The Democracy Dilemma

The Democracy Dilemma

The Bush administration is taking credit for an apparent trend towards democratic reform in the middle east. Are its controversial foreign and defence policies actually bearing fruit, contrary to the views of its detractors?

Not so fast, cautions Stephen E. Meyer of Washington's National Defence University in the latest Capital Commentary from the Center for Public Justice. Such optimism is almost certainly premature, and it is far from clear, even where elections have been held with some success, that democracy will prove to have staying power. Moreover, "because democracy is the Bush administration's new foreign policy centerpiece, the administration has a motive to trumpet democratic success in the Middle East even if there is relatively little to cheer about. In other words, if democracies are needed in the Middle East to lend credibility to our foreign policy, then democracies will be found."