University of Amsterdam Department of Political Science -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

State & Nation Building in Afghanistan

Master Thesis: Ofran Badakhshani Supervisor: Dr. H. Matthee Second reader: Drs. Maaike Warnaar Date: 20 September 2011, Amsterdam

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Abstract The troubled history and the complex social composition of Afghanistan have undermined many politico-social processes, to which state building and nation building are no exception. To explain the failure of both nation building and state building, from external to internal factors, there are many causes to be identified. This thesis however, is convinced that one of the most crucial and yet missing element in the process of state building, was and is lack of a common identity and also a homogenous culture between inhabitants of Afghanistan. In other words, the absence of a coherent nation and national connectedness and solidarity, is the main cause of state failure in Afghanistan. This thesis is an effort to explain why both state building and nation building has failed in Afghanistan and to justify the priority of nation building to state building.

Keywords: Afghanistan – State Building – Nation Building – Nationalism – Ethnic Conflict

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Table of contents

Introduction  ........................................................................................................................  5  Main  questions:  ...........................................................................................................................  6  Sub-­‐questions:  .............................................................................................................................  6  

1.  Methodology  ...................................................................................................................  6  

2.  Conceptualisation  .........................................................................................................  6  2.1  State  ..........................................................................................................................................  6  2.2  State  Capacity  ........................................................................................................................  7  2.2.1  Transformative  capacity  ............................................................................................................  8  2.2.2  Relational  capacity  ........................................................................................................................  9  2.2.3  Infrastructural  and  distributive  capacity  ............................................................................  9  

2.3  What  is  state  failure  ............................................................................................................  9  2.4  The  rise  of  State  .................................................................................................................  11  

3.  Theoretical  framework  ............................................................................................  13  3.1  Approaches  to  state  building  ........................................................................................  13  3.1.1  State-­‐Building  models  ..............................................................................................................  14  3.1.2  Responsive  State-­‐Building  .....................................................................................................  14  3.1.3  Unresponsive  State-­‐Building  .................................................................................................  15  3.1.4  other  approaches  .......................................................................................................................  16  

3.2  Approaches  to  nation  building  .....................................................................................  18  3.2.1  Origins  of  Nation  and  Nationalism  .....................................................................................  18  3.2.2  Defining  the  Nation  ...................................................................................................................  19  3.2.3  Transition  to  an  age  of  nationalism  ....................................................................................  20  3.2.4  Modernization  vs.  Social  constructivism  .........................................................................  22  

4.  Nation  building  in  Afghanistan  ..............................................................................  23  4.1  The  rise  of  modernism  and  nationalism  ...................................................................  23  

5.  State  building  in  Afghanistan  .................................................................................  28  5.1  Ethnic  composition  ..........................................................................................................  28  5.2  Social  and  political  structure  ........................................................................................  29  5.2.1  Religious  diversity  .....................................................................................................................  30  5.2.2  Afghan  tribalism  .........................................................................................................................  30  5.2.3  The  Pashtunwali  .........................................................................................................................  31  

5.3  State  building  in  Afghanistan:  the  origins  ................................................................  32  5.3.1  European  Imperialism  and  its  impact  on  state  formation  in  Afghanistan  ........  33  5.3.2  Afghanistan:  from  anarchy  to  absolute  monarchy  ......................................................  35  5.3.3  Administrative  reforms  ...........................................................................................................  37  5.3.4  Legal  and  social  reforms  .........................................................................................................  38  5.3.5  Political  reforms  .........................................................................................................................  38  

6.  Recent  state  building  and  the  fragmentation  of  Afghanistan  .....................  40  5.1  The  North  ............................................................................................................................  43  5.2  The  Northeast  ....................................................................................................................  43  

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5.3  The  West  ..............................................................................................................................  44  5.4  The  East  ................................................................................................................................  44  5.5  The  Hazarajat  .....................................................................................................................  44  

7.  Analysis  .........................................................................................................................  45  

8.  Conclusion  ....................................................................................................................  48  

Bibliography  .....................................................................................................................  50  

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Introduction To what degree is nation building a necessary condition for state building in Afghanistan? The question of nation building and state building in Afghanistan has kept my mind occupied for some time now. Being a citizen of Afghanistan, having access to its ancient and contemporary history, I kept asking myself questions like, ; why did we fail to build a united nation? Why did we fail to build a functioning state? Why did we fail to modernize, and many more questions of this kind. In my bachelor period I started with the first question. I did a small qualitative research, an effort to answer the question, why did the process of nation building fail in Afghanistan? My conclusions as answer to that question, gave birth to many other questions and doubts about the course of politics, nation building and state building in Afghanistan. When I joined the Master course at the University of Amsterdam, for the sake of a better and profound understanding of their dynamics and working, I chose subjects related to state, ethnic conflict, nation and nationalism. My roots was not the only deciding factor, the position of Afghanistan as an ill-functioning state within international community of states on the one hand and the involvement of international community with Afghanistan on the other, too affected my choice to do this research. In all humbleness this thesis will be an effort to make a small scientific contribution to the theories of state and nation building in multi-ethnic societies like that of Afghanistan. Another point worth mentioning is my choice over the period of state building in Afghanistan. Firstly I will focus on the very first efforts of state building during Amir Abdul Rahman (1880-1901) and his successor and son Habibullah Khan (1901-1919), later in part five I will justify, why this period can be seen as the first brick of state building in Afghanistan. Secondly in order to make a comparison and to show how contemporary state building is affected and how state failure is caused by the old approaches to state building. My choice over the period I discuss is greatly affected by the vagueness of contemporary history of Afghanistan in providing a satisfying answer to the question, when and what went wrong with state building and nation building in Afghanistan? Between the old and recent state building, there seems to be a gap. The aim of this thesis is not to fill that gap. The aim is, to show old state building has affected the current lack of state building and that effect led to the fragmentation of the country. The thesis has the following structure. The first part contains a small description of the method used in this research. Second comes conceptualization where the core concepts of state and nation are defined. The third part is the theoretical framework, where approaches to state building and nation building are discussed. The fourth part focuses on nation building in Afghanistan. The fifth part is devoted to state formation in Afghanistan. Sixth part covers some recent state building in Afghanistan followed by an analysis where the theories are compared and discussed. The last part contains a conclusion where the main question of this thesis is answered.

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Main questions:

The main question of this thesis is, to what extent is nation building a necessary condition for state building in Afghanistan?

Sub-questions:

What do we know of state building? What do we know of nation building? Why did nation building fail in Afghanistan? What do we know of state building in Afghanistan? Why did state building fail in Afghanistan?

1. Methodology This thesis is a qualitative research on state building and nation building in Afghanistan. It’s an effort to discuss and analyse some theories of state building and nation building and to draw an image of how state building and nation building in Afghanistan took off, what were and are the challenges that both projects faced and how successful and effective both state building and nation building have been. Furthermore, the thesis makes use of secondary literature and resources of both Western, non-western and Afghan scholars, reviews and critically discusses the historical events in the course of state building and nation building in Afghanistan. In order to provide a satisfying answer to the main question of this research, I have divided the thesis in different parts. As briefly mentioned in the introductions, I firstly discuss a few approaches to state building and nation building to have a theoretical ground. Second, I focus on the process of nation building in Afghanistan and how this process failed. I discuss this before state building, because I believe that in multi-ethnic societies like Afghanistan, only through successful nation building state building can be achieved. Consequently I will discuss state building in two different periods in Afghanistan in order to make a comparison to identify underlying causes of state failure. Finally in the seventh part of this thesis I will critically discuss the theories and approaches to both state building and nation building and how these are applied in Afghanistan on the one hand and on the other how lack of nation building has greatly contributed to state failure in Afghanistan. Besides that, every part of this thesis contains a small conclusion in which one of the sub-questions will be answered. The summoned and compared answer to those sub-questions will too contribute to answering the main question of this research.

2. Conceptualisation Before coming to theories and approaches to state building, it’s important to define the core understandings of state building.

