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National Unity Government

& a history of division in Afghanistan

S. D. Ekelschot

MSc. Public Administration Leiden University

S1368478

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

First of all I would like to thank my supervisors Vasilis Karakasis and Joris Voorhoeve for all their patience and assistance throughout this research process: rereading quite some pieces of text, advising and steering me whenever I needed it. In this regard, I would also like to thank Geor Hintzen with whom I have spent many hours talking about Afghanistan and shared a great fascination for its culture and history. It has taken some time and it has been quite an explorative adventure. But luckily, not all those who wander are lost, and with some guidance I found the direction to the finish of this thesis.

I would like to thank my family for always having faith in me and for never getting tired of the word “thesis” but always showing interest and asking me how I was progressing instead. I would like to thank my friends, Sara, Marianush, Mélissa, Dan, Serena, Rosanne, and Jasmijn for all their encouraging talks and help, and Jeroen for bringing me coffee and bananas at the library. I also apologize for all those times that I had to tell you “I have to write thesis” but we will make up for that now. Furthermore, I would like to express my deep gratitude to my colleagues and friends at BPRA, Marcel, Amela and Pepijn, for their flexibility and giving me all the time to finish my thesis.

Finally, I would like to thank the Coffeestar at the library where I spent many hours writing two theses: Robbe en Tijmen, thank you for the special effort you put in making shapes in my cappuccinos, small chat, and company. It made studying more fun! And last but not least, I would like to thank the security of the Leiden University Wijnhaven, and Bayram in

particular, for the jokes and happy talks, and for letting me out when I was once again the last remaining person in the building. Much appreciated!

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Executive Summary

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Contents

1 Introduction ... 1

2 Research Design ... 4

2.1 Political cleavages ... 4

2.2 State functioning ... 7

2.3 Research questions ... 9

2.4 Causal process tracing method ... 9

2.5 Justification of the sources cited ... 14

3 The historical and cultural narrative ... 15

3.1 Part 1: historical narrative ... 15

3.1.1 Geographical location: where the story begins ... 15

3.1.2 The origin of traditional political order ... 19

3.1.3 The end of traditional political order ... 25

3.1.4 A new era: restoring political order ... 30

3.2 Part 2: anthropological analysis ... 37

3.2.1 Religious identity ... 37

3.2.2 Ethnicity ... 38

3.2.3 Qawms ... 42

3.2.4 Warlords ... 42

3.3 Conclusion ... 44

4 The functioning of the National Unity Government ... 46

4.1 The NUG as a solution to power struggle? ... 46

4.2 Appointment by parity and merit ... 48

4.3 Performance of the government institutions ... 50

4.3.1 The National Assembly ... 51

4.3.2 The judiciary ... 54

4.3.3 The security sector ... 55

4.3.4 The Taliban: a shadow government ... 56

4.3.5 Sub-national governance ... 58

4.4 Conclusion: a weak state ... 62

5 Analysis ... 64

5.1 Relevant political cleavages ... 64

5.1.1 Cleavage: Pashtuns vs. Non-Pashtuns (traditional) ... 64

5.1.2 Cleavage: Warlords vs. State ... 65

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5.1.4 Cleavage: Modernists vs. Tradition ... 69

5.2 CPT configuration ... 71

6 Conclusions ... 76

7 References ... 79

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“A massive truck bomb blast has ripped through the heart of Kabul’s diplomatic district, killing at least 80 people and wounding hundreds in a powerful explosion described by officials as “one of the biggest” to have hit the capital of Afghanistan”(Al Jazeera, 2017, May 31).

1 Introduction

The United Nations strategic review of 2017 classified Afghanistan as one in active conflict and stated that in the first nine months of this year, 12.903 conflict incidents have been reported, which is five times more than the amount of incidents in 2008 (OCHA, 2017, October 31). Moreover, more than 69,000 trauma cases have been reported, which signifies a 21 per cent increase in comparison to those in 2016 (ibid.). Currently, Afghans make up the second largest refugee group in Europe and are the largest refugee population of concern to the UNHCR in Asia (Petersmann, 2017, Aug. 4; UNHCR, 2017, Nov. 14). In the first eight months of 2017, more than 200,000 people were forced to flee their homes (ibid.). Sixteen years since the Taliban has been defeated and removed from power in Afghanistan, the state is still weak and failing. The governmental system is nearly paralysed and general John Nicholson even warned that its fracture and “the leadership situation” threaten the country’s stability (Nicholson, 2016, Dec. 2). Last year, in 2016, director of National Intelligence James Clapper indeed confirmed that the country was “at serious risk of political breakdown” (Katzman, 2017, p. 10).

The new National Unity Government, installed in 2014, seems to be divided between two camps, the Pashtuns and the Non-Pashtuns represented by the Pashtun president, Ashraf Ghani, and its Tajik Chief Executive Officer, Abdullah Abdullah. The two are unable to agree on any crucial matters, such as the appointment of new officials, which prevents the government from well functioning. It has, for instance, caused a delay in parliamentary elections and which is why the Parliament is performing outside its constitutional mandate for over two years already. Moreover, the internal conflicts of the security apparatus undermine the ability to provide and uphold security. As the Taliban is growing stronger, the prospects for Afghanistan are not good, as the state is at the edge of complete breakdown.

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research questions included: how do political cleavages influence the functioning of the contemporary Afghan state? The main contribution of my study is to provide an insightful analysis of the underlying mechanisms of political cleavages that appear to divide the current governmental system and prevent it from well functioning. The great asset of approaching state performance by the use of the term “political cleavages” is that it connects individual political and sociological behaviour with that of macro-historical processes (Bornschier, 2009). It describes socially constructed divisions that have a potential of conflict and could lead to social and political structural transformations. Change is inherent to politics, which makes political structures dynamic and respond to internal and external forces (Lane & Ersson, 1987).Therefore, my thesis aims to present those who are interested in state-building the contribution of anthropological and historical analysis. Sociological phenomenon may differ from country to country. Hence previous state-building experiences in one country may not provide an accurate framework for state-building projects in another. My thesis was therefore devoted to a qualitative research, exploring the historical and anthropological aspects of the political cleavages that affect state functioning today.

Methodology

My thesis presents a qualitative research based within-case analysis of Afghanistan. It includes not only a study of its public administration but combines this with a historical and anthropological approach. The aim of this thesis is not only to summarize existing case studies of the anthropological and historical aspects of Afghan society but also to reveal how these features have shaped the Afghans state system today. My research has drawn upon academic works, books, reports and (news) articles, media channels such as Twitter and Youtube, and documentaries. I was limited to the use of English because I do not speak any of the Afghan official languages.

