CRAFTING INCENTIVES FOR PEACE: THE CHALLENGES OF INSTITUTIONAL DESIGN IN POST-WAR IRAQ

Transcription

1 Stefano Recchia STM-103 Part One: Policy Analysis ICG Middle East Report N November 2004 CRAFTING INCENTIVES FOR PEACE: THE CHALLENGES OF INSTITUTIONAL DESIGN IN POST-WAR IRAQ EXECUTIVE SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS Iraq today is at a crossroads. The results of military intervention to oust Iraq s previous regime from power, and subsequent attempts at political stabilization and democratization, are unlikely to become clear for a number of years. The International Crisis Group has been following the political evolution in Iraq since the early 1990s. In spite of several drawbacks in recent months, we believe that the international community still has a realistic chance of setting Iraq on the path towards stable democracy and sustainable peace. Together with other international analysts, we forecast a 60% chance that by end-2006 significant improvements in security will occur and a more legitimate, sovereign government will be in place. 1 However, several requirements need to be fulfilled for this to happen. The design of Iraq s constitutional and broader institutional structure constitutes a major challenge in this sense, both for the Iraqi people and the international community at large. Unfortunately, the question of institutional design in post-war Iraq has not been devoted the attention it warrants so far. In late June 2004 the formal reins of power were transferred from the US-led Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) to an interim Iraqi government. Previously, in March 2004, an interim constitutional document - the transitional Law of Administration for the State of Iraq - was agreed by the CPA with the now dissolved Iraqi Governing Council (GC). 2 The interim constitutional document contains little detail on the institutional outlines of a future 1 See also EIU [Economist Intelligence Unit] Country Report: Iraq. London: Economist Intelligence Unit. 2 CPA [Coalition Provisional Authority] Law of Administration for the State of Iraq for the Transitional Period. Baghdad: 8 March ( 1

2 democratic Iraq, apart from the general statement of principle that the system of government in Iraq shall be republican, federal, democratic, and pluralistic (Article 4). Elections for a transitional National Assembly, which should draft the permanent constitutional document, are intended to be held no later than 31 January The adoption of Iraq s new permanent constitution is planned for December 2005 at the latest. It is surprising how little international analysts and foreign officials have provided in terms of suggestions as to how the precise outline and content of this permanent constitution might look like. After a military intervention that plunged the country into severe political instability, bringing ethic and tribal divisions to the forefront, the people of Iraq badly need international assistance in designing a viable institutional structure that will provide their leaders with the necessary incentives for peace. The present Middle East report on post-war Iraq is intended as a substantial contribution to the debate about Iraq s broader institutional design. In order to set the framework for our specific policy recommendations, the entire first part of the report will be devoted to an in-depth review of the contemporary literature on powersharing and institutional design in heterogeneous societies. The second part of the report will proceed in a broadly comparative manner: the intention is to test the major theoretical insights from the literature against the experience of two contemporary post-war societies that have witnessed sustained international involvement, namely Lebanon and Bosnia-Herzegovina. Finally, taking Iraq s complex social and political reality into account, various scenarios of permanent institutional design will be discussed. Specific recommendations are summarized below. RECOMMENDATIONS 1. The permanent institutional structure for Iraq should be based on the classical principles of liberal democracy and the non-discrimination of individuals, with particular regard to religion, ethnicity, gender, and personal belief. 2. Iraq s permanent institutional structure should be based on the principle of federal self-rule, implying substantial administrative and legislative autonomy for sub-state regional entities. The guiding principle should be that of territorial self-government, with ethnically homogeneous regions to be avoided whenever possible. An exception should be made for the Kurdish autonomous region in the North of Iraq, where the distinct ethno-national character of a territorially concentrated minority warrants selfgovernment on the basis of group autonomy. 3. A confessional, Lebanon-style outcome of rigid consociationalism for all of Iraq should be avoided by all means. A permanent institutional structure founded on the recognition of ethnic and religious difference would only risk to further empower ethnic entrepreneurs, who could mobilize the electorate according to communal affiliations and thus permanently destabilize the country. 4. Iraq s permanent system of government should be broadly parliamentary, with a twochamber legislative branch, and a prime minister elected by and responsible to the parliament. One possible alternative might be the adoption of a semi-presidential system, with a prime minister dependent on parliamentary support and a president directly elected on the basis alternative vote (AV). 2