2.1 State

Given its complex and multi-dimension nature, it is hard to provide a comprehensive definition of the state. Many different answers have been provided to the question, ; what is a state? The most basic definition of the state upon which scholars have come to agree involves a territory with defined borders that is populated by a certain

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homogeneous or heterogeneous population, who do or do not share the same cultural values and norms and who are or not of the same ethnic or cultural background. Another point of agreement between the scholars is that the state is a political entity. Therefore, the state is also defined in terms of political sovereignty, which refers to the independence of a given country or political entity from any external force in regulating its domestic affairs. Or as Wang argues, a sovereign state is in possession of “the monopoly of legitimate violence, absolute supremacy over its internal affairs within its territory, absolute right to govern its people and freedom from any external interference in the above matters” (Wang 2004: 473). This is however not the only definition of the state. The functionalist theorists have come to define state as “a place, an arena, in which the struggle of classes, interest groups and individuals are expressed and institutionalized and implemented” (Mann, 1984: 110). Less functionalist scholars like Mann on the other hand argue that, there are at least two dimensions to states that deserve wide attention in order to understand its dynamics and nature. Those are the domestic and international dimensions. The former refers to the economic, ideological and military aspect of the state and the later to its relationship with other internationally recognized and independent states. The definition provided by Wang underlines the coercive and the administrative capacity of the state. What state capacity is, will be discussed later on. Even though this ‘Weberian’ focus on state is not irrelevant, as Theda Skocpol rightly argues, in order to understand the changing dynamics of state, “we must often look above and below the level of historic nation-states to see the most fascinating state-building going on in our time” (Skocpol, 2008: 121). For Michael Mann, The state is merely an embodiment of physical force in the society. According to Mann, “the state is not an arena where domestic economic/ideological issues are resolved, rather it is an arena in which military force is mobilized domestically and used domestically and, above, all, internationally” (Mann, 1984: 110 – 111). Due to the messiness of the concept, the state remains a disputable term. In other words, should one define the state in its institutional terms or in terms of its function? Since there are different levels of analysis it is hard to provide a definition of the state, which could embraces all of its aspects. Briefly, as discussed above, one can in very general terms define the state as an institution, which has the supreme right to govern over its people and territory and has a monopoly of violence to enforce domestic order and gain international recognition. What is evident is that there are different degrees of being a well functioning state, some states are more successful then others. In other words some states have succeeded in becoming a well functioning institution while others have failed. Therefore, after having defined state capacity, in what follows this thesis will shed some light on weak, failed and failing state.

2.2 State Capacity

What is state capacity? The most basic answer to this question involves the ability of a state to form and execute policies and to enforce law through legal means, that is the

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legitimate monopoly of violence. But the discussion is much more complex and deeper. According to Robinson (2008) state capacity is defined and understood by two approaches, a ‘command-hierarchy’ approach and ‘influence-network’ model. The former refers to the hierarchical relation of state and society. Within this model there are clear and evident boundaries between governmental organizations and the wider society. “In this approach, policy formation operates as a state-led linear process defined by distinct states of agenda setting and implementations” (Robinson, 2008: 568). The second model emphasises the density of networks and the inter-organizational relations on the one hand and the interdependence of the state and other interest groups on the other. In this model states policies are an outcome of the “complex interactions between networks of actors in the state and society, with an emphasis on the quality of outcomes as the principal determinant of accountability” (Robinson, 2008: 568). According to Robinson, the conventional approaches to state capacity are suffering from many errors. He believes that in the era of globalization state are compelled to develop new capacity in order to cope with the changing nature of politics and inter-state relations. Robinson consequently argues that, there are four exogenous forces that challenge the traditional approach to state capacity. These are, Globalization, Democratization, Liberalization and Securitization or the so-called ‘New Security Agenda’. One can of course question the nature of this distinction, and argue that the later three terms are different words for or a consequence of Globalization, but that debate requires more time and space. Ones agreement or disagreement with the distinction made by Robinson is a different issue, but what is important, is the fact that states are facing challenges from the transformation of ‘command-hierarchy’ approach to the ‘influence-network’ model. Within the new global order, non-governmental actors are gaining more and more power and therefore, states are bound to develop new capacities in order to maintain their power within the global system. Besides the conventional capacity of state, there are four other capacities that states either posses or need to develop. These are ‘Transformative capacity’, ‘Relational capacity’, ‘Infrastructural capacity’ and ‘Distributive capacity’. Bellow, each of these capacities, except for distributive capacity, will be discussed.

2.2.1 Transformative capacity

According to Kanishka Jayasuriya, the transformative capacity of a state, refers to a set of attributes or “key endowments that a state or public agency may possess to give it a set of transformative powers over policy and structure” (Jayasuriya quoted in Robinson, 2008: 576). In other words, it refers to the ability of policy elites to pursue national policies and ‘economic adjustment policies’ to evoke cooperation with organised and economic interest groups to transform the industrial economy. Furthermore, transformative capacity refers to the ability of the state to enter “close cooperation with business groups in creating the conditions for investment and sustained capital accumulation” by substituting import and by promoting export (Robinson, 2008: 577).

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2.2.2 Relational capacity

As a consequence of the structural transformation of the global economy, national governments have limited power to pursue transformative ends and objectives. That is to say, the international environment where states operate has come to change. And as a response to that change the state came to develop a new form of capacity. Within this context, relational capacity contains “the facilitation of strategic capacity of different agencies rather than in specific institutions arrangements between state and non-state actors” (Jayasuriya quoted in Robinson, 2008: 576). Put differently, relational capacity refers to the ability of the state to reach an advanced stage of development and to achieve “a high degree of integration into the global economy, which includes for the most part the advanced capitalist economies” (Robinson, 2008: 578).

2.2.3 Infrastructural and distributive capacity

According to Evans, (1995); Weiss and Hobson, (1995) infrastructural capacity is associated with the ability of the state to penetrate society in order to extract resources and to evoke “cooperation from organised interest groups in the pursuit of collective goods” (Evans, Weiss and Hobson quoted in Robinson, 2008: 577). But it mainly refers to the capacity of a state to collect tax and to spend that in the pursuit of public goods, rather than the benefit of a particular political elite or a dominant social class within the society. The distributive capacity of the state, which according to some scholars is a distinctive type to state capacity, refers to the ability of the state to distribute the economic gains over a wider populous. In sum, state capacity refers not only to the conventional definition of capacity, which entailed the monopoly of legitimate force and enforcement of the rule of law. As discussed above, state capacity is a much wider concept within which, transformative, relational, infrastructural and distributive capacities are the necessary attributes for a state to develop and to maintain its power within the changing international environment.

2.3 What is state failure

Like the state itself, state failure too remains a disputed concept and therefore hard to define. In general the failure of the state is measured in terms of its effectiveness. Meaning to what degree is a state, taken the above definitions into account. In the State Building literature, the effectiveness of the state refers to its ability to govern over its people, enforce rules and maintain domestic order independent of any external interference is termed as state capacity. According to Bates (2008) state failure refers to collapse of the state. By the collapse of the state he means two things. The first is the transformation of the state into an instrument of predation. “As states fail, (…), those in power use the state to promote their own interest, rendering others insecure” (Bates, 2008: 2). The second is the loss over a monopoly of violence. As a result of the second Bates argues, “Political competition takes place between groups bearing arms. Political parties become political militias as elites transform them into military bands” (Bates, 2008: 2). One should be

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aware of the fact that not every transformation of the state is state failure. Revolutions and regimes changes do sometimes too transform the state, but the difference is, a revolution ends in a new political order, whereas state failure yields disorder only. The important question that remains unanswered is what causes state failure? Bates (2008) argues that there are three major themes that play a role in the process of state failure, namely economic factors, ethnicity and democracy. Scholars who study the impact of the economic factors focus on poverty, natural resources and public revenues. According to Sambanis and Hegre (2006) there is an important relationship between poverty and political disorder. They argue, “the lower the per capita income, the greater the likelihood of civil war” (Sambanis and Hegre quoted in Bates, 2008: 4). In this discussion Bates (2008) refers to something crucial. He argues that it may not be the poverty of the citizens, but rather the poverty of the state that causes political disorder. For instance when the state fails to collect taxes, it fails to pay her civil servants or her armed forces. And when those in power do not posses over the means to induce influential groups, military forces and elites to remain faithful, then the state starts to fragment. As a consequence of this disability, civil servant might turn to corruption and the military forces might use their weapons to pay themselves. The same applies to natural resources. It is not the lack but the availability of natural resources that lead to political disorder. The argument made here is that, “the rebel groups seek wealth and seize control over resources to finance their operations”. Since rebels are not the only competing groups, states that contain valuable natural resources are more likely to become violence torn. The second source of state failure is argued to come from the social composition of the society. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, from the East Europe to the clashes between Hutu and Tutsi1, from Kenya and Liberia are all examples of wars fought on basis of ethnic backgrounds. Collier and Hoeffler argue that “higher level of ethnic diversity yield a greater likelihood of civil war” (Collier and Hoeffler quoted in Bates, 2008: 6). This is because ethnic groups quarrel, be it over the control of trade, natural resources or the distribution of political power. Bates (2008) on the other hand argues that ethnically diverse society are polarized and therefore they are less likely to reach agreements to choose public policy or finance public goods. And this will consequently lead to as he puts it, ineffective bureaucracy or weak state. But it is not only the diversity and the polarization of ethnic groups that leads to civil war and therefore, to political disorder. Ethnic concentration in terms of one large ethnic group possessing all political means of the state might as well trigger ethnic conflict. When one group becomes dominant the others might reasonably fear the ‘privatization’ of the state and the likelihood of being excluded from the benefits that power provides in the future. Some scholars even argue that there is a direct link between state failure and rule by the minority. When minorities rule, “they often prepare the                                                                                                                          1 Hutu and Tutsi are an ethnic group in Central Africa. Historically they were often referred to as the Watussi or Watusi. They are the second largest population of peoples in Rwanda and Burundi, the other two being the Hutu (largest) and the Twa (smallest).

