On April 26, Pakistan's Supreme Court took the unprecedented step of convicting Pakistan's Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani of contempt of court. While the prime minister avoided a jail sentence, the conviction could force him from the premiership, has ramifications on Pakistan's internal political dynamics and could distract from the reconciliation process currently underway with the United States.

No Jail Time, but a Time Out

Prime Minister Gilani was in the dock on charges of contempt for repeatedly refusing to write to Swiss authorities to reopen old corruption cases against Asif Ali Zardari, the sitting President and co-chairman, along with Gilani, of the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP). The contempt charges could have landed Gilani in jail for six months but the court chose instead to sentence him to symbolic detention in the courtroom until the judges left the chamber, a sentence lasting no more than a minute. The verdict served as a final flourish to the high drama that had surrounded the judicial proceedings ever since the court first summoned Gilani on January 19.

What remains unclear is whether the ruling is a victory for Gilani and the PPP or an albatross around their neck that will bring them down in the next election. Although Gilani is not serving a jail sentence, he is now a convicted felon and the first sitting prime minister in Pakistan's history to be convicted of contempt of court. The conviction might cost Gilani his seat in parliament and, by extension, the premiership, since Pakistan's constitution forbids anyone with a criminal conviction from serving as a parliamentarian. Indeed, the court's justices, while reading their verdict, made specific reference to this fact, indicating that they hoped to see exactly that clause invoked in order to sack Gilani. The leaders of major opposition parties called on Gilani to resign after the conviction, saying he had lost all "moral authority." Imran Khan, the leader of the Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaaf, threatened to start a massive civil disobedience movement if Gilani did not step down. Analysts further questioned whether the PPP's coalition partners would stick with the PPP and a convict prime minister "enmeshed in controversy." Opposition parties are sure to use the conviction as a campaign slogan against the PPP in the upcoming election to be held sometime within the next ten months.

The Long Road to Joblessness

The PPP has rallied strongly around the prime minister since his conviction and has vowed to both fight the ruling and oppose his ouster. The process by which Gilani could be forced from office is long, tortuous, and could be challenged and delayed at every step. Gilani could keep his post for months.

Gilani and the PPP have publicly stated their intention to appeal the ruling. Only once the appeal is dismissed can petitions be brought in parliament for Gilani to be disqualified to hold a seat in the National Assembly, Pakistan's lower house (and even the dismissed appeal can be filed for "further review," dragging the process out even longer). Authority over the proceedings rests with the Speaker of the House, Fahmida Mirza, who is herself a PPP stalwart and would have the ability to delay if not derail the process. Even if a petition were to successfully get through the National Assembly, final authority rests with the Election Commission of Pakistan. Any decision taken by the commission to unseat Gilani would be subject to challenge and appeal as well. The PPP holds enough seats in parliament to be able to pick the next prime minister, meaning little would change politically even if Gilani was dismissed.

The PPP's Response

The PPP is fully aware of these facts and is openly pursuing a strategy to prolong any final decision for as long as possible or until the prime minister's term in office lapses (Gilani is already the longest serving premier in Pakistan's history) and any ruling becomes irrelevant. It is also clear that the PPP plans to use the conviction as part of its own rallying cry come the next elections. The PPP will likely try to present Gilani as a political martyr and the contempt decision as the witch-hunt of an activist court acting on the direction of an interventionist military with a historical agenda against the party. While opposition parties will be trying to paint Gilani as a criminal, it remains unclear if contempt of court is a crime that could get the blood of the masses boiling, given that they have repeatedly and knowingly elected leaders whom they generally believed to be guilty of much more visible criminality such as corruption and graft-the PPP and Nawaz Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz have, for example, made repeated returns to power at the ballot box despite having their tenures cut short on grounds of rampant corruption.

In the end, while not clear-cut, the verdict can be considered a victory of sorts for the PPP. In what had become a charged, almost personal battle of wills between the government and the judiciary, the judiciary seems to have blinked first. Gilani is still the prime minister for the time being and, more importantly for the PPP, Zardari is still the president. Zardari was the ultimate prize throughout the whole proceeding; putting Gilani in the dock was the court's way of attempting to force the government to open corruption proceedings against Zardari. The government consistently refused judicial pressure on the grounds that Zardari has presidential immunity from prosecution; the court-initiated procedure for sacking the prime minister could take months; and a new prime minister will likely be from the PPP as well. For better or worse, Zardari remains inviolate and looks to remain so until the next elections.

Wider Implications

The ruling relieves much of the pressure from the government and lessens fears of an irreparable institutional clash between the judiciary and executive. What it does do, however, is throw the matter out of the courts and back into the highly charged political arena in an election year; all parties are likely to latch onto and spin the issue in their favor during campaign time.

Alongside the political drama, Pakistan is currently engaged in a complicated and long-drawn out reconciliation process with the United States. Pakistan is renegotiating its entire terms of engagement with the U.S. and is in the vital stages of finalizing agreements over the reopening of NATO supply routes to Afghanistan, resumption of reimbursements for counter-terrorism assistance and other cooperation issues. While the verdict provides for cast continuity, the internal political wrangling prompted by the court ruling could distract the government from focusing its attention on these key issues. The government is also less likely to support controversial or unpopular requests from the U.S. in parliament, since it will want to limit the number of issues on which opposition parties can vilify it and score political points against it in front of a broadly anti-American electorate. There is also the question of whether, given the now questionable legality of Gilani's status as prime minister, any decisions signed by him following the conviction could be dredged up later as illegal and therefore void.

While the ruling is a positive development for Pakistan in terms of furthering the democratic process and strengthening a historically weak judiciary in Pakistan, it does not bring closure to the issue of Gilani's status or to Zardari's corruption charges. It complicates the political debate in Pakistan in an election year, and possibly delays and complicates finalization of agreements with the U.S. on key bilateral issues. Where the dust settles remains to be seen, but what is clear is that the ruling muddies far more issues than it clarifies.

Reza Nasim Jan is the Pakistan team lead at the American Enterprise Institute's Critical Threats Project.

As Sunday's spectacular attack in Kabul showed, the war in Afghanistan may be winding down in Washington, but it is heating up on the ground with spring's arrival.

And in Foggy Bottom and, to a lesser degree, on Capitol Hill, a battle is on for American hearts and minds even as calls for immediate withdrawal grow louder.  The objective: to keep Afghan women from falling off the political agenda while Washington and its NATO allies hunt desperately for a diplomatic solution to America's longest-ever war.  As the NATO summit in Chicago approaches - and women to date still have no formal role - that fight gets more urgent.

"Any peace that is attempted to be made by excluding more than half the population is no peace at all," said Sec. of State Hillary Clinton at a luncheon for the U.S.-Afghan Women's Council, an organization started under President George W. Bush to support programs benefiting Afghan women. "We will continue to stand with and work closely with Afghan women. And we will be working closely with the international community as well, because we all need to be vigilant and disciplined in our support and in our refusal to accept the erosion of women's rights and freedoms."

Former First Lady Laura Bush echoed the Secretary's comments.

"The failure to protect women's rights and to ensure their security could undermine the significant gains Afghan women have achieved," said Mrs. Bush.  "No one wants to see Afghanistan's progress reversed or its people returned to the perilous circumstances that marked the Taliban's rule."

Clinton, Bush and their allies face an uphill fight.  Today a record-high 69 percent of Americans say the war in Afghanistan has not been worth fighting. And the recent alleged killing of unarmed Afghan civilians by an American soldier has cemented public desire to call an end to the war that began just after the attacks of September 11.

President Obama did not once mention Afghan women in his 2009 speech at West Point, and members of his administration have been quoted as likening the country's women to "pet rocks."

It wasn't always this way. In 2001, Washington leaders regularly invoked the plight of women, who had just endured years of Taliban rule that barred them from school and work.  Afghan women became something of a cause célèbre worldwide, and the return of women to public life was seen as among the most positive byproducts of the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan. Then-First Lady Laura Bush spoke out in support of Afghan women during a weekly presidential radio broadcast in 2001, and made high-profile visits to women's projects while visiting the country. 

A decade later, members of Mrs. Bush's team acknowledge the challenge they face convincing the American public that supporting Afghan women on the way out of the country matters.

"It is hard for people to see the endgame and that is what I think contributes to the frustration," says Mrs. Bush's former chief of staff, Anita McBride. "This is not high on the radar screen because it is challenging and the solution seems so far away."

Those working closely with Sec. Clinton acknowledge the battle to keep women front and center is not easy.  But they say they see an increased acknowledgment throughout the State Department and in the president's recent executive order on U.N. Resolution 1325 that women matter when it comes to peace. 

"While clearly there is a strong, strong desire for the end of this (war), the big concern is the state of the women -- what happens to Afghan women and that they not somehow be forgotten," says Ambassador-at-large for Global Women's Issues Melanne Verveer. "There is a recognition that for the genuine end of conflict and for the ability to reconcile with whomever it is possible to reconcile with, that the women have to be a part of that."

Those who have spoken out about the need to end the war swiftly say they agree.

"I came away strongly feeling that as we do draw down there that we have to retain a focus on these gains and whatever is necessary diplomatically or through our aid, that we can't neglect women," says Rep. Niki Tsongas of a recent trip to Afghanistan. "You have to publicly continue to raise the issue. That is the very least what we can continue to do, to publicly raise the issue and the importance of just trying to protect and secure those gains."

Tsongas did just that at a recent House Armed Services Committee hearing with Gen. John Allen.  

"The question is, as we draw down from Afghanistan over the next several years, what can we do to make sure that we don't lose the hard-fought gains for the rights of Afghan women, 50 percent of the population? And what, if any, leverage will we have as we go through this process and after our withdrawal is complete?" she asked.

But is more than rhetorical support from those who support Afghan women's progress even possible?