3 5. Representatives to the lower chamber of parliament should be elected on the basis of a party-list proportional system, with multi-member regional electoral districts. Representatives to the second, federal legislative chamber should also be elected on a regional basis, by either alternative vote (AV) or single transferable vote (STV), so as to encourage vote-pooling across ethnic and religious boundaries. 6. While broad power-sharing within the executive should be a goal, representatives of the different ethnic and religious groups should not be included according to rigid predetermined ratios. One possible exception to this rule could be that whenever the prime minister (or president in a semi-presidential system) is a Shia, his or her deputy (or the prime minister in a semi-presidential system) as well as the foreign minister should be Sunnis, and vice-versa. Sustained international pressure and incentives should be applied to secure broader power-sharing and rough proportionality throughout the executive. Regional governments should rely on similar power-sharing arrangements. 7. The international community should be ready to assist the Iraqi population for an indefinite transitional period. The option of postponing elections for a transitional National Assembly beyond the January 2005 deadline, until security conditions in the country improve substantially, should be seriously considered. 3

4 PART I THEORETICAL BACKGROUND This first part of the report is intended to provide an in-depth review of the contemporary debate on the management and regulation of communal conflict in heterogeneous and divided societies. Such detailed attention to theory is slightly unusual for ICG policy reports. However, the complex nature of the challenges facing Iraq today warrants such a theoretical focus, to better situate and evaluate the thrust of our specific policy recommendations. 1) Conflict regulation and the institutionalization of communal differences Conflict regulation is less concerned with the processes for ending violent conflict, such as mediation, negotiation, or military enforcement, and more with the institutional structures that are subsequently established as the foundation for sustainable peace and democratization. The conflict regulation approach accepts ethnic conflict as a given in divided societies, and tries to manage it effectively so as to avoid violent escalation. Going one step further, conflict regulation relies on the explicit recognition of the major religious and ethno-linguistic groups that compose a society as the bedrock of its institutional structure. This recognition of differences translates into specific political and institutional arrangements; the two basic principles in this respect are power-sharing, and group autonomy or self-rule. While the former implies that no group can decide important matters without the consent of the others, the latter allows groups to determine their own political, cultural, and economic affairs to a certain degree. 3 By explicitly recognizing the existence of separate groups and elevating them into the foundation of a society s political structure, however, communal differences become further institutionalized and strengthened. A particularly ambitious model of conflict regulation, so-called consociational democracy, has been developed from the late 1960s onwards. The underlying theoretical framework was extrapolated from the successful experiences of conflict regulation in several European societies traditionally affected by communal cleavages, such as Switzerland, the Netherlands, Belgium, and Austria. 4 Consociational democracy relies on power sharing and cooperation among political elites to counteract the centrifugal tendencies inherent in divided societies. Its principal characteristics have been identified as follows: 1) government by a grand coalition ; 2) the existence of a mutual veto power; 3) proportional representation; 4) group autonomy. 1) Grand coalition: The political leaders of all major groups should be included in government and share executive power within a grand coalition. Various justifications for the grand-coalition argument have been put forward. The first, normative argument starts from the assumption that under normal circumstances, minority parties that are excluded from government can legitimately aspire to become majorities in the future. In divided societies, however, communal cleavages cannot be easily overcome, and a communal minority will remain permanently excluded under simple majority rule. Therefore, to avoid undemocratic majority rule on a permanent basis, all groups should be included in a grand coalition. It is 3 Ulrich Schneckener Models of Ethnic Conflict Regulation: The Politics of Recognition. In Ulrich Schneckener and Stefan Wolff, eds., Managing and Settling Ethnic Conflicts: Perspectives on Successes and Failures in Europe, Africa and Asia. London: Hurst. 4 See Arend Lijphart Democracy in Plural Societies: A Comparative Exploration. New Haven: Yale University Press. 4