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ground for state failure” (Bates, 2008: 7). The argument put forwarded by G. P. Miquel (2005) provides a similar explanation. He argues that it is in the interest of those in power not to use the power to render the lives of those who lack it, for that would lead the downfall of the ruling elite itself. Instead they seek to inspire hatred to “lock in the loyalty of their supporters, discouraging defection and eliciting political vigilance” (Miquel quoted in Bates, 2008: 7). Finally some scholars have come to argue that besides the economic and social factors, democracy too plays an important role in explaining state failure. Within this debate most arguments originate from the well-known ‘Polity index’, “which assigns low numbers to autocracies, high numbers to democracies, and intermediate values to ‘partial’ or ‘unconsolidated’ democracy.” (Bates, 2008: 8). The argument here is mostly based on the intermediate democracies, which are young. For some of these democracies were created as a result of decolonization and some were created at the end of Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union. Therefore, if the new emerging democracies are less stable in comparison to the old ones, the relationship between the regime type and political conflict is more likely a result of their age rather than their political characteristics. State failure is also measured in terms of the state functionality. One of the most important functions of the state is the provision of public goods that other private organizations cannot or, are less able to provide. According to Robert Rotberg (2002) there are three crucial areas of service provision where states need to focus on. First and foremost is “the provision of national and individual security and public order” (Rotberg, 2002: 131). This includes the secure right of property possession and inviolable contacts grounded in an enforceable code of law. The second is the provision of “organization and regulation of logistical and communications infrastructure” (Rotberg, 2002: 131). The argument here is that a state without a well-maintained system of commerce and information will not be able to serve its citizens fully. Third is the provision of “basic medical care and education” (Rotberg, 2002: 131). Rotberg argues that when states fail to provide these services to their citizens, failure is inevitable. Briefly, the study of state failure focuses on the collapse of political regimes. State failure is marked by state predation and political disorder and the disability of states to provide public goods as discussed above. And finally state failure may be caused by economical, social as well as political reasons in terms of regime type and democracy.

2.4 The rise of State

How did the state come about? Being aware of limited time and space, one will not do just discussing the origins and rise of the state within a few pages, but in order to provide the reader with some background information, in what follows a few theories of state formation will be discussed. The urge to explain the rise of states comes from changes in the ideas and perceptions about the state. The classical thinkers like Aristotle and Plato conceived of the state a something natural. It were only the later generations of thinkers who were exposed to different forms of organizations as villages, tribal communities and bands,

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that challenged the classical understanding of the state and started to ask question about the origins and the formation of states. In doing so, many theories were developed. The first of such theories is, the Voluntaristic Theories of state formation. According to Carneiro (1970) these theories employ that at a certain time of their history, peoples of different independent communities for rational reasons gave up their individual sovereignty joining other communities to form bigger political entities that one could call state. The Social Contract theory, associated particularly with Rousseau is an example of such a theory, though Carneiro finds it nothing but a ‘historical curiosity’. The widely accepted, yet modern Voluntaristic theory, Carneiro argues, is what comes to term as the ‘Automatic Theory’. What this theory employs is that, “the invention of agriculture automatically brought into being a surplus of food, enabling some individuals to divorce themselves from food production and to become potters, weavers, smiths, masons and soon, thus creating an extensive division of labour” (Carneiro, 1970: 733). And it was this occupational specialization the brought independent communities together and through a process of political integration states were formed. A second effort to explain the rise of states comes from the Coercive Theories. The advocates of these theories proclaim, “A close examination of history indicates that only a coercive theory can account for the rise of the state. Force and not enlightened self-interest, is the mechanism by which political evolution has led, step by step, from autonomous villages to the state” (Carneiro, 1970: 734). Another argument in favour of coercive theories is made by Oppenheimer who states, “state emerged when the productive capacity of settled agriculturists was combined with the energy of pastoral nomads, through the conquest of the former by the latter” (Oppenheimer quoted in Carneiro, 1970: 734). Put in very general terms, what these theories claim is that, all political communities of the modern type, that is the states, owe their existence to successful warfare. Carneiro (1970) who is critical of both Voluntaristic and Coercive theories recognizes warfare as one explaining factor for state formation but not a sufficient one. Therefore, he rightly raises the question, under what conditions does war lead to state formation? For he believes that war making did not everywhere lead to state formation? For the sake of argument he makes a comparison between the Amazonian and the Peruvian villages of old times. One of the conditions he puts forward is scarcity of land. Where as in Amazonia villages that were involved in a fight and had to flee their land, they simply found land elsewhere. The wars in Amazonia were mostly fought over revenge than for economic reasons. Whereas in Peru, “with increasing pressure of human population on the land, however, the major incentive for war changed from a desire for revenge to a need to acquire land” (Carneiro, 1970: 735). This had two major consequences. Firstly the causes of war was economic and therefore, more frequent and more intense. Secondly, in contrast to Amazonia where the inhabitants of a defeated village had the possibility of settling down elsewhere, the defeated villagers in Peru had only grim prospect. The price they paid was political subordination to the victor. And only under this circumstances warfare led to creation of bigger communities, which

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deserved to be called states. Besides this political evolution, the theory of Environmental Circumscription puts also a social condition forward. The theory entails that, there were important social factors too that led to the creation of political communities. This argument comes from Napoleon A. Chagnon, who studied the Yanomamö Indians of Venezuela. The argument made here is that due to high density of population the inhabitants “tend to impinge on one another more, with the result that warfare is more frequent and intense in the centre than in peripheral areas.” (Chagnon quoted in Carneiro 1970: 737). In addition to this, in comparison with the villages in the periphery it is more difficult for the villages in the centre to escape attacks, their ability is restricted. This, Chagnon argues, led to offensive and defensive alliances building between the villages. Even though the villages remained autonomous, “those Yanomamö subject to social circumscription have clearly moved a step or two in the direction of higher political development” (Carneiro, 1970: 737). Briefly, there are of course many other theories that have tended to explain the success and failure of state formation. This classical approach to state formation suffers from many shortcomings, since besides the arguments put forward by both Voluntaristic and Coercive theories; there are many other factors like, cultural and geopolitical, that could explain the rise of the state.

3. Theoretical framework This chapter deals with theories and approaches to state building. After having discussed different approaches to state building, the question what do we know of state building will be answered.

3.1 Approaches to state building

Before discussing different approaches to state building, it’s important to understand state building itself. Therefore, what does state building mean? According to Alan Whaites (2008), state building or state formation is a process through which states enhance their ability to function better. But that’s of course the process by which a less functioning state becomes a well functioning organization. In other cases where are state yet to be developed, state formation or state building refers to the process by which peoples or territories become to identify themselves with distinct ‘organizational structures’. These distinct structures, “are determined by an underlying political settlement; the forging of a common understanding, usually among elites, that their interests or beliefs are served by a particular way of organizing political power” (Whaites, 2008: 4). Understanding state building first and foremost means understanding state society relations. Since essential to the process of state building is some form of legitimacy as Whaites rightly suggest, so finding moral grounds as in tradition or popular support are of great importance for the continuation and acceptance of state building and state formation. Consequently “claiming legitimacy and nurturing loyalty usually involves some attempt at nation-building” (Whaites, 2008: 5). Even though successful

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nation building is no guarantee for easy state building, it is important to foster a common identity among the governed to create a sense of unity. Another important factor in state building is the involvement of internal and external media, promoting human right values and gaining international support.

3.1.1 State-Building models

Based on the given definition to state building and state failure above, one can argue that state building is the outcome of state society relations. The first model of state building, which is termed as Responsive State-Building follows this approach.

3.1.2 Responsive State-Building

According to this model, state building does not occur at a certain stage of development. State building is rather the outcome of a wide and various policy and non-policy factors within a given society. Responsive State-Building involves three necessary areas of progress. These are, Political Settlement, Survival Functions and Expected Functions, which will be discussed accordingly. According to Whaites (2008) the development of a political settlement is one of the necessary conditions for the responsive model of state building to take hold. But what is political settlement? Some scholars prefer to use the term elite consolidation, which has come to mean a process, which persuades elites to coexist peacefully. Whaites argues on the other hand that political settlement is not the same as elite consolidation. Instead, political settlement is “much deeper, often unarticulated, understandings between elites that bring about the conditions to end conflict, but which also in most states prevent violent conflict from occurring” (Whaites, 2008: 7). Political settlement comes about because of self-interest or is rooted in shared values, as religion or ideological convictions. A first step in forming political settlements is the emergence of a group strong enough to impose or negotiate settlement. Therefore, political settlement is the ability of a group to threaten state structures either for the security of the involved group, or for the sake of opportunity to become the government and administer the existing structures. The second necessary area of progress for responsive state building is, Survival Functions. As the name suggests, these are a set of “core functions essential to the survival and strength of the institutional framework of the state” (Whaites, 2008: 7). Why are these functions important? When political settlements emerge, they either come with new structures or dominate the already existing ones. In either case, three core competences must be developed to deal with the political process and order within the society. The three competences include, security, revenue and law. In other words, the monopoly or at least control of violence, the ability to raise taxes and the capability to rule by laws are the necessary functions that a state should develop in order to cope with the political challenges and changes. As suggested by the Crisis States Research Centre, “security requirements trump all other development needs” (James Putzel quoted in Whaites, 2008: 8). That means of all these survival functions; security greatly matters for state-building to take hold. Also seen symbolically, for the achievement of internal order