"It is difficult, because I think that even for those who care very deeply about the status of Afghan women there is a little bit of schizophrenia, because I think some of us recognize that whatever the future is for Afghan women, the kind of military footprint that we have in Afghanistan can't go on another decade," says Rep. Donna Edwards, who co-chairs the Afghan Women's Task Force in Congress. "I believe that it is possible for us to construct a strategy where we make those kinds of civilian investments that will enable investments where it is possible to support women entrepreneurs, to support women in education, to support women as parliamentarians, I think it is possible to do that and I don't think we have too many more options left."

So what do the women at the center of all the discussion think of all the discussion of their future? Most say they simply want to be part of the conversation about their own country, particularly as they work to elbow their way into the discussions in Chicago next month.   And they want to know what, exactly, leaders of the international community means when they say to women that "we will not abandon you," as Sec. Clinton has repeatedly.

"We women are no more the priority for the world, that is true," says Samira Hamidi of the Afghan Women's Network.  "The international community is in a rush for withdrawal, but at the same time they keep repeating and pushing the theme that we will remain with you."

Hamidi says women want clarity on what, exactly, those assurances mean. Says Hamidi, "in ten years whatever has happened for women is because of the struggle and participation of women.  We are still fighting for our rights, for our inclusion, to be part of decisions and to be decision makers."

What Hamidi and other women leaders say they seek are assurances that any Taliban negotiations will keep in tact the Afghan constitution of the past decade, with its guarantee of equal opportunities, including the right to work and go to school, as well as a set-aside of a quarter of parliamentary seats for women.  More than two million Afghan girls are now in school, with thousands in university, and civil society leaders want them to stay there.  Women also want to be at the table, not outside the room, in any diplomatic discussions that will decide their country's future shape.   That starts with Chicago next month.

Women say they are not asking for favors, but to be part of their own societies.  They can speak up for themselves, and they are, but they could use the backing of big-dollar international donors who will be funding their government's security forces for years to come.  

"The worrying part for me in 2014 is not that the international community is leaving -- troops are leaving, they have to leave this is a reality.  We can't expect them to stay in Afghanistan for years and years, but for me what is important is how powerful our own security forces will be in 2014, how responsive they will be to women's needs.  Those are things that the international community can really make their funding conditional on."

Those who support Afghan women say that if the world wants to see any progress achieved in Afghanistan continue, it will support civil society leaders like Hamidi - between now and 2014, and beyond.

"Increasingly, across the board, people get the fact that this is pragmatic, that you can't get from here to there on the items all of us want to see [in Afghanistan] without women," Verveer says.   "Is it a guarantee? Well, we can't write the future.  None of us knows exactly what is going to happen.  We are dealing with a hypothetical and the best we can all do is to make sure that everything is in place as best as it can be as this continues to go forward."

Gayle Tzemach Lemmon is a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and the author of The Dressmaker of Khair Khana.

In 2014, Afghanistan is scheduled to hold its third presidential election since 2004, just 18 months after the next U.S. presidential inauguration, and at the height of the withdrawal of the international military presence. Then, just a year later, they are supposed to hold a legislative election in 2015.  There is little prospect that either election will be adequately funded or competently administered. But even if, by some miracle, they come off without a hitch, they will only serve to entrench the corrupt, over-centralized administration in Kabul, and do little to improve governance in the localities. Holding elections in Afghanistan in the midst of its long-running political crisis is a lose-lose situation.

The United States and United Nations should work with the Afghans instead to push for a grand political bargain that could actually make a difference in the counterinsurgency against the Taliban: a new Loya Jirga to amend the constitution, devolve power, adjust the electoral calendar, change the voting system, and invite the Taliban to form a political party. Neither Kabul nor the international community stands to gain from holding another round of elections, but a new political bargain can break the paralysis in Kabul and break the logjam in talks with the Taliban.

I.                    Devolve Power

Afghanistan's slow-burning political crisis began in 2003, when a Loya Jirga convened in Kabul in December to ratify a new constitution. The new document was modeled closely on the 1964 constitution, itself following closely in the footsteps of constitutions in 1923 and the 1890s. That a new democratic constitution was modeled on the older constitutional monarchy is telling:  the new system simply replaced the hereditary Afghan monarch with an elected President and retained on paper many of the centralized powers that the Afghan kings had claimed (though not always exercised) since the late 19^th Century. The new constitution was unanimously ratified by acclamation in January 2004.

The United States and the U.N. are often blamed for creating or forcing a centralized system onto the Afghans at the Bonn Conference in 2001. The accusation is wrong - the centralized system came from the Afghans themselves, stemming from the century-old practice of Afghan rulers, and readily accepted by the Loya Jirga. But the point remains true that Afghanistan has one of the most highly centralized systems of government in the world. Provincial governments are not independent governments, like U.S. states, but implementing agencies of Kabul. Provincial councils are advisory, not legislative, bodies. Provincial governors and district chiefs are appointed by the president, not elected by the people.  Provincial and district police chiefs are also appointed by the president, not by governors. That makes the President personally responsible for hiring and firing every governor and police chief in 34 provinces and nearly 400 districts nation-wide.

The centralization is almost completely unsuitable to Afghanistan's culture, economy, and society.  According to Thomas Barfield's magisterial book, Afghanistan:  A Political and Cultural History (arguably the most intelligent thing written on Afghanistan in a decade), the Afghan government has always claimed centralized powers, but has been most successful when it exercises those powers sparingly, or in cooperation with local elites like tribal elders and landowners.  Efforts to use centralized government to compel social change tended to provoke resistance, as it did under the reign of the modernizing king Amanullah Khan (1919-1929), who was overthrown by a coalition of rural tribes and conservative mullahs; the communizing efforts of the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan (1978-1989); and the Islamizing efforts to the Taliban (1994-2001), the two most recent of which sparked civil war. 

Despite the potential lessons of that history, the ten-year reign of Hamid Karzai looks more like Amanullah in his efforts to centralize power and push social reform, than that of Zahir Shah (1933-73), who took a more relaxed approach to the provinces and whose rule was marked by relative stability.  Devolving power, for example by making governors elected and giving them the power of appointments in their province, giving provincial councils legislative power, and enabling provinces to levy their own taxes would bring the formal government into closer alignment with the informal practices that worked in the past.

II.                 Adjust the electoral calendar 

Afghanistan's political dysfunction gained a new complication in 2004 when the nascent Afghan government and the U.N. Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) first decided to separate presidential and legislative elections. They were supposed to be held simultaneously under the original Bonn Agreement, but the latter were delayed a year because of logistical difficulties.  That immediately saddled Afghanistan with the burden of hosting not one, but two expensive national elections every five years. The 2004 election and voter registration drive cost in the neighborhood of $200 million; the decision to separate the elections simply doubled the cost of Afghan democracy and delayed the day Afghanistan could pay for its own government. 

The first round of split elections in 2004 and 2005 were relatively successful: Afghans turned out to vote in large numbers and the results were widely accepted. The success masked a deeper problem, however:  the elections were not held by the Afghan government. The international community, primarily the United States, paid the entire cost of the elections. And the U.N. administered the elections through the Joint Electoral Management Body (JEMB), a hybrid U.N.-Afghan organization in which the international community could ensure the elections did not fail.

The weaknesses were exposed by the second round of elections in 2009 and 2010, which the U.N. turned over to the Afghan government to administer.  The elections were notoriously marred by logistical problems, fraud, and low turnout. Although the Afghan Electoral Complaints Commission (ECC) took the accusations of fraud seriously, launched a credible investigation, and eventually disqualified over 1 million votes (facts almost always overlooked by critics of the Afghan government) it is nonetheless true that that the elections were a disaster for the legitimacy of the Afghan government and the Karzai administration.  The international community's and the Afghan people's disenchantment with Karzai accelerated dramatically after 2009.

III.               Change the voting system

Afghanistan's political crisis is not simply a matter of over-centralization, expensive elections, and fraud. It also stems from the absence of the one institution that is essential for the basic functioning of any democracy: political parties. As any political scientist will argue, political parties are essential for aggregating and articulating voters' grievances and demands, translating them into a political agenda, mediating political participation, moderating extremism, and linking citizens to their government.  Without political parties, democracy cannot thrive.

Political parties exist in Afghanistan, technically.  But they play no role in the political system, thanks to the (frankly) bizarre voting system that President Karzai settled on in the Electoral Law in May 2004. The system, called the single non-transferable vote (SNTV), is used almost nowhere else in the world.  Just three other states (Jordan, Indonesia, and Thailand) use versions of it for part or all of their legislative elections. The reason is that it is blatantly undemocratic and hostile to political parties.

In a normal parliamentary system, seats are allocated to parties in proportion to their share of the vote: if a party wins 35 percent of the vote, it is awarded 35 percent of seats.  In the SNTV system, by contrast, the individual who wins the most votes in a given constituency is awarded the first seat; the candidate with the second-highest vote tally is awarded the next seat, and so on down the line until all seats are awarded. Regardless of how many votes the candidate wins, he is awarded one seat. In theory, the top candidate could win 90 percent of the vote and win one seat, while the fifth-place candidate might win two percent of the vote, and also win one seat. 

The result is obviously undemocratic, but it also results in a highly fractured legislature composed of a few extremely popular, well-known (or feared) candidates with an independent political power base - the first-place finishers in each province - and scores of unknown, often extremist candidates who have no connections or loyalties to established political groupings.  Political parties have no entry point into this system, and so play almost no role in Afghan political life. Without parties, there is nothing to structure debate or formulate competing agendas, and the result is a fragmented, disorganized branch. Americans have grown jaded about the U.S. Congress, but it is a well-oiled machine compared to the Afghan legislature.

IV.               Invite the Taliban to form a political party

Counterinsurgency is competitive state-building. The counterinsurgent must build a government that is more attractive to the people than what the insurgents offer. Kabul will not win a counterinsurgency against the Taliban with a government that is distant, over-centralized, disconnected from the population, and in which the only opportunities for participation are periodic elections that are too expensive to succeed and marred by fraud.

But most importantly, Kabul will not end the war and stabilize Afghanistan until the insurgents and the constituency they represent believe they have an opportunity to participate in Afghanistan's political life. Afghanistan needs a Taliban political party.

