New York Times Magazine: Democracy Promotion Efforts in Iran Counter-Productive?
By Daniel Hollingsworth
July 3, 2007 | Printer Friendly

A June 24, 2007 article in the New York Times Magazine by Negar Azimi describes the challenges currently facing efforts to promote democracy in Iran, focusing on the $75 million that the United States has dedicated to this purpose.  This request by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in February 2006 was a major increase over past requests and was intended to “advance freedom and human rights within Iran,” but a great deal of skepticism and criticism has developed regarding the effectiveness of this allocation.  Perhaps most troubling is that this criticism comes “not only from Iranian officials but also from some of the very people whose causes it aims to advance,” and Azimi speculates on whether this program could be doing more harm than good.

Azimi notes that a major source of concern is that the public announcement of this fund and the corresponding push for democracy in Iran has provoked a sharp backlash in Tehran.  He writes that the Iranian government sees this funding initiative as “one more element in an elaborate Bush Administration regime-change stratagem” and has consequently reacted by setting out to distance itself from the United States of America.  Iranians that are seen to have links with the U.S. have been targeted, barred from coming into or leaving the country, and have even been arrested (see previous CCD report on recent arrests in Iran).  The fear that Iranians working in the US feel is so real that members of U.S.-based institutions that work with and in Iran have asked for their “cause to not be mentioned during speeches to protect them from the Iranian government.”

The author suggests that it is not only contact with the U.S. which is being targeted but contact with the West in general, and laws have been instituted under Ahmadinejad to hinder any development of civil society; phone conversations are tapped, emails are read, and conference and workshop attendance is closely scrutinized by the Iranian government.  David Denehy, a senior adviser to the State Department’s Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs, is responsible for overseeing the distribution of the $75 million.  He contends that this program is “not about regime change.”  He argues that it is instead the continuation of a “policy of the U.S., since the end of World War II to support efforts to expand personal liberty and freedom around the world.”  However, Azimi notes that suspicion of foreign influence has a long history in Iran and has especially been a visible influence since the 1950s.  Iranians have been even more cautious with respect to the intentions of those affiliated to the United States since 1996, when then Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich proposed an $18 million program that, according to Martin Indyk, assistant secretary of state for Near East Affairs during the Clinton administration, was “a covert program to overthrow the [Iranian] regime.”  Azimi argues that the Bush administration has not been clear in its intentions, allowing Iran to claim that these programs are an attempt to undermine the government:

“Ambiguity as to what the United States really wants from Iran seems to be built into the system.  While the goals of the democracy fund may seem mild and the U.S. recently participated in rare talks with Iran, American aircraft carriers patrol the Persian Gulf, and five Iranian officials continue to be held incommunicado by U.S. forces in Iraq.”

These developments cast doubt on the potential effectiveness of the overall effort to support democracy in Iran under current conditions.  A similar effort by the Dutch government, which in 2004 presented a plan dedicating 15 million euros to democracy promotion in Iran, resulted in similar accusations from Iran’s government.  The Humanist Institute for Development Corporation (Hivos), a Dutch NGO that supports civil society development in Iran, received special scrutiny from the Iranian government.  Fariba Davoudi Mohajer, a campaign member of Hivos and journalist, remarked that the current circumstances in Iran present a challenge in that “besides ourselves, our independence from foreign funding is our only strength.”  Such a statement provokes concern regarding the effect of the efforts of the United States, and as Azimi concludes, “suggests a bleak future for American promotion of democracy” in Iran.

Source:
“Hard Realities of Soft Power”
New York Times Magazine
Negar Azimi
June 24, 2007