5 sometimes argued that majority rule is not only undemocratic but also dangerous, since minorities that are continually denied access to power will feel excluded and discriminated against and may lose their allegiance to the regime. 5 Moreover, the grand coalition ensures that all the parties have a stake in government, which is assumed to have a moderating effect on political leaders in divided societies. Since they presumably want to stay in the cabinet, they should also have strong incentives to compromise on a regular basis. 6 2) Veto power: In order to avoid the possibility that a minority will be outvoted on matters considered to be in its vital interest, a minority veto needs to be added to the grand coalition principle. In the opinion of its principal defender, the principal function of the veto power is that of a deterrent: The very fact that the veto is available gives a feeling of security which makes the actual use of it improbable. 7 The determination of which matters are in a group s vital interest can of course be highly controversial in itself. If a veto power is introduced in the constitutional structure of deeply divided societies, its applicability should not be too-broadly defined so as to avoid the danger of recurrent institutional deadlocks. 3) Proportionality: A further crucial element of consociational democracy is proportionality not only of political representation, but also of civil service appointments and the allocation of public funds. The underlying idea is that the proportional allocation of benefits among all the major groups will remove potentially divisive issues from the decision-making process. On the other hand, the introduction of specific quotas for the allocation of benefits among ethnic groups may be problematic in several regards. It may facilitate the development of clientelistic relationships between group-leaders and their followers, from which corruption and broader administrative inefficiencies may follow. Moreover, the proportional allocation of funds to individuals within a society requires the enforcement of a strict ethnic census system, in which all citizens unequivocally declare themselves as belonging to one group or another. If such a system is sustained indefinitely, one potential consequence may be a further entrenchment of sectarian loyalties, and a consequent further polarization of society. The above-mentioned undesirable effects might be even stronger if preferential policies are adopted for specific groups in education, business, or employment, to compensate for past discriminatory practices. If they are adopted, policies of group proportionality and group preference should always be regarded as temporary exceptions, possibly with a specified time limit. 8 4) Group autonomy: Finally, consociational democracy requires a high degree of autonomy for each group to rule over itself in areas considered to be of its exclusive concern. Where group cleavages coincide with regional cleavages, autonomy can be achieved through territorial devolution or federalism. Alternatively, group autonomy can be realized on a nonterritorial basis (personal autonomy), particularly in the cultural and educational domains. Territorial devolution and federalism can have an accommodating effect and avert communal separatism, if skilfully designed. The main challenge consists in combining devolution with policies that give regionally concentrated groups a strong stake in the center. 9 When the pressure for autonomous self-government is much stronger in some parts of the country than 5 Arend Lijphart Patterns of Democracy: Government Forms and Performance in Thirty-Six Countries. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, pp Arend Lijphart The Wave of Power-Sharing Democracy. In Andrew Reynolds, ed., The Architecture of Democracy. Constitutional Design, Conflict Management, and Democracy. Oxford: Oxford University Press, p Lijphart. Democracy in Plural Societies, p Donald L. Horowitz Ethnic Gropups in Conflict. Berkeley: University of California Press, pp Donald L. Horowitz Democracy in Divided Societies. Journal of Democracy 4 (4), p

6 in others, asymmetrical constitutional arrangements may also be considered. 10 One problem with territorial autonomy and decentralization is that as groups consolidate their regional autonomy, they grow politically stronger and become able to renegotiate ever greater shares of autonomy. 11 By strengthening the political autonomy of territorially concentrated communal groups, federalism may also further contribute to the institutionalization of ethnic or religious differences. One possible answer to this problem is to give priority to the territorial over the communal dimension when designing federal arrangements, by creating ethnically heterogeneous sub-state units with their own political dynamics that take the heat off an overheated political center. 