The Taliban were the only faction not represented at the original Bonn Conference.  That is their fault: they were still actively fighting a shooting war against the Northern Alliance up until the day after the conference closed, and they almost certainly would not have accepted an invitation to participate if one had been extended. Regardless, the Taliban do have a constituency, and represent a view of Afghan political life that a small minority of Deobandi Pashtuns still find compelling. Their exclusion from Afghan life feeds resentment, and gives the insurgents a potent narrative with which to sell their rebellion. Karzai knows that, which is why he has consistently and aggressively sought to reach out to the Taliban ever since his 2004 inauguration. 

The Taliban as a whole are not going to surrender, lay down their arms, and peacefully convert into a political party.  The leaders, if no one else, are true believers in their brutal theocratic system, in which elections and compromise have no place. But the average Taliban foot soldier is probably more flexible in his commitments, so long as he believes he is secure and respected.  Holding talks with the Taliban and creating a way for them to participate in Afghan political life will not end the insurgency, but it can weaken the movement, sow disarray in their ranks, incentivize defections, and bolster Kabul's legitimacy. Reconciliation with some Taliban could be a potent weapon in the counterinsurgency campaign.

V.                 Convene a Loya Jirga

Each of these problems - centralization, the disjointed electoral calendar, the wonky voting system and weak political parties, the exclusion of the Taliban - exacerbates the others.  The weakness of parties make it hard for an authentic local voice to be heard in Kabul, while the over-centralization gives Kabul little incentive to seek such a voice out. The electoral calendar has driven the cost of elections up, while fraud and corruption is making the international community ever more skeptical about providing the money necessary to keep the democratic charade going. The exclusion of the Taliban fuels the insurgency, but Kabul's incompetence and political paralysis cripple its own counterinsurgency efforts, and weakens the will of its international backers. Under these circumstances, new elections in 2014 and 2015 offer nothing good for Afghanistan or the international community.

Afghanistan has a mechanism for dealing with the "supreme interests of the country":  the Loya Jirga. The Loya Jirga, a grand council of elders, is the supreme authority in Afghanistan, higher than any branch of government and the constitution itself. It is perfectly legal and constitutional:  Chapter Six of the Afghan Constitution describes the Jirga and its powers.  It is also a relatively democratic gathering, consisting of the National Assembly and chairmen of provincial and district councils, almost all of whom are elected (only one-third of the upper house of the Assembly are appointed by the President). The Afghans held an Emergency Loya Jirga in 2002 to ratify the Bonn Agreement, and a Constitutional Loya Jirga in 2003-4 to ratify the new constitution. Karzai has called "mini" loya jirgas in the years since to ratify specific decisions or agreements, including the U.S.-Afghan Strategic Partnership in 2005.

Many of the political changes needed would not even require constitutional amendments. Chapter Eight of the Afghan Constitution actually mandates that the government "delegate certain authorities to local administration units for the purpose of expediting and promoting economic, social, and cultural affairs, and increasing the participation of people in the development of the nation." The President's power to appoint governors and police chiefs is nowhere mentioned in the constitution.  The voting system was created by statute, not by the Constitution. Changing the Afghan political system to be more decentralized, more democratic, and more responsive to the people could probably be accomplished even without the two-thirds vote of a Jirga required for constitutional amendments.

But the biggest potential benefit of the Jirga would be the inclusion of Taliban representatives.  The Jirga could itself be an important medium in the ongoing efforts to hold talks with the insurgency. Kabul would have to be flexible about the Jirga's composition - the Constitution does not exactly have a clause about representatives from an active rebellion sitting in on a Jirga. But there are ways to skirt this, for example by allowing Taliban "observers" to attend without voting rights or, even better, through an understanding that district council representatives from southern provinces would be speaking for the Taliban. Regardless of the modality, the presence of Taliban spokesmen or their proxies would be an important symbolic step in the effort to incorporate willing Taliban into Afghan political life, catalyze talks with the insurgents, prompt defections, split the insurgency, and edge closer to peace.

A Loya Jirga in 2014 would be a more cost-effective use of international money.  More elections at this point will accomplish little to stabilize Afghanistan or bolster Kabul's legitimacy.  A Jirga, by contrast, has a greater chance of being seen as legitimate and accomplishing something worthwhile. An election will only pick the next person to head the corrupt and incompetent administration in Kabul. A Jirga, by contrast, would be empowered to tackle the full range of problems that plague Afghanistan's political system.  Elections, held just as the international military presence is winding down, would be a dangerous nation-wide event for which security would be a major challenge. A Jirga, by contrast, would be a smaller, easier affair to secure.

Of course, a Jirga would be unwieldy and unpredictable. The international community would not be able to control it. Even with the substantial aid international donors continue to give Afghanistan, the international community has much less leverage over the course of events in Afghanistan than it did in 2001-2. But that is probably a good thing. The heavy international hand guiding events in Afghanistan ten years ago was perhaps necessary, but it was also abnormal. A new Jirga, this time under unquestioned Afghan leadership, could be the step needed to restart normal Afghan political life.

Dr. Paul D. Miller is an Assistant Professor of International Security Studies at the National Defense University's College of International Security Affairs. The views expressed here are his own, and do not reflect those of the U.S. government.

Whipsawed by a long-drawn U.S.-led military operation and a decade of erratic international economic assistance, Afghanistan is in shambles.  With economic development always considered secondary to security concerns, little has been done in the past decade to establish a sustainable Afghan economy. While the international community has tried to generate a steady flow of aid, the Afghan government is still unable to cater to the population's basic needs. Moreover, the little economy we have seen evolve in Afghanistan since 2001 is predominantly based on the international security presence. The bulk of Afghanistan's gross domestic product (GDP) stems from international aid, and the impending 2014 deadline for the withdrawal of international combat troops will be accompanied by a parallel reduction in aid money. Thus, as the tide of war recedes, a large chunk of the economy will also disappear, posing an increasing threat to stability. The country's current economic trajectory beyond 2014 is fraught with corruption and uncertainty.  However, despite the dire situation, Afghanistan's economic transition has received only minor policy attention, with the focus remaining on the ongoing security transition. Thus the question remains: How will Afghanistan sustain its economy beyond 2014?

The decrease in foreign assistance is like to cause today's economic bubble to burst, potentially plunging the country into an economic recession. And if the security environment further deteriorates, the country could face full economic collapse.  A financing gap of 25 percent of GDP by 2022 due to increased military and non-military spending by the Afghan government further puts Afghanistan's economic stability at risk. While the international donor community can help to prevent a total collapse of the economy by decreasing aid gradually, the key to a prosperous Afghanistan is to invest in the long-term economic advantages the country has to offer.

One such advantage may lie in Afghanistan's geographic location.  The New Silk Road strategy, often promoted by the United States, aims at linking Afghanistan with its South and Central Asian neighbors, transforming the country into a nucleus for regional trade. Focus should also be placed on rebuilding the oil and gas pipeline running from Turkmenistan through Afghanistan and on to Pakistan and India.  If done right, these initiatives might enable Afghanistan to attract increased foreign investment, connect the country to foreign markets, and promote growth, gradually reducing its dependence on foreign aid. However, the key to such a scenario lies in Afghanistan's relations with regional players, in particular Pakistan. Given its location, Pakistan is expected to serve as the main transit route for Afghan exports and access to the port cities of Gwadar and Karachi will remain crucial to Afghanistan's development. However, a volatile relationship with its eastern neighbor could mean a precarious dependency for Afghanistan.

Another potential economic trigger may be found in Afghanistan's untapped mineral reserves, ostensibly valued in the trillions of dollars. Based on cautiously optimistic assumptions by the World Bank, the iron ore project at Hajigak and copper mine at Aynak could deliver $2 to $3 billion to the extractive industry, with each deposit potentially generating over half a billion dollars in government revenue in just a few years. The mining industry may appear at first glance to be a potential panacea for the Afghan economy, but it will take decades before the country can reap the benefits of such a project. The Afghan mineral reserves require significant investments in infrastructure, and more importantly, effective and accountable governance that can efficiently and transparently manage revenues. Furthermore, in 2010, of the total $17 billion government expenditure, only $1.9 billion of the spending were drawn from Afghanistan's own sources of revenue; the rest: foreign assistance. Hence, besides the projected tax revenues and some foreign aid, even if mineral resources did manage to generate the estimated revenue, the Afghan budget would still face an annual deficit of $7 billion.

Rebuilding after more than a decade of conflict must also involve encouraging growth in Afghanistan's nascent private sector, a sector that has been stifled to some degree by the international donor presence. In a "donor drunk" economy, there are a large number of foreign, private NGOs, which dominate the private sector and make entry into it difficult for Afghan organizations. Although some of these private entities are effective development organizations at the grassroots level, many carry a negative perception among the Afghan people, who see the ubiquitous "briefcase NGOs" as money-making mechanisms for the people involved. Meanwhile, the influx of foreign money and employers has also artificially inflated labor costs for low-skilled workers over the past years, and has made Afghanistan an attractive venue for external laborers from neighboring countries such as Pakistan. However, as the flow of aid dwindles, those who have been paid hefty salaries over much of the past decade for low-skilled work for foreign entities may now prove more affordable to Afghan businesses, and will also open up more jobs for Afghan workers. While the initial transition phase from a military focused economy to a regular one will be difficult, it will leave room for a more long-term, sustainable economy to develop.

Regardless of Afghanistan's many potential sources of revenue, any real progress will be limited without the long-term support of the international community. While the West's future commitment to Afghanistan is vague at best, the increasing number of strategic partnerships with key allies signals a willingness by certain powers to remain involved in shaping Afghanistan's future beyond 2014. In the past week, Afghanistan has signed strategic partnership agreements with key European allies such as the UK, France, and Italy that ensure an enduring commitment and cooperation with Afghanistan in key areas, including economy, security, and governance. While only time will tell if the West really will stay committed to Afghanistan, this week's agreements are at least a step in the right direction.