Outline of the thesis

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2 Research Design

As described in the introduction, the Afghan state is clearly not functioning well and there is still much violence and conflict. My aim was therefore to analyse what conditions are causing bad state performance and the process that has eventually led to this status quo. Through my inductive research, I stumbled upon the theory of political cleavages. These are divisions in society with a potential of conflict. I decided to examine the relationship between political cleaves and state functioning in the context of a single case study: Afghanistan. My main focus was to identify the political cleavages in Afghan society and to explore how these cleavages interact with the state functioning of the Afghan government. The main question of my research was therefore the following: how do political cleavages influence the functioning of the contemporary Afghan state?

This chapter aims to provide the reader an explanation of: what cleavages are, why they actually exist, how they relate to politics, and what state functioning actually means. Subsequently, the (sub-) questions of the research that are drawn from this theory are set out and elaborated on. Finally, the chapter concludes with a description of the used research method: the causal process tracing method.

2.1 Political cleavages

The Cambridge Dictionary describes cleavage as “a division or disagreement” (2017). According to Jan-Erik Lane and Svante Ersson, a cleavage, in political and sociological theory, is “a division on the basis of some criteria of individuals, groups or organizations among conflict may arise” (Lane & Ersson, 1987, p. 39). Thus, although cleavages may be linked to conflict, the two concepts are not identical; there may be conflict without the presence of a cleavage and visa versa. They argue that cleavages may be found in society, in party systems and in governments and can occur at different levels, and thus, with a probability of conflict (ibid.).

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create dissension between people. This is also what defines them: “political systems are to be interpreted according to how they relate to structures of social cleavages” (Lane & Ersson, 1987; Rokkan, 1970; Kriesi, 1998). In accordance, Garrett Hardin described in 1968 that social arrangements prevent the exploitation of resources by restraining access to that what is called “the commons” (Hardin, 1968). This also explains why there is conflict at the basis of social life; “the fight between individuals or organizations for opportunities, which are scarce due to limitations set by the environment”, and the “allocation of resources of every nature involves the resolution of conflict about priorities” (Lane & Ersson, 1987, p. 39). This leads to great dilemmas concerning questions of equity, equality and justice. It also motivates individuals to move against each other, which makes the concept of politics very important (ibid.).

The Cambridge Dictionary defines politics as “the activities of the government, members of law making organizations, or people who try to influence the way a country is governed” (2017). Politics is determined by cleavages; the parties involved have different and conflicting interest in the allocation of the resources. Political systems are therefore vital in dealing with these kinds of dissent and provide “mechanisms of resolution by means of decision-making structures” (ibid.). The political institutions aim to deliver the social arrangements through which the incompatibility of goals and demands of individuals and organizations are regulated to avoid anarchy (ibid.). Moreover, studying political cleavages is especially meaningful in the context of democracies. This is because democractic politics implies that, at some point, a decision needs to be made about something that involves different alternatives. Structures of different political cleavages provide these alternatives. If people would not gather in opposed groupings, democratic politics would not operate. It would signify that politics is of no importance to the community and is dictated by a ruling elite (Almond & Verba, 1965 in ibid.). Additionally, the significance and intensity of a cleavage grows in case it provides the members of the group “a distinctive and persistent outlook or cultural orientation that is different from that of other sectors; a raison d’être for maintaining organized segmentation” (Kenneth McRae, 1974 in ibid. p. 43).

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political actors selectively reinforce some preferences and ignore others when social divisions are translated into politics (ibid. p. 177). The different political segments carry different value orientations and therefore lead to different political choices.

His study also makes apparent that, in the process of preference formation, historical structures play an important role. He claims that political preferences are “shaped by the legacy of past political struggles, which is sedimented in the multiple layers of traditional cleavages and in the configuration of political actors associated with them” (ibid.). In addition he argues that, whether new political preferences and cleavages are formed, depends on the strength of traditional cleavages: “the more salient and the less pacified traditional cleavages are, the less new cleavages will come to the fore in politics” (ibid.).

Cleavage typologies

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Given the described theory, I concluded that there is not one valid justification or criterion or typology that prescribes what a cleavage should comprise. Therefore, my research relied foremost on the Lane and Ersson’s approach of political cleavage. The ambiguity of their criterion description of segmentation provided me the flexibility to recognize any relevant social segmentation that may influence state functioning in Afghanistan. In this sense, I was able to identify and combine all the necessary factors that lead me to a comprehensive conclusion to my research question. Yet, Lane and Ersson also argue that the identification of a cleavage needs to be done properly. According to them, a “proper choice of cleavage” entails an explanation “on the basis of theoretical arguments about interrelationships between cleavages” (ibid. p. 46). This is why my research also relied on a comprehensive narrative to infer how cleavages become relevant and influence current state functioning in Afghanistan. I have conceptualized political cleavages as the following: a division based on some criteria of individuals, groups or organizations found in society, in party systems and in governments and can occur at different levels, with a probability of conflict, and that may influence the way a country is governed.

2.2 State functioning

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State functions

The functions of a state are highly critical. First of all, by defining its territory and building institutions, the state is able to extract the needed resources from its citizens, such as taxes and soldiers for its national army, in order to survive. On the other hand, the state offers its citizens protection from outside invaders (Torpey, 1997, p. 5). Therefore, the function of the state is some sort of a contract between the state and its citizens. According to Fukuyama, there is a broad range of functions of the modern state that may vary from “protecting property rights” to “provide safety” (Fukuyama, 2004, p. 1). Additionally, the World Bank Poverty Group argues, that in most countries today, governments “aim not merely to protect their citizens, but also to ensure that even the poorest among them have access to basic services” (World Bank, 1999, p. 65). In order to do so, governments establish a broad scope of state institutions to provide in services such as education, old age pensions, safe drinking water or basic health care (ibid.). However, in case government institutions fail to deliver the services they were designed to provide, the state could grow weak. This has serious consequences for the state’s survival.

Weak States

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2.3 Research questions

As earlier described in this chapter, I built the main research question of this thesis on the theory of political cleavages: how do political cleavages influence the functioning of the contemporary Afghan state? Concluding on the theory as described above, this question can now be translated into an analysis of how the divisions found in Afghan society, that have a probability of conflict and that may influence the way a country is governed, have an impact on the performance of the governmental functions, capabilities and legitimacy in Afghanistan. However, to be able to answer the main question of my thesis, I have laid out the following sub-questions:

• How well or bad is the current performance of the governmental functions, capabilities and legitimacy of the Afghan state?

• What are the relevant political cleavages?

• Are there historical and traditional political cleavages that are still relevant?

• How does the performance of the current Afghan government mirror the political cleavages?

• Does the current political system offer a solution to conflict between political cleavages?

2.4 Causal process tracing method

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the process of “how” a certain outcome is achieved within a certain context, rather than to conclude that “A leads to B”, as is the case with the co-variational approach.