12 2) Evaluating consociational democracy and power-sharing Of all the elements making up consociational democracy, the grand coalition requirement has been most intensely debated. In fact, elements of the grand coalition argument can be found in most contemporary theories of executive power-sharing in deeply divided societies. According to the classical argument, the grand coalition requirement can be fulfilled in two different ways: the first and most straightforward form is that of a grand coalition cabinet including all major ethnic parties represented in the legislature. The more inclusive the coalition, however, the more the system of democratic checks and balances is being distorted. As one prominent critic argued, if everyone is included, what is the reward of winning? 13 Such all-inclusive coalitions may further lead to instability and virtual deadlock within the executive. A second, alternative way to achieve a grand coalition is to include in the executive representatives of all the major groups according to a pre-determined ratio (in the presence of a few large communities, one possible option is to give all of them an equal share in power, which will lead to an over-representation of smaller groups). 14 The determination of which groups are to be included in the executive, however, may be highly controversial in a divided society. Perhaps the major problem with such fixed quotas is that they may be challenged years later, as the balance of power between groups changes following the socio-economic and demographic evolution of society. An excessively rigid quota system, for instance, was a major factor in the breakdown of the Lebanese power-sharing agreement in When executive power is shared according to pre-determined ratios, the possibility of future adaptations should therefore always be left open, and explicitly integrated into the institutional framework if possible. One fundamental condition for the survival of power-sharing agreements in deeply divided societies is that they roughly reflect the actual balance of power between communal groups on the ground. Ideally, as some early theories of consociational democracy had recognized, the balance of power will be multiple, based on both an approximate equilibrium among the different groups and the presence of at least three different groups on the ground. 15 Together, these two elements mean that all groups are minorities, making it more difficult for any one group to impose its will on the others. One important shortcoming of power-sharing theory is that it assumes each of the communities within a divided society to be represented by a unified political leadership. In 10 Ronald Watts Models of federal power sharing. International Social Science Journal 167, p David A. Lake and Donald Rothchild Territorial Decentralization and Civil War Settlements. In Philip G. Roeder and Donald Rothchild, eds., Powersharing and Peacemaking (forthcoming). 12 See Horowitz, Ethnic Groups in Conflict, pp Horowitz, Democracy in Divided Societies, p Lijphart, The Wave of Power-Sharing Democracy, pp Lijphart. Democracy in Plural Societies, p

7 the face of highly divisive issues, however, when elites compromise across ethnic lines, counter-elites may arise that challenge the compromise. As one critic cogently put it, a principal limitation on interethnic cooperation is the configuration of intraethnic competition. 16 Centrifugal competition among elites may lead to the emergence of radical spoilers within communal groups. If such spoilers are not effectively dealt with, either through inducements or the use of coercion, they may fundamentally undermine the success of a peace process in divided societies. 17 The most that can be expected from power-sharing arrangements is that they sufficiently alter the political incentive structure of the leading political elites within each group, so that they prefer institutional competition to open warfare. What cannot be expected from power-sharing agreements is that they substantially alter the diffuse support for the political system among minority populations at large. 18 According to the proponents of consociational democracy, a parliamentary system of government is most conducive to power-sharing. In parliamentary systems, the executive is appointed by the legislature and is dependent on legislative confidence. This leads, first of all, to a sharing of power between executive and legislative. Furthermore, since the cabinet in parliamentary system is a collegial decision-making body, it offers the optimal setting for forming a broad power-sharing executive. 19 The adoption of a pure parliamentary system, however, may lead to serious problems of assembly government and executive instability, in severely polarized societies more than elsewhere. 20 This is why even the most arduous proponents of consociational democracy have recently come to recognize that the position of cabinets ought to be strengthened through specific constitutional provisions. One such provision might be the constructive vote of no confidence, which stipulates that the head of government can be dismissed by parliament only if his or her successor is elected simultaneously. 