Similarly, any future foreign aid funneled by the West to the Afghan government is effectively futile without properly addressing the raging corruption and lack of transparency and accountability in public finances. As the world's second most corrupt nation, any failure by the West and the Afghan government in tackling this menace in the so-called "transformation decade" would mean repeating and wasting yet another inefficient ten years of international assistance.

Today, as U.S. and NATO troops prepare to assume a lighter military presence, many Afghans fear a serious economic downturn when foreign aid and spending recede, leaving Afghanistan with little or nothing to fall back on. It is still uncertain if and how the Afghan government will function after 2014 without an open-ended $8 to $10 billion yearly commitment from the United States and Europe. However, responsibility for a stable and secure Afghanistan ultimately rests with the Afghans themselves, and there is still a sense of optimism among the Afghan people about the future of their country. The Afghan government, for its part, must foster transparency and accountability in public finances drawn from foreign aid, and work to cut leaks that enable corruption. If these reforms and the myriad of other challenges go unaddressed, the hard work and accomplishments of the past decade could easily unravel and ultimately lead to an even more troubled Afghanistan than we have seen in the past ten years.

Javid Ahmad, a native of Kabul, is Program Coordinator with the Asia Program of the German Marshall Fund of the United States in Washington, DC. Louise Langeby is a Program Associate with the German Marshall Fund of the United States in Brussels. The views reflected here are their own.

Cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan is batting to strike out two major "conventional" political parties -- the leftist Pakistan People's Party and the conservative Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz -- simultaneously. He talks about eradicating corruption, handling the grievances of the Baloch and the tribal areas, "friendliness" as the ultimate foreign policy, and his plans to combat four of Pakistan's biggest "emergencies" in 90 days, should his party, Tehreek-e Insaf, win Pakistan's general elections planned for 2013.

Massive public turnout at his rallies -- what he calls a "tsunami" of support -- has inspired self-doubt among other politicians who claim to have captured the hearts of Pakistani people. But Khan's critics are unforgiving; some call his approach radical, and others believe he is backed by the establishment, although Khan dismisses such claims. Kiran Nazish talked with Khan about his meteoric rise and his plans to achieve what he calls "the New Pakistan."

Kiran Nazish: You have been talking a lot about leading a civil disobedience movement, but it hasn't happened yet. Will it happen at all?

Imran Khan: We have thought many times [that we might] go for it, but we have been reluctant to initiate because we do not want to exaggerate the chaos that has already shaken Pakistan. There was a point when we used to discuss amongst ourselves, that we should really commence the movement, but we refrained because we knew that it would only worsen the situation for the common man. However, if we do see the state of governance in the current regime getting out of hand, we would have no other choice but to go for it.

If the current government does anything unconstitutional, my party will boycott that and protest that. I am and will stand against anybody who goes against the judiciary or does not respect the judiciary. Anyone includes everyone. These few thieves [the politicians] have looted billions from the poor nation, and to save their own wealth they are now after the only sovereign institution [the Supreme Court].

KN: You keep calling the current government corrupt, making aggressive statements regarding the government-Supreme Court rift. But this government got elected democratically. Isn't that like saying you are against the people's choice?

IK: If you read Condoleezza Rice's books, she has exhaustively explained how the U.S. worked with Benazir Bhutto and General [Pervez] Musharraf to form their own type of puppet government. Now this government is responsible for the deaths of thousands of civilians and soldiers who have been killed in [the war on terror].

With the extent of corruption that this government has been indulging in, it was inevitable that they had this clash with the Supreme Court. The day the Supreme Court had called the NRO [National Reconciliation Ordinance] government unconstitutional, it was decided right then that this government couldn't have survived a good relation with [the Supreme Court]. Sadly, we have had no genuine opposition in this country. [There might have been] an opposition within parliamentary members who could have stood up and questioned the government, but that did not happen. The government did not resign, and everyone else was busy trying to save democracy -- while of course the government was trying to save their corruption.

The Supreme Court of any state [is the institution that should have] the highest reliance and authority. Such an institution in a democratic state has no [ground for] military intervention and has the highest power to launch a control system for the corrupt actions, or a corrupt state. If and when any other democratic institution fails to perform, the Supreme Court can control them and make them accountable. No one can challenge the Supreme Court. Our government, on the other hand, is a corrupt government. I reject calling it a democratic state, it having laid its foundations on the basis of a corrupt engagement called the NRO.

KN: So how do you plan to protect the Supreme Court?

IK: Now the Supreme Court is openly attacked and insulted, which I hope you agree is not a democratic act. Should we let the corrupt government spoil the first independent chief justice in the Supreme Court? I don't think so. We will decide in our party central executive committee meeting soon when we will draft a plan and later present it. This presentation will have guidelines on how to protect the system and the judiciary from an imposed failure.

KN: How do you think this idea of civil disobedience can save democracy?

IK: There is just one thing that I suggest, a singular solution, which is something the Supreme Court has also suggested. And that is: go to the people -- which means, we should have free and fair elections, and let the people decide their true, democratic leader.

KN: What would you say about the "Memogate" crisis?

IK: If at any point the government fears military takeover, it should act with maturity not impunity. A democratic government needs to go to the people, not to outsiders. This happened twice in our country. In 1999, according to [counterterrorism expert and former CIA analyst] Bruce Riedel, [former Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz] Sharif went to him and asked him to save him from the military. And now we have this memogate [with Adm. Mike Mullen and former Pakistani Ambassador to Washington Husain Haqqani].

A democratic government should never fear, and needs to take responsibility. I take responsibility! Whoever takes responsibility, it will be very difficult for them. When I take responsibility, I will need authority as well. If I don't get that authority, I will go back to the people. The people who elected me! I will never [put] a foreign agenda [ahead of] my own people. I will not go to the U.S. for help -- or anywhere else for that matter.

KN: Are you ready for the elections if they take place sooner?

IK: We are ready for elections anytime. Our entire party will be ready, whether the elections happen now or later. We have been talking about mid-term elections since the NRO cases came out in the open, and yet were dismissed in the Supreme Court by the government. But it seems that at that time the N-League [Nawaz Sharif's party] wanted to save the system. We have been ready, and now we think we should have early elections. We will reveal our action plan soon.

Whatever happens and whenever the elections take place, PTI [Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf] will sweep the elections. We can't be confident enough.

KN: You have been making too many promises. What would you do if you are unable to handle things, if and when you come into power?

IK: I am completely confident; I will not fail at anything. My party will not fail. I will change the entire system in 90 days. If the system is not corrected in 90 days, it will never be corrected at all.

I believe there is a proper way to handle every institution. The only way to run a government appropriately is when the institutions are strong and work under a system of accountability and in synchrony. We need to restore the institutions.

I have a well-thought-out plan to change the system in 90 days. When a country loses its ethical leadership, that is when its physical leadership takes over. This means if your democratic government fails, your army will take over. We need to ensure that point doesn't come. And I take that responsibility.

KN: What role do you want to give to the army? How much intervention will you allow?

IK: In a democratic government, the power is held by the state head. Every policy is supposed to be made by the government and not the army. Foreign policy is the job of the democratic government and not the army. Why is the army controlling the war on terror? I will never understand.

I am against military takeover or any sort of military intervention, to any extent at all, in any capacity at all. Pakistan needs democracy and public political participation without any sort or form of authoritative control.

It's the responsibility of the civilian government to take control of state matters, especially those which have to do with state's sovereignty. I don't think I will be so lousy that the army would have to make my decision[s].

KN: And how would your civil military policy balance out?

IK: No aid, proper taxation, and proper division of resources are my major strategies to balance out the whole system. We can't free the people until we give them what they want. We need to identify the needs of this country and focus on that. Why would the military intervene if the democratic government is operating in harmony and giving the people what they want? My goal is to bring that harmony. Everything else will fall into place on its own.

KN: What's your policy on the U.S.?

IK: Friendly! Look, we don't want to make any enemies. My nation and my people is my priority. I will do whatever is my people's priority. The war on terror was fought for dollars, and do you see what lesson we learn from it? The lesson is, to not fight the war for dollars. The lesson is, to not disadvantage your own people, to feed your government. We don't want dollars if they will overshadow our people's interest.

KN: What's your policy on Israel?

IK: Pakistan's founding father, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, wrote a letter to Harry S. Truman talking about the injustices done to the people. Every Pakistani stands by that letter. We stand by the one simple fact that Palestinians should be given their homeland. PTI is not against any people, we are with the people. We believe in human rights, and that is our ultimate stance.

KN: What's your policy on the India-Kashmir conflict?

IK: We will definitely try to work our way around our relationship with India. India is indeed our closest and most familiar neighbor. We would love to improve trade and other interactions.

The only problem with India is that there has to be a road map. Once we figure that out, we will know how to go about it too. We will try to work on the Kashmir issue with whatever mutuality allows us to. But it is very important to note that we cannot ignore Kashmir. Or else, if another Mumbai happens, we will be back to square one.

KN: How do you plan to deal with the militants or Jihadis?

IK: We have learned that proxy policies don't work. To keep militant groups is not the idea we should follow and is certainly not the strategy I support or will follow. In Karachi when the Supreme Court did the hearing, they found out the three major parties had hired militant groups to escalate their fights. We can't let such things happen. People get hurt.

We need to do a truth and reconciliation strategy in the tribal areas. Why should we keep fighting? Wars don't achieve anything. We are having a dialogue as we speak. Americans are having a dialogue, and we need to do this too. So far, since the dialogue has been initiated by the U.S. and ourselves, haven't you noticed how militancy and bombing has come down significantly?

KN: You have conducted dharnas (sit-in boycotts) against drone strikes, and protested against the government's act of carrying them out. But the U.S. and Pakistan governments say that they are efficient in targeting the Taliban.

