The Mikocheni Report hits the nail on the head on the role of social media in developing countries:

Social media are an elite concern at this point in time, limited in their reach and somewhat unsuited for mass political campaigns except through SMS. Still, they are important for convincing the reluctant voters in the Blackberry class that as a tech-savvy politician, you might be someone they would like to do business with.

Bingo. Twitter won’t overthrow any country until it becomes an everyday part of life and Facebook isn’t really of much value if you live in a village without electricity. SMS, by contrast, is an everyday part of life in many developing countries and is playing a role in political mobilization.

The prez spoke at me tonight on Afghanistan, Iraq, and the economy. His comments on Afghanistan were less than edifying:

…next August, we will begin a transition to Afghan responsibility.  The pace of our troop reductions will be determined by conditions on the ground…

Clear. As. Mud.

Yet another discussion of whether Democracy and Islam are compatible (these folks say yes). The discussion just won’t die. I’ll keep this brief.

The countries with the largest Muslim population (Indonesia) and the third largest Muslim population (India) are democracies. Close to one in four Muslims live in these two countries. If something is true nearly 25% of the time, I’d say it is far more than a theoretical possibility.

The rejoinder to this argument is typically “well, what I really meant was Arabs.” This is true: there are no Arab democracies. Yet since Arabs account for only 20% of all Muslims, using “Muslim” as a synonym for “Arab” doesn’t work very well. Moreover, Arab is an ethnic group, not a religion, so using Islam (i.e., a religion) as an argument for why Arabs (i.e., an ethnic group) can’t be democrats doesn’t seem to make much sense to me.

Some in the US government are furious at Hamid Karzai because he is blocking attempts to investigate corruption. Others in the US government are the counter-parties to many of these bribes. These guys say the mugwumps don’t understand that bribes are the only way we can get the intel we need. We tend to call these no win situations. From now on, I think I will refer to them as Karzai’s Paradox.

Contemplating the travails of USAID is a common theme on this blog. Our analysis today is the self-inflicted wound of omission. The world’s most popular children’s television show is Sesame Street. USAID is one of the major funders of Sesame Street overseas.

Question: Why is there so little on USAID’s website about this impressive accomplishment?

Answer: I don’t know.

Elmo is stumped

A cynical take on why the Obama administration is so focused on fighting corruption in Afghanistan:

Insofar as the Afghan government refuses to deliver on the promises our [US government] money has purchased, it has to be challenged. It has to be made to understand that a failure to take at least some steps toward reform will eventually produce unpleasant consequences, as American support, already wavering, dwindles down to a few hardcore neocons gathered together in a single room. All of which is to say, Washington’s current fight against corruption is mainly about American, not Afghan, hearts and minds.

Representative Nita Lowey’s recent circus hearings on corruption in Afghanistan lend some credibility to this argument.

Recent elections that have produced coalition governments in Australia and the UK have prompted claims that Durverger’s Law, a plurality rule electoral system tends to favor a two-parties, is failing. I think claims of Duverger’s death have been exaggerated.

First, as Gary Cox observed in Making Votes Count, Duverger’s Law holds at the district level, not the national level. That a plurality system could produce two parties at the district level, but many more at the national level is perfectly consistent with Durverger’s Law.

Second, its not clear that Australia’s election was that much of an outlier. Examining the district-level returns (where we expect Duverger’s Law to hold) shows that on average there were 2.6 effective parties in its 2009 election in each single-member electoral district. This is only a bit higher than Australia’s long-term average of 2.3 and not that much higher than the US’s long-term average of 2.4.

I think its a pit premature to put a toe tag on Durverger’s Law.