past two decades. Simply put: sustainability must balance much, but above all it must always balance the needs of both the present and the future. Ultimately, rebuilding must not compromise the long-term

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environment or self-empowerment of Iraq. Conversely, immediate sustainability should understand and be sensitive to the critical nature of transparent process and empowerment achieved by bringing in and bringing forward Iraqis (both nationally and locally). The ultimate sustainable professional planning must be shaped with major involvement of the newly empowered Iraqis. Section 2 begins with chapter 2, in which Gerald Paulus outlines a strategy “to increase employment, revitalize the economy, reduce the insurgency, and to provide regional stability” in Iraq. The premise of this approach is that “human behavior is motivated by self-interest”; and, that the Iraqi people should be given a “cause to live for” which is far more attractive than a “cause to die for”. The “cause to live for” would be an economic plan that would create small public works projects to put “people to work rebuilding their own neighborhoods, cities and country; provide them an opportunity to support their families; (and) rally them toward a vision for a better future.” Basically, what Paulus is advocating for is a network of small work camps throughout Iraq that would empower the people economically through the provision of jobs and training. In chapter 3, Tom Syring examines two of the four interconnected “pillars” that must be addressed in order to ensure a successful and sustainable postconflict resolution. These are governance and (democratic) participation; and justice and reconciliation. The other two pillars are security and, social and economic well-being. After a detailed analysis of the “Iraqi experience of drafting a new constitution, and establishing a higher criminal tribunal,” Syring concludes that “while establishing legal institutions is of vital importance in any attempt at state-rebuilding, their success depends on externalities that can only be outlined, not guaranteed by law per se, i.e., on truly independent and fair trials, a broadly accepted constitution, and a population imbued with a desire for peaceful participation—anything less is but a lure.” Chapter 4, by Douglas Green, reports the outcome of a collaborative project between a Washington D.C.based nonprofit organization and local community activists in the Kurdistan region of northern Iraq. The organization is the Leadership Council for Human Rights, which focuses on the unique concerns of women and ethnic minorities, understands the immense potential that these grassroots leaders hold and has formed partnerships to carry out home-grown, community-level interventions that will have a far-reaching impact (see page 75 herewith).

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The project was mainly concerned with the education and empowerment of women and other marginalized Iraqis; the preservation of cultural heritage; and the intensification of cross-cultural appreciation that is imperative for the future of Iraq. In chapter 5, Justin Dargin outlines strategies that should be implemented in Iraq in order to “create a viable petroleum sector, and to construct a constitutional and legal infrastructure as an integral part of a coherent national petroleum policy.” Dargin notes that Iraq has the world’s third largest proven oil reserves (115 billion barrels), and that only institutional and constitutional safeguards, including financial accountability and the equitable apportioning of its oil revenues, will guarantee Iraq’s health (see page 85 herewith).

Chapter 6, by Besim Hakim, examines a number of issues that are “directly linked” to Iraqi society’s values and ethics, decision-making processes, management practices (including rules and codes for planning and construction), as well as the policies that are necessary for rebuilding Iraqi communities in a sustainable fashion. For example, he proposes that “the possibility is open during the reconstruction process to recycle the positive aspects of traditional Iraqi indigenous design and practice at the levels of neighborhoods, building design and construction practices.” In chapter 7, Mohammad Sadik analyzes the place of higher education in the development process in Iraq. He observes that “higher education is essential to exploit our tremendous abundance of petroleum wealth in ways that best serve the public interest where each and every Iraqi citizen benefits equitably.” Section 3 begins with the chapter by Michael A. Burayidi and Craig Maher. Their central proposition is that the U.S. has a long history of community participation in national development and some of the lessons learned from this experience could be applicable to Iraq as the country contemplates reconstruction efforts to amend a shattered nation after the war. (see page 127 herewith).

Some of the lessons which the authors explored and analyzed, based on case studies, were: the need for a national law requiring that government-assisted programs include resident participation; the need for a follow-up review of agency programs to ensure that the agencies actually followed through with their plans to involve the public in the development process; and the need for development agencies to devote considerable

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time to their outreach efforts in order to ensure the effectiveness and success of community participation in nation building. In chapter 9, Michael Donlan and Muhammad Ali-Salaam propose a distinct exemplar model for prospective usage in Iraq to accelerate institutional public planning on the local level: to that end, they offer the Boston Redevelopment Authority (BRA) as a prime exemplar. While on the one hand there is a “mountain to climb” by way of professionalizing and systematizing institutional process for local post-disaster rebuilding in Iraq; on the other hand, there is a prime exemplar available for replication to fill much of that void. The BRA offers many features, and these features are largely unique thereto. That model is set out in full detail. Sustainability, while essential for rebuilding, is a challenge all its own, requiring holism, balance, transparency, comprehension, empowerment and professionalism, which in itself requires time-tested institutional processes and implementation of professional planning—and more. Further, according to Michael and Muhammad, true sustainability is achieved only when a genuine mix of public and private funding enter a post-disaster scene. The BRA model expertly applies to such a mix; and more compelling, the BRA model uniquely attracts such a funding mix. And finally, the BRA can cause sustainable rebuilding at the dénouement of the public funding sourcing—by drawing forth wholly private investment in rebuilding. Chapter 10 is authored by Najim Azadzoi and Michael Hicks. They are both architects who have extensive experience with development projects in Afghanistan. They note that many of the challenges Iraq faces today could be found in Afghanistan when that country’s reconstruction effort began in 2002. While acknowledging that Iraq and Afghanistan are undoubtedly very different nations, they argue that many of the lessons that were learned in Afghanistan can be applied to the reconstruction of Iraq. In chapter 11, Yomi Oruwari makes a case for the development of dynamic and efficient women’s groups that would form an important part of the means for actually assisting the households rebuild their communities and consequently their state as part of the post-war peace building and reconstruction process in Iraq. She does this by using the experiences of women’s groups in conflict resolution and peace-building in Nigeria’s Niger Delta Region (an area that is prone to violent conflict) as a starting point in exploring the changing role of Iraqi women in rebuilding their communities and the policies, programs and projects that will assist them to effectively perform this challenging role in the Iraqi context.

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In the final chapter, Asgedet Stefanos explores the degree to which Eritrean women enhanced their status and rights during a successful 30year national independence struggle against Ethiopian occupation. The period analyzed begins in 1974 as the national liberation struggle’s male leadership formally embraced full female participation in the liberation organization, the Eritrean People’s Liberation Front (EPLF), and promulgated a commitment and program to establish gender equality. The period under study ends with Eritrea’s military victory and national independence in 1993. With the view that specificity and historical context are critical for understanding women and conflict, the roles and status of Eritrean women in traditional society and under colonial occupations are summarized. The chapter examines a protracted armed conflict that not only victimized women (and their children), but also mobilized them to seize opportunities to improve their conditions within the political, economic, educational, and familial realms. It reflects the view that, as one of society’s most vulnerable groups, women are disproportionately victimized by war; but at the same time they are also agents who creatively struggle to survive, and if possible, empower themselves during the enormous dislocations and hardships of armed conflict. The theories and policies of the EPLF regarding women’s emancipation are delineated. The chapter is primarily focused on the bottom-up experience and perceptions of a diverse sample of Eritrean women who were extensively interviewed in field studies. In regards to gender equity, it assesses both the congruence and dissonance between the perceptions, priorities and aspirations emphasized by Eritrean women from below and those of the male leadership from above. This approach is relevant for other contexts, including efforts to shape an effective and sustained effort to enhance the status of Iraqi women. Acknowledgments Some of the Iraqi political, professional and academic leaders who attended and made significant intellectual contributions to the conference were: Tahir Albakaa, a former Iraqi Minister of Higher Education and Scientific Research, former President of Al Mustansiriya University in Baghdad, a former member of the Iraqi National Assembly, and a former member of the Constitution Drafting Committee; Abdul Hadi Al Khalili, a neurosurgeon and the Cultural Attaché at the Iraq Embassy in Washington D.C.; Rajaa Al-khuzai, an Obstetrician and Gynecologist, founder and President of the Iraqi Widows Organization, and a former member of the

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Iraqi National Assembly and Constitution Drafting Committee; Mishkat Al Moumin, former Minister of the Environment in the Interim Iraqi Government and currently a professor at George Mason University in Washington D.C.; Dawood Atrushi, Vice President of Dohuk University of Kurdistan, Northern Iraq; Ahmed Dezaye, Director of the Higher Education & Scientific Research Ministry in the Kurdistan Region, Iraq; Besim Hakim, a Fellow of the American Institute of Certified Planners and author of Arabic-Islamic Cities: Building and Planning Principles (1986); Ferhang Jalal, Senior Economic Advisor for Economic Development in the Prime Minister’s Office of the Kurdistan Region, Iraq; Mohammad Sadik, President of the University of Salahaddin at Erbil, Kurdistan, Iraq; Fuad Safwat, former Provost and Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs and currently Professor Emeritus of Biology at the University of Massachusetts Boston, and a former Professor of Botany at the University of Baghdad, Iraq; Nada Shabout, a specialist in Arab visual culture and Islamic art and an Assistant Professor of Art History at the University of North Texas; and Riadh Tappuni, former Coordinator of the Iraq Task Force and leader of the Urban Development and Housing Policies Team at the United Nations. In addition to these and other esteemed program participants, I would like to acknowledge the following people and organizations for their efforts to make the conference a success: Ann-Marie Kent, Senior Staff Writer, University Communications and Community Relations, University of Massachusetts Boston; Boston Park Plaza Hotel and Towers, Boston, Massachusetts; Charlie Titus, Vice Chancellor, Division of Athletics and Recreation, Special Projects and Programs, University of Massachusetts Boston; Cheryl Monahan, Assistant Director of Undergraduate Admissions, Office of Undergraduate Admissions, University of Massachusetts Boston; Christine DePalma, Communications Coordinator, Office of the Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs, University of Massachusetts Boston; Christopher Hogan, Chief of Staff, Chancellor’s Office, University of Massachusetts Boston; The Comfort Inn, Boston, Massachusetts; Darrel Byers, Vice Chancellor, University Advancement, University of Massachusetts Boston; Edward Hayward, former Associate Vice Chancellor for University Communications, University Communications and Community Relations, University of Massachusetts Boston; Edgar Klugman, Professor Emeritus, Wheelock College, Boston, Massachusetts; Fuad Safwat, Biology Professor Emeritus and former Provost, University of Massachusetts Boston; Heather Batherwich, Assistant to the Director of Undergraduate Admissions, Office of Undergraduate Admissions, University of Massachusetts Boston; Hoshiar

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Nooraddin, President of Kurdistan Planners Association, Iraq; Isabel Coletti, Manager, Early Childhood Associates, Inc. Framingham, Massachusetts; John Drew, Senior Associate Director of Admissions, Office of Undergraduate Admissions, University of Massachusetts Boston; Jon Hutton, Director of Enrollment Information Services, Office of Enrollment Management, University of Massachusetts Boston; Judith Roberts, Assistant to the Dean for Special Projects, College of Public and Community Service, University of Massachusetts Boston; Karen Tewhey, Early Childhood Associates, Inc., Framingham, Massachusetts; J. Keith Motley, Chancellor, University of Massachusetts Boston; Lauren Tredeau, Scheduling and Event Logistics Manager, Campus Center Operations, University of Massachusetts Boston; Linda Warren, President, Early Childhood Associates, Inc., Framingham, Massachusetts; Lisa Johnson, Associate Vice Chancellor, Office of Enrollment Management, University of Massachusetts Boston; Lisa Van Thiel, Senior Early Childhood Specialist, Institute for Community Inclusion, University of Massachusetts Boston; Maia Hurley, Researcher and Policy Analyst, Early Childhood Associates, Inc., Framingham, Massachusetts; Margaret E. McNamara, former Assistant Vice Chancellor, Corporations and Foundations, University Advancement, University of Massachusetts Boston; Martha London, Major Gifts Officer, University Advancement, University of Massachusetts Boston; Mary Lu Love, Director of Project Boston Ready, Institute for Community Inclusion, University of Massachusetts Boston; Michael Collins, Senior Vice President for University Relations, Fundraising and Legislative Outreach and Interim Chancellor, University of Massachusetts Worcester (former Chancellor, University of Massachusetts Boston); Nannette Cormier, Vice Chancellor for Corporations and Foundations, University Advancement, University of Massachusetts Boston; Patricia Devine, Senior Research and Development, Early Childhood Associates, Inc., Framingham, Massachusetts; Peter Adams, Director of Communication and Information Technology, College of Public and Community Service, University of Massachusetts Boston; Paul Breslin, Quinn Graphics Production Supervisor, Central Reprographics, University of Massachusetts Boston; Paul Fonteyn, Provost and Senior Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs, University of Massachusetts Boston; Patrick Day, Vice Chancellor of Student Affairs, University of Massachusetts Boston; Philip O’Donnell, Director, Public Safety, University of Massachusetts Boston; Rose Coveney, Senior Graphic Designer, University Communications and Community Relations, University of Massachusetts Boston; Sarah Weatherbee, Art Director, Marketing and Communications, University of

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Massachusetts Boston; Sodexho Catering, University of Massachusetts Boston; Soma Dutt, Research Assistant, College of Public and Community Service, University of Massachusetts Boston; Stanley Stewart, Public Safety Special Services, Sergeant Detective Special Supervisor, University of Massachusetts Boston; Stephanie Murguia, Executive Assistant to the Dean, College of Public and Community Service, University of Massachusetts Boston; Su Theriault, Institute for Community Inclusion, University of Massachusetts Boston; Suzanne Allmendinger, Director of Community Outreach, College of Public and Community Service, University of Massachusetts Boston; Thijs Messelaar, Coordinator of Enrollment Marketing, Office of Enrollment Management, University of Massachusetts Boston; Winston Langley, Associate Chancellor, University of Massachusetts Boston; Marcellette Williams, Sr. Vice President for Academic and Student Affairs and International Relations, University of Massachusetts System; Michael Donlan, Vice Chairman Emeritus of the Boston Redevelopment Authority, lawyer, author and adjunct Professor at the University of Massachusetts Boston; and Muhammad Ali-Salaam, Deputy Director, Boston Redevelopment Authority. In addition to these people, there were many others who worked tirelessly on this event. I thank all of them as well. Special thanks go to the Curtis International Fund of the Boston Foundation for its support of the conference. Adenrele Awotona University of Massachusetts Boston USA

PART I CROSS-CUTTING THEMES

CHAPTER 1 RECONSTRUCTING IRAQ: MASSIVE INVESTMENT, LITTLE SUSTAINABLE RESULTS Introduction Reconstruction in Iraq is generally acknowledged to be in a disappointing state. We believe the situation is even worse than reported; yet, any hope of a successful resolution of the problems in Iraq swings on successful achievement of sustainable rebuilding of communities. Not only is the state of reconstruction a major disappointment; its overall strategy was wrongly conceived and is being so pursued. The overall strategy and construct of the rebuilding effort must be reoriented more toward sustainable community rebuilding. The top-down and anecdotal rebuilding process must be recognized as inadequate and, in turn, be strongly complemented by a systematized and balancing process (bottom-up as well as top-down) of sustainable community rebuilding by genuine experts. The existing efforts and the newer processes must combine together, so as to work toward a positive and integrated dynamic tension. Broad community empowerment is imperative; and that newly empowered community must become a major contributor and commentator on the course and accountability of rebuilding. At the outset, the U.S. Department of Defense was able to convince the U.S. Administration that the military knew best—even as to the rebuilding of Iraq. That mindset never changed, despite the helpful changes just put in place in military strategy (prompted by recognition of mistakes); similar changes must be made to the rebuilding strategies and implementation, or the current disappointment will become permanent. However, a most difficult conundrum lurks: sustainable rebuilding requires security and security requires sustainable rebuilding, and the stakes are too high to let this correctable, troubled scene become another tragic failure. It is imperative to critique the scene. It is now 2008, and massive funds have been expended with disappointing results. For example, as noted in The Economist in April 2006, “Iraq has already cost America more than $250 billion” and that, according to one study, it could “cost America an eye-catching $2.24 trillion through 2015.”1 But still, only a

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low fraction of funds available and/or promised has been expended for reconstruction, and even less funding has been expended toward sustainable rebuilding on the community level. According to a 2008 article in The Washington Times by Sharon Behn, “out of $10 billion budgeted for capital projects in 2007, only 4.4 percent had been spent by August.” Behn further observed that increased Iraqi oil revenues stemming from high prices and improved security are piling up in the Federal Reserve Bank of New York rather than being spent on needed reconstruction projects.2

This chapter plumbs and probes the nature of sustainable community rebuilding and the compelling imperative thereof. The Context Rebuilding of Iraq is critical. A stable and sustainable Iraq is critical to the Middle East and to the national strategic priorities of the U.S. and its allies. Yet, post-war (and pre-post-war) Iraq is unstable—and will so persist—in the absence of serious and successful sustainable rebuilding of Iraq’s many communities, as well as Iraq as a nation. New, vital ingredients must be added to this already massive, but still unimpressive, rebuilding—indeed, more massive than any estimate to date. The rebuilding effort has been over balanced on the national, top-down (and seemingly serendipitous) level in Iraq, with disappointing results. Glaringly insufficient efforts have been directed toward communityoriented, bottom-up rebuilding, and consequently the results at that level are worse than disappointing. Simply put, rebuilding sustainable communities must be holistic, integrated and balanced, so that bottom-up rebuilding at the community level becomes as important as top-down rebuilding at the national level, and sustainable rebuilding of soft infrastructure as important as rebuilding of hard infrastructure. Early commitment to reconstruction. In 2004, the World Bank and the UN established the International Reconstruction Fund Facility for Iraq to help “donor nations channel their resources and coordinate their support for reconstruction and development in Iraq.”3 Similarly, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) has expressed its commitment to support Iraqis in rebuilding their country by carrying out

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programs in education, health care, food security, infrastructure reconstruction, airport and seaport management, economic growth, community development, local governance, and transition initiatives.4

In fact, the Iraq Relief and Reconstruction Fund (IRRF), which is administered and funded by the U.S., had alone expended about $11.4 billion USD between April 2003 and March 2006. Broad disappointment. An extensive and intensive survey of numerous recent reports has revealed that the efforts of the Iraqi government, the Iraq Relief and Reconstruction Fund (IRRF), the United Nations Development Group, the World Bank, and other multilateral agencies to rebuild Iraq continue to be less than victorious. Some of these publications include the following: Rebuilding Iraq: Reconstruction Progress Hindered by Contacting, Security, and Capacity Challenges; Rebuilding Iraq: Integrated Strategic Plan Needed to Help Restore Iraq’s Oil and Electricity Sectors; and Military Operations: The Department of Defense’s Use of Solatia and Condolence Payments in Iraq and Afghanistan.5 Background The Center for Rebuilding Sustainable Communities after Disasters at the University of Massachusetts Boston (the Center) has embarked upon a sustained effort to promote a series of conferences on the Rebuilding of Sustainable Communities in Iraq. The first such conference took place in Boston in July 2007. The purpose of these conferences is to attract experts in the realm of rebuilding sustainable communities—both academic and practitioners—from international sources, especially the Middle East. Their proposals are to be presented, published and critiqued. By design, these experts will know and understand community rebuilding from the bottom-up (as well as top-down). Furthermore, these experts appreciate the combined contribution toward holism of a mix of both hard and soft infrastructure. And, in contrast, it is the belief of the Center (and these experts) that non-experts have long held a “default disposition” that such rebuilding efforts can readily suffer over-balanced, serendipitous and top-down efforts (especially when there are immediate military exigencies) and can be so pursued anecdotally (especially toward hard infrastructure) by whoever is in power (regardless of lack of expertise and resultant

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predisposition thereto). But, we believe, such “making do” after disasters will not do. Disasters are prone to become compounded in the absence of expert responses. Disasters inflict trauma and heavy damage. Societies are set back and typically experience a severe vacuum of established essential modalities. Civilization has sought to evolve in salutary fashion (apart from disasters); and, as such, salutary institutions are sought out and promoted. In turn, these salutary institutions (soft infrastructure) must be made to survive disasters. Conversely, when a severe vacuum is encountered post-disaster, unsavory opportunists endemically seek to exploit the situation—starting off with looters. Public health is vulnerable; families must evacuate if their children are to avoid prolonged setbacks; the status of women becomes an early concern. Sustainability comes into question. Lacking expert attention to the conditions of disaster, classic disasters are prone to become compounded and increasingly complex. Furthermore, when the disaster strikes in a realm such as Iraq that was already a fragile yet totalitarian state with prospective societal divisions, such risk becomes inordinately acute. Priority of military and military resolution. The military was put in charge of both the invasion and the rebuilding of Iraq. The invasion was expected to take but a few months, to dispose of the Iraqi Army and establish a comfortable peace. Presumably, that would have happened if the U.S. used the standard size force for such an attack and occupation (300,000); but hubris took over, and only half of that force was used. Then the Iraqi Army “melted away” and was advised not to return. Finally, the Baathist political party was made persona non grata—such that ordinary managers and civil servants were similarly sent into (internal) exile. A traumatic vacuum arose, and that vacuum was readily filled by unsavory destabilizing insurgents. A cottage industry for civil war arose, and a comfortable peace never settled. The military is still in control and still trying to achieve a workable settled peace. Contrary to plan (presumably a best-case plan), matters descended into a maelstrom—until an attempt was made to reach down within the military resources and infuse more forces on the ground (from 120,000 to 160,000), which was termed the Surge. This Surge has turned a tide, but the improvement is far from comfortable. The losses in military lives are serious, and the rate of wounded is as bad as any war ever encountered; the military cannot be readily relegated

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to a reduced, supporting role. Accordingly, any reorientation of the process of rebuilding along the lines suggested herein will have to be done in collaboration of the overall pursuit of peace by the military. While the military suffers such severe casualties, it is inappropriate to question their sense of priority. Helpful shift in the rebuilding process in 2007. Our national leaders are in the saddle in Iraq seeking to achieve both peace and rebuilding, but, unfortunately, urban development experts and programs are sorely lacking. The U.S. military is the principal power, and the Department of State is seeking to achieve positive insinuation. The once-powerful Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) has come and gone. Recently, the U.S. military together with USAID has begun limited rebuilding efforts as part of Provincial Redevelopment Teams (PRTs). Hence, there is some slow slogging-along—away from the national level and toward the provincial level. But the overall rebuilding results are disappointing; and, absent midcourse correction, Iraq is headed for further tragedy. The shift toward provincial orientation is helpful, but it must continue toward to the municipal level. Moreover, these PRTs are reputedly overwhelmed by military contingent embedded therein (for necessary safety). To achieve sustainability, any rebuilding teams must become predominantly civilian and establish comity with local endemic rebuilding agencies. Salutary role of USAID. USAID is the federal government organization responsible for most non-military foreign aid. An independent federal agency, it receives overall foreign policy guidance from the U.S. Secretary of State and seeks to [extend] a helping hand to those people overseas struggling to make a better life, recover from a disaster or striving to live in a free and democratic country.6

USAID is an agency that is much akin to the Center and the efforts to garner international expertise to post-disaster rebuilding in Iraq through several academic conferences. The entrée of USAID into Iraq is a major and salutary step. It draws its posture from the U.S. State Department, which has a strong appreciation of the need for sustainability. Further, it bears a full civilian mark and its reputation commands respect. It is an aim of the Center and the conferences to achieve positive liaison with USAID and together pursue our complementary goals.

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“Doubled Disasters” The Center addresses disasters and, in addition, “doubled disasters.” Some disasters become compounded—“doubled disasters.” But this war— followed as it is by guerilla action, insurgency and civil war—is a fully compounded doubled disaster. Such disasters make the pursuit of sustainable community rebuilding extremely challenging and complicated. Regardless, anecdotal and serendipitous rebuilding efforts are no substitute for holistic, balanced and sustainable community rebuilding, whether or not the disaster is doubled. Indeed, the more compounded the disaster, the more urgent the need to pursue holistic sustainable community rebuilding, yet the circumstances make such a task significantly more difficult.7 Disasters that have doubled warrant a broad doubling of the thesis offered herein by us. The talented and courageous, but humanly manned, military. No military has ever been a “man for all seasons.” A military force reaches its zenith when they concentrate their professionalism on military prowess: an invading military is not the ideal organization for sustainable rebuilding. Even if it were, such capability would be continually frustrated, as the nature of military units is to rotate frequently. Also, the same military ranks would have to receive supplemental training separately to be sensitive (at best) to the strategic importance of other realms (in this case, public planning and redevelopment) and respectful of experts in these other realms. But no military can train its entire rank and file in both the realm of war and the realm of rebuilding post-war.8 So the military was left holding an empty sack and told to make that sack stand up straight. What had been an extremely difficult task for an untrained military, evolved, in turn, into an impossible task. Playing the hand dealt in high stakes. To repeat: Iraq is coping with a heavy series of disasters. But the stakes are immensely high, even without these disasters. The U.S. invaded Iraq with the purpose of assuring stability in the Middle East; now we have compounded that existential problem. Serious catching up is in order. But, having compounded the instability in the Middle East, our nation should see the need to bring about a broad-scale public purpose to rebuild sustainable communities in Iraq. Furthermore, we should acknowledge that such rebuilding requires our best efforts. The military should be able to find mode and means to segue-away from this task and, in turn, rotate-in resources that befit the task.9

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This is the hand that has been dealt. Geopolitics—more often than not—cannot pick the hand it is forced to play. Much of the future will be determined by the wisdom employed in playing an awkward hand—and, in addition, the extent to which positive suggestions are forthcoming and will be in turn taken on board. Looking beyond the military, and beyond U.S. exclusivity. The world has been addressing disasters, including military disasters, for all time. Much is known and much of that knowledge exists here in the U.S.—and, notably, in the Western world and the Middle East. It makes eminent good sense for some institution to undertake to draw upon the depth of such knowledge and expertise. We urge a fresh new look, and that such a new look be bold and worthy of the high stakes. We posit, for example, a working party of a half-dozen nations (some great powers, some Muslim powers, some Middle Eastern powers) combined with a joint action plan to achieve sustainable community rebuilding in Iraq. Would that constitute a coup de theatre? Would not the entire sense of polarity diminish? Would not those who are to become “part of the solution” increase, and those who are disaffected decrease? Would such precedent constitute a model for advancing the state of world expertise for post-disaster rebuilding?10 The tainted occupying military would cease to be dominant and a target of recrimination and disappointment. The cultural dissonance would be muted. The strategy of rebuilding would become more holistic and transparent. The community-level participants should become a voice of positive critique for the top-down powers-that-be—a positive dynamic tension. While this idea could be much ridiculed, such a construct would be no worse than the current construct. It also sends a positive signal to Iraq and the regions around it that the U.S., which acted largely unilaterally to invade Iraq and then commenced to rebuild, is reverting to its once salutary posture of drawing upon the wisdom of its civilian corps, its allies, other major powers (allies or not) and Iraq’s neighboring countries as it seeks to bring about a solid sense of sustainability to the ultimate rebuilding of Iraq. Changing the focus of rebuilding and the leadership thereof. At the moment the focus is directed from the top down, and the leadership is in the hands of the U.S. Army (and Marines) and General David Howell Petraeus (the current Commanding General, Multi-National Force - Iraq). As urged herein, the focus must be balanced so as to include both topdown and bottom-up approaches for sustainable community rebuilding.

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And the leadership must evolve away from the U.S. Army and toward the several points of responsibility of the emergent Iraqi governance. In the interim, there could be some form of power sharing between the two; in addition, a full complement of experts in sustainable rebuilding would be on-scene. Recognizing and finessing the unstable scene in most of Iraq. It is a classic military maxim: to advance where you have a bridgehead. While the scene in most of Iraq is wholly unsettled, the scene in Kurdistan is settled. The Kurds are exploiting their freedom from Saddam Hussein by establishing a strong and effective local government and promoting effective and successful rebuilding. Moreover, the Kurds are engaging in outreach—seeking the infusion of capital, experts and expertise for sustainable rebuilding. The Kurds will continue in that direction as long as possible; and, in turn, much should be exploited from this opportunity. Indeed, the conference of July 2007 at the University of Massachusetts, Boston enjoyed strong participation by Kurdish officials. The rebuilding already done serves well, but a mindset shift can be helpful. As noted at the outset, serious promises have been pronounced both in the U.S. and internationally. A start has been made to initiate rebuilding (which we have described herein as overbalanced with anecdotal, hard, and nationally-oriented infrastructure). It is a “default” orientation for military occupying powers to start off in that bent. But it must be soon recognized that such non-systematized, non-localized and non-indigenously empowering endeavor must soon change. However, we can learn from the efforts to date. We can assess that an unusual relationship has developed with mega-corporations in America that have in turn initiated rebuilding efforts which are rife with corruption and a major disappointment to our own powers-that-be and the affected populace of Iraq. Let us make use of such efforts to date to posit a base line from which much improvement can be made to flow and which will urge a major mindset shift. Critiquing the Scene in Iraq The value of critique, while coping with a fearsome, complex conundrum. Critiquing the strategic focus and the leadership of the rebuilding of Iraq cannot be avoided. At first blush, it may seem unfair to critique the gallant and sacrificing military, which is exerting its best

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efforts; and moreover, no military would have elected in advance to have taken this role, which was foisted on it by a political leadership; and no U.S. military has ever run away from a task—however awkward or illfitting. A worthy positive critique should be helpful in enabling and encouraging a new strategic focus for rebuilding (and thereby shift mindsets toward becoming more sustainable), and complementary resources to be brought front-and-center that can enable the military to be rotated out (while more befitting replacements are rotated in). But the proverbial elephant in the room lurks. The conundrum remains: as progress in sustainable rebuilding requires the presence of public security, obversely, public security requires progress in sustainable rebuilding. And not only is there a full conundrum; but this conundrum is a complex one (as so noted in the footnote).11 This urban university in Boston stands alone to promote a shifting of strategy and complementing of resources. Our nation invaded Iraq and now it is responsible to rebuild Iraq: mistakes were made, and mistakes are being corrected. But there are few in the upper reaches of the U.S. Administration that have the experience and expertise to point out its own faults in the rebuilding of Iraq, least of all the U.S. military. But while a search of the literature appears to contain a plethora of laments over the disappointing state of rebuilding in Iraq, there is little in the way of constructive critique. The Center for Rebuilding Sustainable Communities after Disasters at the University of Massachusetts, Boston stands alone with this constructive critique. Critique outline. We can and should inquire as to why have reconstruction efforts, and billions of dollars of investment, yielded such little results? The answer does not seem to lie in the absence of time or resources. Telltale questions can and should be probed and plumbed. • Is the conundrum (just noted) seen, in turn, by the U.S. military as a full thwarting of and frustration to effective rebuilding efforts: namely, no sustainability without public security, and no public security without sustainable rebuilding? Or does this basic disappointment of progress flow from the clear absence of holism and sustainable community rebuilding, by reason of absence of expertise? ƕ Could there be full holism and sustainable rebuilding, yet the same is not being seen by reason of absent transparency?

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•

•

•

•

Has the task of rebuilding ever been fully and professionally assessed by a broad battery of experts, and then put through peer review—and then reassessed as it proceeds? ƕ By what transparent means and modes is the rebuilding of Iraq being tested and held to account? ƕ Would, for example, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) let this non-sustainable, top-down and anecdotal effort pass muster before any of its own standard criteria? ƕ Has any assessment concentrated expressly upon the critical nature of sustainability? ƕ To what extent can the planning and implementation of sustainable rebuilding be judged transparently as balanced and holistic? How severe is the societal vacuum that resulted when the prior regime was swept away? ƕ Are the powers-that-be (which swept away the Iraqi infrastructure) the proper powers-that-be to acknowledge its own unhelpful clear-cutting of civilian administration and, so chastened, proceed to replace it? ƕ From what institutions, if not FEMA, are the powers-that-be drawing in peer review and critiques of its own sense of rebuilding? ƕ If an unstable state of vacuum exists as to localized community infrastructure, are not these communities vulnerable to a filling by unsavory forces, absent proactive rebuilding plans at the community level? What is the current level of competence of the reconstituted civil service, police and judiciary in particular, and societal empowerment in general? And how is that being measured transparently (other than by military institutions)? What is the best mode and means to convince the U.S. power structure to come to understand the value of sustainability and community-oriented rebuilding, such as ƕ instituting and monitoring basic rights and roles for women; ƕ reconstituting early childhood education for family orientation; ƕ instituting effective modes and means of conflict resolution; and

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instituting modes and means for establishing public/private projects for establishing new public/private partnerships for economic enterprises and institutions at the local level?

Sustainable features for societal evolution. Beyond the questions set out above, there are a host of further questions to be addressed, once we get beyond a primary critique. • To what degree have reconstruction efforts taken in the support of social, economic, and infrastructural development in a sustainable way? • What is the function of the arts (literature, the visual arts, theater, music) in rebuilding communities as a mode of giving form to aspirations for the self, community, and nation and as a vehicle for recording the process of rebuilding? • To what extent has institutional support been provided for community-based organizations? • What are the politics of state reconstruction and conflict management? What is the regional and global impact of rebuilding Iraq? • Where are the intersections of the humanities and legal structures? • To what extent have the international community and the U.S. gone beyond the upgrading and refurbishing of the infrastructure to empowering community-based grassroots organizations and capacity building for sustainable development? • And, what approaches should be adopted in order to ensure more positive outcomes? Shifting mindsets. It is the thesis of this chapter that a new look is imperative. The current course is following a mindset that works in Washington D.C. and in the military, but is not working in the Arab, Kurd, and Muslim realities. This default mindset must evolve to appreciate that the role of reconstruction must be of equal importance to the original military invasion (and hence warrant a cadre of experts and strong expertise). Public planners could not plan and implement the invasion; and, conversely, the military cannot plan and implement the reconstruction. This chapter takes note that General David Howell Petraeus and the “Surge” have shifted priorities; and such shift seems to be in accord with the basic thesis hereof. But, the U.S. military and the U.S. Administration

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continue to be sole judges and reporters of this progress. So, while such effort is probably to be much welcomed, there is, no doubt, much more to be done in that regard. Principal Shift of Mindset toward Sustainable Rebuilding Sustainability is an entire realm of its own. The world has encyclopedic knowledge of sustainable rebuilding. But it can be declaimed—simply—that the type of rebuilding now underway in Iraq is far from sustainable. It is sad to see such a vital and critical evolution, following a full-fledged invasion, be sloughed off toward mere default bureaucracy despite its committed effort. In this case, such mediocrity portends tragedy, and the U.S. cannot sustain one more tragedy in Iraq. This chapter cannot set out all the elements and overall holism of sustainable community rebuilding—a full volume would be necessary. But we can point out key elements therein, and are believed essential. Distinctions between immediate and ultimate sustainability. In many respects, sustainability is akin to beauty—it inheres in the mind of the beholder. For the past two decades, international scholars have been coming together for the purpose of defining sustainability; and, while there is much overlap and consistency, there is not a single, simple definition. However, we will do well for the purposes of this chapter to distinguish between immediate and ultimate sustainability. In the case of immediate sustainability, we wish to emphasize those elements and features that will serve the purpose of effective rebuilding in the short term as well as in the longer-term. In the case of ultimate sustainability, we seek to delve more deeply into scholarly efforts so as lay sound groundwork for future conferences, as international scholars and practitioners meet to discuss with both immediate and the ultimate sustainability. As the scholarly and deeper analysis of the term and concepts of sustainability will have the more long-lasting merit, we can start herein by addressing the ultimate before we deal with the immediate. More Ultimate Definition and Analysis of Sustainability The dimensions, indicators and perceptions of sustainable development. Before we can consider the operational meaning of, as well

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as the ways and means of rebuilding sustainable communities in Iraq, we must initially do three things. First, we must examine the various dimensions of sustainable development. Second, we must assess people’s perceptions of sustainability and sustainable development. Third, we must explore how best we can assist decision-makers and policy-makers in tracking progress towards sustainable development: that is, measuring the apparently unmeasurable. This section will endeavor to do these three things—mainly through a review of the following: the work done by the UNESCO-sponsored The Encyclopedia of Life Support Systems (EOLSS), the various landmark reports concerning sustainability, the work of the UN Commission on Sustainable Development, and the work of the UN Inter-Agency Committee on Sustainable Development. The landmark reports to be reviewed will include those of the World Bank, World Conservation Strategy of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources, the World Commission on Environment and Development (also referred to as the Brundtland Commission) report Our Common Future; and the outcomes of the two major global conferences on sustainable development in 199212 and 2002.13 In order to answer the question, “how do we measure sustainable development?” we will review the various indicators for sustainable development that have been developed and published by the United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD) in 1996, 2001 and 2007. In 1996, the CSD published 134 social, economic, environmental and institutional indicators for monitoring progress towards sustainable development. Social aspects of sustainability were defined to include social equity, human rights, cultural diversity, well-being in a broad sense, the cultural and psychological barriers to social change, and options for overcoming the barriers.14

Following extensive testing and application of these indicators in many countries through 2001, the CSD published the third revised edition in October 2007: In response to decisions by the CSD and the World Summit on Sustainable Development in 2002 which encouraged further work on indicators at the country level in line with national conditions and priorities and invited the international community to support efforts of developing countries in this regard.15

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The revised edition consists of 96 indicators. Based on the findings from the above-mentioned reviews, this section will conclude by attempting to identify some of the actions required to improve local quality of life for the people through sustainable development in Iraqi communities. The dimensions of sustainable development. It is quite a difficult task to define “sustainability”. This is largely due to the diverse viewpoints on it. For example, the Encyclopedia of Life Support Systems (EOLSS), sponsored by UNESCO, has identified the following perspectives: environmental, natural resource, economic, physical science, technological, political, social, cultural, ethical, legal, private sector, public sector, Egalitarian, Utilitarian, Marxist, Libertarian, Eco-Capitalist, Conservationist, Eco-Feminist, Deep Ecology, as well as the divergent perspectives of the industrially developed countries and developing nations.16 The city of Leicester in central England, which in 1990 was designated Britain’s first Environment City by the Royal Society for Nature Conservation and the Civic Trust, and which won the European Sustainable City Award in 1996, has defined sustainable development as “integrating urban development with resource management.”17 Similarly, in its report on sustainable development published in 1994, Britain defined it as “the balancing of urban development with the conservation of environmental resources—land, air, water, forests, energy, etc.”18 In 1992, the Treaty on European Union, which was signed at Maastricht, defined sustainability in terms of four broad objectives:19 Preserving, protecting and improving the quality of the environment; protecting human health; prudent and rational utilization of natural resources; and promoting measures at international level to deal with worldwide and environmental problems. Earlier, the International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources had defined it as “the utilization of species and ecosystems in ways that allow them to go on renewing themselves indefinitely.”20 Furthermore, in response to the apprehensions expressed by environmental scientists and ecologists, Robert Repetto provided the following thought: At the core of the idea of sustainability, then, is the concept that current decisions should not damage the prospects for maintaining or improving living standards in the future…This implies that our economic systems should be managed so that we live off the dividend of our resources, maintaining and improving the asset base so that the generations that follow will be able to live equally well or better. This principle also has much in common with the ideal concept of income that accountants seek

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to determine: the greatest amount that can be consumed in the current period without reducing prospects for consumption in the future.21

However, although no single definition of sustainability will totally encompass the whole meaning of the concept, the “official” definition became popular in 1987, when the Brundtland Commission published its report, Our Common Future. The report defined the concept as “development which meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.”22 More specifically, the report notes that sustainable development requires the following: 1. A political system securing citizen participation in decisionmaking. 2. An economic system that is able to generate surpluses and technical knowledge on a self-reliant and sustained basis. 3. A social system that provides for solutions for the tensions arising from disharmonious development. 4. A production system that respects the obligation to preserve the ecological base for development. 5. A technological system that can search continuously for new solutions. 6. An international system that fosters sustainable patterns of trade and finance. 7. A flexible and self-correcting administrative system.23 Mainly as a consequence of the Brundtland Report,24 United Nations Center for Human Settlements (UN-Habitat) launched the Sustainable Cities Program (SCP) in August 1990. Its principal goal was To provide municipal authorities and their partners in the public, private and popular sectors with an improved environmental planning and management capacity. This will strengthen their ability to define the most critical environmental issues, to identify available instruments to address these issues, and to involve all those whose cooperation is required in concerted and practical action.25

By 1992, the SCP had been established in a number of countries in Africa, the Arab States, Central and Eastern Europe, Asia and the Pacific, and Latin America. Funding (at approximately $0.5 million USD per city) came from UNDP-IPF, from bilateral sources, and from multilateral organizations.26 Furthermore, SCP, in collaboration with the World Health

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Organization, had developed and demonstrated a “Healthy and Sustainable City” project in Ibadan, Nigeria. But how can decision-makers and policymakers track progress towards sustainable development as defined in the Brundtland Report? Tracking progress towards sustainable development. The principal outcome of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (The Earth Summit), which was held in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, was a commitment by 160 world governments to adopt four measures on aspects of sustainable development. These were: 1. Agenda 21: a comprehensive program of action needed throughout the world to achieve a more sustainable pattern of development for the next century. 2. The Climate Change Convention: an agreement between countries establishing a framework for action to reduce the risks of global warming by limiting the emission of so-called “greenhouse gases”. 3. The Biodiversity Convention: an agreement between countries about how to protect the diversity of species and habitats in the world. 4. A statement of principles for the management, conservation and sustainable development of all the world’s forests.27 In addition to the above, the first Earth Summit also resulted in the longer-term commitment by the international community to establish the UN Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD) whose task it is to monitor progress on the four measures outlined above. CSD’s other mandates are to review actions by governments including America, Japan, Brazil and India against commitments made, to organize international conferences on environmental matters, and to recommend further action by the UN. Since its inception, the CSD has focused its attention largely on monitoring the adoption of sustainable policies by governments and the problem of rainforest conservation. At its tenth meeting in Geneva in September 1997, the UN InterAgency Committee on Sustainable Development identified five specific thematic proposals that it recommended for action by the various national governments. These called for the establishment of national sustainable development strategies, integrated approach to land water management, integration of sustainability concerns in national fiscal instruments, promoting broad-based sustainable development through tourism while safeguarding the

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integrity of local cultures and protecting the environment, and local sustainable development initiatives.28

In order to monitor progress towards the achievement of these objectives and towards sustainable consumption and production, the CSD adopted, at its third session in April 1995, a working list of 134 “indicators of sustainable development” (ISDs). The aim of the CSD with respect to ISDs was to have an agreed set of indicators available to all countries to use by the year 2001. The indicators for monitoring progress towards sustainable development. The 134 indicators, which were intended for use at the national level by policy developers in their decision-making processes, were grouped under eight main headings: social, economic, environmental (water, land, other natural resources, atmosphere and waste) and institutional.29 Table 1.1 provides a detailed listing of the indicators. Table 1.1 Working List of Indicators of Sustainable Development* Category SOCIAL Combating crime

Demographic dynamics and sustainability

Driving Force Indicators

State Indicators

Unemployment rate

Head count index of poverty; Poverty gap index; Squared poverty gap index; Gini index of income inequality; Ration of average female wage to male wage Population density

Response Indicators

Population growth rate; Net migration rate; Total fertility rate GDP spent on Children reaching Rate of change of Promoting education grade five of primary school-age education, public population; Primary education; School life awareness and expectancy; Difference school enrollment training ratio (gross and net); between male and female school Secondary school enrollment rations; enrollment ratio Women per hundred (gross and net); men in the labor force Adult literacy rate *Reproduced from United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, 1996, downloaded from http://www.un.org/esa/sustdev/natlinfo/indicators/worklist.htm on May 25, 2008 (with the permission of the United Nations Organization).

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Table 1.1 Working List of Indicators of Sustainable Development continued Category

Driving Force Indicators

SOCIAL Protecting and promoting human health

Promoting sustainable human settlement development

ECONOMIC International cooperation to accelerate sustainable development in countries and related domestic policies Changing consumption patterns

Transfer of environmentally sound technology, cooperation and capacity-building

State Indicators

Response Indicators

Basic sanitation; Percent of population with adequate excreta disposal facilities; Access to safe drinking water Life expectancy at birth; Adequate birth weight; Infant mortality rate; Maternal mortality rate; Nutritional status of children

Immunization against infectious childhood diseases; Contraceptive prevalence

Rate of growth of urban population; Per capita consumption of fossil fuel by motor vehicle transport; Human and economic loss due to natural disasters

Percent of population in urban areas; Area and population of urban formal and informal settlements; Floor area per person; House price to income ration

GDP per capita; Net investment share in GDP; Sum of exports and imports as a percent of GDP

Environmentally adjusted Net Domestic Product; Share of manufactured goods in total merchandise exports Proven mineral reserves; Proven fossil fuel energy reserves; Lifetime of proven energy reserves; Intensity of material use; Share of manufacturing valueadded in GDP Share of environmentally sound capital goods imports

Annual energy consumption; Share of naturalresource intensive industries in manufacturing value-added Capital goods imports; Foreign direct investments

Promotion of potentially hazardous chemicals monitored in food; National health expenditure devoted to local health care; Total national health expenditure related to GNP Infrastructure expenditure per capita

Technical cooperation grants

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Table 1.1 Working List of Indicators of Sustainable Development continued Category ENVIRONMENT Protection of the quality and supply of freshwater resources Protection of the oceans, all kinds of seas and coastal areas

Integrated approach to the planning and management of land resources Managing fragile ecosystems: combating desertification and drought Managing fragile ecosystems: sustainable mountain development Promoting sustainable agriculture and rural development Combating deforestation Conservation of biological diversity Environmentally sound management of biotechnology

Driving Force Indicators

State Indicators

Response Indicators

Annual withdrawals of ground and surface water; Domestic consumption of water per capita Population growth in coastal areas; Discharges of oil into coastal waters; Releases of nitrogen and phosphorus to coastal waters Land use change

Groundwater reserves; Concentration of fecal coliform in freshwater; Biochemical oxygen demand in water bodies Maximum sustained yield for fisheries; Algae index

Waste-water coverage; Density of hydrological networks

Changes in land condition

Decentralized locallevel natural resource management

National monthly rainfall index; Satellite derived vegetation index; Land affected by desertification Population change Sustainable use of in mountain areas natural resources in mountain areas; Welfare of mountain populations Arable land per capita; Agricultural Use of agricultural education Area affected by pesticides; Use of fertilizers; Irrigation salinization and waterlogging percent of arable land; Energy use in agriculture Wood harvesting Forest area change Managed forest area intensity ratio; Protected forest area as a percent of total forest Threatened species as a Protected area as a percent of total native percent of total area species R & D expenditure for biotechnology; Existence of national biosafety regulations or guidelines Population living below poverty line in dry land areas

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Table 1.1 Working List of Indicators of Sustainable Development continued Category ENVIRONMENT Protection of the atmosphere

Environmentally sound management of solid waste and sewage-related issues Environmentally sound management of toxic chemicals Environmentally sound management of hazardous wastes Safe and environmentally sound management of radioactive wastes INSTITUTIONAL Integrating environment and development in decision-making

Science for sustainable development

Driving Force Indicators

State Indicators

Response Indicators

Emissions of greenhouse gases; Emissions of sulfur oxides; Emissions of nitrogen oxides; Consumption of ozone depleting substances Generation of industrial and municipal solid waste; Household waste disposal per capita

Ambient concentrations of pollutants in urban areas

Expenditure on air pollution abatement

Generation of hazardous wastes; Imports and exports of hazardous wastes Generation of radioactive wastes

Expenditure on waste management; Waste recycling and reuse; Municipal waste disposal Chemically induced acute poisonings

Number of chemicals banned or severely restricted

Area of land contaminated by hazardous wastes

Expenditure on hazardous waste treatment

Potential scientists and engineers per million population

Sustainable development strategies; Program of integrated environmental and economic accounting; Mandated environmental impact assessment; National councils for sustainable development Scientists and engineeers engaged in R & D per million population; Expenditure on R & D as a percent of GDP

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Table 1.1 Working List of Indicators of Sustainable Development continued Category

Driving Force Indicators

State Indicators

INSTITUTIONAL National mechanisms and international cooperation for capacity-building in developing countries International institutional arrangements International legal instruments and mechanisms Information for decision-making Strengthening the role of major groups

Main telephone lines per 100 inhabitants; Access to information

Response Indicators

Ratification of global agreements; Implementation of ratified global agreements Programs for national environmental statistics Representation of major groups in national councils for sustainable development; Representatives of ethnic minorities and indigenous people in national councils for sustainable development; Contribution of NGOs to sustainable development

Twenty-two countries pilot-tested these 134 indicators from 1996 to 1999 and evaluated the results of the tests from 1999 to 2000. They concluded that these were “too large to be easily managed.”30 The number of indicators was therefore reduced to 58 and published by CSD in 2001 as the second edition, with a decision “to keep the indicators under review.” Between 2001 and 2006, the indicators of sustainable development were extensively reviewed based on experience gained from their application in many countries. This resulted in a further reduction of the number to the newly revised core set of 50 (which were published in October 2007). Thus, the new CSD indicator themes are: poverty; governance; health; education; demographics; natural hazards;

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atmosphere; land; oceans, seas and coasts; freshwater; biodiversity; economic development; global economic partnership; and consumption and production patterns.31 The significant development here is that the division of indicators under social, economic, environmental and institutional categories is no longer explicit in the newly revised set…which (emphasizes) the multi-dimensional nature of sustainable development and reflects the importance of integrating its (four) pillars.32

For example, poverty and natural hazards have been introduced as “new cross-cutting themes” (Table 1.2). Table 1.2 Commission for Sustainable Development (CSD) Indicators of Sustainable Development* Theme POVERTY

Sub-Theme

Core Indicator

Income poverty

Proportion of population living below national poverty line Ratio of share in national income of highest to lowest quintile Proportion of population using an improved sanitation facility Proportion of population using an improved water source Share of households without electricity or other modern energy services Proportion of urban population living in slums

Income inequality Sanitation Drinking water Access to energy Living conditions GOVERNANCE Corruption Crime

Other Indicator Proportion of population living below $1 a day

Percentage of population using solid fuels for cooking

Percentage of population having paid bribes Number of intentional homicides per 100,000 population

HEALTH Mortality

Under-five mortality rate Life expectancy at birth

Healthy life expectancy at birth *Reproduced from United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, 2007, (44), downloaded from http://www.un.org/esa/sustdev/natlinfo/indicators/guidelines.pdf on May 25, 2008 (with the permission of the United Nations Organization).

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Table 1.2 CSD Indicators of Sustainable Development continued Theme Sub-Theme HEALTH continued Health care delivery

Nutritional status Health status and risks

Core Indicator

Other Indicator

Percentage of population with access to primary health care facilities Immunization against infectious childhood diseases Nutritional status of children

Contraceptive prevalence rate

Morbidity of major diseases such as HIV/AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis

Prevalence of tobacco use Suicide rate

EDUCATION Education level

Literacy DEMOGRAPHICS Population

Gross intake ratio to last grade of primary education Net enrolment rate in primary education Adult secondary (tertiary) schooling attainment level Adult literacy rate

Life long learning

Population growth rate Dependency ratio

Total fertility rate

Tourism

NATURAL HAZARDS Vulnerability to natural hazards Disaster preparedness and response ATMOSPHERE Climate change Ozone layer depletion Air quality

Ratio of local residents to tourists in major tourist regions and destinations Percentage of population living in hazard prone areas Human and economic loss due to natural disasters Carbon dioxide emissions

Emissions of greenhouse gases

Consumption of ozone depleting substances Ambient concentration of air pollutants in urban areas

LAND Land use and status

Land use change

Desertification Agriculture

Arable and permanent cropland area

Land degradation Land affected by desertification Fertilizer use efficiency

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Table 1.2 CSD Indicators of Sustainable Development Theme Sub-Theme LAND continued

Forests

Core Indicator

Other Indicator

Proportion of land area covered by forests

Use of agricultural pesticides Area under organic farming Percentage of forest trees damaged by defoliation Area of forest under sustainable forest management

OCEANS, SEAS, AND COASTS Coastal zone Percentage of total population living in coastal areas Fisheries Proportion of fish stocks within safe biological limits Marine Proportion of marine area environment protected

Bathing water quality

Marine trophic index Area of coral reef ecosystems and percentage live cover

FRESHWATER Water quantity

Water quality BIODIVERSITY Ecosystem

Species

Proportion of total water resources used Water use intensity by economic activity Presence of faecal coliforms in freshwater

Proportion of terrestrial area protected, total and by ecological region

Change in threat status of species

ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT Macroeconomic Gross domestic product performance (GDP) per capita Investment share in GDP

Biochemical oxygen demand in water bodies Wastewater treatment Management effectiveness of protected areas Area of selected key ecosystems Fragmentation of habitats Abundance of selected key species Abundance of invasive alien species Gross saving Adjusted net savings as percentage of gross national income (GNI)

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Table 1.2 CSD Indicators of Sustainable Development continued Theme Sub-Theme Core Indicator ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT continued Sustainable Debt to GNI ratio public finance Employment Employment-population ratio Labor productivity and unit labor costs Share of women in wage employment in the nonagricultural sector Information and Internet users per 100 communication population technologies

Inflation rate Vulnerable employment

Fixed telephone lines per 100 population Mobile cellular telephone subscribers per 100 population Gross domestic expenditure on R&D as percent of GDP

Research and Development Tourism Tourism contribution to GDP GLOBAL ECONOMIC PARTERNSHIP Trade Current account deficit as percentage of GDP

External financing

Other Indicator

Net Official Development Assistance (ODA) given or received as a percentage of GNI

Share of imports from developing countries and from LDCs Average tariff barriers imposed on exports from developing countries and LDCs Foreign direct investment (FDI) net inflows and net outflows as percentage of GDP

CONSUMPTION AND PRODUCTION PATTERNS Material consumption Energy use

Waste generation and management

Material intensity of the economy Annual energy consumption, total and by main user category Intensity of energy use, total and by economic activity Generation of hazardous waste Waste treatment and disposal

Remittances as percentage of GNI Domestic material consumption Share of renewable energy sources in total energy use Generation of waste Management of radioactive waste

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Table 1.2 CSD Indicators of Sustainable Development continued Theme Sub-Theme Core Indicator CONSUMPTION AND PRODUCTION PATTERNS continued Transportation Modal split of passenger transportation

Other Indicator Modal split of freight transport Energy intensity of transport

Iraq and CSD indicators—Stymied Measurement Measuring the “unmeasurable” achievement of sustainability becomes all the more awkward when measurement modes and means encounter serious obstacles. Just as it is fair to posit that the disaster in Iraq is a doubled disaster, so too it is inescapable that ongoing measurement of achieving sustainability faces serious obstacles. Although in 2002, the World Summit for Sustainable Development (WSSD) urged States not only to take immediate steps to make progress in the formulation and elaboration of national strategies for sustainable development but also to begin their implementation by 2005.33

Iraq has not been able to address this matter mainly because of the ongoing conflict there. Similarly, although the various indicators reviewed are useful tools to gain insight regarding progress being made in achieving sustainable development, the capacities of Iraq to use them have been greatly impaired by a number of factors (as are set out in detail in note 34).34 Indeed, the 2007 Mid-Year Progress Report on the United Nations’ International Compact with Iraq published by the Government of Iraq shows, for example, that out of the 75 actions which the Government had promised to take in order to facilitate and achieve progress in the areas of “human development and human security,” only four had been completed by 2007.35 People’s perceptions of sustainability and sustainable development. Based on the discourse above, it is obvious that developing sustainability is hard and needs both resources and the cooperation of all. But so far, we have only examined sustainability from the viewpoints of international agencies, politicians, non-governmental organizations and academics.

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So, what are people’s own perceptions of sustainability and sustainable development? Finding answers to this question is crucial for the following reasons, amongst others, if the current sustainability programs are to succeed locally, nationally and internationally.36 Barrett posited the following: 1. The sustainability discourse speaks of a society where people’s economic welfare and quality of life needs can be met while still considering environmental limits. To achieve this, the general public’s opinions and attitudes must be taken into consideration. 2. If sustainability is to be achieved, it is the fundamental value system that undermines a society that must change. The sustainability agenda, therefore, depends on an informed public when considering environmental issues and sustainable lifestyles. 3. Sustainable development cannot just be an issue for politicians to implement and academics to discuss. It is an issue that must be addressed by every person and incorporated into everyday decisions and lifestyle choices. 4. Finally, another important reason why public attitudes of sustainability must be considered is the democratic nature of the concept itself. Sustainable development strives for a more just society where people have the ability to control their own lives. Sustainable development is about giving everyone the right to have his or her own say. By addressing the issues of public attitude and behavior, this is possible to assess.37 Amongst the benefits to a community (be it at a local or national level) that will come from researching this question of public perceptions of sustainability are the following: • • • •

an understanding and awareness of the general public’s attitude to new policy initiatives; an understanding of public reaction to the use of sustainable indicators; an insight into what is required of a community to achieve sustainability in a way that is publicly expectable; and, helping the community understand the importance of sustainable lifestyles and realizing their responsibility on a local and global scale.38

These benefits notwithstanding, there is currently a dearth of research

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that has assessed public attitudes and behaviors toward the environment and to the concept of sustainability. However, John Barrett’s study obtained the following preliminary results: •

Most people do not want to be sustainable, especially when they realize that a sustainable economy requires a reduced level of consumption. Thus, when the participants in the study realized that fundamental changes in society were required, and particularly in their own lives, the idea of sustainability seemed less attractive.

•

There is a huge gap between public attitude and behavior.39

Given Iraq’s potentially rich resource base, what guiding principles must Iraq policy makers take into account in pursuing a balance between development and environmental protection? And, given its uniqueness (nationally and geographically), what kind of a strategy must be devised for sustainable development so that environmental issues can be linked with national social, cultural and economic objectives? What might the implications of such a strategy, which seeks to “reduce overall demand for resources” whilst helping to “maintain biological diversity,” be on economic growth, social and health issues, agricultural development, urban form, urban development, the construction industry, water resources and, research? And given that direct public and community involvement is essential to the success of sustainability, what form should this take? Similarly, since local authorities are much closer to the people than central government and therefore better placed to explore community initiatives, what must be the nature of their involvement in policy formulation and implementation processes? What are the direct and indirect impacts of the scarcity of water on land use patterns? In what ways, and to what extent, should a comprehensive water policy dictate the land use policy (including settlement patterns—type, distribution and size)? How can the public, private and voluntary sector representatives, working collaboratively, synthesize the different and often divergent strands of development in order to formulate a coordinated model for energy, transport, waste and pollution, food production, livestock raising, and agriculture, economy and work, population growth pressure and the built environment, natural environment and social environment? Based on the issues examined so far, we suggest that the following principles (“which are the least talked about and the least addressed by national governments”) should guide Iraqi communities in general in their

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efforts to pursue sustainable development. A systematic determination of future user needs: how much capital should the future inherit from the present generation? The Brundtland Report’s definition of sustainability, as quoted by Sudhir Anand and Amartya Sen, emphasizes the concept of “needs”: “the needs of the present” and the needs of the “future generations.” The later set of needs “reminds us that sustainability is an obligation to future generations, and thus that it is necessarily about intergenerational allocation.”40

Hence, sustainability is simply a matter of distributional equity, of sharing the capacity of wellbeing between present people and future people…[it] is an injunction not to satisfy ourselves by impoverishing our successors… [Thus, sustainability is an] obligation to preserve the present-day economic opportunities (such as productive capacity) for the future, not necessarily to increase them…However, “preservation of the resource base does not imply that all exhaustible resources (such as minerals and fossil fuel) must be conserved; that is likely to be unfeasible. But if society’s broad stock of capital is to be maintained, the non-renewable resources that are used up must be replaced with something else. That has to be reproducible capital, whether physical or human.”41

Poverty alleviation as a means of protecting the environment. With regards to the “needs of the present,” it is “the essential needs of the world’s poor to which overriding priority should be given.” In their comments on intra-generational justice and human development, Anand and Sen noted that there would be something distinctly odd if we were deeply concerned for the well-being of the future—and as yet unborn—generations while ignoring the plight of the poor today. The moral obligation underlying sustainability is an injunction to preserve the capacity for future people to be as well off as we are. This has a terribly hollow ring if it is not accompanied by a moral obligation to protect and enhance the well-being of those amongst us who are poor and deprived.42

Indeed, the World Bank has suggested that poverty alleviation should be an instrument to protect the environment from degradation. It must be a prerequisite for environmental conservation:

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Adenrele Awotona and Michael Donlan The poor are both victims and agents of environmental change. About half of the world’s poor live in rural areas that are environmentally fragile, and they rely on natural resources over which they have little legal control. Land-hungry farmers resort to cultivating unsuitable areas—steeply sloped, erosion-prone hillsides; semiarid land where soil degradation is rapid; and tropical forests where crop yields on cleared fields frequently drop sharply after just a few years. Poor families often lack the resources to avoid degrading their environment. The very poor, struggling at the edge of subsistence, are preoccupied with day-to-day survival. It is not that the poor have inherently short horizons; poor communities often have a strong ethic of stewardship in managing their traditional lands. But their fragile and limited resources, their often poorly defined property rights, and their limited access to credit and insurance markets prevent them from investing as much as they should in environmental protection.43

It must be noted, however, that strategies, which are aimed at the economic empowerment of low-income and poor households, must not be limited to the redistribution of the national or community wealth to the poor. They must also focus on enabling them to generate for themselves “more income and other means of good living.” More Immediate Definition and Analysis of Sustainability Salient distinctions between ultimate and immediate sustainability. As we shift our analysis from the ultimate to the more immediate, there is one set of distinctions that arise promptly. In the case of the ultimate, we are much concerned as to global considerations in general and environmental considerations in particular. Conversely, in the case of our more immediate analysis, we are much more into the process of teamwork, inclusion, transparency and avoidance of having the “perfect be the enemy of the good.” Furthermore, the immediate task is essentially localized—and, accordingly, we should seek to match our planning to the geography and the polity of the various communities in Iraq. And of course there is no sin in sensing immediate inadequacies in the degree of sustainability, if we believe that we can identify these and set a sound course of correction in place. Although well-begun is half-done, it is equally important to get the process underway so that progress can begin to be sensed and appreciated and, in turn, the process can be bought-into by the populace.