IK: Drones can never be good. Like I said, war is never good for people. Give me one example of war that has reconciled a nation or brought peace. There is no possibility that drones can help these people. What kind of country or nation gives permission to another country to have drones attacks within their country. What kind of country takes money to kill their own wives and children? This is a corrupt government with greedy leadership, and drones for them is a mere barter for dollars and luxury. Therefore, it supports these drones. An honest government should think about the people. If this government had any honesty, it would have come up with alternative strategies.

KN: What's your vision for Pakistan?

IK: First, we need to understand what kind of country we want. Pakistan should be an Islamic Republic of Pakistan, which should follow the Objectives Resolution, something every political party of the country has endorsed, at all times: the ideology of the Quaid [Muhammad Ali Jinnah] -- who is my greatest inspiration -- and the ideology of Iqbal when he spoke about spiritual democracy. No one must bow down to anyone who speaks against the interest of the people.

We will declare four major emergencies. First and foremost, the education system.. There must be one core system of education, with a singular syllabus. A proper syllabus committee will be established. It will be ensured that there are equal opportunities for everyone and equal competition for everyone. Equip the people with a technical education.

Nothing can be done if there is [no] rule of law. We will also strengthen the judiciary and the police system. We will de-politicize the police, step out of the war on terror, and invest [our] time and resources on internal system cleansing. Revenue collection is next. We need to establish [a better] tax culture and eradicate contamination in tax distribution. And the most important agenda is to control corruption. Conflict of interest law will be established. This all needs to be done in 90 days. If you cannot do it in 90 days, the corrupt system will come back.

KN: How will you change Pakistan in 90 days, when the environment is conducive to the contrary of your agenda of filtration and cleansing?

IK: We need to create good governance and an enabling environment for good people who want to work. I will work towards attracting overseas Pakistanis and make it feasible for them to work here. Once that environment is created, recovery will automatically be on its way. 

We will support professional politicians who will be ready to make sacrifices and compromises to take politics seriously. There is no room for opportunity seekers and no room for corruption and the corrupt. I will support and invest in the process of strengthening the NAB [National Accountability Bureau]. I will ensure the judiciary is strong. 

KN: Your critics find it amusing that you talk about asset declaration while there is a bandwagon of politicians joining your party simultaneously -- many of whom you have criticized in the past. How do you justify that when you talk about accountability?

IK: I'm not going to be hijacked by a few people. When someone joins PTI, the first step for them is to declare their assets. If they default, they are held by our accountability committee. The corrupt system has to change. I believe that if you cannot do it in 90 days, you will never be able to do it. It's basically the question of who has the will. It's not what we have to do; it's who wants to do it.

KN: People of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas [FATA] and Balochistan have been secluded by the state for six decades. You say you plan to accommodate them. How would you do that, given their hostility?

IK: We will have a completely new relationship with the people of FATA and Balochistan and Gilgit. We will sit with them. We will mutually explore which laws they want to keep. We will try to develop mutual understanding on every matter that concerns them. A PTI government will execute massive development in FATA and Balochistan. We will try our best to ensure that the grievances of the people, of the common man, in any area, from any background, are not ignored. We will engage with every single Pakistani and ensure everyone gets their basic rights. Their right for food, employment, education, equity, and human rights. And we will do all this by good governance.

The way Pakistan is run should be changed, that's what I mean by a New Pakistan.

Kiran Nazish is a journalist, activist, and academic based in Pakistan. She can be followed on Twitter @kirannazish.

As Yogi Berrafamously put it, "It's déjà vu all over again." Amid a looming budget standoff,a presidential election cycle in full swing, and the popular dissatisfaction ofboth the left and the right, the United States has arrived -- yet again -- at acritical juncture in its war in Afghanistan, with key decisions being debatedconcerning the post-surge scenario and the prospects of political reconciliationwith various militant groups. The tragedy is that, much like its previousiterations, the current round of the Afghanistan debate in Washington isriddled with a staggering number of mischaracterizations. While the Cold Warproduced a cohort of able Soviet specialists, the decade-long war inAfghanistan has so far failed to produce sufficientregional expertise in the United States (this reasonably comprehensive list, for example,identifies just 107 Afghanistan-watchers in the United States).

Consequently, anumber of questionable assumptions about the Afghan people -- concerning theirattitudes to foreigners, their history, their society, and their values -- gounchallenged. Historicalanalogiesand socioeconomicdata are regularly manipulated by various parties to validate their ownbiases and preconceptions, and readingsof Afghan historyare, when not completely erroneous, unapologeticallyWestern-centric. For example, onecommon view that has gainedcirculation among think-tankers, policymakers, and congressional staffersis that a majority of Afghans are inherently hostile to the United States. Yet this viewpoint is not borne out by polling data, however imperfect. Thelast pollconducted by ABC News, the BBC and, ARD German TV, for example, says that nearlyseven in 10 Afghans support the presence of U.S. forces in their country.

Another and perhapsmore damaging misperception is of Afghanistan as the "graveyardof empires": a historically insignificant strategic backwater where greatcivilizations -- inevitably European ones -- ended up mired in ruinous war. Buteven a cursory examination of the region's history makes a mockery of this nowentrenched concept. During his conquests, Alexander of Macedon spent about twoyears solidifyinghis control of what is today Afghanistan and Central Asia, referred to inhis day as Bactria and Sogdiana. In fact, his army chose to reverse its coursein today's Punjab, over 200 miles to modern Afghanistan's east, afterthe Battleof the Hydaspes. The 19th-century British Empire, despitean initial setback, wonsubsequent engagements against the Afghans in its bid to create a bufferzone to British India's northwest. And the defeat of the Soviet military in the1980s was only made possible with American,Pakistani, and Saudi support.

The "graveyard of empires" canard also largely ignores non-Western history. Ancient and medievalAfghanistan was in fact at the heart of a number of major civilizations,including the GreekBactrian states; the KushanEmpire, which was a contemporary of imperial Rome; and, from the 10th to 12th centuries, the Ghaznavidsultanate, whoserulers made regular military forays into the subcontinent. The great MughalEmpire, at its zenith perhaps the most prosperous realm on Earth, had itsfoundations in what is today's Afghanistan, when its progenitor Baburestablished a presence in the region between Kabul and Peshawar. Count, on topof all this, several centuries of sustained Persian rule over the region.

In addition topopular misconceptions of Afghan xenophobia and historical backwardness, argumentsare regularly setforth about theincompatibility of Afghan societywith democracy.Although Afghanistan does have a history of underdeveloped democraticinstitutions, there are many reasons to question this blanket assessment.Definitional problems certainly persist: For many rural Afghans, democracyconnotes unlimited freedoms, rather than responsible and self-determinedgovernance. During the 1970s and 1980s, Soviet forces and their Afghan clientsoften called themselves democrats, further adding to confusion about the termin the minds of many Afghans. At the same time, there are mechanisms -- shuras,jirgas -- that, though hardly Jeffersonian, are analogous to the town hallsthat formed the bedrock of early American democracy. In this year's edition ofthe reasonably reliable Asia Foundation surveyof Afghanistan -- which polled 6,348 Afghans from all 34 provinces -- anoverwhelming 69 percent of Afghans polled say they are satisfied with the waydemocracy works in Afghanistan.

Ethnic politics isanother common source of confusion, with regular calls now heard inWashington for a soft partition of the state, creating a Taliban-dominated "Pashtunistan" separated from a confederation of provinces dominated by ethnicTajiks, Hazaras, and Uzbeks. Soft partitions, which were also advocatedin the case of Iraq not that long ago by U.S. Vice President JoeBiden, may appear to be easy and seductive solutions to pacifying complexpost-colonial societies overrun by civil war. But among otherproblems, they present a moral quandary, implicitly (thoughunintentionally) opening the door to ethnic cleansing. A cursory look athistory tells us that the partition of mixed political entities has almostalways been accompanied or preceded by ethnic cleansing or immense sectarianviolence: Consider India, Palestine, Bosnia, or Cyprus. Afghanistan'spopulation is heterogeneous, and given the commitment to establishing apluralistic and democratic state, calls for the country's de facto or de jurepartition appear both irresponsible and impractical.

Just as there areseveral peculiar narratives about Afghan society and history in steadycirculation, thereis also growing skepticism aboutthe United States' abilityto prosecute theAfghanistan war, with enormousdivergences between official U.S. and Afghanperspectives. One reason often cited for limiting the United States'involvement is the financial burden that the Afghanistan war represents in an era ofausterity. But according to the Congressional ResearchService, the war in Afghanistan will cost the United States an estimated$114 billion this year, a mere 3 percent of the federal budget, and a muchsmaller fraction of the American economy. This appears to be a small investmentrelative to the importance to American foreign policy and national security ofgetting Afghanistan right.

Somecommentators make theargument that the Afghanistan war is a sideshow to other forms of securitycompetition, particularly in East Asia -- that, in essence, the continued U.S.involvement in Afghanistan distracts from looming threats to U.S. securityposed by other great powers such as China. This is questionable for at leasttwo reasons. Firstly, other major powers -- including China, India, Russia, andIran, all of whom see Afghanistan as part of their extended neighborhoods -- areclosely watching developments affecting the U.S. position there. Americansuccess or failure will resonate in Moscow and Beijing, as well as New Delhiand Tehran. Secondly, the United States is not confronted with a binary choicebetween prosecuting the Afghanistan war and retaining a military presence againstmajor state threats. The United States has faced multiple security challengesbefore; the resources required to tackle them are quite different from oneanother; and U.S. military resources dedicated to securing Europe and theAsia-Pacific region have been steadilydeclining regardlessof investments in Afghanistan.

Finally, it is widely believed today inWashington that the Taliban enjoy popularpublic support, particularly among the ethnic Pashtun population ofAfghanistan. If true, it is certainly not reinforced by extant survey data. Noris the Afghan public weary of the United States' intensified involvement. Accordingto the Asia Foundation survey, aplurality of Afghans (46 percent) believes that the country is headed in the rightdirection, compared with 35 percent who believe otherwise. What is even moreencouraging, only 11 percent of Afghans have a lot of sympathy for armed opposition groups,half the proportion who expressed similar sentiments two years ago. In that sameperiod, those who have "no sympathy at all" for the Taliban have almost doubledto 64 percent of the population. Despite frustrations with the ability of the currentgovernment to deliver, Afghans express optimism about democracy as a principle,associating it most closely with peace and freedom. The United States, suchpolls clearly reveal, should not fool itself with undue pessimism. Its effortsare gradually beginning to bear fruit.