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and external recognition, security is a necessary condition to establish credibility and to demonstrate that someone is in charge. A well functioning taxation system also matters for several reasons. Firstly, when states raise revenue, through tax a linkage is created “with society and helps generate expectations of accountability. Domestic revenue can also create confidence that the state has financial sustainability” and therefore is not dependent on foreign aid or commodity prices (Whaites, 2008: 8). Tax and security are crucial means for the viability of state structure. Governing by the rule of law as the last competence remains a scholarly debate. The advocates of an institutional approach to state building claim it to be a necessary condition for the responsive state building to develop, but others are content with the acknowledgment of its importance. Briefly, what makes the survival function so necessary is the fact that, these functions provide incentives for the state to engage with the society and as a consequence of that engagement state building is stimulated in different levels of the society. The third area of progress needed for responsive state building is, “the achievement of expected level of functionalities” (Whaites, 2008: 9). What Whaites means by expected functions is basically the expected behaviour of the state on issues that are of great importance to the governed and to external actors. Expected functions can also be translated as the effort of the state to keep up with demands for better services that is the provision of public goods. Briefly, in the responsive model of state building, it is the centrality of negotiation surrounded by expectations that leads the process of state building. This model suggests a dynamic, through which the effort to build capacity, brings the state in contact with the society and therefore bounds the state to respond to the expectations of the governed.

3.1.3 Unresponsive State-Building

As is discussed in the previous part, as a response to the demands of the society and as a result of political settlement, state structures become stronger and states develop capacity to cope with the changes and challenges they face. But in other cases political settlement does not lead to survival and expected functionalities and the process of state building does not take off. The question here is, why do some political settlements lead to state building and others to repressive, corrupt and ineffective states? What is important to note, is that in understanding state building political settlements play a crucial role. What also should be stressed is, that political settlements are marked as groups who heavily rely on satisfying either their self-interest or the core beliefs of the elite to which they belong to. Therefore, one of the causes of unresponsive state building lies in the “need to keep powerful constituencies on board” (Whaites, 2008: 11). This is especially the case when the power is evenly shared between the elites and the leaders pay a premium to buy the support of those who form a threat. Put differently, there is a desire on the part of the dominant elite to create incentives “to view state institutions as either unimportant, or potentially a threat” (Whaites, 2008: 12). And as a result effective state institutions and economic management policies will be undermined. This is particularly the case if a minority group dominates the political

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resources and power. Since it’s in their interest, it leads the state to wards towards failure, as is discussed in the previous part. A second given reason for unresponsive state building is the role of international environment, also termed as ‘global drivers of bad governance’. The argument made here is that when there is international crime and global corruption elites might “fund political settlements through illicit cross-border revenue” instead of fostering the survival functions (Whaites, 2008: 12). The international environment is particularity of effect on states with a weak institutional structure where it is difficult for political settlements to develop and operate. Briefly, in the responsive model of state building, it is the centrality of negotiation surrounded by expectations that lead the process of state building. This model suggests a dynamic through which the effort to build capacity, brings the state in contact with the society and therefore bounds the state to respond to the expectations of the governed. And since some political settlements for the presented reasons above are less sensitive for responsiveness, one the one hand and the desire to enhance and foster states ability to function better, political settlement does not always lead to responsive state building and creation of survival function.

3.1.4 other approaches

Other scholars have a different approach to state building. Shaw (1994) believes that in some cases, states with salient ethnic conflict, the disintegration of the state might lead to creation of small autonomous and peaceful states. Mengisteab (1997) on the other hand argues that dividing states along ethnic lines is not a desired option. Because different ethnic groups have cohabited dividing them will give birth to more conflict. Mengisteab (1997) prefers other approaches. Especially in the case of African countries, he puts more emphasis on economic and regional integration of states and a profound transformation of the state from self-serving to an institution that advances social interest. This transformation he argues will strengthen the state. But it’s required of the state to develop mechanism through which it can accommodate the interests of different ethnic groups and integrate those politically, socially and economically. He furthermore argues that although state building preceded democratization and state building generally was accomplished by coercive means, economic interdependence along with the homogenizing of educational and administrative systems, including democratic arrangements have contributed in consolidating state building. Mengisteab (1997) is convinced that, because of the increasing concerns about human rights violation state building through coercive means is no longer possible. State building and democratization are fused projects for him. Therefore, “in regards to state building, it implies that integrating the disparate groups and determining the relations between them and the state can only be accomplished through collective decisions of all the parties involved and on the basis of carefully negotiated terms that are acceptable for all of them” (Mengisteab, 1997: 118). Mengisteab prefers a state building though decentralization of power. For he believes that transforming a multination state into a nation-state is not a realistic

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objective. State building is a process negotiation and integration of different ethnic groups and their interest into one single nation-state. Other scholars like Fukuyama (2007) believe that state building in a strict sense is the creation of a Weberian monopoly of legitimate violence over a given territory. Therefore, the democratic approach to state building, presented by Mengisteab, will limit central state’s authority to coerce by “putting it under a stet of transparent and universal rules” and “by ensuring that the exercise of power reflects the popular will” (Fukuyama, 2007: 11). Another problem with the democratic theory is, he argues, that it doesn’t define state’s borders with regard to the ethnic and social groups that compose it. He furthermore states that, state building in multi-ethnic society has always been a difficult task and in order to accommodate social cleavages certain institutions can be adopted. Therefore it’s of great importance to know where to draw the border and whom to include or exclude from the territory to homogenize the population through the process of ethnic cleansing. For Fukuyama state building precedes democratization. State building for Fukuyama is a liberal process of institution building through which a homogeneous population and a common identity can be created. Other scholars, (Ghani, Lockhart, Carnahan, 2005) have a similar approach to Fukuyama and state that the main cause of state failure is lack of sovereignty. In their approach to state building, beside the importance of the legitimate monopoly of violence, they also stress the role foreign aid and international environment. An important cause for the lack of sate building in developing countries is what they have come to term as ‘non-state provision of core state functions’. The argument here is that international financial organization contract UN and NGO’s to preform functions that are usually preformed by the state. This leads to financially unstable and unaccountable practices, which negatively impact the legitimacy and sovereignty of the state. In order to achieve effective state building, the international system must be reoriented towards a model where “partnership and co-production of sovereignty becomes the aim of both national leaders and international partners” (Ghani, Lockhart and Carnahan, 2005: 13). This is a step-by-step approach to state building. Within this model first and foremost the core function and the key indicators of the state must be delineated. Consequently on the basis of those indicators the sovereignty gap must be measured to develop strategies to close that gap. Within this approach state building is institution and capacity building and in particular the development of a strong central authority. Fukuyama (2004) too states that the effectiveness of the state lays in its ability to enforce the laws through strong institutions in and delivering pubic goods. In sum, state building remains a very complex process. As is discussed above, we know that there are coercive as well as Voluntaristic approaches to state building. But as Whaites (2008) rightly argues state building is always a state-society relation. In his first approach, responsive state building, state building is achieved by the response of political elites to the needs and demands of society and his second approach, unresponsive state building, is discussed that it is sometimes in the interest of political elites to lead the state towards failure. Fukuyama, Ghani, Lockhart, Carnahan, Shaw are advocates of the coercive methods of state building and believe that without a strong central authority

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state building cannot be achieved. In contrast to these scholars Mengisteab states that, in the era of universal human rights state building cannot be achieved to coercive means. Instead he believes that state building can only be achieved through economic and regional integration and transformation of state from self-serving to an institution where social interest is fostered.

3.2 Approaches to nation building

What do we know of nation building? If one is ought to believe in causality phenomena are subject to other phenomena, which are prior to their own existence, in other words, everything must have its origins or roots in something different than itself, or every sensible reality must have been caused. This brings one to the question, what caused nation and nationalism? Hence, before defining nation and nationalism and answering the question raised above, for the sake of a better understanding of both concepts, this thesis makes an effort to analyse their historical origins.