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Style segue, from the scholarly to the abbreviated. The prior section was dutifully detailed; and, as such, will well serve the respective upcoming conferences. Conversely, in dealing with immediate, we seek to be briefer. Accordingly, in sum, we posit that: •

•

•

Sustainable communities are built with leadership, commitment, collaboration, and partnership by planners possessing deep expertise—which: ƕ demonstratively establishes a distinct holistic planning role that provides specific attention to sustainability; ƕ comprehends the character of the individual community, the damages suffered, and the extant vacuum; ƕ perceives the short, medium and long-term goals and needs, together with the need for harmony thereof. Moreover, there must be assurances of public promulgation of the evolving plans, the process of the planning and the transparency of implementation, which: ƕ explains sustainability, for example, in terms of economic gains as a strong motivational message; ƕ draws upon the character, talents and institutions of the affected community; ƕ identifies local jurisdictional powers and authorities. Also, builds public trust by helping the community draw upon experiences, resources, and policies already in place, by: ƕ sensitivity to safety and security and environment; ƕ appreciating the culture and history of the affected community; ƕ encouraging and facilitating public participation; ƕ using a participative approach, especially civil society participation, which is gender and culture sensitive, empowerment and capacity building, and demand driven (including assistance in the formulation of the requests); ƕ building partnerships by way of a broad-based task force with representatives from all key sectors of the community, e.g. business leaders, civic associations, health care professionals, and representatives of the construction and housing sectors); ƕ maximizing community stakeholder involvement, recruits local corporations, foundations, and nonprofit or civic organizations to participate in the planning process, and

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•

• • • •

establishes a multidisciplinary steering committee to maintain an overview on reconstruction; ƕ demonstrating sympathy toward local preference and sense of community ownership in the plans and process. Assures multidisciplinary monitoring of the rebuilding with periodic assessments of reconstruction and planning efforts which is sensitive to the need for maintenance as a complement to construction. Attracts funding resources for the short-, medium- and longterm(s). Comprehends careful, comprehensive land use planning. Stimulates sustainable economics redevelopment. Establishes systematized and institutionalized processes for stimulating public/private processes necessary for institutional and commercial development via public/private partnerships.

More on immediate sustainability. Sustainability can be viewed from differing perspectives. From a negative view, sustainability is the opposite of anecdotal and serendipitous processes. More positively, sustainable rebuilding understands the holism of community fabric and the need for multi-level leadership and participation. Multiple disciplines must be integrated and harmonized. When the U.S. is struggling to advance democracy, the need for sustainability in the process of rebuilding is an ideal and vital complement thereto. Indeed, as democracy is being pursued in Iraq, it is most helpful that sustainable rebuilding be its strong complement. Specific Exemplars of Positive Sustainable Rebuilding An exemplar: drawing upon the synergy between the Center at UMASS/Boston and the Boston Redevelopment Authority (BRA). Synergy amongst allies can transcend normal boundaries. Academia has its own endemic limitations; and, conversely, an agency such as the BRA, although an ideal partner with the Center, cannot extend its geographical radius beyond Boston. However, there are alumni from the BRA who are active with the Center and principal figures at the BRA who have provided consulting service in the Middle East and have strong reputations therefore. One specific point proposed by the Center is for an agency such as the BRA to be replicated in Kurdistan for establishment of localized, indigenously promoted projects. A valuable task force could be formed to

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advise emerging community organizations as to modes and means to institutionalize and systematize local community-oriented development via public/private partnerships. The need to promote evolution beyond hard infrastructure and toward public/private programs. While on the one hand hard national-level infrastructure such as highways are best pursued as public works projects, there are many regional and community-focused projects that should be pursued in the nature of public/private projects. There is a wide spectrum amongst public/private projects. The most common feature is that the sources of repayment of funding and the operation of the project would arise out of the private sector; while, conversely, the overall planning and initiation is public (and perhaps even the sources of funding). Cities have distinct needs (for example, the need for the proper situation of institutional structures, hotels and commercial complexes, and the need of its outer regions for industrial complexes). The public sector can plan, promote, facilitate and permit these programs, while the private sector bids-in their individual proposals that compete to be selected (as the designated developer). The combined role of the public sector and the private sector is to assure that such projects will be sustainable. Sustainability can only occur when public/private projects become as common as public works projects. And localized institutions are necessary to effectuate sound planning, credible processes, and attraction of private sector capabilities (especially skills for sustainability). The BRA provides strong processes to accentuate and facilitate public/private projects with public/private funding. Chapter 9 herein, “Finding a Model Exemplar for Institutionalization of Public Planning for Sustainable Rebuilding in Post-War Iraq: The Boston Redevelopment Authority,” complements this chapter by setting out a time-tested, successful mode of facilitating and accelerating sustainable economic development—principally (as per the thesis of that chapter) by way of structuring and systematizing a public/private process via a municipallyoriented development agency. As we pursue sustainability we should draw strength and wisdom from valid exemplar successes.

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Conclusion There has been a great deal of discussion on the need to reconstruct Iraq. While many policy makers, government officials, experts of multilateral agencies, academics and others agree that the reconstruction efforts should ultimately cater to the needs of the ordinary Iraqis, there are differing opinions on how exactly this should occur. Should a top-down, government-centric approach be employed or a bottom-up approach, in which policy formation and implementation are more culturally appropriate and sensitive to the everyday realities of the Iraqis? The U.S. government and other multilateral agencies’ approach to the task of helping Iraq with its reconstruction efforts has been mainly topdown.45 This approach has been inadequate and has resulted in a state of reconstruction which is a major disappointment to ordinary Iraqis. It has also led to what the Office of the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction has called the “reconstruction gap” in its report, defined as “the difference between what the United States originally promised to build and what it will actually complete.”46 There is, therefore, the urgent need to re-examine this strategy and replace it with a systematized and balancing process (bottom-up as well as top-down) of sustainable community rebuilding which empowers local communities. Mindsets must change. When they do, it will cause changes in the rebuilding strategies and implementation—or the current disappointment will become permanent. And the stakes are too high to let this correctable, troubled scene become another tragic failure. It is now 2008—a full five years since the invasion—and massive funds have been expended with disappointing results. But still, only a low fraction of funds available and/or promised has been expended for reconstruction. And even less funding has been expended toward sustainable rebuilding on the community level. This chapter plumbed and probed the nature of sustainable community rebuilding and the compelling imperatives thereof. The conditions in Iraq are unsustainable, and if they so persist, much injury will be suffered by the region and by the strategic interests to the U.S. and the Western world. Yet, the U.S. has found ways to rebuild after other wars. It is our belief that the way will be found. Most particularly, we urge this achievement at municipality levels via a public/private process that has worked successfully in Boston—and can be translated to Iraq.

PART II CASE STUDIES FROM IRAQ

CHAPTER 2 CREATING A SUSTAINABLE IRAQ: A STRATEGY TO RESTORE HOPE Iraq Employment, Governance, and Reconstruction Strategy The war in Iraq has taken a great toll on our society in the forms of human sacrifice, economic loss, energy and the environment. To achieve peace in Iraq, we must revitalize the faith in government and create opportunities so compelling that they stop the bloodshed. The people of Iraq need a “cause to live for” that is greater that the perceived “cause to die for”, and hope. This chapter presents such a strategy: a plan that will put a stop to violence, poverty, desperation, revolution, insurgency and crime. This paper provides key steps necessary to establish peace and create a sustainable Iraq. It is based on the belief that human behavior is motivated by self-interest; that democracy cannot take root unless basic human needs are provided for;1 and that nations from around the world will openly participate to stop the violence and social decline. Working through the government of Iraq, the plan offers a strategy to increase employment, revitalize the economy, reduced the insurgency, and to provide regional stability. The intent is to energize the working economy in Iraq and in doing so restore peace, to permit the emergence of political and social conditions in which freedom and democracy can take hold. This plan is based on a simple and workable concept: put people to work rebuilding their own neighborhoods, cities and country, provide them an opportunity to support their families, rally them toward a vision for a better future, and you will divert energy away from self-destructive behaviors. In essence, the plan provides the people of Iraq with “a cause to live for.” We need only look to history for examples of how government work programs and reconstruction encampments mitigated social decline. After WWII, Germany hired millions of men to rebuild their nation on loans from other countries. In U.S. history, when economic engines had stalled during the great depression, President F. D. Roosevelt created the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) and the Worker Progress Administration (WPA). Simply doling out welfare aid payments means spiritual and moral disintegration destructive to the national fiber: the philosophy behind this

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strategy is to put the unemployed back to work in jobs that would serve the public good and improve both the skills and the self-esteem of workers. We must borrow these chapters in history to create the conditions for peace in Iraq. The plan is based on meeting basic needs for food, water, shelter, security and income: jobs first and quality of life second, followed by selfconfidence, esteem, freedom, and justice on the path to democracy. Aristotle said “poverty is the father of crime, revolution and corruption” and it is clear that the people of Iraq are no strangers to poverty: I’ve been to the Philippines before and saw poverty. But at least they had villages and something they could eat. Here there is sewage on the ground outside... kids running in and out of it. Shepherds take their sheep to eat from the trash.2

As the country of Iraq faces increasing poverty, insurgency, and economic decline, the new government in Iraq must take the leading role in solving this problem. They must articulate and deliver an Iraqi initiative for peace, economic recovery and hope. Within this plan are powerful principles of government leadership, economic self-help, ethnic and regional cooperation, technical training, education and jobs, which are all fundamental to rebuilding Iraq today. The program will allow Iraqis to set aside ethnic and tribal rivalries and take seriously the need for regional decentralized planning and cooperation. It is believed that this plan will mitigate additional widespread ethnic and sectarian fighting. The result of this plan will be a revitalization of Iraqi agriculture, utilities, energy infrastructure, roads, governance, communities, and industrial capability. It must be financed, implemented, and managed by Iraqis, for Iraqis. In the end, thousands of development projects will be initiated to help create jobs, stimulate economic growth, rebuild the infrastructure, promote trade, restore peace, and create a sustainable Iraq. History has shown insurgencies cannot be defeated by force alone; such rebellions inherently promote a local distrust of outsider motives, and carry a level of popular support that is nearly impossible to win over completely. The insurgents control the local population because they control the environmental resources, and, when a small group controls the resources within a region, they also create environmental scarcity.3 This fact alone gives the insurgents great control over the general population within an area. Those who are unwilling to participate in either direct or indirect support to the insurgency are marginalized within their community. The effects of environmental scarcity directly affect the level

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of violence, and act in combination with other social, political, and economic stressors. The basic challenge is that we have never settled on a strategy for containing the insurgency and achieving broader objectives. The support Iraqi insurgents get, if only from Iraqis who merely fail to report them, is incalculable. On the political front, we have been working to create a democratic Iraq, but that is a goal, not a strategy. On the military front, we have sought to train Iraqi security forces and turn the war over to them. As President George W. Bush has stated, “our strategy can be summed up this way: as the Iraqis stand up, we will stand down.” But the president is describing a withdrawal plan rather than a strategy;4 there must be swift economic recovery and development, concurrent with establishing security and governance, to ensure that Iraq achieves democratic self-sufficiency. This plan of action is a strategy to support a desperate cry for help from the Iraqi people in crisis and despair, who continue to endure insurgency and war. Most of the Iraqi people want peace, but at the same time they need jobs to feed their families and a purpose for their future. At work in Iraq is the Power of Context:5 this says that human beings are influenced much more by their environment than they may seem. Good people will do malicious things in a permissive environment: the worsening environment directly affects behavior. Working through the government of Iraq, we must put an end to the rampant unemployment, economic decline, violence and societal degradation that grips the country if we ever hope to see a democratic Iraq emerge.6 To accomplish the regional goals of peace, stability, and freedom, we must act. Although this strategy is a mighty undertaking, it is worthy of our support, commitment and resolve. Creating Sustainability This strategy will bring together two under-utilized resources: the talent of young people ages 18 to 40, and the natural resources of this great country, in an effort to save both. The plan offers employment to hundreds of thousands of unemployed citizens, especially young men7 who have limited opportunities. Government legitimacy comes with the first wages paid to the Iraqi workers, winning their hearts and minds while organizing society toward a unifying, tangible vision based on government action rather than rhetoric. The Iraqi people will be offered jobs on a volunteer basis for a one-year commitment in exchange for compensation, to be enrolled and to live in employment camps within their area. An incentive

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of two months’ wages will be paid to individuals upon enrollment in the camp. Living in the camp is a key strategy to take enrollees out of their usual surroundings and negative distractions, providing income-producing jobs, develop trust in government, offer on-site academic and skills training, and push money into the local economy. The camps will be expanded or contracted in size depending on the reconstruction work in the local area. It is expected that there will be some 1,000 reconstruction camps opened throughout the country with about 1,000 men at each camp. Each camp will serve a highly localized area: in other words, workers will perform work very near their own communities, usually within ten km of the camp. Enrollees will perform many different jobs, from the most basic to high-skilled duties and tasks, and at the same time will receive pay, training, and education.8 This training and education will prepare men for future jobs. Education is not only a right guaranteed by the new Iraqi constitution, it is described therein as a main factor in the advancement of society.9 This group of Iraqi citizens will enter this employment program on a purely voluntary basis. They will be asked to work hard so that they can see the fruits of their labor as they rebuild local communities in Iraq brick by brick, and block by block. The world will see the Broken Window Theory at work.10 The theory implies that if buildings or communities are left in disarray, with broken windows, refugees, and in a continued state of decay, then people will break more windows, break into other buildings, and destroy property. Society continues in a downward spiral until total chaos ensues. A successful strategy for preventing decline is to fix the small problems: repair the broken windows within a short time, say, a day or a week, and the tendency is that people will stop further decay. Clean up the sidewalk every day, and the tendency is for litter not to accumulate. Problems do not escalate, and thus respectable residents do not flee a neighborhood. The theory claims that crime and violence are the inevitable result of disorder, and that they are contagious. Repair the broken windows and two major events will result—crime and inexcusable social behavior will be deterred, and violence will be reduced. Men in the camp will work six days a week on community projects and will be provided one day per week for care and maintenance. Work groups will be organized into companies of 100 or fewer workers. New camps will be constructed as necessary to manage the reconstruction effort throughout Iraq. Although the duration of the reconstruction effort will be longer, the length of the enrollment period for each enrollee is about one year. Of course, the intent is to work themselves out of a job by gaining experience, education and training so that they can assume private sector

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jobs as the economy expands to support employment. The target audience is males 18 to 40: however, flexibility may be granted to the program administrator in hiring others, including men outside the target age, and women. The attitude and cooperation of the camp administrator will be critical to meeting the goals of the program. The camp will provide these men billeting, food and water, work uniforms, training, and localized reconstruction projects while providing the communities hope. It is a core goal of the program to assist these young men, so that by the end of their commitment, they are prepared and have found private sector employment. The private sector employment may occur at any time during the program life, and as a result new enrollees will be regularly joining and leaving the camps upon employee placement certification. Each camp will have supervisors, educators, trainers, camp administrators, cooks, law enforcement, maintenance, and skilled and unskilled reconstruction workers, up to approximately 1,000,000 enrollees countrywide. Enrollees throughout the country will be engaged in renewing this nation that has been so decimated by neglect, war and terror. There is little time to waste: the Iraqi National Assembly (INA) must be called to an emergency session to hear and authorize this effort. As John F. Kennedy said, “if a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich.”11 The creation of jobs is a government-to-thepeople program implemented and financed by Iraqis for Iraqis. It cannot be over-emphasized that the program cannot be American- or contractorrun, or private sector managed, or else it will not work. It must be noted that this program does not preclude the involvement of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), or other non-governmental assistance programs concurrently hiring the Iraq people, but those projects must be separate and distinct from this effort. These agencies should not take the lead in the reconstruction effort: this plan is about building trust and confidence in the new government of Iraq and the demonstration that the Iraqi government will provide leadership through the most difficult of times. It is essential that the Iraqi government finance and manage this effort. The Iraqi Government will enlist the services of thousands of unemployed young men, enroll them in an unprecedented peacetime force, and send them on a mission against poverty, destruction and loss of their national resources. Although by the end of the program, more than three million proud men will have accomplished their goals, the entire nation will be able to take the credit for rebuilding the country. Each completed

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project will act as a living tribute to the struggle that is upon this generation. If implemented swiftly, more than 250,000 men could be enrolled in the program within months of implementation. It is an emergency mobilization of men, material, and muscle on a scale rarely witnessed in the world. The speed with which the plan moves through proposal, authorization, implementation and operation will be a function of the joint cooperation among all leaders in our collective governments. Each camp will have a Sector Working Group (SWG) with tribal leaders as members of the group, and a goal to translate local needs into project deliverables. Each SWG will report to the Regional Development Authorities (RDAs) and then to the Baghdad Coordination Group (BCG). These groups will communicate the plans with government ministers to ensure continuity and project coordination. The BCG will ensure consistency between tribal, regional and national priorities, and resolve delays in project implementation. The SWGs, RDAs and BCG will identify localized priority projects in food and agriculture, transportation and roads, health and human services, utilities (water, wastewater, electricity and gas), communications, environmental and solid waste management, housing and schools, parks and recreation, law and order, training and education, planning and business development, oil and gas, camp improvements and feeding, public safety and security, irrigation and drainage, national monuments and archives, art and drama, and history and cultural affairs. These interventions will yield an immediate benefit of security, stability, employment and hope so that a vibrant economy can begin to take shape and to provide a basis for democracy and the migration to a marketoriented society. The overall objective of SWG is to increase the speed, effectiveness and efficiency of the program to support the national development and reconstruction objectives. The transition to a multiethnic democracy must be achieved without bloodshed, and democracy cannot take hold until people are gainfully working for their own welfare again—working for contractors that in turn work for coalition forces is not gainful employment. Above all, this strategy is about creating jobs so as to provide income to families, restore dignity and lead Iraq to prosperity and recovery. The answer is to initially develop government reconstruction (public relief), followed by a transition to private enterprise endeavors. This message is very, very brief: do it—do it now—and do it as laid out in this plan. The government must be responsible for and answer to its citizens, not to contractors.12 The people of Iraq need to develop a trust in

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their government and a belief that in times of crisis, the new government will be there for them. The plan stands on four pillars: the creation of jobs to provide basic services for life; the strengthening of government and establishment of legitimacy and trust; the improvement the quality of life through security and government reconstruction;13 and revitalization of the private sector, in that order. We must allow the Iraqi people the honor, dignity and trust to stand up on their own.14 This program will solidify trust and confidence in the new government and demonstrate the government’s commitment to helping Iraq rebuild. “The care of human life and happiness, and not their destruction, is the first and only legitimate object of government,” said Thomas Jefferson. There will be strong reactions both for and against this effort, but there should be no fear and no faltering in the resolve to help Iraq rebuild. Leaders throughout the world must not fear a loss of private sector jobs in Iraq, but must celebrate the creation of stability, future opportunities and hope. The government is not taking control of agriculture, public works, industry, transportation or anything else; rather, it is a partnership between the government and the people. Not a partnership in profits, for the profits go to the citizens, but rather a partnership in planning and implementation to see that people are working, that they feel valuable and that the reconstruction efforts are carried out. The goals are quite clear: Iraq must move away from the conditions that are close to destroying what we call civilized order. This purpose cannot be accomplished in a day, a month or a year, but it is believed that the people of Iraq and the world will understand this, and will also understand the spirit in which this effort is undertaken. Although not fully detailed here, this new strategy and plan provides that elusive direction that everyone wants. Some of the camps are in place already throughout the country: they are called New York, Junction City, Stryker, Blue Diamond, Falcon, Bucca and Dagger, and they will be vacated and turned over intact to the Iraqi government. This serves two purposes. First, it allows a quick transition to established employment camps, and second, it gives the appearance that the Coalition Forces are reducing their footprint by converting war camps to employment camps. Each community will use local authorities to staff and to transition these camps to working camps.

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The Role of the Iraqi Government The Ministers of Electricity, Oil, Agriculture, Finance, and the Interior, as well as many others, are responsible for planning, coordinating and organizing work to be performed in every region of the country. The Minister of Labor and Social Affairs through the state and local relief office is responsible for the selection and enrollment of applicants. All agencies must perform their work in coordination with a National Director of the Iraq Employment Program, who will be personally appointed by the Prime Minister in accordance with Executive Order of the INA.15 It must be noted that mistakes of procedure will be made as the plan is carried out, but make no mistake about it: the vision is clear. Revitalize the economy and you will reduce the violence, and revitalize the country. The administration of this program is unprecedented. The same INA Order will authorize the program, appoint a National Director and establish an Advisory Council. This council should be composed of representatives of the Iraqi National Assembly and foreign observers. There are few rules, except that the projects shall be local, rapidly implemented, and administered in a manner that makes all workers feel needed, utilized, and important. Never before has this been done—it is a first. It will be an experiment in top-level management designed to prevent red tape from strangling the mission and to provide gainful employment to every young man that is able, capable, and committed to rebuilding the great country of Iraq. This plan is not about perfection: it is about progress toward democracy. The National Director shall hold complete authority for the program; however, the Prime Minister will retain final approval of certain aspects, and the funding for the program shall be appropriated by the INA. Decisions as to the location of camps shall not be delayed, and the first camps will be those camps vacated by the Coalition Forces. The Role of the Coalition Military An accelerated timetable for withdrawal is not the answer; coalition forces must continue to provide security and stability in Iraq. They must stay on the offensive and pursue those who refuse to obey law and order. Coalition forces cannot pullout and hope for the best: the costs of such premature disengagement would be disastrous. The insurgency could morph into a bloody civil war, or widespread ethnic and sectarian fighting with the significant involvement of both Syria and Iran.16 Radical

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Islamists, Iran and Syria would see a premature U.S. departure as a victory, and the ensuing chaos would destabilize the region, reward the insurgency, and inflate world oil prices. The U.S. decision to invade Iraq and restructure the Iraqi political order will be seen as the essential cause of any failure. Moreover, in Iraq and the rest of the Arab World, the U.S. will be widely charged with deliberately inciting a civil war.17 This type of failure and premature withdrawal is simply not an option. U.S. and Iraqi military and security forces must continue to focus on establishing a safe and secure environment under the rule of law, stability, and geographical security for the Iraqi people. They must continue to attack and destroy insurgents and they must provide a stable platform for democracy to take hold. Furthermore, it must be clear that insurgents, political parties, or other groups whose aim is to perpetuate human misery in order to profit, politically or otherwise, will encounter immediate and decisive action from coalition military forces. In addition, the people of Iraq must understand that violence will not be tolerated. Anyone found outside of their homes with a weapon will be dealt with severely. Once this program is initiated, security forces will be told to deal harshly first and ask questions later if anyone is found with a weapon. As legitimate governmental security institutions are strengthened and ethnic or sectarian militias are replaced or absorbed in the economy and by national and regional governmental security forces, there will be less domestic aggression. And, by employing 18 to 40 year old men from the same population, the insurgent activity and their recruitment will be significantly reduced. While it is unwise to think that the insurgency will go away completely, it is believed that it will become no more than background noise to the strategic intent. A healthy employment program and reduced environmental scarcity will deny insurgents the popular support they need to manage recruitment, and constant military pressure will reduce their number and weaken their will to fight. This approach is designed to fracture, de-legitimize, demoralize, and to strip the insurgent population of resources. The military security and stability will enable the newly freed people of Iraq to repair their economy, cement the rule of law and order, and provide governance. The security forces must protect routes, camps, families of enrollees and enlisted men, and project sites. The unique aspect of the coalition leadership in facing this challenge is not just the idea that Iraq may be in the throes of a civil war within their communities, but that coalition forces value cultural attitudes and that the world will not leave until Iraq becomes self-sufficient and strong.

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Since it will be impossible for the Coalition Forces and the Iraqi armies to guarantee security to all of the working camps simultaneously, the effort must start by focusing on certain key areas and then, over time, broaden to reach further into other sectors on a gradual basis using the Ink Blot methodology. The first camps will be established in strategic areas; they must then initiate projects that have immediate local impact, meeting basic needs and providing immediate positive feedback to the public. These local camps will also minimize the possibility of warring factions from hindering progress. News from the recovery effort and pay for services will spread throughout the country. This strategy will provide a high probability of initial success, which will provide momentum for regional and national projects. As the economy recovers, the coalition military role will become smaller and smaller until all security forces are managed by the Iraqi police and security personnel. Only then will the goal of the coalition force be fully met—as Iraq stands up, the coalition will stand down. Financing the Plan and Iraq’s Future The pre-2003 figure for oil and gas production was nearly 3.5 million barrels per day of oil and 215 Bcf/D of natural gas: today the number is less than half that. To finance the plan, countries of the world will be offered an opportunity to buy oil and natural gas reserves in the ground in exchange for financial commitments. In essence, Iraq will be issuing reconstruction bonds backed by oil and natural gas. Financing the future is done by providing countries of the world with up to 1.1 million barrels per day of foreign exchange reserves and 5.5Bcf/D natural gas reserves that are non-deliverable today, but commits the Iraq government to deliver the oil and natural gas on demand in years to come once the situation stabilizes and the pipeline deliveries improve to pre-2003 levels. Countries contributing to the effort will be given a proportionate amount of oil and natural gas per day based on their per day reserve purchased quantities. This is a crucial distinction from past practices in that contributing countries own the reserve rights for the quantity of daily purchases, but do not receive deliveries until the future. Of course the price for future deliveries is less than the current opportunity cost of this commodity. This is done for several reasons. Countries can call for the deliveries in proportion to their purchases, or they may forgo deliveries choosing to take deliveries in the future when oil prices or their individual economic interests dictate. They may control oil prices by increasing deliveries to

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affect supply, and lower price or to increase supply to meet an increase in demand. All deliveries will be on a pro rata share based on their initial contributions. The plan is to employ up to 1,000,000 Iraqi men at the peak of this program, and to pay a fair wage per month. The cost of the salaries will be $330 to 400 million USD per month, or 48 percent of the monthly commitment of oil based on a $25.00 USD per barrel price. In addition, Iraq has the opportunity to sell reserves of natural gas up to 215Bcf/D. The sale of natural gas will provide a monthly revenue stream of $330 million USD based on $2.00/Mcf. It must be noted that the price established for the reserves is below the current opportunity cost of the commodity; however, given the risk, it is appropriate. In addition, it is not the intent to set up a welfare state for Iraq. Keeping the reserve price below the opportunity price provides an inherent incentive for the Iraqi government to minimize the program duration to only as long as is necessary, and not a day longer. The program does not prevent countries owning the reserves from selling them at any time for any reason to interested parties. The main engine for recovery and growth is the oil sector, which accounts for two-thirds of Iraq’s GDP and over 98 percent of exports and government revenues. Crude oil production and exports in 2004௅2005 averaged 1.9 and 1.4 million barrels per day respectively, and remain below the pre-2003 levels. Oil revenues, however, exceeded the projected levels due to high world oil prices. The recovery of the oil sector propelled real growth to 47 percent in 2004, but in 2005 real growth was projected to be 3.7 percent, as oil production and exports are impeded by sabotage and deteriorated infrastructure. Insurgents continue to disrupt the delivery capability of the pipelines, and as a result billions of dollars are spent to construct, reconstruct and repair damages. Sabotage will remain a serious threat well into the future and pipeline repairs will require substantial security efforts by coalition and Iraqi security forces. It must be noted that repairing the pipeline infrastructure today is unnecessary during these times of violence. It only detracts from the reconstruction efforts because it moves money away from the local projects to more national, complex ones. These projects take specialized skills from outside contractors and contribute little to the economic recovery. The sale of reserves contracts as described above takes this option away from the insurgency and reduces the volatility of world oil prices. The volatility of oil prices due to the war is referred to as a “war premium.” The money from the sale of the oil and natural gas reserves will go back to rebuilding the country;18 the reserves will become owned by nations that are contributing to the reconstruction effort. In summary, any

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country that is willing to step forward with reconstruction money will get a foreign exchange credit of oil. Wages to Workers This effort is intended to be a temporary program of less than five years, but it is necessary in order to prime the economic engines. Young and inexperienced workers will be paid 479,000 dinars per month ($400 USD) for their work and services, but the average camp worker will be paid 598,500 dinars per month ($500 USD). The worker will receive ten percent of the earned wage for his use and welfare at the camp. The remaining wages will be disbursed via an allotment paid directly to the family (electronic pay systems may be used if the implementation time can keep up with the rapid pace of this program. Under this system an allotment card is charged with Iraqi dinar’s equivalents on a weekly basis). It is anticipated that the family will make expenditures into the local economy to buy essential services such as milk, bread, eggs, cheese, electricity, food, water and other goods. It is the “velocity of money”19 moving through the economy that will create hope in each local community. Each dinar spent in the local community will have a rollover effect of 140 percent. The compensation must go to the families in the community to push cash into the local economy so that all benefit immediately—a Keynesian multiplier. In other words, 140 percent of the value of each dinar spent in the community will be transfused back into the economy each week as a result of local goods and services purchased from vendors. In turn the vendors use the money to buy goods, services and raw materials. Its immediate effects will be felt in the economy of every city, village and tribe across the country. These allotments will make life more bearable for the families at home and everyone will feel the gains from the rebuilding effort. All materials and goods to support the rebuilding effort will be locally purchased wherever practical. In communities close to the camps, local purchases will invigorate the economy even more and support small businesses. Everyone all across Iraq and around the world will say “there’s good news tonight in Baghdad.” This program must have transparency,20 and news from the camps must be shared with all of the communities throughout Iraq. The enrollees will be asked to work hard, eat heartily and rebuild their country square meter by square meter as they complete millions of projects throughout all regions of the country. New roads will be built, along with utilities,

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communications, pipelines and telephone lines; millions of trees will be planted, farming and agriculture improved, irrigation ditches dug, national treasures preserved and improved for future generations, while education and training will take place throughout the country. The employment effort will make no distinctions based on either education or training of the incoming enrollees: everyone will be employed. Each camp will have an Education Advisor to provide growth and development to the enrollees. Ultimately, the success or failure of the educational effort will be determined by the initiative and qualifications of the educational advisor stationed in each camp. In addition to reconstruction, it is the intent to teach basic skills in literacy and life to all camp members. Individuals can earn more if they actively participate in the additional training opportunities. Since most of this training will be on the enrollee’s own time, those willing to work the hardest will undoubtedly gain more, be it in a secondary school (high school) diploma, literacy, learning trades, or language skills. The intent of the program is to use unemployed men from nearby communities as the first priority for the camp.21 The program may offer hiring preferences to Iraqi military veterans, with no age or marital restrictions. These veterans will perform duties in accordance with their age and physical condition. The intent is to create an opportunity to rebuild lives disrupted by earlier service to their country. Beginning with the End in Mind It is easy to see that the current course of the reconstruction effort in Iraq will have serious negative effects, and the social cost will continue to bring harm and bloodshed for all. This course of action is too much to ask of the Iraqi people and the countries of the world: the current course involves not only the further loss of lives, homes and wages but also a loss of spiritual values—the loss of that sense of security for the present and the future so necessary for peace to endure. When these things are destroyed it is impossible to establish confidence of any sort in the future. It is clear that mere appeals for patience, unwavering support, and the mere hoping that things will get better will not stop the downward spiral. This plan, as outlined above, is justified, necessary and imperative, and must be applied as quickly as possible. With the strategy outlined above, tomorrow will bring a brighter future for Iraq. Everyone will live in their own homes, each with food, security, safety and work. The community will be able to work without

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great hardship and will be able to provide families with all the necessities and amenities of life. How sadly different is the picture around us today: if we continue on the current path, the economy will fail, the safety and security of men and women will continue to be in jeopardy, and we will have yielded to those who would bring death, destruction, and evil which robs children of food, education, jobs, peace and a productive future. The Iraqi people want the opportunity to work and they want the opportunity to build Iraq into the great country that it can be. This is the awful paradox with which we are confronted: on the one hand we want free market enterprises, but the people are not free; on the other, we see an opportunity to shape the future, to provide security and to operate a slightly different economic machine. We are presented with a multitude of views as to how we may again set into motion governance, security, and the economic machine. Some hold to the theory that private enterprises and the slow progress of Iraq’s economy is one of its inherent peculiarities—a peculiarity which we must simply grin and bear. According to this theory, as we are seeing, if we grin and bear long enough, the economic machine will eventually begin to pick up speed and in the course of an indefinite number of years will again support growth and development. The support for this effort is critical, and it is failing. Working with and through the government of Iraq, the local employment camps will put an end to the rampant unemployment, economic decline, violence, and at the same time will control the insurgency. This strategy will provide employment opportunities to hundreds of thousands of unemployed Iraqi citizens, primarily men, especially to the young men who are doubling as insurgents. The plan will provide public works and pick-and-shovel reconstruction jobs to the Iraqi people with compensation, but in exchange they must live on their secured local employment camp. It is government reconstruction at its most basic level. It should not be assumed that there are no dangers ahead under this new strategy, but it is clear that a fundamental change in popular economic thought is necessary in Iraq. It is to be hoped that in the future they will think less about the producer and more about the consumer, which is the free market way, but today we must think about the unemployed. “Few will have the greatness to bend history itself, but each of us can work to change a small portion of events, and in the total of all those acts will be written the history of this generation,” said Robert F. Kennedy. This vision is very, very clear. Do it—do it now—and do it as laid out in this strategy. Unfortunately, there is simply not enough time to allow the existing conditions to endure.

CHAPTER 3 FATA MORGANA AND THE LURE OF LAW Rebuilding a War-torn State after Regime Breakdown: Prospects, Limits, and Illusions

“But when I would enter the gate Of that golden atmosphere, It is gone, and I wonder and wait For the vision to reappear.”1

Introduction In recent years intensive debate has revolved around questions of regime change, preemptive strike,2 and the various conditions under which those actions are to be regarded as legitimate or not. Both concepts featured prominently in the U.S.-led strike against the Taliban regime in Afghanistan following the 9/11 attacks in 2001 and the war against Iraq that started in 2003. In fact, while both concepts often are interrelated and appear concomitantly, the preemptive strike argument has more often been stressed, even where regime change has been the main underlying motivation. The explanation offered in that regard seems to be that in certain situations successful, “sustainable” preemption (with respect to the threat posed by nuclear capabilities, or, more generally, weapons of mass destruction etc. in the hands of so-called “rogue states”) ultimately necessitates regime change. While a lot of attention has been devoted to discussing the moral and legal basis for resorting to war in an attempt at preempting the kind of threat described above, or achieving a regime change (and, as pointed out, often both)—in other words debate related to the grounds for intervening and the action of intervening itself—much less has been written on “the day after”: i.e. on how to proceed once a regime has been toppled. How to (re)build a stable, democratic regime instead of just installing a fickle and dependent puppet? Furthermore, whether a regime change has been brought about by foreign intervention, as a result of a preemptive strike or other international war (i.e. from the outside), or is the result of a domestic conflict, uprising, revolution, mutatis mutandis (i.e. brought about from

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the inside), or any amalgamation thereof (e.g. a domestic regime change spurred by foreign support or by some degree of direct or indirect intervention by one or several foreign countries), has to be taken into account when crafting a solution in a given case, but it does not affect the underlying, core problem. Whether the regime change that necessitates state (re)building occurred due to outside forces or a purely internal struggle, the general question will remain unaltered: what should be done about this state of affairs? How is a stable, legitimate, viable, democratic regime to be created in the aftermath of regime change? While the basic problem will be the same in most attempts at state rebuilding, the particular solutions will, of course, have to take a multitude of aspects into account which may affect the feasibility of the task. Those include the degree of violence exerted by the previous regime, the degree of violence exerted by the various factions in bringing about regime change, the involvement of foreign forces, the degree of religious, ethnic and sectarian division within a given country, and the existence of (still) functioning institutions and laws. It is generally held that all post-conflict reconstruction needs to take four key issues into account: security, governance (and democratic participation), social and economic well-being, and justice and reconciliation.3 This essay mostly focuses on the second and fourth areas, having the Iraqi experience of drafting a new constitution and establishing a higher criminal tribunal as its centerpiece, while acknowledging that all four pillars are ultimately interrelated. To be sure, not all areas may be equally important at all times. Any rebuilding effort must start somewhere, and as a matter of practicability and perhaps efficiency, not every issue can be focused on simultaneously and to the same degree. However, where the interdependence of those core areas is disregarded and one or several key aspects are neglected for too long, the structure of the newly “rebuilt” state is bound to collapse and assume the Italian name of the fairy half-sister of King Arthur,4 now commonly employed to denote an illusory prospect: Fata Morgana. The Particular Problem March 20, 2008, marked the fifth year since the U.S.-led war against Iraq started, and there is still no end in sight. While in recent years a vast amount of literature has dealt with the justification or condemnation of preemptive warfare,5 this does not help the individuals and communities

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directly affected by such actions, nor does the outcome of that discourse alleviate in any significant way the task of rebuilding a war-torn society. What is needed in such a situation are efforts at reducing the general level of violence and the meddling influence of neighboring states, incorporating the “disenfranchised” members of society, and ensuring a somewhat adequate distribution of power, wealth, and justice across religious and ethnic lines, should we aspire to arrive at something more than a temporary and frail truce. Owing to the overriding acuteness of the regime change in Iraq and the ongoing struggle to reduce the level of violence in that country6 and, eventually, rebuild the Iraqi state, the case of Iraq will not only be the focus of this study, but is likely to remain in the spotlight on the world stage due to its potential repercussions. If state-building can be accomplished in a war-torn country with such unfavorable conditions for arriving at a stable, viable peace then—argumentum a maiore ad minus— the successful (re)building of a state under more favorable conditions may be even more likely. Thus, in line with the criterion of falsification, success here would carry with it potentially greater importance than succeeding under comparably less harsh conditions. Hence, while acknowledging the involvement of a variety of factors in the process of (successful) state-building in the aftermath of violent conflict, this essay focuses on the role of legal institutions necessary for dealing with the past (criminal tribunals and courts of law), and framing the future (drafting a constitution) as the probably most foundational components of state-building: state-building by law, taking the case of Iraq (and the Iraqi Special Tribunal) along with the drafting process of the interim and then permanent Constitution as a point of departure, and evaluating their contribution to the rebuilding efforts at large. In the final part of this chapter, challenges to such efforts will be explored, highlighted by a recent case before the European Court of Justice (ECJ) dealing with the right to access to the courts in general, and the right to judicial review in particular. While those rights are enshrined in most (democratic) countries’ constitutions and safeguarded by domestic and international law, not least within the EU, the case in question exposes the appeal of legal institutions as something not unbound or unlimited, and successful by itself, but constrained and in danger of being reduced to a mere lure, unless and until other stabilizing factors are established, which cannot be left to the realm of law alone.

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The Importance of Trials In the aftermath of the breakdown of an abusive regime exposing at the very least the perpetrators of the most serious crimes to the judgment of the citizens that suffered under that rule, if not to the judgment of world opinion, is crucial to establishing a stable, democratic, accountable mode of government. Apart from being an end in itself, the measures a given state takes with respect to punishing perpetrators of some of the most serious atrocities—genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity— are liable to have an effect on the social order within that state, which in turn affects the prospects for peace. Peace, in the narrowest sense of the word, amounts to the absence of war. However, in international law it is established that the lack of belligerence is but a necessary condition for peace: a sufficient condition needs to take peace in the broader sense, peace connoted as “a state of harmony between people or groups” and “law and order within a state” into account. True peace thus requires peace of mind on the part of all affected people; unsettled, “unsaturated” scores cannot provide that. The way the crimes of a former regime are dealt with (or otherwise) especially affects peace in this broader sense, represents a conditio sine qua non for peace-keeping, if not—considering the currently ongoing violence in Iraq7—for making peace in the first place. Where the end of war leaves festering resentment, the sense of unsettled scores and a deeply felt need for individual or collective revenge, the danger of reprisal will always lurk in the dark and render any truce into a frail state of peace.8

Finding an arrangement that somehow best translates into action the need to face human rights abuses, while at the same time reduces the danger of excessive reactions by previous victims to a minimum, i.e. an approach that realizes the necessity of taking both senses of peace into account, is of paramount importance. Two different approaches have been put forward for facing that challenge: employing truth commissions, or leaving the task to courts of law. While there may be good reasons for either side, ultimately, as has been argued for elsewhere,9 despite their doubtful fringe benefits of impunity, truth commissions do not even offer greater incentives for truthtelling. Granted, due to the circumstances necessary for courts of law to have their say—requirements that are seldom met (especially by regimes in transition) at the time when taking a stance on the issue at stake is initially relevant—truth commissions are more likely to be established.

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Hence, there is a greater possibility of witnesses telling their story and of truth being obtained simply because truth commissions are more likely to be established. But without the threat of criminal trials at their disposal, establishing the truth is not a distinguishing feature of truth commissions. In explaining that seeming discrepancy it may be stated, in line with the realist tradition that state practice always accords with political realities, an argument that points to the “praetorian problem”10 in particular that a not-yet-fully-fledged new government is faced with: Where the new regime has cause to fear a military uprising if its members are prosecuted, it would be wise to avoid such a course and to seek some alternative method of acknowledging the crimes of the past.11

Furthermore, it has been asserted that [a]ll that often effectively remains is the truth of wounded memories of loved ones sharing instinctive suspicions, deep and traumatizing to the survivors but otherwise incapable of translating themselves into objective and corroborative evidence which could survive the rigors of the law.12

Hence, a truth commission, even where it entails the granting of immunity from criminal prosecution to offenders, is to be preferred over the alternative of keeping “intact the abstract right to such a prosecution for particular persons without the evidence to sustain the prosecution successfully...”13 If we lack the evidence required by a court of law in order to have a chance of successfully proving the guilt of perpetrators, we should go far towards siding with a truth commission, because this will then be the only (feasible) option left to us. But whenever there is a chance of taking recourse to criminal trials, it may be argued that courts of law are more apt at eventually establishing the above mentioned preconditions for lasting peace, provided the trials take place in an uninhibited environment and are based on the rule of law. Thus, in the following I will depict certain aspects of the Statute of the Iraqi Special Tribunal and the circumstances surrounding the trial of Saddam Hussein and his co-defendants (regarding the Dujail massacre) as well as of other high-ranking officials (regarding the so-called Anfal campaign) which may have an impact on the (perception of the) legitimacy of the proceedings, which, in turn, would be crucial for the potential of future reconciliation and stability within Iraq. Only criminal proceedings widely perceived as legitimate, taking due process rules into

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account and adhering to the highest standards of justice and fairness in international law, could provide the promise of success in that regard. The Iraqi Special Tribunal More than five years ago the U.S.-led war against Iraq started, and an end to the ensuing insurgency is still not in sight. As a matter of fact, in August 2006 a U.S. general and commander of American forces in the Middle East was quoted as stating: “I believe that the sectarian violence is probably as bad as I’ve seen it, in Baghdad in particular, and that if not stopped, it is possible that Iraq could move towards civil war,”14 and continuous reports of bombings and insurgency attacks underpin the truth of that gloomy foreboding.15 Most recently, suicide bombings carried out by two women, killing at least 99 people in Baghdad on February 1, 2008,16 further validated that assessment, at the same time highlighting the sad commonplace that, in times of war, the greatest number of casualties by far is almost always to be found on the civilians’ side.17 Nevertheless, after toppling the previous Iraqi dictator, the coalition forces proceeded with establishing institutions for trying Saddam Hussein and other high-ranking officials regarded as being responsible for committing serious crimes under the former regime, and, somewhat in passing, also provided for the trial of future, and lesser, crimes. The Statute of the Court. The Iraqi Special Tribunal, or rather The Iraqi High Criminal Court (IHCC), as it has been known since the revision of its Statute,18 has been set up to have jurisdiction over every natural person, whether Iraqi or non-Iraqi resident of Iraq, and accused of the crime of genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and certain violations of Iraqi laws,19 committed during the period from July 17, 1968 to May 1, 2003 (Article 1 Iraqi High Criminal Court Law (IHCCL)). As for the crime of genocide, the Court bases its jurisdiction on the definition as set out in the Genocide Convention of 1948,20 ratified by Iraq on January 20, 1959.21 The Court which, according to Article 2 has its main office in Baghdad, was initially established by the U.S.-appointed Iraqi Governing Council on December 10, 2003. Since the conception of the Court thus cannot be said to be a specifically national (Iraqi) accomplishment, there have been frequent calls for an international court to deal with the subject matter. The International Criminal Court (ICC), however, may only try cases that involve crimes committed after the Rome Statute came into effect on July 1, 2002; most of the crimes Saddam

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Hussein and his co-defendants are accused of were committed prior to that date. The creation of yet another UN ad-hoc war crimes tribunal, akin to the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) or Rwanda (ICTR), which was raised as a possible alternative to an Iraqi Court, would have required the approval of the UN Security Council.22 Several countries wielding a veto power in that Council made it clear they would not vote in favor of the establishment of such an ad-hoc tribunal to try Saddam Hussein. Thus, in that context, having no feasible international alternative at hand, and faced with a lack of viable national institutions for that purpose—and probably driven by the idea that trying Saddam, establishing a historical record, and exposing the Iraqi people to the display of the former regime’s crimes would contribute to reducing support of the insurgency23—the special court for Iraq was conceived of. The Statute of the Court, especially Section Two dealing with the jurisdiction of the Court, the applicable law, and the definition of the respective crimes, resembles the Statutes of the aforementioned international courts, and as such is probably the object of the least controversy. Furthermore, the definitions of individual criminal responsibility in Article 15, and the Guarantees of the Accused, including the presumption of innocence and the due process rules generally adhere to internationally accepted standards. The real dispute has been mainly about the legitimacy of the trials in general, highlighted by concerns about the history of its establishment, location, fairness, and the interaction between those factors, underpinned by the ongoing political violence ravaging the country. It is to these factors I will now briefly turn, having a particular focus on the legitimacy of the court and taking the underlying motivation for and particular circumstances of its genesis into account. Legitimacy of the Court. According to the Fourth Geneva Convention, the laws of an occupied state may only be changed in cases of military necessity.24 Therefore, a narrow interpretation of the laws governing occupation law under that Convention would mandate finding that the Iraqi Special Tribunal (IST)25 was not a legitimate judicial institution with regard to its status as a creation of an occupying power, the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA), in the absence of a military reason for its establishment. Occasionally, legal scholars now also recognize the need of an occupying power to be permitted to change the laws of an occupied state if the purpose is to render humanitarian aid. This line of reasoning might, however, be too much of a stretch and not applicable to the IST. Furthermore, it seems there would generally have to be higher restrictions in that regard when the occupier is a state or coalition of states, as opposed

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to an intervention with ensuing, temporary occupation led or in any case authorized by the UN, as has been the case in situations like Kosovo and East Timor, but not in Iraq. The Court’s legitimacy may be based on the approval by the Iraqi Governing Council (IGC). The IGC is an unelected governing body and as such does not seem to add legitimacy to the Court. However, the IGC has been recognized by the international community as a legitimate governing body; this body’s endorsement of the IST may render the IST a legitimate legal institution. Construing the legal basis in this fashion may still fail to convince critics of the Court, because even recognition by an elusive “international community” is not the same as a democratic endorsement by the Iraqi people, who, after all, should be the main legitimizing entity. To those one may now reply that on August 11, 2005, the Transitional National Assembly, which had the power to replace the Statute, instituted a revised Statute for the IST, now known as the Iraqi High Criminal Court (IHCC), basically confirming the 2003 Statute. Thus, even if the legitimacy of the initial IST may have been seriously flawed, the establishment of the IHCC should have alleviated those concerns.26 Legitimacy of the trials. Even if we accept the legitimacy of the IHCC in general, questions remain as to the soundness and legitimacy of holding trials in the particular situation and circumstances of present-day Iraq, particularly as highlighted by the trial of Saddam Hussein and his codefendants, and the negative repercussions the execution of some of the sentences27 and their timing resulted in. More recently, the conclusion of the trial of Hussein’s cousin, Ali Hassan al-Majid (“Chemical Ali”), and other high-ranking former government officials for the so-called Anfal campaign28 added to the sentiment that the swiftness of the prosecution and, perhaps even more conspicuous, of the execution of penalties, might have taken precedent over concerns of providing, at all times, sufficient time for consideration, not least in regard to appeals. In the majority of cases, the automatic appeals were concluded in little more than a month, and the often sustained death sentences were executed shortly thereafter. Critics have asserted that pursuing high profile criminal trials amidst a war-torn country was not only a high-risk ridge walk, but bordering on irresponsibility, and thus indirectly accuse the Court of not being able to sufficiently safeguard the defendants’ right to due process. The choice of locus may, indeed, be questioned. In general, it has to be assumed that a state in which some of the most serious violations of human rights have occurred and, considering the ongoing insurgency (which led former Iraqi

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interim prime minister Ayad Allawi to declare in March 2006 that Iraq was in a state of de facto civil war29) are indeed still occurring on a daily basis, lacks in some fundamental way appropriate, viable institutions that may deal with and prevent the recurrence of such abuses. That assessment, which, after all, was the basis for concluding that Iraq had no functioning legal system to which recourse could have been taken with regard to trying the former regime, may be validly applied to the question of situs. If a country lacks appropriate, viable institutions of justice, does it not also lack the environment for such institutions? Is the war-torn location not itself a threat to justice and should a trial therefore, whether by an existing court or a newly established special one, not be held in a safer environment, even if that entails moving it outside the national boundaries of a state? As for the IHCC, the kidnapping and murder of Sadoun Nasouaf alJanavi, counsel to Awad Hamed al-Bander, one of Saddam’s codefendants, and the subsequent threats and set-backs to both sides in the trial, including the resignation of the initial Presiding Judge Rizgar Muhammad Amin on January 17, 200630 and the dispute over his successor,31 shed a very unfavorable light on the functioning and legitimacy of the IHCC. As Raymond Brown rightfully pointed out: A court cannot claim legitimacy if it is attached to a regime which cannot guarantee the physical safety of trial participants. Protected participants must include defense lawyers representing despised or controversial defendants.32

Considering the application for asylum in Great Britain by Mr. Rahman, the trial judge who eventually sentenced Saddam Hussein, Awad Hamed al-Bander, and Barzan Ibrahim al-Tikriti to death, so soon after handing down a verdict in such a major case, the list of serious concerns has to be further amended.33 Fairness of the proceedings. Possibly the most serious threat to the (perceived) legitimacy of the Court is allegations of bias on the side of judges. To a certain degree the danger of such allegations was lurking in the dark, with the Presiding Judge Rahman having members of his family among the victims of one of the defendant’s alleged crimes, though not related to the case of the Dujail massacre, for which Saddam and his codefendants were on trial. Having a “[p]ersonal interest in the case”34 would constitute a violation of the requirement of impartiality, as most international tribunals acknowledge. Although hearing the Dujail case

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might pass the test of “personal interest,” cases involving Kurdish victims, especially from Halabja, certainly would not. Probably even more troublesome than the potential of a judge being biased is the perception by Iraqi citizens that this may be the case, especially among the Sunni population. If a disenfranchised segment of society is ever to embrace proceedings that are hoped to establish a historic record of the abuses and thus, eventually, contribute to the reconciliation and healing of society, it is crucial that the proceedings are not only fair, but also seen as fair. In the recent trial, Sunnis for the most part saw a trial presided over by a Kurdish judge (Rahman) in regard to a claim involving Shiite victims. Furthermore, in an effort to restore greater control over the proceedings (the very lack of which had been the strongest criticism raised against his predecessor), Judge Rahman once reminded the defense counsel they might be substituted with appointed defense counsels, should they decide to stage a walk-out again—a threat he eventually carried out. Though his response to this particular situation was perfectly in line with due process and international standards of fair trials35—and precedents may be found in both the ICTY, ICTR, and other international and domestic courts—the judge did not communicate his decision very well. The trial thus seemed in the eyes of human rights groups and significant parts of public opinion to resemble a trial in absentia, which would be inconsistent with due process rights; hence it is probably fair to say that a lot of damage to the trial had been done by appearance. Unless judges at such high profile trials undertake every effort to communicate their decisions, by releasing written opinions or at least addressing the contended issues orally at the beginning of each session, the perceived legitimacy of the trials and thus the potential contribution of the proceedings to reconciliation may remain seriously tainted. Conclusion on the question of legitimacy. In sum, what were initially the most controversial issues regarding the legitimacy of the IHCC, its establishment and the writing of the statute, seem to be less controversial now and have been pushed aside by concerns regarding the legitimacy of the proceedings and the particular environment and circumstances of the trial. This most likely reflects the realities of the trials (as a matter of fact, and despite all criticism, the trials did move forward and came to a conclusion), but it also points to the seriousness of the concerns that are now at the centre of criticism: despite the importance of the legal foundation and legitimacy of a court, to the degree that a trial is supposed to fulfill a societal function36 well beyond the mere punishment of

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perpetrators, the perceived legitimacy of the proceedings is, if possible, even more decisive. The Iraqi Constitution Another important aspect of acquiring the above-mentioned peace of mind is reconciliation between the formerly contending parties in the aftermath of regime change in order to be able to move on and provide an environment necessary for keeping the peace (or at least contributing to it),37 deals with the framing of the future by drafting and eventually ratifying a constitution as the probably most foundational component of state-building: state-building by law. Especially in a country as divided and shaken by sectarian violence as Iraq is today, mastering the task of drafting a constitution that manages to accommodate the innate societal tensions is of paramount importance. Thus, the following questions need to be considered: did the constitutional process adequately take the religious and sectarian cleavage lines into account? Does the final product (the constitution) adequately accommodate the various factions, sufficiently safeguard human rights, and thus provide the foundation for a viable, democratic state? Evaluating the efforts at accommodating those concentric forces at work will be at the center of the ensuing discussion, paying particular attention to the protection of human rights in the constitution. Drafting a constitution. To a certain degree, the same concerns that have been voiced with respect to the legitimacy of the establishment of the Iraqi Special Tribunal may be valid with respect to the drafted constitution. In order to facilitate the transition to self-government after the fall of Saddam Hussein, the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) was set up by the international community: this provisional government, including the Iraqi Governing Council (IGC), a subgroup of Iraqi members of the CPA, was inter alia in charge of drafting a constitution.38 Thus, the degree of genuine, equal, democratic participation and involvement of all Iraqis is at best questionable. At a later juncture, in preparation for the official transfer of sovereignty on June 30, 2004, the UN collaborated with the IGC and CPA to establish the Independent Electoral Commission of Iraq (IECI), which decided upon the guidelines for the forthcoming elections to the National Assembly. Because the Assembly would ultimately draft Iraq’s permanent constitution, which, if accepted in a referendum, would thus be ratified and permanently in place, the voting

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system used to elect the delegates to the Assembly and, in general, the broadest possible involvement of the various factions right from the start would be crucial with respect to the share each political group would garner eventually. Thus, being critical towards the origins of the constitutional process, as many Sunnis initially have been, seems to represent an understandable and valid concern. The main problem with the constitutional process from the point of view of the (minority) Sunni population was that even if they had received a level of political power commensurate with their share of the country’s population (which they did not, due to their initial rejection of the whole procedure, and the chaos and disorientation in their ranks in the days following the breakdown of the Iraqi regime),39 this might not have been enough to participate effectively in the constitutional negotiations.40 Purely proportional representation does not always guarantee the political power necessary to ensure that the rights of a minority population will be protected. Some even go as far as to suggest that in the specific context of post regime change Iraq, the “closed party system” employed in the elections contributed to sectarian violence and an unaccountable parliament.41 Under such a scheme, rather than choosing a particular candidate, voters merely chose a specific list of candidates backed and organized by a political party, often without even knowing the candidates of that list, because “many electoral lists weren’t made public until just before the voting.”42 Combined with strong intimidation from various religious and ethnic militias, and the use of religious symbols by political parties to influence voters, the electorate largely followed sectarian and ethnic lines in casting their votes, not a particular representative or political program which, in turn, led to a lack of a feeling of accountability among the various representatives and a sectarian parliament. What eventually safeguarded some sort of bargaining leverage despite the disappointing election results from a Sunni perspective were the ratification requirements as set out in the Transitional Administrative Law (TAL),43 an interim charter jointly established by the IGC and the CPA. Article 61 of the TAL imposed a strict timeline for the ratification, and declared that the ratification will only be successful and thus transform the draft constitution into a permanent one “if a majority of the voters in Iraq approve and if two-thirds of the voters in three or more [provinces] do not reject it.”44 The Sunnis eventually did not reject the constitution (or rather could not),45 but the real power was the threat of non-ratification. By credibly threatening to reject the constitutional process, with negative consequences for all the parties involved,46 the minority population was able to ensure their interests were taken into account, in any case to a

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greater extent than their mere share of the population would have indicated. The constitutional protection of human rights and the constitutional flaw. There are two basic approaches towards protecting human rights in a constitution. One is to list all possible human rights in the constitution itself; another is to refer to international human rights treaties and conventions which the respective country drafting a constitution is either already party to or, by listing them in the constitution, inherently declares to be bound by. Those options were presented to the Iraqi authorities in connection with the drafting efforts,47 and the first alternative was chosen. Thus, in Section Two of the 2005 Iraqi Constitution, rights and liberties are listed, starting with equality before the law (Article 14) and the civil and political rights to life, security, and liberty (Article 15), before economic, social, and cultural liberties, related to such issues as private property and education, are granted and, eventually, freedom of the press, expression, and assembly are safeguarded (Article 22 ff).48 Thus the Iraqi Constitution looks very similar to other well-established constitutions with a strong stance on the protection of human rights; however, following closer scrutiny, there is at least one major flaw. Despite the otherwise seemingly carefully drafted human rights protections listed in the Constitution, Article 21 comprises a serious flaw. While Article 15 celebrates that “[e]very individual has the right to enjoy life, security and liberty” and Article 19 proclaims the classical nullum crimen sine lege and the presumption of innocence rule, Article 21 restricts the right to political asylum in a way unworthy of a democratic state. After stating that “[n]o Iraqi shall be surrendered to foreign entities and authorities” (Article 21 (1)) and “[n]o political refugee shall be surrendered to a foreign entity or returned to the country from which he fled” (Article 21 (2)), Article 21 (3) declares: “Political asylum shall not be granted to a person accused of committing international or terrorist crimes or to any person who inflicted damage on Iraq.”49 While the last part of that sentence may be acceptable, because that person may at least be said to actually have done something wrong (“inflicted,” rather than “may have inflicted”), the first part is a far cry from the due process that one should expect of the rule of law in a country aspiring to become a democracy as well as in a democratic country. Denying the right to asylum even to persons who are merely accused (as opposed to proven guilty) is simply not acceptable, and does not go well with the right to life and security in Article 15 and the professed presumption of innocence in Article 19 (5).50 Restricting the right to asylum on the basis of mere

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accusations opens a Pandora’s box of potential abuse by people that might benefit from having others disposed of in this fashion. Being denied the right to asylum on those grounds would amount to punishment without a trial which in some cases, e.g. that of members of the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI)51 being sent back to the country they fled from, would be tantamount to the death penalty, which makes one wonder who the real architects behind this particular constitutional construction are. Recent reports, according to which the chief prosecutor of the Iraqi High Criminal Court plans to bring charges against senior members of this exiled Iranian opposition group,52—the same people who were issued status as protected persons under the Fourth Geneva Convention by the U.S. forces—further fuels suspicion that political meddling across borders may have been the main motivation behind this prosecutorial move, and serves as a reminder of how fragile the state of affairs in Iraq still is, and the limits of law. The lure of law. Overshadowed by the ongoing violence in Iraq, the trials of Saddam Hussein and his co-defendants before the Iraqi High Criminal Court, and widespread discussion as to the quality and legitimacy of the Court’s Statute and the trials themselves, a potentially even more serious challenge to the aim of calming and rebuilding Iraq has been largely overlooked: neighboring states’ (particularly Iran’s) interests and often meddling, overtly and covertly, in Iraq’s affairs, and the repercussions of such exertions of influence, have only recently come to the forefront of factors to be taken into account when contemplating and crafting potential solutions to the stalemate or stand-off, respectively, in the rebuilding efforts in Iraq, and the necessary conduct of international relations in that regard with the Middle Eastern region at large. The U.S., herself vulnerable to criticism due to her exposed role as an occupying power, has repeatedly criticized Iran for providing weapons and ammunition, and in general fueling the insurgency in Iraq,53 all the while in need of treading carefully due to the insecurity regarding what should be done about Iran’s suspected nuclear weapons program. Neighboring states, however, have exerted strong influence much earlier, if indeed such influence has ever been absent. In fact, some signs of it were discernible in the aforementioned either careless wording or forced ambivalence of certain parts of the text in the new Iraqi Constitution of 2005, and the apparently politically motivated threat of carrying out certain prosecutions; others may be found in the Council of the European Union’s reluctance, if not unwillingness, to comply with a judgment issued by the European Court of Justice, Court of First Instance,

