Barak and I end up talking quite a bit about the misperception that states such as Somalia and Afghanistan are failed.  As Barak likes to point out, the problem isn’t that there is NO governance, but rather that it is not the Westphalian statehood model of governance we have all grown accustomed to in the US.  Here, now, almost as it was written just for us, is a blog post about similar ‘ungoverned’ areas of Yemen.  According to the authors, the correct term is ‘alternatively governed’, which I agree with, although it is close enough to late ’90s PC terminology to make me giggle.

This week, there was a big conference on Afghanistan in London. President Karzai made clear that he intends to reach out to the Taliban. The US and other governments involved in Afghanistan seem to agree (to varying extents) that a political solution with the Taliban is the only viable way to end the insurgency.

How’s that policy working out? It would appear not too well. The Washington Post reports that Taliban leaders deny meeting with Kai Eide, the outgoing head of the UN mission in Afghanistan, even though Eide reported he met with them. Ron Moreau’s recent article in Newsweek makes the Taliban’s claim credible:

The London conference was a futile exercise. Once again Washington and its allies are looking for solutions that don’t exist: a new Karzai, bribing the Taliban, negotiating with the Taliban. No Taliban leader of any stature seems to have entered into negotiations thus far. U.N. special envoy Kai Eide reportedly met in Dubai on Jan. 6 with Afghans who claimed to represent the Taliban and said they could pass messages to the Quetta Shura, but it’s unlikely that their mission was actually sanctioned by anyone in the senior leadership.

I think it’s important to ask what’s plan B? Suppose the Taliban view Karzai’s willingness to negotiate as a sign of weakness? Perhaps the Taliban think they can win, so have no incentive to negotiate. The US government has already said that there is no military solution, only a political one. The assumption here seems to be that the Taliban want to talk. I hope someone has verified this because we seem to be heading in a very dangerous direction in Afghanistan. What if the Taliban don’t want to negotiate, but want to keep fighting? What then? Do we keep fighting a war we say we cannot win? Does anybody know if the Taliban wants to negotiate?

At this point many of you may be saying “Barak, there is no such thing as the Taliban, it’s highly decentralized.” Good point. But I wasn’t the one who brought up the idea of negotiating with them. I don’t want to be overly critical, but if the Taliban does not exist as a centralized, hierarchical organization, this makes negotiations even more difficult. If it’s a decentralzied organization, Karzai will need to strike deals with lots and lots of “Taliban” who may be little more than local strongmen. Moreover, do we keep fighting those who do not want to negotiate? This would seem to require some nimble policy choices and public relations management: the US isn’t fighting the Taliban, just the bad Taliban. That will probably go over as well as New Coke.

Russia Today interviewed me about Afghanistan a few days ago. I think I need to brush up on my TV interview skills.

Actually, no this post isn’t, but there is a post at Gartner that makes the claim: the iPad is better than OLPC.

Having never even seen an iPad, I can’t say that the premise – that it is easier to use than the XO (which is pretty easy to use) will help bridge the digital divide with the elderly.

The ‘digital divide’ is the general term for the gap between those writing blog posts about the digital divide and those who won’t or can’t as easily adopt every new technology. Common reasons include price, education level, applicability of services, and lack of support infrastructure. Andrea DiMaio, the post’s author, makes an excellent point that the digital divide has an element of usability, not just availability.

What is intriguing about the iPad is not only the friendly user interface and the great Internet surfing experience, but also the likely usage patterns and the unlikely users. Many commented that this device will be carried around in the home (also depending on what accessories will be available to ruggedize it). But I would argue, it could be used by people who would never use a computer.

Read the rest of this entry…

Michael Allen at Democracy Digest picks up on a emerging wave of grass-roots protest against corruption: the zero currency note. The idea behind it is when officials ask for bribes, people should offer zero-currency notes. In particular, it’s having a lot of success in India. Why does it work?

…a number of factors contribute to the success of the zero rupee notes in fighting corruption in India. First, bribery is a crime in India punishable with jail time. Corrupt officials seldom encounter resistance by ordinary people that they become scared when people have the courage to show their zero rupee notes, effectively making a strong statement condemning bribery. In addition, officials want to keep their jobs and are fearful about setting off disciplinary proceedings, not to mention risking going to jail. More importantly…the success of the notes lies in the willingness of the people to use them. People are willing to stand up against the practice that has become so commonplace because they are no longer afraid: first, they have nothing to lose, and secondly, they know that this initiative is being backed up by an organization—that is, they are not alone in this fight.

This last point—people knowing that they are not alone in the fight—seems to be the biggest hurdle when it comes to transforming norms vis-à-vis corruption. For people to speak up against corruption that has become institutionalized within society, they must know that there are others who are just as fed up and frustrated with the system. Once they realize that they are not alone, they also realize that this battle is not unbeatable. Then, a path opens up—a path that can pave the way for relatively simple ideas like the zero rupee notes to turn into a powerful social statement against petty corruption.

This is a great way to solve the collective action problem in fighting corruption. Since it’s typically easier and cheaper for a person to pay a bribe then spending the time and money to fight the practice, self-interest deters people from fighting corruption even though most people hate it. Zero currency has notes for every country in the world.

I have been writing a lot about the internet lately, primarily as a result of Secretary Clinton’s speech last week on internet freedom. It’s important to recall, however, that technology is typically neutral. Whether it is good or bad for democracy is a function of who uses it and for what purposes. Recent violence in Nigeria makes this clear:

Text messages that urged people to murder and then burn their victims’ bodies helped stoke inter-religious violence in central Nigeria that killed hundreds of people last week, police and rights activists said overnight.

Rights activists have identified at least 145 texts that circulated on mobile phones in the central city of Jos, the epicentre of four days of Muslim-Christian clashes that authorities said killed 326 people.

“The messages helped escalate the violence in Jos in that some of them instructed people on how to kill, dispose of and burn bodies,” said leading rights activist Shehu Sani.

The texts were aimed at “spreading rumours and inflaming tensions”, said Mr Sani, who heads a coalition of 32 Nigerian civil and human rights groups called the Civil Rights Congress.

One of the messages seen by AFP read: “War, war, war. Stand up … and defend yourselves. Kill before they kill you. Slaughter before they slaughter you. Dump them in a pit before they dump you.”

Moreover, this is not an isolated incident. For example, people used SMS’s for similar purposes following Kenya’s flawed election in 2007.

The State Department seems to be taking internet freedom quite seriously. The Department’s Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor is asking for proposals for the following programs:

Mobile technology: DRL seeks proposals that support innovative technologies designed to operationally defeat or circumvent censorship and/or surveillance of all forms of content related to independent news, democracy, and human rights that is created, shared or stored on mobile devices in repressive environments…

Mobile technology/education and outreach: DRL seeks proposals that support training and networking of potential users of mobile circumvention technology that would support the promotion of democracy and human rights in repressive environments.

Protecting privacy in the documentation of human rights crises: DRL seeks proposals that support the development of technology and best practices to protect users from surveillance in documenting human rights and other abuses as they occur or in the promotion of independent news and information through the use of mobile technology or other new media tools.

Promoting organizational information security: DRL seeks proposals that promote the implementation of effective information security policies and practices amongst individual activists and civil society organizations promoting democracy and human rights.

I wonder if I could apply for funding to develop software to get around this surveillance? I am guessing the good folks at the State Department would not find this amusing. In fact, I bet if I did this, the FBI would probably want me to come on down for an informational interview. Oh well, foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, isn’t it?