3.2.1 Origins of Nation and Nationalism

According to some influential scholars, as will be presented later on, Capitalism and along with Capitalism the development of print technology, the disintegration of religious communities and the change in the character of Latin language, form the corner stones of national consciousness. However, Capitalism and print technology may not be the only explanatory factors of the concept. Anderson for example is convinced that “the factors involved are obviously complex and various. But a strong case can be made for the primacy of capitalism” (Anderson, 2006: 37). There were three main developments in the western societies, which directly contributed to national consciousness. The first development was the change in the character of Latin language. “Thanks to the labour of the Humanists in reviving the broad literature of pre-Christian antiquity and spreading it thought the print-market” a new understanding and appreciation for the ancient perplex and stylistic achievements could be observed (Anderson, 2006: 39). This in its turn led to aspiration of Latin to be written differently from that of Latin Church, which finally led to age of Enlightenment. Secondly, before the availability of print technology, Rome being the most dominant dynasty and Latin the most dominant language in Western Europe, the Catholic Church never lost a war to its challengers because of this “internal lines of communication” (Anderson, 2006: 39). However, when for the first time, “in 1517 Martin Luther nailed his thesis to the chapel-door in Wittenberg, they were printed up in German translation and within 15 days were seen in every part of the country” (Anderson, 2006: 39). This was just a starting point. Within two decades thousands of books and biblical translations were published. Print work and translation to vernaculars became a new trend in trade as well as in the “battle for mans’ mind” (Anderson, 2006: 39-40). Religious propagandists were the first amongst followers of Luther who took the advantage of this opportunity to propagate for the religious wars. In other words, the “coalition between Protestantism and print-capitalism, (…), quickly created large new readings public, (…), who typically knew little or none Latin” (Anderson, 2006: 40). This

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did not only lead to the mobilization of people for political and religious purposes, but also to “Europe’s first none dynastic, non-city states of Dutch Republic and the Commonwealth of the Puritans” (Anderson, 2006: 40). These were the first visible steps towards national consciousness. Thirdly, the same universality, which applied for Latin in the medieval Europe, did not apply for a universal political system. Put differently, after the collapse of the Western Empire no sovereign or monarch could mobilize Latin as the language of the state. Due to this political fragmentation Latin lost its binding element and Latin’s’ religious authority was deprived of a “true political analogue”. In Anderson’s terms a shift took place; there was a transition from the scared imagined communities 2to administrative vernaculars. Within these administrative vernaculars print-language became the most essential, which again paved the way for national consciousness in three distinctive ways. “First and foremost, they created unified fields of exchange and communication” (Anderson, 2006: 44). This made communication possible between different European people who before found communication difficult or in some cases impossible. Secondly, “print-capitalism gave a new fixity to the language” through which the image of antiquity became a central objective to the idea of nation (Anderson, 2006: 44). Third and most importantly, “print-capitalism created the language of power” through which some languages came to dominate certain dialects, which were close to them. In sum, the convergence of Capitalism along with the development of print technology and political authority of Latin, made a new form of imaged communities possible, which set the stage for modern nation.

3.2.2 Defining the Nation

The notions nation and nationalism are mutually interdependent. That is to say, one cannot define them independently for the simple reason of disability to point, which was the cause of the other. Scholars have come to agree that nation should be defined in terms of principles, which have defined nationalism itself. According to Gellner, “nationalism is primarily a political principle, which holds that the political and the national unit should be congruent” (Gellner, 2006: 1). Within this principle nationalism is best defined in terms of sentiment or a movement he argues, whereas the first holds “the feeling of anger aroused by the violation of the principle, or the feeling of satisfaction aroused by its fulfilment”, the second holds a movement actuated by a sentiment of this kind (Gellner, 2006: 1). There are of course many ways in which this principle can be violated but, briefly when the political borders fail to include all its members, or fail to exclude foreigners or in both ways, this can be felt as a violation of the nationalist principle. A more fundamental and profound form of violation to which the nationalist sentiment is outstandingly sensitive is “if the ruler of the political unit belongs to a nation other than that of the majority of the ruled” (Gellner, 2006: 1). Having defined                                                                                                                          2 According to Anderson a nation is community, which is socially constructed. In other words it is a community imagined by a certain group of people who perceive themselves as part of that group.

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nationalism, what follows is an effort to give a plausible answer to,: what is a nation? According to Gellner (2006) the theory of nationality has initially two promising candidates for its constructions; will on the one hand and culture on the other. Will, he argues consequently refers to a “voluntary adherence and identification, loyalty and solidarity on the one hand and fear, coercion and compulsion on the other” (Gellner, 2006: 52). In a cultural sense, “two men are of the same nation if and only if they share the same culture, where culture in turn means a system of ideas and signs and associations and ways of behaving and communicating” (Gellner, 2006: 52). Briefly, nation refers to a group of people with the same or different cultural background who have come to accept and recognize each other as full members of their society, have managed to agree on a common system of signs, ideas, ways of behaving and communicating and who are inhabitants of a given territory with defined borders and boundaries. There are two types of nationalism, ethnic nationalism and civic nationalism. Ethnic nationalism is a vision developed by German Romantics where a state is composed of one group. It is culturally, ethnically homogeneous. On the contrary, civic nationalism is a vision where the nation according to Ignatieff (1994) should be composed to all those – regardless of race, colour, creed, gender, language or ethnicity who subscribe to the nation’s political creed. Ethnic nationalism explains that the nation creates the state. Nation corresponds here to the ethnic group and each group is considered a state. It is the notion of Gemeinshaft, meaning community. It is this community, which is at the base of the nation. Ethnic nationalism takes the concept of nation as something natural, inherited. You are part of a nation due to your culture, ethnic ties and it is something that you cannot change. Civic nationalism on the contrary states that the state creates the nation. The state unites the people, making them equal citizens. It is related to the concept of Gesellschaft, literally society. In this view it is the society, which creates the nation. Civic nationalism is a rational vision where being part of a nation is a question of will and rational choice and not a question of ethnicity. This vision states that anyone who agrees to follow the rules of one state can become a member of this state. Civic nationalism is a legalist way of looking at state formation while ethnic nationalism could be considered as a naturalist way of looking at it. The French for example, adopted this institutional vision of nation-state after the Revolution. Being French meant to comply with French laws, ethnicity was not a criterion. The German vision had more influence in the east of Europe and was one of the justifications for the separation between Serbs and Croats. They were of two different cultures, nations and thus needed their own state.

3.2.3 Transition to an age of nationalism

Nationalism is not something of today only. The idea and desire to be distinguished and be different has always been there. But in the history of nationality and nationalism like any other theory, there must have been a tipping point to nationalism in the modern sense. This part is an effort to retrieve that turning point and the conditions under which

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nationalism flourished. “The age of transition to industrialism was bound, according to our model, also to be an age of nationalism” (Gellner, 2006: 39). Unfortunately historical developments and processes are not visual. In other words, one cannot point to a specific period in human history as the cause of a certain development, but fortunately one can study and evaluate a historical process to pass a plausible judgment. Scholars believe that the transition from the agrarian to the industrial society has been the driving force behind nationalism in the modern sense. In contrast to the industrial societies the agrarian societies were divided into small or sub-communities and in most cases semi-independent of each other. Every community had its own structure and division of labour, but most importantly they were able to reproduce themselves and their culture. The age of industrialism on the other hand, was characterized by its perpetual growth, rapid change and elaborates division of labour, its quest for the formation of homogenous cultures and its desire for the universalization of norms and values. Industrialization meant “population explosion, rapid urbanization, labour migration and also the economic and political penetration of previously more or less inward-turned communities, by a global economy and cartelizing polity” (Gellner, 2006: 41). This dichotomous development asked for two things: one, it demanded the smaller communities to dissolve into a bigger, broader, advance and centralized community and two, it demanded a well ordered and strong organization capable of directing the ever growing flows of labour migration and the creation of a homogenous culture and a common language and means of communication. But how was this homogenous and universal culture going to be formed? Gellner for the sake of analogy divides the cultures into wild and gardened ones. In this botanical analogy he argues, “cultures, like plants can be divided into savage and cultivated varieties” (Gellner, 2006: 48). Whereas the first refers to a culture, which produces and reproduces itself as part of life, the second kind refers to a culture developed from the wild varieties into a more rich and complex one, sustained by literacy, specialized personnel and institutions of learning. He furthermore argues, “during the agrarian epoch of human history the high cultures or great traditions became prominent, important, and (…), dominant” (Gellner, 2006: 49). Hence when the transition from the agrarian to the industrial societies took place, the dominant cultures fought to universalize their values. Therefore, the task of the high culture, as Gellner argues, was much greater. As they say, “every girl ought to have a husband, preferably her own; and every high culture now wants a state, and preferably its own” Gellner, 2006: 49). In sum, industrialization made the question for the formation of homogenous and universal culture and values necessary. Along with this process went the rise of Colonialism, the desire of European powers to conquer the entire world, and of curse the human greed, paving the way for a new era in human history, that of nationalism. Another important element of industrialism was urbanization, which too triggered the formation of a common language and means of communication and therefore, nationalism.