21 It should be noted how presidential systems are not necessarily incompatible with executive power-sharing. The office of the president itself may be shared between the representatives of major communal groups, either according to a rotation formula following the Swiss model or by a multiple-head presidency such as in the case of Bosnia-Herzegovina. Power-sharing within the cabinet can be constitutionally mandated according to a pre-determined ratio. In the end, the adoption of a pure parliamentary system seems ill-suited to preventing problems of severe cabinet instability and legislative deadlock in divided societies. Perhaps a semipresidential system, based on power sharing between a president independent from parliamentary interference and a prime minister who must obtain continuous parliamentary support, might be better able to combine the requirements of political stability and inclusive government in heterogeneous societies. 22 The full package of consociational democracy, as discussed above, is not necessarily what divided societies after violent conflict need most to achieve political stability and eventual democratic consolidation. The principal weakness of power-sharing arrangements in deeply 16 Horowitz, Ethnic Gropups in Conflict, p Stephen J. Stedman Spoiler Problems in Peace Processes. International Security 22 (2), pp Pippa Norris Ethnic Minorities. In Id. Electoral Engineering: Voting Rules and Political Behavior. New York: Cambridge University Press. 19 Arend Lijphart Constitutional Design for Divided Societies. Journal of Democracy 15 (2), p Giovanni Sartori Comparative Constitutional Engineering: An Inquiry into Structures, Incentives and Outcomes. New York: New York University Press, pp Lijphart, Constitutional Design for Divided Societies, p In divided societies, however, the constructive vote of no confidence requirement may lead to the paradoxical situation where an executive cannot be dismissed by parliament but does not have the necessary parliamentary support to implement its program. 22 See Sartori, op. cit., pp , for a dispassionate defence of semi-presidential government. 7

8 divided societies is that they institutionalize ethnic divisions, with the potential to further increase their political salience. This danger is even greater when the full package of consociational democracy is adopted. If consociational structures become embedded in a society where ethnic or religious opposition is only one of several dimensions along which political conflict occurs, then the institutions designed to alleviate tensions may actually entrench communal polarization further. Nonetheless, the sharing of power among the leaders of major ethnic or religious groups may be essential to guaranteeing a minimum of political stability in the short run. This is why specific power-sharing agreements between the major ethnic or religious groups have often been an integral component of the peace-settlements negotiated to end violent inter-group conflict in recent years. A particularly complex (though far from perfect) power-sharing agreement, for instance, emerged from the Dayton Peace accords that ended the Bosnian conflict in In post-war societies where communal differences are salient, some form of power-sharing may not only be expedient, but politically necessary for the sustainability of democratic politics. Power-sharing is probably best seen as a stop-gap measure, the lesser of two evils which keeps the lid on the pressure cooker of a divided society that is about to blow. 23 Even in the short run, however, power-sharing within the executive branch of government should be seen as only one of several dimensions where inter-group accommodation is possible. Institutional design should answer the specific needs and experiences of a given society, and there is no one-size-fits-all model that can be applied. Not only the relative power of communal groups, but also the salience of communal identifications can evolve over time. As one foremost scholar of ethnic conflict put it: treat a group differently, by denial or privilege, and its members become more self-conscious about their common bonds and interests. 24 Institutional structures that contribute to moderate behaviour among elites and counter polarizing tendencies should therefore be crafted at several different levels. The potential incentives for political elites provided by various electoral systems have been studied particularly well. 3) Democratic elections and the role of the electoral system Electoral systems are commonly agreed to have an important role in sustaining or diminishing ethnic conflict. Beyond the electoral formula itself, the delimitation of constituencies and the number or seats allocated per constituency can also have important consequences. Nonetheless, the adoption of different electoral formulas is clearly most consequential with regard to the management of ethnic conflict. Straightforward plurality or majority formulas, such as first-past-the-post, are commonly seen as least responsive to the needs of deeply divided societies. In situations of communal polarization where one group is dominant and internally cohesive, that group will have gained access to power for the indefinite future. When large minorities feel permanently excluded, political stability can be seriously undermined, and the outbreak of sectarian violence might be followed by military coups, and the advent of single-party regimes. 