Currently,Afghanistan's fledgling state, though challenged frequently by security, governance,and development problems, has an elected government and an internationalpresence to contribute to the work of nation-building. Despite the ongoinginsurgency, widespread corruption, and the daily risk of arbitrary orextrajudicial killing, the Afghan people continue to strive for normalcy intheir day-to-day lives and hope for peace and prosperity in the future. Withthat in mind, the pontification of a few pundits and the exigencies ofnear-term politics should not lead to poor or rash decision-making. A balancedview of Afghan public opinion, history, culture, and politics -- and, just asimportantly, of the United States' ability to shape these factors in advancingits national security interests -- is crucial as Washington debates a decisionthat will have important regional and international implications for decades tocome.

JavidAhmad, a native of Kabul, is program coordinator and Dhruva Jaishankar is program officer with the Asia Program of the German Marshall Fund of the UnitedStates in Washington, D.C. The views reflected here are their own.

Last month, Afghanistan's Chamber of Commerce, the ACCI, elected its new leadership. The process was not without controversy. A lively pre-election trade in ACCI membership* cards allowed large numbers of underage children and people who had nothing to do with running a business to participate in the vote at the provincial level. And at the national level there were allegations of deal-making, money transfers and ethnic politicking. The fact that highly powerful individuals and networks find these positions worth competing over illustrates their importance. The controversies surrounding the vote also underscore how deeply problematic elections - of any kind - have become, and how the involvement of the Independent Electoral Commission is no guarantee for a serious vote.

The ACCI's leadership elections, organized by the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC), took place between September 11 and October 14, 2011 in the 21 provinces that have their own ACCI departments. It was followed by the election of the national Executive Board on October 24, 2011. Most of the provincial-level elections went unreported, with the exception of Kabul and Mazar-e Sharif where there were at least some echoes of the tumult going on behind the scenes.

In Mazar the vote was postponed for weeks due to complaints over the irregular distribution of ACCI cards and the high number of candidates. Local traders hinted that they expected Governor Atta to step in and solve the problem (read: pre-select the members of the provincial ACCI board) and, indeed, by the time the Mazar election took place there were exactly the same number of candidates as there were seats. In Kabul the Chamber's CEO, Mohammad Qorban Haqju, assured the media that the electoral procedures had been fully transparent and that all allegations of fraud were baseless. A video obtained by AAN, however, suggests otherwise.

This video is a collection of short recordings, 15 minutes in total, taken in one of Kabul's polling centers in what appears to be a large tent.** It shows, among other things, considerable chaos, with multiple voters behind the cardboard voting booths (which can be partially explained by the complexity of the vote; in Kabul voters could mark up to 19 candidates).

More seriously, the footage also shows a large variety of obviously ineligible voters, who were nevertheless allowed to vote. This included men and women who indicated that they were not involved in any kind of business (in some cases whole groups of what appeared to be family members of candidates were brought to the polling center, receiving last-minute voting instructions) and large numbers of under-age voters. The video shows groups of students, some of them in identical uniforms, and interviews with boys and girls as young as 14 years old, all of them holding ACCI membership cards. There is a recording of a member of the ACCI leadership, who is shown a very young boy and asked whether the boy should be allowed to vote, telling the staff that it is alright as long as he holds a card.

The footage confirms allegations, including by businessmen who chose to boycott the vote for this reason, that there had been a lively and uncontrolled trade in ACCI cards in the run-up to the election (in an ironic parallel to the country's presidential and parliamentary elections, which have become increasingly impossible to control due to the massive over-registration of voters). This is also borne out by the figures, as described with an admirable lack of irony by the ACCI in their own report of the election:

‘During this period [i.e. during the weeks of the provincial level elections] membership in the Chamber increased from approximately 35,000 to an estimated 62,000 as individuals and enterprises sought to exercise their right to vote for the future of ACCI.'

A total of around 29,000 members are said to have voted countrywide.

There were also complaints of ethnic campaigning, for instance in Kabul (and during the national-level vote), alleging that separate lists with either Pashtun or non-Pashtun (Northern Alliance-linked) candidates had been created and distributed, and that candidates and their backers were encouraging voters to vote along these lines. The video footage does indeed show voters holding photocopied pieces of paper with selected candidates and using them while filling in the ballot (there were 57 candidates in Kabul and voters were allowed to mark up to 19 candidates, given that there were 19 seats).

The national-level election of the ACCI Board took place during the High Council Congress on October 23 and 24. It was not plagued by the same level of controversy, if only because the number of voters was fixed and limited to the 319 provincial representatives that had been voted in at the provincial level. There were, however, allegations of behind-the scenes deal-making, money transfers and a similar kind of ethnic politicking as took place on the provincial level (with candidates and their backers seeking to secure bloc votes along ethnic and factional lines). 

The ACCI in its current form is a relatively recent institution and was established after the merger of two initially competing bodies. The pre-existing body, the Afghan Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ACCI) was a Soviet-era government institution, whose main function had been the valuing of imported goods against a fee to facilitate the government's collection of custom taxes. The second, much more recent body - the Afghan International Chamber of Commerce (AICC) - was an independent, market-oriented business association. It was established in 2004 by none other than Sher Khan Farnod and Mahmud Karzai, two protagonists in the Kabul Bank scandal. The two chambers were supported by competing donors with diverging agendas: GTZ, the government-owned German development agency (now renamed GIZ), and USAID.

The new ACCI that was established in 2008 represented a compromise: the old-style chamber was reformed rather than dissolved, but its character is much closer to what the U.S. had in mind than what the Germans and the Afghan government had initially been working toward (a government-led single point of contact for all businesses). When the new ACCI held its first leadership elections in 2009, Sher Khan Farnod and Mahmud Karzai were re-elected as chairman and first vice chairman, as they had been in the U.S.-supported association.

The ACCI's second leadership election in October resulted in a national board in which half of the members are newcomers. Sher Khan Farnod and Mahmud Karzai, the leaders of the first hour, have both gone (neither of them were candidates) and the new ACCI chairman is Hassin Fahim, another leading protagonist in the Kabul Bank saga and brother of Vice President Qasem Fahim. His main competitor for the seat of chairperson was Dr. Faridun Noorzad of the Maiwand Bank, who also has deep roots in the Kabul Bank network (originally a medical doctor, Noorzad started his banking career in the hawala businesses of Shaheen Exchange and Kabul Exchange, after which he became deputy CEO for Kabul Bank and Azizi Bank, before taking over Maiwand Bank. Shaheen Exchange was founded by Sher Khan Farnod and was instrumental to the irregular financial transactions of the Kabul Bank).

The backgrounds and business interests of the ACCI board members provide an overview of where money can currently be made and influence peddled: banking, construction, oil and gas, and trade (mainly import of consumer goods, fuel and construction materials). Much of this is related to the international presence, which has allowed newcomers to rise to prominence and in some cases outflank the more established businessmen. A case in point is the election of the head of the Transport Committee, Ajmal Rahmani, a young Bagram contractor and son of Parwan MP Rahman Rahmani.*** 

Many of Afghanistan's large businessmen run groups of companies, allowing them to be involved in multiple sectors at the same time, in an effort to maximize influence and profit. This is also the case for several of the ACCI board members, including most prominently the Zahed Walid Group (Hassin Fahim), the Ghazanfar Group (Ismail Ghazanfar), Kamgar Group, which includes Kam Air (Zmaray Kamgar), the Javid Jaihoon Group(headed by ‘Lala Javid' now also head of the Afghan United Bank), and the Zamindar Group (headed by Latif Khan Zhwanday, son of former Azizi Bank vice chairman, Ali Akbar Zhwanday). Some of these business groups have their roots in generations of cross-border trading, such as for instance Ghazanfar, while others, such as for instance Jaihoon, became well-established in the years of war and resistance. Others are newcomers and rose to prominence through their ties to government and international contracting, like Hassin Fahim or Ajmal Rahmani. Many of them have headquarters abroad.

The new board also has a few remarkable omissions, for instance Abdul Ghaffar Dawi of Dawi Oil, who used to be on the board as previously the Deputy for Services. But also some of the other big name companies are unrepresented, such the Azizi Hotak Group, known for its banks (Azizi and Bakhtar), fuel, import of cars and watches, and real estate investments; Habib Gulzar, known for its Coca Cola plant and cigarette imports; or the Alokozay Group, famous for its tea, but also cooking oil, fuel, cigarette imports, real estate, biscuits and tissues.**** None of them, incidentally, were candidates, at least not in the national election. There were no women elected to the board this time. Last time there was one: Hossay Andar, known to many as an unsuccessful, but very active and vocal parliamentary candidate. She was one of the three female candidates but failed to secure sufficient votes.

Serving on an ACCI board is clearly not just a matter of prestige. Although the Chamber of Commerce has no direct executive powers, it is an influential body that can help shape policies, legislation and business practices. It also provides its members with important opportunities to raise their profile. Several senior government officials, including former Ministers Rahimi, Qaderi and Eilaghi, are believed to have started their rise to prominence here.

It will be interesting to watch how the new ACCI board uses its influence. There is a great need, not just for an improved investment climate and better legislation, but also for greater self-regulation in the various sectors - as was rather dramatically illustrated by the Kabul Bank crisis (and the fact that many of Afghanistan's other banks remain shaky in their own ways). The controversies surrounding the ACCI election, however, seem to suggest that we should not be holding our breath just yet.