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in a case involving the freezing of funds of the PMOI, the largest Iranian opposition group. The latter is addressed below. The Case before the European Court of Justice In a recent judgment54 issued by the European Court of Justice, Court of First Instance, the Court largely complied with the PMOI’s request seeking annulment of a European Council Decision, effectively freezing the applicant’s funds based on allegations of terrorist activities. In spite of the Court’s judgment, the Council of the European Union chose neither to comply with the decision nor to appeal it; instead, the Council, largely ignoring the judgment, issued a new so-called Common Position, bypassing the criticism voiced in the judgment in regard to the legality of keeping the applicant in the list of terrorist organizations that entitled the EU to the freezing of funds in the first place. Background to the case. By order of March 28, 2002, the U.K. Secretary of State for the Home Department (the Home Secretary) included the applicant in the list of organizations proscribed under the Terrorism Act of 2000. The applicant brought two parallel actions against that order, one an appeal before the Proscribed Organizations Appeal Commission (POAC), the other for judicial review before the High Court of Justice (England and Wales), Queen’s Bench Division (Administrative Court). On September 28, 2001, the United Nations Security Council adopted Resolution 1373 (2001) laying down strategies to combat terrorism, in particular the financing thereof, asking, inter alia, that all States must freeze without delay funds and other financial assets of persons and entities who commit, or attempt to commit, terrorist acts or participate in the commission thereof. In implementation of that Resolution, the European Council adopted Common Position 2001/930/CFSP on combating terrorism55 and Common Position 2001/931/CFSP on the application of specific measures to combat terrorism.56 According to Article 1 (1) of that Common Position, the latter was to be applied “to persons, groups and entities involved in terrorist acts and listed in the Annex,” a compilation that according to Article 1 (4) was to be drawn up on the basis of precise information or material in the relevant file which indicates that a decision has been taken by a competent authority in respect of the persons, groups and entities concerned…57

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and reviewed at regular intervals to insure there are grounds for keeping a person or entity in the list. The applicant’s name did not appear in that list. On May 2, 2002, however, the Council adopted, under Articles 15 EU and 34 EU, Common Position 2002/340/CFSP, updating Common Position 2001/931,58 now also including the applicant’s name in the list of proscribed organizations, a designation reiterated in subsequent Council Decisions and Common Positions.59 Parallel to these developments, the High Court of Justice (England and Wales) dismissed, by judgment of April 17, 2002, the action for judicial review brought by the applicant against the Home Secretary’s order, claiming in essence that the POAC was the appropriate forum for hearing the applicant’s arguments.60 The latter however plainly dismissed the appeal by judgment of November 15, 2002, arguing “that there was no requirement to hear the applicant’s views beforehand, such a hearing being impractical or undesirable in the context of legislation directed against terrorist organizations.”61 Faced with such a Kafkaesque denial of the right to be heard, the applicant turned to the European Court of Justice, Court of First Instance, basically seeking annulment of the Common Position decision, insofar as those acts concerned the applicant’s inclusion in the European Council’s list of terrorist organizations and the concomitant freezing of the applicant’s funds. The Court’s judgment. In its reasoning the Court of First Instance underlined that the right to a fair hearing, in principle, comprises two main parts. First, the party concerned must be informed of the evidence adduced against it to justify the proposed sanction […]. Second, he must be afforded the opportunity to effectively make known his view in that evidence.62

The Court stated that the applicant not only had been unable effectively to make known its views to the Council of the European Union but, in the absence of any statement, in the contested decision, of the actual and specific grounds justifying that decision [the inclusion in the said list], it has not been placed in a position to avail itself of its right of action before the Court.63

Furthermore, the Court pointed out that at the hearing, in response to questions put by the Court, the Council and the U.K. representatives “were not even able to give a coherent answer to the question of what was the

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national decision on the basis of which the contested [Council of the European Union] decision was adopted.”64 In conclusion the Court found that the contested decision did “not contain a sufficient statement of reasons and that it was adopted in the course of a procedure during which the applicant’s right to a fair hearing was not observed.”65 On those grounds, the Court of First Instance inter alia annulled, in so far as it concerned the applicant, the contested Council Decision on the basis of which it was included in the EU terrorism list and its funds frozen. The reaction of the Council of the European Union. In spite of the clear language applied in the Judgment, the Council did not proceed with removing the applicant from the said list, or even unfreezing its funds, but rather announced on January 30, 2007 that it had decided to provide the PMOI with a statement of reasons for keeping it on the EU’s list of persons, groups and entities whose assets are to be frozen based on their alleged involvement in terrorist acts, a course of action that suggests significant political undertones. As a matter of fact, European diplomats have previously acknowledged that the PMOI figured prominently as a bargaining chip, where Tehran insisted on them being listed as terrorists in exchange for benevolent behavior of various kinds, and also to the U.S. such furtive overtures are not foreign.66 Considering current U.S. contemplations in regard to labeling Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps a foreign terrorist organization,67 the incoherence of keeping the PMOI, a direct adversary of the former, on the same list, would seem apparent and yet, where politics are involved, reasoning sometimes collides with reason. The Judgment of the POAC Despite the judgment and the unsatisfying outcome of the proceedings before the European Court of Justice, Court of First Instance—after all, the Council of the European Union neither adhered to the Court’s decision nor appealed it, but rather chose to circumvent the judgment by issuing a new Common Position, in essence employing the same, disputed assessments—the PMOI sought to remove the very basis on which the apparently unjustified terror designation and concomitant freezing of funds was founded, and turned once again to the Proscribed Organizations Appeal Commission (POAC). This time the POAC, a superior court of record created by the Terrorism Act 2000 in order to deal with appeals in

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cases where the Home Secretary refuses to de-proscribe organizations believed to be involved in terrorism, accepted to hear the case, citing that previous procedural bars at this point had been removed. In particular, the POAC held that now that the High Court of Justice (England and Wales), which was in their opinion the primarily competent court in the matter at hand, had dismissed the action for judicial review, and the proceedings before the ECJ had been concluded without, despite the judgment, adequately remedying the abuse objected to by the applicant, access to the regular courts had been exhausted. In such a situation, the POAC would be the competent organ as the last instance to hear an appeal in the face of the continuous refusal by the Home Secretary to de-proscribe the appellant. After all, the Home Secretary’s initial terrorism designation formed the very basis for the decision of the Council of the European Union to include the appellant in the EU terrorism list. The appeal by numerous, cross-party parliamentarians—among them sixteen members of the House of Commons and thirteen members of the Upper House,68 including the former Home Secretary Lord Waddington and the former law lord Lord Slynn of Hadley—brought in the matter of the PMOI, maintained “that the continued proscription of the PMOI invokes the constraints imposed by virtue of section 12 of the Terrorism Act 2000 from their otherwise right to support the PMOI by all available democratic and lawful means.”69 The Appellants filed their appeal on October 30, 2006, maintaining, inter alia, that “the PMOI had not been ‘concerned in terrorism’ as defined in sections 1 and 3 of the [Terrorism] Act” and thus could not be lawfully regarded as an organization subject to such designation.70 The Home Secretary, on the other hand, asserted that the relevant statutory provisions merely required a “belief” on his part and that the question for the POAC thus was not whether the PMOI actually was concerned with terrorism, but whether the Secretary of State [Home Secretary] reasonably held the belief that it was, taking into account factors reasonably considered by him to be relevant and according to them such weight (if any) he considered to be appropriate.71

In support of his “belief” the Home Secretary specifically: prayed in aid reporting on occasions during 2002 by the PMOI of youths attacking government property in Iran. This, he asserted, could properly be characterized as ‘glorifying’ terrorism and thus amounted to the promotion and encouragement of terrorism by the PMOI [within

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paragraph 3 (5) (c), Terrorism Act 2000, as amended by section 5 (A) (a) (b) of the Terrorism Act 2006].72

In its judgment the POAC allowed the appeal against the refusal of the Home Secretary to de-proscribe the PMO. While in general acknowledging the right of the Home Secretary to take to a certain degree foreign policy considerations into account in his discretion as to whether an organization should be kept on the list of proscribed organizations, in the present case the Court held that the decision to proscribe the PMOI was flawed right from the beginning and thus must be set aside.73 In fact, the POAC went even further in its criticism: [H]aving carefully considered all the material before us, we have concluded that the decision at the First Stage [the initial proscription of the PMOI] is properly characterized as perverse. We recognize that a finding of perversity is uncommon. We believe, however, that this Commission is in the (perhaps unusual) position of having before it all of the material that is relevant to this decision.74

Thus, pursuant to its powers under sections 5 (4) and 5 (5) of the Terrorism Act 2000, the Court ordered that the Home Secretary lay before Parliament the draft of an Order under section 3 (3) (b) of that Act removing the PMOI from the list of proscribed organizations.75 The U.K. government’s final challenge of that decision on the grounds of an alleged error in law was dismissed by the Court of Appeal (England and Wales) and no further appeals are permissive in the present case.76 Still, the Home Secretary has yet to comply with the Court’s order and de-proscribe the exiled Iranian opposition group. What if Brussels were Baghdad? As this case demonstrates, sometimes, especially where politics encroaches upon the law, the judicial process may go awry and legal safeguards, by themselves, turn out to be insufficient. In such a situation, upholding the law may depend on factors outside the law, including a strong civil society, which in a recently “rebuilt” state has yet to evolve. Here, an organization that was wrongfully proscribed eventually was able to enlist broad support from numerous members of parliament across party lines, other individual sympathizers, and NGOs. And despite the seeming unwillingness on the part of both the U.K. government and the Council of the European Union, further remedies were eventually granted and the organization vindicated, in part due to the pressure and attention that prominent supporters were able to generate, and in part owing to the capacity of persons in power to understand and rectify

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the wrongfulness of an act, here the unfounded proscription of an organization. While the actual de-proscription still has to be carried out, without significant civil society support proper administration of justice presumably would not even have been achieved in the first place. However, after all, this is Europe, and thus the above narrative may merely serve as a warning example of what may go wrong, despite established legal institutions. But, what if not Brussels, the cradle of the European Union, and countries generally imbued with democracy for many decades now, but Baghdad, were the venue of the (legal) dispute? What if the question of a wrongful labeling as a terrorist organization would not merely have the freezing of funds, but severe punishment of innocent people as a consequence? Keeping such thoughts in the back of our heads serves as a wake-up call and admonishes us that legal institutions, irrespective of their careful founding and well-intentioned drafting, sometimes are insufficient instruments for safeguarding legal rights, where political will is lacking. Thus, ultimately only a country with a consolidated democracy may provide the necessary setting for guaranteeing that legal rights are afforded to its citizens. Such a level of democracy is achieved when under the given political and economic conditions a particular system of institutions becomes the only game in town, when no one can imagine acting outside the democratic institutions, when all the losers want to do is to try again within the same institutions under which they have just lost. Democracy is consolidated, when it becomes selfenforcing, that is, when all the relevant political forces find it best to continue to submit their interests and values to the uncertain interplay of the institutions.77

However, those are preconditions which a still fragile, newly rebuilt state is often unable to provide for a long time. Hence, it is important to bear in mind that, even though the main focus here is on legal institutions as the probably most foundational components of state-building, other key pillars, such as security, social and economic well-being, and democratic participation, are just as valuable for a viable rebuilding effort. Where they lag too far and for too long behind, the path towards a functioning Rechtsstaat, a state founded on the rule of law, may not be sustained, irrespective of the quality of legal institutions.

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Conclusion In sum, both the establishment of the Iraqi High Criminal Court, the trial of Saddam Hussein and his co-defendants, and the Iraqi Constitution of 2005 entail serious challenges to the legitimacy of the respective institutions and to the protection of certain human rights. Ultimately, it seems that the healing of those flaws, as well as of the war-torn Iraqi society in general, depends on the application of the rules laid down in the Statute of the IHCC and its governing laws, and the Iraqi Constitution. Failure to comply with the highest standards of due process and other fundamental human rights may have capital consequences, not only for the particular person accused. Furthermore, as recurring interferences with the legal process in Iraq and the threat of the hollowing out of constitutional provisions demonstrate, even such instruments of law are but a precondition for a successful transition in the aftermath of violent conflict. Contemplating the abovementioned case before the European Court of Justice serves as a further reminder of the at times insufficient authority of law, if left to its own resources, even within consolidated democracies, and points to the limits of justice. While establishing legal institutions is of vital importance in any attempt at state-rebuilding, their success depends on externalities that can only be outlined, not guaranteed by law per se, i.e. on truly independent and fair trials, a broadly accepted constitution, and a population imbued with a desire for peaceful participation—anything less is but a lure.

CHAPTER 4 SUCCESSFUL PROJECT STRATEGIES IN IRAQ’S KURDISTAN REGION: HOLISTIC APPROACH THE KEY TO EFFECTIVE INITIATIVES Reconstruction in Iraq is an endeavor fraught with tremendous challenges. The ongoing conflict has impeded basic service delivery and infrastructure development, and heightened ethnic and sectarian tensions continue to compromise prospects for future progress. However, by collaborating with community activists who are determined to secure a brighter future for their country, but often lack the resources necessary to do so, meaningful change can be realized. The Leadership Council for Human Rights, a 501 (c)(3) nonprofit organization based in Washington D.C. that focuses on the unique concerns of women and ethnic minorities, understands the immense potential that these grassroots leaders hold and has formed partnerships to carry out home-grown, community-level interventions that will have a far-reaching impact. In northern Iraq’s Kurdistan region, LCHR is working with local staff on the ground to build literacy; increase dialogue on women’s rights, human rights, and everyday challenges; preserve cultural heritage; and strengthen the cross-cultural understanding that is vital for the future of the country. Local women and men coordinate LCHR’s pioneering mobile library project, which makes thousands of books and human rights related publications available to underserved individuals in rural areas near Halabja—an area devastated by the 1988 chemical attacks carried out by Saddam Hussein against the Kurds. They also lead seminars on a variety of topics, from understanding basic rights to women’s health issues, in the villages served. The project was modeled after UNICEF’s mobile library in Bam, Iran, and a literacy project conducted in the past by an Iraq-based organization. As part of a related initiative in the region, LCHR has partnered with local women for the production of an Arab-language newsletter on women’s rights and democracy. In addition, LCHR is currently pursuing a project concept, “Kurdistan’s Treasures,” that would transcend geopolitics and create pride of place, as well as economic

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opportunity, by focusing on the archaeological wealth of the region. All three of these initiatives are bound together by a common emphasis on meeting community needs holistically. Iraq’s Kurdistan region was chosen as the initial site for LCHR’s Iraq projects based on several factors. First, the Kurds have historically been marginalized in Iraq, having suffered through extreme hardships during the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein. Thousands of Iraqi Kurds were killed or displaced in genocidal chemical attacks, many had relatives who were forcibly deported to Iran, and virtually all have suffered through severe limitations on basic rights and access to education and other needed services. Iraqi Kurds continue to struggle with the lingering effects of these brutal, targeted policies, and as members of an ethnic minority group in the Middle East, they still face ongoing discrimination on a regional level. Kurdish women, while they enjoy more rights on the whole than other Iraqi women, have been to an extent twice victimized—once for their gender and again for their ethnicity. Second, the region’s vibrant civil society sector is well established, thanks to more than a decade of democratic governance by the Kurdistan Regional Government, and could serve as a fertile framework for expansion. Third, LCHR Founder and President Kathryn Cameron Porter has long worked on issues of concern in the region and, through the relationships forged during her numerous fact-finding missions to Kurdistan, she established a strong network of local contacts active in civil society that could be readily drawn upon to assist in project development. Fourth, from a logistical standpoint of project implementation, security concerns in the region are not as pervasive as elsewhere in Iraq, as Kurdistan has to a large degree—with the exception of Kirkuk—been spared the sectarian violence that has plagued much of the rest of the country. Empowerment through Literacy With all of these factors in mind, LCHR partnered with local human rights activists to implement the mobile library project, the first of our onthe-ground initiatives in the region. In 2006, the initial stage of the project was set into motion, when mobile library van service began in three rural villages near Halabja. The villages initially served by the project are all agricultural communities with extremely limited access to educational resources of any kind. (Indeed, LCHR’s president saw that old scraps of newspaper were being used in these areas to teach basic reading skills during a 2006 fact-finding mission.) Initial site visits built trust and

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generated excitement among participants. Mobile library staff visited villagers’ homes, schools, and markets to introduce women and youth— both boys and girls—to the project and invite them to borrow books. The mobile library vehicle made weekly trips to each village served by the project, and in each village a monitor was assigned to register the names of borrowed books and handle the book return process. Library materials include a range of genres, from fiction and poetry to the sciences, as well as newspapers and magazines. Themes emphasized in these materials include traditional democratic values, women’s rights, and civil society development. At its inception the mobile library attracted 400 participants and this number has steadily grown. During the first months of the project’s operation, LCHR received an overwhelmingly positive response, and in early 2007 three new villages were added to the areas served, making the literature available to several hundred additional participants. These villages had been dominated by the Islamic fundamentalist group Ansar al-Islam until recently and consequently have seen serious abuses to women’s rights. Women were forbidden from participating in public life; according to our local staff, even smiling and laughing were banned. LCHR is now exploring expanding the project to other towns in Iraq, including Khanaqueen and Lurs—areas largely untouched by government support both under Saddam Hussein and since his ousting. By late 2006 library staff had begun conducting informal literacy clinics with interested individuals as an offshoot of the mobile library visits. The sessions are advertised by word of mouth and have been run both in donated classroom space (which doubled as a resource center) and in women’s homes. The generous donation by private individuals of rooms to serve as permanent resources centers has greatly complimented LCHR’s efforts. It also shows the commitment of the participating villages to work cooperatively to increase the scope and impact of the project. In addition to serving as clinic sites, the resource centers have become much-needed spaces for women and youth to talk about quality of life issues and their visions for the future. Another project component, training seminars on selected issues of concern, began early in 2007. Extensive interviews conducted with project participants enabled LCHR to identify discussion topics for the seminars. These topics include preventing violence against women, civil rights, cultural exchange and understanding, the environment and conservation, and women’s health topics, particularly breast cancer awareness. The first seminars addressed women’s health issues and were led by two health specialists. One of the most fundamental human rights violated by Saddam

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Hussein was the health of the Kurdish people. Those who survived the chemical attacks in Halabja and surrounding villages still struggle with the aftereffects—both physical and mental health problems. Approximately 30 to 40 women attended each of the two initial seminars. Feedback from participants was positive and project staff reported that the material covered was very useful because of the lack of health care in rural areas; it was the first time such a workshop had been offered in their villages. LCHR’s mobile library project has already had a major impact. The lending services and seminars have fostered increased literacy skills, youth participation, and a stronger sense of community in the areas served. The project has successfully promoted dialogue between staff and participants on social and family issues, with participants indicating that the borrowed literature has helped them to reflect and think critically about these matters. The project’s provision of educational services to underserved segments of the population helps fill a pressing need. Substandard access to education throughout the country not only compromises employment prospects, it also severely undermines the development of a new generation of leaders, posing a grave threat to Iraq’s future. Troublingly, many Iraqis have not attained even the most basic levels of education. Some 26 percent of the populace is illiterate, according to the latest figures available from the CIA World Factbook.1 When broken down by gender, the statistics are even more alarming: while roughly 84 percent of Iraqi males can read and write, only 64 percent of the country’s females can do the same. UNICEF’s Executive Director, Ann Veneman, said at a 2006 speech commemorating International Women’s Day: Education must be a critical area of focus. When women are educated, their own health improves, and the survival of their children improves. Literacy rates increase, and families are lifted out of hunger and poverty.2

Indeed, literate women are able to educate themselves about their rights, and that knowledge translates into power. Literate women are also more independent than their illiterate counterparts. They do not have to rely on another’s interpretation of their rights; rather, they can learn what protections and freedoms to which they are entitled for themselves. They, in turn, can help other women, and their children, to develop literacy skills and expand the project’s circle of influence. By educating their daughters and sons about traditional democratic values—human rights for all, civic rights and responsibilities, and that regardless of gender they can

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accomplish their greatest aspirations, whatever they may be—women pave the way for future generations that honor and practice these ideals. In a region in which women’s worth still needs to be reinforced, literacy and human rights awareness are important steps toward greater gender equality. In addition to the project’s educational component, the fact that the training seminars have become safe spaces for dialogue on women’s needs and challenges is key, as women in the region, like so many of their counterparts throughout the world, face tremendous obstacles to advancement. The ongoing conflict has raised the threat of abduction, rape, and assault. Additionally, gender based violence—including honor killings and female genital mutilation—and related problems such as self immolation continue to plague the villages served by the project. We believe that our seminars will go a long way towards confronting and combating these practices. The results of a recent survey completed by LCHR’s local partners in Kurdistan demonstrate the urgent need for these types of interventions. The survey indicated that nearly 70 percent of women who were subjected to female genital mutilation (FGM) lived in rural areas, like the ones served by the project. A strong correlation was found between level of education and FGM—only seven percent of women interviewed who had attended university had undergone the practice. 90 percent of surveyed women described their experiences following FGM as bad or very bad, and many are still experiencing psychological trauma as a result. Indeed, FGM is a dangerous practice known to be physically and psychologically scarring. In much of the world, FGM is performed by midwives more often than doctors. Instruments are rarely sterilized and can be crude, sometimes consisting of nothing more than broken glass. Anesthesia is rarely administered, and victims can be as young as four. Complications are common, and death by bleeding has been known to occur.3 Long-term consequences are also a major concern. Lasting emotional trauma is almost always an aftereffect, and studies have directly linked FGM to both higher infant mortality rates and greater incidences of complications during childbirth.4 Roughly 135 million women world-wide have already been affected by this practice and an additional two million girls are potential victims each year.5 Honor killings are also a major problem in the region. In these crimes, women and girls are murdered by those close to them for the perceived shame that that they have brought to their family by engaging in certain acts. Victims of sexual assault, individuals who commit adultery or seek a divorce,6 and women who pursue a relationship outside of their religion or

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ethnicity are all at risk of being targeted. Indeed, in April 2007 in the village of Bashiqa, a 17-year-old Kurdish girl of the Yazidi faith was publicly stoned to death by her own relatives for pursuing a relationship with a Sunni Muslim.7 A little over a month later, a 19-year-old Kurdish mother was tortured and then shot dead by her husband and his family after an unknown number was discovered on her cell phone.8 While honor killings had occurred less in Kurdistan, incidents are now increasing, as demonstrated by these recent attacks. Self immolation—suicide in which individuals set themselves afire often in a desperate effort to escape torturous personal circumstances— also occurs with far too great a frequency in the region. The prevalence of this particular type of suicide in Kurdistan has been linked to the availability of cooking fuel over other potential tools, as well as the symbolism associated with this method. During a 2006 fact-finding mission to Kurdistan, Ms. Porter learned that 400 cases of self immolation were recorded between January and May of 2006, and that some of these cases were likely honor killings made to look like suicides. For instance, a study conducted by the Kurdistan Women’s Union and presented to Ms. Porter during her trip indicated that the number of immolation cases in the region had risen significantly between 2003 and 2005, with young women accounting for the overwhelming majority of the incidents. However, most of these cases were described as accidents, as the authors of the study indicated that underreporting is rampant because of the stigma associated with suicide. In general, the accuracy of statistics on gender-based violence is difficult to validate, as the sensitivity of the subject matter deters full disclosure. Still, by opening up forums for discussing these sensitive issues we can further contest these crippling stigmas, as well as the damaging beliefs that underlie the perpetration of gender-based violence. Kurdish women have already made significant headway in these efforts and LCHR’s projects can build upon their good work. Through their efforts, they have called attention to manifestations of bigotry that have, for so long, gone unaddressed. Women’s organizations in the region have developed ground-breaking public education campaigns against FGM and advocated for legislation aimed at combating the practice. Honor killings have also been a major point of emphasis for Kurdish women right’s groups, and in 2002, thanks to their sustained pressure, the Kurdistan Regional Government created new legislation that defined the act as homicide and stipulated that perpetrators be treated as any other murderer. In addition, there are a greater number of services available to at-risk women in the

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area. There are two women’s shelters for victims of domestic violence in Suleimaniyah, and one each in Erbil and Duhok. Still, many Kurdish women are convinced that an attack on their lives is imminent. A local physician has informed LCHR that many of the women at the shelters are plagued by depression and hopelessness and live in a constant state of fear, unable to envision a day when they will lead a normal existence. Though LCHR’s initiatives are at a grassroots level, the space that they give local women is a vital one. Through the opportunities provided by our mobile library services, participants are able to air their concerns and fears, discuss personal circumstances, and verbalize their hopes and dreams. Through peer-to-peer expression of these issues in a safe environment, we are hopeful that LCHR’s project can help to ease these tensions. Furthermore, the awareness and self-confidence engendered by the forums may spur some participants on to further advocacy. Arab-language Women’s Publications In addition to our literacy project, LCHR has also begun to provide support to local staff for the production of a publication on women’s rights and democracy. After working with the project coordinator, a prominent women’s rights activist in Kurdistan, to develop the concept, work began in 2007. In addition to its emphasis on rights and the empowerment and advancement of women, the magazine is intended to foster cross-cultural dialogue. Kurdish women are our local staff, but the publication is written in Arabic and distributed throughout the country—including Suleimaniyah, Erbil, Duhok, Kirkuk, Baghdad, Alrumadi, Najaf, and Basra—to foster unity between Iraqi women of all backgrounds. As such, the publication will address women’s issues in central and southern Iraq; create dialogue between Kurdish and Arabic women that will highlight the work of women activists to all Iraqis in the fields of politics, economics, and social services; and cultivate homegrown women leaders across the country. The issues will be approximately 150 pages in length, with an anticipated circulation of 1,000 copies per issue. Circulation will be tracked and any feedback from readers received will be collected as indication of success in disseminating information on democracy and women’s rights. As civil strife continues to ravage the country, the necessity of bringing together and promoting dialogue and cross-cultural understanding

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among all Iraqis has become increasingly apparent. LCHR believes that the publication can help to address these crucial issues. Iraqi Kurdistan’s Treasures Home to what some say is the world’s oldest continuously inhabited city (Erbil), Kurdistan is rich in treasures of antiquity deserving of international recognition and protection. The region is the birthplace of agriculture, and is home to numerous prehistoric cave paintings as well as ancient sacred sites. Kurdistan’s archaeological treasures transcend geopolitics, and are invaluable to the cultural legacy of all humankind. The region’s some 3,500 archaeological sites are tremendous sources of historical knowledge, and, if recognized, archaeologically authenticated, and protected, these sites can build political cohesion and create pride of place and international prestige for the region and the country at large. Troublingly, many of these sites are littered with landmines and unexploded ordinance—the remnants of years of conflict. While Kurdistan has made progress in clearing these areas with the help of various international organizations, additional de-mining funding is sorely needed. LCHR is confident that increased exposure of these sites will lead to expanded assistance for this effort. In light of these circumstances, LCHR is working to create strong partnerships with international institutions to safeguard these archaeological treasures. Iraqi Kurdistan has the potential to be an extremely important center for the study of the history of humankind; if Kurdistan’s sites are designated as UNESCO World Heritage Sites, archeologists will give the region its due recognition and tourism and accompanying microenterprise initiatives will flourish. These ventures would create new jobs for local citizens and greatly benefit the Iraqi economy. The U.S. government has already targeted northern Iraq as a prime platform for foreign investment in its business gateways project, and our Kurdistan’s Treasures initiative could complement this new effort. Replicability and Sustainability of LCHR’s Iraq Initiatives Through the promotion of locally-run initiatives that can be implemented with modest amounts of capital, yet have a far-reaching impact, our projects in northern Iraq can serve as replicable models for other regions of the country. In spite of the security concerns, both

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development practitioners and local citizens have bravely persevered in their efforts to improve the lives of all Iraqis, and by building partnerships that strengthen local capacity and advance the established efforts of community leaders, this goal can be realized. Some potential donors are reluctant to fund LCHR’s projects due the inherent risk of working in Iraq. Still, we are firmly committed to continuing our work on the ground in Iraq with real people, especially women, who care not about the continuity of governments, but about something even more fundamental: the continuity of generations. The education and empowerment of women and other marginalized Iraqis will ensure a brighter future for the country.

CHAPTER 5 REBUILDING THE IRAQI OIL INDUSTRY: LEGAL AND CONSTITUTIONAL STRATEGIES FOR SUSTAINABLE, POST-SADDAM DEVELOPMENT Introduction The Iraqi people have lived under the shadow of totalitarianism and corruption during the three decades of Baath party rule. Saddam Hussein obscenely squandered Iraq’s natural and human resources on fruitless wars, while enriching his inner circle and close-knit members of his tribal group. Yet, few would question that oil is Iraq’s lifeblood. Iraq sits atop the world’s third largest proven oil reserves (115 billion barrels),1 but only institutional and constitutional safeguards, including financial accountability and the equitable apportioning of its oil revenues, will guarantee Iraq’s economic health. Without a viable legal framework, Iraq will find it difficult to attract the investment capital necessary for sustainable nationwide development and petroleum production. To consider investment of large sums of money into Iraq, international oil companies (IOCs) require legal/constitutional protection for foreign direct investment (FDI), a stable security situation, and a functioning government. The lack of a legal framework generally leads to “resource curse,” a trait all too common among resource-rich developing nations.2 Resource curse may be corrected by sound political and cultural infrastructures wedded to responsible policies, which cannot simply be willed into place. The principle of resource curse presumes that access to vast revenues, independent of taxation,3 provides perverse incentives for a “bad” leader to fulfill his innermost authoritarian fantasies without fear of significant checks and balances.4 A lack of fiscal transparency encourages corrupt officials to siphon funds from the government treasury. The refusal to equitably distribute petroleum revenues may precipitate violence, because different factions will struggle for ground-level control of the resources.5 It is possible that Iraq has experienced resource curse, not only in the unbridled passions of Saddam Hussein, but in the actions of regional

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warlords since Hussein’s fall from grace. Tribal and sectarian violence may already be reaching the boiling point, since ethnic Arabs, Turkmen, and Kurds are currently facing off over the fate of the oil-rich region of Northern Iraq known as Kirkuk. This research presumes that Iraq’s successful attainment of postSaddam recovery of its resources is significant for global stability, and that regional and ethnic interdependence will be the lodestar of the new state. This paper also focuses on strategies that all interested Iraqi factions— shareholders—may implement to create a viable petroleum sector, and to construct a constitutional and legal infrastructure as an integral part of a coherent national petroleum policy. Overview of Iraqi Oil Policy Iraqi oil reserves and production history. Iraq’s 115 billion barrels (bbl)6 of proven reserves amount to eleven percent of the globe’s proven total.7 Only 17 of Iraq’s 74 oil fields have been exploited, most significantly the Southern Rumayla field and Kirkuk in the North.8 Since little oil or gas exploration and development have taken place for years, Iraq may have more reserves than previously estimated.9 Some of the more prominent oil analysts believe that deep oil-bearing formations located in the vast untouched Western Desert region could yield up to a possible 100 bbl.10 A somewhat exuberant proclamation by the former Iraqi Oil Minister, Thamir Ghadban, flatly declared that Iraq had “unconfirmed or potential reserves of up to 214 bbl.”11 Iraq reached its peak production shortly before the 1990 Kuwait invasion, with 3.5 million of barrels per day (mbd). After the invasion of Kuwait and the first Gulf War, production was significantly curtailed by international boycott, and dropped precipitously to about 500,000 barrels per day (b/d). The UN Oil for Food Program (UN Resolution 986), implemented in December 1996, allowed petroleum exports to start again.12 Between 1991 and 2001, Iraq averaged approximately 2.5 mbd of oil production.13 During the start of the U.S.-led 2003 war, oil production ceased, but resumed after the official fall of the Baath regime. In 2004, production ranged from 1.9 mbd to 2.4 mbd; exports peaked at 1.6 mbd, but averaged considerably less as insurgents regularly attacked or sabotaged export terminals and pipelines.14 If its development strategies were enhanced, Iraq could easily support expanded production, estimated to be up to three times its highest peak

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production, at around eleven mbd.15 Amazingly, Iraq could rival Saudi Arabia’s mammoth production with expanded use of current geophysics and investment in field development and infrastructure. The cost of extracting Iraq’s oil is among the world’s lowest:16 when taken together, all these elements show that Iraq offers the potential for substantial production expansion in a few, high producing fields. At the time of writing (2007), Iraq has 1,600 wells with the potential to produce up to 3 mbd.17 The U.S. Department of Energy’s Energy Information Administration (EIA) estimates that ninety percent of the country remains unexplored due to the years of sanctions and unremitting war.18 The exploration that Iraq has carried out was conducted using antiquated, two-dimensional seismic equipment, instead of the latest threedimensional models. The unexplored regions of Iraq are estimated to potentially yield up to 100 billion additional barrels of oil. Iraq’s easily produced petroleum reserves allow it to substantially increase its oil production through contemporary oil management techniques, the drilling of new wells, and infrastructure rehabilitation. Iraq’s current oil production. With Saddam’s fall in 2003, oil production resumed and increased after a virtual standstill. However, damage to the wells, lack of materials, and security concerns impeded the ability to get production quickly online. In the oil fields of Kirkuk, refinery constraints and attacks on transportation caused local refineries to strip extracted oil of its gasoline and re-inject the leftover into the wells. This has led to some amount of uncertainty in determining the total amount of production.19 Iraq’s former oil minister, Ibrahim Bahr al-Uloum, dramatically set corruption reduction as one of the new goals of the Oil Ministry during his term,20 along with increased availability of fuel, the reduction of insurgent attacks on the oil infrastructure, and the reestablishment and strengthening the Iraqi National Oil Company.21 As of yet, there have been notable difficulties in reaching these goals. As of May 2006, Iraqi oil production was averaging approximately 1.9 mbd, which is substantially below its current potential of 3 mbd; the EIA estimates, however, that the total gross production was about 2.1 mbd.23 Iraqi production remains relatively low due to the lack of sophisticated equipment (3D Seismic, directional or deep drilling, gas injection), insufficient spare parts, and inadequate foreign investment.24 Because Saddam-Era Iraq utilized inferior production techniques such as over-pumping, the oil infrastructure remains in great disrepair. Simply by

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instituting modern oil field management techniques and developing new fields, Iraq has the possibility of significantly increasing its production yield by millions of barrels.

Figure 5.122 Iraq’s Oil Production and Consumption

Under normal petroleum industry practices, reserve oil may take between five to ten years to reach production. Investment in the Iraqi oil sector must begin as rapidly as possible, so that adequate revenue inflows can be generated by the early 2010s. It is estimated that an investment of five to six billion USD will be needed to bring the upstream oil sector (exploration and production) and downstream (refining, export, and distribution) on par with the pre-invasion production capacity.25 Further investment of approximately $35 to 40 billion USD will be needed to boost production up to five to six mbd. It is essential that the new investment monies be directed to expanding capacity, and not merely to damage control and security.26 Every dollar spent on oil field security is a sunk cost that diverts crucial money away from capacity development.27 Challenges to capacity expansion of Iraqi fields. Iraqi fields are greatly impaired due to underinvestment, previous sanctions (prohibitions for importation of new technology), war damage, sabotage, and inferior extraction techniques. Iraqi fields may have already suffered irreparable damage.28 During the Second Gulf War, the oil fields were little affected; however, after the fall of the regime, there was widespread looting that caused significant damage. According to the EIA, the chaos that ensued

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may have accounted for up to 80 percent of the total oil infrastructure damage.29 One of the major problems with current efforts to increase production capacity is Iraq’s previous use of the highly destructive “water cut” process to increase production.30 A Saybolt International report in 2000 on the state of Iraqi fields reported that the Iraqi Northern Oil Company (INOC) and the Southern Oil Company (SOC) increased their production rates through highly destructive processes, such as injection of refined oil products into crude reservoirs.31 Further damage to Iraqi fields comes from constant attacks of insurgent sabotage32 (sometimes reaching almost five or six times a day).33 Iraq is averaging one to two significant attacks per week against its oil infrastructure.34 Even though the U.S. and Iraqi governments have made protecting the oil infrastructure35 a top priority, they have not successfully prevented the insurgents’ efforts to cut off the oil tap.36 In the face of this chaos, former Iraqi Oil Minister, Issam alChalabi, insisted that there should not be an effort to meet or match Iraq’s prewar oil production level of 2.8 mbd. Instead, Chalabi held that Iraq should “cap oil production at a maximum two mbd, export no more than 1.5 mbd, and start immediately on subsurface work to assess and repair damaged reservoirs in its oil fields.”37 Chalabi contended that Hussein reached such high production levels due to a lack of concern about the irreparable damage to Iraq’s fields, coupled with an eye for short-term gain. Chalabi argued that Iraq should focus on renovating the fields and installing modern oil field management techniques.38 According to many Iraqi oil officials, Kirkuk and the other reservoirs suffered damage as the result of “13 years of sanctions, mismanagement, overproduction, and last, but not least, reinjection of various products, including hydrocarbon wastes.”39 Chalabi estimates that out of Kirkuk’s proven remaining 8.7 billion barrels, 1.48 billion is attributable to reinjected crude oil from as early as 1991.40 Legal and Constitutional Issues Saddam managed Iraq’s oil fields based on a centralized model that did not take into account the actual geographic locations of the oil and gas fields vis-à-vis established administrative borders. However, the new constitution incorporates a significantly decentralized, federalist model that considers the locations of the fields and the respective regions vested with administrative control. With its birth amid chaos and the self-interested scrambling for levers

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of political power, the 2005 Iraqi Constitution became a magnet for adverse criticism, much of it related to the document’s ambiguity and the emphasis on decentralization. Although an almost legendary vagueness may have expedited its passage, the Constitution created seemingly insolvable problems. Many of the IOCs are hesitant to invest in the country, forming a paradoxical situation whereby Iraq is sitting on massive amounts of oil, and yet lacks access to modern oil field techniques. The new constitution is an abrupt departure from previous strong central management girded by weak regional subsidiaries to a heavily decentralized method, in which a weak central authority is tolerated by strong regional offices. The strength of the central authorities is expected to diminish further in the future, as output from current fields depletes and new exploration and development is undertaken in new fields.41 Operating in an uncertain legal environment. Prior to Saddam’s fall, Iraq had concluded several multi-billion dollar petroleum contracts with foreign oil companies, the majority from China, France and Russia:42 a Deutsche Bank estimate states that Iraq signed up to $38 billion in contracts to develop new fields. This would potentially raise production capacity to 4.7 mbd, if all the contracts proceed normally.43 With the toppling of the regime and the election of a new Iraqi government, all of the previously signed contracts are stranded in legal limbo, thus increasing the legal uncertainty that all IOCs wish to avoid. Iraq still owes Russia, with which it has had a historically strong relationship, billions of dollars for previous arms deliveries. In 2001, Russia signed a 23-year $3.7 billion contract for rehabilitation of Iraq’s aging fields, with a specific focus on the West Qurna field.44 Shortly before the coalition-led invasion, the Iraqi Oil Ministry made an announcement in December 2002 that it was negating the contract signed with the Lukoil consortium on West Qurna, due to the company’s failure to abide by its contract stipulations.45 The Iraqis argued that Lukoil had failed to invest the contractually-stipulated $200 million over three years. To resurrect the contract, Lukoil began training Iraqi oil personnel in its facilities in Western Siberia.46 In February 2006, Lukoil announced that it wished to begin negotiations with the new Iraqi government and work on the West Qurna restoration.47 France negotiated an even larger contract through its state owned TotalFinaElf Company to explore the Majnoon field, estimated to contain between twenty to thirty billion barrels of reserves. Prior to the French-Iraqi Agreement, China National Petroleum Company (CNPC) had a substantial reconstruction contract for a portion of the Rumayla field, which suffered substantial damage during the 1991

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Gulf War.48 The viability of the Saddam-era contracts is dubious because the Iraqi Oil Ministry announced in June 2006 that it would renegotiate existing oil development contracts with France’s Total, as well as the Russian and Chinese firms.49 These renegotiations will of course have a direct bearing on any future development undertaken by the large IOCs, in order to strengthen legal guarantees. The issue of regional licenses: Constitutional clarity. A vital problem facing Iraq is whether licenses granted by the regional authorities are valid, and whether Baghdad will recognize them. The Constitution grants licensing rights to Baghdad and the regional governments. Ratified on October 15, 2005, the Iraqi National Constitution is quite an ambitious document, which fails to ban regional governments from issuing drilling licenses in their own right. Nature, of course, abhors a vacuum, and the Sunni and Shiite Arabs stand poised to oppose any move towards regional autonomy in granting oil licenses. The Iraqi people accepted the Constitution in a popular referendum on October 25, 2005. Section 2, Article 112 of the Iraqi National Constitution declares: The federal government, and the governments of the producing regions, and provinces together will draw up the necessary strategic policies to develop oil and gas wealth to bring the greatest benefit for the Iraqi people, relying on the most modern techniques of market principles and encouraging investment.

Article 112/2 suggests that certain sub-sectors will be opened to FDI, but it fails to set specific jurisdictional parameters. Because Article 115 of the Iraqi constitution, which enumerates the separation of powers, does not specify otherwise, observers construe it to mean that new fields, or fields not properly exploited, are under the regional authority’s mandate.50 Conflict reigns, not only as to the separation of powers, but also as to which entity has the legal authority to negotiate petroleum contracts. In a hurry to sign new contracts, Kurdish leaders cite Article 115 as authority to negotiate new contracts. In June 2004, the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG) signed an exploration and development deal with the Norwegian oil and gas company DNO, and entered into exploration deals with Canada’s Heritage Oil and Britain’s Sterling Energy.51

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Differences in Constitutional Construction between the Federal and Regional Government Former Iraqi oil minister Thamir al-Ghadban contended that the Constitution vested the central government in Baghdad with ultimate power to approve oil contracts with foreign corporations when he said any future oil research or development project on oil fields in Iraq that would be undertaken in cooperation with foreign companies must be approved by the future [Iraqi parliament’s] Council of Representatives….”52

The newly appointed oil minister, Hussein al-Shahristani, reaffirmed the government’s position when he argued that “all oil production, exports or exploration should be handled by the [Baghdad] Ministry of Oil.”53 Reading the same document, Ashti Hawrami, the KRG’s Minister of Natural Resources, contended that Section 1, Article 112 vests the KRG with authority to collaboratively administer undiscovered wells:54 The federal government in cooperation with the producing regions and governorates shall administer the extracted (produced) oil and gas from existing oil and gas fields provided that the proceeds (revenues) are evenly distributed in accordance with the demographic distribution around the whole country, and a specific share of the proceeds for a specific period of time shall be allotted to the regions which are unjustly deprived by the previous regime, and were affected by it, to secure a balanced development of the different areas of the country and this shall be regulated by law.55 (emphasis mine)

Ambiguity abounds as to whether the term “existing oil and gas fields” refers to all discovered fields, to those in the process of current extraction (equaling about 78 of Iraq’s known reserves), or to fully developed fields (approximately 36 of the total).56 The Kurdish Natural Resources Minister, Dr. Ashti A. Hawrami, initially interpreted “existing fields” to mean those currently producing oil.57 He later broadened that definition by proclaiming that the regions and governorates should not only control the revenue from undeveloped fields, but have veto power over the limited administrative role enumerated for the federal government.58 To him, this seemingly innocuous verbiage limits the federal authorities to the narrow administrative role necessary to exporting and marketing extracted oil and gas from existing producing fields. Because the KRG views even this limited administrative role as conditional upon a comprehensive agreement between the regions as to the gas proceeds, it would likely

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earmark additional shares to regions uniquely deprived under the Saddam era, particularly the Kurdish and Shiite areas. KRG officials insist that the regional governments also be vested with added shares, as Saddam’s regime systematically deprived them of their rightful shares. The KRG also contends that, while the right of the central government to handle extracted oil and gas is contingent upon an equitable revenue distribution, the daily management of the fields should be conducted locally. Conflict of laws. Ironically, the Iraqi Constitution does contain a conflict of laws provision, as reflected by Article 115 which declares: all that is not written in the exclusive powers of the federal authorities is in the authority of the regions. In other powers priority will be given to the region’s law in case of dispute.

The KRG therefore views Article 115 as a trump card that vests it with authority to have its own petroleum law on the grounds that a comprehensive petroleum law does not exist.59 Enumerated powers. Because the constitution is silent about many aspects of the oil and gas industry, the KRG views most rights as vested in the regional authority. This is consistent with Article 115, which declares that non-enumerated functions are implicitly left to regional governance. Yet there are many logical gaps in the argument, since Article 115 does not make provision for dealing with the discovery of new fields, or any unexplored areas. Furthermore, it does not specify if control of downstream activities is vested in federal or regional authorities when oil comes from new or undeveloped fields, and it fails to mention downstream activities, such as refining, storage facilities, pipeline, export terminals, tankers, etc. The conflict over Kirkuk. Kirkuk is located in Northern Iraq, about 250 kilometers north of Baghdad, near the foot of the Zagros Mountains. With approximately ten billion barrels of proven reserves and exports totaling about half of Iraq’s oil exports, Kirkuk is a flashpoint in Iraq’s oil politics: whoever controls Kirkuk effectively controls Iraq’s oil and wealth.60A referendum was to be held by December 31, 2007, but amid persistent allegations of potential voting irregularities and flare-ups of violence, it was delayed until June 2008.61 The issue is particularly inflammatory because of the uncertain status of the Kurds whom Saddam displaced under his Arabization resettlement policy.

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Kirkuk is a battleground, since Kurdish residents are re-entering at a rate that will soon give it a “democratic” advantage over competing ethnic groups, namely Turkomen and Arabs. The Sunni Arabs are supported by Baghdad; Turkey not only favors its ethnic brethren, the Turkomen, but intends to block the Kurds from regional power. The Kurdish North favors the local Kurds, and wishes to bring the Kirkuk governorate, with its 8.7 billion barrels of proven remaining reserves, securely into the KRG fold.62 If the referendum finally does take place, Kirkuk residents will decide if the province will be incorporated into the Kurdish region. There are reports of ethnic Arabs being driven out of the city, and of reprisals and counter-reprisals.63 The Kurds see their return as an important response to redress the wrongs committed under Saddam’s Arabization program; they also feel that the oil revenue gained from the city will help solidify their position as an autonomous region. KRG’s annual budget is derived from its share of the overall Iraqi oil export, essentially seventeen percent of the total.64 The Kurds fear—although not without reason—economic starvation if the Arabs gain a numerical edge. This embattled feeling steels the KRG determination to exercise regional authority in granting oil contracts. State of the Current Iraqi Draft Petroleum Law At the time of writing, the Iraqi Cabinet created65 a draft petroleum law (not yet entered into law) which would create the framework for nationwide distribution of the country’s immense oil wealth and structure foreign investment in the country.66 This agreement, which included all major ethnic and sectarian power blocs, revealed an unprecedented level of cooperation, particularly with regard to governance of Iraq’s oil reserves. The law allows a degree of centralization, because the oil revenue will go to Baghdad, which will then distribute the wealth to all eighteen provinces based on population demographics. This particular factor could act as a salve for Sunni worries, who fear that they will be left out of any oil plan by the politically powerful and oil-rich Shiites and Kurds. Features of the draft code. The draft law vests regions with negotiating power to conclude exploration and development agreements with IOCs subject by the review and approval by the central authorities.67 A controversial aspect of the code is that it will allow regions to enter into production-sharing agreements (PSA) with IOCS, a feature that some

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Iraqis feel conceals a tacit bid by foreign IOCs to gain control over the country’s petroleum resources.68 To mitigate this fear, Iraqi officials have insisted that all contracts be subjected to a transparent bidding process. Many foreign delegates contend that changes in bidding protocols will do little to stem the corruption, which they believe is rife in the upper echelons of government, or diminish the fear among non-Americans that U.S. companies will be favored. Oil industry experts respond that there is little to fear, since there IOCs have little incentive to invest in Iraq; the law not only fails to adequately protect investors, but remains vague and uncertain.69 Parliament must approve the draft law before it takes effect, if at all; bitter sectarian feuds that impeded its drafting may also impede its enactment.70 Potential problems. Even though the draft law allows revenue to be divided according to population demographics and has done much to placate Sunni worries, accurate population figures are elusive as Iraqi census counts have nearly always been politically driven.71 The draft law attempts a delicate balancing act between the powers of the regions, and those of the Central authorities.72 The law could placate Sunnis if it allows more petroleum exploration on their oil parched territory.73 The Iraqi government recently paid upwards of tens of millions of dollars to IOCs for review of old seismic data across the country, and to retrain Iraqi petroleum personnel.74 The issue of revenue splitting was agreed upon fairly early in the draft negotiations: the main point of contention with regard to oil contracts being whether the authority to sign was vested in the regions or the central authorities. The Kurds forcefully argued for expansive regional powers, while Sunni Arabs sought a more centralized system. The draft law sought to balance the interests of these two often adversarial groups with compromises that declared that regions may enter into contracts75 with IOCs, subject to overview of a powerful new committee termed the “Federal Oil and Gas Council”;76 that the Iraqi National Oil Company (INOC) will be resurrected with a separate legal status from the Oil Ministry, and will be run according to a profit model;77 and that any region that produces more than 150,000 barrels a day can incorporate its own regional operating company. Harsh criticism78 has been leveled at the proposed draft law since there is no mechanism for dispute resolution between the regions and the federal government. Some allegedly aggrieved parties contend that the compromise was pushed through with significant political pressure from Washington.79 Parliament may enact the draft laws, yet only time will tell if it will bring lasting stability.

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Conclusions and Recommendations To stabilize its petroleum sector, Iraq must speedily achieve critical short-term objectives. To encourage investment, the primary objective must be toward production restoration from the major fields and reducing ethnic tensions. It is essential that before significant expansion of production is attempted, petroleum specialists carefully study the historic production levels of reservoirs to analyze the extent of damage, if any, and prescribe best production practices that will contribute to the long-term petroleum recovery. The noted author on Iraq and energetic proponent of Kurdish autonomy, Peter Galbraith,80 proposed that the U.S. authorities should accept the inevitability of the dissolution of Iraq into three distinct countries (relating back to the old Ottoman administrative viliyats (provinces) based on ethno-sectarian majorities. This should be avoided at all costs. The reality is that many of Iraq’s regions are mixed, and internal conflict can, as with anywhere, wreak epic devastation. Once unleashed, highly impassioned instability may race throughout the region and lead to ethnic cleansing as rival groups battle over petroleum resources. Because historically producing fields should not be overtaxed, production efforts should create secondary production fields from underutilized or new (not produced before) fields.81 Stable production is necessary, not only for Iraq, but for the world. Enhanced oil production requires foreign investment. Iraq has not benefited from state-of-the-art oil industry technology (i.e., 3D seismic, directional or deep drilling, gas injection), and its oil production has suffered from a lack of sufficient spare parts and investment throughout most of the 1990s. Production has been sustained with sub-standard engineering techniques such as over-pumping and water injection (“flooding”) and obsolete technology (systems were in various states of decay, including corroded well casings). Reversal of all these practices and utilization of the most modern techniques, combined with development of both discovered fields and any new ones, could result in Iraq’s oil output increasing by several million barrels per day. In February 2004, former Iraqi Oil Minister Issam al-Chalabi astutely concluded that recent efforts to boost Iraqi production may harm the country’s oil reserves.82 Although Iraq has made long strides from its previous incarnation as a despotic regime, it finds itself in a very precarious position. The national Constitution made great headway as a starting point for national

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reconciliation and establishment of a fledgling nation-state. Although tact and ambiguity may have been essential ingredients in crafting the Constitution, intentional ambiguities can now generate divisiveness. The present Iraqi government can implement transparency and accountability in any national oil management regime. The sustainability of the historically underrepresented areas (i.e., the Kurdish North and Shiite South) depends on a measure of interdependency with the rest of the country. No discussion of the development of the Kurdish-administered area can take place without considering the development of problem solving forums within a larger Iraqi national framework. Legislative reform must pre-empt the growth of post-Saddam corruption. To escape Saddam’s legacy of exploitation and culture of corruption, the Iraqi stakeholders should implement the following legal and constitutional recommendations: • The establishment of a transparent and accountable budgetary process. Any section of the constitution that details the responsibility for the national budget should specifically include that all oil-related revenue and expenditures must be a portion of the public budgetary process. The legislature must also be given the power for administrative oversight of the Executive and the cabinet ministers, to monitor spending decisions and budgetary allocations. To prevent post-Saddam Iraq from merely perpetuating its culture of corruption, an audit board armed with specific authority to investigate alleged misappropriation should give annual reports to the parliament. Even in a highly decentralized Iraq, all petroleum monies should flow through a central authority that will be legally authorized to monitor the budgetary process. • National petroleum law. The development of the Draft National Petroleum Law based on the Constitution will reassure IOCs before they commit large sums of FDI to the Petroleum Sector. The new petroleum law need not be exhaustive, but it should cover all aspects and phases of operations, particularly main principles, while leaving site-specific details to regulations, individual agreements, and future amendments. • Formulation of a model petroleum agreement. The petroleum law and subsequent regulations should establish the overarching features of a coherent petroleum policy, and must broadly establish the relationship between the host country and IOCs. To accommodate regional interests, the specific details of the

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relationship should be documented in individual commercial agreements and contracts. The four main types of petroleum arrangements used internationally are modified buyback schemes, service contracts, production-sharing agreements (PSAs) and a petroleum tax regime. These four types of petroleum agreements reflect different levels of the relationship between the government and the oil company. The government can negotiate to achieve whatever policy considerations it desires. However, one overriding consideration is that petroleum ownership should be in the hands of the Iraqi people as required by Constitutional mandates. The service and buyback agreement should both place primary ownership in the hands of the national oil company. A tax-based regime and PSA should allow the IOC to take full or partial ownership only after the extracted resources are above surface level. Any new Iraqi fields require large capital investments, as well as the transfer of technology and expertise. To facilitate and recoup their investments, IOCs generally prefer PSAs. Even so, the Iraqi government should only accept a PSA if there is an optional clause for the INOC to take over operations after a specified period of time. It is incumbent upon the central government in Baghdad to craft a model PSA and distribute it to the regions for contract negotiations. Ideally, a PSA should leave ownership of the fields in Iraqi hands, but allow a mutually beneficial fiscal arrangement with the IOC. The Iraqi constitution should be amended to conform to the realities on the ground. The fundamental principles of a country are enshrined in its laws and constitution, and subsequent legislation details the exercise of these principles. Constitutional amendments to the Iraqi constitution safeguarding oil revenues will have stability when integrated into the constitution.83 Any amendment should include ownership restrictions to eradicate corruption centered on the management of natural resources. In the manner of anti-trust legislation, the Iraqi Constitution should limit the ownership of any single person, family, clan or entity. Ownership provisions should be creatively employed as a vehicle that moves rival groups into economic interdependence. Regulators must, however, monitor dummy corporations or front people attempting to thwart the restrictions. Constitutional ambiguities, omissions, and contradictions relating to petroleum must be sharpened and clarified. A good starting point would be the phrase “existing fields” in Article 112/1, which is not a standard petroleum industry term and is therefore open to highly selfserving interpretations. A proposed amendment to Article 112/1 would

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replace the hazy term “existing fields” with one specifying that supervision of all oil/gas exploration and production is vested in the Central authorities. The amendment would also enumerate a proposed share of oil profits for the producing regions and provinces, but not to exceed a clearly defined percentage. A Natural Resource Fund (NRF) should be established through a constitutional amendment, to prevent the petroleum sector from being victimized by political wrangling, ensure its (semi-) immutability, and enforce interdependence among the various stakeholders. There are two methods of structuring a NRF: a stabilization fund would channel excess revenue to the stabilization fund when oil prices are high, and channel funds to the general budget when it runs a deficit; a saving fund would channel a constant share of oil revenue to be set aside for future generations. If successful, this fund would lead to higher governmental savings in the aggregate. If a constitutional framework is developed alongside a culture of interdependence, the legislative and constitutional changes suggested should have a lasting impact in Iraq and build a successful future. These anti-corruption, consensus-building measures are post-Saddam, but they are also designed to cure the culture of corruption that Saddam created.

CHAPTER 6 TOWARDS ECO-URBANISM FOR ALL IRAQI CITIES, TOWNS, AND VILLAGES Introduction This chapter addresses the current situation in Iraq and is intended to be broad in scope by using the term eco-urbanism, a concept that is relevant at all levels of a built environment. The chapter will address issues directly linked to society’s values and the policies which must be implemented to achieve desired goals and objectives. The following are some of the issues that Iraq faces in rebuilding its communities in a sustainable fashion: • Overcoming the recent traumatic experiences that most people have endured either directly or indirectly, and the opportunity that reconstruction provides as a therapeutic process. • Rebuilding, in a sensible and economical way, by recreating the sense of place of localities that were the victims of destruction, thereby reaffirming the sense of communities that were traumatized. • The opportunity exists to deal with the phenomenon of globalization by avoiding its negative aspects, particularly as it affects the reshaping of the built environment. • The possibility is open during the reconstruction process to recycle the positive aspects of traditional Iraqi indigenous design and practice at the levels of neighborhoods, building design and construction practices. I will discuss principles that relate to the following: sustainability and ecology; society’s values and ethics; decision-making and management including rules and codes for planning and construction; and suggestions for formulating policy. Principles related to all of these areas are of direct relevance to the issues outlined above.

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Sustainability and Design Principles There are numerous definitions in the current literature for sustainability. I find the following valuable: the ability of the community to utilize its natural, human, and technological resources to ensure that all members of present and future generations can attain high degrees of health and well-being, economic security, and a say in shaping their future while maintaining the integrity of the ecological systems on which all life and production depends.1

It is important to understand basic principles of ecology as they relate to the built environment and the manner in which people ought to intervene in the shaping of their cities, towns and villages. The following are five important general principles: Solutions grow from place. Ecological design begins with the intimate knowledge of a particular place. Therefore, it is small-scale and direct, responsive to both local conditions and local people. If we are sensitive to the nuances of place, we can inhabit without destroying. A bottom-up decision-making process is necessary. Everyone is a designer. Listen to every voice in the design process. No one is a participant only or a designer only: Everyone is a participantdesigner. Honor the special knowledge that each person brings. As people work together to heal their places, they also heal themselves. Ecological accounting informs design. Trace the environmental impacts of existing or proposed designs. Use this information to determine the most ecologically sound design possibility. Design with nature. By working with living processes, we respect the needs of all species while meeting our own. By engaging in processes that regenerate rather than deplete, we become more alive. Make nature visible. De-natured environments ignore our need and potential for learning. Making natural cycles and processes visible brings the designed environment back to life. Effective design helps inform us of our place within nature.2 Seven specific principles related to city design and development must also be added to the above: i) the city should strive to learn from the efficiency and resiliency of nature by relying on cyclical rather than linear systems; ii) integration of housing, energy, food, work and recreation are made possible by their proximity to one another; iii) neighborhoods are favored where people can live, work, shop, and play within a small radius; iv) the city should support a thriving, vibrant, culturally diverse center with convenient, accessible public transportation linked to bicycle and

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walking routes; v) the city should be compact with a defined edge, so that residents have easy access to surrounding rural and natural areas; vi) incrementalism should be encouraged at the level of the house plot to the level of the city center—in other words do not only think of completed projects, but rather of a first step in an ongoing process of growth and change as resources and needs dictate; vii) encourage conversion of building uses instead of demolition and replacement. Figures 6.1 and 6.2 Rogers (1997) reinforce the above principles:3

Figure 6.1 Diagrams Illustrating Linear and Circular Metabolism for Cities

The following are three quotes that are very relevant for creating a mindset conducive for absorbing the concept of eco-urbanism:4 If we change the way we make decisions, we will change the decisions we make. Jim MacNeil, Secretary General, U.N. World Commission on Environment and Development

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Figure 6.2 Compact Mixed-Use Nodes Reduce Journey Requirements and Create Lively Sustainable Neighborhoods We have created a regulatory system of command and control that limits choice and says No, instead of one that sets goals and encourages innovation. Lawrence R. Codey, Public Service Electric and Gas Co. Tell me, I forget. Show me, I remember. Involve me, I understand. Chinese proverb

The Charter of Calcutta was formulated as a result of the International Conference and Exhibition of Architecture of Cities that was held in Kolkata, India on November 20, 1990. Here is the wording that was adopted in the Concluding Session of that conference:5 We are at a turning point in history. Our planetary environment is severely damaged. Desertification is spreading, the globe is warming. Entire ecosystems are under threat. And the City is at the center of the storm of destruction. But that is the key! We must cease seeing the City as a problem. We must see the City as the solution. For the City is our home. It is what we make it to be. It is where we live. If we fail to seize the Future, We will be consumed by the Past. The Future begins NOW! Let the Charter of Calcutta be simple and clear,

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To be heard by all, And filled with hope and vision— The City Can Save the World!

