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The Follies of Democratic Imperialism Omar G Omar G. Encarnación is associate professor of politics at Bard College. He is the author, most recently, of The Myth of Civil Society: Social Capital and Democratic Consolidation in Spain and Brazil (2003). The Follies of Democratic Imperialism Omar G. Encarnación President George W. Bush’s invasion of Iraq spread of democracy by force or other signaled the unambiguous return of “demo- means.4 Her predecessor at the State Depart- cratic imperialism” in American foreign pol- ment, Colin Powell, who Bush entrusted icy. Entailing what is tantamount to the im- with the task of selling the war in Iraq to position of democracy upon a foreign coun- the world, had opposed ousting Saddam try, this can be seen as the ultimate manifes- Hussein during the first Gulf war and ad- tation of America’s traditional obsession vised against intervention to stop genocide with its role as a global moral crusader.1 in Bosnia, contending that neither case Bringing freedom and democracy to Iraq is posed a threat to the national interest. expected to impart a “domino-like” effect Indeed, the attempt to democratize the throughout the Middle East, resulting in Middle East is little short of revolutionary. the collapse of one autocracy after another. Unlike in Asia, Africa, and especially Latin President Bush elaborated his vision in a America, promoting democracy in the speech to the American Enterprise Institute Middle East has never been an explicit (AEI) on February 27, 2003, by any measure U.S. goal. Over the years, American policy- a presidential manifesto on the virtues of makers have been reticent to push democra- spreading democracy abroad. Removing tization there on the grounds that friendly Saddam Hussein from power and replacing authoritarians in Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and him with a democratically elected govern- Egypt provided a defense against the spread ment, Bush asserted, “would serve as a dra- of radical Islam. Conventional wisdom held matic and inspiring example of freedom for that the advent of real reforms in the Arab other nations in the region.”2 world could result in legitimately elected This robust rebirth of democratic impe- Islamist governments that were “anti-Amer- rialism could hardly have been imagined on- ican and ultimately anti-democratic in ori- ly a few years ago. As a candidate in 2000, entation.”5 This scenario materialized in Bush faulted the Clinton administration for Algeria during the 1990s. To prevent the its intervention in Haiti in 1994 with the all-but-certain electoral victory of the Islam- goal of restoring democracy there as well as ic Salvation Front (FIS), the Algerian mili- for its “humanitarian interventions” in So- tary staged a coup in January 1992, con- malia and Kosovo. His stance was in keep- doned by the United States and other West- ing with the conservative realpolitik of his ern powers, which opened the way for a civil closest advisers, who regarded the moralistic war that has claimed an estimated 150,000 impulse in American foreign policy as at lives. best a distraction and at worst counterpro- September 11 was obviously the most ductive.3 It was now Secretary of State Con- important factor behind the roaring return doleezza Rice who then advised Bush to of democratic imperialism. The events of adopt a hard-nosed realist view of interna- that fateful day engendered the belief that tional relations that left little room for the Islamic authoritarianism nurtured political The Follies of Democratic Imperialism 47 extremism, and that the essential correc- democratic practices in places where none tive was the democratization of the Mus- existed before. lim, and especially the Arab, world. As expounded by Under Secretary of State From Wilson to Bush: Quixotic Ideals Paula Dobriansky, “The advancement of In sending U.S. troops to Mexico in 1914 human rights and democracy is the bed- with the intention of toppling the dictator- rock of our war on terrorism. A stable gov- ship of Gen. Victoriano Huerta, who had ernment that responds to the legitimate seized power through a violent coup the desires of its people and respects their year before, Wilson articulated three princi- rights, and shares power is a powerful anti- ples that comprise the essence of “Wilsoni- dote to extremism.”6 These views echoed anism,” and by extension, democratic impe- influential neoconservative voices in the rialism. First is the view that spreading Bush administration who maintained that democracy abroad, even by force, is an un- American power should not be limited to qualified blessing. Wilson saw democracy as the defense of vital interests but should the source of trust, order, and peace in inter- also be employed to defeat ideologies op- national relations. “A steadfast concert of posing freedom and democracy.7 Deputy peace can never be