25 Plurality systems combined with pre-determined parliamentary seats for specified minorities, such as in Lebanon, might be less disruptive in the short run, although the decision of which groups are entitled to parliamentary representation will inevitably be highly controversial. 23 Ben Reilly and Andrew Reynolds Electoral Systems and Conflict in Divided Societies. Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, p Ted Robert Gurr, Minorities at Risk: A Global View of Ethnopolitical Conflicts. Washington, D.C.: United States Institute of Peace Press, p Horowitz, Ethnic Groups in Conflict, p

9 Proportional electoral formulas are often seen as best suited to the needs of divided societies. A high degree of proportionality, achieved through low electoral thresholds and large multimember districts, guarantees that all relevant minorities will be represented in parliament. Moreover, the gap between a group s demographic strength and its effective parliamentary representation will narrow with each increase in the proportionality of the electoral system. Giving each group a proportional stake in parliament should at least partially moderate the centrifugal tendencies that are inherent in divided societies. This has led some political scientists to argue that proportional representation (PR) is undoubtedly the optimal electoral formula for divided societies. 26 Other studies appear substantially more critical of PR. One group of scholars has gone so far as to argue that while PR may be an effective instrument for smoothening the path of democratic transition, it may be less effective at promoting democratic consolidation. 27 First, it is argued, proportional representation entails a serious problem of geographic accountability. Large multimember districts, and particularly national list PR, increase the distance between the citizens and its elected representatives, with related problems of accountability and responsiveness. 28 This argument does not undermine PR as such; it simply questions the appropriateness of excessively large multimember districts. A second critique of PR is more trenchant: experience tells us that PR may not only accommodate potential ethnopolitical identities, but also strengthen them by facilitating their political organization and expression. 29 Whenever ethnic or communal leaders can be elected with the exclusive support of their own group, they may have strong incentives to mobilize their electorate along ethnic lines, and social polarization will be subsequently replicated in the legislature. Finally, pure proportional representation in divided societies almost inevitably leads to a proliferation in the number of parties, with consequent problems of political fragmentation and ingovernabilty. Electoral systems should not be seen as simply a mechanism for the transfer of societal preferences into political representation. They also constitute a coherent structure of incentives for political leaders that might lead them to moderate behaviour, or the exact opposite thereof. Following this view, a key challenge for institutional design in divided societies should be to secure the adoption of electoral and governmental structures that give politicians incentives to behave in one way rather than another. 30 One group of scholars has consistently suggested the adoption of so-called preferential electoral systems in this regard, which enable voters to rank-order their preferences among different candidates or parties on the ballot paper. 31 Such systems include the alternative vote (AV) and the single transferable vote (STV). AV is a majoritarian system used in single-member electoral districts, applied most prominently to elections for the lower house in Australia. Voters are required to rank-order their candidates, and if no candidate receives an absolute majority of first preferences, the candidate with the lowest number of first preferences is eliminated, and his or her ballots are transferred to the remaining candidates according to the lower preferences marked. This process of excluding the weakest candidate is repeated until a majority winner emerges. 26 Lijphart, Constitutional Design for Divided Societies, p Reilly and Reynolds, Electoral Systems and Conflict in Divided Societies, p Ibid., p Norris, Ethnic Minorities, p Horowitz, Democracy in Divided Societies, p See e.g. Benjamin Reilly Electoral Systems for Divided Societies. Journal of Democracy 13 (2). 9