The Hannover Principles, developed by William McDonough & Partners for EXPO 2000 World’s Fair in Hannover, Germany, are an excellent start for an evolving set of principles that can be fine-tuned with more knowledge and experience. These nine principles were assembled after extensive consultation with representatives from the design, environmental, and philosophical communities.6 They are adaptable to the concerns of different cultures and countries. • Insist on rights of humanity and nature to co-exist. • Recognize interdependence. • Respect relationships between spirit and matter. • Accept responsibility for the consequences of design decisions. • Create safe objects of long-term value. • Eliminate the concept of waste. • Rely on natural energy flows. • Understand the limitations of design. • Seek constant improvements by the sharing of knowledge. Society’s Values and Ethics These are meta-principles comprised of ethical and legal norms derived from the history and value systems of society. To provide a concrete example of such principles I will use those predominant in Islamic societies,7 that are embedded in the Quran and Sunnah of the Prophet. Elsewhere I have documented a large number of pertinent verses and hadith.8 They clearly articulate the importance of thinking in ecological terms about our intentions and actions related to decisions affecting the built environment: thus the concept of eco-urbanism is clearly sanctioned by those sources. The following seven meta-principles are a part of Islamic ethical norms: i) good intentions are the basis for sound decisions; ii) the basis for action is the freedom to act within one’s property, constrained by the ethical norm of “beauty without arrogance”, and by avoiding creating harm as stipulated in the following norms; iii) harm to others should be avoided, and if two damages should occur then, and only if necessary, accept the lesser of the two; iv) respect the rights of older established conditions on the ground including existing buildings, and by extension accepting the idea of interdependence and cooperation between neighbors; v) respect the privacy of others, particularly avoiding

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the creation of direct visual corridors into private domains; vi) do not debase the social and economic integrity of adjacent properties by changes or the use of one’s property that would create such harm; vii) local customary practices must be respected and followed, although with the passage of time changes to those customs might be necessary. For a thorough analysis and discussion of the articulation of Islamic values, principles and related institutions that are pertinent to the environment at large, see Bagader et al., Environmental Protection in Islam.9 Decision-Making and Management Private and public rights are fairly and equitably exercised. In a generative bottom-up system, as found in most traditional cities and towns in the Islamic world, most of the decisions affecting the built environment are made by the people living in their neighborhoods.10 Rights that affect those decisions have to be clearly articulated and understood by the public. They are: • The right for abutting an adjacent neighbor, and the right of servitude and access. This will depend on the specific configurations of the site and buildings. • The protection and maintenance of privacy rights. • Rights of original and earlier usage. This means that subsequent decisions and acts must take into account existing conditions. • Rights for the full utilization of one’s property that include the right to increase useable areas such as building a Sabat (a common practice in traditional cities was to build a room bridging the right-of-way without creating obstructions to traffic), or increasing the height of a building within stipulated restrictions if those exist for a specific locality or site. • Right for using a part or all of one’s property for generating income, provided such use does not create damage to the neighborhood. • Right of pre-emption (Shufa’a) of an adjacent property. This right provides the first option for purchasing an adjacent property by the neighbors. • Right of Waqf property. The Waqf is an Islamic institution that allows owners of property to endow their property and the income it generates for charitable purposes. • Right of inheritance by taking into consideration the impact it might have on division of a property.

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Public rights relate to transportation, infrastructure, and certain public facilities. The public authorities have to implement and maintain them. Private and public responsibilities are properly allocated and implemented. Historically the responsibilities of private citizens and institutions in generative systems that were clearly evident in societies and cultures located in the Islamic world and around the Mediterranean basin were: • Utilizing the exterior Fina when needed and the responsibility for keeping it clean. (The Fina is a longitudinal space along the exterior wall of buildings about one meter wide. It has many useful purposes; see below in Rules and Codes).11 • Informing the public authorities of any danger to the public realm from within private properties so that corrective action is taken. A typical example is the leaning wall that might pose a danger to passersby on the street. • Each individual and family is responsible to maintain peace and tranquility with their surrounding neighbors. Responsibilities of public authorities are: • Protecting the rights of the public. • Building and maintaining public streets and sewer lines, water and electricity distribution and maintenance, garbage collection, and insuring that the public realm—streets and open spaces—are always kept safe. • Protecting the integrity of local customs that are related to change and growth in the built environment. • Resolving equitably problems and disputes that may arise between property owners, particularly between adjacent neighbors. Control and Management It is important to establish a system of control and management that will be guided by the meta-principles detailed above, and that would ensure private and public rights are fairly and equitably exercised and responsibilities are properly discharged by private and public parties. Such a system of control and management should be based locally and must have legitimacy to the people living in the area or who will live there in

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the near future. One effective method that was predominant in many traditional societies was the system of neighborhood representatives, i.e. one person is elected or selected/identified by the majority residents of a neighborhood to represent them at a council of representatives. In Iraq this person was the Mukhtar, literally translated as the selected one. If a council system were not used, then each representative would have direct access to the ruling authority. In some traditional communities a council of elders was responsible for the day-to-day affairs of a community including matters that related to building activities. That was all that was needed in traditional societies to correctly control and manage the built environment. However, with changes that occurred in many societies since the first half of the twentieth century and the introduction of the municipal system in countries that traditionally did not have them, an intermediary became necessary. This role can take the form of the Office of Arbitrator and his/her technical and secretarial assistants. It can be a small office or a large one depending on the size of the community that it serves. Ideally a council of neighborhood representatives should select the Arbitrator. His/her primary responsibility would be to liaise between neighborhoods and the municipal central authorities. This is necessary to maintain a healthy generative process controlled by the people, i.e. keeping it a bottom-up system. The Arbitrator will also be responsible for ensuring that all parts of a generative program function properly, and that the rights and responsibilities of private and public parties are respected and followed. Rules and Codes Another important component of a generative system is the necessary rules and codes that can be followed during the process of growth and change and for resolving unforeseen conflicts between neighbors. It is preferable that such a system of rules and codes is compatible with the ethical/legal norms, the rights and responsibilities of private and public parties, and should also be linked in content to traditional local customs (Urf) that are still viable socially and technically. They should also be proscriptive in nature and their intention clear, i.e. what is to be achieved must be understood by everybody involved in the generative process. They are to be open for interpretation in response to the peculiarities of each location and condition. Prescriptive codes that do not allow localized interpretation must be discouraged unless they are absolutely necessary. Two examples of codes that were followed in traditional Arab-Islamic towns are included here.12 The first is about the Fina and its utilization on

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the ground and vertically. The second example is about the location of exterior doors and windows. By studying these two examples it is hoped that this type of dynamic code is understood and especially how it differs from stasis codes that order people exactly what to do regardless of the micro-conditions of their location in a neighborhood. Example 1: Rules for the utilization of the Fina on the ground and vertically. The Fina is an Arabic term that refers to two types of spaces. The internal courtyard of a building is called a Fina in some parts of the Arab world. It is also synonymous with the term Harim, which refers to an invisible space of about 1.00 to 1.50 meters wide alongside all exterior walls of a building that is not attached to other walls, and primarily alongside streets and access paths. It extends vertically alongside the walls of the building. The owner or tenant of the building has certain rights and responsibilities associated with the Fina. He has the right to use it for temporary purposes provided such use will not impede the traffic in the street, and he has the responsibility to keep his part of the Fina always clean and safe from any obstructions. The Fina extended vertically allows high-level projections in the form of balconies, enclosed bay windows, and rooms bridging the public-right-of-way which are called Sabat. In the past, before the era of municipal government, the historic sectors of Muharraq and Manama fully utilized the Fina as in other ArabIslamic cities. Therefore: • The Fina should be recognized as a generative principle. • As it is evident in the attached photo from a street in Muharraq, projections at the upper level were allowed as well as steps to front doors within the space of the Fina. This practice should be encouraged to continue so that the traditional character of the built form within streets will continue. • Although the municipal system took over the responsibility of cleaning streets, it never manages to keep them always clean. Therefore, owners or tenants of buildings are responsible for: i) cleaning the Fina adjacent to the exterior walls of their building at least once per week; ii) refraining from placing any kind of item within the Fina that will impede access in the street, except for dire necessity and only for a few hours. If the public-right-of-way is determined to be wide enough for vehicular access (depending on the location in the town) and particularly if wide enough for emergency vehicular access, then it is allowed to use the

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Fina for planting vines and flowers, and to locate a Sabil, which is a privately donated and maintained drinking fountain for public use. Any projections from the upper floor(s) of a building are allowed, provided it has a clearance of at least 4.60 meters above the street level. The clearance may be lower if that part of the street is determined not to allow emergency vehicles to go through. The width of an upper projection must not exceed the width of the Fina, keeping in consideration the nature of use of the Fina on the other side of the street. One set of steps to the front door are allowed for each building. The treatment of downspouts and gargoyles for rainwater evacuation onto streets should observe the following rules: • Downspouts are preferred to gargoyles, because they do not cause splashing. Street

Exterior Fina

Courtyard or Interior Fina

Projections allowed within Fina provided height for unobstructed passage is maintained

Plan of cluster of houses showing location of exterior Fina Concept of Fina extends vertically Gargoyle Downspouts are preferred to gargoyles

Downspout Must discharge water within building’s Fina

Fina about 1.00–1.50m

Figure 6.3 The Fina in Plan and Section and the Usage Allowed within it

•

When gargoyles are used they should project from the roof of a one-story structure and pour within the width of the Fina of the building from which it originates. It is preferable to build the

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spout at a 45 degree angle from the surface of the wall so that rainwater will fall within the Fina and thus avoid splashing the wall of the opposite neighbor, particularly in narrow streets. Gargoyles are not allowed from structures of more than one story.

Photo of a street in Muharraq, June 2005

Fina Fina Solid lines show elements allowed within the Fina

Figure 6.4 Diagram Showing Elements Allowed within the Fina

Example 2: Rules for the location of exterior doors and windows. As a general rule and as a result of the sequence of building events, doors and windows facing the public right-of-way were traditionally viewed as either “old” or “recent.” Older doors and windows have a priority over more recent ones in terms of their right to continue as they are. This rule is related to the meta-principle listed above under society’s values and ethics, “to respect the rights of older established conditions.” In other words the “recent” door or window has to adjust to the conditions of the “older” ones. It is difficult to determine accurately which buildings were built before others in the traditional fabric of Muharraq or Manama; however, the principle can still be followed today. For example, if an owner of a house which is in a very bad state decides to tear it down and re-build it, he should respect the existing conditions of adjacent and opposite buildings in locating the exterior door(s) and window(s) of his proposed new building.

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The following rules should be followed for any changes to door locations: • A door must not be located exactly opposite another door. It should be offset from it adequately to discourage looking into the entry hall of the opposite house. However, this stipulation might be relaxed if the street between opposite buildings is wider than usual and has a higher pedestrian activity than other streets in the vicinity. A door must not be located opposite a shop, or vice versa. They should be offset from each other so that direct overlooking will not be possible from the shop into the entry hall of the opposite house. However, this stipulation might be relaxed if the street between opposite buildings is wider than usual and has a higher pedestrian activity than other streets in the vicinity. • On the same side of a street, a door must not be located adjacent to an existing neighbor’s door without his consent. This is to avoid disrupting the Fina space on both sides of an existing door, in the event that such a Fina space was used by the neighbor. Examples for such uses include space for flower pots, unloading groceries, and temporary or emergency parking if cars are allowed in that area. The following rules should be followed for any changes to window locations: • The height of a window sill on the ground level for residential buildings, facing a street or a public area, is determined from the exterior, i.e. from the street. It should be approximately 1.75 meters from the surface of the street or public area. This dimension is based on the intention for keeping the eye level of an average man below the level of the window sill. It can be less if the sightline from the window into the interior would pass above head level of a standing person(s) inside. This condition would occur when the interior floor level is appreciably lower than the outside street level. Therefore as a general rule, ground level windows on exterior walls facing streets should be designed for the purposes of ventilation and light. Measures for security should also be kept in mind for the design of such windows. • Windows on upper levels (i.e. first and second floors that are above the ground level) facing streets or other public areas have no restriction on their size and sill height above the street.

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However, their location should be influenced by existing windows on the other side of the street. The proper thing to do is to offset, i.e. set them aside, but this is not as critical as the case with doors discussed above, because exterior windows were traditionally covered by a wooden lattice to prevent visual penetration. This treatment is commonly termed Mashrabiya, and its use should be encouraged. The specific design should be influenced by traditional models found in Muharraq and Manama. Location of windows facing the interior courtyard or garden: ƕ There are no restrictions for the location and size of ground level windows that face a courtyard or garden. Any constraints will be due to other design requirements. ƕ Upper level windows, whether or not they face an interior courtyard or garden, must not be located so they would provide direct visual penetration of an adjacent neighbor’s courtyard or garden. Narrow street less than 3.00m

Proposed door must be offset

Wide street with heavy traffic Proposed door allowed

Existing door

Location of proposed door on narrow street less than 3.00m wide

Existing door

Location of proposed door on a wide/heavy traffic street

Figure 6.5 Acceptable Locations of Proposed Doors onto Streets

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Allowed location for shop

No overlooking into entry hall

Proposed door not allowed Fina length reduced

Proposed location not allowed

Existing door

Overlooks into entry hall

Location of proposed shop relative to existing door on other side of street

Fina Location of proposed door adjacent to a neighbor’s door is not allowed if it reduces the length of the Fina

Figure 6.6 Locations of Proposed Shop and Door

1.75m

Can be less than 1.75m if sightline passes above person inside

Street Street Levels of street and interior approximately the same

Standing person

Interior level lower than street

Determine height of window sill from the exterior of the house and from the street

Figure 6.7 Diagrams of Height of Window Relative to the Exterior and Interior

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Building in Sheik Isa road in Muharraq showing use of Mashrabiya wrapping around two sides of building. Drawing by John Yarwood, 1980s.

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An example from Manama also showing the chamfered corner at the junction of two streets, 2006.

Figure 6.8 Examples of Mashrabiya and Chamfered Corner

Suggestions for Policy Makers Beyond the abundant traditional examples from the Islamic world and from other traditional societies, we need to learn from the various ideas and suggestions made by numerous individuals and organizations worldwide. These date back primarily to the decades of the 1980s and 1990s.13 The following are a list of some of those ideas that can be the basis for formulating sustainable policies for the future of rehabilitation and reconstruction of Iraqi cities, towns and villages: • Cities should be based on a circular metabolism system. The distinction between the linear and circular systems is that linear metabolism cities consume and pollute at a high rate, whereas circular metabolism cities minimize new inputs and maximize recycling. • Reduce the ecological footprint. This is an accounting tool that enables us to estimate the resource consumption and waste assimilation requirements of a defined human population or economy in terms of a corresponding productive land area. • Build or retrofit to achieve compact mixed-use nodes that reduce journey requirements.

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• • • • •

Compact nodes that make up the city can be linked by masstransit systems. Local transportation can rely on bicycles, small one or two person vehicles, and delivery vans. The compact city should rely on its own local power generation and waste recycling, not on distant power sources. Use water resources sensibly, and recycle rain and gray water for sustaining local plants and trees. People should have the option of establishing small local farms within or near their neighborhoods.

Other principles mentioned and discussed in this article can be added to the above as an arsenal and basis for policy formulation.

CHAPTER 7 THE PLACE OF HIGHER EDUCATION IN THE DEVELOPMENT PROCESS IN IRAQ As we in Iraq struggle through an intensely traumatic transition period, I would like to offer a framework to help us see through the conflict, confusion, and complexities to a time in the not too far distant future when we are on the runway, engines running, ready to take off to a genuinely peaceful, prosperous and progressive future. It can happen. It has happened in the past, which gives us cause to believe it can happen in the future. Although under current circumstances, this may seem very difficult if not impossible to envision, I believe we—all the people of Iraq— inherently have the opportunity, the potential and the resources to move forward in an unprecedented manner to a future that all peace-loving people everywhere want and deserve. This vision—a function of political will and leadership—cannot and will not happen by itself. The Kurdistan Region of Iraq, with its traumatic history over more than four decades, and especially the progress it has made since the 1991 war that began Iraq’s liberation, offers a good glimpse of that vision. As an integral part of Iraq, where today personal security and political stability reign, the region is where anyone—visitor as well as resident, women as well as men, can move anywhere at anytime, alone and without armed guards. Many visitors do more around the Kurdistan Region, including Arab visitors from other parts of the country, often enjoying adventurous excursions into our wonderful mountains. Please have no doubt that most people in Iraq are peace-loving. For centuries, the people of Iraq have lived very respectfully and peaceably with each other, in the same neighborhoods where they have looked after each other, participated together in social activities, where their children attended the same schools together—Arabs, Kurds, Turkmen, non-Kurd Christians, Armenians, Shias, Sunnis, Yezidis, Mandeans or Sabeans (followers of John the Baptist), Jews, and others. Socially and culturally, living respectfully and nicely with each other is what many of us have grown up with and we know this to be a fact of life. It is our heritage, our legacy, and our culture.

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We are a land of acute differences. But we are also an ancient land where our rich ethnic and religious diversity has been genuinely respected and where we have long lived very well with each other at social, cultural, and humanitarian levels; unfortunately and regrettably, this has not been the case at some political levels. The framework I wish to offer you is based on the very real experience of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq where thousands of communities were destroyed, tens of thousands of families forcibly dislocated and disconnected from their lands and livelihoods, and chemical weapons used at dozens of sites. Where fear and persecution prevailed, rural and urban areas were subjected to extreme neglect relative to the rest of the country, especially Baghdad, and social, cultural, and economic development was stifled. I know that here in America there have been many positive news articles and other reports about the Kurdistan Region, “the other Iraq.” But our history did not begin in the last few weeks and months: over decades we suffered and struggled and sacrificed, we returned, and we have begun to build a new life that is contributing to a new and better Iraq. It is this very hard and very practical experience that allows a vision of a positive and promising future for all the peoples of Iraq to come into focus. We of the Kurdistan Region, after years, indeed decades, have returned to our homeland to move forward to a new and certainly much better future. It is a future we have decided to deliberately pursue in close cooperation and collaboration with all other peoples in Iraq who are of a peaceful, prosperous, and progressive disposition. In today’s Iraq, the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) regards education as an essential element in its vision of a vibrant, productive and economically prosperous path to regional development. Whilst security continues to be a major problem in Iraq, the Kurdistan region has been the safest and the most secure area since 2003 in comparison to the rest of Iraq. This makes Kurdistan a more productive region in which to focus rebuilding efforts. To this end, the sector which is in need of rebuilding is higher education. Today in Iraq more than four million of our 27 million citizens have been forced to migrate, or forcibly dislocated, for security reasons. Two million have fled to neighboring countries and beyond and are refugees. Another two million have sought refuge in other parts of the country and are internally displaced persons, or IDPs. Many are educators who form the backbone of education in Iraq. We look through this terrible transition period to a time when the raging wildfire that has threatened their lives and homes will burn out and they

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will return to build anew, new lives and new homes. Their energy, resilience, and the knowledge and skills that they will bring back will be met by the great potential and abundant wealth of their homeland. It has happened before, and it can happen again. Looking ahead to this vision, in considering the role of higher education in the development of Iraq we must consider first and foremost our young people, who are our future. More than half of Iraq’s population of 27 million is under 20 years of age. To clarify a bit of the past in order to see our way through to a positive future, the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, that part of the Kurdistan Region administered by the KRG, is only part of the territory where ethnic Kurds predominate. Today’s KRG-administered territory was formed by the regime of Saddam Hussein after the 1991 war over Kuwait. The regime withdrew the administration of the central government from northernmost parts of Iraq, and arbitrarily established a militarized demarcation line. In effect, by drawing the line and separating the Region, the Iraqi government abandoned more than three million of its citizens. Food and fuel supplies were suspended to areas north of the line, and this northern area was disconnected from the national electricity grid. Medical patients were prevented from seeking specialized medical treatment and high school graduates were prevented from attending universities south of the line. This abandonment and separation by the central government caused an administrative crisis in the territory, which is twice the area of the State of Massachusetts. This crisis led to regional elections being held six and a half months later in May 1992, the first ever internationallyobserved elections in Iraq, which were judged and deemed to be free and fair. Following these elections, a regional parliament was formed, which we call the Kurdistan National Assembly, or KNA. The KRG was also formed at this time. Despite severe growing pains, both the KNA and KRG continue to this day, 16 years later. Back in 1992, the KNA decided to adopt the governing structures and laws and regulations being applied throughout Iraq, except, of course, for those structures and laws and regulations that promoted the oppression, brutality and cruelty for which the regime of Saddam Hussein was infamous. A separate or replacement course was not envisioned. This KNA policy included adopting the same educational structures and systems prevailing throughout the country, once highly regarded as among the best in the Middle East. Under severe resource constraints during the period of international sanctions in the 1990s, we began to take education farther. We opened for the first time, in Iraq, schools that taught in Turkmani for children of

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Turkmen families, Syriac (a derivative of the Aramaic spoken by Jesus Christ) for children of Christian families, and Armenian for children of Armenian families. All these schools are fully funded by the KRG. No such schools exist anywhere else in Iraq. Of course, we have schools that teach in Kurdish and other schools in Arabic; English is also increasingly becoming a medium of instruction as an international language that is critical to our development. What all this means is that all our children and young people in the Kurdistan Region (more than 50 percent of our population) grew up in liberated territory. They do not know the fear, nor have they developed the guarded behavior that their parents deemed essential to surviving under the regime of Saddam Hussein. The past 16 years, however, were not without threats and challenges. Internal political rivalries had to be dealt with and worked through. Twelve years were spent under crippling international trade sanctions compounded by a second, internal embargo imposed by the central government. Neighbors on all sides—north, south, east, west—promoted our international isolation with restrictions on our movements and communications with the outside world. All our neighbors either supported or directly engaged in armed incursions against our territory. Between 1991 and 2003, hundreds of destroyed communities in the Kurdistan Region were reconstructed and tens of thousands of families returned to their homes and resettled. For more than 20 years, many of these families had been refugees in Iran and other countries. In addition to those who were refugees, many other families were forcibly displaced inside Iraq to distant, unfamiliar areas, or restricted to government communities, conceptually not unlike the reservations for indigenous people here in America. This forced migration not only disconnected people from the spiritual roots of their culture, but also disconnected them from their lands, the source of their livelihoods for their once sustainable communities. We are grateful to the international community for their reconstruction and resettlement support and assistance, especially the U.S., European countries, Japan, and many other countries that helped through NGOs during these initial years. But throughout these 12 years, with the regime of Saddam Hussein just minutes away and ready to pounce at our throats, with our other neighbors restricting our freedom of movement and communication with the outside world, our people faced a most uncertain future. There was a turning inwards, a seeking of refuge in restrictive religion instead of its spiritual and intellectual liberation. Not only did it appear we had no friends; our youth despaired that they had no future at all.

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For the Kurdistan Region, the events of 2003 began to change all this. We look forward to the days when the rest of Iraq will work through the tyranny and terror of this terrible transition period when we all will live as we know we can live with each other, in peace and prosperity. For this to happen, as we all know only too very well, personal security and political stability are paramount. While we in the Kurdistan Region no doubt have our act together to a significant extent, we also know that our institutions are young and fragile. But we have the experience of surmounting difficulties that no people anywhere in the world should have to face. And when we look at higher education, in the midst of the extreme economic constraints we faced during the 12 years before 2003 when our young people had nowhere to go, we opened new four-year universities and a number of two-year technical institutes that have grown for over a decade. In 1991, we had only one university: today we have six. We need more, including an agricultural university. We need alternative universities based on the leading universities of the world. Higher education actually begins after the completion of preparatory levels (high school). In the Kurdistan Region today, over 70,000 teachers in 5,000 schools are educating more than one million primary and secondary school students. If the Kurdistan Region is about 20 percent of Iraq, then we are looking at a country of no fewer than five million primary and secondary school students, 350,000 teachers, and 25,000 schools. Let’s not overlook the fact that these numbers do not include all the children who could and should, but for whatever reasons do not, attend school; nor do these numbers include preschool or pre-kindergarten schools commonly available in many progressive countries. Such preschool systems, an important source of not only education but also jobs for trained citizens, have yet to be instituted in Iraq; there are virtually no Montessori-type schools anywhere in the country, even in the Kurdistan Region. And our educational environment does not yet include private schools that offer alternative educational models and promote higher standards. In the Kurdistan Region, a region of four to five million citizens, there are only five private schools in operation today. Taking the position that Iraqi high school graduates could and should be on par with the best in the world, let’s detour for a moment to examine the resources needed for this assumption to become reality. While we naturally look toward our oil and gas reserves, we should not overlook our extensive water resources. With water and modern agricultural practices, Iraq would be fully capable of feeding itself and producing surpluses for export. As it is, as

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with most people in the world we are accustomed to eating three meals per day but most of our food is imported, including apples from Washington State and chicken from other states. Agriculture, agri-business, and agroindustry are sources of important jobs and higher incomes calling for educational excellence in rural areas where there are hundreds of smaller communities. Higher education is essential to make our agricultural potential a reality. But let’s go back to oil and gas. The latest exploration and production technologies available in the world have yet to be applied throughout the country. Please don’t be misled by media reports that only areas where the Shia and Kurds predominate have oil and gas. Even the so-called Sunni areas have oil and gas, waiting to be technically explored and extracted. Higher education is essential to exploit our tremendous abundance of petroleum wealth in ways that best serve the public interest where each and every Iraqi citizen benefits equitably. Iraq’s oil and gas is relatively shallow and of high quality. The two million or so barrels per day being produced come from only 1,500 wells, many in poor condition. All oil and gas belongs to all Iraqi people. All oil and gas wells are operated by the Iraqi government. Stunningly, there are privately owned companies here in America that successfully operate more than 1,500 wells. On top of all the oil and gas that could be produced in Iraq if the latest technologies are applied throughout the country, tremendous value could be added in-country by petrochemical industries and electrical power production. All this—exploration, extraction or production, petrochemical products, and power generation means more industries, more jobs, more demand for higher education. These industries could be located anywhere in the country, not just where oil and gas are located. If we can pump oil many hundreds of miles to ports in Jordan, Syria, and Turkey, we can very well pump oil and gas far fewer miles to petrochemical plants and power stations in Ramadi, Fallujah, and wherever within the country. Adding more value in-country means generating more wealth for education, and creating more demand for higher education to generate more wealth for all our citizens. Iraq would have the capability of providing more power to neighboring countries at rates lower than what they currently afford. The tremendous abundance of wealth we could be producing for ourselves to be shared equitably by each and every person in every corner of Iraq staggers the imagination. Higher education is needed not only to exploit this wealth in the public interest, but the wealth is needed to support higher education.

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In other words, we can well afford ourselves to strive toward educational systems and standards that rival the best in the world. The fact that so many of our citizens have been successfully educated at some of the leading universities of the world attests to our potential to develop our education services accordingly. We are well aware that natural resource-poor Japan in the early 1900s dedicated 43 percent of its budget to education, and by 1910 produced more books than the U.K. and more than twice as many as the U.S. It all began in the 1800s when Japan’s Fundamental Code of Education stated “there shall, in the future, be no community with an illiterate family, nor a family with an illiterate person.” Back then an influential Japanese leader stated the basic issue with great clarity: “our people are no different from the Americans or Europeans of today; it is all a matter of education or lack of education.” This we learn from Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen’s book Identity and Violence: The Illusion of Destiny in which he tries to make sense of the wasteful, senseless, and self-destructive violence that too many in Iraq have been suffering. Our current institutions of higher education are not known for developing capabilities to think critically. Regrettably, our universities have been largely offering military type instruction, especially in engineering and science, to the best high school graduates. The social sciences have been diminished in status and importance. Scholarship, as is commonly known in Iraq, is more about rote learning than creative and critical thinking to generate sound opinions and judgments, formulate sound policies, and make sound decisions. Since 2003 this has begun to change. Strategic planning and reforms are being introduced into a highly entrenched educational system in existing universities. It is not easy; indeed, it is very difficult. In addition, new universities are being opened with new vision and new instructional methods and materials. Nearly 13 years of isolation caused by international sanctions have taken their toll by suspending access to the latest in knowledge and educational developments. Efforts have begun to modernize engineering and science within an increasingly global world. The social sciences are beginning to receive more attention so that we can reflect on ourselves, understand ourselves better, and develop programs to improve our societies. The Internet did not begin to become available until 1999, and then only in limited parts of the Kurdistan Region, to only the few who had access to expensive satellite Internet access systems. Our telecommunication systems, until only a few years ago remained in an era of analog and electro-mechanical devices instead of the digital and

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electronic world we know today. We did not begin to have cellular (mobile) telephones until 2001, and then in only limited parts of the Kurdistan Region. While the Internet became increasingly available in the Kurdistan Region before 2003, due to restrictions by the regime of Saddam Hussein it was only after 2003 that it became available in the rest of the country. Education is highly valued in Iraq. Children, in general, love to go to school and their families are very supportive. Preparation for year-end exams is a time when families put on hold—for themselves as well as their student-children—all extra-curricular activities until exams are completed. Nothing is more important. With all institutions in Iraq requiring substantial development, it is the primary role of higher education to contribute to this development, and so contribute to the social, cultural, and economic development of the country. Because educational institutions at all levels from preschool through university require substantial development, education in Iraq is itself a developing industry that involves virtually every household and every other industry. We are a country of diversity, of strong capable people and abundant natural resources. First and foremost among our resources is, of course, our people. We are a country of education, skills, especially technical skills, and we are hard-working. Our culture is strongly family-centered. Secondarily, we are a country of great potential economic wealth in agriculture, water, petroleum, and other minerals. However, we are also regrettably a country of weapons and terror at present. With personal security and political stability being paramount, our future requires that weapons of violence be put aside and that the weapon of education be applied in fighting for a peaceful, prosperous, and progressive Iraq. We are fortunate to have a strong base with our students, teachers, and schools on which to build modern educational systems and success. It is a base that needs to be greatly expanded and modernized as quickly as possible. We look forward to the well wishes and support of all good people.

PART III INTERNATIONAL PERSPECTIVES

CHAPTER 8 COMMUNITY PARTICIPATION IN NATION BUILDING: LESSONS FROM THE U.S. EXPERIENCE Introduction Community participation should be an integral part of national development policy. This is more so following a major catastrophic event such as a natural disaster, or in the case of Iraq, a war. The conference held in July 2007 on rebuilding Iraqi communities identified community participation as a significant factor in national reconstruction: The central objective of the conference is to provide an intellectual forum for scholars and practitioners from Iraq and everywhere else in the world, to explore how the reconstruction of Iraq can be carried out in a way that promotes social justice, economic and political sustainability, and the full participation of all stakeholders.1

The U.S. has a long history of community participation in national development, and some of the lessons learned from this experience could be applicable to Iraq as the country contemplates reconstruction efforts to amend a shattered nation after the war. For development practitioners such as urban planners, community participation in development has long been recognized as essential for ensuring that development plans reflect the needs and wishes of a country’s residents. As Burby observed: Strong plans stem from planning processes that involve a broad array of stakeholders, and strong plans accompanied by broad stakeholder involvement are needed if plans are to have a significant effect on the actions of local governments.2

Mileti put it even more forcefully when he said: “The participatory process itself may be as important as the outcome.”3 Finding ways to effectively involve the public in development planning has been a well beaten path of planners.4 Brody, Goldschalk, and Burby list the benefits of participation

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as generating “trust, credibility, and commitment regarding the implementation of policies….”5 In recognition of the benefits of stakeholder involvement in development planning, the U.S. federal government mandated public participation in the planning and implementation of federally funded programs ranging from community economic revitalization to environmental remediation: thus the 1949 Housing Act that launched the urban renewal program required municipalities to involve residents in the redevelopment plans. Part of the reason for the generally acknowledged failure of the urban renewal program is that the Citizen Advisory Boards that directed the programs at the local level had only token representation from the affected communities. To counteract this shortcoming, the community participation mandate was strengthened under the Economic Opportunity Act (1964) of President Lyndon Johnson’s War on Poverty with a requirement for “maximum feasible participation” of community residents in the programs. Similarly, model inner city neighborhood plans under the Model Cities program had to include a “widespread citizen participation” component in order to take advantage of federal funding. Later, when the Model Cities program was replaced with the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) under the Housing and Community Development Act in 1974, communities applying for grant funds had to show that they “provided adequate opportunity for citizen participation” in the development of the application and had resident involvement in program activities. Requirement for community participation was not limited to just economic and social programs. Resident participation was an essential component of the 1970 National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). NEPA outlined a process for assessing the environmental impact of programs that had the potential to adversely impact the environment. Public participation in environmental impact assessments was to be accomplished through public hearings and a review and comment of the draft Environmental Impact Statements before their final approval. Furthermore, the Federal Water Pollution Act (1972) also had a strong and inclusive public participation requirement: Public participation in the development, revision, and enforcement of any requirement, standard, effluent limitation, plan, or program…. shall be provided for, encouraged and assisted by the Administrator and the states.6

State governments also embraced community participation as essential to the implementation of their programs. While participation

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requirement by state governments vary (see Table 8.1), the growth management plans of most states including Maryland, Georgia, and Vermont require, at a minimum, a public hearing before the approval of local comprehensive plans. Under Article 6 of California’s Planning and Land Use Code, during the preparation or amendment of the general plan, the planning agency shall provide opportunities for the involvement of citizens, California Native American Indian tribes, public agencies, public utility companies, and civic, education, and other community groups, through public hearings and any other means the planning agency deems appropriate.7

In Florida, the state planning agency reviews local plans to ensure compliance with state community participation requirements, while Oregon’s planning statute requires local governments to establish a Committee for Citizen Involvement and to provide financial support for involving the public in planning. Goal 1 of the plan states that communities must “develop a citizen involvement program that insures the opportunity for citizens to be involved in all phases of the planning process.” In addition, the statute also provides state oversight of local comprehensive plans by the state’s Citizen Involvement Advisory Committee and by the Land Conservation and Development Commission (LCDC). Table 8.1: Examples of State Community Participation Requirements State California

Florida Georgia

Relevant State Statute Article 6 Section 65351 Section 187.201 Section 110-121 (.04-.08)

Pennsylvania

Section 10202

Maine

Section 4444

Public Participation Requirement Planning agencies are required to provide opportunities for public involvement during the planning process through public hearings and any other means the planning agency deems appropriate. Requires citizen participation at all levels of policy development, planning, and implementation. Public participation is required for all levels of the planning process and at least two public hearings must be held before plan adoption. Governing bodies must hold at least one public hearing to discuss plans and if revision is substantial then another public hearing must be held before plan adoption. Local governments must hold public hearings before adoption, amendment, or repeal of bylaws and other regulatory tools. Plans must be published or posted and made available for public comments.

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Table 8.1: Examples of State Community Participation Requirements State Maryland

Relevant State Statute Section 4522.2-8

New Jersey

Section 5:851.6 & 1.7

Oregon

Section 187.160-165

Tennessee

Section 7(3)

Washington

WAC 365-195010 Wisconsin Act 9 Section 66.1001(4)a

Wisconsin

Public Participation Requirement Public hearings must be used to solicit and encourage citizen input prior to adoption of comprehensive plans. Public participation to include written and oral comments required in planning. The Smart Growth Office must seek public comments at least 60 days prior to approval of state development and redevelopment plan. Communities must establish Advisory Committees that are organized to ensure public participation and local governments must submit programs to the State Citizen Involvement Advisory Committee for approval. Municipalities and Counties must hold at least two public hearings before plan approval. Public must be involved in the smart growth planning process. Written procedures for involving the public must be adopted. Must provide opportunities for the public to offer comments.

Elements of Community Participation Effectiveness Community participation is effective if participatory processes lead to the desired goals and objectives. These objectives may be process-driven or outcome-driven.8 Extensive review of literature on empirical-based research on community participation processes led Chess and Purcell to the conclusion that the form of participation may not be a determinant of process or outcome success: Studies of different forms sometimes yielded similar outcomes, while studies exploring the same form of participation sometimes yielded different outcomes.9

Even so, Chess and Purcell went on to provide what they considered “rules of thumb” in public participation: make goals clear, involve stakeholders early in the planning process, invest time in pre-planning, be flexible and explore non formal approaches to involve the public, use multiple approaches, and seek feedback from participants. Burby arrived at similar conclusions after reviewing the literature on community participation in planning. He distilled five criteria for increasing community participation effectiveness: i) planners should

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empower citizens by giving them the ability to shape decision choices; ii) the public ought to be involved in the planning process early and throughout the planning process; iii) a variety of stakeholders should be involved in the planning process; iv) a multiplicity of techniques should be used to provide and receive information from the public; and lastly, v) the information provided to the public should be understandable and free of technical distortions and jargon.10 Lowry, Adler and Milner extend this discussion further, noting that planners often undertake community participation as an afterthought or to meet legislative requirements with no sincerity in the outcome of the process because public agency personnel are reluctant to engage in a participation process that may involve relinquishing or compromising their control over the outcome of significant portions of a plan.11

To counteract this, Lowry and his colleagues offered five norms for good practice in community participation. They suggest that, first of all, planners must pay attention to the distribution of power between them and the stakeholders in community deliberations especially as it relates to ability to set an agenda, to legitimate identified problems, and to identify alternative solutions. Second, representatives of stakeholders at planning meetings should have the full faith of those they are representing. Third, planners must make clear whether the views shared by participants at meetings are advisory, or binding on the final decisions that are made. Fourth, planners have to communicate to participants how information obtained from the community is going to be used in the planning process, and finally, community participation doesn’t necessarily need to be viewed as a means for solving problems or arriving at a consensus but could be used for learning about community interests and to develop trust among participants and planners. The availability and commitment of sufficient resources for citizen participation also affects community participation outcomes. Cooper, Bryer and Meek observed that federal mandates for community participation in the 1960s following the War on Poverty programs did not yield optimum outcomes in large part due to insufficient commitment of resources for their implementation. Thus administrators responded to such mandates by complying with the minimal requirements of the law so that they don’t drain resources that are needed for the operation of the programs: Administrators were put in a bind in which their most reasonable way

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Cooper, Bryer and Meek went on to identify five important aspects of community participation. First, the participation process must involve as many people from a wide variety of backgrounds as possible. In particular, they caution that community leaders must reach beyond the traditionally older and engaged demographic that typically participates in meetings. Second, for local issues, they suggest that preference be given to bottomup approaches over top-down approaches to civic engagement. Third, community residents should be involved in all stages of the process from problem identification and budgeting to implementation and evaluation. Fourth, the authors also point out that planners should give sufficient weight to the local context on planning issues and to how the public is involved in the process. To this end, they identified five approaches to civic engagement and ranked them from least effective to most effective, as follows: i) an adversarial approach in which residents seek to compel government to address their needs; ii) electoral approaches (examples of which include voting and running for office); iii) public hearings; iv) civil society approaches; and v) deliberative approaches. They convincingly argued that deliberative approaches are the most effective in building “citizen efficacy, citizen trust in government, and citizen competence.”13 Webler and Tuler assessed participants’ perceptions of public participation effectiveness in environmental decision-making in ten case studies and concluded that there are no universally accepted criteria for ensuring participation effectiveness and that best public participation practices vary by the needs and perspectives of the participants. They identified four perspectives on community participation, which they labeled i) science-centered stakeholder consultation, ii) egalitarian deliberation, iii) efficient cooperation, and iv) informed collaboration. From these four perspectives the authors concluded that “good processes reach out to all stakeholders, share information openly and readily, engage people in meaningful interaction, and attempt to satisfy multiple interest positions.”14 Of late, concern has turned to the use of collaborative and consensus based approaches in community participation.15 Consensus and collaborative approaches have an advantage over adversarial approaches because they enable planners to more amicably resolve conflicts, address differences in value systems among participants, and bring people of different interests to a common underlying solution to a problem. Innes and Booher, for example, identified several criteria for evaluating the effectiveness of consensus building approaches including determination of

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how inclusive the process was of different interests, whether there is an agreement on the tasks to be accomplished, the variety of approaches that were used to engage participants, and how information was incorporated into the consensus-building process.16 Empirical Investigation of Community Participation in Development Planning In order to test the theoretical literature on community participation, we investigated the planning process in the state of Wisconsin to identify the elements that contributed to ensuring effective participation outcomes. Wisconsin, like many other states seeking to manage growth, enacted Wisconsin Act 9, also known as the “Smart Growth” or “Comprehensive Planning Law” in December 1999. The law requires communities that engage in zoning, subdivision or official mapping actions to make decisions related to these programs consistent with an adopted comprehensive plan beginning on January 1, 2010. The law also outlines specific procedures for involving the public in planning. It requires communities to adopt written procedures to involve the public throughout the preparation of a comprehensive plan, hold a public hearing prior to adoption of the plan, and widely distribute proposed or amended plans for public review and comment.17 This study examined the comprehensive planning processes of a sample of Wisconsin municipalities to see the effects that different community characteristics, inputs and processes have on participation outcomes. At the time of this study (February 2006), the Wisconsin Department of Administration had received 473 adopted municipal comprehensive plans. A random sample of 57 plans, including 37 town, ten village and ten city plans, were selected for review. Four sources were referenced in evaluating community participation effectiveness: 1) the public participation plans of the communities, 2) summaries of community meetings, 3) the content of adopted comprehensive plans, and 4) interviews with key community personnel involved in preparing the comprehensive plans. Community characteristics (such as population, education and income), as well as variables related to planning inputs, processes and outcomes (such as the presence of an adopted public participation plan, number and type of participation techniques used, diversity of groups involved, and level of citizen influence) were recorded and analyzed for each community. Table 8.2 describes the variables and how they were measured.

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Table 8.2: Input, Process, and Outcome Variables in Path Model Concept Indicator(s) INPUT VARIABLES Written Procedures Identifies whether a community has written procedures for involving the public in the planning process or not Planning capacity of municipality

Scale of the plan Per capita expenditure on conservation and development

Identifies whether the community comprehensive plan was prepared by i) only higher levels of government and/or planning consultants, ii) a combination of planning consultants and/or higher levels of government and community planners, or iii) only by community planners. Identifies whether the plan was prepared for a single jurisdiction or for multiple jurisdictions Divided the total municipal expenditure on conservation and development by the population of the municipality

PROCESS VARIABLES Pre-planning Determines whether the community was involvement involved at the stage of preplanning or not Planning involvement

Determines whether the community was involved at the stage of planning or not

Post-planning involvement

Determines whether there are procedures for involving the community after the adoption and implementation of the plan or not

Types of target groups involved in planning

Determines whether the target groups involved in the planning process are i) the traditional groups or whether ii) both traditional and non traditional groups were involved Counts the number of groups involved in the planning process

Number of groups involved Approaches used to involve the public

Determines whether the approaches used to involve the public are i) the traditional approaches or whether ii) both traditional and non traditional approaches were used

Coding 0=Does not have written procedures 1=Has written procedures 1=Low planning capacity 2= Medium planning capacity 3=High planning capacity 1=Single jurisdiction 2=Multiple jurisdictions Recorded conservation and development expenditure per person 1=No preplanning involvement 2=Preplanning involvement 1=No planning involvement 2=Planning involvement 1=Has no procedures for post planning involvement 2=Has procedures for post planning involvement 1=Traditional groups only 2=Both traditional and nontraditional groups Records the number of groups involved in planning process 1=Traditional approaches only 2=Both traditional and nontraditional approaches

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Table 8.2: Input, Process, and Outcome Variables in Path Model continued Concept Indicators PROCESS VARIABLES continued Number of Counts the number of approaches used to approaches used to involve the public in the planning involve the public process

OUTCOME VARIABLES Level of citizen Determines whether the nature of control involving the public in the planning process can be classified as nonparticipation, tokenism or citizen power Determines whether citizen stated Confluence of preferences are reflected in the goals, residents’ expressed policies, and programs of the goals for their comprehensive plan community and the goals and policies in comprehensive plan

COMMUNITY CHARACTERISTICS VARIABLES Incorporation Whether a municipality is incorporated or unincorporated Proportion of a community population Percentage of that has a bachelors degree or higher population with Bachelors Degree or higher 2000 population

The 2000 population of the community

Population growth rate (1990௅2000)

Population growth rate of community between 1990 and 2000

Median income

The median income of community residents

Coding Records the number of approaches used to involve the public in the planning process 0=No citizen power (nonparticipation and tokenism) 1=Citizen power 1=Weak correlation between citizen preferences and plan 2=Strong correlation between citizen preferences and plan 0=Uncinorporated 1=Incorporated Recorded percentage of residents with at least a Bachelor’s degree Recorded number of residents in community in 2000 (2000 pop௅1990 pop)/1990 pop. * 100 Recorded the community’s 2000 median income in $$

Table 8.3 compares the participation scores of incorporated and unincorporated municipalities and shows that these municipalities differ in six key areas: incorporated municipalities spent more per capita on conservation and development activities, involved both traditional and nontraditional groups, went beyond the traditional approaches to involve

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the public in the planning process, involved a greater number of stakeholders, used a wider variety of participation approaches, and gave residents greater control over the planning process than unincorporated municipalities. Using multiple regression analysis, one process variable and three community characteristic variables were shown to have the most effect on citizen power (that is, the extent to which residents in a community were given control over the planning process).18 Table 8.3: Community Participation Index Community Characteristics Municipality is incorporated Percent of population with bachelor’s degree or higher Mean Population (2000) Population growth rate (1990௅2000) Median income (2000) INPUT VARIABLES Have written procedures for public participation High planning capacity as indicated by the preparation of the plan by a community’s own planners in-house Single jurisdiction plan Per capita development expenditures exceed state average of $70.08 PROCESS VARIABLES Involved residents in pre-planning Involved residents in planning Have procedures to involve residents in post-planning Involved both traditional and nontraditional groups in planning Involved more than five groups in planning

Incorporated Municipalities (20)

Unincorporated Municipalities (37)

Total (N=57)

20 (100%)

0 (0.0%)

20 (35.0%)

17.7 3730

14.4 944

15.6 1921

12.74 41,671

6.95 43,078

8.97 42,584

20 (100%)

37 (100%)

57 (100%)

2 (10.0%) 7 (35.0%)

0 (0%) 12 (32.4%)

2 (3.5%) 19 (33.3%)

4 (20.0%)

1 (2.7%)

5 (8.8%)**

16 (80.0%)

22 (59.5%)

38 (66.7%)

20 (100%)

37 (100%)

57 (100%)

1 (5.0%)

1 (2.7%)

2 (3.5%)

8 (40.0%)

4 (10.8%)

12 (21.1%)**

6 (30.0%)

2 (5.4%)

8 (14.0%)**

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Table 8.3: Community Participation Index continued Community Incorporated Characteristics Municipalities (20) PROCESS VARIABLES continued Used nontraditional approaches to involve the public in planning 7 (35.0%) Used more than five approaches to involve the public 14 (70.0%)

Unincorporated Municipalities (37)

Total (N=57)

4 (10.8%)

11 (19.3%)**

11 (29.7%)

25 (43.9%)**

OUTCOME VARIABLES Gave citizens “power” over the planning process 13 (65.0%) 15 (40.5%) 28 (49.1%)* High correlation between resident goals and comprehensive plan goals 18 (90.0%) 33 (89.2%) 51 (89.5%) PARTICIPATION SCORE BASED ON INPUT, PROCESS AND OUTCOME VARIABLES Maximum possible score 45 45 45 Lowest score 16 17 16 Highest score 42 39 42 Average score 27 22.5 24 Number scoring above average 7 12 19 ** Significance at the .05 level. * Significance at the .10 level

Figure 8.1 below shows the expected interaction between the input, process, and outcome variables displayed in Table 8.3. While the process variables were expected to have a direct effect on citizen power, the input variables could have both a direct and/or indirect effect (acting through the process variables) on the outcome variable (citizen power). The regression analysis identified four significant variables in the model. A community’s outreach efforts, such as the number and types of stakeholders involved, and the number and types of approaches used to involve the public in the planning process were the key factors that determined the community’s public participation effectiveness. Also, large communities, those with a high proportion of residents holding a bachelor’s degree or higher, and those in which plans are prepared for a single jurisdiction rather than multiple jurisdictions showed more effectiveness in their public participation processes than those without these characteristics. Most of the communities that had low scores in their outreach efforts also scored low on the overall index of community participation. By contrast communities with high outreach scores did remarkably well on the overall index.

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Figure 8.1: The Fully Saturated Path Model Incorporation Status Population growth rate

Community Outreach efforts

Scale of plan

Citizen Power Stage of Involvement in Planning

Per capita expenditure

% BA or higher

2000 Population

Table 8.4: Logistic Regression of Independent (Input, Process, and Community Characteristics) Variables on Citizen Power (Outcome Variable). Independent variables Constant Stage of participation in planning Community outreach efforts Scale of plan Population growth rate 2000 population Percentage with Bachelor’s degree or higher Per capita development expenditure -2 Log likelihood = 29.263 Nagelkerke R. Square = .834 Model Chi square = 46.965* * p”0.05

Ǻ -7.715 -.576 1.238 -3.123 .037 -.001 .300

Standard Error Odds Ratio 3.353 .632 .405 1.399 .031 .000 .144

-.003 .011 Cox and Snell R-square = .574 Degrees of Freedom = 7

Of ȕ .000 .562 3.448* .044* 1.038 .999* 1.350* .977

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Lessons in Community Participation Several lessons can be learned from the U.S. experience in community participation for the reconstruction efforts in Iraq. Most important is the need for a national law requiring that government-assisted programs include resident participation. Governmental agencies as well as local governments should be required to document how they will involve local residents in the implementation of their programs. These plans should be reviewed and approved by a national level agency before funding is provided for the implementation of agency programs. There must also be a follow-up review of agency programs to ensure that the agencies actually followed through with their plans to involve the public in the development process. To ensure that the agencies actually followed their community participation program, they should be required to file a report with the national overseeing agency at the end of the implementation process documenting how the public was involved. Without this follow-through requirement, it is possible that these community participation plans would merely sit on the shelves and gather dust. In addition, for community participation in nation building to be effective, development agencies must devote considerable time to their outreach efforts. As we’ve seen in the case of Wisconsin, many communities had low scores on the community participation index primarily because of their poor outreach efforts. One way to rectify this problem is for the Iraqi government to provide incentives to encourage the use of innovative approaches that go beyond conventional methods of eliciting participation in development planning. In a multicultural society such as Iraq, strenuous efforts must be made to ensure not only that the process is transparent but also that it is fair to all ethnic and tribal groups. Therefore community participation in programs must be preceded with an intense public education program publicized through several readily accessible media in the country. This should include print media as well as audio-video programs on television and radio programs that are broadcast in the relevant ethnic languages, which would then eventually culminate in the actual participation of a wide variety of stakeholders including governmental and non governmental groups, as well as the traditional leaders of the affected communities. In conclusion, while community participation in the implementation of development programs and projects is time-consuming, it represents the best way to gauge the needs of stakeholders and beneficiaries of the

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programs and ultimately the rewards justify the time put into outlining a process that works to the satisfaction of all concerned.

CHAPTER 9 FINDING A MODEL EXEMPLAR FOR INSTITUTIONALIZATION OF PUBLIC PLANNING FOR SUSTAINABLE REBUILDING IN POST-WAR IRAQ: THE BOSTON REDEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY Introduction There is much to do to set matters right in Iraq. A heavy onus rests on our national leadership to achieve sustainable holistic rebuilding. Moreover, our national leadership needs help, as the endemic capabilities of our national government (that drove us deep into this mire) are largely unfit to get us through; worse, that leadership must be persuaded it needs such help, and that such help is available to be marshaled from and amongst the public planning realm—especially the municipal public planning realm. The nature of municipal public planning (and other such planning) requires development of indigenous developmental and planning capacity on the ground, especially in municipalities. Stakeholders must be involved as a norm. Systematized process is always needed, and disaster accentuates that need. The Center for Rebuilding of Sustainable Communities after Disasters strongly urges that an exemplar for systematized municipal redevelopment be put in place in Iraq’s municipalities. Moreover, the Boston Redevelopment Authority can and should serve as an ideal exemplar for the type of institutions and the type of institutionalized process that will make such public/private redevelopment credible and sustainable. Public funding must be used where available, but municipal development can (and usually must) proceed by way of inducing private developers—who can rely on institutional and reliable regulatory processes being put in place—to secure private financing in cities that are ripe for redevelopment (in this case, because of severe war damage). And, in turn, such institutional agencies will reach out to find entrepreneurs who can and will see strong and attractive profit opportunities. Notably, cities

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in Kurdistan are ripe to pursue such a redevelopment process; and a pilot effort in Kurdistan with a model municipal development agency can become a model for all Iraq. Finding Our Way through Iraq The onus on the U.S. The U.S. overthrew a flawed government in 2003, and in turn, became the military occupying power in Iraq; the afterinvasion task (of setting the ship of state aright) is proving to be a floundering odyssey. A heavy onus for rebuilding rests on the U.S.—to rectify the many of the severe upsets resulting. However, our national government, which engineered this debacle, is ill-equipped to achieve the necessary rectification without receiving and listening to advice from competent experts in rebuilding post-disaster—especially at the urban level; but that is not happening. Consummate teamwork is mandated between our national powers-that-be and urban-level experts (here and abroad). Our national powers-that-be are in the saddle in Iraq seeking to rebuild and establish peace; but, unfortunately, urban development experts and programs are sorely lacking. Moreover, any redevelopment is overbalanced toward anecdotal top-down development of hard infrastructure. The U.S. military is the principal power—the once-powerful Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) has come and gone. Most recently, the U.S. military, together with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) has begun limited rebuilding efforts as part of “PRTs” (Provincial Redevelopment Teams). Hence, there is some slow slogging-along away from the national level toward the provincial level. But the overall rebuilding results are disappointing; and, without midcourse correction, Iraq is headed for further tragedy. The task of rebuilding and establishing competent institutions for public planning on the ground. Much damage has been done by warrelated disasters in Iraq, and also by the subsequent occupation by the CPA caused further disasters. The physical, economic, societal, and government structures are suffering severely and have been in steady decline.1 The achievement of successful rebuilding of these four essentials to a recovering Iraq—post-war—will require the melding of multiple points of competency and application of resources. Rebuilding a nation torn asunder by war and incompetent occupation, and left sundered by endemic divisions of ethnic and religious culture, will require substantial

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time and effort—even with strong competency and expertise coupled with strong application of resources. Simply put, this recovering nation must muster the best of abilities of public planning and public implementation on a broad scale. Rebuilding post-disaster requires broad and deep expertise. But, again, such experts and expertise are not being mustered. Need for moving toward rebuilding sustainable communities by reorienting rebuilding toward localized bottom-up development. This chapter is directed toward promotion of rebuilding at the community and urban levels. The effort to reestablish Iraq must be looked at from both the top-down and the bottom-up. At the moment, rebuilding is over-balanced top-down. The top-down process began soon enough; but such anecdotal effort is flawed both as to design and implementation. And seemingly, it has little real hope in the longer term—unless strong institutions and sound public planning springing therefrom are proposed for establishment and are established and pursued systematically. Moreover, there is much too little bottom-up planning or rebuilding. Furthermore, the rebuilding is over-balanced with hard infrastructure, and lacks sufficient soft infrastructures, whereas at the local level, much infrastructure involves more mixed processes of soft and hard infrastructure—just as it should become a distinct mix of public/private development process. Soft infrastructure must be seen to be as important as hard infrastructure. Sound augmentation. U.S. governmental power centers, such as the U.S. military and/or State Department, can do much to corral a good team; but neither has much genuine in-house expertise in the task ahead. Their predisposition toward unilateralism has been and is likely to be counterproductive. For example, neither the Department of Defense nor the Department of State have undergone peer review of their rebuilding plans and structure—for example, from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). If experts were recognized for their expertise, the prospects for successful rebuilding would much improve. Somehow, the message must get to the powers-that-be to reorient their disposition away from their “default disposition”— so as to be sensitive to both the ultimate and the proximate, and to make the former to be the equal of the latter.

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Developing a Better Focus Limitation and a seminal bias of this chapter’s orbit. It is stressed herein that this chapter offers a thesis to advance sustainable redevelopment planning and programming at the localized municipal level. In turn, such planning and programming must fit within a greater scheme of sustainable planning and programming for the nation as a whole. This chapter largely avoids delving into the task of national reorganization for Iraq, and has a seminal bias, believing that the heavy onus on the U.S. includes the establishment of broad-based indigenous, sustainable public-planning and public-rebuilding capability. From all appearances, the efforts by the U.S. are directed the other way: although rebuilding efforts are being pursued by U.S. resources (with massive outsourcing to Bechtels and Halliburtons), indigenous capacity and talent building are absent. A review of the many publications relating to rebuilding finds inadequate attention to the need for sustainable rebuilding; yet, without attention to sustainability, rebuilding in a foreign land with mediocre expertise will bring one more tragic failure to Iraq (the first chapter of this book delves deeply into the essential characteristics of sustainability). Pursuing sustainability is far more than a mere amorphous goal; for example, it leads strongly toward vital synergies of public/private partnerships. Most non-planners have never encountered the synergy resulting from public/private partnerships; it is mostly encountered at the municipal level where the public sector is close to its people and urban needs. Present reality dictates that most sectors of government are finding that their funding needs much exceed their funding resources; and, in turn, it is the municipal governments that have best observed, especially in cities such as Boston, that critical public needs can be met with private capital and private entrepreneurship. Indeed, many such needs can only be fulfilled in this way. There is a meaningful analogy between voters and entrepreneurs: neither will respond enthusiastically, unless the public sector reaches out to them and makes a solid case for an embracing partnership between the public sector and the private. Moreover, the outreach can only come from the public sector, as the private sector is much resentful if it offers up an ingenious concept and the public sector, in its turn, elects to offer the idea out for all competitors to bid.

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Evolving toward sustainability will shift from a preponderant public funding process toward a more mixed public/private process. In the case of a municipality in Iraq, which is facing challenge-and-response moment whereby it must respond post disaster, it should be expected that there will be recourse to some helpful public funding (whether internal or external). Inescapably, public funding has built in limitations and restrictions. But regardless, true sustainable rebuilding comes into being when private entrepreneurs come forward with private funding resources. At that point, “critical mass” for sustainability has been reached. Public funding can prime the pump; but that is as far as public funding goes. Accordingly, municipalities should look at exemplars of cities that have found successful local institutions that readily promote successful public/private partnerships. Prioritizing Sustainable Rebuilding for/by Iraqis Both sustainability and local orientation must be factored in at the outset. The plight of Iraq is so extreme that the rebuilding will take several years. Hence, there should be many opportunities for the matter of empowering indigenous capacity resources at the national level to be addressed and reconsidered. However, in contrast, the thesis herein as to the urban-based development is insistent that indigenous resources must be prioritized at the outset. Urban sustainable redevelopment must integrate the affected community stakeholders at the outset. Essential urban planning institutions for bottom-up contribution to rebuilding effort. This chapter is offered by experts in the realm of urban and public planning. It is their thesis that bottom-up planning and rebuilding must both counterpoint and complement top-down strategic planning. Such a dynamic tends to enable a complementing and synergistic process. National, regional and urban planning must be complementary (one to the others)—and yet distinct talents with distinct experience and competence often are required, respectively. And more particularly, this chapter advances the thesis that strong ground level urban planning institutions are vital if any broad effort for sustainable rebuilding in Iraq is to succeed. There is no time to waste. It will not work to have localized sustainable rebuilding be sloughed off (until a later time)—as

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sustainability requires a rational process from the outset. Moreover, it takes valuable time— • To set up the soft infrastructure for institutionalized development promotion; • To consult with local leadership to identify the attuned priorities; • To fashion a complex plan for commercial development that will attract private sector entrepreneurs; • For private sector entrepreneurs to weigh and assess the opportunities and, in turn, fashion responsive reflexive proposals; • To compare competing responsive proposals offered by the private sector; • To conduct transparent public processes to review and validate superior proposals; • To grant tentative designation to the superior proposals after public hearings; • For the selected private tentative developers to round out their development team, finalize architectural drawings, secure financing and prospective users of the project; • For the selected developer to be granted final designation after public hearing; and • For construction of the project and initiation of operations. If such a process has to wait until the powers-that-be can get past their national-level priorities, while, at the same time, they are coping with chronic insurgency, it will be too late to start localized development. And again, localized development is as important as nation-level development. Local development agencies provide an additional source of synergy and accountability. In addition, many helpful results will unfold from a balanced redevelopment structure. One such result is that those empowered at the local level will constitute a vital source of critiquing progress (now absent) at the national and regional levels. So far, there is no process of accountability. The powers-that-be report to themselves, and invariably report stellar successes. Yet the overall assessments have indicated general disappointment with overall results. Once localized institutions begin to advance local projects, these same localized institutions will begin to constructively challenge the national administration. Successes at the local level can be replicated at other localities; and conversely, national programs that are stumbling will soon become evident to one localized institution or another—and a critique can be issued accordingly.