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3.2.4 Modernization vs. Social constructivism

The modernization theory of nationalism, discussed above, is mainly concerned about the question of why and how nationalism evolved. According to this theory, nationalism is an effect of industrial social organization. Also the processes of colonialism, imperialism and decolonization have affected nationalism. The theory claims that, the modern state can only exist with a mobile, literate, culturally standardized interchangeable population, or in other words a homogenous culture and population. From this perspective, nationalism is not the wakening of nations. A nation is the consequence of a new form of social organization based on internalized education and high cultures. Within this theory nationalism is not in the nature of things but comes from a set of social conditions, where homogeneity, literacy, anonymity are the key traits. The social constructivists (Anderson, 2006 and Kaufman, 2006) on the other hand believe that nations can be created, regardless the process of modernization. The constructivist theory of nationalism rejects the Rational Choice and Primordialist views on how ties are established between an individual and a group. In contrast, constructivists argue that national identities are constructed on myths and symbols and National identities are constructed on myths and supported by an individual’s need to gain or maintain power. Within the constructivist theory, elites play an important role. The theory states that nations are created according to the interests of leaders or elite groups of the political system in which they are included. The constructivists study the process by which elites and counter-elites within certain groups select aspects of the group’s culture, attach new value and meaning to them, and use them as symbols to mobilize the group, to defend its interests and to compete with other groups. Nationalism in this case is used as an instrument to achieve political goals and legitimize certain actions. There is a comparison in the modernization theory and the constructivist in the sense that the modernization theory states that to achieve industrialization nationalism is necessary, so if leaders want industrialization they also need nationalism. The constructivists explain how elites can use nationalism to achieve their goals. Briefly, Nation-building refers to the process of constructing or structuring a national identity, either through coercive capacity of the state or through free will to be part of a give identity or political entity. The process, for the sake of political stability, social harmony and economic growth, aims at the unification of the people and homogenization of values and means of communication within a state. There are at least two approaches nation building. The first is the modernization approaches, which states that nation building is achieved through modernization and uses industrial revolution and as a consequence urbanization and division labour to show how values were formed and identities were created. The second approach to nation building is social constructivism. The argument made here is that, values and identities are socially constructed. In other words, it is the will of the peoples to consider themselves part of a given nation or political entity. These communities, the social constructivists argue, are imagined and the nation does not exist as something external to the peoples of a give political territory and therefore it is socially constructed. There are

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of course other approaches like ethno-symbolism and perennialism, which see nation as something given or as outcome of ethnic myths and historical memories and symbols.

4. Nation building in Afghanistan Why did the process of nation building fail in Afghanistan?. As will be discussed later on, Afghan statesmen at the time, did not build on already existing cultural values and means of communication, but instead endeavoured to create and impose an artificial identity on the majority of Afghanistan’s inhabitants. The importance of homogenous cultural values, means of communication and division of labour as discussed in the modernizations theory of nationalism in theoretical framework, seem not to have attracted the attention of Afghan statesmen at the time. But in order to answer the question raised above, in what follows the course of nationalism in Afghanistan will be discussed.

4.1 The rise of modernism and nationalism

According to Farhang (1994), Abdul Rahman (1880-1901) had banished many of his political opponents. Amongst these was Sardar Ghulam Muhammad Khan Tarzi, the father of Mahmud Tarzi a learned and ambitious young man, who was charged with conspiracy against the state. When Habibullah Khan ascended the throne, he pardoned his father’s political opponents and allowed them to come back. With the death of both Amir Adbul Rahman and Sardar Ghulam Muhammad Khan Tarzi, the Tarzi family decided to return to Afghanistan. Gregorian (1969) states, after a brief stay in Karachi, the Tarzi family went to Damascus, where Sultan Abdul Hamid II, the Ottoman emperor, allowed them to establish residence. The twenty years of exile were of great importance for the young Mahmud Tarzi. In the schools of Damascus and Constantinople he did not only come in contact with European culture and institutions, but he was also exposed to the Ottoman nationalist-revivalist movement and the Pan-Islamic views of al-Afghani3. Furthermore, serving in the secretariat of the Ottoman provincial administration he gained also administrative experience aboard. His eventual return to Afghanistan meant two things; the rise of both modernist and nationalist movement. Immediately after his arrival, Tarzi made a first effort to initiate a program of reform in Afghanistan, calling for Amir’s attention to the seriousness of problems in educational, communication and industrial system, as well as pointing the undesirable effect of the political, cultural and intellectual isolations. At first the new Amir appointed Tarzi as the chief of the bureau of translation. Tarzi’s main task was to inform Amir about changes and events in the Islamic world and Europe. Consequently, after many untiring efforts of Tarzi and Inayatullah Khan, the eldest son of Amir Habibullah Khan who supervised the educational administration, Tarzi succeeded to introduce the first newspaper in Afghanistan, the Siraj al-Akhbar,                                                                                                                          3 Sayyid Jamal-al-din al-Afghani (1838-1879) was a political activist and Islamic nationalist in Persia, Khorasan or the present-day Afghanistan, Egypt, and the Ottoman empire during the 19th century. He was one of the founders of Islamic modernism and an advocate of pan-Islamic unity.

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meaning the lamp of news. Siraj al-Akbar was published biweekly in Persian from October 1911 to January 1919 and served as a forum for small groups of young Afghan intellectuals. In Tarzi’s view a newspaper was one of the most essential tools of modern civilization, and except for some savage tribes, there was no organized society without it. “To this end, he published both domestic and foreign news, either carrying translations of stories that had appeared in the English, Urdu, Turkish and Arabic press or reproducing articles from Persian newspapers and journals” (Gregorian, 1969: 163-165). Siraj al-Akhbar was also a medium of propagating the Afghan nationalism. Given the fact that the majority of the country was ethnically non-Afghan, Tarzi and his associates faced a twofold challenge. On the one hand “they had to try to redefine the term Afghan on a geographic and religious basis, and so ally any fear of the non-Afghans that modernization might lead to a strengthening of the Afghan hold over the country” and on the other “to convince Habibullah that a socio-economic transformation of Afghanistan would not invite foreign intervention and domination or jeopardize the monarchy and its ruling dynasty” (Gregorian, 1969: 164). Worth mentioning with in this process is the clashing idea’s of young intellectual Afghans and that of the religious establishment and their effort to persuade the religious leaders of the compatibility of Islam with modernity. Tarzi and his associates rejected the view of those who argued that the backwardness of the Islamic societies had its roots in the religion itself. Instead they believed, a planned modernization would not contradict Islamic values and therefore, one should not only look into “these limited European culture exports, which were designed exclusively for European colonies” (Gregorian, 1969: 166). According to Tarzi, the main cause of Afghanistan’s backwardness was on the one hand the disunity and on the other the isolationist position of the country, which had led to a cultural and intellectual isolationism. The disunity he described was a kind Hobbesian state of nature where everyone is the judge of his own, and survival is the only concern. “ The disunity was such, he declared, that it had calamitously set city against city, village against village, street against street, tribe against tribe, brother against brother” (Gregorian, 1969: 166). Along with all these, Tarzi repeatedly emphasized the importance of the contact with the outside world and other cultures. From his perspective this was the first concrete and essential step towards social reform and transformation. To this end he used Siraj al-Akhbar to bridge the gap between Afghanistan and the rest of the world. He did this to firstly, inform young Afghan intellectuals of the scientific and technological achievements of the West and secondly to advance their understanding of the western institutions. To fight illiteracy, to emphasize the importance of education and to motivate the youngsters towards education, Tarzi came up with Siraj al-Atfal, the light of Children. In this newspaper, he published stories, moralistic and didactic tales, riddles and puzzles, all designed to impress the Afghan youngsters, with the importance of education. In order to generate popular interest in science and learning, he translated many works from English, Turkish and Arabic literatures, amongst which; “around the world in eighty days, twenty thousand leagues under the sea, the mysterious island and international law. (…), and a five volume of history of the Russo-Japanese war”

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(Gregorian, 1969: 171). The dilemma that Afghan modernists like Tarzi were facing was the question of, how to modernize the country and to preserve its independence and monarchy? While they failed to find an immediate solution to that dilemma, “they thought they saw a long-term solution: in nationalism they foresaw a force mighty enough to protect Afghan sovereignty and permit Afghanistan to modernize unhindered” (Gregorian, 1969: 173-174). Tragically it was exactly the rise of nationalism that led to the fall of it. Unfortunately even Tarzi, at that time as one of the most educated and experienced man within the kingdom, failed to put his personal and tribal interest aside to promote and foster the true interest of the country and the nation that was yet to be built. Later on will be explained how this tribal conduct of statesmen, the cultural backwardness of the Afghan tribes and isolationist position of the county along with ethnic diversity led to the failure of nationalism in Afghanistan. Sakhawarz (2006) believes in order to legitimate the idea of Afghan nationalism, Tarzi and his associates had to do two things; firstly, to convince people that the idea of nationalism does not contradict the Islamic theory of brotherhood, and secondly to convince them that modernization is compatible with Islam. To the first aim, he distinguished between the Islamic community and the small Islamic entities. It is true, he argued that Muslims are brothers, but every entity within the great community has the right to love and defend the place where he lives. “To support his contention that the very concept of an Afghan ethos and fatherland emanated from Islam, he quoted a saying of the prophet Muhammad; Hob ul watan min al iman (patriotism derives from faith)” (Gregorian, 1969: 174). He also argued that the Afghans have accepted Islam by grace and will of God. And given the fact that Afghanistan was a God given country, thus love of the fatherland was divinely ordained. The next dilemma that Tarzi was facing was, how to link nationalism with modernization to overcome religious resistance? To this end he argued, “patriotism was explicitly sanctioned and exactly by Islam as a commitment to the defence of the fatherland. Since progress and modernization were indispensable in this regard, they were compatible with Islam” (Gregorian, 1969: 175). Only through modernization could the Afghan kingdom defend itself and Islam against the insatiable appetite of European imperialists. For he, argued, “true patriotism thus went beyond the willingness to fight in defence of the fatherland; it necessarily entailed the desire to reform and modernize the fatherland as well” (Gregorian, 1969: 175). Tarzi and his associates formed a group of scholars to develop historical rationalism. Their task was to do comparative studies to discover the source of success and weaknesses of different civilizations, in order to secure the future of their own country. Besides this, Tarzi argued, “these studies ought to be accompanied by a concerted effort to raise the status of Pashtu, which he and his associates regarded as the Afghan language, in contrast to Persian, the official language. Pashtun or Afghani was the manifestation of the national genius and the ancestor of all language, a true national language. As such, it must be studied and taught to all the ethnic groups in Afghanistan” (Gregorian, 1969: 175-176). This continued to be the driving

