“Don’t Lose Any Countries” Is Elliott Abrams’s Advice
Democracy-promotion agenda turns to keeping existing democracies free
[“America has a positive role to play in advancing freedom and democracy in the rest of the world,” is one of the themes here at The Editors. I’ve been reporting that out by soliciting, from a variety of thoughtful voices, answers to this prompt:
What are the most promising, concrete, specific steps America can take over the next few years to promote freedom, democracy, and rule of law in other countries? What places and people would you focus on, what’s the case for making the efforts, and how, practically, do you get it done given the constraints imposed by the American political and fiscal landscape?
The first response—he was the first to file his draft, and his last name also comes first in alphabetical order, so it is the first to be published here—comes from Elliott Abrams. Abrams is senior fellow for Middle Eastern studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, for which he writes a lively blog called Pressure Points. After working for Democratic senators Henry “Scoop” Jackson and Daniel Patrick Moynihan, he served in the Reagan, George W. Bush, and Trump administrations. He is chairman of the Vandenberg Coalition and of Tikvah. His most recent book, If You Will It: Rebuilding Jewish Peoplehood for the 21st Century, is just out (October 8, 2024) from Wicked Son. I first met him in the mid-1990s when I was Washington correspondent of the Forward. — Ira Stoll]
Promoting democracy does not work as a bureaucratic project. Either it comes from the top—the president and secretary of state—or dictators and democracy activists soon see there is no muscle behind it. That means that speeches are not enough. There are almost always difficult choices between democracy goals and other U.S. interests: financial, economic, commercial, or security. If democracy always comes last, the message is clear.
That’s why George Shultz began his meetings with the Soviets with human rights matters: so they would understand human rights was a prime concern, not a marginal add-on to the agenda. It is why the Biden administration’s refusal to reimpose oil sanctions on Venezuela right now is so damaging to the democratic opposition there: they (and the regime) can see that oil company lobbying trumps support for freedom.
One focus now should be keeping existing democracies free: “don’t lose any countries.” It was tragic to see Tunisia, the last democracy in the Arab world, decline into dictatorship in the last few years, and this was not inevitable. American pressure, coordination with allies such as France and the EU, and economic aid should have been maximized—especially in a case like Tunisia where countervailing economic or security interests are almost non-existent.
Second, we should be supporting the people on the front lines of freedom: democracy activists in their own countries. That means our own efforts, and budget, should not go for conferences, beltway-bandit programs, or academic analyses. The United States government should support the activists and their organizations directly whenever possible, and indirectly or even covertly when that’s easier or safer for them. Let them make that decision.
Third, joint efforts are well worth pursuing. Authoritarian governments will listen more carefully when hearing from the United States and the EU countries and other democracies. In unity there really is strength, and the cooperation prevents those regimes from claiming that U.S. arguments are purely the product of our narrow national interests.
Fourth, when security or other interests require giving a pass to an authoritarian regime, we should say so. We should not lie. When for example the State Department concludes that Egypt’s importance on several security matters (Sudan, Ethiopia, Gaza) requires us to waive human rights standards on foreign aid, we should say exactly that. We should not smile but should wince as we announce the aid.
Unfortunately, it is rare for a president and secretary of state to follow this advice, and especially to make promoting democracy a priority. Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush did; George Shultz did. Many people think Jimmy Carter did, but he spent New Year’s weekend 1977-78 in Tehran, where his toast to the Shah was this: “Iran, because of the great leadership of the Shah, is an island of stability in one of the more troubled areas of the world. This is a great tribute to you, Your Majesty, and to your leadership and to the respect and the admiration and love which your people give to you.”
Joe Biden and Antony Blinken have mouthed the words; Blinken as his tenure began said “President Biden is committed to a foreign policy that unites our democratic values with our diplomatic leadership, and one that is centered on the defense of democracy and the protection of human rights.” But it has not been so, as the Egypt and Venezuela cases demonstrate.
Donald Trump did not mouth the words, and adopted a transactional approach to foreign policy where democracy promotion when present was incidental to economic or security goals.
Regardless of the 2024 election result, it is most likely that democracy promotion will not be high on the White House agenda. As so often has been the case, that will leave Congress as the last redoubt—conditioning various forms of U.S. assistance on human rights performance and preserving the kernel of a democracy promotion policy for another day. And another administration.
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Promoting democracy is of huge importance, but one needs to be careful about programs that "support the activists and their organizations directly whenever possible, and indirectly or even covertly when that’s easier or safer for them".
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's support for anti-Putin activists in Russian legislative elections was problematic, and the covert efforts of Russia afterwards to interfere with American elections are likely a consequence of Clinton's meddling. But supporting election monitoring organizations was a good move. The efforts of such groups illustrated that in an election that was properly scored Putin would have had only minority power in the legislature. Discouragingly, the democracy advocates would have had only a small number of seats, with the main underreporting being votes for communists and fascists. Democracy doesn't always give results that we like.
The efforts of the United States to support "pro-democracy" groups in Israel, whose efforts translated into anti-Likud election interference, were unwise.
Abrams has the right values, but we need to be careful about tactics. I met Abrams in 1980 at a Reagan campaign event in the living room of a large apartment on the West Side of NYC. Abrams was one of the speakers. Abrams and I were both part of a large number of supporters of Senator Scoop Jackson who pivoted to Reagan in 1980.