Comprehensive storyline

Drawing on process tracing, I need to put forward a ‘comprehensive storyline’, through which I am able to determine the pathway and temporal order of events that leads from cause to effect and specifies the underlying action-formation mechanisms that link conditions (ibid.). “A comprehensive storyline is the development of potentially relevant causal conditions a presented in a narrative style. […] A major goal of these comprehensive storylines is to differentiate the major structural sequences of the overall process and identify the critical moments that further shape the process” (ibid. p. 111). They thus present the bigger picture and “identify the most important steps that have led to the outcome” (ibid.). The overall process, that is presented by the narrative, is then “sectioned into different sequences that are separated by decisive situations of time that have the characteristics of ‘critical (con) junctions’ – their outcome strongly affects the further path of a causal process” (ibid. p. 111-2). In sum, CPT links causal conditions by a comprehensive story into a causal mechanism that describes the “when and how” of interrelationships that have lead to the outcome of interest (ibid. p. 80).

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cleavages and divisions, my research has also taken the cultural context into consideration and incorporates a somewhat anthropological approach.

Initial conditions and contingency

To draw inferences with the CPT method, there are three vital assumptions at the basis: 1) “almost all social outcomes are the results of a combination of causal factors; 2) there are divergent pathways to similar social outcomes; and 3) the effects of the same causal factor can be different in different contexts and combinations” (ibid. p. 80). Therefore, CPT also builds on the idea of ‘contingency’ and ‘initial conditions’. James Mahoney and Daniel Schensul describe initial conditions as “the historically specific configuration of variables at the “beginning” - or perhaps even before the beginning – of a sequence of events” (2006, p. 459). Furthermore, contingency is described as “a way of speaking about the unpredictable nature of final outcomes, given some set of initial conditions” (ibid. p. 461). It is, for example, during critical junctures, a relative short period of time, when the range of possibilities is substantial, that the actions and choices made are momentous for the final outcome. “This is when contingency becomes paramount” (Capoccia & Kelemen, 2007, p. 343). In this sense, initial conditions by themselves are unable to predict or explain final outcomes (Mahoney & Schensul, 2006, p. 459). According to Blatter and Haverland, this is why the CPT method is applied to reveal (inter) dependencies and configurations of all the different conditions that were necessary to establish the outcome of interest (Blatter & Haverland, 2012, p.91). The principle of contingency thus also implies that the inferences drawn from causal process tracing analysis highly depends on context and explains why every case study is different. The causal configurations observed in one case study may therefore not apply to another.

Contextual, necessary and sufficient conditions

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eventually lead to the final outcome. For example, in political processes, the effects of contextual conditions “lend themselves to systematic description and explanation, hence their proper understanding facilitates discovery of true regularities” (Tilly & Gooding, 2006, p. 6). Context is like “a piece of the puzzle”: an important piece of explanatory information to understand why developments take form in the way they do (ibid. p. 20-2). This is why aspects like philosophy, psychology, ideas, culture, history, place, population, technology, and general reflections could matter in causal process analysis. It could explain, for example, why certain decisions are made, why certain ideas of justice, democracy or social order may be relevant, how cultural differences may determine different political values, how chains of events in history have led to a certain outcome, and so on (ibid. p. 27-8).

Figure 1: Causal conjunctions and chains of contextual, necessary and sufficient conditions

The CPT method also identifies sufficient conditions (SC). These conditions differ from the necessary conditions as they do not rely on other factors but can independently produce the next step in the causal sequence. This makes the causal strength of a sufficient condition higher than that of a necessary condition. Blatter and Haverland explain, “a causal factor (X) is a sufficient condition if the outcome (Y) always occurs when X exists. Nevertheless, Y can also occur when X does not exist. In other words, X always leads to Y, but Y is also possible without X” (ibid. p. 92).

Causal configurations

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comprehensive narrative, the overall causal process mechanism of the outcome could encompass different sub- mechanisms of interactions, such as causal chains and conjunctions, which are “glued” together by the explanation of the story. To indicatively illustrate this, I provide a short example. In chapter 3, I elaborate about the cleavage between the Durrani and Ghilzai Pashtuns. The Pashtuns form the elite minority in Afghanistan. However, internally, this ethnic group is much divided. In figure 2, I have visualized the causal conjunction, in which several factors, glued together by a comprehensive story, have eventually produced the fact that the Durrani and Ghilzai Pashtuns oppose each other.

Figure 2: example of a causal configuration

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the throne and the Ghilzais have fought the Durranis during the rule of the Taliban, who were mostly Ghilzai Pashtuns.

2.5 Justification of the sources cited

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3 The historical and cultural narrative

This chapter provides the comprehensive storyline that enables me to do a process tracing analysis of the causal factors, and cleavages in particular, that have influenced state functioning in the past. The first section, part one of the chapter, provides a summary of the events and other conditions that have shaped political order in Afghanistan. The story begins with the initial conditions of the geographical location. The reason why I have chosen to start here is because it explains why there are so many different ethnicities in Afghanistan and how it has shaped both society and politics up till today. The historical narrative further describes the development of political order and events that are crucial to understand its current political system. The second section, the chapter gives an overview of the different segments in society by an anthropological analysis approach. Both parts of this chapter are very important to distinguish the political cleavages and their development through time.

3.1 Part 1: historical narrative

3.1.1 Geographical location: where the story begins

Afghanistan is a landlocked country that is located in Central Asia. It has a very mountainous landscape but also some large plains in the north and the southeast (Ansary, 2012; Runion, 2017, p. 5). Deserts cover much of the Afghan lands, despite the fertile soil in the regions around the waters of the Amu Darya or Oxus River in the north (ibid.). Although, geography may not be Afghanistan’s destiny, it has shaped the country’s history by the many travellers and conquerors that have once set foot on it (Barfield, 2010; Hiebert, 2013; Atwoord, 2013).

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Around 500 B.C. the ancestors of the contemporary Pashtun tribes dominated the south of the Afghan lands, while the lands of what is now Pakistan and eastern Afghanistan was under the influence of the Indian king of Gandhara (ibid; Behrendt, 2012). Around 330 B.C., Alexander the Great conquered this area. Later, under the rule of the Indian Maurya Empire cities of Bamuyan and Ghandhara flourished as great Buddhist centres. However, succeeding conquerors mostly destroyed its monasteries and other Buddhist remains (ibid; Yamada, 2002, p.109, 118; Greater Des Moines Public Art Foundation, 2012; Gall, 2006, December 6). By the time the Arabs invaded the country in the eight-century, the lands of Afghanistan contained a patchwork of different principalities such as those of the Greco-Bactrians, the Indo-Parthians, the Saka, the Kushans, the Kidarites, and the Hephthalites (Pillalamarri, 2017). The Arabs found it quite hard to overrule them, which is why it took them an estimated 200 years to spread Islam from east to west Afghanistan (ibid.).

Comparably today, Afghanistan is surrounded by very powerful states that hold special interest in the territory. In the south and the east Afghanistan borders with Pakistan, Iran in the west, and in the north with Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. Afghanistan maintains strong relationships with these surrounding powers that often try to interfere in their domestic affairs for strategic purposes.

