Postwar Iraq (2003-2016): A Postcolonial Grassroots Approach to the Failure of "Democratic Nation-Building"

• Author / Creator

  Georgis, Mariam

• The “democratic nation-building” project implemented in Iraq after the American-led invasion and occupation in 2003 has failed by any measure of the concept. The country is unstable; the central government does not provide social services or security. The Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) destroyed Mosul, Iraq’s second largest city, endangering the very existence of Iraq as a sovereign state. Even worse, Iraqis not only seem to have little to no faith in their governing elites, but increasingly find them culpable in the violence, which has taken over their lives since the invasion of 2003. Iraqi national identity is fragmented along tribal, ethnic, and religious lines due to the sectarianization of the state, which began under the occupation. Finally, the violence has resulted in a refugee crisis but also drastically changed the demographics of Iraq, homogenizing neighbourhoods that were once diverse. This reality on the ground facilitates the question that underlines this study: why has the “democratic nation-building” project in Iraq failed since the US-led regime change in 2003 until 2016? Much of the conventional literature on post-invasion Iraq has focused on the twin concepts of “democratization” and “nation-building.” Specifically, this literature sought solutions for the problem of re-building Iraq – as opposed to the problem of the invasion and occupation – and largely focused on endogenous factors such as power-sharing, consociational democracy, “ethnically divided societies,” and “sectarianism.” In contrast, this dissertation identifies and seeks to address two underdeveloped elements in the literature; first, analyses of post-2003 Iraq have broadly focused on the problem of sectarianism as an impediment to the democratization of Iraq, which implies that Iraqis are inherently unable to live together in one state. This literature has largely, aside from some critical voices, ignored the role played by the invasion, occupation, international and regional politics. Second, these studies on nation-building have predominantly focused on unrepresentative elites and a top-down approach to democratization. This is problematic because there has not been enough attention paid to Iraqi voices and their visions of democracy. There is also not much attention paid to the fact that US nation-building efforts in 2003, much like their British predecessors following the First World War, have largely excluded representative Iraqis from forging their own political future. Subsequently, this research uses critical postcolonial/decolonial, “history from below,” and subaltern approaches. It does so, in part, to demonstrate a reciprocal and dialectical relationship between international and domestic politics in Iraq by problematizing the invasion and occupation. This is achieved through using critical discourse analysis to challenge the top-down, elite-driven model of “democratic” nation-building imposed on post-2003 Iraq. In addition, this research seeks to explore the potential for democratization “from below” by examining Iraqi articulations of the state. To that end, I accessed the Hizb al-Ba’th al- ‘Arabi al-Ishtiraki (Ba’ath Party of Iraq) Collection at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University. I also conducted nine semi-structured interviews with Iraqis experts and civil society practitioners in March and April of 2016. These research participants were selected due to their expertise in democratization, Iraq and their direct or indirect involvement with the state-building project in post-2003 Iraq. In addition, I consciously used the work of critical Iraqi scholars to discuss post-2003 Iraq, especially with regards to the violence, the occupation and its legacies and sectarianism to provide a counter-story to the conventional narrative on post-2003 Iraq. Together, this data not only strongly challenges the dominant narrative on post-2003 Iraq but also offers a more nuanced and comprehensive understanding of Iraqi society, sectarian relations, and politics. The major contribution of this research is the inclusion of Iraqi voices and primary materials to understand what went wrong in post-2003 Iraq. One of the biggest lessons Iraq teaches us is the limitations of a top-down, unrepresentative model of democratization imposed through a foreign invasion and occupation. This affirms the importance of research that examines the potential for a bottom-up, grassroots model of democratization.

• Subjects / Keywords

  • Postcolonialism
  • Iraq
  • History from below
  • nation-building
  • international relations of the middle east
  • ISIS

• Graduation date

  Fall 2017

• Type of Item

  Thesis

• Degree

  Doctor of Philosophy

• DOI

  https://doi.org/10.7939/R3BR8MZ2J

• License

  This thesis is made available by the University of Alberta Libraries with permission of the copyright owner solely for non-commercial purposes. This thesis, or any portion thereof, may not otherwise be copied or reproduced without the written consent of the copyright owner, except to the extent permitted by Canadian copyright law.