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Focusing in Localized institutions. Rebuilding Iraq will be a massive and daunting undertaking. Many, many ingredients and processes will be required. Let us look at the type of institutional ingredients and processes necessary on the urban level. Some of the key features must include: • prolonged, sustained and comprehensive performances by to-beestablished public-planning urban-based institutions; • these institutions will enjoy support of dramatic political leadership by demonstrating vision and competence, which, in turn, can facilitate the marshaling of major economic resources; • which, in time, will establish a reputation for integrity and competence and be dedicated to gaining indigenous professional institutional developmental experience and capability. Assessing of Herculean task, and division of responsibility between public and private sectors. Hence, as we seek to study and plan recovery for the plight of Iraq, and its search for a course back from disaster postwar, the civil government (now aborning) must establish extraordinary and reliable public institutions for planning and developing sustained rebuilding, with proper attention to the local level. Sustained, prolonged rebuilding must be institutionally promoted and regulated by fully competent localized government agencies. Some tasks are clearly to be performed entirely by the public sector.2 Conversely, a complementing mixed public/private sector must earn its place. On the one hand, the public side of the public/private sector can “set the table and chairs and salt the pantry with yeast” and, in addition, regulate process; but, on the other hand—as a general maxim—the private side of that mixed process must “select the ingredients and bake the cake”—envisioning, designing, performing, building and operating (and, yes, gaining a profit from) sustainable societal rebuilding. To repeat: despite the promises of major public U.S. funding for reconstruction (when the war started), most rebuilding will have to find strong elements of private-sector initiative, capability and funding. Public/private collaboration, with integrity and transparency, has been shown to work well over time. Public institutions best perform an essentially regulatory role over the performance of urban redeveloping. Some of these bureaucracies succeed; but some bureaucracies are disappointing.

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Applying Resources Taking public funding as far as it will go. No one should look a gift horse in the mouth. Every effort should be pursued to gain both outside public funding and inside public funding for urban development in Iraq. At one point, this U.S. Administration was touting that it could restructure Iraq to the full with $30 billion. Much has been expended for top-down reconstruction and the results are hard to determine; but all that has been assessed and determined—so far—is that most of that funding was not well applied, and most of the reconstruction was a disappointment. Moreover, powers-that-be in Washington D.C. are “not returning phone calls” and are currently ducking future responsibility for future reconstruction. As noted, worthwhile rebuilding can take place with a mix of public and private funding. Public funding should be available for basic urban infrastructure; and conversely, private entrepreneurship and funding will be required for clearly private redevelopments. The closer the rebuilding comes to the local ground level, the more likely that public funding will be found scarce. Critical concept of public/private development using public/private funding. True sustainable development will gain a proper momentum for rebuilding Iraq when actual private sector entrepreneurs and private funding become regularized, but private entrepreneurs are chronically in short supply. Ultimately, sustainable development gets its full wind when private entrepreneurs with private funding sources become a mainstay: but, in the shorter run, it can serve well for early developments to draw on public-sourced funding that, in counterpoint, will be repaid from the private developer/entrepreneur (as that developer earns revenues from such commercial project).3 Public/private funding and public funding complement one another. Of course, public funding is essential; it must make vital progress in nationally-oriented hard-infrastructure rebuilding (such as highways, bridges, hospitals). And, on the local level, there are hard infrastructures as well—such as water and sewers and local roads—that should be constructed with public funding. But, to stress, sustainable economic progress occurs when private entrepreneurs initiate and fulfill commercial enterprise. Accordingly, real sustainable development is achieved when private sector entrepreneurs seek out opportunities to redevelop (commercially oriented) developments.

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But at what point will a private entrepreneur come forward and seek to invest and be responsible for commercial developing and long-term performance? What conditions must the private entrepreneur perceive? Must not there be a transparent public/private plan, indeed a locally prepared plan, whereby a critical mass for a battery of respective commercial developments designed thoughtfully to fill a series of attractive commercial roles? Must not there be a process whereby the private entrepreneurs will see that other private entrepreneurs are coming forward? It then follows that the locales will have to put in place a systematized process for promoting a rational complex of commercial opportunities. Furthermore, such institutions must offer transparent processes whereby all private sector entrepreneurs see that the best prospects are being advanced and, being so advanced, are being held to commercially rational standards. Local, systematized institutional promotion and advancement of private sector development is the goal—promoting ongoing public /private partnerships. In the case of public/private projects, the public sector proposes and the private sector disposes. (One hand must wash the other). Localized Programming Pilot programs. Some serious leadership is necessary to bring a proper level of priority toward localized development. In the absence of sound proactive leadership, nearly all public planners start off with their initial empowerment occurring at the national level; and, being so empowered, these new planners seek to show progress toward clear national goals. In contrast, political leadership is necessary to shift away from this “default” orientation. Some locales must speak up and demand that they be accorded the opportunity to be empowered to show a proper share of bottom-up development. Getting there from here. It seems “a bridge too far” to expect that the nascent national government of Iraq, with the guidance of the U.S. military and State Department advisors, will be able to structure a comprehensive set of redeveloping statutes and implementing institutions—coincidently top-down and bottom-up (for the entire country)—the first time through. Conversely, there ought to be another course for enabling and empowering local communities that are ready to show initiative. One such means is to focus on prospective pilot programs that can be initiated in local communities that are eager to fill such a role.

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Indeed, there is one part of Iraq where indigenous capability is being pulled together and where successful rebuilding is underway: in Kurdistan. A strong case can be made that urban-oriented institution of public planning and urban redevelopment can be set in train immediately (on a pilot program basis) in Kurdistan. Nascent democracy. Just as it was too much to expect a prompt, smooth-functioning democracy in Iraq, where no democracy had previously existed, it may be too much to expect that most cities of Iraq can establish sophisticated redeveloping regulatory agencies from scratch. Most notably, Baghdad has been in free fall. Yet, the best ideas that can be offered up for consideration should be brought forward: herein, we are advancing the thesis that democracy mandates a counter-balancing exploitation between the complementing, but distinct, resources of the public sector and the private sector, respectively. If Iraq is going to be able to achieve prompt and sustained rebuilding, it is behooved to look for exemplars of public planning institutions that have proved successful, and we offer an exemplar herein. As noted above, the localized soft infrastructure of Kurdistan gives strong evidence that it could be an ideal locus to develop further soft infrastructure in the form of an institutionalized localized process for promoting and advancing commercial redevelopment. Focusing on Iraq Bringing forward (or back) a millennium of history. Muslim— especially Arab—lands have had to cope with the Sunni/Shia division for a millennium and more; yet, civil life had avoided any incipient civil war conditions, until the CPA’s rush toward immediate democracy forced an accentuation and governmental institutionalization of such division. This imposed nascent democratization in Iraq prompted the opposite of its intended result and its intuitive promise. Similarly, the long-standing but suppressed rights of the Kurds in Northern Iraq must find their place in this nascent democracy. Fateful conundrum. Then there is the fateful conundrum: that peaceful democracy cannot evolve without significant and sustained rebuilding; but significant and sustained rebuilding cannot evolve without peaceful government.

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The portending chaos will very likely visit catastrophe to the Middle East and, in addition, impose indelible ignominy on the West and the U.S. leadership thereof. Serious effort should be offered from U.S. institutions, such as UMASS/Boston (and from Boston generally), to head off that catastrophe to the extent this “city of ideas” has helpful contributions to offer. Despite the awkward scene, planning can surely start toward fashioning municipal-level institutions of planning and development. Despite the awkward, difficult scene (and in part because of it) we can (and should) focus entirely herein on the premise that most rebuilding will take place in urban contexts; and, to that end, the best exemplars available for institutional public/private planning should be sought at the municipal level. It is not saying much, but it is axiomatic to stress that nearly all redevelopment is to be accomplished at a local level. Local government should (indeed must) be the vehicle for promoting and regulation such development. Moreover, much of the funding will involve private source funding. Accordingly, locales that desire to advance their role in the process of rebuilding must gain institutional capability to achieve such development promotion and regulation. Looking at Model Exemplars for Use in Pilot Programs Looking at an exemplar of a municipal planning and development agency. Much is known by the authors of this chapter as to the breadth of experience and success of the Boston Redevelopment Authority (BRA). Moreover, we know that the BRA has evolved over time to cope with evolving tasks and challenges—over the past half century. Further, the BRA stands out in relative terms over other municipal redevelopment agencies. This chapter advances the thesis that the BRA is the ideal institutional public planning and redevelopment agency to serve as an exemplar for fashioning a replication thereof in Iraq—for bringing forth the best possible prospect of sustainable community-based rebuilding postdisaster. Bias toward community-oriented redeveloping process. The authors hold and stress a common bias (that arises from decades of experience): the best urban public planning involves a process that includes participation by the affected communities as early and integral features of

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the planning process. The affected communities are vital stakeholders; and, as such, will expect to be involved. Such expectation can be, and is best, respected. Sometimes that process of community involvement is called the soft aspect of the redevelopment process; while, conversely, concrete and steel provide the hard component. In between the soft side and the hard side—in the middle—are the roles of the developer and his architect, who will, in turn, create the prospective value-added and be responsible for the ultimate development (to be brought in to being) and for its sustainability (alongside companion developments). In addition, sustainability will be much advanced by the involvement of indigenous representatives—as these representatives will have to live with the results for decades to come. Advancing the thesis hereof to the powers-that-be. At this early point in the study of holistic and comprehensive sustained rebuilding in Iraq, we must acknowledge the need to gain broad acceptance amongst the governing powers-that-be (today the U.S. military “holds the hammer,” but this could change); and these momentary, major mavens will need to (and should now) seek out professional expert rebuilding consultancy. Moreover, one point of consultancy should be to promote the prompt and sustained establishment of both native, endemic capability for public planning, and the institutionalization of sustainable rebuilding. Action plans must be presented to and digested by these powers-that-be. New public planning agencies must be proposed and critiqued; new indigenous schools of public planning must be designed and set in motion. Professionalism must draw upon rigorous training and competent experience. Modal processes must be traced out whereby the to-beestablished institutional planning agencies would set out broad visions of prospective development and then seek out fully specific opportunity proposals from the private sector. For example, the type of institutionalized public process that is used by the BRA has been in place for generations; and it is time-tested in a variety of contexts. This institutional process is the process the authors believe should be posited and customized, as necessary; and pilot programs that utilize such process should be set in motion without delay. The BRA as Exemplar The BRA. Boston has exceptional and world-class public planning resources. The prime resource is the Boston Redevelopment Authority

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(BRA), which is the sole city public planning authority in the nation that has both planning and development authority and responsibility. The BRA has a professional staff of over 100. The accomplishments of the BRA are more than extensive, and (being a semi-autonomous agency) are ongoing and strongly institutionalized. All major developments in Boston pass through the BRA and, as such, undergo much interactive iteration—all as contemplated by its institutionalized process. The institutionalization of development. Again, all major building permits must pass through the BRA. Moreover, every zoning variance and rezoning evolution in the city receives professional comment from the BRA Staff—indeed such zoning is typically initiated by the BRA. Accordingly, the BRA must judge and affect almost every point of building in Boston. Moreover, being semi-autonomous, its personnel resources overlap political changes in city administration. Accordingly, professionalism and consistency reign over all development. The promotion of development. The BRA not only judges all major developments in an objective posture; but (more to the points herein) the BRA also promotes major development, both directly and indirectly. Again, the BRA is both the planning agency for the City of Boston and its permitting agency. (Such joining of potentially conflicting roles is unique in the U.S.). Notably, over the past half century, the BRA has assembled real estate parcels in strategic locations, especially land that suffers from blight; and, upon finishing such assembly and setting out public planning for the subject land, the BRA will issue “Requests for Proposals” (RFPs) seeking response from the private sector. The response to these RFPs has been strong and impressive. Developers will propose developments that add much value to public goals, the area involved, and the site—and, in addition, they bring profit (especially long-term) to themselves. The most attractive of such submitted proposals are in turn selected by the Board of the BRA upon the recommendation of the Staff. However, this initial review and selection only determines “Tentative Designation” of the winning proposing developer. That winning developer, armed with a Tentative Designation, will round out a full development team; and, in turn, with such development team coupled with a Designation, the favored developer can secure attractive private-sector financing terms for this development. Much greater architectural detail is thence generated. In addition, notably, the developer and the architect then must continue engaging in strenuous community meetings so that every community concern is heard and every

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reasonable concern receives reasonable response. Such efforts and progress lead, in turn, to the gaining of final designation. Dissecting the internals of institutional process. It is stressed herein that long-term sustained development must be institutionalized to be successful. Yet institutionalization requires a professionally-oriented staff and consistent, transparent processes. Moreover, because the subject developer must invest serious effort and resources into its first initial proposal (in response to the RFP), the credibility of the Staff and the process does much to induce (and empower) the drawing forward of entrepreneurial developers. However, the brief salutary summaries so noted above of the institutionalized process misses much of the point sought to be made herein; to that end, such institutionalized processes should be set out in particularized detail to show the rigorousness and the necessity of the institutionalization to gain credibility. Hence, it should help this presentation to set out the institutionalization of development of a classic development. In such cases the BRA: • identifies prospective urban sites that chronically lag into blight and, in addition, fashion generalized plans for the highest and best usage of such land; • uses its honed, localized urban vision to “make straight the path” for major site-specific profit-making opportunities for the privatesector development community, which opportunities should serve the valuable double duty of both promoting major benefit for Boston and its stakeholders and facilitating profit-opportunities for a private developer; • structures the needed legal underpinning, such as zoning and permit process; • structures the relevant physical infrastructure (such as roads and sewers); • assembles key real estate parcels (often using the power of eminent domain); • then issues out institutionalized Requests for Proposals (RFPs) to the development community. Such RFPs cause the entrepreneurial development community to compete positively by way of proposing (bidding in) prospectively successful projects that, in turn, would accelerate the very “critical mass” vision just set in motion by the BRA. BRA Staff then assess such competing proposals and make recommendations for project improvements (with

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particular sensitivity toward expected concern to be felt by the affected community), and use their experience to rate the competing proposals. Thereupon an institutionalized process to select and to issue out a Tentative Designation will ensue—involving a transparent public and community process together with initial community explanation meetings; and again, there is further moment of project iteration. By now, there is a degree of public atmosphere about the general plans and, in addition, the leading specific development plans; and, as such, a public sense of project would be coming into being. Per force, the Staff of the BRA will have encountered many community critics and be in an early position to determine whether the project will inflict burdens on the scene and whether those burdens can and should be “weathered.” The Staff will then make a recommendation for the granting of Tentative Designation; in turn, that recommendation will be digested by the BRA Board at a public hearing at which both the developer and major figures in the community will have their views heard on the specific project—and attention is also given to concessions that have been made to the community by such developer. The Board of the BRA (comprised of five members, enjoying staggered five year terms) is presented with a well-documented recommendation; and that Board is in a position to cross-examine the Staff and the representatives of the developer. The Board will ask the developer (and his professional staff) probing questions to determine the sense of the developer and the developer’s sense of the project. Typically, the Board will accept such recommendation—as, by that point, the developer is committed to the worth of the project and its opportunity value to him; and, accordingly, such entrepreneurial developer can be expected to make an impressive presentation. Such Tentatively Designated (and now broadly understood) development project will have two additional years (pro forma) to achieve Final Designation (with full financial commitments, full architectural tasks and a rounding out of a broad competent development and construction team). Most developments that achieve Tentative Designation will achieve, in turn, Final Designation, and, as such, succeed. Moreover, one successful development leads to more. Most critically, the vast bulk of development capital and ensuing commercial enterprise comes from and stays with the private sector. It is not unusual for the marketplace to suffer setbacks; and per force, the Final Designation is delayed, principally because the banking community applies rational restraints upon the developer.

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The role of the private sector. No institutionalized process will succeed as set out above unless there is an entrepreneurial class of real estate developers available and eager to try their hand at making serious profit by way of exploiting the RFPs issued by the BRAs of this world. In Iraq, much must be learned in that regard. Furthermore, such entrepreneurial class must gain a comfortable sense as to the credibility of the institutionalized process. They cannot expend time, opportunity cost, and serious soft costs if the institutionalized process is not a reliable one. Conversely, they cannot find themselves developing into a market that is inordinately saturated—by the absence of market modulation. Relevant History of the BRA Genesis of the BRA. While aggressive urban development today in the U.S. is but a shadow of what it was a half-century ago, much wisdom and expertise was gained in that half-century. All of that can and should be used to accomplish sustainable rebuilding after any disaster—and, for our purposes herein, for use in Iraq post-war. Once our nation was committed to aggressive urban renewal (with major public funding). Ironically, the leader in Congress for urban redevelopment was Senator Taft, who was known in the 1950s as Mr. Republican. As you would expect, the Democrats were more than pleased to support such proposals. Coming out of WWII, the nation looked to the Federal Government for leadership, especially in view of the then highlygraduated federal income tax—and hence the prospective financial font of all good deeds. Conversely, the cities of the nation had suffered during the Depression and from war priorities—and, as such, evidenced counterproductive blight. Jumping ahead to President Reagan in the 1980s, the Federal Government succeeded in cutting the income tax rate and many of the roles of the federal treasury. Aggressive urban renewal (with strong public funding) ceased, and is now a thing of the past, at least in Boston. Yet, ironically, the BRA lives on and achieves as much as before (especially during “bull real estate markets”)—making strong usage of the technique of pubic/private partnerships and permitting power. Understanding past local history of the BRA. There are two prominent points to the early history of the BRA, and that early history still lingers. First, the BRA came into being at a time when the federal government had adopted aggressive urban redevelopment policies (in the 1950s), which

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included major public funding for slum clearance and land takings by eminent domain—especially for public housing. Armed with such funding (and the excitement of this dramatic role) the BRA had a high opinion of its powers and the worthiness of the agency to enjoy such powers. Second, because of this institutional hubris, the BRA set out (in its signature initial project) to demolish an entire integral and affordable (albeit run-down) neighborhood in downtown Boston and to replace that neighborhood with so-called high-end, high-rent, high-rise housing (that was the vogue in the 50s). However, the people displaced from that neighborhood in the West End (Jewish, Italian and generally mixed), felt wronged (chiefly because the rents of the replacement redevelopments were much above their range of affordability); and, in time, the rest of Boston felt likewise. Consequently, the BRA gained a (burdensome) image of being a powerful, well-funded and bureaucratic agency that prefers not to listen; and when it does listen, it prefers to listen to developers. This is ironic, as the BRA has spent the last 40 years with a much more sensitive appreciation for neighborhoods; and (to add to its cache-comedown) the BRA has no more federal funds to “muscle” itself around town. The BRA can cause development to occur, but only by exploiting its own expertise. Just as we can observe the stumbling efforts of the U.S. military and State Department trying to succeed in Iraq relying on a non-indigenous, non-professional and wholly top-down rebuilding process, the BRA has had its own history of stumbling. It is very hard to get it right the first time. Recent history of the BRA. Times change: now agencies like the BRA must reach into their own creative genius and expertise to promote and regulate public holistically-oriented redevelopment in Boston—with principal financial recourse being to the financial risk-taking entrepreneurship of the private sector. The BRA strives to achieve the same ends by a combination of vision, experience, control of the public/private process and understanding of creative synergy of the public/private development community—and, in addition, appreciation of the phenomenon of “critical mass” (whereby the end result can exceed the input). However, there are chronic ups and downs. In times of recession, the public hails any progress achievable by the BRA; but, in contrast, the development community finds the securing of financing to be a major challenge. Conversely, in boom times, the public becomes a hard marker—as new developments are seen as less

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necessary and prospectively leading to overcrowding and prospective inflation of land and rents. Relevance of the Experience and Structure of the BRA Generally, the public sector needs a variety of vehicles to perform public roles. Governments are ordained to serve the public. Some functions are legislative, executive and judicial; but some are a mixed process. Starting during the Depression, the U.S. legal system developed a new animal within the legal process: administrative agencies and administrative law. Also, similar evolution occurred in and around cities— for example, with transit authorities, bridge authorities, port authorities and turnpike authorities, and, more recently, water and sewer authorities. Some of these agencies and authorities were empowered to issue bonds for capital funding and their bonds would, in turn, be serviced by agency and authority fee-based revenues that were collected from users. Typically, these agencies and authorities were limited and restricted in their scope of activity, and functioned without much public hue and cry. Yet, sometimes the public sector needs an exceptional agency possessing multiple powers that can shape urban landscape, urban flavor and even urban moguls. While the typical service-oriented public agency and authority is but a functionary entity; some exceptional agencies may have to fill a public role that is a mix of legislative, executive and judicial functions. And, in consequence, some rare public agencies can function beyond typical government glacial attenuation, and—ineluctably—in the heat of public controversy. The cities of the U.S. were seen to need additional legal process that could bring urban resources, urban savvy, and a mold-breaking orientation to enable cities to redevelop themselves—especially after one era passes into another (and, in consequence, its infrastructure is ill fitting going forward). Reshaping urban infrastructure (soft and hard, public and private) requires broad public participation, major infusion of capital (both public and private), and, pointedly, some real estate parcels must be transformed from an obsolete use to a more viable one. Many individual and existing interests will be affected, many will benefit, and many will ask questions. This is a rare, but vital, public activity. And, as noted often herein, some private entrepreneurs must be mustered to play a tip-of-the-spear role. Redevelopment must be sustainable; and only long-term private profit provides both the engine and the fuel capacity to set a new, sustainable urban era in place. Such

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entrepreneurs must be attracted; and, if attracted, some of them will end up being favored by being selected by the systemic process—provided, in their turn, they will fulfill a critical holistic private sector role as mandated. Important quasi-legal process. The granting of public (or any other) benefits to private individuals, whether by legislative, executive, or judicial decision must pass time-tested standards for fair and proper public process. Accordingly, redevelopment authorities, their Boards and Staff must achieve and demonstrate integrity, transparency, consistency and competence with mandates of tradition, of law and of legal process (while also demonstrating savvy and empathy) as they advance major changes in the urban city-scape. Likewise, if a municipality in Iraq seeks to establish urban redevelopment agencies, it is strongly urged that the public and legal protections that have been built up in an agency such as the BRA be carefully replicated on paper and in reality. Much legalism and politics are involved. Somehow, a solid time-tested legal process must be imported and imparted. Looking at the Functioning Process of the BRA Springing from legislation—Federal, but mostly state. In the original construct of urban renewal, the Federal Government (via “HUD,” the Department of Housing and Urban Development) cast itself with a major national transformative role. Monies flowed therefrom to cities having established qualifying urban renewal agencies. Boston’s BRA was one of the first such agencies and was the most aggressive—and, accordingly, received significant federal funding. Cities, in their turn, need enabling legislation to function anew; and accordingly, special state statutes were adopted in Massachusetts so as to establish the BRA (and similarly make straight the path for any other municipalities wishing to follow suit). Empowerment of the BRA by state statute as semi-distinct government body. The BRA was and is set up as a distinct government authority to function autonomously—(more or less) apart from the State of Massachusetts and the City of Boston (with confirming ordinances by the Boston City Council). The state exercises a normative, albeit limited, role, by reason of appointing one member of the BRA Board; in turn, the City has a very major role—by appointing (via its Mayor) the remaining four

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members of the Board. Moreover, the City of Boston confirm such appointments and must bolster the budget for the BRA from time to time. That five-member Board is empowered by statute to perform any and all acts of the BRA. However, such Board does not function full-time; instead it is part-time. And its compensation is very modest. Such Board members must earn their ordinary living as ordinary citizens. The terms (of five years) of the Board are staggered so as to avoid any sweeping changes therein. Notably, most Board members serve multiple terms—as they are seen to be helpful cogs in an important public wheel. Similarly, the Staff of the BRA is thought of as a professional staff; and, as such, enjoys longevity of employment (although they have no claim thereto— other than the respect they earn for themselves and the Authority). While the BRA is a distinct legal body, it serves and is seen to serve a clear and exclusively municipal function for Boston. Both the Board and the Staff see themselves serving a special role for their city. By tradition, its Board and Staff are residents of Boston and respected in their respective communities. Similarly, any inquiries issued by any citizens or from Boston-oriented entity are accorded very high respect. Semi-autonomy of the BRA. The BRA, although an autonomous agency (and legally governed by its Board), has a more-than-mystical relationship with the Mayor of Boston. By tradition (and real politique), the Director of the BRA is selected by the Mayor—and, as such, is recommended by the Mayor for hiring by the Board. The Director, simply put, runs the BRA. While, on the one hand, the Director works for the BRA Board; on the other hand, that Board only meets twice a month (for a half-day). Furthermore, when the Board does meet, it has a full agenda of specific and complex matters to address, presented to the Board by the Director. It is a major accomplishment to fulfill that agenda—including the heavy task of taking of evidence on prospective and/or immediate public/private projects. The Board is and feels very busy—especially having spent many an evening reading up before the meetings and, in addition, monitoring multiple community meetings. In counterpoint, the Director and the Mayor work every day in the same building, and each is in contact together with their respective staffs on myriad onerous municipal matters. The personal prospects of both the Mayor and the Director are fulfilled in large measure to the extent that they function together compatibly. While, in general, much of politics is unwritten; so too, in particular, much of the relationship between the Mayor and the BRA is unwritten. Most notably, there is one strong unwritten code: if the public is inclined

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to hurl (short-term) criticism towards a particular public/private project, that criticism seems typically to land upon the BRA and its Board and Staff. That Board and Staff, being multi-headed or anonymous (respectively), somehow weather such criticism in “admirable silence.” In turn, the Mayor only suffers the ricochet of the political bullets fired by a momentarily-irate public. The Mayor, in time, gains respect by reason of the economy and the nature of the city becoming more holistic and sustainable than otherwise. In turn, both the Board (and the Staff) and the Mayor are expected to have enough wisdom and savvy to anticipate, and so avoid generating, permanent ire of the populace. Legal process of the BRA’s vital public/private function. When the BRA makes selections for tentative-developer and permanent-developer designations, the effect of these designations is significant. Public benefits are granted to select, favored private entrepreneurs. Accordingly, there must be a transparent process whereby the opportunity for such selection—at the very first—will have been publicly offered out in the form of Requests for Proposals to any and all comers. In turn, those RFPs are often snapped up by able entrepreneurs who fashion impressive and creative responses—such that that both i) the public need, designed to be advanced in the RFP, will be fulfilled in a salutary manner; and ii) the prospective developer will structure enough added value to the proposal so that a comfortable profit (especially in the long term) will flow to that entrepreneur. In turn, these Response Proposals to the RFP are open for public inspection. More critically, the professional Staff of the BRA will perform due diligence thereon and offer comment on all the Response Proposals (to the Director and his senior officers). Furthermore, the most attractive of those Response Proposals will become the subject of community meetings where the opinion of the community is solicited. And more to the point, there is always a cadre of naysayers who are given a fair forum at these community meetings. Much heat and (inevitably) some light arise from these community meetings. Quasi-judicial decision responding to sound substantial evidence. Ultimately a full and impressive evidential record will be presented before the Board at pubic hearings to show how and why a particular favored development and developer, if selected, can be expected to serve the public need.4 Moreover, the Board sees itself as being mandated in procedural law to act existentially as a quasi-judicial body that acts upon well-presented evidence showing exemplary application of developmental

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expertise of both the applicant and the Staff. (The traditional legal standard for administrative agency requires that their judgment be based upon “substantial evidence;” while, politically, the Board often raises that standard to a “preponderance of evidence”). In turn, any disappointed applicant is free to pursue legal remedy in court, but overturns are rare.5 The press adds another level of transparency, as the press could argue that the evidential presentation should have led to a contrary conclusion, or, for example, that the judgment exercised by the Board did not consider some counterpoint urban priorities. But again, such criticism (if only that) tends to have limited effect. “Squaring the circle” of a haunting political dilemma. The credibility of the legal process helps very much to “square the circle” of a haunting political dilemma. Political campaigns for mayor are expensive. Such campaigns can only be funded by political campaign contributions. There are many campaign contributors: inevitably, some of the campaign contributors (all subject to transparent public scrutiny) include some of the favored developmental entrepreneurs. The system is imperfect.6 Yet even these developmental entrepreneurs can be accorded a fair review process, because their presentations are all on the record and the process is transparent and fully reviewable. The strong, open legal records, leading to a legally-grounded grant of public favor, which can be questioned in courts of law, have been able to stand up—time after time. Time required for gestation of public/private projects. If a municipality in Iraq wishes to establish a localized institutional process to enable recourse to the synergy resulting from public/private partnerships, then planning must begin promptly and plans set in motion. It will take time to propose, to reflect on and to put the soft institutional infrastructure in place; and it will take time to have that institutional infrastructure gear up to full reality. In turn, it takes time for a cadre of developmental entrepreneurs to be bought into focus, who would assess the opportunity for long-term profit. These steps are noted elsewhere herein: at this point we seek only to stress the need to get started. Applicable Unique Talents Found within the BRA The additional role of urban institutional rebuilders as a vehicle for cross-community bridging. When structuring new programs and institutions for the rebuilding of Iraq and/or Iraqi Kurdistan, it should be

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noted that Boston and the BRA have demonstrated a special talent for cross-community bridge-building. Serendipitously, the BRA and the University of Massachusetts at Boston (UMASS/Boston) had linked up in the late 1980s to serve as a catalyst to jump-start reconciliation, reform and rebuilding in Northern Ireland. That team was led by one of the authors hereof (as its Chairman); he was joined by the then-Director of the BRA, and by a faculty member of UMASS/Boston. The City of Derry served as pilot exemplar for all Northern Ireland. An entrée was made into a divided (and war-torn) community under a local and regional academic collaborative, employing Magee College in Derry and University College Galway. The response from all sides of the community was resounding. Derry soon became the model and catalyst to hasten an end to the “Troubles” in Northern Ireland (a Nobel Peace Prize was granted to the local political leader, John Hume).7 Evolving redevelopment agency expertise. As any redevelopment agency functions, a body of expertise builds up. And, in particular, an understanding of commercial reasonableness builds up. A sense of balance amongst conflicting priorities builds up. For example, while on the one hand, a redevelopment agency would never think that it should have the power to limit the number of hotels in an urban area; on the other hand, the same agency would believe that it has a key role of modulating the number of hotels to be built at any one time so as to avoid any boom and bust in that industry; likewise office buildings, residential apartments and condominiums, and shopping complexes.8 Then there are requirements of a municipality that seem apart from economics and aesthetics, but bear heavily on issues of sustainability. For example, such disasters may have disrupted childhood education, damaged public health and/or caused the missing of vital community ingredients. In the first period of post-disaster response, the municipal redevelopment agency can become a one-time ad hoc advocate for fulfilling urgent community needs. Immediate role for a redevelopment agency, post-disaster. Apart from the long-term role of a redevelopment agency, there are moments—such as the present in Iraq—where a nascent redevelopment agency must venture itself as a newly arrived “white knight.” Iraq has been and is suffering from disaster. Public commitment toward a suitable rebuilding program is at a very high point. There is a front-and-center sense of need for change and the opportunities that come therefrom.

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This moment would be “present at the creation moment.” The U.S. bears a heavy onus and should be seen as a resource for rebuilding. It could and should offer expertise for post-disaster sustainable rebuilding. UMASS/Boston and its Center for Rebuilding Sustainable Communities after Disaster are so disposed, if retained. Conversely, there must be a client municipality and/or province that wish to draw on that disposition and availability. Replicating the Structure of the BRA for an Iraq Municipality Available model. There is much to commend using the model of the BRA. Not only is it readily available: it is also readily replicable. Moreover, it is the bias of the authors that the built-in safeguards have proven valuable. The authors are much familiar with that functional construct, and how it could be translated to another locus. They are also familiar with instances where BRA staffers or alumni have provided unobtrusive consultancy advises, working with the in-place legal construct on the ground (in scenes such as Iraq). Inevitably, there are a brace of legal questions that must be plumbed. As noted below, there are differing traditions in law in Iraq and the region. Hence, the model of the BRA can be replicated or not, as the local mavens prefer. However, there should be a compelling mandate to achieve sustainability in rebuilding communities, and achieving such sustainability will require an agency such as the BRA. Differing legal traditions. The legal system of the U.S. is the progeny of the U.K.’s Common Law system. Conversely, law systems in much of the rest of world, including the Middle East, are the progeny of the Civil Law system that originated in Roman times and was brought to impressive status and promulgation by Napoleon. The French Civil Code influenced all European Civil Codes; and, in turn, European Union-derived codes influenced codes adopted in Arab lands, including Iraq.9 Setting up an administrative agency under the Civil Law system should be expected to have differences from the same task under the Common Law tradition. However, that circle can be squared. In states such as Louisiana and California (and the Canadian Province of Quebec) current day needs for administrative law have been worked through despite the divergence of legal traditions. For now, it is believed sound to predict that such differences can be readily navigated.

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Differing practical traditions. Despite the divergent legal traditions, there are also, we expect, differing practical traditions. While here in the U.S. we are accustomed to prolonged and tedious legal record-building, it should be queried as to whether such a norm would befit Arab-governing style. Positing the BRA modality. As articulated in detail herein, the BRA is structured by means of statutory empowerment of a five-person Board of Directors who are ordained to govern an autonomous quasi-legal administrative agency (with geographic franchise limited to the City of Boston). The statute was adopted at the state level, which is normative in the U.S. federal system. Is it normative for the Provinces in Iraq to be governed by a Provincial Parliament; and is such Parliament empowered to establish administrative agencies that may serve a complementing role for a municipality? Furthermore, municipalities are presumably governed locally; and, as such, can facilitating coordination be ordained to empower a localized administrative agency to function in relation to local ordinances (such as zoning ordinances)? A genuine study is in order. Should this Board of Directors be cast as a part-time Board? If it was compensated with but a nominal consideration, then the practical effect is that such Board can only function part time (unless a Member is independently wealthy). In the case of the BRA, the Director has been the most important figure. For example, the Director has held the power to hire and fire. He hires the principal officers and, in turn, the entire Staff. Notably, urban planning capability is a strong point of expertise in the U.S. (and, in consequence, a strong and valuable Staff is available to serve the Director—and ultimately the Board). More on Sustainability There is much to sustainability: it must not be sloughed off, and yet it typically is. When rebuilding post-disaster there is a nagging “default” orientation toward using the wrong institutions, the wrong plans, with the wrong perspective, starting at the wrong point. Iraq is about to become the classic case of a “perfect storm”—whereby the world’s only super power invaded the wrong country, the wrong way and then proceeded in every wrong way to try to achieve rectifying rebuilding. But there is no point in expressing an exasperated polemic. Whether we were right before, we must strive to be right going forward. Indeed, if

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we proceed rationally going forward, we may well be remembered for having rescued ourselves by showing that rebuilding can cover a multitude of sins. We must dig in deep to embrace sustainability.10 We cannot slough it off. No one is a true expert in achieving momentary sustainability, because the essence of sustainability is proven out over time—and, more critically, is shaped over time. All societies—national or local—work to readjust over time whenever it is seen that a certain set of modalities are not working. Moreover, when we see such modalities not working, that provides an ideal focus for correction. However, when rebuilding postdisaster, sustainability has to occur in a near-moment. We must understand sustainability at the outset and get it right at the outset. Even experts have few models to draw upon. It is a natural orientation of the U.S. military to deal with the immediate, when they are under fire (and had never been in the business of sustainability). There are compound reasons why there is little attention being given to sustainability and localized development by the controlling military. Not only does it take some serious leadership on the local level to prompt any non-expert power-that-be (after a disaster) to heed the need for a concentration of capability toward sustainability; but, in the case of the military, there is justifiable preoccupation when the state of war is still present (five years after the original invasion). The immediate scene for the military is to shift and reshift strategy and tactics so as to overcome the insurgency, and, to a degree, their “Surge” is helping. But one has to wonder. Somehow the military—despite its dilemma—must look to experts in public planning for rebuilding post-disaster (despite being under fire).11 Again, it is the thesis of this chapter that local institutions that emulate the process used in Boston for localized developing will accelerate such development; and by reason of such acceleration, the prospects of peaceful cohabitation will increase. Conclusion There is much to do to set matters right in Iraq. A heavy onus rests on our national leadership. Moreover, our national leadership needs help—as the endemic capabilities of the national government (that drove us deep into this mess) are largely unfit to get us through; and worse, that leadership must be persuaded it needs such help and that such help is

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available to be marshaled from and amongst the public planning realm— especially the municipal public planning realm. The nature of municipal public planning (and other such planning) requires development of indigenous developmental and planning capacity on the ground in municipalities. Stakeholders must be involved as a norm. This capability is prospectively endemic to localized institutions, but not national institutions. Moreover, the Boston Redevelopment Authority can and should serve as ideal exemplar for the type of institutions with the type of institutionalized process that will make such public/private redevelopment credible and sustainable. Its success and credibility are salutary. Public funding must be used where available; but municipal development can (and usually must) proceed by way of inducing private developers to secure private financing—who can rely on institutional and reliable regulatory processes being put in place in cities that are ripe for redevelopment (in this case, because of severe war damage). And, in turn, such institutional agencies will reach out to find developmental entrepreneurs who can and will see strong and attractive profit opportunities on previously fallow land when redeveloped consistent with creative planning. Notably, cities in Kurdistan are ripe to pursue such a redevelopment process: a pilot effort in Kurdistan with a model municipal development agency can become a model for all Iraq.

CHAPTER 10 REBUILDING IRAQ: THEORETICAL ISSUES AND PRACTICAL APPROACHES TO REBUILDING SUSTAINABLE COMMUNITIES AFTER DISASTERS Reconstruction Experiences from Afghanistan: What Lessons can be Learned from Successes and Mistakes

The rebuilding of Iraq presents numerous complexities and challenges. After four years of war and, to a lesser extent, ten more years of economic sanctions imposed by the international community, this nation of 227,000 square miles is devastated. Communities large and small have been destroyed, and Iraq’s infrastructure is virtually non-existent. The challenge facing the world community extends beyond physically rebuilding Iraq: according to the Council on Foreign Relations, more than two million Iraqis have fled to surrounding nations, particularly Jordan and Syria, and another million have been displaced within Iraq itself.1 If Iraq is to recover, the bulk of those three million will need to be repatriated. While these issues are daunting, they are not unprecedented. Many of the challenges present in Iraq today could be found in Afghanistan when that country’s reconstruction effort began in 2002. While Iraq and Afghanistan are certainly very different nations, many of the lessons that were learned in Afghanistan can be applied to the reconstruction of Iraq. Recent U.S.-sponsored rebuilding efforts in war-torn areas have failed for one of two reasons: • They revolved around super-fast-tracked projects through which enormous amounts of money were spent. While this approach often enriches those who control the process (most often American corporations), it seldom leads to success. • Many rebuilding projects, particularly larger ones, are encompassed in red tape, which strangles the project to the point where it dies a slow death. We must—and can—do better in Iraq.

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The greatest impediment to infrastructure development is the violence that has been wrought by the civil war, and the difficulty in maintaining security throughout the country. To some extent, the hopes of successfully rebuilding Iraq rest on the ability of the powers in control to improve security; however, in spite of the current lack of security, it is imperative for the international community to begin creating a plan for rebuilding Iraq. Before any reconstruction program can be developed, the political implications must be considered. The political context in which any rebuilding effort is pursued is highly complex, and if not adequately addressed is likely to lead to failure. Political issues impact all projects from beginning to end, and they must be an important element of any rebuilding project. Four issues must be addressed before a rebuilding strategy is developed for any individual community: Who benefits from the project physically and politically? Every project benefits a variety of groups. Obviously, residents of rebuilt communities are the primary beneficiaries, but there may also be additional individuals or groups who profit; for instance, local political leaders can be positively or negatively impacted by the success or failure of a project and their relationship to that project. Therefore, it is important to obtain the support of local leaders for planned projects, and to work closely with those leaders to maintain it. Additionally, local tradespeople and residents may benefit if new jobs are created by a project. Typically, jobs translate into local support: this is an important political consideration whenever a project is being planned. Finally, local entrepreneurs and merchants stand to benefit when they have an opportunity to participate in area rebuilding projects. By permitting them to provide materials, laborers, and other necessary elements, project managers can go a long way towards earning the support of influential individuals. Who controls the outcome? When it comes to managing a project’s development and implementation, it is essential to determine early in the process who will ultimately control the outcome. Will those who are underwriting the development have the final say over key project issues, or will local decision-leaders and stakeholders hold sway? These are essential issues that will go a long way towards determining whether the project succeeds or fails. One of the fundamental mistakes made in Afghanistan was giving control of the rebuilding process to American companies: this assured that the financial benefits of the rebuilding effort were enjoyed by foreigners, not Afghans. In addition to undermining the vital effort to generate local support for redevelopment projects, this approach also

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wasted an excellent opportunity for local economic development. American military leaders in some areas of Iraq are already being given autonomy to work closely with local chieftains to set certain types of social—and in some cases, military—policy. This initiative has been very successful because it given Iraqis a measure of control over their destinies, and it has demonstrated America’s commitment to implementing Iraqi-led solutions to the many challenges facing the country. This approach would be similarly powerful in the rebuilding effort. Who controls the money? Monetary control is also vital, and it is related to the issue of overall outcome control. Should the nations and organizations that are financing reconstruction determine how that money is spent? Or should those who will benefit from the project hold the purse strings? There is a thin line between micromanaging a project and ceding too much control. Grantors are justifiably concerned about graft and corruption. International rebuilding efforts are often subjected to skimming and other forms of corruption—on both local and national levels—by officials of grantee governments. As a result, grantors are often inclined to maintain control over how redevelopment dollars are spent. However, by taking monetary control out of the hands of local managers, grantors run the risk of undermining projects by creating excessive red tape. With a project as large in scope as the rebuilding of Iraq, micromanagement could lead to millions of wasted dollars in administrative oversight and project delays. Additionally, grantors also sometimes like to maintain financial control so they can fund development scenarios and technologies with which they are familiar; however, problems arise when grantors bring pressure on local communities to “become more like us,” which often undermines local support for the project. Where does the money stop? Development budgets are notoriously fluid. The best of plans can go awry, and costs often rise as work proceeds. Before work starts, decisions must be made about what level of spending is acceptable and who will decide when that level has been reached. These decisions can’t be made on the spot; arrangements must be in place from the beginning. Each of these four issues must be addressed from the outset, and should be revisited whenever a new initiative is undertaken. The manner in which these forms of project control are determined establishes the ultimate nature of the project and influences the project’s outcome. In creating a strategic plan for rebuilding Iraq, three goals must be pursued: 1. Prepare a strategic framework for approaching the design of rebuilt communities, rather than a response to specific requirements of any one

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locality. In the case of Afghanistan, priority was given to rebuilding the country’s infrastructure, including roads, agriculture, animal husbandry, power, and education facilities; 2. Develop new approaches that will support the historic, indigenous systems and patterns of built communities, and provide for natural growth and change; 3. Develop new approaches that are self-sustaining, including: • Public services (including water/sewer, power, data, vehicular, and pedestrian circulation). In Afghanistan, the rapid rate of development, particularly commercial development, threatens to overwhelm traffic and sanitation resources unless mitigation strategies are implemented. • Residential • Schools • Local retail • Facilities that build jobs and support enterprise development (such as plants to produce concrete blocks for construction). The first step is to decide where to begin the redevelopment process. In selecting an area within Iraq to initiate the rebuilding process, it is essential to begin someplace where success is most likely. By quickly demonstrating results, the world community can achieve “buy-in” from Iraqi leaders, decision-makers, and citizens. Success breeds support and can have a powerful impact on the effort to build consensus within the local community, which will only enhance the success of the rebuilding effort, and success in one area of the country will promote consensus and buy-in in other areas within Iraq. Because there has already been some progress in Northern Iraq, it makes sense to focus initial rebuilding efforts there. The U.S. and its allies are particularly influential in the Kurdish north, and the necessary political structure for assuring success is already in place in parts of the north, so this is a logical place for the rebuilding effort to start. Once a section of Iraq has been selected for the onset of the rebuilding effort, it must then be determined what type of community to target. There is often a temptation to start by rebuilding large cities; this is only natural. The risk in beginning the rebuilding process in larger cities like Baghdad is that more people would be encouraged to move to those cities in search of better housing and jobs. Before long they would be overwhelmed by the volume of people, which would make it too difficult to provide housing, services, and employment. It makes more sense to begin the rebuilding process in small or mid-sized cities. By developing initial projects on a more manageable scale, designers and planners can increase the likelihood

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of success. Those successful projects can then serve as models for the recovery of the rest of the country. In developing a strategic plan for redeveloping Iraq, historic building patterns must be taken into account, including local customs and traditions, as well as naturally available building materials. Planners need to determine whether historic patterns reflect modern-day local lifestyles and customs. This is important because any rebuilding effort must be sensitive to unique cultural traditions—not just those of Iraq as a whole, but traditions of individual areas within Iraq that are being revitalized. Local citizens shouldn’t be made to feel as if their communities are being swept aside for the sake of achieving some outsiders’ vision. Instead, they should be made to feel as if the communities in which they have spent their lives are being revitalized. Public perception is a vital element of the reconstruction effort. If local citizens feel invested in the process and the final result, they are more likely to support the effort with their political influence, their investment capital, and their sweat equity. One of the keys to achieving this support is to make sure that the local population recognizes a commitment on the part of developing organizations to respect their history. In analyzing historic patterns, a number of questions must be asked: • How have communities traditionally been organized? Have they revolved around public services (such as government buildings, schools, and hospitals), or have they been organized around residential development? The answers to these questions should influence the ultimate development plan for each community. It isn’t necessary to perfectly replicate each city’s historic nature, but planners and designers should respect the visions that have evolved over many—often hundreds—of years. •

What materials have traditionally been used for construction? Do residential, commercial, and professional developments utilize similar materials, or are different materials used for different types of development? Are those materials readily available, or will new industries need to be established to create them? If new industries must be established to create those materials, is it feasible to do so? There is generally a reason that people come to rely on certain building materials. It may be that those materials are more readily available or more affordable, or perhaps they are more appropriate given the area’s climate or weather patterns.

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Designers and planners should take pains to understand why certain materials gain prominence, and if it makes sense to use them for the rebuilding effort, they should create systems for utilizing them. •

If it is determined that historical development approaches are not feasible, how can developing bodies gain the support of local citizens to pursue new approaches?

Of course, organizations overseeing redevelopment efforts should make every effort to respect traditional building approaches whenever possible. As stated earlier, it probably isn’t possible to exactly recreate communities that have been destroyed: however, planners should make every effort to create new, better communities in their place, which respect the traditions and aesthetic sensibilities of the Iraqi people. This is a lesson that has been learned the hard way in Afghanistan by the U.S. government over the past two or three decades. Even Peace Corps rebuilding projects have often been bedeviled by difficulties caused by planners trying to create American-style communities in the heart of Afghanistan. American planners have often created problems for themselves by inadvertently utilizing technologies that can’t be supported by Afghan infrastructure and materials that can’t be easily obtained in Afghanistan. For instance, American developers have been known to design buildings that rely on America’s 110 watt electric technology, even though the rest of the world (including Afghanistan) uses 220 watt technology. This may seem like a simple issue, but it is the type of simple mistake that can undermine a development. And it is the type of mistake that must be avoided in Iraq. After analyzing traditional approaches to development in Iraq, planners can create planning strategies for the creation of new communities. While Iraqi development traditions should play an important role in these strategies, they will also inevitably be influenced by development approaches that are most familiar to the planners who are creating them. Because those planners will hail from all over the world, this will likely result in a complex combination of design and planning styles and approaches. While these styles and approaches will bring a new dimension to Iraq’s development, it is important for planners to not lose sight of the fact that the communities being developed will have the sole purpose of serving Iraqi citizens. As such, they should be designed to meet the needs of Iraqis, not to satisfy the ambitions of planners.

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An essential element of these plans should be to focus on series of local projects, rather than large-scale projects. Smaller projects are more manageable and can be completed more quickly. This enhances both the rate of success and the chances of making an immediate impact on the lives of Iraqi citizens. This will in turn improve local support for the rebuilding effort. Additionally, local projects will also be more likely to encourage refugees to return to their homes. The return of refugees will provide multiple benefits, including: • Increasing stability as local residents with a personal stake in the community reclaim prominent positions in the community; • Providing a labor force for continued development in the area; • Jump starting local economic development as returning refugees take jobs and use the money they earn to purchase locally produced goods and services. The U.S. government has given military leaders on the ground discretion to apply funds as they see fit to pursue local development projects. As a result, in much of the country there is already an administrative structure in place that could promote successful development of a series of small-scale developments. This small-scale approach should be another element of the overall planning strategy. Once a general planning approach is determined, the first step in rebuilding Iraq’s communities is to restore the nation’s infrastructure. The war has taken a terrible toll, destroying most of the nation’s courts, schools, hospitals, electric power plants, and water facilities. Additionally, many of the nation’s roads have been destroyed, while many of the roadways that remain have been severely impacted by the threats caused by the ongoing terrorist insurgency. Over the past three years, the international community has made limited progress in rebuilding Iraq’s infrastructure. In the four years since the fall of Baghdad, the U.S. government has initiated thousands of development projects. While these projects are a drop in the bucket, they do represent an important starting point that must be built upon. The good news is that Iraq’s history over recent decades has been of a relatively wealthy country with excellent infrastructure. While that infrastructure has been largely destroyed, that which remains represents a useful starting point. Unlike Afghanistan, which has a long history of poverty and inadequate infrastructure, Iraq won’t require building up from scratch.

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The infrastructure that is developed should be designed to serve individual communities and to connect those communities to each other. In many cases, this will involve rebuilding communities that were destroyed in the war. The advantages of rebuilding existing communities are two-fold: first, the people who will live in these cities and towns, and the refugees who will return to them, are familiar with those cities and have a level of comfort with them. These are their hometowns and if we want local citizens to embrace the rebuilding effort, it is essential that they feel invested in the cities and towns in which they are living. Also, there is generally logic to where communities are located. Vibrant, successful communities are generally located next to vital natural resources, such as water and food supplies or major roads. Over time— often hundreds of years—Iraq’s communities have followed this historical pattern, and planners should take advantage of these resources in rebuilding Iraq’s communities. Sustainability is essential to the success of any rebuilding program. It won’t be sufficient to just rebuild cities and towns. Planners need to assure that communities can sustain themselves once the process is completed and the Iraqi people are left to live on their own. That means that natural resources like water and food supplies must be readily available, and that vital infrastructure is fully functional. Of course, the war has dramatically altered the country’s landscape. Roads that once served communities are now gone, and in some cases their replacements have been built elsewhere. In other cases, energy centers and water facilities have been destroyed. Any rebuilding plan must have an element of flexibility built into it to allow planners to create new communities when historic communities are no longer able to sustain themselves. Deciding whether to rebuild historic communities or create entirely new communities will involve a delicate balancing act. Planners need to recognize which vital resources are available today, and whether they will be available in the future for local use. Only then, can infrastructure networks be developed. And what will those networks be comprised of? Of course, basic services are essential. Communities can’t succeed without water and energy, so the creation of water facilities and power plants will be required first. Also, roads must be developed to assure that the heavy equipment that is necessary for development will be able to get in and out of the areas in which development is taking place. Finally, when people are ready to move back to the community they will need access to safety, health, and education services. Therefore, the

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final step in the creation of infrastructure is the development of police stations and courts, fire stations, hospitals, and schools. In fact, successful development in the north of Iraq has revolved around the development of new universities. Once these services are in place, residents can begin to move back, and commerce will follow. Sustainability is also an essential to newly created public services, and standardized elements must be included in the design of public facilities to assure their continued operation after the rebuilding process is completed. For instance, power generators and wastewater treatment plants must be created with technologies and administrative methodologies that can be handled by local professionals once the international community withdraws from Iraq. After the networks of infrastructure are completed throughout the country, planners should focus on residential development. If we are to restore stability to Iraq, we will need to provide places for Iraqi citizens to live, and places to which refugees can return. To date, the bulk of the reconstruction effort has revolved around defense development and limited infrastructure development. There has been no general effort to pursue housing and urban development, and now is the time to formulate plans to rebuild Iraq’s residential resources. Residential development should utilize both large- and small-scale phasing strategies. After the creation of core public services and infrastructure, the next step is the development of “construction worker villages.” Iraqi construction managers and workers need a place to live and congregate at the end of the day. Construction worker villages can provide a home base for those who are relied upon to rebuild Iraq. Next, comes the development of residential communities for the general Iraqi populace. Like Afghanistan, Iraq is a patriarchic society that is built around individual family units. The biggest mistake we can make is to try to create American-style residential areas. Any residential development must revolve around the traditional Iraqi approach of developing communities around extended family units. One of the primary goals of any residential development plan should be to assure that residential development is capable of serving the contemporary family size and make-up. However, there is so much work to be done that this may not be possible to achieve all at one time. Is it realistic to assume that whole communities that meet all of the residential needs of local residents can be immediately developed? It may make more sense to start with more modest development plans, but make sure that those plans are flexible enough to permit ongoing growth to meet the residential needs of Iraqi families. For instance, rather

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than build large homes designed to accommodate several generations of a family, designers should create plans for homes that can expand over time to continually accommodate additional family members. These homes can start as modest buildings. In Afghanistan, one successful housing model has provided for one-room homes in which entire families can initially live. As families acquire wealth and the community’s rebuilding effort proceeds, these homes are expanded to include additional rooms, including bedrooms, kitchens, and other living areas. Over time, the once simple home expands into a complex that provides all of the living space that the family requires. The advantage of this approach is that it allows planners to serve greater numbers of people more quickly. It also requires residents to become invested in the success of their communities because their wellbeing is directly tied to the well-being of their neighbors and others in the community. The residential component of the rebuilding program must also provide for the introduction of modern technologies. In some instances this will merely be a case of reintroducing technologies like automobiles, and the space they need to securely park their vehicles. Additionally, there will be opportunities to introduce new types of technology to Iraqi citizens. For instance, in some cases planners will be able to provide telephone service in areas where there have never been telephones in the past. Designers can also include Internet capabilities into these new residences. The introduction of these new technologies will further enhance the quality of life for Iraqi citizens who are touched by this rebuilding program. When it comes to developing neighborhoods in Iraqi cities and towns, while the family unit is the primary cultural reference point, planners have to think bigger. The rebuilding effort can’t be limited to creating a series of individual homes. We must build actual communities in which people live, work, and seek recreation together. As such, planners must provide a variety of different neighborhoods and scales to best meet the day-to-day living needs of Iraqi citizens. Finally, when developing communities, planners will need to look beyond just the creation of new homes. While homes are the anchors of any residential neighborhood, there are numerous services upon which residents rely, and they must be included in a residential development plan. For instance, planners must also provide for neighborhood schools and houses of worship that can be utilized by local residents. Additionally, sufficient public spaces must also be included in neighborhood development.

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Public space is an essential element of community development which is often overlooked or treated as an afterthought. Parks and plazas provide places for people to congregate, and they also enhance the overall aesthetic of a neighborhood. Also, wide sidewalks can enhance neighborhoods by de-emphasizing the primacy of automobiles in favor of pedestrian traffic. In effect, by providing convenient, attractive, and safe sidewalks, planners can create neighborhoods that revolve around people, rather than on vehicles. Combined with plazas, parks, and other public spaces, this approach can dramatically enhance the attractiveness of residential neighborhoods, and improve the quality of life for those who live there. Once the nature of the newly development communities is determined, the next step is determining how to create them. The first step should be analyzing historic construction technologies in the area. To do so, several questions must be answered: • Are traditional construction technologies appropriate for application by residents and local tradesmen? For instance, if local architecture has traditionally been comprised of one-story clay adobe buildings, is that approach viable in light of current local conditions? Also, is there a sufficient number of local tradesmen and residents who are qualified to work with these materials and technologies? This is a particularly important issue in light of the number of educated and skilled Iraqis who have fled the country in the past five years. An essential element of this rebuilding plan is using local craftsmen and other professionals to do the work. If there are no longer enough people to do the work, project managers will have to find ways to entice qualified Iraqis to return to the area to complete these development projects. •

Are there benefits, or perhaps drawbacks, to introducing new technologies for use in these development projects? For instance, would precast concrete be a better long-term solution than local bricks for certain projects? Also, would the introduction of these technologies generate new enterprise opportunities in Iraq?

The Afghani reconstruction around Kabul provides a perfect illustration of a situation in which it does make sense to introduce new approaches. When the U.S. government’s reconstruction teams arrived in Afghanistan, they found that the most common building material that was traditionally used in the Kabul area was adobe. However, the planners

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wanted to use a sturdier material for their rebuilding projects. There was no history of building with sheet rock, steel, or wood framing, and those materials were rejected because of the anticipated difficulty in obtaining them. Ultimately, the planning team decided to design new buildings out of cinder blocks because, although there were no factories to create them, it would be relatively simple to obtain the necessary materials to begin making cinder blocks locally. Initially, the equipment for making the blocks had to be imported from Dubai. However, before long several factories were established. There are now numerous cinder block factories scattered throughout Afghanistan that are meeting the material needs of redevelopment. In addition to providing better building materials for local development, this approach created a whole new industry that has had an important positive impact on Afghanistan’s economy. A similar approach could be pursued if it is determined that new technologies and approaches would work better in Iraq. Such an approach could both improve the quality of life for Iraqis and provide a jump start to the local economy. •

Can local residents participate in the construction? As stated earlier, many parts of Iraq are experiencing manpower shortages because so many millions of Iraqis have fled the country over the past four years. If local residents need to be trained to do the work, designers and planners will need to select materials that are relatively simple to use and which don’t require a lot of training. Because local economic development is such an important component of this approach, it is essential for designers and planners to pursue approaches that will permit the use of local labor.

Additionally, it is much less expensive to use local talent than to import workers. Therefore, by using cheaper local labor, planners can free up money for use in developing other areas of Iraq. Iraqi professionals must also be included in the process at the leadership level. Key decisions about the nature of Iraq’s reconstruction should be made by Iraqis. While it’s true that professionals and skilled craftsmen make up a disproportionate number of the refugees who have fled Iraq, these expatriates will hopefully return to help rebuild their nation. That has been the experience in Afghanistan, where many professionals and craftsman who left in the nineties because of hazardous

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political and military conditions have returned to lead the rebuilding of their country. •

Finally, can local residents service and maintain the facilities once outsiders have left? The international community’s involvement in Iraq will hopefully be limited. Once the country is rebuilt and made secure, the international community will be able to pull out, leaving Iraqis to maintain the new structures that are built and carry on the nation’s ongoing development.

This is why the Afghan experience with the creation of a cinder block industry was so important. By helping to establish an industry that could easily be sustained by local tradesmen, planners were able to have a long term economic impact on the communities they built, while assuring that the work that they started could be continued after they left. Similar approaches should be pursued in Iraq. After some initial challenges the rebuilding effort in Afghanistan is progressing, with dozens of Afghan communities positively impacted. While Iraq is a separate country with a different culture, there are many similarities between the two and the lessons that were learned in Afghanistan should influence the planning and design decisions that are made in Iraq. George Santayana said “those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it.” This sentiment applies to the renewal of Iraq. By applying the lessons learned during the re-development of Afghanistan, the international community can improve the likelihood that the rebuilding of Iraq will be successful.