* Acquiring ACCI membership does not require much more than a copy of a valid business license and a yearly fee (and even that may have been recently ‘waived'). ‘Ordinary membership' costs 500 Afghanis (10 USD) per year according to the website - although this may also be an outdated figure, given that the membership form mentions 2000 Afs (40 USD) as the yearly ordinary fee. Silver, Gold, Platinum and VIP memberships cost 200, 500, 1000, and 5000 USD per year respectively and provide an increasing scale of privileges, including invitations to conferences and matchmaking events, visa recommendation letters, legal services, access to credit, VIP vehicle passes, and invitations to regular meetings with the President, donors and other high-level officials.

** The quality of the footage strongly suggests that it was recorded by a professional journalist, and there is evidence on the video of a considerable and active media presence during the Kabul vote. The lack of media reporting, despite the obvious and on-tape irregularities, can probably be explained by the ongoing parliamentary scuffle and hunger strike of Semin Barakzai at the time, which probably took precedence.

*** The company name given, Ahmad Rashed Rahmani Ltd, does not appear in an internet search, but his other companies do, including Ajmal Rahmani Construction and Road Building and Afghan International Transport and Logistics (the company briefly featured on what appears to be a blacklist - the EPLS; Excluded Parties List System - before it was apparently removed again). 

*** The Alokozay Group has also secured the exclusive bottling rights for Pepsi and the acquisition of Brac Bank. The group is not to be confused with Khan Jan Alkozay Ltd, the company of ACCI First Deputy Khan Jan Alkozay. Alikozai is a wide-spread tribal name (and the variations in spelling here follow the transcriptions used by the companies themselves).

The newly elected ACCI national board (with company names as given by ACCI, and * signifies that the person is a new member):

1. Hassin Fahim (Zahed Walid Construction Company); Chairman (previously ACCI Deputy for Industries and Mines)

2. Khan Jan Alkozay (Khan Jan Alkozay Ltd); First Vice Chairman (previously Deputy for Commerce)

3. Mohammad Ismail Ghazanfar (Ghazanfar Oil and Gas Trade Company); Deputy for Services

4. Mohammad Yunus Momand (Shadab Zafar Construction Company); Deputy for Commerce*

5. Baz Mohammad (Afsar Khan Ltd); Deputy for Industries and Mines*

6. Zamarai Kamgar (Kamgar Trade Company); Adviser International Affairs*

7. Ajmal Rahmani (Ahmad Rashed Rahmani Ltd); Head of the Transport Committee*

8. Mohammad Daud Yusufzai (Afghan Petrol Group Ltd.); Head of the Oil Committee*

9. Azarkhash Hafizi (Afghan-German Company and on the Board of Directors of Azizi Bank); re-elected as Head of the International Relations Committee

10. Sadullah Haqyar (Khalid Jaihoon Construction Company); re-elected as Head of the Secretariat

11. Javid Jaihoon (Afghan United Bank); re-elected as Treasurer

12. Gholam Nabi Eidizadah (Nabi Akbar Ltd); Member

13. Mohammad Ebrahim Zarif (Arif Zarif Ltd); Member

14. Esmatullah Wardak (Kabul Fulad); Member

15. Assadullah Faruqyar (Rahim Farid Ltd.); Member

16. Khairuldin Mayel (Bashir Nawid Group); Member

17. Latif Khan Zhwandai (Zamindar Group); Member*

18. Nezamuldin Tajzadah (Ettehad Aftab); Member*

19. Jamaludin Ishaq (IRAA Ishaq Construction Company); Member*

20. Mohammad Latif Ghanawizian [sic] (Super Cola); Member*

21. Faridun Nurzad (Maiwand Bank); Member*

A total of 46 candidates, including three women, competed for 21 seats. The electoral results can be found here.  

Martine van Bijlert is the co-director of the Afghanistan Analysts Network, from which this piece was adapted. The original article can be found here. 

Afghan women have long fought for a say in their country's future, but that fight has grown more urgent in the run-up to the Bonn Conference, a gathering charged with laying out a plan for Afghanistan for 2014 and beyond.

So far, women's battle to win a substantive role at Bonn - and any other peace talks that may come to the capital - has gained little traction either at home or abroad.  And in the US, those backing women say they face an uphill fight convincing the Obama Administration to speak out more about the need for women's participation.

Afghan women leaders have issued press releases and formal position papers in the run-up to December's meeting demanding that civil society makes up 30 percent of Afghanistan's delegation to the Bonn Conference, with women accounting for half of that group.  

The Afghan government has not yet announced its official delegation, but so far one man and one woman from civil society have been invited to Bonn, with the woman getting three minutes to address the plenary.  Of the sixteen women attending a separate civil society forum, only one will have access to the official conference, according to the Institute for Inclusive Security, which recently brought Afghan women leaders to Washington to press their case on the Hill and with the Obama Administration.

"We would like to have strong participation in these processes, we would like to know what is being discussed, what is put on the table," says Orzala Ashraf, a peace activist and founder of an Afghan NGO for women and children. "We would like to ensure that these bargaining chips (in any peace process) are not women's rights or our achievements of the past ten years."

With the U.S. and its NATO allies focused on extricating themselves from Afghanistan, the task of laying out the path ahead has assumed extreme urgency for Afghans. "It is of high importance for women's groups and civil society to make sure their voices are included in any road map," says Ashraf, "in any direction that Afghanistan is going to take." 

But whether those voices will be heard remains an open question.

As Human Rights Watch noted, "The Afghan government and its international backers say that women's rights are one of their ‘red lines' as they plan for the withdrawal of international forces. If this is the case, why are Afghan women struggling to get a seat at the table in Bonn?"

Those in Washington attribute part of the reason to a White House inner circle that sees the role of women as far removed from the issue of Afghan security.  As the Washington Post famously noted earlier this year, women are seen as "pet rocks in our rucksack" that are "taking us down."

"These guys don't get it," said a senior administration official who has argued that women's participation is crucial for Afghanistan's stability, as then-Secretary of State Colin Powell did in 2002. "Ten years on we still have to make the case that women are additive."

As I've written in these pages, it is far from the situation of a decade ago when leaders across Washington fanned out before the cameras to speak about the importance of supporting Afghan women. After five years of Taliban rule, in which women were denied the rights to work and education and to leave their homes, the international community offered its arrival in 2001 as a new start.  

Secretary of State Clinton helped women leaders win a speaking role at last year's Kabul Conference and has promised women that "we will not abandon you," but with her departure imminent and 2014 looming, talk of a Taliban return is surging.

Fears of what the Taliban's ascendance would mean for women have only grown stronger with news of the stoning death of a woman and her daughter in Ghazni Province.  Assassinations of leading human rights supporters and police officials and attacks on girls schools have skyrocketed in recent years - even as talk of a peace deal with the Taliban has come to be viewed in NATO capitals as the best option for ending the war.

Some American advocates for women say any talk of Taliban negotiations is misplaced, especially given the recent assassination of former President and head of the High Peace Council, Burhanuddin Rabbani.

"We don't think anybody should be negotiating with the Taliban," says Esther Hyneman of Women for Afghan Women, which runs family centers and safe homes for abused women across Afghanistan.  "If the Taliban wanted a role in the government, why don't they run for parliament in a democratic election? They don't want a role in the Afghan government -- they want the Afghan government."

Women's group leaders say that just like in the 1990s, when they lobbied to stop the Clinton Administration from recognizing the Taliban government, they will not stand by quietly while women half a world away are denied their constitutionally guaranteed rights to work and education. They note that Afghan women are making progress for themselves, pointing to the rising number of girls attending school, as well as female midwives, police officers, lawyers, entrepreneurs, civil society activists, parliamentarians and educators as evidence.

"We will keep the pressure on and support women in any way we can," says Eleanor Smeal of the Feminist Majority Foundation, which helped to lead the fight against Washington's recognition of the Taliban in 1996.  "There is now a huge network of non-profit organizations within Afghanistan and we are talking to them and they are taking the lead.  What we can do is continue to put pressure on the U.S. government not to agree to anything that omits half the population."

Yet some wonder just how committed the White House is to supporting women's participation in their country. The President has not spoken often about Afghanistan - and far less about the country's women.

"Perhaps the tremendous unpopularity of the war puts [President Obama] in an awkward position," says activist Mavis Leno, wife of talk show host Jay Leno and one of the women who put the issue on America's map -- and in PEOPLE Magazine in 1998 -- after the Taliban came to power in 1996. "I don't think he is doing as much as he could."

Hyneman goes further:

"I am at my wit's end at the lack of discussion by the media, by our government, by our president on the issue of women's rights in Afghanistan." Of Obama, Hyneman says, "I am appalled that he has not mentioned Afghan women's rights since his speech on withdrawing US troops."

Women's activists say they are watching closely to see exactly what the Afghan government -- with support from the United States -- agrees to in any peace deal.

"I just don't understand why the fate of these women has to be considered as special pleading," Leno says.  "Are we just going to stand back and see this happen again? Women were making it a little way up the hill; can we at least make sure that they don't slide back down again?"

They say they share Americans' desire to end the country's longest war, but that a peace that leaves women out will not last.

"We are in favor of peace, but this is not the road to peace, it is the road to bloodshed and subjugation and civil war, a repeat of the years past," Hyneman says. "Everyone will be sitting in front of their TV sets wringing their hands as we see women brutalized."

The market has recently been flooded with books about Pakistan by academics, policymakers, and journalists. Many of these have sought to explain - and to some extent apologize for - contemporary Pakistani society to the western world. Pamela Constable's Playing with Fire: Pakistan at War with Itself is the rare exception that acknowledges this goal, and then lives up to its appointed task. Western readers could hope for no better guide to present-day Pakistan than Constable, a veteran journalist who has reported extensively from Pakistan for over a decade with The Washington Post. Her new book is a sound introduction to Pakistan's contradictions, inequalities, tumultuous politics, and every fluctuating national identity. 