Pakistan and India

Afghanistan is located right in the middle of a power struggle between India and Pakistan. At the centre of this conflict are the disagreements about the Kashmir areas where both countries claim parts of the land (Wagemaker, 2012, p. 92). Both Pakistan and India try to extent their power by offering development aid and financing projects in Afghanistan, also in an attempt to obstruct one another. For India, Afghanistan is highly interesting because it links with Central Asia and Iran, two regions with whom India has close trading relationships. Quite recently, a new trading route between India, Afghanistan and Iran was launched. This Kabul-Chabahar-Mumbai route limits Afghanistan’s dependence on trade with Pakistan because it can now import and export goods to India without even passing through Pakistan (Economic Times, 2017, Nov. 7). For this reason, Pakistan worries about India’s growing economic and political influence is the region.

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and different practises of Islam (Wagemaker, 2012, p. 93). Among the many tribes, the most dominant ones are the Punjabi’s (mostly found in the army), the Sindhi’s, the Baluchi’s, and the Pashtuns (ibid.). Especially the latter is of great importance for Pakistan - Afghanistan relations, which concerns the matter of a Pashtunistan. The issue dates back to the establishment of the Durand line in 1893 that had to distinguish Afghanistan from British India (now Pakistan). The border was drawn through an area inhabited by Pashtun tribes and that, as a consequence, divided whole Pashtun villages and families. Currently, the line formally separates the Pashtun tribes found in the Pakistani areas of the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) and regions in Baluchistan such as Quetta, from those tribes that live on the Afghan side of the border (Global Security.org, 2011, Nov. 7). Yet, despite the border that divides the Afghans from the Pakistani, the Pashtuns in those areas rather identify themselves as being Pashtun and with the villages or regions in which they live in (Ansary, 2012). This is because, living at the border of Afghanistan and Pakistan, in a very mountainous landscape, it is hard to tell where exactly the border is located (ibid). Therefore, Pashtun tribes living here do not recognize the Durand line. They rather favour an independent Pashtunistan based on their ethnical heritage. Moreover, at the national level, Afghanistan refuses to acknowledge the border and holds strong relationships with the Pashtuns at the other side of the frontier. The country even claims the rights of the Pakistan North-West Frontiers Province (NWFP) (Global Security.org, 2011, Nov. 7). Unsurprisingly, different parties fight over the ‘lands of Pashtunistan’. There are violent casualties in the Afghan and Pakistan Pashtun regions frequently and these areas are great breeding nests of radicalization (Wagemaker, 2012, p. 94). Yet, Afghanistan accuses Islamabad’s counterterrorism policies to be murky and fall short (Siddique, 2017, Nov. 8).

The former Soviet countries

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domestic infrastructure and corruption within these former Soviet states, it is hard to successfully combat drug trafficking and Islamist terrorism in this area (Rae, 2011). These issues thus require intrastate cooperation as the domestic security within one state relies on the security situation in another. However, the hostilities among these countries prevent such interstate responses to tackle these challenges.

Iran

Iran and Afghanistan share a history that dates back to the great Persian Empire. Up to today, Iran still exerts significant influence in Afghanistan. Iran benefits from stability in the region because a stable Afghan state would mean the return of many Afghan refugees residing in Iran and the withdrawal of the US troops (Wagemaker, 2012, p. 98). Yet, the rivalry between Sunni Islamic Saudi Arabia and Shiite Iran also takes place in Afghanistan. Therefore, Iran supports the Hazaras in Afghanistan, who are mostly Shiite Islamic, and seeks ways to limit the influence of Saudi Arabia and Pakistan in the region (ibid.). In order to do this, it even cooperates with Sunni Tajik and Uzbek parties in an attempt to counterbalance the Saudi and Pakistani support to the Pashtuns (ibid.). I will further elaborate on the ethnic groups within Afghanistan, later in this chapter.

Saudi Arabia

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muscle in their jihad against the United States and other, more liberal, convictions of Islam (ibid).

3.1.2 The origin of traditional political order

Traditional political order, as found in Afghanistan before the reign of Abdu’Rahman in 19th century, dates back to Turko-Mongolian rulers that founded dynasties all over the region from what is now modern Turkey to northern India (Barfield, 2010). This political structure was based on two characteristics: 1) the subject population was not politically or military involved, and 2) the only people who competed for power belonged to a dynastic elite of ‘professional rulers’, or foreign invaders (ibid.). Therefore, Afghan political order did not traditionally rely on popular support. It was rather a sort of contract between the ruler and the many Afghan tribes: the tribes would stand back from power but in return demanded that he would either respect their traditional rights or pay them off (ibid.).

Although subordinated groups within Afghan society may revolt against or in favour of Afghan rulers, they never regarded themselves as potential rulers (ibid.). According to anthropologist Thomas Barfield, “the emergence of a class of professional rulers was the product of a hierarchical political culture in which only men from certain elite descent groups were believed to have the right to rule or even compete for power” (ibid.). Instead of fighting tribal revolts, rulers sought to prevent them by granting tribes authority over parts of the land and the provision of feudal levies (ibid; Pillalamarri, 2015). The rulers would also work together with the local rulers and use their military capacity to protect the land from foreign invaders and provided security (ibid.). However, the only occasion in which tribal warriors would become a challenge to political order was when the state would grow weak. Yet, this would still not change the system. In case these warriors would succeed to seize power, they would immediately monopolize themselves and push rivals to the margins (Barfield, 2010). This was exactly how the Durrani Dynasty started off when Ahmad Shah Abdali “Baba” (father) became the first king of the Afghans.

Durrani absolutism

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the Persian warlord was assassinated. His Afghan general, Ahmad Khan Abdali, was then chosen as the first king of Afghanistan (Pillalamarri, 2015). His followers praised him as the Durri-i-Durran, the pearl of pearls (Ansary, 2012, p. 12). The new bloodline of royal rulers, the Durrani dynasty, those of the pearly ones, delivered kings for the upcoming 250 years (ibid.).

The story tells that Ahmad Khan was chosen as king of the Afghans through a Pashtun democratic institution called jirga (Ansary, 2012). According to Pashtun tradition, a jirga is a council of the most notable elders of the tribe who make most important decisions on the basis of consensus. Yet, Barfield argues that Ahmad Khan was appointed because of other,

non-democratic, political considerations: the rivalry among the Pashtun tribes made the Abdali Pashtuns chose Ahmad because an Abdali on the throne could remove their Ghilzai rivals in Kandahar (Barfield, 2010). Furthermore, in times when “money was an army’s mother’s milk”, Ahmad Khan had become incredibly wealthy after seizing the large treasure caravan of the Persian Nader Shah and therefore also military very powerful (ibid.). Another aspect was that the Abdali general had built a great network with a lot of connections beyond his Pashtun clan. For example, the Turkish Shi’ite Qizilbash who supported him with significant military capacity (ibid.).