CHAPTER 11 ENHANCING THE CAPACITY OF WOMEN LEADERS OF COMMUNITY ORGANIZATIONS TOWARD SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT IN IRAQ: THE ROLE OF WOMEN’S GROUPS IN REBUILDING THEIR COMMUNITIES AFTER CONFLICTS

In the past decade, Iraq has gone through a lot of conflicts and violence that have had a tremendous negative impact on its physical, economic and social infrastructure. Although the conflict and violence are still going on, this is the time to start thinking about building peace in the country. The best place to begin the process is at the grassroots, where it is not only expected to have maximum impact but also to uplift the people from the ruins of war. This study explores the changing role of Iraqi women in rebuilding their communities, and the policies, programs and projects that will assist them to effectively perform this challenging role in the Iraqi context, while using the experiences of women’s groups in conflict resolution and peacebuilding in Nigeria’s Niger Delta Region (an area that is prone to violent conflict) as a starting point. All of these issues are expected to assist in our discussion of the search for effective development of sustainable communities in post conflict Iraq. Introduction Generally, the typical approach employed by the international community to assist countries in transition from violent conflicts involves inserting international peace keeping forces assembled from participating countries, establishing interim governments based on power sharing arrangements among antagonistic armed groups, and sometimes holding national elections. As observed by Sawyer,1 democratic governance is considered introduced by holding national elections along with post-

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conflict reconstruction planning that commences with needs-assessment surveys. However, Sawyer argued that although these processes, along with national elections, are important activities in the reconstitution of governing arrangements in post-conflict situations, they have not and cannot yield systems of sustainable governance; neither can all the formal institutions and processes of government by themselves. Also, although assessment of needs for developing inventories of what is perceived to be lacking in local communities is important, such assessments do not always tell the full story because they do not most times assess available capabilities such as the stocks of social capital of local communities. And it is the informal institutions through which people reach understandings among themselves, resolve conflicts, and undertake a variety of collective actions that contribute to critical foundations of self-governance. What is being realized globally is that armed conflict in whatever form interferes with and can destroy altogether the normal conduct of statecraft and governance. This is why protracted armed conflicts cause great damage and harm to individual psyches, institutions and practices of democracy, and civil society, and why they undermine socio-cultural values such as tolerance and justice, and the general democratic norms. According to Guhathakurta,2 the process has a gendered dimension, as the women form the last vestiges of civil society during the process. And, as the process of the negotiated cessation of hostilities is merely the first step towards normalizing the situation and restoring governance and democratic practices in war-torn regions, a lot depends on how trauma and inter-factional rivalry are dealt with, how local development needs are addressed, and how institutional capacity building takes place in the post conflict situation. Coupled with this, the ultimate aim of development interventions in developing countries is to understand diverse ways of improving the well-being of the poor. As argued by Guha-Khasnobis et al,3 intervention has to be contextual for it to be meaningful to the target group. For example, Sawyer observed that in the case of Liberia, different ethnic groups rely on indigenous institutions to achieve peace after their extended and brutal civil war.4 The literature on women in peace-building evolves around several theoretical propositions about women and war. Many have claimed that while men make war as soldiers, women’s social and biological roles as mothers and nurturers have generally made them adept at building relationships that bridge ethnic, religious and cultural divides. At the same time feminist theorists have always challenged this notion, claiming that women are not only victims of war but also active participants. As stressed by Guhathakurta,5 the usefulness of the observation of different gender

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roles is made apparent in its focus on the socialization process. Thus roles may not be biologically determined but influenced by the different socialization processes that men and women undergo in their life processes. Also, there is a body of literature on the consequences of conflict on women, men, communities etc., and feminist scholarship has been at the forefront of highlighting structures of patriarchy, capital and militarization as a cause of conflict rather than consequence. Another body of literature that looks at peace-building as a gendered process is of the view that peace is a woman’s issue for reason of justice. Cockburn maintains that “if women have a distinctive angle in peace, it is not due to their being nurturing. It seems more to do with knowing oppression when they see it.”6 Knowing what is to be excluded and marginalized as women gives them special insights into the structure of unequal relations at the root of conflict. Women therefore are more likely to see a continuum of violence because they experience the connected forms of domestic and political violence that stretches from the home to the street and to the battlefield.7 All of these views have relevance for our discussions in this chapter. This is based on the fact that authentic sustainable community development promotes and enhances empowerment and peaceful society especially during and after violent conflicts. For it to have maximum effect, the interaction must be at the grassroots and of course the best proponents and activists are the women in the households who are the recognized effective managers of the home. This is more so as generally, when conflicts occur, women are usually caught at the receiving end of losses incurred. Displacement and death place untold heavy burdens on their traditional roles as providers of livelihoods, mothers, daughters and wives. While using the experiences of women’s groups in conflict resolution and peace building in Nigeria’s Niger Delta Region (an area that is prone to violent conflicts) as a starting point, the discussions here explore the changing role of Iraqi women in rebuilding their communities in respect to their involvement with economic, social, religious, political activities, including the specific role that concerns the damage to the minds of the people (i.e. bringing the people back to normal life) and the policies, programs and projects that will assist them in performing this challenging role in the traditional, religious and environmental context. The study is aimed at exploring the challenges for Iraqi women in their efforts to assist in rebuilding their communities after the destruction caused by the war. To achieve this aim, the following objectives (among others) will be addressed: the exploration of important factors affecting

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peace-building, and their relevance in the context of specific communities; and the use of experiences gained from the Nigerian studies as an addition to the learning processes for Iraqi women in rebuilding their communities. The discussion is divided into three parts after the introduction. First is a short discussion on gender and Islam. Second is a section (in form of theses) of summary and discussions along with comments where necessary of the Nigerian study on the role played by women groups in peacebuilding in their communities. This teases out areas of challenges for Iraqi women in peace building in their communities. The chapter is rounded off with concluding remarks. On Gender and Islam in Iraq Over the past decades, attitudes and arguments about gender and Islam have been changing in Muslim societies with more liberal thoughts and behaviors being exhibited. In contrast to historians who argue that fundamentalist reinterpretations of the Koran are to blame for the repressive nature of Islam in many countries, Ahmed argues that the repression of women dates back to the expansion of Mesopotamian law and that Muslim women have always used informal channels to obtain education and property. She advises that, instead of urging Islamic governments to change voluntarily, particularly in countries where religious and political authorities are one and the same, women and other activists should open communication and dialogue within the alreadyexisting religious frameworks.8 Mir-Hosseini argues that Islam and feminism are not incompatible and that over the years avenues are opening for dialogue and change within the framework, since religion is a paramount element in the emergence of feminist theories in Muslim societies.9 Since the 1970s, religious scholars in Iran and Iraq have vigorously discussed the roles and responsibilities of women, and from 1979 women themselves have increasingly participated in these debates. Although what we are aware of through the press and the media are mostly discussions about veiling and segregation of women in public spaces, the problems are not only more encompassing than these, they have been exacerbated by two issues: one is patriarchal attitudes based on beliefs and values; the other relates to legal doctrines.10 It is the legal structure that places women in a highly disadvantageous position in the social order. It should be noted that the patriarchal attitudes have sources beyond any specific religion. Religious traditions and practices sometimes reinforce their main thrust as portrayed

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by Islam regarding its patriarchal foundations and practices. However, this is not peculiar to Islam since globally, whether due to patriarchal views or other causes, full gender equality remains elusive everywhere in the world. Women all over the world have adopted various strategies to contain, limit and lessen the impact of patriarchal controls; Iraqi women are no exception. What has always baffled this writer is the ignorance exhibited by the Western world about Islam. Islam, like its Christian counterpart, is a religion of peace (see Figure 11.1 below). If some of its followers commit acts of violence, this does not mean that it is the religion that is violent. Islamic Views of Peace and Violence Contrary to stereotypes of Islam, as Professor Mohammed Abu-Nimer has stated, Islam advocates numerous nonviolent and peace-building values and expects Muslims to live by them. These values are supported by the Quran and the Hadith (the Prophet’s sayings). One of these values is the duty to pursue justice (Quran 5:8). Another is the necessity of doing well by struggling against oppression and helping those who are in need. A third such value is that all humans are God’s creation, have sacred lives, and thus are all equal (7:11). Islam grants no special privileges based on race, ethnicity, or tribal affiliation. Moreover, all Muslims are to respect and preserve human life (5:32). Islam also calls for the quest for peace, which is a state of physical, mental, spiritual, and social harmony (5:64). Other verses stress the importance of tolerance and kindness to other people (16:90). Looking at the life of the Prophet, one notes his use of nonviolent methods to resist those who persecuted him; the Prophet never resorted to violence or force. Peacemaking and negotiation are considered more effective than aggression and violent confrontation. In fact, the Arabic meaning of the word Islam itself connotes peace. Another virtue in Islam is forgiveness (23:96). Muslims are urged to live in harmony and peace with all fellow humans. Despite these ideals set out for Muslims, various societal forces pose obstacles to their implementation, Abu-Nimer noted. Among these are the cooptation of religious leaders by governments, which leads to a lack of trust and credibility in religious leadership. Other challenges include corruption, patriarchal social structures, rigid social hierarchies, economic dependence on the West and the sense of helplessness it engenders, and the humiliation generated by such confrontations as the Arab-Israeli conflict.

Figure 11.1: Islamic Views of Peace and Violence11

Relevant Summary and Discussions from the Nigerian Study •

Culturally in Nigeria, when women come out to take part in conflict, it is time for peace since they are considered as peacemakers (mothers, daughters and wives). In some communities for example whenever there are volatile situations: ƕ All married women will run away to neighboring village chiefs and refuse to come back home until the men solve their problems.

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ƕ

Sometimes daughters of the village will use village criers to make pronouncements and call on the deities. Immediately the men will succumb and settle their differences.

What is being highlighted here is that there is no culture that does not have traditional ways of solving conflict and violence. These are part of the social, cultural, and religious life of the people. Most times women have distinct systems. Iraqi women must resort to these systems and not only modernize them but contextualize them to fit present day realities. •

A very important traditional tool that women use to broker peace all over Nigeria is to threaten that they will march naked on the streets. Immediately after this threat is announced, even the government listens. This threat was executed in the 1920s during difficulties over the Poll tax law for education in Aba, Eastern Nigeria. The women came out in a peaceful demonstration to appeal to the colonial administration to repeal the law. Their request was ignored. It was then they came out naked. The colonial administration had no option but to repeal the law. It is not being suggested that Iraqi women should come out naked in a peaceful demonstration; what is being highlighted here is that they can threaten to act drastically using a cultural taboo as the instrument of expression to broker peace in the communities.

•

The response of government agencies to conflict has always been to deploy the military forces to keep peace in areas where conflict exists. Often times this has served to worsen the situation as in some of the cases studied. However, in the Niger Delta Region (NDR), the oil prospecting multinationals have learnt that this method does not augur well for solution. They have also learnt that when women come out, they want peaceful solutions. The issue arising from this is the ability to maximize the potential of women and maybe practice this method at the national scale.

•

When women get involved in conflict resolution, it is for the good of the community, which supersedes household circumstances. What is needed are NGOs that not only provide relief materials and assist in reconstruction and rehabilitation of affected communities in conflict situations, but also stress the need for dialogue which has so far proven to be the best practice

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in conflict resolution as well as avoidance. Dialogue is the key to achieving balance in peace negotiations. Thus getting access to dialogue, exercising the ability to listen as well as talk and demonstrating the political will to negotiate are essential. •

Culturally, when there is conflict in the household, a third party in form of an elderly relation is brought in to make peace. Extended to the community and external relations, the third party takes the form of chiefs and elders. It is this that women take over. We have to recognize this process of settling conflict (that has always been successful) and not only improve it, but focus everyone’s attention to it. This is what will improve women’s involvement in peace-making, especially in conflict resolution. Of course, there must be a corollary cultural means of settling domestic problems in Iraq. What is needed is for this to be highlighted and tried; such institutions are rooted in the religious and cultural systems of the people.

•

There is the need to build coalitions among various local women’s NGOs so that they can be more effective as researchers, advocates and action-oriented practitioners. It is also necessary for women in the villages to be aware of them so that they know where to call for assistance whenever it is necessary to make peace in any community, especially in relation to government agencies and multinationals. The caution here is that the NGOs must be local. Even when they are funded internationally, they must be respected. The mistake always made is that because northern NGOs provide the resources, they always feel that they should dictate to the local partners. That is why most times the projects suggested by them do not conform to the social, cultural, and religious settings of the local communities.

•

For there to be peace in the country, it must start in the home. Domestic violence must be recognized and addressed, rather than swept under the carpet. Policies must take care of women, not as a token gesture but from the beginning: the impact on women must be assessed and made an integral part of legislation, not just as an after-thought. The challenge is for women to improve their traditional techniques of peace-making to meet the challenges of conflict

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resolution. We expect that they will be better placed to do this with the assistance of local NGOs and their international counterparts in their capacity for peace-making and peacebuilding in their communities. Several issues emerge from the interviews in Nigeria. These have implications for the ability of women’s groups to participate in conflict resolution and peace-building. Women apply different forms of intervention depending on their assessment of how best to proceed: one fairly easy way is the writing of petitions to state security agents operating within and outside the locality, and to persons regarded as key players such as traditional rulers, oil companies and relevant government officials. Petition writing has the potential of reaching a wider audience but it suffers from the draw back of being ignored. In the case of one study on women’s groups, there was no response from any quarter. This is the reason why following up the written petitions with lobbying of relevant persons and agencies is important. Another form of intervention is confrontation of those regarded as fueling the conflict. Often such confrontations are peaceful protests directed at attracting the attention of government or company officials, religious clerics, etc., so that dialogue can be open. Sometimes, rather than engage in dialogue, oil companies in collaboration with government security agents unleash terror on the unarmed women. Thus no single women’s group can undertake protests unless the all the women in the community are involved. Some forms of intervention are subtler. Nigerians are very religious and combine praying in churches and mosques for some resolutions and offering sacrifices to the gods for others. No one can assess the effectiveness of this form of intervention, but it is clear that in the case of the Women’s Peace forum, the church became the tool for mobilizing the women. The fact that the forum began as a prayer group enabled women from different sides of the conflict to put aside their differences and come together as one organization to intervene in the conflict. A fact highlighted by the Nigerian study is the limited involvement of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in conflict resolution in the Niger Delta. There is a need for local NGOs that train, sensitize and empower the factions in the conflict to manage the situation by themselves. There is also a need to redefine power, not as domination over others in the sense of enforcing one’s will on subdued individuals or groups, but rather emphasizing power as the capacity for action to bring about the changes needed—i.e. power as taking action; taking on different roles in the

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society, creating empowering systems, meaningfully participating in and shaping decision making. That is the kind of power that calls for more women in action. Thus women must hold the principle of inclusion in government as a key one. However, this is a formidable task. We know that historically that no group of people relinquish power easily, especially when it is part of the culture: Iraqi men are no exception. But, like Nigerian women, the Iraqi women have perfected the art of persuasion rather than using confrontation like Western feminism movements. This is what will provide the initial opportunity for them. Another issue of note is the rising militancy of youth gangs in Nigeria, most of them visibly armed. These gangs deal with inter- and intraconflict problems (as perceived by them: most cases irrationally so). The youths have access to sophisticated weapons and they are ready to use them with the slightest perceived provocation. The women attribute the cause of this to idleness arising from the fact that the youths in the Niger Delta Region are not gainfully employed. The women claim that it is not possible for the youths to be gainfully employed, as they have not been trained for the changing job opportunities in the oil sector; meanwhile their expectations have risen tremendously since the world has become a global village and there is easy access to information, thus signifying the potential for more violence. Any training of women to enhance their capacity towards peace-building must recognize this development. The suggestion is that women must intensify home education of their children so that they will learn more constructive values and shun violence, while the state consciously creates jobs for them. This suggestion is just as pertinent for Iraq. Government efforts at peace-building have not really given opportunities to women to participate. This is evident from the fact that none of the women’s groups interviewed in Nigeria had networked with government agencies such as the National Council of Women Societies (NCWS) or the Women’s Commission at state and national levels. Rather, it is the groups that had taken the initiative to involve government agencies by petitioning and lobbying them. Sometimes the lobbying is informal based on ethnic affiliations. The challenge is for women to improve their traditional techniques of peace-making to meet the challenges of conflict resolution. None of the leaders of the groups interviewed had received any training in conflict resolution. What they did was by personal insight of the leadership. The groups simply feel their way through the conflict, doing what seems workable to achieve peace. There is need to train leaders and members of women groups involved in peace making so that they can become more

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pro-active. It is expected that they will be better placed to do this with the assistance of local NGOs and their international counterparts in capacity building for peacemaking and peace-building in their communities. International NGOs and development aid agencies with the support of national governments should fund such training. The NCWS may also be involved. Other national women’s outfits can serve as rallying points to effectively train women for conflict resolution. This suggestion must be taken as part of the package, not by itself. All the groups covered in the interviews depended on individual contributions from members; the men sometimes assisted when appealed to. It is clear that funds available to the groups are limited. Oil multinationals and government officials are alleged to often “buy” the peace by bribing youth gangs set on disrupting oil production activities. Rather than serve as an effective means of peace-making, such acts only temporarily hold the youths at bay. As long as the fundamental grounds for grievances are not addressed, it is only a matter of time before rival gangs emerge and the conflict escalates. The women’s groups have tended to achieve more lasting solutions with the meager resources available to them. It would be reasonable to suggest that better funding will assist women’s groups involved in conflict resolution to do more. An area that is lacking in attention is the rehabilitation of displaced persons and those who have lost homes and family members. None of the groups interviewed had done anything in this direction. The critical question remains: who should fund groups engaged in conflict resolution? If government funds the groups by giving cash, the real possibility exists of group loyalty breaking down as members try to benefit and some individuals within the groups divert funds. However, funds can be provided through indirect means such as providing logistic support, paying for training of group leaders to improve their skills, facilitating the networking of groups involved in conflict resolution within and outside their immediate environments, and providing avenues where women in areas of conflict can go for assistance in respect to forming associations that will be involved in peace-making and peace-building. International NGOs have built credibility over the years and can use local groups of women in implementing their programs of intervention in conflict situations. They can also organize capacity building workshops to train groups in “early warning” peace-making and peace-building. The questions are: Who should attend? How should the representatives be chosen? Who should fund the workshops? Who should provide for the welfare of participants? What should be provided? How do we guard against the hijacking of the workshop by government and political party

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members? How do we assist the international NGOs to contextualize their training programs? The associations have obviously been established in response to the occurrence of specific conflict situations: it could in fact be safely said that some of the associations would not exist if conflict had not existed. The women mobilized to restore peace. In the cases studied, there is a degree of success, but once the need had been met, the women appear to have disbanded. An important factor for group sustainability will be how the leadership re-focuses the group and whether the new vision is sufficient to pull the group together in the same way that conflict did. If a group succeeds in making this transition, it could continue to exist. For example, in one of the cases studied, one women’s group is attempting to diversify their portfolio into development activities like trying to re-activate the local market, as well as forming a co-operative society and develop a palm plantation. It is clear that the group did not set out to be a highly structured outfit, but if the transformation into a co-operative society succeeds then sustainability is assured. Tying peace-building with relevant economic activities can ensure sustainability. When conflict erupts into violence between contiguous communities with a history of intermarriages, the wives get caught between the factions. They are regarded as saboteurs by both sides: each faction feels betrayed by their “daughters” on one hand and their “wives” on the other. It is interesting to note that there are folk tales in Nigeria that state “you cannot shed the blood of an in-law on your soil.” This traditional check appears not to apply in conflict situations. It is also interesting to note that being a wife in a community does not preclude the woman’s active participation in peace-making on the part of her husband’s community. The fact that a woman is married outside her own village does not detract from her being given the opportunity and necessary support either from the women or the men in her marital community to act on their behalf when it comes to intervention in conflict situations. Conclusion What is clear from conflict situations all over the world is that emphasis must be placed on the importance of supporting change agents, based on the understanding that supporting national and local champions of reform is critical in preventing the slide into a cycle of collapse and rebuilding of damaged institutions. Damages to the state affect men and

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women differently; however, these two strands have become lost in the works of development agencies.12 Of note is the fact that most of the policy work and research are taking place in developed countries, while focusing on what they should do to solve what are first and foremost specific national problems in developing states. There is an urgent need to expose and illuminate some alternatives from the south that are very simple but contextual, rather than northern-driven discourses. What we must note is that any developmental activity must extend beyond purely service provision to the ethical, religious, and cultural values. In the case of Islamic regions, stakeholders expect the operations to be carried out in compliance with the principles of Shariah (Islamic laws). Thus new structures that cater for the specific needs of Islamic households are urgently necessary, as the effectiveness of any framework for intervention will depend on the socio-economic context and the specific needs of each jurisdiction. A challenge for peace building is to prevent the search for security and revenge from undermining the moral fabric of global societies. The gap between Islamic values and Muslim practices and between democratic values and American foreign policies must be bridged: this requires selfreflection and self-criticism, connecting values with actions, deeds with words, and ideas with realities. All of these make us pose the following questions: Why must causes of development fit into a model that is Western-world oriented? Why must we have full generalization globally? What about different cultural, location and religious factors? Are these factors not what shape individual perceptions and responses to any issue? Indigenous models of interaction are very important and must be brought to the fore in interacting with households about their development; thus it is necessary to explore the potential for an overlapping consensus between different cultural approaches. This does not mean that Western-oriented universals will be abandoned, but rather that we must protect the procedures that reveal convergent universal norms justified from different religious and philosophical perspectives.13 This paper attempts to make a case for the development of vigorous and effective women’s groups that form an important part of assisting households in rebuilding their communities and consequently their state as part of the post-war peace-building and reconstruction process in Iraq. For reconstruction to be effective, it has to start from two fronts simultaneously: i.e. nationally and in small communities. While the nation grapples with national reconstruction with the full assistance of international bodies, it is also necessary to translate reconstruction into the stabilization and rebuilding of households and communities at the

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economic, social and psychological levels. A very important point to remember is that although the people at the grassroots had no say in their country going to war, not only do they suffer the most in the war and its aftermath, the reconstruction of their households and communities must start from and be directed by them. However, they need assistance that must be at their level, contextual and sustainable. The world must respect the sovereignty of Iraq and Islamic laws of governance, as the country is an Islamic state. The Western countries are mostly Christian states and their actions are based on the fabric of Christian tenets. Ultimately, uniting global, national, cultural and religious codes is a big challenge, for Iraqi women are like all women, as all versions of gender relations globally are decidedly not equitable.14

CHAPTER 12 PLANNING FOR IRAQI WOMEN’S EMPOWERMENT IN THE MIDST OF SOCIAL UPHEAVAL AND ARMED CONFLICT: LESSONS FROM ERITREA Introduction Iraq is a society that is undergoing armed conflicts, severe deprivation, and massive dislocations. Amidst the apparent chaos, a broad range of political and social groups are trying to come to grips with the current situation, attempting to ameliorate and command it on their own terms, and are clashing with contending social forces and points of view. The reportage of U.S. journalists and press often seems unable or unwilling to discern the intentionality and agency of Iraqis during this difficult period. Its default position has often been to portray the current upheaval as a primeval Hobbesian war—a patronizing view that stymies understanding. Women in Iraq, as in many societies throughout the world, suffer from second-class citizenship, patriarchy, and a relative lack of resources in domains that are considered singularly a woman’s sphere—the care of children and the elderly, and domestic labor. War intensifies these forms of oppression and women are disproportionately victimized by it. Policy planners who seek to enhance women’s conditions, power, and status must develop a rich grasp of how women have suffered during the current period of armed conflict in Iraq. Nevertheless, the focus must not dwell solely on victimization and loss. Despite the grave suffering of the war in Iraq, it is also vital to identify and analyze the ways that women have struggled to survive and care-take during the conflicts, including the skills they have utilized and the strategies they have devised. It is necessary to be attuned to new unintended opportunities or spaces that may have opened up for women due to the dislocations of war, and how they have responded to them. Furthermore, one must study the multiple meanings that women have ascribed to conflict and war and their role in it. In sum, a full understanding of how Iraqi women have grappled with the current

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upheaval must not simply assess their immiseration, but also discern their agency and activity during a period of protracted conflict. With this more comprehensive view, policy planners gain insights into the ways the women have been resourceful and striven for empowerment well before a formal period of policy formulation and reconstruction. It should be clear from the perspective above that a key source for understanding and planning must come from the voices, thought and perspectives of Iraqi women themselves. “Bottom-up” data must drive the planning process: Iraqi women are not women in general, or women in a developing nation, or women in an Islamic society. Generic theories of development or of women’s oppression will not prove very helpful. Methodologies must be handled skillfully to elicit and analyze the views of a broad cross-section of women in their own words and on their own terms. In order to make them central, Iraqi women must be historically understood by planners—their condition, struggles, and constraints during varied historical periods. An historical knowledge of Iraqi women is critical to insure specificity necessary for effective policy formulation. This chapter is an example of a study of a society’s women during the course of war and an assessment of formal policies enacted to empower them. It is a case of how Eritrean women negotiated a period of armed conflict during Eritrea’s 30-year war of independence against Ethiopia. It is rooted in extensive interviews with a diverse sample of Eritrean women, and includes an historical analysis of Eritrean women’s struggles in traditional and colonial epochs. It delineates how women from below can offer a rich, nuanced and critical evaluation of top-down policies that were designed to empower them. Of course, there are notable dissimilarities between the situation of Eritrean women in the midst of war and that of Iraqi women: nevertheless, the points of disconnection between wellintentioned Eritrean policy makers and the articulated needs, priorities and aspirations of Eritrean women, may in themselves be instructive beyond this particular study and relevant for reconstruction planning focused on Iraqi women. In addition, the chapter’s analytic approach, methods of data collection, and commitment to research from below can perhaps be usefully applied in efforts to develop and implement strategies to empower Iraqi women. Background, Overview, Methodology Eritrea is located on the Horn of Africa, stretching 800 km along the Red Sea Coast. It is bordered in the north and west by Sudan, and on the

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south by Ethiopia and Djibouti. Contrasting geographical features and climatic conditions have led to the development of a variety of economic and social cultures. Eritrea’s approximately four million inhabitants1 are a mosaic of diverse national/linguistic groups—Kebessa (Tigrignia), Sahho, Afar, Belen, Tigre, Bedawi, Kunama, and Nara. The two major religions are Coptic Christian and Muslim, and most of the inhabitants are either agriculturalists or pastoralists. In its history, Eritrea has experienced a series of colonial conquests and occupations. The first foreign powers that made their presence felt in Eritrea were the Turks, Portuguese and Egyptians in the sixteenth century. Italians seized power over Eritrea in 1889; after allied forces defeated Italy during WWII, Eritrea was placed under British administration from 1941 to 1952. In 1952, the UN decided that Eritrea would be federated with Ethiopia, and this arrangement lasted until 1962, when Haile Selassie’s government unilaterally abrogated the federal arrangement and annexed Eritrea as the thirteenth province of Ethiopia. In 1961, the Eritrean Liberation Front launched a national liberation struggle in response to Haile Selassie’s unilateral incorporation of Eritrea as part of Ethiopia. In 1970, a group of Eritrean activists split from the Eritrean Liberation Front and formed a separate organization called the Eritrean People’s Liberation Front (EPLF), which emerged as the predominant organization to forge a national liberation struggle. This struggle had enormous success in mobilizing the Eritrean people and, against enormous odds and with no big power sponsorship, ultimately won its struggle for independence in 1993. Early on, the EPLF determined that the liberation struggle must take the form of a national democratic secular revolution that included and empowered all groups that had been oppressed and marginalized. It asserted that the goal for national liberation was contingent upon pursuing social revolution. In 1974, after decades of male predominance in the struggle, the EPLF made a major decision to admit women into the organization and to mount policies and programs against gender inequality in Eritrean society. In 1991, during the latter years of the national liberation struggle, women constituted 30 percent of front line combatants and one third of the EPLF’s total membership. The EPLF was genuinely wedded to the vision of a secular, democratic Eritrea, with strong egalitarian underpinnings. The emancipation of women was linked to this overarching ideal. At the same time, the EPLF’s commitment to its ideological goals was reinforced by their strategic efficacy. Traditional society was rife with injustices and splintered by class, gender, nationalities, and religion. A successful

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national liberation struggle—poorly resourced compared to the enemy— could not be built upon the internal rivalries endemic to traditional societies. A social revolution would mobilize a people that was energized, cohesive, and ready to accept a national identity. As a formerly marginalized and oppressed group, women could be expected to be particularly vigorous activists, eager to seize the new opportunities provided by the EPLF’s campaign for gender equity. Long confined and cloistered, women were heartened by the ground-breaking mobility— geographically, intellectually and vocationally—that came with participation in the struggle. The EPLF intended that its social revolution would sweep up social groups who had been severely subordinated and shut out both by the traditional system and society under occupations, and that these groups would provide their strongest adherents. In 1983, I began a five-year study focusing on Eritrean women’s position during the national liberation struggle. By then, the EPLF’s campaign against women’s subordination had had time to take root. Female membership in the EPLF constituted almost 45 percent of the organization. The field research was conducted during the struggle for national liberation over a period of two months, in 11 towns and villages in the northeastern and northwestern regions of Eritrea. The study explored four major realms of Eritrean women’s lives—education, the family, economic and political life—and the central questions I assessed were: What constituted equality? Were Eritrean women experiencing equality? What elements promoted (or inhibited) change? What was the role of education in this? As stated, the field research and interviews that form the basis of this study began in 1983, and proceeded for five years. This was 22 years after the first stirrings of resistance to Ethiopian colonialism, 13 years after the formation of the EPLF, and nine years after the EPLF’s strategic decision to admit women into its organization and to pursue a comprehensive campaign for gender equity. This study began gathering data when the campaign for women’s emancipation during the war with Ethiopia was at its halfway point—with ten more years to struggle before independence was secured. An analysis of the attempt to sustain and consolidate the pursuit of gender equity in independent Eritrea during national reconstruction will form the subject of a second, subsequent analysis. A diverse group of 24 women were interviewed: these “views from below” were essential in examining Eritrean women’s position and their perspectives on gender equity and oppression. Their life stories illuminated women’s position within the broader social and cultural structures and themes in contemporary Eritrean society. The interviews

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were designed to encourage women to focus on themselves: what they did within the revolution; how they assessed their activities; how they conceived oppression and emancipation; what they identified as oppressive core attitudes and behaviors; whether they saw shifts in opportunity as a result of the struggle, and their participation in it. A major part of the interviews focused on women’s encounters with education— how it was valued, assessments of its impact, and where it fit in the women’s perceptions of social change. In addition, interviews were conducted with a range of EPLF officials, including members of its Central Committee. The study contrasted the perceptions of female participants with those of EPLF officials, as they assessed the significance and impact of the campaign against male domination. The documentary materials that were analyzed served as a second major source of data.2 They helped flesh out the EPLF’s “view from above” of women’s status and efforts to achieve emancipation, and delineated the EPLF’s strategies and programs for eradicating women’s inferior position in Eritrean society. These data clarified both official policies and programs undertaken to bring about women’s equality, and the Front’s theoretical viewpoint on the nature of women’s oppression. As a participant-observer, I kept a journal and recorded my experiences and perceptions of the overall revolutionary process, women’s emancipatory process, and the interview process. I interviewed a number of Eritrean men, including several members of the EPLF leadership, about their conception of women’s emancipation. I also discussed my central areas of study with people other than my subjects. My observations and discussions with various individuals helped illuminate the interviewees’ data and redirect the inquiry. I participated in group activities and attended special events that enabled me to observe a range of activities. The interview subjects came from 11 towns and villages, and were not necessarily the most active or visible women from their sites (see table 12.1 and 12.2 below). They were diverse in age, educational level, class background, religious affiliation, and ethnic group. They ranged from 12 to 65 years old, non-literate to college-educated, peasants and factory workers to students and medical doctors. The religious affiliations included Coptic, Catholic, Protestant, Muslim and African religious orientations. The nationalities represented were Tigre, Sahho, Belen, Afar, Kunama and Kebessa (Tigrignia). The sample also included varied marital status and ideological positions. Levels of involvement with the liberation struggle and the EPLF itself also varied greatly. The interview format was individual and semi-structured. An informal interview guide, which consisted of open-ended questions relating to the

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Table 12.1 Respondents’ Biographical Chart 1 POLITICS: EPLF Base Area Front Line Liberated Area Residents Refugees ECONOMY Before -Middle Class -Working Class -Peasant FAMILY Marital Status -Single -Married -Divorced -Widowed -With child(ren) EDUCATION Before -College -High school -Elementary Non-literate RELIGION -Coptic [Orthodox] -Muslim -Catholic -Protestant Animist

1 0 5 9

8 1 0 4 2 1 0

5 5 4 1 0

Now [Occupation] Professionals / Workers (administrators, teachers, doctors, mechanics, etc) Army Students Peasants

12 3 3 6

14 3 2 5

Nationality Tigre Kebessa (Tigrignia)

7 13

Belen Afar Sahho Kunama

1 1 1 1

Now -College -High School (& professional school) Elementary School (& vocational training) Literacy training (& vocational training)

5 5 6 8

Age: 16-65 9 8 5 1 1

four themes of politics, economics, family and education and utilized women’s life histories to illuminate their personal lives and their position within the broader social and cultural structures. The interview was conducted mostly in Tigrignia language, which is one of the official languages in Eritrea. Many the Eritrean women spoke Tigrignia as a second language. On two occasions, I used translators for those women who spoke Tigre and Kunama,3 in order to allow women to speak in their own voices about what their own ideas of equality were, how they depicted revolutionary change, what changes they valued and what priorities they set.

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Table 12.2 Respondents’ Biographical Chart 2 Respondents 1. Genet

Political Affiliation Base area

2. Asma

Base area

3. Zewdi

Base area

4. Halima

Base area

Economic Occupation Before/Now Military commander / professional-adm. Peasant / professional arts Military commander / professional arts w. c. / professional arts

5. Himune

Base area

w. c. / professional arts

6. Sarwat

Liberated

Peasant / peasant

7. Kedija

Refugee

Peasant / peasant

8. Leila

Refugee

Peasant / peasant

9. Fatna

Refugee

Peasant / peasant

10. Raqiya

Front-line

Peasant / EPLA

11. Yelsu 12. Keddes

Liberated Area Front line

13. Miriam 14. Bisrat

Base area Base area

15. Tsion 16. Senayit

Base area Base area

17. Amete

Base area

18. Askalu

Base area

19. Hiwet 20. Asmeret

Liberated Area Refugee

Military commander / professional-adm. Military commander / EPLA Peasant / student Military commander / professional-adm. W. c. / student Military commander / professional teacher Military commander / professional medical doctor Military commander / professional nurse Military commander / professional-adm. Peasant / peasant

21. Betli

Refugee

Peasant / worker

22. Mamet

Refugee

W. c. / worker

23. Tsehaytu

Base area

24. Rishan

Front line

Military commander / professional machinist W. c. / EPLA

Educational Level Before/Now College Non-literate / elementary High school / professional school Elementary / professional school Non-literate / elementary school Non-literate / literacy training Non-literate / literacy training Non-literate / literacy training Non-literate / literacy training Non-literate / literacy training Elementary / vocational training High school / military training Elementary / high school College Elementary / elementary College College College High school / professional school Non-literate / literacy training Non-literate / literacy training Non-literate / literacy training Elementary / vocational training High school / military training

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Table 12.3 Respondents’ Biographical Chart 3 Marital Respondents Status [*] Nationality 1. Genet M Kebessa (Tigrignia) 2. Asma M Tigre 3. Zewdi M* Kebessa (Tigrignia) 4. Halima S Denakil 5. Himune M Kebessa (Tigrignia) 6. Sarwat M* Tigre 7. Kedija M* Tigre 8. Leila M* Tigre 9. Fatna M* Tigre 10. Raqiya M Tigre 11. Yelsu D Kebessa (Tigrignia) 12. Keddes D Kebessa (Tigrignia) 13. Miriam S Tigre 14. Bisrat S Kebessa (Tigrignia) 15. Tsion S Kebessa (Tigrignia) 16. Senayit S Kebessa (Tigrignia) 17. Amete D* Kebessa (Tigrignia) 18. Askalu S Kebessa (Tigrignia) 19. Hiwet W* Kebessa (Tigrignia) 20. Asmeret M* Kunama 21. Betli W* Sahho 22. Mamet D* Belen 23. Tsehaytu S Kebessa (Tigrignia) 24. Rishan S Kebessa (Tigrignia)

Religion Catholic Muslim Coptic Muslim Coptic Muslim Muslim Muslim Muslim Muslim Coptic Coptic Muslim Catholic Coptic Coptic Coptic Coptic Catholic Animist Muslim Catholic Catholic Coptic

Age 27 22 27 19 30 24? 65? 32? 28? 21 24 28 18 25 16 30 43 35 45 18 59? 42? 23 24

*with child (ren) ? not sure about age

As an Eritrean, my knowledge of the language and familiarity with the culture provided me with the means to probe for clarification or elaboration, to help detect error or misunderstanding, and to reduce ambiguities and complexities of Eritrean cultural expression into their English equivalents. In addition, my insider role provided knowledge and reduced problems of ethnocentrism. As a native born Eritrean woman, I was sensitive to how the framing of questions and the style of interviewer would elicit (or inhibit) open communication from my female subjects. My approach was interactive and openly empathetic. The research work was an intensively collaborative effort between the participants and me. Many of the subjects indicated there were moments during the interview when new insight and understanding emerged, and many participants

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stated that they had never had such focused and in-depth discussions on gender issues and particularly on their own personal lives. Before focusing on the study, itself, it will be helpful to provide a brief history of Eritrean women in traditional societies and under a range of occupations. Eritrean Women in History Women in the traditional period. Both before and during a succession of colonial eras, Eritrean women’s status was subordinate in social, economic and political affairs. Under the traditional order, Eritrean women carried the weight of conservatism and prejudice or pre-capitalist relations and practices. Non-indigenous and Western colonialists’ heritage of attitudes and values about gender roles were carefully delineated by their own economic and political interests; in traditional Eritrea, women’s roles were largely based on semi-feudal agricultural and pastoral economic systems. For both agrarian highlanders and pastoral lowlanders, the family was a crucial unit of economic production and socialization. It was hierarchical, patrilineal, authoritarian, and had strict sexual and generational division of labor. Although traditional women held a subservient position in the family, they could play crucial roles in its continuity because of their reproductive role. Eritrean women’s relationships with their families were characterized by an unequal division of domestic labor, oppressive marriage customs, discriminatory customary laws, rigid religious and moral beliefs, and the regressive attitudes of men. The ideal character traits of female behavior were docility, humility, and industriousness. In youth, a girl was obedient to the wishes of her father; when married, to her husband; and in widowhood, to her sons. In a predominantly agrarian country, women’s participation in the economic sphere was significant. Highland women shared primary responsibility in agriculture with men, farming and harvesting the crops that fed their families. They were integral to each step in the process, from clearing the land through harvesting, winnowing the grain and grinding it into flour, and preparing it for baking. Despite their economic role in agricultural production, Eritrean highland women’s position was subordinate to men’s within the rural economy. Men were sole owners of agricultural produce and the fruits of their wives’ and daughters’ labor were their undisputed property. By contrast, Eritrean women from the lowland had minimal involvement both

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in agricultural production and animal husbandry. In keeping with Islamic law, a strict system of seclusion was widely practiced. However, even among these conservative pastoral lowlanders the need of extra hands in seasonal farming and a family’s economic circumstances dictated the extent of women’s participation in productive activities. In traditional Eritrea, the education of women reinforced their roles and the associated cultural values. Traditional education had secular and church parts. The non-religious education, like agricultural and pastoral life, was suited to the traditional needs of the people. Education of the young fitted them for their roles in communal life. Skills and crafts were handed down, along with traditions, customs, and knowledge of the complex system of rights and duties which ordered the society. Education was usually rounded-off by initiation ceremonies or “regimental” training marking the young person’s entry into full adult status. Thus, traditional Eritrean education was functional and utilitarian with respect to the social and economic roles women and men were called upon to fill. Women under colonialism. The introduction of colonialist rule by the Italians and Ethiopians exacerbated the oppression of Eritrean women in the economy and within the family. The Italians imposed a capitalist mode of production, a focus on cash crops, and money exchange. The increased production in the cities and Italian land confiscation brought a migration of highland men into urban areas, and the taxes and rents imposed on the rural populace placed additional pressure on women who were raising subsistence crops. Women from agricultural regions had a double load—to feed their families and to pay off the colonial administration. The shift arrangement for men to work on cash crop plantations and in mines and urban factories left women responsible for village farming. Neither the Italians nor the British paid any attention to Eritrean family life. The colonialists’ own patriarchal concepts of gender roles led to the marginalization of Eritrean women. Western patriarchal culture intersected with local Christian and Islamic culture to increase women’s inequality: colonialism increased the restriction of Eritrean women to the domestic sphere and to non-wage labor, at the same time that expropriation of land forced many to live on wage labor. Colonial policies and legal codes favored men for access to employment, education and public life. New marriage laws, based largely on the Western ideal of monogamous nuclear family and a Victorian moral repugnance to traditional practices, did not lighten women’s burdens. Under both Italian and British rule, the education of Eritrean women was marginal to the political and economic interests of the metropolis. Western conceptions of acceptable sex roles were manifested in differential education of boys and

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girls, as represented by access to schooling, curriculum and educational participation rate. In traditional and colonial Eritrea, the history, and social context of agrarian highland Christians and semi-nomadic pastoral lowland Muslims were notably distinct. Not surprisingly, patriarchal arrangements also varied between these two groupings. Accordingly, while uniformly oppressed, Eritrean females were grappling with diverse structures of domination as the Eritrean people and women in particular began to engage in the oppositional struggle against Ethiopian colonialism and for national independence. The increasingly acute repression by Ethiopia fell hard on women and catalyzed their increasing commitment to participate actively and fully in the unfolding national liberation effort. The View from Above: The EPLF’s View of Women’s Subordination and Strategies for Change The following section examines whether and to what extent Eritrean women were securing social equality with men during the national liberation struggle. It delineates how issues of female subjugation became recognized within the national liberation struggle and the ideals, policies and programs devised by the Eritrean revolutionary leadership to promote equity in women’s public and private lives. It also depicts how Eritrean women’s own perceptions and experiences of their status within Eritrean society. Finally, it analyzes the revolutionary front’s view and women’s views of what constituted equality and what elements brought change in their status. The EPLF’s theoretical perspectives and its policies for the elimination of gender inequality along lines of sex are primarily contained in two texts, Women and Revolution in Eritrea and The National Democratic Program,4 which provide a schematic delineation of the Front’s view of the cause and remedy of women’s oppression, while other documentary sources have extensively detailed the Front’s programmatic approach aimed at securing women participation in the revolution. The EPLF believed that the emancipation of women is achieved as part of the overall revolution for national liberation and democratic change, and that women’s status is transformed as part of the process of abolishing division along class lines. It accepted the basic Marxist view that the relationship between the sexes is a function of relationships among classes.5 It argued that the dismantling of the feudal and colonial order and its replacement by a new centralized, secular and more egalitarian social

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order carried within it a fundamental solution to the problem of women’s subordinate status. The Front held that women were subjected to dual oppression—one “as members of the toiling masses under colonialism and feudalism,” and the other as a social group “by virtue of their sex.” The attainment of gender equality required women’s equal participation in socially productive labor and in political activities. This would free women from the familial and cultural constraints which are the roots of female oppression.6 The EPLF’s conception of women’s oppression and its official policy measures to bring about equality in women’s status were rooted in its broader vision of political change and social transformation. The EPLF’s core theoretical assumptions were: l) women’s emancipation required Eritrean political independence and economic development; 2) equality for women was gained through the inclusion of women in political struggle and productive labor outside the family; and 3) women’s full participation in the public sphere would lead to changes in relations between sexes and in the feudal ideologies and practices that denigrate women. Politics. The dynamics of the national liberation struggle generated the EPLF’s interest in mobilizing the active support of women. Beginning in 1974, women’s political mobilization and integration became a major priority of the Front. It strove to eliminate obstacles to women’s participation in political activity. Concurrently, women became fighter in the revolutionary army (20 percent by 1983). The EPLF was clear that women’s political involvement strengthened support for the liberation struggle, and all initiatives—including an Eritrean women’s organization—were geared to this larger instrumental goal. Women’s entry into central leadership positions was not highlighted as particularly desirable. Placing women in high positions of leadership was not considered; the Front’s exclusive focus was on mobilization at lower levels. Consequently, while grassroots changes proliferated, the highest strata of leadership was exclusively male. Economy. The EPLF viewed the economy as the critical realm in which to advance women’s emancipation. The underlying assumptions of this point of view were: 1) the oppression of women was held to derive from class relations, and men are regarded just as victimized by it as women; 2) economic transformation was key to eliminating women’s oppression; and 3) the mobilization of women into the labor force was seen as a means to enhance the drive for national economic development and, at the same time, to dissipate women’s inferior status through wage

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labor. Thus, production and development were primary goals: women’s equality, while desirable, was subordinated to economic transformation. Economic activity was theoretically privileged as the most vital pathway for women to achieve liberation. Productive labor, according to the EPLF, promoted transformations in both women’s consciousness and material circumstances. Family. The EPLF’s concept of the family was informed by the view that public and private power are linked, that social liberation was fundamental and necessary to generate gender equality within the personal realm of the family. Since the oppression of women was held to derive primarily from the overall societal oppression, the EPLF’s policies were devised to underplay the non-economic, primarily familial elements of Eritrean women’s inequality. There was very little official strategy to alleviate women’s domestic work within the family. The study found that, both conceptually and programmatically, institutionalizing child-care through communal parenting was given precedence over equalizing household labor between the sexes. However, there were new legislative initiatives to abolish restrictive customs and traditions against women, such as granting women’s right to choice of partnership in marriage, the right of divorce, and equal legal status. The EPLF cautiously disseminated information questioning discriminatory customs, such as female seclusion, polygamy and female circumcision. Education. Education was viewed as critical in the EPLF’s broader vision of the imperatives for national liberation. The official ideal of education was the creation of a system of pedagogy to support the interests of peasants and workers in Eritrea. The EPLF sought an approach to education that would nurture and reinforce a non-hierarchical society. The system of education included formal and non-formal schooling and consciousness-raising. Education was viewed as an important vehicle for the elimination of social inequalities through the creation of capabilities for skill acquisition and consciousness. Educational policy was therefore regarded as central in helping women prepare to build the kind of society the EPLF envisioned. Accordingly, females were given extensive access to education. A non-formal literacy campaign had major impact on women. Women’s oppression was addressed by the curriculum, and male and female teachers modeled emancipated gender relations.

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The View from Below: Eritrean Women’s Perceptions and Experiences of their Status within Society Eritrean women’s concepts of gender equality. Eritrean women who were interviewed chronicled major events in their lives that caused changes in their material condition, social relationships and ideas. They delineated their lived reality and perceptions of their position within the society. Based on the interview data, four major themes in Eritrean women’s lives emerged: public life, including the domains of political activities, work, and education (including formal and non-formal schooling and consciousness-raising). The fourth domain is the private realm of family life. The majority of the respondents stated that Eritrean women suffered dual oppression as members of a colonized society and as females. When asked to elaborate about the cause and the nature of women’s inequality, many described the source of women’s subordination in economic terms— “productive relations,” “private property,” and “men’s exclusive ownership of capital through land ownership and employment remuneration.” Others referred to the “feudal-capitalist system” or the “system” as the basis for women’s subordination. However, in describing the nature of female oppression, they portrayed the feudal family system as playing a prominent role in subjugating women. They regarded the household as a bedrock for women’s subordinate status relative to men. They described male privileges as “feudal ideas and practices” which keep women in “absolute servitude,” and guarantee “male supremacy.” Asma7 stated: In our society a women is not considered an equal human being to a man... she is there to serve him and to bear children... she has no recognition of her person... the man can do whatever he likes with her. She has no individual rights. She does not exercise free choice. Even the law does not recognize her. A father chooses her husband and she has no say. She is prohibited from leaving the house, expressing her views, and owning any property. Even her younger brothers or her younger sons have better rights than her.

Genet described gender ranking and differential treatment within the family: A man does not want a woman to be independent, because he has a personal gain in her servitude, so he will resist change. Even when they themselves are oppressed, men feel that women are their domain. Even between siblings, this attitude exists. For example, when parents find a

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girl playing with her brothers, she will be told to go inside the house and sit there, or work... If she says, “how about them,” [her brothers], she is told, “they are boys, they can do whatever they like, you’re a girl, how can you think you’re equal to them.” This is what all mothers say to their daughters.

Many of the women stated that feudal ideologies promulgated by “the system” or “by men” are powerful means of keeping women in subjugation and asserted that sometimes even women themselves perpetuate their own oppression by accepting these “myths.” Genet declared that women’s oppression is so deep seated and multifarious that it will take a close scrutiny to locate it, let alone to begin to fight it.... This organization has embraced “women’s question” and it has given women the opportunity to participate... [and] to fight against their specific oppression....This is an important concession....They [the EPLF] did not have to do that... but it is a daring act. As for men’s attitude it takes time to change that... nothing can be abolished overnight.

All the respondents believed that Eritrean women’s emancipation can be achieved only as an integral part of the national liberation effort and social change. They indicated that women’s equality requires first, national freedom from colonial oppression and economic stagnation, and second, cultural change from feudal traditions of regressive customs and ideologies that hamper women from achieving their full potential. For instance, Yelsu stated: Our goal is primarily to extricate ourselves from alien oppression which had become a threat to our very survival as a people and to eliminate feudo-capitalist social relations... [or] private property, which is the basis of all oppression....All of us, male or female, have to struggle for the creation of a free and democratic society.

Most women viewed full incorporation into the national public life as the means to do away with women’s inferior status within the domestic and public domains. Halima stated: Only when the oppressed class takes control of the productive forces and become his own master... [and] when women become direct participants in all levels of society can females progress towards equality be fully realized.

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The majority held the view that in order for women to begin to seek change in their status, they have to secure the right to participate in politics, the opportunity to engage in public employment, and access to education and health care. They reiterated that “women are half of the society, and there is no liberation without the participation of women” and indicated that the integration of women into public life benefits the entire society and accelerates social change. More importantly, they asserted that gender inequality will diminish and eventually disappear as a new egalitarian system develops. Ideologies and customs that denigrate women will disintegrate as women gain entry into the public arena and acquire economic security, political power, and educational advancement. Genet stated: In spite of the double character of women’s oppression in our society, the cause of women’s oppression is their exclusion from the public spheres especially their economic dependence on men. Since men feel that they have the upper hand in the affairs of the state and the economic well-being of their families, they denigrate women and see them as inferior beings. All male chauvinist ideas will certainly be eliminated through women’s participation in production, which would accord her equal economic status and decision-making both in private or public arenas.

Himune affirmed that women can achieve social liberation with the establishment of an egalitarian society, which will dispose of the male-oriented society where men see themselves as all-knowing, powerful, and sole decision-makers and women are looked down upon as second-class citizens.

In sum, Eritrean women perceived their oppression in both public and private terms. Living in a country ravaged by war, economic underdevelopment and social dislocation was an important cause of their inferior status—as is the special oppression they encounter as females. Eritrean Women’s Experiences of Equality Politics. Eritrean women placed high value on their participation in the national liberation effort. By and large, political activity was conceived as a duty to their country. For example, involvement in the revolutionary army was a highly regarded political activity. They also viewed access to politics as their individual right to partake in the affairs of their community

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and to defend themselves and their country from colonial repression and aggression. Many respondents stated one of the EPLF’s most important achievements was the formal acknowledgment of women’s right to participate in the liberation struggle. Himune commented that it is unprecedented, in our movement, for women to be given the opportunity to participate fully....Until the l970’s, women did not gain entry into the armed struggle. Since the birth of EPLF, this reactionary curtain has been pulled wide open and women are fighting side by side with their brothers. This institutional support is important for us because we can begin the difficult process of entering the political arena both locally through the electoral process and nationally as a member of the liberation front. This also allows women to respond in concrete ways to the enemy’s excesses and do patriotic work to rid ourselves of the colonialists. In the process we have learned that the demise of “the system” which has hindered our social development is of particular significance to women. Also, our contribution to the struggle is indispensable since the liberation of women depends on the victory of the revolution and the revolution in turn has to secure women’s participation in order to achieve victory.

Most respondents remembered their initial involvement in politics as a direct consequence of their personal exposure to injustices of the Ethiopian regime against them, their families, friends, and neighbors. It was as much for personal as for collective survival that they decided to join the Front. Their unconditional choice to be politically active reflected the deep connection between their private lives and public politics. Some had felt compelled to take a stand against the Ethiopian regime’s wanton killing of defenseless civilians and destruction of properties and saw it as their “patriotic obligation” to “answer the call of duty,” to rise in defense of their country and “to play one’s proper role” or “do one’s bit” for the collective redemption of their society. The social upheaval which colonialism brought in its wake created enormous difficulties for women, but also opened up new possibilities for them to challenge the status quo. The majority of the respondents noted that their personal commitment to the national liberation struggle and their experience within it had heightened their awareness of oppression within Eritrean society— particularly their own inferior position as females. They were previously cognizant of women’s inferior position, but they could not have conceived how to fight for women’s equality. For them, the national liberation movement—especially the EPLF—had introduced an avenue for women to confront “[our] own situation within [our] society and to openly voice [our] rejection and work to create a ‘new Eritrean woman.’”

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All women were engaged in a wide-ranging campaign: membership in secret cells, behind the enemy lines, election to the new village and town administration, service as members of people’s militia in liberated areas, being part of EPLF political institutions, and joining the Eritrean People Liberation Army (EPLA). Most of them had no political involvement prior to joining the EPLF, though a quarter of the interviewees had worked clandestinely or served in their local political administration or militia. Whether they had prior political experience or not, all those who were interviewed indicated that their experiences in the field had deeply reshaped their conception of themselves and their surroundings. Zewdi’s comment conveys their view: For me it is an unexpected and unimaginable way of life.... When I joined the movement, all I wanted is to be in the frontline and fight the enemy face to face. I felt, with a gun in hand, I will stand on equal grounds with the enemy and avenge the misery and devastation it has brought to our people. I also thought it was a privilege to forfeit life in defense of my country. Later, I learned that there were other dimensions to struggling for national liberation that we need to eradicate other types of oppression in our midst. There is prejudice, poverty, and illiteracy and there is also gender oppression. As for me, when I left for the field I did not make the connection between my political and my personal oppression....Now, I consider it a bonus to exercise my rights, not only as an Eritrean but also as a woman.

Further, many women pointed out that political participation was a rapid means of achieving equality with men. They said political activity helped create new values, images and mobility. All women interviewed indicated that the political situation had made their integration in the public spheres like economy and education possible; enabled them to become involved in traditionally male-defined activities; and developed their awareness of the need to change women’s unequal position within the society. Most respondents noted that direct involvement in the national liberation effort opened up options for assuming equal privileges and authority within the political hierarchy, and also ameliorated their inferior status in other parts of their lives. They stated that particularly in the base areas women’s positions had dramatically changed and their contribution had become visible. Halima asserted that the advantage of being here is that everyone is judged according to her or his activity. And also, with one third of our organization being female, it is difficult to not recognize women’s contribution. Especially after l978,

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with the numerical increase of female participation, our contribution in all endeavors became unmistakably clear.

For example, Yelsu, the EPLF’s top representative in the village of Adi Sheik, and Keddes, a top officer of a combat brigade in the Sahel Front Line, noted that they were able to get to their present leadership positions through hard work in which they were judged solely on their own efforts and accomplishments. Yelsu stated that here people have a choice to work in an area they are best suited for and their political position is earned and not appropriated for other reasons than ability and willingness to work on certain tasks. For example, I like my work very much and I think I am good at this sort of work. If I want to change the kind of work I do, there is no one to hold me back. Everyone has a chance to upgrade their skills. As for me, I find my work challenging and gratifying because I relate with different types of people and their issues. There are new issues and challenges that one runs into all the time. I am always learning.... Women have entered in all departments and some have even achieved leadership positions because of their competence....

Another respondent remarked, even in the military domain, women have become a vital force here, which has enabled us to develop confidence and political maturity....The political situation has brought forth a condition in which women can rapidly advance into traditionally male-defined areas.... When you are in combat and you do the same task a man does, there is no way that your achievements cannot be recognized. I would say it is the same for [every woman] who is actively involved in the struggle, anyway.

They added that everyone within the organization gets the same treatment and those in leadership positions receive no special privileges. The nature of the military struggle had opened up opportunities that enhanced women’s status. For example, sex-typing within the economy became irrelevant and counterproductive in the context of the national liberation struggle. Likewise, traditional family values that limit women’s independence were circumvented to meet the demands of the military situation. Women benefited from the new mass-oriented educational system which consciously sought to eliminate the barriers to women’s equality. The majority of the women interviewed saw their current political roles within the revolution from both a personal and institutional point of

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view. Their new perceptions and their political participation were derived from both individual consciousness and the EPLF’s organizational reforms. Their previous lives formed the framework of any discussion of their current political work. Their political and social consciousness of their personal transformation was rooted in their own individual histories as female members of the society and in the historical events of Eritrean politics. They had to make difficult choices on their road to revolutionary activity, choices which marked critical points in their lives. Some respondents spoke of the National Union of Eritrean Women (NUEW) as an institutionalization of the idea that female emancipation required mass initiative by women themselves. The NUEW, which was formed in 1979, was composed of five regional organizations—one within Eritrea and four abroad—in Ethiopia, the Middle East, Europe and North America. The leadership of NUEW consisted of five members, one elected from each region. Most of the women indicated NUEW’s primary responsibility was mass mobilization and the conducting of political education to broaden women’s involvement in public life. NUEW saw political education as critical in seeking women’s equality and national liberation, and its members were urged to attend regular meetings and seminars. Hiwet stated that women needed to know that their private experience was closely connected to what happened in the broader society: Some of us might think we have the answers to our problems, but in reality people who are faced with the problem know what it takes to solve their problem. But there may be circumstances that hinder their progress. They themselves have to point out the avenue to change. We cannot dictate change. At best, we can only provide the mechanisms or the tools that will bring about change in people’s lives.

Genet contended that NUEW’s political education is crucial because it addresses only women’s issues. It will take a long time before we even begin to understand the source and remedies of our oppression.

Eritrean women interviewed stated that NUEW’s role is to furnish a forum in which women could address issues that were important to them. The organization was also an intermediary between the national liberation struggle and women who find themselves excluded from public life and isolated in their homes. NUEW members felt they could organize effectively among those who felt they could not break out of the bonds of tradition and religion. Yelsu indicated that

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we can go to the inner sanctum of women’s wushati8 and talk to them. It’s even better to have a meeting with women in there, because they become very animated and direct and do not have to fear reprisal for talking with “militant” women like us.... Women who would have rejected us because of our unorthodox lifestyle become more open to hearing new ideas and new ways to life since most of them face such difficult circumstances and lead unstable lives....And joining an all female organization does not violate their sense of propriety.... Through the local chapter of NUEW women can participate in public life and address issues relevant to their immediate needs. Also, their political representation would enable them to be in step with revolution.

In liberated areas and abroad, members of NEUW promoted the EPLF’s social and cultural programs. It oversaw literacy campaigns, vocational skill training, health care services, etc. NEUW members presented cultural events that revealed women’s concerns and their contributions to society through theater, songs, dance and other art forms. Many women described NUEW as a sort of umbrella organization that unified Eritrean women in Eritrea and abroad, and created unity and understanding among various nationalities and social classes. NUEW members who lived abroad were kept abreast of what was going on within Eritrea through publications and pamphlets. NUEW members abroad gave political and material support for the national liberation effort by publicizing the Eritrean struggle and conducting fundraising efforts. The National Union of Eritrean Women was viewed as an organization whose primary purpose was to mobilize women for participation in political, economic, and educational activities. It did not concern itself with women’s issues specifically. In fact, respondents expressed the belief that women have to be active and aggressive on behalf of their own liberation: an attack from above on gender oppression was not enough. Most interviewees pointed to the women’s organization as the best medium for women to channel their needs and concerns. However, many expressed concerns about individual women’s roles in their own liberation. Some held the position that women must first rid themselves of self-denigrating acquiescence to lower status before they demand change. More concretely, they suggested that women must be actively engaged in revolutionary struggle, so they could acquire new values and ideas from their daily relations to political and productive work and to male members of society. Moreover, the NUEW had very little influence and independence from the EPLF leadership.9 Thus, women insisted upon “proving themselves” in political activities (“through deeds”) and “sacrificing their lives for the national cause, just like men” in order to claim equality to

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men. Others stated that a woman has to be informed and strive to raise her personal consciousness. Amete stated: A woman has to actively participate on behalf of her own liberation... she must know her rights and roles. Also, she has to see to it that those rights given to her in principle are not violated. She has to struggle against obstacles that come her way. No one is going to deliver a package of rights to her.

Another opinion put forward was that when given the opportunity to participate, the burden rests on women to “validate” their rights through “sacrifice” and “hard work.” Asma explained: I say, women should fully participate in all spheres of the revolution. But, it is also up to them [women] to prove their capabilities. They have to work and dispel the feudal and reactionary beliefs that women are inferior and lack agility or have to be exempted from certain activities....Also, it is their responsibility to assist [men] in the struggle...

Yelsu added that the emancipation of women is not something that will be handed. We should earn it, through our own struggle. Particularly, removal of women’s suppression requires our own sacrifices... we [women] have a double responsibility to fight for our freedom and for the liberation of our country.

Economy. While they did not stress it as strongly as political participation, some women viewed full involvement in the labor force as an important means of attaining their equality. Also, economic involvement outside the home was viewed as creating access to public life. Keddes elaborated: When a woman is freed from unpaid back-breaking work within the family, she gains a foothold in public life to work on her farm, becoming a proprietor of her own yield, or she engages in exchange and distribution of surplus proceeds or joins the labor-force with equal opportunity for advancement and in wages. A woman can be an independent person rather than an appendage to a man. Then no one can deny her the right to participate in the affairs of her community. She can also learn the skills of public life.... But to do all this, a women needs to have the institutional support and education. Schooling would enable a woman to know what is possible and to acquire training and skills.... Now, because of EPLF’s policy, some conservative rural villages have

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accepted the notion of women’s right to own land. But this happened after conducting a long and arduous political education and discussion with the entire village community and not the least with women themselves. .

Others reported that official encouragement of women’s right to work outside the home was critical to accessing the kinds of jobs that were previously unattainable to them. Most women interviewed stressed the importance of women’s full inclusion in economic production outside the family, which allowed them to gain access to economic decision-making and economic options, as well as to break old taboos and cultural habits. Yelsu indicated that access to employment enabled women to gain not only personal earnings and economic security, but it also broadened their horizons towards new experiences and ideas that were previously inaccessible to them when they were isolated in their homes. They are also viewed as productive members of the family and the society.

Nearly all those interviewed emphasized that economic self sufficiency was fundamental to women’s freedom. Yelsu explained that women have been oppressed from the time when men began to have exclusive control over economic resources.... For example, if you own this house you can kick me out any time, for I have no claim over it. Likewise, a woman who relies on a man for her economic survival cannot have equal say. She either has to put up with her secondary status or she would leave with nothing.

Respondents asserted that integration in the work force enhanced their capabilities to learn new skills and thereby move into previously maledefined jobs. The EPLF created access to resources by conducting a campaign to include women in social production in the liberated rural areas and in the base areas. Askalu stated: Without exaggeration, here, women have proved that they have equal capabilities to men. They work as mechanics, electricians, doctors, engineers, construction workers, front-line fighters in the trenches and in the tanks.... We worked hard for all these achievements. Knowing that we started from the bottom the achievements may be tremendous but we have a lot of work ahead of us.... And, in part, all this is possible because we had the institutional support of EPLF.

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In the EPLF-held agricultural region, women were eligible to participate in the allotment of community property. Women gained the institutional support to engage in every economic activity including, for the first time, tilling their farms and selling their produce in the newly established “peoples’ stores.” Hiwet indicated: I feel EPLF’s policy to allow women the right to own land is one of the most far reaching reforms. For women to legally own land and be able to dispose of the surplus harvest as they see fit is a significant material and psychological gain. It also has an impact on the entire regressive ideology which keeps women in secondary status. For example, arranged marriage would someday become obsolete because it would have no economic basis. Girls would cease to be viewed as burdens if they are economically active.... And generally, women will gain economic freedom and social acceptance. Women have always worked hard. It was the feudal social custom that prohibited them from owning land, tilling the farm and engaging in rural market activities.