maintained except by a Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, a partnership of democratic nations. No auto- pivotal figure in the “neocon” movement, cratic government could be trusted to keep argued that the challenge facing the United faith within it or observe its covenants,” de- States after 9/11 was far wider than a fight clared Wilson as he dispatched the Marines against terrorism: “It is a war of ideas, a to occupy the port of Veracruz and force a struggle over modernity and secularism, showdown with what he called “a govern- pluralism and democracy and real economic ment of butchers.”11 Wilson’s faith flowed development.”8 from what is known today as “democratic However outwardly attractive and com- peace theory,” which contends that democra- pelling, the return of democratic imperial- cies, owing to their very constitution, do ism is rooted in faulty premises that are not go to war with each other.12 Thus, Wil- not merely quixotic but actually counter- son reasoned, the more democratic the productive in spreading democracy, peace, world, the more peaceful it would become. and order around the world. These “follies Second was Wilson’s belief in democracy of democratic imperialism,” as I call them, as a universal value capable of succeeding were first formulated by President Wood- everywhere. “There is no people not fitted row Wilson to justify his democratic cru- for self government,” asserted Wilson as he sades in Latin America during an earlier undertook to bring “an orderly and right- era when America’s imperial impulses were eous government” to Mexico.13 This cut in full bloom. They have been adopted against the grain of the era’s conventional virtually unvarnished eight decades later wisdom about Latin America, given its by President Bush, “the most Wilsonian Catholic faith, colonial experience, warm president since Wilson himself,”9 conjuring climate, mixed racial heritage, and pre- the image of America as “the New Rome.”10 sumed volatile temperament.14 A New York Oddly, the ideals underpinning democratic Times editorial published at the time of Wil- imperialism are probably more problematic son’s intervention in Mexico observed that a today than when they were first unveiled. great part of the Latin American public was Now, as then, they encourage false and un- “hopelessly ignorant while those of high in- realistic expectations about the benefits of telligence, often of pure Spanish blood and spreading democracy abroad and the ca- free from that racial mixture which has been pacity of the United States to develop so prolific, remain aloof from politics.”15 48 WORLD POLICY JOURNAL • SPRING 2005 Finally, there was Wilson’s conviction shore up European support for the war in that America was the bearer of the moral Iraq, Bush reiterated the theme: “Democra- task of democratizing the world. He be- cy and the hope and progress it brings are lieved that “as the definite example of the alternative to instability and to hatred democracy, the United States had a special and terror. Lasting peace is gained as justice obligation to extend its benefits and to in- and democracy advance.” struct backward peoples in its uses.”16 This Like Wilson, Bush alludes to the univer- was squarely within the tradition that it was sal appeal of democracy, especially in con- America’s “manifest destiny” to create “an nection to the Middle East which, like Latin exemplary state separate from the corrupt America in years past, is today regarded by and fallen world devoted to pushing the many as culturally unsuited to democracy. world along by means of regenerative inter- This view has its roots in the perceived in- vention.”17 Such a providential mandate was compatibility of Islam and democracy and is rooted in America’s unique history: its revo- underscored by the fact that not a single lutionary origins, its republican and federal Arab society can credibly be deemed demo- constitution, and its flourishing economy. In cratic.20 No less an authority than Prince- Wilson’s words: “We are friends of constitu- ton’s Bernard Lewis, the doyen of Middle tional government in America; we are more East studies, has stated that “Islam is in- than its friends, we are its champions. I am compatible with democracy as the funda- going to teach the South American re- mentalists themselves would be the first to publics to elect good men!”18 This mission say: they regard liberal democracy as a cor- required a hands-on approach, as Wilson rupt and corrupting form of government.”21 stressed in his struggle to redeem Mexico: To such skeptics Bush responds: “It is pre- sumptuous and insulting to suggest that a The duty of the United States was whole region of the world or the one fifth of not to act as a policeman who estab- humanity that is Muslim is somehow un- lished order and then left, but rather touched by the most basic aspirations of life.
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