Ahmad Shah transformed traditional ruling by abandoning the local feudal system and replaced it with autocracy (Barfield, 2010). As he knew that a weak state could threaten his position, he appointed his sons as governors in territories that were hard for him to control. By doing this, he replaced the ruling elites in places such as Baluchistan, Khorasan and Turkistan, who were actually defeated enemies and thus always ready to revolt. Through the appointment of his sons, he extended his power over the lands and ensured stability (ibid.). To protect the country from threats from abroad, the king also built a strong army to keep potential foreign invaders, such as the Mughals and the Sikhs, at bay (ibid). The absolutism of Ahmad Shah was, however, still limited.

Ahmad Shah Abdali

“Durri-i-Durran” (Bibliothèque Nationale de

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From a military perspective, Ahmad Shah’s government was highly centralized. In his army, Ahmad Shah even succeeded to unite the tribes more than any other ruler would be able to (Ansary, 2012, p. 15). the army provided a sense of Afghaniyat or ‘Afghan-ness’ and soldiers from all kinds of ethnic origin would fought side by side (ibid.). However, one of his descendants, Amir Abdu’Rahman, would use the term later to denote Afghanistan as “the land of the Pashtuns” (ibid. p. 88; Bleuer, 2012). From the administrative perspective, the system was more of a confederation in which most governors were practically governing autonomously in their ‘mini-kingdoms’ (Barfield, 2010). However, when the Shah died, the state grew vulnerable by the absence of its charismatic leader (Ansary, 2012, p. 32). His heirs were less towering. They all fought for the crown while the country fragmented and slipped back into civil war between Pashtun tribes (ibid.). Whereas the grandsons of the shah were fighting over power, Dost Mohammed, member another Durrani clan, declared himself king in 1826. This was the beginning of a new Durrani clan, the royal Mohammadzais (ibid.). He restored some order in the empire but failed to preserve the city of Peshawar, the traditional winter capital of Afghan kings, and lost it to the Sikh king Ranjit Singh (ibid. p. 33).

Foreign imperialist forces

Roughly between 1813 and 1917, Afghanistan found itself in the middle of the “Great Game” between Great Britain and Russia (Ansary, 2012, p. 35). Since the 18th century, European powers explored the seas (ibid. p. 36). The oceans provided access to the rest of the world. Great naval powers, such as Great Britain, mastered international trade and politics. Russia desired the same access. However, the Russian Arctic waters in the north prevented this as they were generally frozen. The only way for Russia to acquire entrance to the stage of naval power politics was to expand their imperium southwards in the direction of Afghanistan, all the way to the Arabian Sea (ibid. p. 37). This made Britain, on the other hand, quite anxious. They wanted to keep Russia as far from their precious British India as possible. The lion and the bear confronted each other at the heart of Central Asia and found another cause to fight for: control over Afghanistan (ibid.).

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armed resistance against the foreign invaders but were prohibited to engage in politics or power sharing after the battle was over (ibid.). This was aligned with tradition, as politics was something that was left for the ruling elite. Until the end of the Mohammadzai dynasty, rulers were able to maintain a grip on power without any significant rivalry coming from non-mohammadzai competitors (Barfield, 2010).

As the Afghans were able to resist foreign occupation during both wars, the British decided to change their tactics to exert their influence. At the end of the Second Anglo-Afghan War (1880), the British placed Adbu’Rahman on the throne, also a descendant of Dost Mohammad (Ansary, 2012, p. 83). With him they made some agreements: if he kept the Russians out, they would hand the country over to him as soon as Russian expansionist aspirations were not fulfilled (ibid.). In return, Abdu’Rahman demanded that he would gain full authority within the Afghan borders. Both parties settled the deal. In the upcoming years, the new king, later known as the “Iron Amir”, would reform the entire traditional Afghan political system with a (hard-handed) nation-building project (ibid. p. 88).

The land of the Pashtuns

Abdu’Rahman completely reorganized the country. He crushed every tribal revolt and even launched a policy to move entire tribal populations around Afghanistan (ibid. p. 90). By dislocating entire families, the Amir hoped to reintegrate them into the new polity he had created (ibid.). It would destroy their roots so that they would not know who to trust in the new region they had come to live (ibid.). Another nation-building aspect was that the Amir was now propagating Afghanistan as the land of the Pashtuns. As Ahmad Shah had spread out his sons over the Afghan land to extent his control, Abdu’Rahman provided the Pashtun tribes the land of other tribal groups such as the Hazara, who were driven into the impoverished sites of mountainous Hazarajat and who he later enslaved by law (Ansary, 2012; Barfield, 2010).

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(Ansary, 2012, p. 91). This was a branch of the Ministry of Interior Affairs and was highly specialized in “night arrests” were people would disappear into the night after an unexpected knock on their door (ibid. p. 97). To pay for this administration, as his entire government employee drew salaries, he taxed almost all kinds of things: animal taxes, tree taxes, taxes for marrying, and even taxes for dying (ibid.). The Amir deliberately kept the country poor and prohibited any improvement such as infrastructure and technologies that could lead to economic development (Barfield, 2010). He feared that such development could lead to foreign interference. Although the country was economically suffering, he was able to ignore this due to the financial support of the British (ibid). Moreover, he used the Islam as a means to establish political legitimacy. Abdu’Rahman claimed to be appointed by Allah to reign over Afghanistan and was therefore authorized to do as he pleased. He would accuse any rebel of acting against the will of God and punish him accordingly (ibid. p. 93). Afghanistan was no longer a secular state.

The Durand line In 1893, the Amir met with Mortimer Durand, minister to the Raj, the British sovereign in India (ibid.). The British requested a solid southern border. This border would be the margins of the era to which the British could extend their power without being pushed back (ibid.). As Abdu’Rahman was on a mission to consolidate Afghanistan, he as well needed clearly defined borders and agreed to the offer (ibid. p. 89). This decision had, however, some consequences: first of all, by drawing the Durand line, the new King

consolidated the dispute about Peshawar into a political fact. The city, where many Afghan kings lay buried, had been a matter of conflict ever since the Sikh warrior-king Ranjit Singh had captured it in the battle of 1834 (ibid. p.88). Second, by placing the border right through the traditional land of the Pashtuns, dividing villages and families, the area around the ‘Durand line’, in both Afghanistan and in Pakistan, would become subject of endless conflict.

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region. Now they had to summit that autonomy over to the government in Kabul (Barfield, 2010). Although any revolt was crushed, it did provoke a force of resentment that undermined the authority of his successors until civil war broke out after the abdication of Amanullah Shah in 1928 (Barfield, 2010).

Modernism versus traditionalism

In 1923, Amanullah Shah presented the Nizamnama or ‘the Book of Order’. A new legal code that was comparable to the one of Ataturk in Turkey and adapted codes from Switzerland, France and Italy (Ansary, 2012, p. 117). It was a secular legal book that did not even mention the Sharia (ibid.). This was very unusual in Afghanistan, especially since his grandfather, Abdu’Rahman, had made Sharia law an official part of the Afghan governmental system. Unsurprisingly, the Nizamnama made a lot of people uneasy, particularly the religious clerics that saw the book as a threat to their power (ibid.). The ulema also believed that no men could draw rules, this was a right that only belonged to God (ibid.).