Leila, a peasant refugee living in the village of Adi Sheik with her family, stated: You see, it is only here [in the liberated area of Sahel] that I saw women plowing the land and engaging in all kinds of activities like selling grains or vegetables to buy necessary goods, like oil, clothing, salt. Our society does not find it acceptable for women to do these things. For a woman to plough the land is considered an insult to her husband or any man. Even if she is an able-bodied woman and her husband is sick or she became widowed, she has to hire a field hand to do this specific job. Or she has to hand over the plot to any man willing to perform the task, entitling him with half of the proceeds. This rule is something that no woman would dare break for she will be an outcast. Then her family will be shunned and no one will marry her offspring.... Now [women] are doing all these new things and the sky has not fallen. Because of the wisdom and help of the EPLF, we [women] are opening our eyes to a new way of life. Even our husbands are open to these new ideas. I only hope it remains like this when the war is over.... I like it better this way.

The EPLF took the lead in mobilizing women in agrarian areas where expansion of agricultural production was underway. Some women indicated that rural women were eager to use the training and to win the economic reforms they had discussed with EPLF members. Yelsu, an EPLF representative in Adi Sheik, stated:

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I would say that the official acknowledgment of women’s centrality in the production of food itself has promoted a new respect for “women’s work.” Because of the economic stagnation and political displacement, peasants were eager to have a relationship with us [EPLF]. By in large, the inclusion of women into all aspects of the village economic activities was viewed positively. Women were urged to form a local women’s organization, where they can avail themselves to literacy training, political education, vocational training, etc.... “Women work groups” were formed and women local villagers were encouraged to apply their vocational training for improving their farm techniques and working on special projects such as digging water wells, irrigation schemes, forestation and some light construction.

Yelsu reflected on her previous experiences and said those of us who were educated, we could only aspire to get clerical, secretarial, or nursing work. Even if we had the training and the ability, we could not get a managerial job or an upper level administrative post. Professional occupations like being a doctor, lawyer, and engineer were out of the question. The job we took had to be always a little lower than a man’s. The boss at work was a man, not a woman. If it was a woman, her subordinates had to be other women like her.

Among the respondents some were professionals and technicians: teachers, garage mechanics, military personnel, artists, and farmers. These women talked vividly about their own experiences in developing their capabilities, “proving themselves,” “employing their creative power and energies” to accomplish previously “unimaginable feats.” Most felt that the Front’s policies enabled them to aim a little higher and start new lives. The majority declared that participation in the economy enhanced women’s personal autonomy and self-worth. Himune commented that women’s participation in economic and political activities had helped women gain confidence and create new images of themselves. She indicated that now women are viewed as workers, combatants and leaders. This is new to our culture. Those who were shy, insecure and fearful have now found a place for themselves within the liberation struggle. We can express our feelings, make public speeches, fight in battles, teach skills other men do not have, etc.... I could not have foreseen that women were capable of doing all these things.

When asked if men’s attitude has changed towards women, Askalu replied:

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In l974, I was among the first females [in the EPLF] and our male comrades were not at ease with us then. However, attitudes have improved a lot. We have proved ourselves to be worthy of it.”

For the most part, women maintained that they had to prove themselves, work hard and improve their capabilities in order to claim their equality. Some, although not the majority, also shared the official view that overall economic development precedes and makes possible female emancipation. On the other hand, some respondents point out that women’s subordination does not disappear when women gain employment and in fact they may face new pressures when they join the labor force. Himune stated: I had worked in factories before I came here and I can tell you that we [women] never felt we were better off than the peasant women. Even while we worked side by side with men, we were paid less and treated unequally....And then outside of work, things remain about the same...and sometimes worse. In fact, those who come from rural areas to gain employment often regret leaving their villages and would have liked to return if it was possible to live off the land. So, although I will consider economic change as the most fundamental change, there has to be change in others spheres as well. Or else, you can be trapped in the work place just like at home also.

The economic policy which accorded women “equal pay for equal work” was not enforced in the base area, because there was no official currency circulation and the labor force did not get financial remuneration. However, respondents who were of working class backgrounds noted the significance of the legislation that accorded women equal pay to men. Himune asserted: Those of us who worked in factories know the unfairness of earning less than our male counterparts. As it were, the wages were shamefully low. When I started work in the soap factory, I earned 50¢ a day. And 12 years later, my salary rose to $3.50 a day, not counting weekends. I took home $91.00 per month. Male workers who worked side by side with female workers received three times more wages than us. We complained, but we were told that we should be glad we had a job. They knew they could replace us any time. They use to tell us that we should be flattered to be wage earners. That was the situation. But now, when Eritrea becomes independent, women will never have to go through what working women like us went through.

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Questions on differential productive capacity between genders led to impassioned discussion and somewhat contradictory assertions by the respondents. This special attention to the issue of physical differences between men and women in terms of endurance and strength may attest to the difficulties of war and of strenuous work with few machines to assist. The topic seemed to be a particularly sensitive issue for many women. A small number of the respondents said forthrightly that women are less physically capable than men, due to biological differences. Many deny any differences in work capacity, even physical labor, but when asked to elaborate, they seem to acknowledge gender disparity: Halima, for example, remarked women are not physically weaker than men.... They can participate equally within their ability or limits, but the notion of absolute equality in the division of labor is a mistaken view.... They cannot be absolutely on par with men.

Zewdi acknowledged that “yes, women can have as much capability as men—but men could endure longer.” Genet stated: Here women have proven themselves to be equal participants in all areas... women and men have to do work according to their abilities... women cannot do everything that men do. For example, if a man carries a quintal (50lb), it does not mean that a woman should do the same.

Himune asserted that here women and men participate equally in all fields.... However, I don’t agree with the assertion that women can do anything, if they are given a chance... Women don’t have the physical strength to perform heavy duties... Furthermore to unduly exert themselves could be hazardous to their health.

When asked how they reconciled the contradictory assertions made by some of the women with regards to differences between men’s and women’s physical capacity, they dismiss the question by stating, equality with men does not mean total replication of men’s work. Others say that the issue was trivial. For example, Genet and Halima observed that women should not worry whether they can produce as well as men. What’s important is their equal participation in all endeavors and contributing their utmost share to the welfare of society.

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Bisrat, who came from an upper middle class family, was inclined to dismiss the whole issue as irrelevant “westernized” preoccupation, declaring that “equality is not gained by doing work just like a man” and added with sarcasm, “a woman is a woman and a man is a man.” While few suggested that there is a biologically determined differential capacity for physical labor, only some seemed to be unambivalent about this question. Hiwet stressed that the biological justification for the exclusion of women from certain kinds of labor is a creation of the feudal and capitalist systems. Why should some jobs be done only by men or by women? When we see closely, the jobs reserved for men have been given more worth. Women are told that they are incapable of doing certain types of labor because of their physical make-up and intellectual capabilities. If given a chance, women can do everything men do. We are a living example of this in our revolution today.... However, it is also important for women themselves to understand that they can and are able to be equal economic participants with men. With proper training and a conducive environment to enhance their skills, women can achieve economic parity.

It was also clear that this was a very charged and controversial issue in their present daily lives. Women were protected by official policy from doing jobs that required strenuous physical work, lifting heavy objects, and working under an environment that may be hazardous to their health. Some respondents felt that this policy would always be necessary to protect women’s health and welfare, while others indicated this policy was valid only during national liberation struggle but should cease to be when conditions change. Another dimension to the issue of differential physical capacity was men’s attitude toward the policy of sex equality. Some respondents stated that there had been a backlash from men. Genet, one of the first females to join the EPLF, indicated that even here, at first, they [men] said that if women want to be equal, then let them carry this load; let them dig the trenches. That was wrong; women and men have to do work according to their ability.

Keddes, a military leader who was not prone to display her emotions, responded most emphatically to this query: I reject this banal view of our society which views women as physically and intellectually weaker than men. There are some men who are weaker than some women and the opposite is also true. In reality, our direct

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participation in the military and other areas of our struggle have negated such notions. In the Sixth Offensive, women fighters of the EPLF fought continuously for two months. What other yardstick can there be to measure their endurance than fighting for two months without rest and sometimes without food and sleep? If there are some men who belittle our capabilities, they are opportunists and backward elements who are jealous of our progress.

When focusing on the future, most respondents saw differences between men’s and women’s physical capacities as socially conditioned—a difference destined for elimination. Asma indicated that “if boys and girls are raised impartially, then they can develop similar capabilities.” Hiwet added the way women are raised is a contributing factor... They have never been allowed to do physical exercise. If from an early age women developed their physical abilities and were allowed to do physical activities, like gymnastics, I feel they could do whatever a man does.

Asma noted in our organization girls and boys who grow up together develop in a similar manner; and their differences can be attributed not to biological or natural factors but to social and environmental ones.

Finally, the majority of respondents, including those who earlier held opposing views, maintained that differences between sexes would diminish if from childhood all were treated equally. As to the question of intellectual differences between sexes, all respondents agreed that women are intellectually equal to men. Family. Eritrean women stressed that the achievement of women’s equality within Eritrean society required the equalization of relationships between sexes within the family and transformation of the feudal social milieu that sustains the existing family. The new family unit they foresaw would incorporate democratic principles that accorded women complete equality. Such a family would be an institution within which male and female members could achieve their individual potential while raising a new generation free from hierarchical and authoritarian customs and ideologies. The majority of the women interviewed believed that the EPLF’s official support for changes in relations between the sexes was crucial to improve women’s position within the home. The EPLF’s policy on the

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family was to establish institutional support for the improvement of women’s status, the protection of women’s rights, and the creation of new values governing relations between people, especially between the sexes. The EPLF’s programs focused on the provision of para-domestic service facilities, creation of a secular legal code, and the building of an ideological campaign against discriminatory practices and traditions. Another major strategy was focused on bringing women out of the home and into the public spheres of politics, production and education, thus strengthening them for struggle inside the family. The EPLF believed that it was important for women to enter public production, especially as the traditional family’s economic function diminished and production and distribution was brought under state control. Genet assessed contemporary women’s condition: EPLF’s official guarantee to protect our personal rights within the family is fundamental in equalizing social relations between the sexes.... I believe women will eventually surmount their subordinate status with legal equality reinforced by access to public life and particularly education.

In contrast to the official view which asserted that women’s entry into and equal status within the paid economy was the paramount driver of women’s emancipation, most respondents believed that gender equality can be achieved only when the unequal sexual division of labor is abolished within the private, as well as the public sphere. They deplored the enormous burden of domestic labor and child-care on women in Eritrean society. While viewing child-care services as necessary to alleviate domestic labor, they asserted that men should assume equal responsibilities for household labor and raising children. The respondents rejected all the discriminatory customary laws and practices with regards to women, such as limitation of choice in marriage, lack of divorce right, female seclusion, female circumcision and lack of legal right. They also admonished that regressive beliefs and attitudes of men towards women which upheld discriminatory customs and traditions had to be abolished. Eritrean women described their experiences within the family during the revolutionary period in four major areas of their relationship to their families—division of labor, personal status, legal right, reproductive function, and values and attitudes held towards women. They asserted that the EPLF’s challenge of traditional family structures had improved contemporary women’s status within the home. They described the EPLF’s strategies to redefine women’s marital and familial relationship

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through the provision of support services, legal reforms, and an ideological campaign. Division of labor. Many stated that sexual division of labor within the family would disappear as a result of progress in individual awareness and an improvement in the overall standard of living. Their participation in public life and the EPLF’s policies on sex equality had contributed to an improvement in their status within the family. The new conception of work had helped men to view household work as not solely a woman’s job. Himune noted that there is a belief within the revolution that work is for everyone to partake in. Irrespective of the sexes, we participate equally in domestic or public labor.

Halima concurred: There is no such thing as exclusively “women’s work” and “men’s work.” This custom is a feudal notion. However, it is also a question of skill and capability. Just as women are learning to do the work that men traditionally perform, men also can learn to do household chores. I personally will expect my future husband to share the domestic work.

Yelsu asserted: Besides, in our present condition in which men and women are engaged in doing the same kind of work, it is unrealistic and contradictory to expect women to do household duties by themselves. I may not force my future husband to do something that he cannot do, but I think it is politically correct for him to do his share.

Asma observed that the issue of division of labor within the family does not apply to our situation at this moment because couples do not live together here. Married couples are only allowed to have a vacation and live with each other for a month every six month or for two months within a year. Otherwise, they work and live in their assigned territories. However, wherever they are located, members of both sexes equally participate and cooperate in domestic chores—cleaning, laundering, cooking, and child-care. When I first came, I could not believe what I saw—men preparing food, sweeping the floors, washing, and mending their clothes.

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The EPLF also provided childcare facilities in the units and regions of the country that it controls. Genet described how the day-care system works: After delivery, mothers remain with their babies and nurse for about six months. After six months, the mother can return to work part-time and leave the baby in the local day-care center. After one year, the mother is expected to resume her work full-time while the child joins the day-care center. After three years of age the child is enrolled in nursery school. The day care facility is operated locally and everyone takes turn in running it.

Amete, the head obstetrician in the Central hospital, reminisced: In the beginning, we set up a centralized day-care facility to enable the mothers to return to their work after six months. We discovered that we were unable to be substitutes for the babies’ mothers, many of whom were EPLA [Eritrean People Liberation Army] members assigned in far away regions. Many of the infants and children who went through that initial program began showing signs of mental and verbal impairment. We felt they needed their mothers’ love and care. We abandoned this program and began decentralizing the day care centers so that mothers would be in close proximity to their children. Although we have limited resources, we believe that we need to raise healthy children who will be future guardians of the revolution and this can only be done when they are properly cared for and raised with their mothers’ love.

Nearly all stated that public cafeterias and collective child care facilities in liberated areas allowed most domestic work to be a communal responsibility, thus freeing women to participate in work outside the family. They believed socialization of some of the domestic work may promote the future restructuring of sexual division of labor within the home. Some of the examples of the institutional provision of paradomestic facilities are grain milling, food processing, and digging water wells. Askalu said: In the past, women worked at home but owned nothing. But now women have been able to release themselves from domestic work and isolation and participate fully in political, economic and cultural activities, enabling them to procure individual options and personal autonomy.

With economic development and better resources, respondents asserted, these services could be provided on a national level, releasing women from the drudgery of domestic labor. Bisrat noted:

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If both women and men work equally hard and create the wealth, then these issues of who does what within the home will disappear. There will be enough resources to relieve women from the burden of household work. Besides, if men have the proper political understanding, they would not expect women to carry the load of housework.

Personal status. Many of the respondents stated that the Eritrean family’s exploitative structures had been weakened by EPLF programs to win women’s rights and women’s participation in the revolution. They noted that some of the most oppressive aspects of family life had been redefined so that women were on an equal footing with men. Contemporary women’s status within the domestic sphere was markedly different. Women were able to exercise personal choice, autonomy and mobility. Rishan stated: I believe women’s isolation within their home dampens their social status and places them at the mercy of men. But if they are engaged in socially productive work, they can secure their economic autonomy and rise up to challenge their personal subordination.

Asma noted: My husband and I have equal say within our home. With our present political awareness we do not have the inclination to resort to traditional authoritarian relationships.... As two individuals we respect each other’s point of view....

Asma explained that she made an independent decision to get married to her present husband: We got married because we love each other. We are together not for the sake of our families or the community, but we freely chose each other.... In fact my choice to marry him was based only on his character and our common interest. I also admire his political principles and dedication. If it was not for the revolution, there was no way that our path would have crossed. I am a lowlander Tigre Muslim women and he is a highlander, Kebessa, Christian. Before, it was unthinkable to marry someone outside my faith. I feel we have been reborn within the revolution. Hence, customs of the past are not observed in our present relations.

A few of the respondents pointed out that the EPLF’s political policies and public campaign were designed to combat exploitative social relations

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between the sexes in the domestic sphere and to promote a new family based on egalitarian and democratic principles. Zewdi noted: The official support of EPLF that women have equal nuptial and familial status is fundamental for eliminating unequal relationship between sexes. The hierarchy and privilege men accord themselves in the privacy of their homes is a manifestation of their dominant political position.

Genet observed that our revolution is vigilant in protecting women’s rights within the families, because it is the site where women’s oppression thrives... in the privacy and quiet corners of people’s homes.... Women’s rapid response to the revolution’s reforms and innovative programs is a testimony of their desire to unsnarl themselves from the web of oppression.

Most of those interviewed indicated that they did not did not prefer having a male, rather than female child although some acknowledged that they had once had a biased view about the desirability of boys over girls. When asked what kind of life they wished their daughters to have, most stated that they hoped their daughters would grow up to be “learned and aware” with “no inhibitions.” Zewdi explained: My life is better than my mother’s, and my daughter’s life will be even better than mine. Many feudal and repressive customs are being left behind. I am so glad that my daughter is able to grow up in such an atmosphere of openness, equality and progress.

Genet noted: Here children are treated equally irrespective of gender. We try to inculcate new ideas and values. They all engage in the same kind of play and activities. All are encouraged to develop their personalities and interests according to their individual inclination. Young people’s image of women is as combatants and workers instead of socially repressed human beings.... It is evident from young people who are brought up in the liberated areas that they have grown up untainted by the feudal view of women. Some of the young people have very little notion of how oppressive our upbringing was.

Legal rights. Nearly all those women interviewed asserted that the EPLF’s new legal codes—that affirm women’s judicial right and personal status under the law—inflicted a significant blow to the conservative practices and ideologies of the traditional family. EPLF reform policies

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had targeted such issues as arranged marriage, women’s marital right, and women’s reproductive role. These women reflected upon their present circumstances and recounted their personal and social gain, while portraying a hopeful view for women in the upcoming new generation. Most of the respondents believed that the EPLF’s legislation had freed women from their unequal legal status within the family. The EPLF outlawed forced marriage, abduction, and polygamy, and affirmed and protected the right of women to choose partners, to free choice within marriage, to seek divorce, to demand child custody, and to own property. Himune noted: With the legislative support of women’s equal rights and change in the marriage system, here we can have the leverage to free ourselves from personal oppression within the family. Women can also seek legal redress to protect their rights in the marital and familial sphere, whereas before, the traditional court did not recognize women as individuals outside the family framework….I believe [the] EPLF has improved the lot of women by granting them equal rights under the law. However, to apply these measures to all the liberated areas will take time. One cannot be too dogmatic about this issue, because the marriage custom is deeply entrenched in our social and religious system. So in the liberated area, the Front has been launching public campaigns aimed at encouraging open discussions and explaining their stance on the issue before putting into effect the new legislation.

Some women stressed that abolishing the traditional arranged marriage system is a cornerstone in freeing women. They felt that from childhood to adulthood, the limitation of their freedom could be traced directly to their role within the family. But now that women have joined the Front, which upholds their full legal status, they acknowledge the substantial change in their relations with their male partners. Yelsu explained: Now, matrimonial relationship is based upon free and mutual consent of partners. And I feel a relationship should be based on individual choice, love and understanding. However, such attitude requires a higher level of personal consciousness and maturity. There are some open minded individuals [men] and there many others who are not. We do not deal with feelings openly. For some men, it is difficult to accept that in reality women can have equal right and decision-making privileges within relationships.

Some women stated that the right to own property and to engage in public production has had a positive effect on relations between men and women. Halima noted:

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Now women can own property and retain the fruits of their labor, which gives them the option to remain single, divorced or widowed. They would not be viewed as outcasts. Moreover, with economic independence and social equality, their choice of partners will be dictated only by their compatibility and feelings towards each others.

When asked what elements they considered important in their choice of marriage partners, the majority stated “love and political beliefs.” With regards to divorce, Yelsu’s statement reflected the majority of the women’s position: I totally oppose our religious stance on this. If a couple decide to end their relationship they should be allowed to do so. There is no absolute situation in nature, and one should not expect marriage to be different. It is not acceptable to live in marriage bond which does not allow happiness. When a couple reach an impasse and can not work out their problems, it is justifiable and revolutionary to terminate [their marriage].

Reproductive functions. Many of those interviewed expressed criticisms and reservations about traditional sexual morality and support for the EPLF’s cautious challenges to a number of traditional sexual strictures. When asked if they personally believe that a woman should remain a virgin until marriage, almost all respondents firmly declared that it has no social value. However, they noted that they did not feel this way before they joined the revolution. Keddes asserted: Virginity has no meaning. I reject the notion that virginity signifies women’s moral character and fidelity. It is only a means to make sure that a woman comes untouched and brand-new, like some inanimate object a person buys in the market. I believe what matters most is the love couples have for each other and the commonalty of views and their political convictions.

Genet admitted: I also used to believe that it is immoral to engage in pre-marital sex.... It was viewed as a badge of good character. Now, whether a girl is a virgin or not is superfluous. What is important is love and understanding. The man may think that a woman’s virginity certifies the kind of life she led before he met her, but it does not guarantee him that she is in fact the kind of person he may want to spend the rest of his life with. Moreover, it is not equitable for men to not account for their actions while women are severely penalized.

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While many respondents rejected the importance of virginity, they made clear that they did not favor sexual promiscuity and they presented a variety of views about sexual freedom. They made statements like “a women should not engage in free sexual expression outside marriage” and it was incumbent upon women to be “careful to protect themselves from unwanted pregnancy.” Discussion of this issue brought out the policy that the EPLF gave official approval for combatants to have conjugal relationships in 1978. Genet stated that under EPLF until very recently, it was frowned upon for a man and a woman to be intimately involved. Now conditions have changed to the point that people have begun to get married.

Himune added: “although the issue of virginity is now passé, sexual relations outside marriage are not allowed.” While not criticizing the official stance on this, Keddes held the view that “this is a matter of individual choice and it should not be prohibited.” Yelsu suggested: This is not something that can be changed through policy. It is deeply ingrained in our conscience, not only of men but also of women. We have come a long way and still have much more to go.

The official stance of the EPLF seemed contradictory and ambiguous—if sexual relations outside marriage were not allowed, then either the traditional ideal of virginity must persist or there were sexual encounters that were not officially sanctioned. However, respondents indicated that “there is no outright prohibition of intimacy between combatants but it is viewed with disfavor to not respect the social convention.” Yelsu tackled this issue by focusing on the larger picture: Generally Eritreans are still engrossed with feudal notions about human nature. They do not view human nature in a scientific manner.... There is a view that one should not intermingle politics with sexuality. People have to learn that they are related. And I think this understanding requires a higher level of awareness. With the present state of affairs, one can only endure the prevailing condition.... It is a question that should be dealt with individually. I may be able to see it scientifically and yet another person may not see it in the same light.

All but four respondents opposed abortion, which was also the Front’s official position. Those who rejected the idea of abortion stated that they were personally opposed; some appeared perturbed by the suggestion that

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abortion could be considered an exercise of one’s right. Many reverted to the official EPLF line that abortion is to be performed only when the mother’s health is threatened. Hiwet stated: “if the mother is healthy, I do not see why she cannot have the baby.” Yelsu noted: A person has an option of using birth control but I do not advocate abortion. For fear or one’s inconvenience the life of a child should not be terminated.

Halima added: I do not consider this as a matter of choice. Besides it goes against the view of our organization. One has to take measures before it happens.... If a child is conceived, then it should be born—for it is the new generation. It is our replacement. It is for the future Eritrea.

Keddes said: I do not think a woman should have abortion, whether it is legal or not. In the old society, premarital pregnancy had very bad social consequences—rejection, shame and in many instances suicide. Now, if a woman has the means to nurture and raise the child, there is no reason to resort to abortion.

Some held the view that morality has no place in a women’s decision to have abortion. Zewdi said: It is not my preference. Not because I consider it a sin, but if the child is conceived then it should be born.... But in situations in which a woman is unable to take care of the child, then I don’t mind it.

Bisrat supported the right of abortion, but added that people have to be educated on this, so that they are aware of the problems or consequences resulting from such action. Some of the major concerns are emotional problems and other people’s reaction.

Genet took a much more definite view: “Yes, [I support] abortion. A woman has the right to make choices.” Many interviewed believed a couple should decide the number of children to have, and that the family size should “depend on the parents’ ability to care for their offspring economically.” Yelsu noted:

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Since children should be raised in the best way possible and Eritrea faces economic problems, a family unit should not exceed more than four children. I personally would like to have two children someday.... But I would not want to have a child now because is not easy to raise a child in the battlefield. Besides, it is a burden for our organization since it is putting its limited resources for the medical services and childcare.

However, Senayit supported the notion that societal needs have to be taken into account when considering the size of family: With the present political and economic situation, this issue should not be left for individuals to decide. If it is left up to the people, some may want to have more children and some less. But the choice of having what number of children families would have should be related to the existing objective condition of the country.

Bisrat added: “it should be determined by the national population policy requirements.” The majority of women vehemently indicated that they opposed the practice of circumcision. Keddes noted: As far as circumcision is concerned, I support its prohibition. I also hail EPLF’s stand on it. EPLF has been educating the public on this issue through various means. For example, the medical department has been giving careful scientific demonstration to enable the populace to grasp the medical dangers of the practice. For those who want to continue the practice, they have been providing them with services of trained foot doctors to supervise the procedure.

Amete, who was the head obstetrician, stated: Once we have established contact with the traditional doctors who perform these procedures, we try to explain to them the physical and the emotional side effects of this practice. In the Sahel area we are dealing with infibulation which is a more severe form of circumcision. Most nomadic women do not have a long life expectancy due to complications arising from this practice.

Some women stated they would not permit their daughters to be circumcised. Halima stated: I would not subject my daughter to what I went through. Now, let alone subjecting my offspring to infibulation, I am critical of other aspects of Sahho practices on women. I want my daughter to grow up free from all

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the restrictions I encountered. I am glad that she will be growing in a free society.

Values and attitudes. Eritrean women stated that the EPLF’s attack on traditional religious and moral beliefs that denigrated women and women’s participation in the public sphere, have challenged and changed values and attitudes held towards and by women. Keddes indicated: We are living examples of the falsehood that women are naturally inferior human beings and have morally unfavorable proclivities. We also have to overcome some of the negative characteristics that we had nurtured or that have been ingrained within us before.

Yelsu underscored the point: Women who grew up being told that they should sit, talk, behave and think only in a certain manner are now being able to face the challenges of new lives within the revolution. I feel women’s personal awareness and material progress is one of the most dynamic aspects of our struggle.

Miriam noted: Our backward cultural beliefs that women are blasphemous, evil and seductive, are all influenced by the need to isolate women from the rest of the society and keep them in bondage. This is all changing today. Women are being viewed like other human beings with good and bad in them.

When asked if there had been any political education effort to change men’s attitudes toward women, Yelsu responded: “no, not particularly addressing men.” However, she added: Men know now that they cannot do whatever they like with a woman. If there are manifestations of male prejudice, it does not go unchallenged. It is also our duty to disprove their negative notion about us. However, we ourselves have to raise our own consciousness and not acquiesce in our own oppression.

Education. The respondents perceived education (formal, non-formal, and consciousness-raising) as a critical means of achieving equality. They believed that education fostered individual betterment by providing consciousness and improved women’s material position in society by

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providing skills necessary to become equal members in public life. Keddes noted: For women, education is a critical measure to deepen their awareness about and to develop the means of change in their personal lives. Also, through the acquisition of training and skills women can successfully move into public life that was previously inaccessible to them. I would say that education is pivotal in transforming the entire society into an egalitarian social system and a productive economic entity.

Yelsu added that the education of women promotes not only the social position of women, but it equips them to impart their knowledge and training to the children they bear and raise within the household. So the next generation would grow up with new attitudes and values.

Most of the women believed they had benefited from the official EPLF policy of universal education for all citizens and the Front’s commitment to combat obstacles to female education. The policy was geared towards removing the attitudinal and material barriers that interfere with girls attending schools and successfully completing their education. Political education campaigns had been launched among the populace to promote the social acceptance of female education. The new educational structure and content are intended to create a new revolutionary personality and to provide the training needed for national economic development. The EPLF realizes that the provision of system-wide educational opportunities for women is not enough—it is necessary also to assure those opportunities are utilized. All respondents depicted their educational experiences as singularly influential in their personal development and current undertakings. Their conception of education included formal, non-formal and ideological training. They perceived learning as a tool in the struggle against obstacles to women’s growth. They believed that education will enable them to become equal participants in political and economic activities. Interviews revealed that all women stressed the significance of access to education, to higher levels of education, and raising one’s consciousness in order to achieve women’s emancipation. They pointed out the importance of encouraging females to enter the educational arena traditionally reserved for men. Most respondents stated that marriage is a major impediment to schooling for girls. Most parents did not send their daughters to school

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because the effort would be wasted on a girl whose future was entirely in the home. Besides, the girl’s time would be better spent learning her proper role in the home and contributing to housework. Asma stated: I was brought up as a Muslim. My father had some education but my mother did not go to school. My parents felt that a girl should learn from her mother how to be a good housekeeper, mother and wife, and the man will take care of the activities outside the home. In fact I was told the Prophet Mohammed has said that women should concern themselves only with family activities. So, it was unthinkable for a girl to be sent to school.

Rishan noted: Even in the urban areas, parents always feel conflicted about sending their daughters to school. The time spent in school takes time away from learning the traditional ways of “women’s work” at home. In addition, mothers always feel that they are denied the use their daughters’ labor. Daughters hold a secondary role to their mothers in taking care of household work and their younger brothers. Some mothers discourage their daughters from paying too much attention to school. Mothers pass on the view that no matter how educated, a girl will revert to her role within the family and would need the domestic skills.

Most women interviewed stressed parents’ anxieties over losing control of adolescent girls and their possible moral corruption. Yelsu said: With better education, girls may refuse to marry the men who already have paid the dowry; scholastic ambitions might tempt girls not to give their full attention to their “proper role” as wives and mothers; higher education may instigate giving up one’s culture and the traditional status accorded childbearing and expose one to moral danger arising from imported values and new ways of life….[many parents felt that] they were being very liberal by allowing their daughters to go to school in the first place. However as the girl gets older they worry she may be interested in boys and before it is too late they consent to the first eligible suitor who appears. In my own case they insisted that my education had improved my chances for a superior husband and that they could not understand why I rejected him. They kept saying, “but he is from a good family, educated and well-off.” They felt that I could not get a better suitor than him.

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Many interviewees also stated that there was a sexual disparity in the higher level of the educational system due to the higher drop-out rate among females. Genet cited that generally families give more attention to their sons’ than their daughters’ education. In my case my mother encouraged me to continue my education. She regretted that she did not have access to higher education for herself. She used to insist that I do my school work instead of helping in the household chores.

However, most of the respondents talked about their interest in education despite all the barriers: Keddes, who was in the EPLA army, professed my field of interest is medicine. I have always wanted to be a medical doctor, despite the fact that there was no one to encourage me to pursue the dream. One brother who supported my desire for more schooling used to advise me to be more realistic and choose some other occupation. But I still have hope that some day I may do be able to do it. If it were not for the political upheaval, I would have done it. Even with my parent’s active involvement to disrupt my schooling I persisted.

Some Eritrean women felt that situation in education reflected the sexual inequality within the society. Senayit, a teacher in the Revolution School, noted: Before there was a differential between females’ and males’ educational goals. Girls who remained in school were urged to take home economics and homemaking courses. Also, school curriculum reflected the sexsegregated labor force, where women received low pay and little training, and were easily dispensed with. Girls were encouraged to get into vocations such as nursing, secretarial, and seamstress.

Genet adds: “because of the limitation of women’s role outside the domestic sphere, women did not have the incentive to continue their education.” Many respondents stated that the EPLF has promoted an expanded system of education aimed at creating widespread opportunities for women. It has targeted women for formal training, literacy training, workstudy programs, and in-plant technical courses for upgrading their skills. The Front had launched political campaigns to gain girls access to school, particularly in the rural areas. Asma stated:

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Before I joined EPLF I had not been to school. I became literate within the struggle and continued by education at the Revolution School until I completed my elementary education. This would not have been possible if it was not for the official view of EPLF giving women equal opportunity.

Fatna continued: The educational program of EPLF is concretely defined. We make use of it in our everyday life and furthering the revolutionary process. My progress on this plane is considerable and I will continue to broaden my horizon.

Senayit described the curriculum material developed by the Revolution School, which addressed women’s oppression and was designed to draw upon people’s everyday experiences: We use the lives of students themselves as a source of learning. Common experiences are to be drawn upon—and the stimulation of social solidarity rather than individualism. Other goals are to subject students to actual everyday problems in order to promote practical creativity and to let students experience and acknowledge the indissolubility of manual and mental labor.

She also noted that textbooks project images of the “new women” as companions and equal to men. Drawings accompanying stories showed women in army uniforms, carrying rifles on their backs and babies in their arms. Tsion, a student at the Revolution School, stated that gender characteristics are no longer attached to manual and intellectual labor and there is equalization in the school activities. She noted: There are two thousand students in this school and we are grouped into three categories according to age—the first is five to seven years, the second is eight to 15; and the third is 16 to 18. I belong to the third category which is called “Fitewrari,” which consists of 50 students. This group lives together in a house that was built by every in the group. There are 25 girls in my group. We collectively share in cleaning, preparing our food, doing our laundry, etc. We also tend to our vegetable garden for our fresh food supply. Work is not assigned based on gender. Student leadership committee has by design equal representation of girls and boys.

Miriam, who was also a student at the Revolution School, asserted:

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here the boys have a very different attitude toward girls, because we grew up here without any stereotype about different sexes. So, to us this domination of women is history. Besides, we will not accept discriminatory treatment.

Some of the respondents said that political education was an integral component of their schooling. Halima noted that she regarded education as a major element in the creation of a new Eritrean woman. Education helps [women] to understand the need for that change, thus empowering us to become major protagonists in our own name.

Asma added: I have undergone immense changes since I joined EPLF. Besides my academic achievement, I progressed ideologically. Today I can understand about my surroundings and about the world. My horizon has broadened.

Yelsu explained that education had given her new options: There is no yardstick to measure the revolution’s influence over my life. Now I have better understanding about myself and others. I also have choices. Before I came here, my interest in life was geared exclusively towards family affairs. I did not know anything about my country and the world beyond.

Analysis of Contemporary Eritrean Women’s Position in Society This section examines whether and to what extent Eritrean women were securing social equality with men during the years of the national liberation struggle. First it assesses the EPLF’s and Eritrean women’s views of what constituted equality and what elements brought change in women’s status. Secondly, it analyzes Eritrean women’s status during the liberation struggle and its implication for theory and policies. The EPLF’s conception of women’s emancipation was derived from a belief that women’s equality can only be achieved as part of the wider goals of social transformation. Its strategy was aimed at releasing women from the constraints of the traditional feudal social order and mobilizing them to participate fully in political, economic and social life of the country. The EPLF’s policies on women’s liberation were derived from

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the readings of Engels’ and Lenin’s texts on the woman question. Engels’ work held a prominent position in that it provided the theoretical explanation of the view that women’s oppression is part of the general problem of exploitation and inequality within society. The source of women’s oppression was found in economic considerations and particularly the rise of private property and the state. This analysis also formed the basis for the classical Marxist theory of women’s oppression.10 The core assumptions of Engels’ work were that women’s subordination was a result of their exclusion from social production and their confinement within the family. Gender oppression was viewed as part of class oppression. Women could achieve their liberation only in a classless society. The primary dynamic was class conflict, not gender conflict: thus, women had no special argument with men per se. Based on this conception, orthodox Marxists’ strategic approach was the elimination of private property, inclusion of women in the wage labor force, institutionalization of child care, and official intervention to ease women’s subordinate status within the family. Lenin’s work was also cited for the need to involve women in political activities in order to construct a truly egalitarian society. Classical Marxism had an important influence on the EPLF’s strategies and programs for women’s emancipation. The EPLF believed that the double oppression of women was caused by both “colonial and feudal socio-economic structures and male chauvinist practices.” They felt that women’s position within Eritrean society would change through political participation in anti-colonial and anti-feudal struggles and bringing an end to a class society based on ownership of private property.11 Women were called upon to leave the confines of their homes and actively participate in the national liberation struggle, public production, and education. The EPLF’s policies on women focused on mobilizing women for political activities, initiating equal opportunities for political representation, endorsement of the right to work, allowing women to own property, establishing official support to socialize and collectivize domestic work, creating access and utilization for education and training opportunities for women, granting women judicial equality, and passing legislation for maternity leave, a safe working environment for pregnant women, and protecting women from an environment that is harmful to their reproductive functions. The EPLF and Eritrean women: perceptions of the struggle for gender equity. In the previous section, 24 Eritrean women disclosed their ideas of what constituted equality and described how changes had

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occurred in their lives. They assessed their present condition from a personal and institutional viewpoint. They also discussed their histories in the pre-revolutionary period, traditional and colonial, and within the contemporary national liberation struggle under the EPLF. Their responses suggested that Eritrean women’s emancipation was possible only when women secured their liberation from national and economic oppression and from inequality between sexes. Their idea of double oppression included first their oppression as colonized Eritreans and second their oppression as women subordinate to men within Eritrean social life. The following will present a summary of Eritrean women’s ideas of what caused change and how they experience equality in the realms of politics, economics, family and education. Women’s pre-revolutionary status will be outlined within each theme. Politics. Respondents placed high value on their political involvement in the national liberation struggle. They viewed the EPLF’s recognition of women’s individual right to participate in politics as a milestone in the history of the Eritrean nationalist struggle. They perceived their participation in politics as a right to defend themselves and their country from the military onslaught of the Ethiopian government. In traditional Eritrea, women had no role in public political life. In rural areas, only males had a voice in societal affairs. In urban areas and under successive colonial administrations, women did not gain access to politics. In the long history of the Eritrean nationalist effort, women were relegated to peripheral activities and opportunities for playing direct roles in politics were not open to them. However, with heightened interest in the nationalist political activity among colleges and high school students, girls became visible in political organizations and clandestine activities. By l974, the EPLF began to admit women officially as members of the organization. Most of the respondents asserted that their participation in nationalist activity had diminished the limitations in their public and private lives, both objectively and subjectively. The struggle against national oppression had created a societal awareness about female oppression. All the women interviewed indicated that under the EPLF they were encouraged to exercise their right to have a public voice in the affairs of their communities and country. The traditional perception of women as weak, isolated, shy, inarticulate, and indecisive had given way to a new image of women as fighters and productive members of the community. Respondents held the view that women’s access to previously male arenas had had a radicalizing effect on society and on women.

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Women participated in all areas of the EPLF, including as members of the armed forces. Within the base area, women were involved in the administrative and political structures of the EPLF and they participated in the local, regional, and national assemblies in the liberated areas. Most of the women stated that women’s involvement in politics was unprecedented, since women were traditionally prohibited from participating in public affairs. With the acquisition of the right to vote and to be elected to public office, women gained seats in village councils, neighborhood committees, and some regional posts for the first time. Behind enemy lines, women constituted a large proportion of neighborhood and village clandestine organization members, since the majority of men had left to serve in the liberation struggle or to work in foreign countries. Even within the liberated area, women were an important force in the new political and socioeconomic structures within their communities. A statement that was often made by (and about) Eritrean women is that “the liberation struggle is a great equalizer.” Women had been able to break through male prejudices and acquire political influence through their “deeds” and “hard work.” They often stated that “here everyone is judged according to her/his performance and everyone can contribute for the reconstruction of the society that is blighted by war.” Women had a better chance for liberation within a revolution which sought to dismantle the traditional structures that has also oppressed them. Although they acknowledged that they were sometimes patronized by men, they stressed that the revolutionary culture repudiated bigotry and chauvinism. Some respondents indicated that the EPLF’s establishment of a women’s organization was an acknowledgment of women as a separate social group and enhanced the prospect for mass mobilization of women for the liberation struggle. Economy. The majority of the women interviewed stated that the right of women to fully participate in economic activity was fundamental to the achievement of women’s equality. The interviews indicated that women believed equal access to resources and the right to engage in productive activity increased personal awareness, sense of worth and economic autonomy. On the societal level, women’s contribution to public production enhanced economic development and the social well-being of the country. In traditional Eritrea, women had very little access to economic resources and ownership of property. In rural regions, women engaged in productive activities, but the majority of urban women did not have the training and skill necessary to join the labor force. The only

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available positions were the lowest level of the occupational hierarchy with minimal pay and long hours of work. The informal sector enabled women to extend their domestic skills to secure some income for their work. Respondents proclaimed the centrality of the EPLF’s official recognition of their economic rights—the right to work, the right to own property, the right to equal pay for equal work, the right to equal opportunities for advancement. The right of women to own property was especially important to rural women, as was the right to plough the soil, an activity from which they had been previously prohibited. These women pointed out that this reform was crucial in improving women’s access to economic resources within the agricultural sector. However, it was clear that this policy applied only to the liberated area. Under the EPLF, significant advances had been achieved in mobilizing women for productive work in private and state run agricultural farms, light industries, workshops and service plants in base and liberated areas. All those interviewed noted that women had been able to upgrade their skills and know-how through in-service training and skill enhancement programs which improved their chances to enter previously inaccessible jobs. The law guaranteed equal pay for equal work. This measure was not applicable to those who lived in the base area since they were not recompensed monetarily for their economic services. This policy of according equal value to all work, whether done by men or women, created the perception of equality beyond the workplace. Respondents stated that there were no job status differentials between mental and manual labor. Everyone was judged according to the task she/he performs, and that cooperation and team effort were stressed over competition and individual gain. Family. Most of the interviewees believed that the equalization of women within the family required a complete transformation of gender roles, personal status, and legal rights and the underlying ideologies and beliefs that sustained prejudicial attitudes and values towards women must be rooted out. Respondents often delineated how an entrenched sexual division of labor and unequal power relationship between men and women within the family burdened women exclusively with a broad array of domestic tasks and sharply curtailed their freedom and autonomy. They portrayed women’s activities, status, and rights within the family and noted how gender was a basis for socialization from a very young age into adulthood. They indicated that the family was a locus of an uneven power relationship between genders, with male members holding privileged

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positions. According to tradition, women had no free choice to select partners, make personal decisions within a marriage; demand for divorce; win custody of children; or own property. Repressive measures controlled women’s sexuality and reproductive functions through practices of circumcision, seclusion, abduction, and harsh discipline. The subordination of women was legitimized by prevailing religious beliefs that reinforced patriarchy and women’s inferior status. Most of the respondents indicated that the EPLF’s program to change the nature of the family had improved women’s lot. That policy favored socialization of child care and of some household work through the establishment of facilities, such as communal bakeries, water wells, flour mills, and cotton spinning. In the base areas, male and female members shared domestic work. However, since there were very few married couples who lived under the same roof as a nuclear family, the division of labor was applied to coed communal settings where everyone performed their assigned tasks. The EPLF had dismantled fundamental structural and ideological barriers that limited Eritrean women’s personal rights within the family. The significant gains women had achieved under the EPLF’s new policies were equal judicial status. The official ban on arranged marriage and child brides had promoted female children the right to reject unwanted partners or forced matrimony. The EPLF’s establishment of a secular judicial system provided the protection of women’s personal rights and accorded them legal parity with men. Women could enter into contracts as individuals and exercise free personal choice within marriage, could demand and win divorce, could successfully claim child custody, and could commonly own property. Many of the respondents observed a weakening of religious and feudal customary laws, and a secularization of social life that had diminished the strength of traditional structures of hierarchy between the sexes and had created personal options and autonomy for women. The EPLF’s attack on practices that upheld men’s special privilege and power—polygyny, concubinage, prostitution, etc.—had brought a positive change in women’s status. The Front’s attack on traditional values and attitudes towards women, together with the creation of a new cultural iconography— showing women as positive role models—had resulted in an improvement of women’s self image and advanced a positive image of women. The EPLF’s official encouragement of women to enter the public sphere was another crucial means of freeing women from familial and marital oppression. In order to attain true equality with men within the family, women had to secure access to education, politics, and production.

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Education. All the women viewed education as a means of gaining, understanding and acquiring the skills that would enable them to increase their material well-being within the private and public spheres. They believed that education provides the means to understand the need for change and enhances women’s ability to exercise control over their lives through improvement of their skills and training to secure access to production and politics. Historically most women were denied education. The EPLF’s policy of encouraging women to attend school was seen as very significant. Many respondents stated that the educational disparities between the sexes were a reflection of Eritrean women’s subordinate social position. Women were confined within the family and forbidden access to economic resources and political decision-making. Lack of education has contributed to isolating women within the domestic sphere and assuring their relegation to peripheral economic activities, when they could assume public roles at all. Traditional non-secular education totally excluded women, while colonial modern education was limited to only a small minority of women. The majority of Eritrean women remained nonliterate. The EPLF established schools in every village of the liberated regions, where male and female children were encouraged to attend. The form and content of the new educational system were geared to meet the needs of both sexes. The educational activities were organized and curriculum was designed to eliminate the attitudinal and material barriers that interfered with Eritrean girls attending school. The EPLF made it clear to parents that they ought not prevent their daughters from attending schools. Courses and school activities are designed to combat male chauvinism and sexual stereotyping. Girls were encouraged to take subjects that were traditionally male-identified—science, mathematics, economics, etc. Women had especially benefited from the literacy and adult education campaigns launched by the EPLF, as well as from agricultural and vocational training. Political education had helped women to place their personal experiences into a social context, and thereby reinforced their commitment. On a more general level, women interviewed indicated that they had a deeper understanding of Eritrea’s political position within the world. The majority of women declared changes in family and education to be the most critical factors in bringing about changes in women’s position within society. The political situation was foremost in their minds, and they directed their energies into political work and fighting in the armed

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struggle. At the same time, they were deeply connected with their own struggle as females and viewed the family as an area where women have been imprisoned from public participation and particularly from education. Most of them indicated that while access to productive activities was significant to bring about equality between genders, first the familial relationships between sexes and cultural notion of inherent inferiority of women had to be redefined. Respondents repeatedly mentioned educational attainment as a critical means to gain equal status. They stated that they were denied employment, income, and social recognition and were consigned to be intellectually subordinate to men due to lack of education. They noted that education promoted both material and nonmaterial change—women’s knowledge, training and skills, that would facilitate their entry into the public sphere of economy and politics as well as provide new self awareness, values, and cultural habits that would impact on women’s interpersonal relationship within the family. All the respondents indicated that the EPLF’s commitment to overcoming sex oppression have been momentous in the history of Eritrean nationalist struggle. The official recognition of women’s right to equality and programmatic intervention has brought positive changes in the lives of women. Eritrean women believed the removal of some structural inequality has secured the material base for their eventual emancipation. Policies that accorded women legal equality and access to economics, politics, and education laid the groundwork to fight for their own liberation. Assessment of the Eritrean Campaign for Gender Equity: Gains, Gaps and Contradictions This section will address women’s responses to the EPLF’s official policy measures, and assess both the convergence and discordance between women’s “views from below” and the EPLF’s perspective “from above” as regards the struggle to achieve gender equality. Before assessing the strategies of the EPLF focused on women’s emancipation, it is necessary to review the general social context within which these initiatives were being launched. The degree to which women could achieve equality and to which official policies could be successfully implemented, was linked to overall historical and cultural factors. Advancement of women’s emancipation was hampered by the effects of war, limited development of productive forces, and conservative feudal ideologies and practices. Psychological forces which originally arose from

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social factors, but had gained a certain life of their own, impeded women’s emancipation long after formal equality has been won. Over decades of armed struggle and the brutal suppression by Ethiopia, the Eritrean people, urban infrastructure, and countryside had been devastated, causing human suffering, hunger, poverty, malnutrition, and migration. In most parts of Eritrea, pre-capitalist relations of production prevailed, and only meager resources of capital, technology and skilled personnel were available. Pre-capitalist feudal social relations and ideologies were held sway over much of Eritrea and they fragmented the people along class, ethnic and religious lines. The ongoing liberation war, economic scarcity, and weight of conservative cultural practices had direct implications for women and posed significant obstacles the progress towards women’s emancipation. The EPLF’s official commitment to women’s equality and its achievements must be viewed within this challenging and often countervailing context. In traditional Eritrea, women’s roles and status were vastly inferior to men’s. Colonialism exacerbated Eritrean women’s conditions of inequality by introducing new forms of sexual divisions within existing pre-capitalist practices. As a consequence, women were one of the most disenfranchised groups in Eritrean society. The revolution’s direct attack on traditional socio-economic relations and its official recognition of women’s oppression had brought changes in women’s lives both in public and private spheres. The EPLF’s official policy to combat women’s oppression was significant—women’s oppression was declared an important issue. It was clear that the women interviewed had high expectations and were prepared to advance their cause. With the official intervention on behalf of women and policy redefinitions of women’s position in society, the interview data indicate that women had experienced change and improvement in their current roles and status. Although there was little quantitative data on the pattern and degree of female involvement in public activities, the general participation trend indicated that women had made tremendous gains in securing access to the liberation movement and its political apparatus, obtaining entry to productive activities, training, and educational facilities. There also had been advances in the respondents’ position within the family as they obtained personal legal rights to exercise free choice and were relieved of some of the oppressive pre-capitalist practices that obstruct women’s equality. In addition to these reforms, the application of a non-hierarchical ideology and democratic principles had begun to transform social relations and the consciousness of people, thus creating new values and ideas towards and by women.

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Despite the constraints that defined the status of these Eritrean women, there had been substantial changes in their lives compared to the pre-revolutionary period. However, there were limitations, gaps and contradictions in the practical applications of policy measures and in the theoretical basis upon which policy measures have been formulated. The following will assess first the effects of the EPLF’s policies on Eritrean women and on the EPLF’s assumptions about women’s emancipation; and second, the implication of the three major Western theories of women’s oppression—classical Marxist, radical feminist, and socialist feminist—on the emancipation of women in Eritrea. The positive advances and the limitations of EPLF policies and initiatives to bring sexual equality are reviewed in the spheres of politics, economy, family and education. Politics. The EPLF’s recognition of the need for women to be full participants in the national liberation effort and its official policy of mobilizing women into the new political apparatus had brought positive changes in Eritrean women’s political status. The interviewed Eritrean women had gained the right to participate in public activities and decisionmaking bodies. The democratization of political life through the formation of local organs of power had meant that women for the first time could exercise their personal right to vote and to be elected into public service. Women had availed themselves of these new opportunities and were extensively involved in local self-government, in the armed struggle for the liberation of the country. Some Eritrean women had earned the right to be defined as militant revolutionaries and hailed as equal to men in battle and political work. While record numbers of women were involved in politics and in other public spheres, the Eritrean women’s organization had no autonomy or influence on policies affecting specific women’s interests. Like the youth, workers, peasants and professional mass organizations, the function of women’s organizations was primarily to mobilize women for the fulfillment of wider revolutionary goals. This had serious ramifications for the extent to which women could take up the effort to achieve equality through the promotion of their own demands from below. In order to continue improvement in women’s position, it was crucial for women to have an independent organization that addressed distinct women’s concerns while undertaking wider political objectives in alliance with the official governing bodies. In an independent organization, women could begin to unravel the nature of their oppression while ensuring that their voices were heard individually and collectively. According to the respondents, the women’s organization had no major influence on the lives

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of those in the base area and less on EPLF policy formation. It focused its activity on mobilizing women outside the base area for political, social, economic, and training activities. The women’s organization was set up simply to recruit women to join the EPLF and provide material support. In a society where women’s participation in public life was restricted, the women’s organization had achieved impressive gains in securing women’s involvement in the national liberation struggle and mobilizing them for various programs and activities. However, it could also play a much more active role in political education and consciousness raising, ensuring that women’s concerns were identified and officially addressed by the Front, and creating alliances among women across class, age, ethnic, and religious lines. Women who were actively involved repeatedly indicated that equality was gained “only through deed—dedicated participation in the political struggle and economic reconstruction... and that equality has to be fought for and not given.” It is one thing for women to participate in public life, having access to positions of power was something else. Where there was a disparity between the two—as in Eritrea—we must suspect the continued existence of traditional attitudes towards and by women that emphasized acquiescence and secondary status. The experience of other countries indicated that even when women were involved in economic production and political life, the locus of political decision-making remained largely in male hands. This was the case in Eritrea, where women were not represented in the highest levels of the EPLF’s political apparatus. When asked about the absence of women in high political posts, some of the respondents and all the male members of the EPLF indicated that the question of sharing power was an unnecessary Western feminist preoccupation, or that they do not believe in “tokenism,” whereby women were placed in positions without deserving them. But indeed merit did not seem to be the only means to achieve success—it was clear that some women held key position because of their relationship with men in power. Some were children of prominent families; some were wives, lovers, sisters or confidant of men in power. Generally, the absence of women in positions of influence was indicative of a reluctance to accept females in public decision-making roles—a reluctance shared by women. Economy. The EPLF’s emphasis on the development of indigenous economic resources and the creation of new forms and conditions of women’s participation in productive activities had resulted in positive consequences in women’s lives. In the areas that were liberated or under the direct influence of the EPLF, Eritrean women had secured the formal

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right to participate extensively in the economic activities that were previously male defined and to have access to personal property rights. In rural areas, the new land reform measures had enabled women to own land and engage in farming. The EPLF had also legislated equal pay for equal work in order to reduce exploitation of women in urban factories and on rural plantations. Women have had extensive vocational and on-the-job training to obtain the skills necessary to enter production. Most of the women interviewed believed that employment opportunities brought economic autonomy and material well-being. The attainment of economic equality had implications for women’s relations within the family and their need for access to education. The official encouragement of women to enter into all types of productive activities necessarily led to the expansion of support services such as day care facilities. Education and training of women was viewed as essential in order to increase women’s level of expertise. The EPLF passed a series of laws designed to protect women’s needs: for example, women gained the right for a paid maternity leave. Another area stressed officially and discussed extensively by respondents was the protection of women from doing work that may be hazardous to their health. The EPLF’s view that inclusion in the economic sphere was the decisive means by which women’s emancipation occur seemed at variance with female realities. For example, highland women had traditionally been active in agricultural production but were prevented from claiming rights over the proceeds.12 Certain EPLF interventions to advance women’s status within the economy had contradictory effects. Labor laws that protect women’s rights may in fact validate the traditional attitudes and structure of inequality. For example, while maternity leave may be considered progressive, it reinforced the view that only mothers were involved in child rearing, that paternity leave was not necessary. Likewise, the protection of women from working in jobs that involved physical exertion limited women’s options in the job market. It was also evident that jobs that were physically demanding received high status and monetary remuneration. Besides, there was an ideological component to the paternalistic concern for women’s health since it ignored the reality that women in both rural and urban areas work in physically demanding jobs, often while pregnant or with a child tied to a mother’s back. While there were very few jobs that women could not perform due to their reproductive functions, protectionist laws could seriously restrict women from becoming full participants in economic activities.

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Family. The EPLF’s policy approach to women’s position within the family was based on the assumption that only women’s full participation in the public sphere would catalyze change in women’s roles within the family. The Front believed that the material condition of women’s oppression lies in their marginalization from the public sphere. Its family policies de-emphasized the economic function of the family while providing institutional support services to households. Its strategies were focused on drawing women out of the confines of home into public life, establishing basic economic services and social services to alleviate women’s domestic labor, providing health care to lighten women’s traditional role as providers of family health services, and introducing legislative reforms to provide the same rights enjoyed by men. The mobilization of women into the public sphere, the democratization of the family institution through the improvement of basic conditions of existence, the provision of secular legal codes, the deemphasis of customary and religious law, had all led to major improvements for these Eritrean women whose position in the society was closely bound up with their status in the family. Their entry into the public sphere and access to resources and public affairs had brought new options for mobility, material autonomy, and personal awareness. The EPLF had sought to lighten women’s responsibilities within the family through the extension of basic services—water wells, flour mills, and foodstuffs—as well as basic health benefits such as pre- and post-natal care, maternity care and family health care. The EPLF’s support for child-care facilities in the base areas could be viewed as an indication of its concern about the unequal division of labor in the family. Likewise, the formal judicial equality of Eritrean women inscribed in the NDP13 meant that for the first time Eritrean women could enjoy the same privileges and rights enjoyed by men, thus initiating wider paths of social and cultural change. The new Marriage Law granted women equal personal status to select marriage partners, exercise free choice in marriage, commonly own property, and demand divorce and child custody. Additionally, the official disapproval and ideological campaign against conservative practices such as child brides, polygamy, seclusion, and circumcision had produced some awareness about how women were subordinated. What is clear from the interviews was that these Eritrean women had a great deal to say about the non-economic and non-political aspects of their oppression, indicating that their conception of women’s emancipation included a redefinition of relationships between men and women within the family. All of the respondents agreed that Eritrean women carried a disproportionate labor load within the household, and that male privilege

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and power are a major deterrent to women’s equality. While some suggested that household chores be equally apportioned between the sexes, others maintained that in the field both sexes were doing just that—which was generally true. The culture of self reliance and many years of attending to ones’ chores (before females were admitted) had made it acceptable for male members of the EPLF to do the work traditionally relegated to women. However, due to the exigencies of war, couples seldom lived together as a nuclear family unit, so this situation is not a good analogy or test. Nevertheless, the interviewer never saw a man relegated to kitchen work during her field observations, while many talented women who were assigned to do only kitchen work.14 Many respondents also indicated that males’ attitude towards women and traditional notions and values about femininity must be re-evaluated and redefined. However, they did not suggest ways to approach these issues. The EPLF’s official policy did not directly address these important issues—sexual division of labor in the family, structure of authority and dominance, and males’ attitudes towards women. There was more to redistributing the burdens of domestic labor between sexes than engaging in an ad hoc arrangement in which men episodically assisted women in cooking, cleaning and child care. Even the socialization of household labor and child care through public cafeterias and day care services did not address the issue of sharing domestic labor with men. In addition, with limited resources and lack of mechanization, the provision of household services would still be difficult to attain after liberation. Other countries’ experience seeking to sustain democratic social change indicated that the pace of improvements in socializing housework was very slow and was dependent on economic and political factors. After liberation, during periods of economic expansion and political consolidation, services for families tend to not be a priority over the achievement of developmental goals and competing demands for limited resources. Women might end up performing double tasks of household chores and child care within the home, while also being expected to join the public sector and help build a new political and economic structure. The EPLF’s official family reforms and the ideological elements that restricted women’s equality are the most resilient to change. Patriarchal religious beliefs and cultural practices that subjugates women and upholds women’s inferior status requires a sustained struggle by policy makers and women themselves. The EPLF’s redefinition of the economic basis of the family and the provision of legal reforms to equalize relations between sexes did not go far enough to challenge males’ attitudes and beliefs about women. If there was an understanding that women suffer from double

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oppression—as members of a colonized society and as females—then there has to be an understanding of the nature of Eritrean males’ dominance over women, just like the analysis of various classes within the feudal and colonial structure. To define Eritrean women according to a Front slogan as the “slowest to stir due to the feudal oppression they had encountered” does not take into account the persistence of long-believed feelings of male superiority—institutionally and personally. Education. The EPLF’s educational policy was geared towards confronting the material and attitudinal barriers that interfered with Eritrean girls attending schools, establishing access for women in the educational systems, and designing a curriculum that would transmit ideals, values and attitudes needed to establish a new revolutionary order. The EPLF’s new educational system of formal and non-formal instruction had been successful in mobilizing and recruiting female students. In the liberated area, half of the student population in the formal schools was female. Women were encouraged to attend EPLF vocational training schools and in-service training units to learn and upgrade their skills. Other training programs geared towards the rural populace were conducted by mass organizations—literacy, basic health care, nutrition, etc. The EPLF successfully implemented its literacy campaign among rural women, whose rate of non-literacy had been as high as 98 percent. Eritrean women interviewed stressed that education has had a major impact on their roles and status in politics, economy and the family, while maintaining at the same time that their present educational status was a reflection of their success in these spheres. They viewed education as a critical determinant of women’s personal status promoting material wellbeing and mental awareness. The success of women’s education was measured in terms of the EPLF’s policy of removing structural obstacles to female participation in education. Once women entered the educational system, the nature of the educational curriculum and females’ level of achievement were important. Eritrean girls were prevented from access to education, and those who were permitted faced a divided curriculum with different subjects for girls and boys. Girls were encouraged to enter nonscience courses and were disallowed to participate in sports. A girl’s schooling is viewed as temporary until a suitor appears. The drop-out rate for girls was very high and few were able to make it to high school. In the base and liberated areas of Eritrea, women represent almost half of the population in both formal and non-formal educational systems. The EPLF promoted women’s right to education as part of political education and national reconstruction effort. Eritrean women themselves felt education

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was the most important means of producing change and had a direct material benefit in their relations with the public sphere and the family. It also enabled women to raise their consciousness and the need for change. They credited their continued success in the public and private spheres to their competence in acquiring skills and training, gaining new knowledge and consciousness. The EPLF’s approach to creating access to women’s education through formal and non-formal means and its design of non-gendered educational curriculum and teaching techniques, had brought positive changes in Eritrean female attendance rate, literacy rate, and educational levels. Women’s participation in education and other activities with men had enhanced their ability to be equally active in public life and to change the images of women as intellectually inferior, passive and worthless. School books and lesson materials included women as active members of society—they recounted women’s achievements and showed their inferior positions in the previous social order. Contemporary women were represented in a positive manner as active participants in all areas of life including warfare, which was traditionally a male preserve. However, these new images of women had some ambiguities in them that did not challenge some basic assumptions about women’s role and status. The notion that women had special relationships to children continued to be unchallenged. For example, there were themes of mother’s brigade, mother’s day, or working mothers and the portrayal of women in official iconography “with a gun in one hand and a baby in the other” that viewed as ways to support the status of women. However, there was no similar representation of men hailed as images of “father’s work-brigade” or “fathers with a child in one hand and a gun in the other.” In sum, the EPLF’s record of women’s emancipation showed that women had secured significant progress in their private and public lives as a direct consequence of the Front’s policies and also due to the experimental nature of the Front. However, there were also practical limitations and contradictions in Front policies that must be addressed if women were to achieve their full emancipation. On close examination, the weaknesses of the EPLF’s policies towards women could be traced beyond the policy measures and into the set of assumptions that are closely aligned to a classical Marxist approach, which most third world revolutions seemed to adopt.