As newspaper headlines about Pakistan policy choices become increasingly shrill, readers seeking context will find much of use in Playing with Fire. The book traces political and security developments across the country, primarily since 2007, that fateful year when former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto was assassinated and the army's poor handling of a siege at the radical Red Mosque in Islamabad led to a spate of nationwide suicide bombings. In addition to political upheaval and terrorist attacks, Constable documents new laws, corruption scandals, media trends, civil society movements, and more, making her book one of the few holistic backgrounders on Pakistan.

Indeed, Playing with Fire benefits immensely from its author's journalistic background. The book covers those aspects of Pakistan that are rarely examined in works by political scientists or retired diplomats focused on Pakistan's security issues or regional geopolitics. Constable includes chapters on women and their divergent experiences in different social classes, upper-class Pakistanis, religious minorities, and life in rural Pakistan (in the interests of disclosure, I read an early draft of one of these chapters while Constable and I overlapped as fellows at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington DC).

Like good journalism, the book also combines faithful documentation with sharp analysis: Constable bookends extensive quotes from Pakistanis - whether brick kiln workers or land-owning politicians - with her own insights into Pakistan's problems. These insights are inevitably the best nuggets in the book; for example, Constable observes that the dynamics of landed feudalism have trickled down into the contemporary industrial sector, where factor workers remain indebted to their employers.

Constable's most profound insight into Pakistan is stated at the outset, in the book's introduction. She argues that Pakistanis are essentially powerless: "they see the trappings of representative democracy around them but little tangible evidence of it working in their lives." The various chapters of Playing with Fire then show how this powerlessness is manifest: in the vestiges of the feudal system, in the failings of the judicial system, in the endless paperwork of a bloated bureaucracy, in the limited circles of dynastic politics, and in the ‘honor' codes of a patriarchal society. Through characters, narratives, statistics, and direct quotes, Constable shows how Pakistanis are denied rights and opportunities in a way that perpetuates the status quo. One only wishes that with each example of a powerless Pakistani she offers, Constable reiterated the theme more explicitly for emphasis. 

Interestingly, while acknowledging their powerlessness, Constable allows Pakistanis to speak for themselves in her book. The liberal use of direct quotes provides an insight into Pakistani perceptions of global trends and political issues. Numerous excerpts from newspaper editorials and columns (including one of mine) also give a taste of public discourse within Pakistan. The country is frequently faulted for its head-in-the-sand attitude towards internal security developments, particularly the long-term fallout of cultivating militant groups. But Constable's regular nods to Pakistani opinion-makers show that a spirited, if convoluted debate about Pakistan's future and identity is currently underway in the country.

The most interesting chapter in Playing with Fire documents the slow ‘Talibanization' of Pakistani society. Constable points to the diverse elements that have led many Pakistanis to equate patriotism and religiosity: the content of government-issue textbooks, the successful campaigns of religious political parties, the moralizing rhetoric of student politics, the vitriol of television talk show hosts, and the state's foreign policy. Moreover, she uncovers how Pakistani society has evolved in a matter of years from wearing its religion loosely to developing extremist sympathies. Constable shows how Islam became "hip" among university students who embraced their religious identity as a way to participate in global trends. She also notes that "poor yet pious" Pakistanis use religious fervor as a way to push back against "errant Muslims of a higher class," introducing equality in what is otherwise a highly stratified society.

This nuanced chapter is bolstered by Constable's overview of the origins and ideologies of Pakistan's various militant and sectarian groups. The book also documents major security-related events such as the formation of the anti-state Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and the takeover of the Swat Valley in 2009 by TNSM, another extremist organization. With these snapshots of militancy, Playing with Fire becomes a handy user's guide to terrorism and security for those who have not followed regional developments at a granular level.

One argumentative disconnect does however emerge in the book. Constable's chapters on the ‘Talibanization' of society and Pakistan's use of militant groups as ‘strategic assets' emphasize that extremism is a top-down phenomenon in Pakistan, perpetuated as a result of state policies. But in other sections of the book, she suggests that extremist tendencies are organic-the expected fallout of widespread poverty, joblessness, and frustration. For example, Constable quotes the bitter complaint of a young man from Peshawar who graduated from a prestigious engineering school but was unable to find a job. He suggests that the lack of opportunity creates terrorists. Similarly, in a chapter about sectarian tensions and violent discrimination against religious minorities, Constable includes a rant by a butcher who denounces rampant corruption, crime, and poor leadership. The decision to include his viewpoint implies that the failure of state institutions is fostering religious intolerance.

There is an ongoing debate about whether extremism in Pakistan is a product of years of state-sponsored militancy and General Ziaul Haq's Islamization policies in the 1980s, or whether it is a contemporary response to flawed Pakistani and American policies. Given Constable's intimate knowledge of the region, a direct summary of her perceptions on this matter would have given the book even more substance.

Throughout her book, Constable draws out the clashing ideological and political stances of Pakistan's liberals and conservatives. She will be aware then that some liberals may find her book too soft on the Pakistan Army. No doubt, the book maps the fallout of the army's many dalliances with militant groups. But the chapter on the ‘murder of democracy' focuses on corrupt politicians such as President Asif Ali Zardari, dynastic politics, and the inefficient bureaucracy. Meanwhile, Constable's analysis of the Pakistan Army delves into the choices made by military dictators Ziaul Haq and Pervez Musharraf as well as the shenanigans of the intelligence agent Khalid Khawaja. This focus on controversial characters (though compelling to read) makes the army's flaws seem individual rather than institutional. A concise assessment of the impact of military interference in Pakistan's political and economic spheres over the decades would have served the book well.

Ultimately, though, Playing with Fire is an accessible yet comprehensive guide to a country that is constantly evolving and much written about, but little understood by westerners.  

Huma Yusuf is a columnist for Pakistan's Dawn Newspaper, and was the 2010-11 Pakistan Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.

During the 2009 presidential elections, when I was serving as a senior aide to candidate Dr. Ashraf Ghani, I used to share a taxi with other travellers going from Kabul to my home town of Jalalabad every weekend. Thousands take that road each day, many either going to or returning from Pakistan - mainly for healthcare or trade. With so many Afghans taking this road, it was an opportunity to gauge public opinion on the elections. I would introduce myself as a university student to get uncensored thoughts from fellow passengers about the topic. I didn't always have to bring it up--as soon as the journey commenced, an analysis of the presidential elections would inevitably begin.

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The ongoing unrest in the Muslim world has sparked increased discussion not only of the possibility of revolt in various places (though such talk has become more subdued of late, with the surge in violence in Libya and Yemen), but also the role social media and technology are playing in political movements in the developing world. Pakistan exhibits many of the traits noted in the countries currently experiencing upheaval; rising unemployment, pent up frustration and a teeming population of young people, trapped in a seemingly endless spiral of inflation. Indigenous factors such as growing religious extremism and ever-present paranoia about foreign interference further increase the likelihood of such an upheaval. In the wake of events in Egypt and Tunisia, Pakistani political parties are already starting to predict an imminent uprising. The question that needs to be answered is what role, if any, does the Internet and social media play in contemporary Pakistani politics.

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Editor's note: This is Part I of a two-part seriesfocusing on aid provision in conflict zones, with tomorrow's edition to focuson Afghanistan.

Although the White House was cautiously optimistic in itsrecent strategy review on Afghanistan, even for seasoned AfPak watchers, itcan be difficult to discern exactly what the U.S. strategy istowards Afghanistan. The sound bite summary "clear, hold, build" may besimplistic, but it still offers a useful starting place to evaluate U.S. andNATO efforts. The "clear" and "hold" represent the straightforward ideas (intheory if not execution) of taking and holding ground, operations with whichmilitaries are well-acquainted. The real issue, and the key to success orfailure, is defining what "build" really means, and examining how the United States andNATO are "building" in Afghanistan.

While many factors in Afghanistan (and Pakistan, for thatmatter) are unique, in a larger sense, the challenges faced there are the sameissues, with new faces, that the United States has been long been struggling with inother countries. The U.S. government clearly hopes to "build" the Afghangovernment and military up to the point that it will take the lead in battlingthe Taliban. For decades now, in countries around the world, the tool mostfrequently called on to "build" countries is aid. Sometimes aid comes in theform of humanitarian, short-term assistance, i.e. emergency food, medicine,water, and shelter, aimed at stabilizing crisis situations. In other cases, aidcomes in the form of "official development assistance" or ODA, most often adirect cash transfer from a donor government or donor institution to arecipient country, usually in the form of grants or low-interest loans, andaimed at promoting long-term growth by developing infrastructure, education,and more. In the case of Afghanistan (and Pakistan), aid to the region hasconsisted of a mixture of both humanitarian and strategic (ODA) aid.

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Will Pakistan go the way of Tunisia and Egypt? Are we on the verge of witnessing throngs of discontented Pakistanis storming the streets of Islamabad and Karachi seeking an end to a wobbly democratic regime with an ever-attentive military establishment keeping a tight leash on its extraordinary privileges?

It's not completely fanciful. Some key similarities do exist between Pakistan and Tunisia and Egypt. Obviously, they are predominantly Muslim countries, they have all experienced long periods of authoritarian rule, they have significant military establishments, and they are all U.S. allies to varying degrees. Despite the willingness of their political elites to work with the United States, especially on the "war on terror," significant segments of their populace remain either hostile toward or suspicious of the United States.

These common features might well lead some to conclude that Pakistan could be on the precipice of a political upheaval, and indeed, Pakistan's prime minister, Yousuf Raza Gilani, was recently forced to defend against the comparisons. Despite these seemingly compelling similarities, it is unlikely that Pakistan will witness a societywide political uprising that will challenge the existing political order.

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"Today, God has given me the opportunity to set the tone for my political legacy. Come join me in changing Pakistan's destiny. It is not an easy task but one we must work for, as Pakistan is ours. ‘All Pakistan Muslim League' is our platform from where I will work tirelessly to serve Pakistan and bring back national unity-Pakistan First." With those words on one of his Facebook pages, as promised, former Pakistani president General Pervez Musharraf appears to have launched his new political party out of London. Clearly, he is attuned to the technology of today. But is he attuned to Pakistan?

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