In sum, the Book of Order “banned the use of torture, even by the government; forbade forced entry into any private home, even by the government; gave every citizen the right to bring charges of corruption, even against any government official; banned slavery; guaranteed freedom of religion; outlawed underage marriage; gave women the freedom to wear a burqa or chad’ri, or not, even their husbands could not force them to wear one (ibid. p. 117-8). Moreover, the King also argued that the Quran discouraged polygamy, as it was impossible to treat all wives equally. Amanullah opened new, coeducational, schools and universities and students, both men and women, could learn foreign languages and could even study abroad (ibid.).

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class (ibid.) A distant relative of Durrani Dost Mohammad and former commander in chief of the Iron Amir’s armies and counsellor of at Amanullah’s palace, Nadir, had him assassinated and became the new shah. The tradition of the governing dynastic elite was restored.

The House of Nadir Shah would also modernize Afghanistan but on a very careful and slow pace, not to damage its amiable relations with the ulema and bring his ruling into jeopardy. He later became assassinated in 1933 by one of the devotees of the former king Amanullah, whom which he had mostly killed or captured. His son Zahir succeeded him until Mohammad Daoud Khan, his Prime Minister and cousin, seized power in a coup in 1973 and made himself president of the new republic of Afghanistan (Ansary, 2012). Daoud wanted to lessen the influence of and dependence on the Soviet Union but was also assassinated by the communist party, People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA) (ibid.).

3.1.3 The end of traditional political order

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Fighting the Soviets: diversity as strength

The goal of the PDPA to break down traditional qawm-based political structure (more explained later), that had isolated villagers from the government for generations, was what incited most opposition to the regime (Barfield, 2010). Resentment among the people eventually established a resistance movement who became known as “the mujahedeen”. These were conservative and religious fighters, from different tribes, who fought against communism, modernization and later Soviet imperialism (Wagemaker, 2012, p. 105.). Although tribal competition had always been a red line throughout Afghan history, it was during the Soviet invasion that the disunity among the mujahedeen resistance turned out to be their strength (Barfield, 2010). First of all, the Soviet occupier had no one to beat that would matter and no one to negotiate with whose submission would enable him to govern (Ansary, 2012, p. 206). On the one hand, this had granted the Afghans their independence in the past because no foreign power was able to control the tribes due to its disunity. There is a Farsi proverb that says: “the glass is sharper when cut in pieces” (Koofi, 2017, Nov. 16). On the other hand, the division among the mujahedeen had made the country ungovernable, as this time; there was no overarching political system anymore.

The road to civil war: diversity as weakness

The Soviet invasion ended with the breakdown of the Soviet Union in 1989. The country was left to Najibullah Ahmadzai, a Ghilzai Pashtun who, with Soviet support, continued to reign for the upcoming two years (Wagemaker, 2012, p. 105). In 1991, the position of Najibullah also diminished when the Soviet Union fell apart. The mujahedeen overthrew him (ibid.). Now that there was no longer a royal governing elite, which had ceased to exists with the assassination of Mohammad Daoud, the disposition of Najibullah raised a very difficult question: who was going to rule? Up to this point, all mujahedeen fighters had been egalitarian; there was no hierarchy of leaders. They had been fighting the same enemy, but with that enemy gone, who was left to fight? The mujahedeen were stalemated and their disunity would lead them to civil war.

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Tajik leader of the Jamiat-e Islami, would govern for four months, while a council would be set up that would arrange new elections for the new Islamic State (Wagemaker, 2012, p. 106). However, when Rabbani became president, the political situation of Afghanistan came into a deadlock (ibid.). The struggle between Rabbani and Hekmatyar for power and the lack of governmental capacity and legitimacy, made Afghanistan ungovernable (ibid.p. 107). Instead of rebuilding state capacity, Rabbani symbolicly nullified the constitution of 1987 and reversed all modernizations by Najibullah (ibid.). This only worsened the situation by the absence of any rule of law (ibid.). The country slipped into a civil war as the different ethnic mujahedeen groups fought for power (ibid.). Because Rabbani had divided Afghanistan in nine different zones, each under control of a different mujahedeen headship, most mujahedeen chiefs were busy increasing their power in their region (ibid.).

In addition, the conflict among the mujahedeen also caused many Afghans to redefine their ethnic identity (Centlivres & Centlivres-Demont, 2000, p. 425). The communist regime had recognized ethnic pluralism and the existence of nationalities, which was part of their ‘Fundamental Principles’ (1980). Yet, these nationalities were mere a cultural and linguistic abstractions (ibid.). After 1992, when Rabbani divided Afghanistan in different territories, these nationalities became political realities (ibid.). The Jumbesh mujahedeen in the North, the Hezb-e Wahdat in the centre, Jamiat-e Islami in the Northeast, all these mujahedeen groups became regional divisions that forced small ethnic groups to “consider their integration into a broader unit” (ibid.).

The end of anarchy

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Reign of terror

The thousands of refugees that had fled the country during the Soviet invasion and mujahedeen civil war were living in refugee camps in countries such as Pakistan and Iran. As the Shiite Islamic Hazara population mostly fled to Iran, Sunni Pashtuns fled to Pakistan (Wagemaker, 2012, p. 98). Here the refugees were bound to their camps. Most of them were really poor families and the Pakistani government had no idea what to do with them (Ansary, 2012, p. 226; Wagemaker, 2012, p. 109). Afghanistan had only twenty million inhabitants when the war started. Now six million Afghans had fled the country (Ansary, 2012, p. 215, 225).

Saudi Arabia supported the madrassas, Deobandi schools, in the Pashtun populated areas in Pakistan, which led to a great influence of Wahhabism and gave Deobandi a more fundamentalist and ultraconservative character (Puri, 2009; Wagemaker, 2012, p. 99; Johnson & Mason, 2007, p. 75). The refugees in the camps were given the option to be taught in these madrassas, which would not only provide them education and an occupation during the day, but also protection and food (Ansary, 2012, p. 226-7). The students, or taliban in Arabic, were trained by the teachings of the purest form of Islam (Puri, 2009). The overall Taliban recruits emerge from the madrassas of the Pakistan’s North-West Frontier Province (NWFP), the federally administered tribal area (the Pakistan area alongside the Durand line), “the kinship networks in the remaining Afghan refugee camps”, and the students from the madrassas near Ghazni and Kandahar (Johnson & Mason, 2007, p. 73). Many of them being refugees, these Taliban were more than motivated (to return to Afghanistan and) to defeat the mujahedeen, mostly from Northern Afghanistan, who were leading the country to its destruction (Wagemaker, 2012, p. 109).