10 STV, on the contrary, is a proportional system based on multimember districts. Voters rank individual candidates in a manner similar to AV. Again, if no candidate is immediately elected, the candidate with the lowest number of first preferences is eliminated and his or her ballots are redistributed among the remaining candidates. At the same time, any surplus votes of elected candidates are redistributed at reduced value to the next most preferred candidates on the ballot. 32 Such preferential electoral systems, it is believed, can encourage politicians in divided societies to campaign not just for first-preference votes from their own community, but for second-choice votes from other groups as well. 33 This should provide incentives for candidates and parties to pool votes across ethnic or communal lines. The ideal scenario is where no single ethnic or religious group is sufficiently dominant and cohesive for any one candidate to be assured of outright electoral victory. STV has the advantage of proportionality, and is therefore less exclusive than majority AV. On the other hand, the threshold for winning a seat in a multimember STV district may be too low to ensure that incentives for vote-pooling influence campaign strategies. The majority AV formula might therefore be more interesting in the case of divided societies. This is particularly the case for presidential or semi-presidential systems, which rely on the direct election of the president, either when no single group polls more than percent or when larger groups exist that are internally fragmented. In similar cases, AV might ideally produce a president that is super partes and effectively enforces the constitution. 34 Preferential electoral systems warrant serious consideration as an answer to the challenges facing divided societies. However, several conditions need to be fulfilled for such systems to provide the expected incentives, one of which is the existence of a substantial moderate center. In a highly polarized electoral environment, preferential electoral systems may have little to contribute, at least in the short term. Moreover, preferential systems seem to operate most effectively in multipolar societies, where no single community is politically dominant. Finally, in the absence of strong external incentives, preferential voting systems may encounter serious problems of local acceptance in divided societies: Why would leaders of a minority group accept a system which gives them no assurances? 35 In the end, electoral systems cannot work magic in divided societies. The first concern of electoral design should be to avoid excessively exclusive systems, for which some form of proportional representation is probably best suited. Thereafter, in situations where a country is sufficiently fractionalized in ethnic or religious terms, the introduction of preferential electoral systems at various levels might be considered. Finally, some considerations might be warranted on the timing of elections as such: democratic elections are inherently competitive and conflictual in their nature. In the absence of adequate safeguards and restraints, elections in ethnically divided societies can be highly divisive, aggravating rather than moderating political cleavages and ethnic tensions. 36 It might therefore be advisable for international actors to postpone the holding of elections until more moderate political parties begin to emerge, and mechanisms have been established to ensure compliance with the election s 32 Ibid, p Ibid. 34 For a discussion of AV in presidential systems, see Horowitz, Ethnic Groups in Conflict, pp Nina Caspersen Good Fences Make Good Neighbours? A Comparison of Conflict-Regulation Strategies in Postwar Bosnia. Journal of Peace Research 41 (5), p Krishna Kumar Postconflict Elections, Democratization, and International Assistance. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, p

11 actual results. 37 The promotion of democratic transitions and power-sharing in divided societies is a risky business. Perhaps the endogenous incentives provided by local political structures and electoral arrangements will be altogether insufficient to stabilize fragile postwar societies. If these societies are to have a chance, they require sustained political and material nurturing by outside actors. 38 This will require powerful outside actors to limit the actual sovereignty of post-war societies for an indefinite transitional period, providing the necessary additional incentives to secure peaceful coexistence and eventual democratic consolidation in what are today deeply divided societies. 39 Research design and method of analysis: The second part of this report (Policy Options) will logically follow from the theoretical framework/literature review presented above. The analysis will be fundamentally qualitative in nature. First, the institutional setup in two post-conflict societies, namely Lebanon and Bosnia-Herzegovina, will be studied in some detail. These case-studies will also be used as a convenient background against which to test the theoretical insights from the first part of the report. Second, different possible institutional frameworks for post-war Iraq will be outlined. Finally, one particular framework will be suggested as the most viable (see executive summary). 37 See Roland Paris At War s End. Building Peace After Civil Conflict. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp Ted Robert Gurr Attaining Peace in Divided Societies: Five Principles of Emerging Doctrine. International Journal on World Peace 19 (2), p Michael Ignatieff Empire lite: Nation-building in Bosnia, Kosovo and Afghanistan. London: Vintage. 11