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force behind Afghan nationalism. Decades later, in 1933 when the nineteen years old Zahir Khan (1933-1973) ascended the Afghan throne, there was a man within his administration who drastically shaped the course of Afghan nationalism. The man was Hashim Khan, the young king’s uncle, who was the prime minister and had “the complete control of the country’s domestic and foreign policies” (Gregorian, 1969: 342). Among many other things that Hashim Khan did in order to promote the national consciousness, he changed the educational system. For he along with king Zahir believed, only the establishment of a good school system would provide the Afghan kingdom with a solid base for modernization. But modernization was not the only aim of education. “Education was also perceived as an instrumentality to achieve national unity, promote national consciousness, and institutionalize Pashtu as the national language” (Gregorian, 1969: 351). Accordingly he argued, in one year Pashtu was to become “the language of our officials, doing away with Persian” (Gregorian, 1969: 351-152). The policy of making Pashtu co-equal to Persian had become the subject of debate. “The case for the use of the Persian language in Afghanistan was best defended by the Calcutta paper Habl-ul-Matin, which warned the Afghan government against the disastrous effects of imposing an artificial national language, which may be harmful to the national unity of the people of Afghanistan. Pashtu was spoken by a minority of the inhabitants of Afghanistan, wrote the paper, whereas Persian was the language of the majority. Instead of forcing everyone in Afghanistan to learn Pashtu, Habl-ul-Matin suggested, the government might encourage the Afghan tribesmen to learn Persian and thus partake in and benefit from the treasures of the Iranian culture” (Gregorian, 1969: 351-352). Instituting Pashtu as the official language, argued Habl-ul-Matin, would furthermore deprive Afghan tribes from their literary and scientific language. According to Khorasani (2004), the Afghan government was not persuaded and followed its own path. This policy led to a lot of difficulties and inefficiencies within the country. Teachers were forced to learn Pashtu; “government officials were obliged to take night courses in the new national language” (Hyman, 2002: 301). According to Louis Dupree, an American anthropologist resident in Kabul at the time, “some non-Pashtu speaking high ranking officials found it necessary to have clerks translate their Farsi communication into Pashtu for transmission to another office. The recipient, often a non-Pashto speaker as well, handed the report to an assistant for translation back into Farsi. The scheme collapsed in a welter of translation and retranslation” (Hyman, 2002: 301). The proposal to teach Pashto throughout Afghanistan, revealed many other problems to the Afghan government, argues Gregorian (1969), the shortage of teachers, the absence of modern teaching techniques and the predominance of Persian language in most of important urban centuries of the country. But according to many other scholars, Anthony Hyman (2002) in particular, the theme of nationalism in Afghanistan begs for many questions. For, they believe that “with the national or patriotic idea so weak and underdeveloped, it arguably makes more sense to analyse rival ideas of the nation held by country’s different ethnic groups than some hypothetical all-emerging Afghan Nationalism” (Hyman, 2002: 299).

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Because different ethnic groups in Afghanistan could not identify themselves with the term Afghan. Better yet, in the very beginning the term Afghan did not embrace all the Afghan tribes either. “The term Afghan gradually became synonymous with Pashtu speaking in general, while non-Pashtun inhabitants of Afghanistan, then as now, commonly used their respective identifying labels of race and language, i.e., Uzbek, Tajik, Farsiwan or of region, i.e., Herati, Panjsheri, Kohistani and Badakhshani” (Hyman, 2002: 302). Another essential ingredient to the idea of nationalism was the high cultures and history. But, neither ancient nor medieval history became well integrated into the Afghan nationalism. Different scholars have different interpretations, but most of them agree that, in order to raise Pashtu as an official language, the Afghan nationalist movement had to cover history, because other whys the historical consciousness of the non-Afghan inhabitants of Afghanistan would have troubled the process of Pashtunization of the country. “The image of the colossal Buddhist statues4 at Bamiyan province did appear on national postage stamps, but it was never adopted methodically as a symbol for the nation’s past glories like, for example pyramids in Egypt or the Arch of Ctesiphon or the Hanging Gardens of Babylon in Ba’thist Iraq” (Hyman, 2002: 307). Besides these cultural biases and tribal preferences, the successive regimes in Kabul “never adopted a coherent national ideology. Official nationalism espoused the cause of freeing the Pashtun tribes of Pakistan (Northwest Frontier province and Baluchistan), with the goal of forming a Pashtun (or Pathan) state to be called Pakhtunistan (also Pashtunistan) and eventually uniting them with Afghanistan” (Hyman, 2002: 307). This policy was adopted for two reason, Hyman (2002) argues, one to end Afghanistan landlocked status by giving it access to the Arabian sea and two, to increase the weight of the Pashtun element in an enlarged Afghanistan, inevitably at the expense of the country’s non Pashtun groups (Hyman, 2002: 307-308). Prince Daoud’s5 Pakhtunistan policy is an apparent example, which was based upon a long-standing irredentist grievance. Kabul’s pro Pashtunistan initiative took the form of annual days, officially organized demonstrations, symbolic postage stamps, and many tracts and other publications intended to further the cause, argues Hyman. The results of this policy however, were wholly negative. By 1963 it had caused “a damaging series of confrontations with Pakistan, a key neighbour which led to periodic closure of the Torkham border and transit trade, inflicting serious economic damage on Afghanistan” (Hyman, 2002: 308). Many contemporary scholars like, Simonsen (2004) and Weinbaum (2004), Hira (2009) and Jennings (2003) who deal with the question of nation building in Afghanistan, believe that without taking the ethnic issue in Afghanistan into serious account, it’s would be impossible to build any political institution.                                                                                                                          4 From the 1st to the 3rd century AD during the Khushan Empire, Khorasan or the present-day Afghanistan was one of the biggest centres of Buddhism. Buddhism was also religion of the kingdom. 5 Mohammed Daoud Khan (1909 –1978) was an Afghan prince and politician who overthrew the monarchy of his cousin King Zahir Shah and became the first President of Afghanistan from 1973 to his assassination in 1978.

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However, based on the studied literature there are some crucial and important elements that led to the failure of nation building in Afghanistan. The first of such an element is the impact of European nationalism and Nazism, which inspired Afghan statesmen or the ruling tribe to translate the nationalist ideas into tribalism and instead building on the existing elements, to impose their own identity and language on the majority of the population. Secondly, according to modernization theory it was the industrial revolution that led to nation building in different parts of the West. Therefore, the isolationist policies of the Afghan authorities at that time, especially under the reign of Abdul Rahman Khan and the myth of an independent Afghanistan, which prevented Afghanistan from modernizing too greatly contributed to the failure of nation building in Afghanistan. A third reason that prevented Afghanistan from modernizing is the Pashtunwali (later more on this). Pashtunwali was not the only local custom but it was and still is the only custom, which undermined every effort to reform the political, social and economical structure of the country. The persistently efforts of Amir Abdul Rahman Khan to break the tribal customs, followed by the persistent efforts of his successor Amir Habibullah Khan to reform the feudal structure of the tribes, have all been in vain. This was because of the strong character of the Afghan tribal code, for transcended not only the civil laws but also that of the Sharia (the Islamic law). Also the cultural lag of the Afghan tribes contributed to this. Since in most cases they were not used to a sedentary life, they, in contrast to other ethnic groups, showed less affection towards change, education and modernization. In addition to that, the ethnical diversity, the lingual issues and the claims and desires of the Afghan tribes for cultural and political supremacy still prevent Afghanistan from becoming a nation. If one analysis Afghanistan and its politics and judges them from today's perspective, the country is struggling with the dilemmas of recognition and redistribution. The case of Afghanistan is not only the clashing political ideologies, but foremost the clashing identities that seek for acceptance and their share in the political power and the process of decision making and governance.

5. State building in Afghanistan As it will be discussed bellow, the process of state building in Afghanistan has been exposed to many different challenges. Ethnic diversity, tribal and feudal structure and isolationist policies of Afghan statesmen have all contributed to the failure of this project. In order to depict a clear picture of this process, this part is divided into three sub-parts. The first will shade some light on social and political structure of Afghanistan at that time. The Second part will be an analysis of state building and its origins. The last part will cover somewhat recent state building. This part will also provide answer to the question, what do we know of state building in Afghanistan?