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The Afghan people that were exhausted from decades of war embraced the Taliban and hoped that they would bring back some peace to their lives (ibid. p. 109). It was as soon as the Taliban came to power and Mullah Omar became emir of Afghanistan, that the people became to realize that they had become subjected to the rulings of fear and repression (ibid. p. 110). The Taliban would institute a religious police force that would uphold the extreme interpretations of Islam in which stoning and amputation were introduced as punishments and women became awfully subordinated to men (Johnson & Mason, 2007, p. 73; Wagemaker, 2012, p. 113). Taliban jurisdiction knew no mercy and enormously brutal (ibid.). Despite the fact that the Pashtunwali is part of Taliban code of conduct, their fundamental and ultraconservative interpretation of the Sharia stands in stark contrast with the tribal life and tradition that the Afghans used to know (Centlivres & Centlivres-Demont, 2000, p. 425). Moreover, in their jihad against all interpretations other than the pure Islam, the Taliban starved an estimated 300.000 Hazaras in the province of Bamiyan and around another 700.000 in the provinces of Wardak, Ghor, and Ghazni by withholding them from the supply of grain (Wagemaker, 2012, p. 113).

The Afghan people started to resent the Taliban for their brutality, and as the socio-economic situation started to deteriorate, they turned inward into their qawms to find the safety that they couldn’t find with the state (ibid. p. 116). People only followed the sacred rules publicly, but resisted the repression behind closed doors (ibid.). What had to unify the Afghan people, the fundamentalist interpretation and execution of the Sharia further partitioned Afghan society. People turned to their qawm and warlord leader for safety and resources, which undermined any effort of state-building and unification. In addition, the non-Pashtuns resented the Taliban for the fact that they were mainly Pashtuns(Wagemaker, 2012, p. 164). Their rule had, once again, brought back Pashtun dominance. During the year of 1996, the leaders in Northern Afghanistan mobilized themselves into an alliance, the Northern Alliance (ibid. p. 114). These former mujahedeen non-Pashtuns warlords would now fight together against the Taliban.

Al Qaeda’s attack on the World Trade Centre

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(ibid. p. 123). In their jihad against the United States, Al Qaeda executed several terrorist attacks on the American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania (ibid.). The United States responded by bombing training camps in Khost and Nangarhar provinces (ibid.). Also the United Nations imposed a resolution in which it stated to be “deeply disturbed by the continuing use of Afghan territory […] for the sheltering and training of terrorists and the planning of terrorist acts” (ibid.). The Taliban ignored UN sanctions (ibid.).

On September 11, 2001, a plane hit the towers of the World Trade Centre in New York and another one hit the Pentagon. Osama Bin Laden had claimed the attacks, which unleashed the U.S. “war on terror” and their intervention in Afghanistan on October 7 (Johnson & Mason, 2007, p. 74). The American president swore to find Bin Laden, destroy Al Qaeda and remove the Taliban from Afghanistan (ibid.).

3.1.4 A new era: restoring political order

By the end of 2001, a peace conference in Bonn was held decide on a plan for Afghanistan. At the table were the delegates of the United States, the United Nations and some Afghan factions that were divided in four groups: 1) the Peshawar group, that represented the Pashtun mujahedeen that had operated from Peshawar, 2) the Cypress group, that represented ethnic groups that had been supported by Iran such as the Hazaras, 3) the Rome group, which represented the allies of former king Zahir Shah, and last but not least 4) the Northern Alliance, which represented the anti-Taliban fighters of the north (Ansary, 2012, p. 267). The Taliban and Pashtuns from the south and southeast were not invited and neither were any delegates from the Kuchi people (Ansary, 2012, p. 267; Wagemaker, 2012).

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some Afghan groups from the state-building process may have further increased the country’s contradictions.

A plan for Afghanistan

The different parties that were present all had their own interest to represent during the talks. The United Nations and the European deputies were most concerned with establishing a stable state based on human rights, democratization, and improvement of the living conditions (ibid. p. 148). The representatives of the four different Afghan groups were rather worried about the future ethnic and political power division (ibid. p.163). The Americans, having the upper hand in the negotiations, were driven by their war on terror and may have considered all state-building efforts as a means to pursue their ultimate goal: capturing Osama Bin Laden and the elimination of extremist terrorism in general from Afghan grounds (ibid. p. 148). Eventually, the delegation came up with a four-step plan that assumed a state-building strategy with a timetable and an end point (Wagemaker, 2012; Ansary, 2012).

Step 1: An interim government

The first step was to install an interim authority to fill the power vacuum. This temporary authority would include the representatives of the biggest regional ethnic communities under leadership of Popalzai Durrani Pashtun Hamid Karzai (Wagemaker, p. 147-8). An acceptable balance by the present ethnic groups at the Bonn conference in December 2001 had to solve the Afghan ethnical issue (ibid. p. 163). All represented groups delivered a vice president, which were all assigned to a different portfolio (ibid.). Yet, the ethnical groups absent at the Bonn conference were also not represented in any governmental posts (ibid. p. 157).

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of violence with the state and to subordinate the powerful warlords to the central authority. In practice this appeared to quite hard as many warlords became the new governors and joined the Afghan police but only increase their informal power (ibid. p. 166-67).

Step 2: A constitutional loya jirga

The second step of the Bonn-process was to convene a loya jirga that would provide the mandate for the preparation of a new constitution (ibid. p. 168). Although it intended to generate mandate for the new government by incorporating traditions, the use of the loya jirga for the selection of a new ruler was innovative in Afghanistan (Barfield, 2010). Although the story goes that Ahmad Durrani was elected by democratic loya jirga, this council however, only included Pashtuns that opposed the Ghilzais (ibid; Ansary, 2012). Moreover, it is also more likely that Ahmad was also chosen because of his wealth and military power. Other Afghan reigns would not even consult a loya jirga. In addition, traditionally, ordinary peasants would not even participate in politics. This was left to the ruling elite. Therefore, all together, is why the loya jirga held on the 11-19th of June 2002 was not traditional at all.

On the agenda of this jirga in 2002 were three issues: 1) choosing a head of state for the transition period of 2002 - 2004, 2) deciding on the actual form of state, and 3) approval of the list of ministers and vice-presidents (Barfield, 2010). This loya jirga comprised of 1.550 deputies from the regions and local qawms (ibid. p. 169). Although it was intended to execute the jirga according the Afghan traditional prescriptions, many of these prescriptions were violated (ibid.). Traditionally, the deputies would represent the most eminent men of the most important ethnic tribes (Ansary, 2012, p. 10). During this loya jirga, a great amount of (Pashtun) commanders were approved to the list of deputies to limit the power of the Tajiks (Wagemaker, 2012, p. 169). Moreover, as a traditional loya jirga would debate and negotiate, sometimes for days, until a consensus was reached about the most important decisions, the outcome would be unknown (Ansary, 2012, p. 272). The decision on the head of state was basically already made in advance of the loya jirga of 2002. For all these reasons, the emergency loya jirga, as it was called, was more of an institutional formality, a show to establish mandate.