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Euro-Feminist Theories of Women’s Oppression and Eritrean Women’s Realities15 The three Euro-feminist theories of women’s oppression—classical Marxist, radical feminist and socialist feminist—have enriched this analysis of contemporary Eritrean women. The main difference between the classical Marxist approach and that of radical and socialist feminism is the field of vision. For classical Marxists, economic reorganization is the singular vehicle for women’s emancipation. In contrast, feminists open up an examination of problems within the family system, the institution of marriage, reproductive activities and relations between men and women. The feminists also focus on the significance of ideology and psychology, viewed as independent social factors in the oppression of women. Historically, the radical feminists were the first to view the subordination of women as a central concern that should be in the foreground of emancipatory politics. Radical feminism provocatively broke with orthodox Marxism’s tendency to place women’s liberation on the back burner. However, radical feminism tended to over-emphasized biology and reproduction, ignoring other forms of gender oppression. As my interviews reveal, Eritrean women articulated diverse obstacles to liberation, many of which are ignored by the radical feminists’ perspective. Radical feminist theory universalizes the experience of women, abstracting from historical and cultural differences. The rich voices of Eritrean women indicate that their oppression—and avenues for change—require an appreciation of historical, national, and cultural specificity. Viewing one’s menfolk as oppressors can minimize other forms of oppression, as evidenced by the history of the Eritrean people. For these reasons, the radical feminist approach does not effectively contribute to a comprehensive understanding of Eritrean women’s inferior position and to strategies for change. The socialist feminist approach is a more expansive and totalist perspective. While it views the family as a central institution where women’s emotional, sexual, and material subordination are maintained, it also acknowledged the differences generated by class, nationality and race. It appreciates the complex relationship among gender, economic, political, and community affiliations. While socialist feminists recognize the need for restructuring both economic and family life, they emphasized the need for women to demand change for themselves and advance women’s issues through an autonomous organization. The socialist feminist approach was useful in assessing Eritrean women’s contemporary position. Further, it presented a contrasting

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perspective to the EPLF’s official view on gender oppression. EPLF theoretical orientation was grounded in classical Marxism, regarding gender relations as a by-product of class relations. The EPLF consistently stressed that women’s emancipation could only be achieved as part of wider goals of social and economic transformation. Accordingly, the dismantling of the feudal and colonial order and its replacement by a centralized, secular and more egalitarian social order was depicted as the fundamental solution to the problem of women’s subordinate status. Accordingly, it regards women’s vigorous participation towards larger social change—in politics, production and education—as the proper focus if they are join a vigorous campaign for gender equity. As socialist feminists correctly noted, this orientation is top-down and narrow, while it is pitched as comprehensive. While women’s involvement in socially productive labor and political activities may terminate some of the most extreme forms of female exploitation, other cultural practices and attitudes which are resistant to change may still limit women’s liberation. Without the inclusion of the feminist point of view, patriarchal tendencies remain locked and unchallenged within the official policies and programs. Socialist feminists are better able to depict obstacles than to delineate a route towards emancipation. They are effective in establishing that economics, politics, family life and culture must all be taken up by an effective campaign to emancipate women. Only Eritrean women themselves can identify which specific conditions to contest and determine how to prioritize targets. The areas for change stressed by my 24 interviewees, particularly those minimized by the EPLF, suggest the themes of an independent Eritrean women’s politics. Conclusion The evidence suggests that the Eritrean women respondents felt they had achieved significant positive change in their status. Women had assumed important positions within the revolutionary movement. Their activity in economics and education had grown steadily since 1974. Women had been granted equal legal status. The effort to abolish some oppressive customary practices within the family, coupled with the availability of institutional service for household work and child care, had lessened burdens women encounter in the domestic realm. Those interviewed highly valued their political involvement in the national liberation struggle. They viewed the EPLF’s recognition of women’s individual rights to participate in politics as a milestone in the

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history of the Eritrean nationalist struggle. They perceived their participation in politics as a right to defend themselves and their country militarily. Interviewees stated that full participation in economic activity was fundamental to the achievement of women’s equality. Schooling had been made accessible to women, and they valued both the gaining of knowledge and skills and the enhanced personal awareness and self-forth that came with education. Women appreciated that the EPLF recognized their burdens domestically and attempt to provide resources that would lighten their load. As such, there is significant concordance between views of the EPLF leadership and women from below that the campaign for women’s emancipation had made notable gains. However, fissures emerge as we review the respondents’ commentary. For example, it is clear that women prioritize the need for domestic gender equity and an attack on patriarchal attitudes in a way that the EPLF does not. Women view the domestic domain as a major source of their oppression and male attitudes as a vital source of resistance to change. The EPLF regards the domestic realm as purely derivative—one in which women will advance once the primary lever for social change—the economy, is invigorated and accessible to females. This rift manifests itself in other domains, as well. It suggests that the all-male leadership of the EPLF, not surprisingly, cannot fully grasp the needs and priorities articulated by women. The total dominance of men at the highest levels (and disinterest in changing this) heightens the probability that the leadership proliferation policy that will lack efficacy and relevance. Secondly, since the National Union of Eritrean Women does not speak independently about strategy or interests, women’s concerns about inequities in the domestic realm or elsewhere would not find a voice in the NUEW. As such, the tension in perspectives would not gain visibility where they could be recognized and negotiated. Thirdly, although the EPLF’s campaign for gender equity was remarkably bold, one wonders at the Front’s reticence in taking on more directly patriarchal power, attitudes, and behavior in the family. It is possible that the strategic priority for unity and fears of stirring male resistance account for the Front’s blunted effort. The EPLF may have calculated that women would ultimately accept its conservative approach, a calculation that could have been rooted in women’s tendency to self-sacrifice: a product, in part, of decades of subjugation. Finally, the study has also identified that, in the EPLF’s theoretical schema, gender equity is secondary and derivative, even if fully valued. This shaky conceptual framework may have the tendency to put at risk the sustainability of a commitment to women’s emancipation, especially in a context where resources are scarce and

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threats from outside recurrent. All of the issues identified pose challenges to maintain and expand the campaign in Eritrea for women’s emancipation. This study of Eritrea examines a case in which war and women’s emancipation were inextricably entwined. This focus is not designed to minimize the devastation that Eritrean women (and children) suffered from a war against Ethiopian colonialism and for national independence. As amongst the most vulnerable groups within society, Eritrean women were disproportionately victimized by 30 years of conflict. However, in this instance, the leading liberation organization’s decision to mobilize women into full participation in the struggle (including the army) and through a broad campaign for gender equity provided an array of opportunities for advancement which many Eritrean women vigorously seized and, in some instances, expanded. Accordingly, this is not an instance in which conflict had been a pure disaster, achieving misery without social justice. It is not a case in which people’s well being, including enhanced women’s rights, awaited an internationally supervised post-conflict reconstruction. Although this campaign for gender equity was autonomous and self-determined, as the study has noted, many contradictions arose between the ideals of the EPLF and the lived experiences of Eritrean women struggling with new roles and rights. As women became increasingly empowered, disparities emerged between the aspirations and priorities of the EPLF articulated from above and those of a diverse cohort of women from below. During war and (in a subsequent study) during reconstruction, the dynamic interplay between policy makers and engaged grassroots participants offers lessons for other settings where daunting efforts to empower women are being pursued. In the introduction to this chapter, it was suggested that the analytic approach employed may be helpful in formulating and implementing policies focused on gender equity in Iraq, particularly in its emphasis on data gathering centered on grass-roots women. In order to engage female subjects in a planning process, methods must be devised that are sensitive to the cultural context and power dynamics that may affect the participation of Iraqi women. A number of the findings in the Eritrean study may resonate in the development of a plan to enhance the status and rights of women in Iraq. It is clear that a well-intentioned, comprehensive plan in Eritrea to promote gender equity often converged with the articulated needs and aspirations of grass-roots women, but, at same time, bypassed some core priorities from below. Since women were not adequately empowered to help in the design of the plan or to provide feedback once implemented, it was inevitable that

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policies would have gaps in which some measure of women’s goals were not addressed. The absence of an autonomous women’s organization further undermined women’s ability to speak forthrightly and to be heard. Eritrean women highlighted the failure to design policies to more directly address oppression in the domestic arena, a domain they regarded as highly instrumental in subordinating women. They intimated that planners were hesitant to confront patriarchy, oppressive traditional attitudes, and male privilege. Planners in other contexts, including Iraq, may display a similar tentativeness in taking on gender inequities in the home and family. A campaign which challenges male domination can be explosive, and there are pressures in the planning process to promote unity and cohesiveness, especially in societies which have been riven with conflict. Nevertheless, the input from Eritrean women—and it may be representative of other women as well—is that the domestic sphere is a primary source of inequity, and it must be included in any plan that seeks women’s empowerment.

APPENDIX IRAQI OFFICIALS

Jalal Talabani – President Adil Abd Al-Mahdi (Shiite), Tariq al-Hashemi (Sunni) – Vice Presidents Nuri al-Maliki – Prime Minister Barham Salih, Salam al-Zubai – Deputy Prime Ministers Ali Husayn al-Bahadili – Minister of Agriculture Muhammad Tawfiq Allawi – Minister of Communications Asad Kamal al-Hashimi – Minister of Culture Abd al-Qadir al-Mufriji – Minister of Defense Abd al-Samad Sultan – Minister of Displacement and Migration Khudayr al-Khuzai – Minister of Education Karim Wahid al-Hasan – Minister of Electricity Nermin Othman – Minister of Environment Bayan Jabr – Minister of Finance Hoshyar Mahmud Zebari – Minister of Foreign Affairs Salih Mahdi Mutlab al-Hasnawi – Minister of Health Abid Dhiyab al-Ujayli – Minister of Higher Education Bayan Dizayee – Minister of Housing and Construction Wijdan Mikhail Salim – Minister of Human Rights Fawzi al-Hariri – Minister of Industry and Minerals Jawad al-Bulani – Minister of Interior Mahmud Muhammad Jawad al-Radi – Minister of Labor and Social Affairs Riyadh Gharib – Minister of Municipalities and Public Works Husayn al-Shahristani – Minister of Oil Ali Baban – Minister of Planning Raid Fahmi Jahid – Minister of Science and Technology Abd al-Falah al-Sudani – Minister of Trade Latif Rashid – Minister of Water Resources Jasim Muhammad Jafar – Minister of Youth and Sports Shirwan al-Waili – Acting Minister of Transportation and Minister of State for National Security Adil al-Asadi – Minister of State for Civil Society Affairs Safa al-Din al-Safi – Minister of State for National Assembly

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Akram al-Hakim – Minister of State for National Dialogue Saad Tahir Abd Khalaf al-Hashimi – Minister of State for Provinces Liwa Sumaysim – Minister of State for Tourism and Antiquities Fatin Abd al-Rahman – Minister of State for Women’s Affairs Ali Muhammad Ahmad, Hasan Radhi Kazim al-Sari, Muhammad Abbas al-Uraybi – Ministers of State Without Portfolio Sinan al-Shabibi – Governor, Central Bank of Iraq Samir Shakir al-Sumaydi – Ambassador to the U.S. Hamid al-Bayati – Permanent Representative to the UN, New York

NOTES CHAPTER 1: RECONSTRUCTING IRAQ: MASSIVE INVESTMENT, LITTLE SUSTAINABLE RESULTS 1. “Blood and Treasure; Paying for Iraq,” The Economist, April 8, 2006. 2. Sharon Behn, “Iraq Not Using Oil Cash to Rebuild,” The Washington Times, (January 30, 2008). 3. United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI), “Trust Fund Facility.” n.d. http://www.uniraq.org/donors/irffi.asp retrieved May 20, 2008. 4. United States Agency for International Development (USAID), “Iraq Reconstruction and Humanitarian Relief.” USAID Weekly Update #14 FY 2004 (January 13, 2004). http://www.usaid.gov/iraq/updates/jan04/iraq_fs14_011304. pdf retrieved May 20, 2008 5. United States Government Accountability Office (GAO), Rebuilding Iraq: Reconstruction Progress Hindered by Contacting, Security, and Capacity Challenges GAO-07-426T (Washington D.C., February 15, 2007); GAO, Rebuilding Iraq: Integrated Strategic Plan Needed to Help Restore Iraq’s Oil and Electricity Sectors GAO-07-677 (Washington D.C., May 2007); and GAO, Military Operations: The Department of Defense’s Use of Solatia and Condolence Payments in Iraq and Afghanistan GAO-07-699 (Washington D.C., May 2007). Other publications include: United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), Rebuilding Agriculture and Food Security in Iraq (2006), http://151.121.3.140/icd/ iraq/iraq.asp; “United States, Iraq Look Toward Reconstruction of Fallujah” ArabicNews.com November 22, 2004. http://www.arabicnews.com/ansub/Daily/ Day/041122/2004112207.html; David L. Phillips, “Academic Module: Perspectives on the Postwar Reconstruction ‘Fiasco’,” Council on Foreign Relations, January 2007; James Glantz, “Iraq: Rebuilding Found to Fall Short,” The New York Times, January 27, 2006; Glantz, “Iraq: Idle Contractors Add Millions to Iraq Rebuilding,” The New York Times, October 25, 2006; Glantz, “Iraq Rebuilding Badly Hobbled, U.S. Report Finds,” The New York Times, January 24, 2006; Sumit Malik, “The Role of the Foreign Service in the Reconstruction of Iraq” American Foreign Service Association 2007 Essay contest Winning Essay, http://www.afsa.org/essaycontest/winningessay07.cfm; “Fact Sheet: Rebuilding Iraq,” White House Fact Sheet (Washington D.C., December 7, 2005), http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/12/20051207.html; Dana Hedgpeth, “U.S. Rebuilding in Iraq is Missing Key Goals, Report Finds,” The Washington Post, April 20, 2007, p. A12; “Report Raps Poor Planning for Iraq Reconstruction” CNN, March 22, 2007, http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/meast /03/21/iraq.reconstruction/index.html; GAO, Stabilizing and Rebuilding Iraq: Conditions in Iraq are Conducive to Fraud, Waste, and Abuse GAO-07-525T (Washington D.C., April 23, 2007); GAO, Stabilizing and Rebuilding Iraq: Coalition Support and International Donor Commitments GAO-07-827T

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(Washington D.C., May 9, 2007); and GAO, Rebuilding Iraq: Status of Funding and Reconstruction Efforts GAO-05-876 (Washington D.C., June 2005). 6. U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), “About USAID,” April 30, 2008, http://www.usaid.gov/about_usaid/. 7. It should be stressed that the military must continue to assert its primacy while still coping with an unsettled and unstable society. And worse, the military is imbued with an endemic opaqueness (read: sense of imperative for secrecy), and secrecy is a difficult dimension to deal with when those pursuing sustainable rebuilding need to achieve significant degrees of transparency. 8. The military must be credited for revising their military manuals in the February 2008 to recognize the equal importance of winning the hearts and minds of occupied populations; but even assuming that such manuals are fully promulgated and emphasized, the best that can ever be achieved is for the military to gain a sense of sensitivity and a respect for other expertise (not a new and equal expertise). 9. We are a society—both national and western—that has faced serious challenges, including some we have brought ourselves. In the case of the U.S., we are blessed with unprecedented resources and broad expertise. UMASS/Boston and the Center advance themselves and their capability to join ranks and help to close the gap of expertise for the rebuilding sustainable communities in Iraq. 10. The concept of a working party would help to obviate the hurdle of a UN veto; more importantly, would take political pressure off both the UN and the domestic regime. Ironically, the UN could be used for the organizational process and the establishment of a multi-lateral modality-function protocol. Notably, the process of working parties is used successfully by the World Trade Organization. 11. For example, the prospective unity of Iraq is vulnerable and problematical because of the polarity between Sunni and Shiite—which had been muted for centuries, but will always reoccur if forced; and it was so forced when Iraqis were sent out to vote for a new Iraqi Parliament before political parties could advance beyond tribal and religious loyalties. Further, the Kurds have a righteous longing for an independent state. The wealth of Iraq involves oil production and the locus of oil productions is not evenly divided. The Sunni minority ruled Iraq for most of its brief existence. The Shia have never ruled; they are a majority with an absence of training for leadership. There are exogenous forces that seek to destabilize Iraq: first al Qaeda and (purportedly) Iran. Neighboring Saudi Arabia is entirely Arab and largely Sunni with a Shia minority, and neighboring Iran is Shia but not Arab. There is a palpable fear that any precipitous departure will lead to civil war and genocide, and also that civil war will ensue regardless of the continued U.S. presence. 12. Chapter 40 of “Agenda 21: Program of Action for Sustainable Development,” adopted at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, 3–14 June 1992. 13. The World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg, South Africa, from 26 August–4 September 2002, informally nicknamed “Rio+10.”

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14. United Nations, “Indicators of Sustainable Development: Guidelines and Methodologies,” 1996, http://www.un.org/esa/sustdev/natlinfo/indicators/isdms 2001/isd-ms2001isd.htm. 15. United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Indicators of Sustainable Development: Guidelines and Methodologies. 3rd Edition. New York: UNDESA, 2007, p. 3. 16. Encyclopedia of Life Support Systems, 1998, http://www.eolss.net/. 17. Brian Edwards, Towards Sustainable Architecture: European Directives and Building Design, (Boston: Butterworth Architecture, 1996), 190. 18. U.K. Department of Environment, Sustainable Development: The UK Strategy (Summary Report), Cm2426, (London: HMSO, 1994), 7. 19. Edwards 1996, 11. 20. International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN). World Conservation Strategy: Living Resource Conservation for Sustainable Development. (Gland, Switzerland: IUCN–United Nations Environment Program–World Wildlife Fund, 1980). 21. Robert Repetto, ed., The Global Possible: Resources, Development, and the New Century, (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1985), 10. 22. United Nations World Commission on Environment and Development (WCED). Our Common Future (The Brundtland Report), (New York: Oxford University Press, 1987), 43. 23. WCED, 1987, 65. 24. WCED, 1987. 25. UNCHS, 1992, 43௅44. 26. UNCHS, 1992, 44. 27. Edwards, 1996, 181. 28. United Nations (UN), Report of the Tenth Meeting of the Inter-Agency Committee on Sustainable Development, ACC/1997/12, (New York: UN, 1998). 29. UNCSD, 1996 30. UNDESA, 2007. 31. UNDESA, 2007, 9. 32. UNDESA, 2007, 10. 33. UNDESA, “National Sustainable Development Strategies,” October 26, 2006, http://www.un.org/esa/sustdev/natlinfo/nsds/nsds.htm. 34. Indicators of achieving sustainability are elusive when encountering the type of stymies now extant in Iraq: • travel difficulties for data collectors due to security conditions; • a severe brain drain from the country has resulted in a general lack of capacity for the collection and assessment of data, for their transformation into useful information and for their dissemination; • lack of technical capacity to guide the process of developing the indicators of sustainability; • technical support and input have been hampered by political and security constraints throughout the country; • security conditions have limited regular consultation and dialogue among the relevant experts leading to lack of coordination among

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environmental, demographic, social and development data and information activities; • general lack of collaboration and communication among government departments and agencies; • local council officials who are responsible for data collection in such areas as demography, urbanization, poverty, health and rights of access to resources, conditions of women, youth, children and the disabled, and their relationships with environment issues are mostly untrained in these fields; • wars and general political uncertainties have resulted in the absence of comprehensive inventories of environmental, resource and developmental data, based on national priorities for the management of sustainable development; • absence of data and information centers which have continuous and accurate data-collection systems and make use of geographic information systems, expert systems, models and a variety of other techniques for the assessment and analysis of data; • lack of efficient and sophisticated techniques of data collection (such as satellite-based remote sensing); and, related to this, the financial inability of the relevant government agencies to acquire the necessary technologies and know-how; • lack of access of local communities and resource users to the information and know-how they need to manage their environment and resources sustainably and to apply traditional and indigenous knowledge and approaches when appropriate; • lack of institutional capacity to integrate environment and development; • lack of financial resources and institutional capacity to develop all the relevant indicators of sustainable developed outlined above; • absence of clearly developed guidelines and mechanisms for the rapid and continuous transfer of environmentally sound technologies from the developed nations to Iraq and for the training of personnel in their utilization; • lack of adequate technical training programs for those involved in data collection, assessment and transformation and for decision makers on how to use such information; • general lack of the capacity to collect, store, organize, assess and use data in decision-making effectively; and • policy integration and the need for coordinated action are central to the successful implementation of national plans for sustainable development. However, efforts to promote integrated approaches to coordination at policy-making and program implementation levels, directly involving most of the national agencies concerned with sustainability issues, are yet to be effectively made. UN, 2007. 35. UN, 2007. 36. Barrett, 1998.

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37. Barrett, 1998. 38. Barrett, 1998. 39. Barrett, 1998. 40. Sudhir Anand and Amartya K. Sen, Sustainable Human Development: Concepts and Priorities, Discussion Paper 1, Office of Development Studies, (New York: United Nations Development Program, 1996), 14. 41. Anand and Sen, 1996, 17. 42. Anand and Sen, 1996, 20. 43. World Bank, World Development Report 1992: Development and the Environment, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992), 30. 44. UNDESA, 2007, 10௅14. 45. Glanz, 2006a, 2006b, 2006c; Bowen, 2006. 46. Bowen, 2006. CHAPTER 2: CREATING A SUSTAINABLE IRAQ: A STRATEGY TO RESTORE HOPE 1. See Abraham Maslow’s Motivation and Personality (New York: Harper Collins, 1954). Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs model was developed between 1943 and 1954, culminating in the publication of Motivation and Personality. At that time the Hierarchy of Needs model comprised five needs; his later (and most popular) book, Toward a Psychology of Being (1968), added further layers to the model. 2. “Combat Engineer Comments,” Military Officer Magazine (May) 2006. 3. Environmental resources in this context are the total means available for economic, social and political development such as jobs, wealth, money, power, labor, fuel, raw materials, food, security, and other assets necessary to sustain life. The effects of environmental scarcity act in combination with other social, political, and economic stresses within a community. 4. Andrew F. Krepinevich, “How to Win in Iraq,” Foreign Affairs, (September/October 2005), 87௅104. 5. Power of Context is described in Malcolm Gladwell’s book The Tipping Point: How Little Things Make a Big Difference (Boston: Little, Brown, 2000). 6. All indications are that the quality of life is deteriorating. A recently published study, the Iraqi Living Conditions Survey 2004 documents the severe deterioration in the quality of life of the average Iraqi family. The study reveals unstable and unreliable electricity, high cost and low quality of water, decline in sanitation, housing, high unemployment and healthcare (Iraq Mortality, 2004, http://iraqmortality.org/mortality-studies/ilcs). 7. A study by the College of Economics at Baghdad University (2004) has found that the unemployment rate in Iraq is 70 percent among young men ages 18 to 30. Others say the numbers are closer to 50 to 60 percent. This is very different than the reports from the CIA World Fact Book, which states the numbers to be only 30 percent. There is indication that the unemployment numbers are artificially lower due to the hiring of men by the U.S. and U.S. contractors, but these figures, and the amount of violence, indicate that the higher numbers are more realistic. 8. Iraq does have a well-educated population that is waiting to participate in reconstruction efforts.

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9. Iraqi Draft Constitution, 2005, Article 34 (1). Available at http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/24_08_05_constit.pdf, accessed May 20, 2008. 10. The theory is based the article “Broken Windows” by James Q. Wilson and George L. Kelling, which appeared in the March 1982 edition of The Atlantic Monthly Magazine. 11. John F. Kennedy, Inaugural Address, January 20, 1961. 12. According to the 2004 Baghdad University College of Economics study, the problem of high unemployment is going from bad to worse, with the security situation deteriorating and the reconstruction process faltering. In most cases, employment offices offer jobs with the U.S. occupation authorities and companies linked to them. Some Iraqis have no problems working for the Americans, while others reject the idea. “I was offered more than four jobs, but all of them were either with U.S. forces and authorities, or with companies associated with them. I cannot work in these positions,” Nasrin al-Agha of Baghdad said. “Not everyone is willing to risk his life for the sake of making a living. What do my children gain if I am killed in one of those attacks on us?” quoted in Ahmed Jahnabi, “Iraq Unemployment Rate Reaches 70%,” Aljazeera, July 26, 2004, available at http:// www.countercurrents.org/iraq-janabi260704.htm (accessed May 20, 2008). 13. Iraq Mortality, 2004. 14. “I cannot accept a job with the U.S. authorities or a company which supplies them. I care about my image in the eyes of my children. After defending Iraq for eight years, how can I accept work with a country that is militarily occupying the country I fought for?” Ala al-Qaisi, quoted in Jahnabi, 2004. 15. The Iraqi National Assembly will be changed to the Council of Representatives under the New Iraqi Constitution. The Council will take an oath, “I swear by God…to look after the interests of the people….” 16. Krepinevich, 2005. 17. W. Andrew Terrill, Strategic Implications of Inter-Communal Warfare in Iraq, Strategic Studies Institute of the U.S. Army War College, February 2005, 10. 18. “The use of oil revenues for improving the lives of the Iraqi population will be one of the most important tools that the occupation force has to contain and defeat potential nationalistic, sectarian, and religious anger with the occupation.” Conrad C. Crane, and W. Andrew Terrill, Reconstructing Iraq: Insights, Challenges, and Missions for Military Forces In A Post-conflict Scenario, Strategic Studies Institute of the U.S. Army War College, February 2003. 19. Velocity of Money is an economic concept relating to the number of times an individual unit of currency turns over in a specific period of time. Velocity affects the amount of economic activity generated by a given money supply. If velocity is high, money is changing hands quickly, and a relatively small money supply can fund a relatively large amount of purchases. 20. Transparency implies openness, freely available information, communication, and accountability. Transparency is introduced as a means of holding public officials accountable and thwarting corruption. Transparency means less opportunity for authorities to abuse a system in their own interests. Participative democracy, built on transparency, has been used officially in northern Europe for

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decades. (In Sweden, public access to government documents became a law as early as 1766.) Transparent procedures include open meetings, financial disclosure statements, budgetary review, audits, etc. 21. According to the New York Times an article which references military data suggests that roughly 80 percent of violent attacks in Iraq are simply criminal in nature—e.g., ransom kidnappings and hijacking convoys—and without political motivation. This figure lends credence to those who cited the CPA’s disbanding of the Iraqi army as an error likely to create a pool of unemployed and discontented young males ripe for absorption into the insurgency. Further, this statistic highlights the importance of reconstruction, and the revitalization of an economy in Iraq that can provide traditional employment opportunities. Of the remaining 20 percent of violent attacks—those with political motivation—four-fifths are believed attributable to native insurgents as opposed to foreigners. CHAPTER 3. FATA MORGANA AND THE LURE OF LAW 1. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, “Fata Morgana”, 6th stanza, in Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Birds of Passage: Flight the Third, (Cambridge, MA: The Riverside Press 1873/1883), 228. 2. Concerning regime change, see e.g., Michael Reisman, “The Manley O. Hudson Lecture: Why Regime Change is (Almost Always) a Bad Idea,” American Journal of International Law 98 no. 3 (2004): 516௅525. Concerning preemptive strike, see e.g., the contributions to the “Agora: Future Implications of the Iraq Conflict”, American Journal of International Law 97 no. 3 (2003): 553 f. 3. Johanna Mendelson Forman, “Striking Out in Baghdad: How Post-Conflict Reconstruction Went Awry,” Nation-Building: Beyond Afghanistan and Iraq ed. Francis Fukuyama, 196௅217 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2006), 199; cf. Robert C. Orr (ed.), Winning the Peace: An American Strategy for PostConflict Reconstruction, (Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and International Studies, 2004), Appendix 1. 4. The classic literary example and namesake for Fata Morgana was Morgan le Fay, a character originally inspired by early Welsh mythology and literature; both “fay” and “fata” mean “fairy”. 5. Cf. supra, fn. 2. 6. According to recent estimates, the number of Iraqi casualties reached 34,000 in 2006 alone: cf. New York Times, January 17, 2007. 7. Though, of course, the reasons for the continuing insurgency are not necessarily—and in any case not exclusively—linked to the crimes and current trials of the former rulers. 8. Tom Syring, “Coping with Peace: Truth Commissions, Courts of Law, and the Pursuit of Justice,” Local-Global: Studies in Community Sustainability, 2 (2006): 34. 9. For an in-depth discussions of the pros and cons of truths commissions and courts of law in the aftermath of regime breakdown, cf. Tom Syring, “Truth versus Justice: A Tale of Two Cities?,” International Legal Theory, 12 (2006): 143௅209.

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10. Samuel P. Huntington, The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late Twentieth Century, (Norman, Oklahoma: University of Oklahoma Press 1991): 231. 11. John Dugard, “Reconciliation and Justice: The South African Experience,” in Burns H. Weston and Stephen P. Marks (eds.), The Future of International Human Rights, (New York: Transnational Publishers 1999): 407. Arguably, a regime that fears uprisings should it prosecute some of its own is not really a new regime properly so-called. And if we take “its members” as referring to “members of the military”, then the new regime is indeed at least seriously weakened. 12. Stated by Ismail Mahomed, Deputy President of the South African Constitutional Court, in AZAPO and Others v. President of the Republic of South Africa, 1996, para.18; emphasis added. Available at: http://www.doj.gov.za/trc /legal/azapo.htm (accessed January 30, 2008). 13. Ibid., emphasis added. 14. Statement of General John P. Abizaid, quoted in Thom Shanker, “U.S. General Says Iraq Could Slide Into a Civil War,” New York Times, August 4, 2006. 15. According to news coverage briefly after that statement, the month of September 2006 had superseded July 2006 as the most deadly month since the U.S. officially declared the “end of major combat” more than three years earlier, resulting in 1089 casualties in September 2006 as opposed to 1065 in July. NRK Radio, “Nyheter” [“News”], October 2, 2006. 16. Cf. “U.S., Iraqis Vow to Avenge Bombings”, Associated Press, February 2, 2008. 17. According to the U.S. Department of Defense, as of February 1, 2008, 3943 U.S. soldiers had been killed since the beginning of the war. Taking all the countries comprising the “Coalition Forces” in Iraq into account, the total death toll is closer to 4400. Adding Iraqi Security Forces killed to that count, the total number increases to about 12000; cf. the numbers provided by the “Iraq Coalition Casualty Count” project, available at: http://www.icasualties.org (accessed February 2, 2008). However, for the same period of time the probably most reliable estimates for civilian deaths, provided by the “Iraqi Body Count” project, based on cross-checked media reports, hospital and morgue records, as well as NGO and official figures, range from 80987 to 88431, or more than twenty times the number of U.S. soldiers killed, and roughly seven times the number of any non-civilian deaths. Cf. http://www.iraqibodycount.org (accessed February 2, 2008). 18. Promulgated as Law No. 10 (2005) (Law of the Iraqi High Criminal Court (IHCCL)), October 18, 2005. 19. Those violations include, e.g., influencing the judiciary or attempts thereof, wastage and squander of natural resources, and the abuse of position, Article 14, IHCCL. 20. Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide of December 9, 1948 21. Cf. Article 11, IHCCL. 22. The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia was set up pursuant to UN Security Council Resolutions 808 of February 22, 1993, and 827 of May 25, 1993, considering the widespread violations of international humanitarian

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law taking place within the former Yugoslavia, including the practice of ethnic cleansing, a threat to international peace and security. Cf. UN Doc. S/Res/808 and UN Doc. S./Res/827, respectively. The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda was set up by UN Security Council Resolution 955 of November 8, 1994 in response to genocide and other systematic, widespread, and flagrant violations of international humanitarian law that had been committed in Rwanda. Cf. UN Doc. S/Res/955. 23. An idea that, to say the least, has not yet kept its promise. 24. The Fourth Geneva Convention Relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War of August 12, 1949; Cf. Article 64, Fourth Geneva Convention: The penal laws of the occupied territory shall remain in force, with the exception that they may be repealed or suspended by the Occupying Power in cases where they constitute a threat to its security or an obstacle to the application of the present Convention. 25. I use this term here intentionally so as to distinguish the early Statute of that Court from the one adopted roughly two years later (the Iraqi High Criminal Court). 26. As a comment in passing it was interesting to observe one of Saddam’s outbursts in trial, which amounted to a reluctant acceptance of the legitimacy of the IHCC. When speaking (on March 1, 2006) on his prerogative as leader of Iraq to prosecute those he felt were responsible for the attack on his life, he stated: If I had wanted, I wouldn’t have referred them [those accused of the attempted assassination] to the Revolutionary Court. I did refer them to the Revolutionary Court. And they were tried according to the law, just as you are trying [us], cf. Paul Williams and Brianne McGonigle, “Saddam’s Admission: I Am Responsible,” in Michael P. Scharf and Gregory S. McNeal (eds.): Saddam on Trial: Understanding and Debating the Iraqi High Tribunal, (Durham, North Carolina: Carolina University Press 2006), 177. 27. Death penalties, death by strangulation. 28. The guilty verdicts included counts of genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity for five of the six defendants. One defendant, who was an aide to Mr. Majid as secretary of the Baath Party’s northern bureau, was found not guilty. Cf. John F. Burns, “Hussein Cousin Sentenced to Die for Kurd Attacks,” New York Times, June 25, 2007. 29. “We are losing each day, as an average, 50 to 60 people through the country, if not more […] If this is not civil war, then God knows what civil war is”, Ayad Allawi, in an interview with the BBC on March 19, 2006, quoted in David E. Sanger and Thom Shanker, “On Anniversary, Bush and Cheney See Iraq Success,” New York Times, March 20, 2006. 30. According to Schabas “[t]he resignation of a presiding judge in the middle of a trial due to political interference and pressure is unprecedented”. Cf. William A. Schabas, “Resignation Casts Terrible Pall over Tribunal,” in Scharf and McNeal, Saddam on Trial, 138. 31. Following allegations that Judge Said al-Hamashi may have been a member of the Baath party and ongoing investigations by the Debathification Commission, on

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January 23, 2006, Judge Raouf Rashid Abdul-Rahman had been appointed as the new Presiding Judge. 32. Raymond M. Brown, “The Significance of the Kidnapping / Murder of Defense Counsel,” in Scharf and McNeal, Saddam on Trial, 123. 33. “Saddam trial judge seeks asylum in Britain—Jazeera,” Reuters, March 9, 2007, available at: http://today.reuters.com/News/CrisesArticle.aspx?storyId= L09481831 (accessed January 30, 2008). 34. Cf., e.g. Rule 34 (1) (a), Rules of Procedure and Evidence, Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. According to this provision, such personal interest represents, inter alia, one of several potential grounds for disqualification of a judge or prosecutor. 35. Through their action (of staging a walk-out and thus disrupting the proceedings) the defense counsels have, at least temporarily, forfeited their right to continue representing the defendants. 36. And at least the trial of Saddam Hussein was surely intended to establish a historical record of his abusive regime and thus possibly contribute to the healing of society, not just to impose a sentence on him. 37. As pointed out above, currently Iraq may be at the verge of, if not already fully engaged in, civil war. Thus, use of too positive language would seem inappropriate. Cf. Ayad Allawi’s comment supra, fn. 29. 38. Cf. Paul Wolfowitz, Deputy Secretary of Defense, Prepared Statement for the Senate Foreign Relations Committee (May 18, 2004), available at: http://www.defenselink.mil/speeches (accessed January 30, 2008). 39. As a matter of fact, in the January 2005 elections the Sunnis, who could have expected 50 to 55 of the 275 seats in the National Assembly with respect to their share of the population, won only 17. 40. Cf. “Note,” Harvard Law Review 119 (May 2006): 1206. 41. Cf. e.g. Ayad Allawi, “How Iraq’s Elections Set Back Democracy,” New York Times, November 2, 2007. 42. Allawi, 2007. 43. Law of Administration for the State of Iraq for the Transitional Period (TAL) of March 8, 2004, available at: http://www.cpa-iraq.org/government/TAL.html (accessed January 30, 2008). 44. Cf. Article 61 (C), TAL. 45. In all three Sunni dominated provinces a majority did reject the constitution in the referendum. However, only in two of them the necessary two-thirds majority had been reached. 46. Had the constitution not been presented to the Iraqi people by August 15, 2005, and accepted in a referendum by October 15, 2005, the National Assembly would have been dissolved; cf. Article 61 (E), TAL. 47. Cf., e.g. the “Legal Memorandum: Protecting Human Rights in an Iraqi Constitution,” Public International Law & Policy Group, June 2005, available at: http://www.pilpg.org (accessed January 30, 2008). 48. An English translation of the Iraqi Constitution of 2005 is available at: http://www.law.case.edu/saddamtrial/documents/UN_USG_UK_NDI_Agreed_En glish_Text_25.01.06-Current.pdf. (accessed January 30, 2008).

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49. Emphasis added. 50. “The accused is innocent until proven guilty in a fair legal trial,” Article 19 (5). 51. The People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (or: Organisation des Modjahedines du peuple d’Iran) is the largest Iranian opposition group living in exile in Iraq. In the wake of the Iraq war, the PMOI, based in Camp Ashraf, Iraq, were issued status as protected persons under the Fourth Geneva Convention, cf. M. Cherif Bassiouni, Legal Opinion on the Legal Status under International Law of the Members of the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran Presently in the Territory of Iraq (2003) (on file with the author). 52. “Iraq tribunal sets sights on Iran opposition group,” Reuters, March 12, 2007, available at: http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/IBO234303.htm (accessed January 30, 2008). 53. Cf. e.g. Helene Cooper, “U.S. Weighing Terrorist Label for Iran Guards,” New York Times, August 14, 2007; Rowan Scarborough, “Rumsfeld: Iran Aids Rebels”, Washington Times, 8 September 2004. 54. European Court of Justice, Judgment of the Court of First Instance of December 12, 2006—Organisation des Modjahedines du peuple d’Iran v. Council of the European Union (Case T-228/02), available at: http://curia.europa.eu/en /actu/activites/index.htm [01/30/2008], in the following “Judgment”. 55. OJ (Official Journal of the European Union) 2001 L 344, p. 90. 56. OJ 2001 L 344, p. 93. 57. Cf. Judgment, para.7. 58. OJ 2002 L 116, p. 75. 59. The most recent of which, i.e. those in force at the time of the closing of the oral procedure, were: Common Position 2005/936/CFSP of the Council of December 21, 2005 updating Common Position 2001/931/CFSP and repealing Common Position 2005/847/CFSP (OJ 2005 L 340, p. 80), and Council Decision 2005/930/EC of December 21, 2005 implementing Article 2 (3) of Regulation No. 2580/2001 and repealing Decision 2005/848/EC (OJ 2005 L 340, p. 64). 60. Cf. Judgment, para.12. 61. Cf. Judgment, para.16. 62. Cf. Judgment, para.93. 63. Cf. Judgment, para.165. 64. Cf. Judgment, para.171. 65. Cf. Judgment, para.173. 66. Cf., e.g. Kenneth Katzman, “Iran: U.S. Concerns and Policy Responses”, Congressional Research Service, Report for Congress, November 29, 2004. Some believe that Iran has thus far refused to extradite Al Qaeda leaders in Iran because Iran views these figures as leverage with the United States and perhaps as a bargaining chip to persuade the United States to extradite to Iran oppositionists based in Iraq. (33) —a clear reference to the PMOI based in Camp Ashraf, Iraq. 67. Cf. Cooper, “Terrorist Label for Iran Guards,” 2007. In fact, on October 21, 2007, the Qods Force and Bank Saderat were named as terrorist-supporting entities (subjecting them to freeze of any U.S.-based assets) under Executive Order 13224, an Executive Order issued right after the September 11, 2001 attacks

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cf. Katzman, “Iran: U.S. Concerns,” CRS, 2007: 48. The Qods Force is a special unit of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps, reporting directly to the “Supreme Leader of Iran,” Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Bank Saderat is one of Iran’s largest government-owned banks. 68. Lord Alton of Liverpool & Others (In the Matter of the People’s Mojahadeen Organisation of Iran) (Appellants) and Secretary of State for the Home Department (Respondent), Proscribed Organisations Appeal Commission (POAC), Appeal No: PC/02/2006, Judgment of November 30, 2007, para. 19, available at: http://www.siac.tribunals.gov.uk/poac/outcomes.htm (accessed January 30, 2008). 69. POAC, Appeal No: PC/02/2006, para. 20. 70. POAC, Appeal No: PC/02/2006, para. 34. 71. POAC, Appeal No: PC/02/2006, para. 40 72. POAC, Appeal No: PC/02/2006. para. 45; emphasis in the original. 73. POAC, Appeal No: PC/02/2006, para. 360. 74. POAC, Appeal No: PC/02/2006, para. 360. 75. POAC, Appeal No: PC/02/2006, para. 362. 76. Cf. Secretary of State for the Home Department (Applicant) and Lord Alton of Liverpool & Others (Respondent), England and Wales Court of Appeal (Civil Division), Application for Permission to Appeal from the Proscribed Organisations Appeal Commission and in the Matter of the People’s Mojahadeen Organisation of Iran, Case No. 2007/9516, Judgment of May 7, 2008, where the justices of the Court held that they “can see no valid ground for contending that, in reaching these conclusions, POAC erred in law, Judgment, para. 55. Thus, in these circumstances the Court considered “that the appeal that the applicant wished to bring had no reasonable prospect of success and that the appropriate course is to dismiss her application,” POAC, Appeal No: PC/02/2006, para 58. 77. Adam Przeworski, Democracy and the Market: Political and Economic Reforms in Eastern Europe and Latin America, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991): 26. CHAPTER 4. SUCCESSFUL PROJECT STRATEGIES IN IRAQ’S KURDISTAN REGION: HOLISTIC APPROACH THE KEY TO EFFECTIVE INITIATIVES 1. “Iraq,” CIA World Factbook, 2008, https://www.cia.gov/library/ publications/the-world-factbook/ (accessed March 5, 2008). 2. Ann M. Veneman, “Statement of UNICEF Executive Director Ann M. Veneman on International Women’s Day,” (speech given for International Women’s Day, March 8, 2006). Transcript available at http://www.unicef.org/media/media _35134.html (accessed March 5, 2008). 3. Sandra Strobel and Thomas von der Osten-Sacken, “Female genital mutilation in Iraqi Kurdistan” [Electronic version], (paper presented to the conference 1ère Journée Humanitaire sur la Santé des Femmes dans le Monde, Paris, May 8, 2006), http://www.wadinet.de/scripte/print.php. (accessed February 6, 2007). 4. United Nations News Service, “‘Medical’ Trend with Female Genital Mutilation Disturbs UN Agency,” February 5, 2007, http://www.un.org/apps/news/printnews .asp?nid=21456, (accessed February 6, 2007).

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5. “Defending Dignity, Fighting Poverty: Female Genital Cutting,” CARE, 2007, http://www.care.org/newsroom/specialreports/fgc/index.asp?source=17074037000 0&WT.srch=1 (accessed February 6, 2007). 6. Human Rights Watch, “Item 12—Integration of the Human Rights of Women and the Gender Perspective: Violence against Women and ‘Honor’ Crimes,” Human Rights Watch Oral Intervention at the 57th Session of the UN Commission on Human Rights, Geneva: April 6, 2001, http://hrw.org/english/docs/2001/04/06 /global268.htm. (accessed May 22, 2007). 7. Tina Susman, “Iraqi girl’s horrific death,” Chicago Tribune, May 22, 2007. http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-stonemay22,1, 7741366.story?coll=chi-news-hed&ctrack=1&cset=true. (accessed May 25, 2007). 8. “Shawbo Ali Rauf, a 19 year old victim of ‘honor’ killing in Kurdistan,” Kurd Net, May 24, 2007, http://www.ekurd.net/mismas/articles/misc2007/5/kurdlocal 361.htm (accessed May 29, 2007). CHAPTER 5. REBUILDING THE IRAQI OIL INDUSTRY: LEGAL AND CONSTITUTIONAL STRATEGIES FOR SUSTAINABLE, POST-SADDAM DEVELOPMENT 1. These figures are from the respected Oil & Gas Journal http://www.ogj.com/ index.cfm. It must be noted that there is some dispute as to where Iraq ranks. Some experts consider that Iraq has the third largest reserves after Saudi Arabia and Canada (counting the immense Alberta Tar Sands), but other specialists argue that it is number two after Saudi Arabia. There is no dispute that Iraq ranks number two in potential export ability, since its domestic consumption is minimal, when compared to Canada. 2. Resource Curse refers to the paradox that countries with an abundance of natural resources tend to have less economic growth than countries without these resources. Economist Richard Auty first coined the term to describe how countries with rich deposits of natural resources were on the whole unable to use that wealth to generate sustainable economic growth, and actually experienced less economic growth than many countries without the resources. See Richard M. Auty, Sustaining Development in Mineral Economies: The Resource Curse Thesis, (London: Routledge, 1993). This phenomenon gathered proponents in the 1980s, including notable studies by economists Jeffrey Sachs and Andrew Warner, each of whom illustrated the link between abundance of natural resources and poor economic performance. See generally Jeffrey D. Sachs and Andrew M. Warner, “Natural Resource Abundance and Economic Growth,” (working paper 5398, NBER, 1995). 3. Taxation is important because it leaves the government to a certain degree dependent on the citizenry and by implication their desires. 4. Michael Ross, “The Political Economy of the Resource Curse.” World Politics 51 (January 1999): 297–332. 5. A semantic point that is currently being tossed about highlights whether Iraq is in a “civil war.” The National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq—a comprehensive intelligence report approved by the entire U.S intelligence community—warned that conflict in Iraq contained elements of a civil war. The report states in part:

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Notes The term “civil war” does not adequately capture the complexity of the conflict in Iraq, which includes extensive Shia-on-Shia violence, alQaeda and Sunni insurgent attacks on coalition forces, and widespread criminally motivated violence” …“Nonetheless, the term “civil war” accurately describes key elements of the Iraqi conflict, including the hardening of ethno-sectarian identities, a sea-change in the character of the violence, ethnosectarian mobilization, and population displacements.

At the time of writing, the Bush administration fought vigorously against the term “civil war” to describe the Iraqi situation. For the full report see National Intelligence Estimate, “Prospects for Iraq’s Stability: A Challenging Road Ahead”. National Intelligence Council, January 2007, www.dni.gov/press_releases/2007 0202_release.pdf (accessed May 22, 2008). Another study by the Washington think-tank, the Brookings Institute’s Saban Center for Middle East Policy, identifies six patterns from other civil wars that are already present in Iraq: large refugee flows, the breeding ground for new terrorist groups, radicalization of neighboring populations, the spread of secessionism, regional economic losses, and intervention by neighbors. See Daniel L. Byman and Kenneth M. Pollack, “Things Fall Apart: Containing the Spillover from an Iraqi Civil War,” Saban Center Analysis, no. 11, January 2007. The Brookings Institute, http://www.brook.edu/fp/saban/analysis/jan2007iraq_civilwar.htm (accessed May 22, 2008). 6. For detailed figures concerning Iraq’s oil industry see Energy Information Administration (EIA), “Iraq Country Brief,” http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/cabs /Iraq/Oil.html (accessed May 22, 2008). 7. There is disagreement between two U.S. federal agencies about the actual size of Iraq’s proven and estimated reserves, with the regularly cited Department of Energy’s (DOE) Energy Information Administration claiming that Iraq holds approximately 115 billion barrels of proven reserves—oil that has been definitively discovered and is feasibly producible—while estimate reserves—oil thought to exist and become economically viable to produce—is between of 200–300 billion barrels. If the figures are accurate, then it would form a quarter of the world’s total estimated reserves. The DOE figures stand in stark contrast to the Department of Interior’s U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) figures that were based on extensive geologic surveys by a team of more than forty geoscientists, which concluded that at the end of 1995 Iraq, had 100 billion barrels of recoverable reserves, of which 22 billion barrels had already been recovered. The current USGS figures are approximated at 78 billion barrels, two-thirds of the DOE figures. In terms of estimated reserves, the USGS predicts that there is a 95 percent probability that Iraq has 14 billion barrels, a 50 percent probability that Iraq has at least 45 billion barrels, but only a five percent probability that it has 84 billion barrels of undiscovered reserves. According to the USGS estimations the probability that the DOE unproven estimates are correct are close to zero. These figures have enormous implications for Iraq’s ability to attract foreign investment, obtain World Bank and IMF loans,

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and to maneuver in OPEC negotiations. See Gal Luft, “How Much Oil Does Iraq Have?” Iraq Memo #16, The Brookings Institute, May 12, 2003, http://www. brookings.edu/views/op-ed/fellows/luft20030512.htm (accessed May 22, 2008). This research paper will use the more widely accepted DOE figures. 8. These two fields are known in oil industry jargon as “giant fields,” with more than five billion barrels of recoverable reserves each. 9. Iraq also has significant reserves of natural gas that have been virtually untouched. Further, it is estimated that only 10 percent of the country has been explored, leaving room for the possibility of significant unknown deposits. 10. These optimistic estimates are from such groups as the Baker Institute, Center for Global Energy Studies, the Federation of American Scientists. However, others, such as the USGS are not as optimistic, and place median estimates for additional reserves at a conservative 45 billion. See “Iraq Country Analysis Brief: Oil,” EIA, June 2006. http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/cabs/Iraq/Oil.html (accessed May 22, 2008). 11. “Iraq” Iraq Energy Info, http://archive.wn.com/2007/01/15/1400/iraqenergy/ (accessed May 22, 2008). 12. The exportation of Iraqi oil was sporadic during the Oil for Food Program, as Saddam regularly disagreed with the UN over its administration of the program. 13. See EIA, “Iraq Country Report,” http://usgovinfo.about.com/gi/dynamic/ offsite.htm?site=http://eia.doe.gov/ (accessed May 22, 2008). 14. “Iraq Pipeline Watch: Attacks on Iraqi Pipelines, Oil Installations and Oil Personnel,” IAGS Energy Security / Oil and Gas Industry Terrorism Monitor, 2003, http://www.iags.org/iraqpipelinewatch.htm (accessed May 22, 2008). 15. These figures are according to the Department of Energy. 16. Not factoring in security costs, Iraqi oil production only costs three to five billion USD per mbd of output. For a detailed discussion of such costs see Gal Luft, “Reconstructing Iraq: Bringing Iraq’s Economy Back Online,” The Middle East Quarterly 8 (3), 2005. Also available at http://www.meforum.org/article/736. 17. This contrasts with U.S. oil production, which as a mature producer yields 5.8 mbd from about 521,000 wells. For further comparison, Iraqi wells produce up to thousands of barrels per day, while U.S. wells produce in the double digits. See “U.S. Crude Oil Fact Page,” EIA, http://www.eia.doe.gov/oil_gas/petroleum/info_ glance/crudeoil.html (accessed May 22, 2008). 18. See EIA website, www.eia.org. 19. The EIA estimates that Kirkuk, producing 200,000 to 300,000 barrels per day, has had waste hydrocarbons reinjected into the wells from 2003 until 2006. See “Iraq Country Analysis Brief: Background” EIA, June 2006 http://www.eia.doe. gov/emeu/cabs/Iraq/Background.html (accessed May 22, 2008). 20. However, Ibrahim Bahr al-Uloum was replaced by Hussein al-Shahristani, after a series of high profile disagreements with the federal government. See Ibrahim Bahr al-Uloum’s statement in Anne Garrels, “Iraq Oil Militia See Obstructing Reforms” All Things Considered National Public Radio (radio broadcast, February 20, 2006). Corruption in the Iraqi oil sector is not just siphoning money, but is also thought to be funding insurgents, as many of the Ministries have been infiltrated by insurgents and criminal elements. A sitting

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member of the Iraqi National Assembly, Meshan al-Juburi was indicted on corruption charges alleging that he smuggled millions of dollars meant to protect a critical pipeline and funneled some of it to insurgents. Ali Allawi, the Finance minister, estimates that insurgents reap 40 to 50 percent of all oil smuggling profits in the country. See Robert F. Forth. and James Glanz, “Oil Graft Fuels the Insurgency, Iraq and U.S. Say.” New York Times, February 5, 2006. 21. One of the minister’s main goals is to reestablish Iraq as one of the nexus centers of OPEC. See “Iraq Promises to Boost Oil Output,” BBC News, May 5, 2005, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4526769.stm (accessed May 22, 2008). 22. Graph supplied from the Energy Information Administration. Iraq Country Brief. June 2006. 23. The “gross” estimate includes oil reinjected into wells, water-cut, and other oil unaccounted for due to metering problems and pilfering. “Iraq Country Brief: Oil,” EIA, 2006. 24. “Iraq Country Brief: Background,” EIA, 2006. 25. Gal Luft, “Iraq’s Oil Sector: One Year after Liberation” Saban Center Middle East Memo #4, Brookings Institute, June 17, 2004, http://brookings.edu/fp/saban/ luftmemo20040617.htm (accessed May 22, 2008). 26. Luft, “Iraq’s Oil Sector,” 2004. 27. Luft, “Iraq’s Oil Sector,” 2004. 28. See “Iraqi Reservoir Damage May be Long-Lasting” Energy Intelligence, September 29, 2004 http://www.energyintel.com/DocumentDetail.asp?Try=Yes& document_id=131706&publication_id=31 (accessed May 22, 2008). 29. “Iraq Country Brief: Background,” EIA, 2006. 30. “Water cut” is the process whereby oil producers seek to increase production in mature petroleum wells through the injection of water. Generally, these processes are considered to be short term solutions with long term negative consequences for future productivity. 31. “Iraq Country Analysis Brief: Oil,” EIA, 2006 32. It should be noted that there are two main groups are responsible for the majority of the sabotage: looters and saboteurs. Looters are primarily petty criminals who “bunker” oil (puncture pipelines to gather oil), and then sell it on the black market for profit. Many of them are also involved in smuggling oil across the border to Syria, Iran, and Turkey. The saboteurs are politically motivated economic terrorists whose goal is to bring the nascent state to its knees. They are composed by a motley group of remnants of Saddam’s Baathists, tribal fighters, Sunni Fundamentalists, and foreign Sunni al-Qaeda inspired groups. The saboteurs are tactically sophisticated; putting precisely placed explosive charges that damage the pipelines at critical junctures. The repairs generally take months to repair. Further, the saboteurs aim at the secondary infrastructure as well, including attacks against oil workers, assassination of oil officials, and attacks against refinery hubs and pumping stations. See Luft, “Iraq’s Oil Sector,” 2004. 33. A comprehensive analysis of the near-constant attacks against Iraq’s oil sector can be found at Iraq Pipeline Watch,” IAGS. 34. See Gal Luft, “A Crude Threat,” Baltimore Sun April 6, 2004.

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35. According to the Analysis of Global Security, sabotage has slowed output by 400,000 to 600,000 barrels per day. See generally http://www.iags.org/. Dr. Hilal Aboud al-Bayati, former economic advisor to the interim prime minister, states that “security problems are the main obstacle” to attracting foreign investment. See David R. Francis, “Exploring New Oil Fields in Iraq: A Risky Business,” Christian Science Monitor January 3, 2005, http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0103/p17s01cogn.html (accessed May 22, 2008). 36. There are nearly 14,000 security guards posted along the pipelines and other critical infrastructure, using sophisticated surveillance equipment. 37. Sam Fletcher, “Former Iraqi Oil Minister Calls for Iraq Production Cap, Reservoir Repairs,” Oil and Gas Journal February 15, 2004. 38. Source: www.stratfor.com. 39. Issam al-Chalabi speaking at an annual energy conference in Houston sponsored by Cambridge Energy Research Associates, as quoted in Fletcher 2004. See also www.cera.com. 40. Fletcher 2004. 41. This is explained subsequently as relating to a disputed constitutional clause. The Iraqi Constitution in its entirety can be read at the Iraq Foundation website: http://www.iraqfoundation.org/projects/constitution/constitutionindex.htm. For an extensive analysis on the Iraqi constitution see Nathan Brown, “The Final Draft of the Iraqi Constitution: Analysis and Commentary,” The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, September 16, 2005, http://www.carnegieendowment.org/ publications/index.cfm?fa=view&id=17423 (accessed May 22, 2008). 42. Andrea Coombes, “Iraq to Renew Saddam-era Oil Deal with China: Baghdad, Beijing to Renegotiate $1.2 Billion Agreement,” Marketwatch, October 28, 2006. 43. Deutsche Bank considered this a highly unlikely outcome. See “Energy Prospects after the Petroleum Age,” Deutsche Bank Research, December 2, 2004, http://www.odacinfo.org/bulletin/documents/DeutscheBankresearch.pdf (accessed May 22, 2008). 44. Located to the west of Basra near the Rumayla field, the field is believed to have a production potential of 800,000 to one million barrels per day, but its current production is hovering around 180,000 barrels per day. 45. Ibid. 46. See “81 Iraqis arrive in Russia for Training Program with Oil Giant Lukoil” Mosnews.com, May 27, 2005, http://www.mosnews.com/news/2005/05/27/iraqis lukoil.shtml (accessed May 22, 2008). 47. See “Lukoil Wants Fresh Iraqi Oil Deal” BBC News, March 11, 2004, http:// news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/3503494.stm (accessed May 22, 2008). 48. The Southern portion of the Rumayla field on the Kuwaiti side of the border, where departing Iraqi troops set the fields afire, serves as an iconic reminder of the 1991 Gulf War. See Christina Reed, “Burning Assets: Oil Fires in Iraq” Geotimes, May 2003, http://www.geotimes.org/may03/geophen.html (accessed May 22, 2008). 49. Reed 2003. 50. Article 115 states

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All that is not written in the exclusive powers of the federal authorities is in the authority of the regions. In other powers shared between the federal government and the regions, the priority will be given to the region’s law in case of dispute. 51. The KRG has run the Kurdish Zone since the early 1990s on a semiautonomous basis. 52. “Iraq Kurds Claim their Right to Oil,” Alexander’s Gas and Oil Connection 10 no. 24 (December 22, 2005). 53. Steve Negus, “Iraq Faces Clashes with Kurds over Oil Deal,” Financial Times. http://search.ft.com/ftArticle?queryText=Iraq+faces+clashes+with+Kurds+over+oi l+deal&aje=true&id=060523008079&ct=0&nclick_check=1 (accessed May 22, 2008). 54. “Iraq-Kurdistan Minister Says in Talks with Oil Majors” Kurdish Media http://www.kurdmedia.com/news.asp?id=13283 (accessed May 22, 2008). 55. Text Draft of Iraqi Constitution: Article 109 at http://news.bbc.co.uk /2/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/24_08_05_constit.pdf (accessed May 22, 2008). 56. Mohammad al-Galiani, “Assessing Iraq’s Oil Potential,” Geotimes, October 2003, http://www.geotimes.org/oct03/feature_oil.html (accessed May 22, 2008). 57. “Iraq: Oil and Gas Rights of Regions and Governorates,” Kurdish Media http://www.kurdmedia.com/inter.asp?id=12634 (accessed May 22, 2008). 58. Ibid. 59. This is subject to parliamentary approval of the new Iraqi Draft Law. 60. “Kirkuk Oil and the Dance of Death,” blog entry, Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying website, http://www.docstrangelove.com/2006/04/27/kirkuk-oil-and-thedance-of-death/> (accessed May 22, 2008). 61.“Kurds Maintain Stance on Kirkuk Elections,” Radio Free Europe 8 no. 2 (17 January 2005). 62. United States Energy Information Administration, Iraq Country Page, at http: //www.hrw.org/reports/2003/iraq0303.htm (accessed May 22, 2008). 63. This would seemingly parallel the dissolution of Yugoslavia, when ethnic mass murders corresponded with the hardening of ethno-sectarian hatred in Sarajevo. See generally “Study of the Battle and the Siege of Sarajevo, Part 1/10” United Nations Commission of Experts Final Report May 27, 1994, available at http:// www.ess.uwe.ac.uk/comexpert/ANX/VI-01.htm (accessed May 22, 2008) 64. James Brandon, “Kurds Quietly Angle for Independence,” Christian Science Monitor April 26, 2006, http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0426/p07s02-woiq.html (accessed May 22, 2008). 65. Iraqi Officials say that U.S. Ambassador Zalmy Khalizad has been instrumental in overcoming Kurdish objections to the draft and getting unanimous Cabinet approval. 66. Eric Wong, “Iraqis Reach an Accord on Oil Revenue,” The New York Times, February 27, 2007. 67. Fundamentally, the central authorities have veto power. Additionally, Iraqi Officials say that they have received offers of interest from oil companies located in the U.S., Russia and China. 68. See Greg Muttitt, “Crude Designs: The Rip-Off of Iraq’s Oil Wealth” Global

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Policy Forum November 2005,