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| Volume XII, Spring 2005, Number 1 |
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| ABSTRACT: The Continuing Crisis in Iraqi Kurdistan |
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| Michael M. Gunter and M. Hakan Yavuz |
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Dr. Gunter is professor of political science at the Tennessee Technological University, Cookeville; Dr. Yavuz is associate professor of political science at the University of Utah, Salt Lake City.
The purpose of this article is to analyze the Kurdish future in Iraq. An artificial state cobbled together by British imperialism following World War I, Iraq may well prove to be a failed state. The interim constitution -- known as the Transitional Administrative Law (TAL) and promulgated on March 8, 2004, for a democratic federal Iraq -- proved largely stillborn, given the majority Shiites' insistence on what they saw as their right to unfettered majority rule. Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the de facto Shiite leader and spokesman, in general felt that the TAL should not tie the hands of the Iraqi parliament elected in January 2005 and specifically objected to Article 61(c) in the TAL, which gave the Kurds an effective veto over the final constitution to be adopted later in 2005. In addition, many Arabs consider the Kurds collaborators for having supported the United States in the 2003 war. On the other hand, many Kurds see the Arabs as chauvinistic nationalists who oppose Kurdish rights because they would end up detaching territory from the Arab patrimony. The future of Iraq, moreover, has become even more uncertain, given the virulent insurgency against the interim Iraqi government and its U.S. ally.
This article analyzes the creation of modern Iraq, the belief that only a highly centralized state would lead to modernity, and how this "official nationalism" helped lead to the Kurdish problem. The article also examines the first broaching of federalism as a solution to the Kurdish problem following the war in 1991. Then it presents a theoretical analysis of federalism, whether it would work in post-Saddam Iraq, and finally examines the option of independence.
This article finds that the mono-national U.S. federal system would not be to the advantage of the Iraqi Kurds because it would dilute their very national existence and enable the Arab Shiite majority, if it so chose, to threaten Kurdish political, cultural, linguistic, and/or economic identities. Instead, the Iraqi Kurds would be favored by a multi-national or ethnic federal system because it would enable the Kurds to protect their rights better. Turkey, however, maintains that it would only accept some type of geographic, mono-national federalism, which would tend to dilute Kurdish ethnic strength and its perceived challenge to Turkey.
For any type of democratic federal system to develop requires the existence of an implicit consensus on the legitimacy of the underlying order and trust on the part of the minority that the majority will not abuse its power. Iraq has a very poor historical record on these issues. Moreover, federalism is a sophisticated division and sharing of powers between a central government and its constituent parts that would probably demand, as a prerequisite for its successful operation, a democratic ethos that has been so lacking in Iraq. This article draws a number of lessons from recent failed multi-national federal systems that may be applied to Iraq. A successful Iraqi federal system must be a voluntary arrangement, not one imposed by the United States or some other outside power; must be democratic with the full panoply of liberal democratic rights; must offer fair economic distribution; and must have strong constitutional guarantees with accepted judicial conflict-settlement procedures to prevent efforts to sabotage the federal arrangement. This article also analyzes whether Massoud Barzani and Jalal Talabani -- the two main Iraqi Kurdish leaders -- can continue to maintain their posts. The uncompromising position they have taken on Kirkuk being Kurdish is probably in part a result of their fear of losing control of the Kurdish "street."
This article concludes that it would be very difficult for the Kurds to obtain the type of federalism that will satisfy their demands. The Arabs oppose it and Iraq lacks a democratic culture that would make actual federalism work. It also analyzes the conditions under which the Iraqi Kurds might move toward independence. Turkish consent would be necessary for obvious long-term geopolitical reasons. Turkey might eventually support independence in the name of stability if a democratic federal Iraq proves impossible to achieve. Such Turkish support for Iraqi Kurdish independence would be a powerful incentive for the Iraqi Kurds not to foment rebellion among the Kurds in Turkey. Turkish candidacy for the European Union may help mellow its opposition to Iraqi Kurdish federalism or even eventual Iraqi Kurdish independence.
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