Step 3: A new constitution

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jirga went not as smooth as the one before. A young female delegate, Malalai Joya, even accused “the bearded old men” surrounding her in the loya jirga to be warlords and criminals, deserving to be in jail and not to be “seated in a national assembly” (ibid.). Moreover, interest groups demanded alternations of the draft constitution until it was finally approved.

Although the new constitution bans any other jurisdiction but the rule of the Sharia, it contains relative progressive rights such as the equal rights for men and women (ibid.). Women were now equally free to men, and allowed to vote, work, and go to school (at least on paper) (ibid.). The constitution furthermore sets out the framework for the governmental organization and divides the parliament into an elected lower house and an upper house appointed by the president (ibid.). The president is chosen for a period of five years, “unless, at the end of his second term, he deems it necessary for the good of the country to stay in power, in which case he can” (ibid. p. 273).

In an attempt to address the diversity issue within Afghan society, the architects of the new constitution wrote what is now article 4: “National sovereignty in Afghanistan shall belong to the nation, manifested directly and through its elected representatives. The nation of Afghanistan is composed of all individuals who possess the citizenship of Afghanistan. The nation of Afghanistan shall be comprised of Pashtun, Tajik, Hazara, Uzbek, Turkman, Baluch, Pachaie, Nuristani, Aymaq, Arab, Qirghiz, Qizilbash, Gujur, Brahwui and other tribes. The word Afghan shall apply to every citizen of Afghanistan. No individual of the nation of Afghanistan shall be deprived of citizenship. The citizenship and asylum related matters shall be regulated by law” (Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, 2004). Moreover, it was decided that besides Pashto and Dari, other languages such as Uzbek, Turkmen, Balochi, Pashayi, Pamiri and Nurustani were added to Afghanistan’s official languages (Wagemaker, 2012, p. 177).

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conservative (intimidating) key players such as former Pashtun mujahedeen Abdul Rasul Sayyaf and the Tajik warlord Ismail Khan demanded a conservative religious high court, it was decided that there could be no law that would be inconsistent with Sharia law (ibid.). On the other hand, to meet the demands of the U.S. and the U.N., article 2 and 7 were added to the constitution that provided the freedom of religion and stated that all law should be in line with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (ibid.). Thus on paper, the constitution appeared quite liberal. However, in practice, most jurisdiction is executed conform the Sharia and custom, especially in the local villages where it is often executed in a very conservative manner. This is because most local imams can barely read. Regularly they just repeat the instructions of the strong and powerful (and very orthodox) leaders who can read the Quran (ibid. 184).

Step 4: Presidential and parliamentary elections

Finally, the fourth step was to consolidate the whole state-building process with presidential and parliamentary elections. In the fall of 2004, presidential elections were held (ibid. p. 274). Although there were relatively few examples of fraud, and the elections were deemed quite successful, there were some notes on the margin. First of all, Karzai was the only candidate that had the means to send a campaigning team to all parts throughout the country (ibid.). This gave him quite some advantage over his opponents. Second, most voters had no idea what they voted as they could not even read (ibid.). Candidates would use graphic and icons instead, which also led to much confusion. Nevertheless, 9 million people voted that day even despite of the Taliban that tried to intimidate potential voters by blowing up a bus and killed all passengers (ibid.). However, it was completed successfully and the new parliament was seated. This concluded the four-staged Bonn process. Afghanistan was now a parliamentary democracy (ibid. p. 268).

A strong centralized state

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the country has never been ruled by a majority, but by a dynasty of ruling elite instead. Never in its history has a leader of one particular ethnic group stood up to establish independence for their own ethnic group. Afghanistan has always been a land of “arranged marriages”; the groups may dislike each other, but staying united against foreign powers was more ideal than independence (ibid.). Yet, although probably not grounded, the international community feared a repetition of a Yugoslavia-like fragmentation of Afghanistan (Barfield, 2010). This lead to heated discussions about the new form of government to be chosen during the peace talks in Bonn (Wagemaker, 2012, p. 176). At the table, there were two options: a centralized or a federal state.

In 2001, the Pashtuns favoured a centralist system. This was because a centralized system would restore them as ruling elite, like it traditionally always has been. In a federalist system, they would have to share power. The non-Pashtun, almost half of the Afghan delegation in Bonn, was against a centralized presidential system, in the sense that a decentralized system as this would provide them autonomy in the regions, as it was the case in the past. Therefore, they proposed a horizontal division of governmental power with a subsidiarity model of decentralization for the regions (Wagemaker, 2012, p. 177). However, as the United States feared fragmentation so much, they felt uneasy with the thought of a decentralist state (ibid.). In a decentralised system, regional instability could lead to state collapse. State collapse would inevitably lead to an upsurge of terrorism. This was what the United State feared most of all. A centralised system would therefore accommodate their counterterrorism operation better (ibid. p. 191). A majority of the representatives in Bonn therefore decided on a centralised system of government for Afghanistan and as Hamid Karzai was a descendant of the royal Popalzai Durrani branch, he was found most suitable for the position of president. The United States hoped that the establishment of the traditional ruling elite would also re-establish stability in the country (Barfield, 2010). Although the old traditional power structures were mostly destroyed during the years of war, this aspect was regarded as politically important (ibid.). It gave him the support of all the Durranis and the Ghilzai Pashtuns would also accept any Pashtun on power.

A weak leader, a weak state

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(Wagemaker. 2012, p. 82). Still, having a good heritage and being educated was no guarantee that Karzai was also going to be a good leader.

A weak leader on top of a heavy centralized system poses a great risk. In case a centralized government fails, the consequences will be felt nationwide (ibid.). According to Barfield, a strong central state with good institutional structures can survive a weak leader. Similarly, defective state structures could work by talented leadership (ibid.). However, the first years of the new government proved that Afghanistan had neither of the two. The flaws of the state structure magnified the flaws of the ruler and vice versa (ibid.). This was for a couple of reasons: Firstly, because of Karzai’s patrimonial practices. Instead of putting his effort in building strong institutional state structures, he enhanced corruption by appointing his officials on the basis of personal relationships, which consolidated the position of warlords. Secondly, in case the misdeeds by governors were reported, he would just simply move them to another position somewhere else in the country (ibid.). Thirdly, as Karzai was a Durrani Pashtun, the Durranis in the south expected generous subsidies and political favouritism. Although Karzai was unable to grant them those subsidies, he protected their regional opium production and illegal economic practices instead (ibid.). The Pashtuns living on the uncultivable lands in the East, mostly Ghilzai, unable to produce such opium, sought financial support in Pakistan instead.

Figure

Figure 1: Causal conjunctions and chains of contextual, necessary and sufficient conditions
Figure 2: example of a causal configuration

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