Afghan Glee

In yet another post-election good news story, we get the report that things aren’t so bad in Afghanistan after all. At least, not according to the people who live there.

Despite a raging pro-Taliban insurgency, the people of Afghanistan say they are optimistic about the future, satisfied with their young democracy and rank security low on their list of everyday concerns, according to a survey out today.

In what it is billing as the widest opinion poll conducted in Afghanistan, the non-profit, San Francisco-based Asia Foundation surveyed 6,226 Afghans 18 and older in person in 32 of the country’s 34 provinces over the summer.

Polling couldn’t be conducted safely or reliably in two areas: southern Afghanistan’s strife-torn Zabul and Uruzgan provinces, which together account for 2.3% of the country’s population. The survey’s margin of error was +/-2.5%.

This is at odds with Nancy Pelosi’s appraisal that the real war is happening there.

Some points from the article:

•Afghans were more than twice as likely (44% to 21%) to think their country was headed in the right direction, rather than the wrong direction; 29% had mixed feelings. Still, the optimists were down from 64% in a smaller Asia Foundation survey conducted in 2004.
…
•77% said they were satisfied with the way democracy is working in Afghanistan.

•Only 6% ranked security as the biggest problem in their area, behind unemployment (18%), electricity shortages (12%), poverty (10%), a weak economy (10%) and scarce water supplies (9%). Sixty percent said they rarely or never worried about their own safety. However, 22% said security was the biggest problem facing the nation.

•54% said they were more prosperous than they were under the Taliban, which governed Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001; 26% felt less prosperous.

•42% said corruption was a major problem in their daily lives, and 77% called it a major national problem; 51% of those who dealt with public health care officials reported paying bribes for health service.

•Afghans had contradictory attitudes toward political tolerance: 85% said the government should allow peaceful opposition, but 64% said they would not allow political parties they personally opposed to meet in their areas.

•Nearly one-tenth of men and one-eighth of women felt that women should occupy most political positions in a country where women traditionally have been barred from schools and jobs.

•87% said they trusted the Afghan national army, and 86% said they trusted the Afghan national police.

That second point is enormous. Democracy isn’t “plug and play”. It takes some time to get a stable democratic government in place, especially where one has never existed in the history of the world. That Afghans are so overwhelmingly pleased with what they have thus far is simply astounding, considering they’ve only just begun.

What’s needed here is the deft hand the President has used thus far. Hopefully, Speaker Pelosi will resist the chance to meddle in something that seems to be working pretty well.

(h/t: Jonah Goldberg)

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Category: Fighting the Islamists