5.1 Ethnic composition

Afghanistan has a very diversified ethnic composition. Over 53 ethnic groups populate the country. Among these there are four ethnic groups that have come to shape the

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political landscape of Afghanistan. The Afghans or the Pashtuns are the largest ethnic group and according to Encyclopaedia of Nations (2011) form 38% of the total population. Tajiks or Persians are the second largest group and form 25% followed by Hazaras who form 19% of the total population. Uzbeks form 6% and other 12% consists of different ethnic and religious minorities.

5.2 Social and political structure

Most scholars agree on two facts. One, “all nation states have citizens who share at least a juridical nationality” and two Afghanistan is a tribal society and therefore, far from being called a nation state (Rubin, 19975: 6-25). As Rubin (1995) further argues, for the inhabitants of Afghanistan kinship has been the essential means of political and economical mobilization. The tribal structure of Afghanistan becomes even more obvious when one focuses on the forms of political representation. Regimes in Afghanistan from old to contemporary have recognized and used certain tribal institutions as a means to control the inhabitants of Afghanistan, particularly in the case of the rural areas. The government officials and local administrations in the rural areas interact “with the population indirectly, through officially appointed representative (called malik or arbab6) of units called Qaum” (Rubin, 1995: 25). The important term here is the word Qaum. Qaum is often translated as tribe or clan, but it also refers to different forms of solidarity. In some cases Qaum even has come to mean ethnic group, for example when the inhabitants of Afghanistan say, Qaum-e-Tajik, they mean the Tajik ethnic group. But also “for those who carried identity cards under the old regime, (…), the line marked qaum contained an ethno-linguistic designation (Tajik, Pashtun, Uzbek)” (Rubin, 1997: 25). The lack of an encompassing national identity is another obvious reason to term Afghanistan as a tribal society. As put forward by Rubin (1995) even that percentage of ethnic groups living an urban life carry an identity card by which they are identified to which Qaum or ethnic group they belong to. Even today after many efforts to build a state with a central authority and a nation with shared values and norms, what has become to be known, as the Afghan passport does not contain a line for nationality? If it was not for the title of the passport itself saying, Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, the holder of that passport could not have been identified as an inhabitant of Afghanistan. Also the role of the government in the formation of a national identity and well-established state remains somewhat fluid. The royal government for example “tried to break large units into smaller ones; among nontribal peoples it tried to reinforce limited kinship or residence-based political identities. Such patterns are typical of a weak state attempting to retain its power by weakening society through fragmentation” (Rubin, 1997: 25). The fragmentation of society by the government goes even further. Language, religion and descent were the elements by which observers including the government defined the major ethnic groups in Afghanistan. The problem however, is as Rubin                                                                                                                          6 Malik means possessor, he who possesses ground is often called the malik of ground, or the owner. Arbab generally refers to the head of a Qaum, he who represent the Qaum in social and political matters.

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(1997) rightly argues, no region of Afghanistan is ethnically uniform and no tribe is dominant. Accordingly in the mid-1950s the state structure itself created recognizable patterns of tribal-ethnic stratification within the political arena of Afghanistan. From the 1950s to 1978 the head of state (King until 1973 and president from 1973-1978), “was a member of the Muhammadzai clan of the Barakzai tribe of the Durrani confederations, on of the three major groups of Pashtun tribes” (Rubin, 1997: 26). During this era the Muhammadzais dominated the social hierarchy. Bellow them were the other Durrani clans and then came the rest of the Pashtun belonging to other tribes as, Ghilzis who were again divided into other sub-tribes as Hotaki, Suleiman-Khel, Tokhi and so on. After the Pashtuns came the Persian speaking peoples which included Tajiks and Hazaras and Uzbeks. In other words the state was not only tribally organized but also tribally defined. Even the nontribal peoples as Tajiks and Hazaras could not escape the tribal structure of the state dominated by the Pashtun tribes.

5.2.1 Religious diversity

Religious diversity was not as crucial as ethnical or lingual cleavages, but because it was an obstacle for both Sunni and Shi’a Muslims to merge and to form a homogeneous culture or social institution, a short notice is of no harm. Scholars believe that almost up to 99 per cent of the present day Afghan population professes Islam. There are two branches of Islam, the Sunnis who are the followers of the Hanafi school of Islam and there are Shi’as. “There are no precise figures on the ratio of Sunni to Shi’a Muslim, (…), but there are indications that the Sunni majority probably does not exceed 75-80 per cent of the total populations” (Gregorian, 1969: 38).

However, the difference between these two communities, the Sunni and the Shi’a were a major problem for those who wanted to build a modern Afghan state because both communities failed to build a homogeneous culture and shared institutions or a common social force. In other words, religion could not really serve as a shared social force or institution to unite different ethnic groups. Different ethnic groups had their own local customs. As for the Afghan tribes, for example, the Islamic law had to coexist with their local tribal code or the Pashtunwali, of which more will be said later on. Islam however was an important element of the late afghan nationalism and of effort to unification. But both, the Afghan monarchy and the Afghan nationalist failed to make that happen. Besides religion another institution, which is of great importance for the failure or at least the weakness of state in Afghanistan, is the Afghan tribalism.

5.2.2 Afghan tribalism

Afghan tribalism has from the very beginning been a great barrier to nation building, state building, modernization and technological progress in Afghanistan. What was Afghan and is Afghan tribalism, how did it come to shape the political structure of Afghanistan, and in what way it was a barrier? Despite the attempts of the Afghan monarch to expand his political base and to pursue a policy of centralization, his

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dependence on the strength of the Afghan tribes committed them to defending the feudal tribal social structure. Along with Pashtunwali, it was and is exactly this ‘feudal-tribal-social structure the forms the core of Afghan tribalism. Afghan tribalism works as follows. Many sub-tribes surround the main core of every tribe. The sub-tribes again are divided into various family units or clans. Within a tribe the families choose a chief, the so-called Malik, who is the leader of the tribe. “Among the tribes whose feudal relations were highly developed, the eldest son customarily succeeded his father, (…), the flexibility of the law of succession encouraged the development of tribal dispute and intrigues, (…). The lack of a firm succession law affected the Afghan ruling dynasty itself and hindered the development of the monarchy as an institutions” (Gregorian, 1969: 40). In dealing with the Afghan tribes the afghan monarch were facing same difficulties and limitations of authority as the tribal chieftains. The actions of both the tribal chieftains and that of the Afghan monarch had to conform to the Islamic law and Pashtunwali.

5.2.3 The Pashtunwali

The Pashtunwali is another institutions that defied and limited centralization of the political power, legal and economical encroachment. Pashtunwali is a tribal code, “which set the limits of acceptable behaviour within the community and governed the relations between the tribes” (Gregorian, 1969: 41). Pashtunwali as any other law system contains also positive elements. “Respectively the law of asylum and interactions, hospitality and protection for all guests, and safe conduct” are of those positive elements, which were moral restraints that checked lawlessness (Gregorian, 1969: 41-42). There is however another side of Pashtunwali, “particularly the concept of nang-i-Pakhtun or nang-i-Pukhtana (Pashtun honour), which embodied the principle of equity and badal7, or revenge at all costs, seriously impeded the development of a secular system” (Gregorian, 1969: 41). Bellow is an example of how the principle of badal works. “In appealing to the customary law the injured person is actuated by a desire for redress or revenge. It would afford him little satisfaction to see the man who had robbed him punished, unless he was indemnified for his loss. There is no conception of a criminal act as an outrage against the peace of the community. There is no state whose peace could be violated, and only a rudimentary conception of a rudimentary conception of a commonwealth. Hence every offense is merely a tort which entitles o requires the person injured to see redress and obtain it if he can” (Gregorian, 1969: 41). The Rawaj, or Rawaj-e-am, which means customary law, is another institutions that resisted the process of political and socio-economic integration. The Afghan tribes did not even succeed to form a homogeneous customary law. There were a variety of Rawaj, which differed from tribe to tribe and from region to region. These customary laws were so deeply rooted that “it often not only circumvented the laws of the kingdom but also modified certain tenets of Islamic law, especially in matters of marriage,

                                                                                                                         7 Badal means both, false and replacing some or someone with something or someone else.

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inheritance, and women’s rights” (Gregorian, 1969: 41). In sum, besides the religion as social institution there were three other institutions, the Afghan tribalism, the Pashtunwali and the Rawaj or customary law that defied, limited and constrained political, social, and economical progress. As already mentioned above and as will be discussed later on, these Rawaj or laws mostly contradicted and prevailed over Islamic and the laws of the kingdom. With this limited, but for the purpose of these thesis limited background knowledge of ethnic and social composition of Afghanistan, in what follows state formation in Afghanistan will be discussed.

5.3 State building in Afghanistan: the origins

For many is Ahmad Shah Durrani (1747-1773) the founding father of contemporary Afghanistan. But this is far from being true. Contrary to this claim, which exists even now, it was Mir Wais Hotaki of the Ghilzai tribe who in 1707 made the first attempt to establish an autonomous Afghan state in the province of Kandahar. It is crucial to mention that by the Afghan state is not meant contemporary Afghanistan. In contrast by Afghan state is meant a first effort of the Afghan tribes to build a political community of their own. According to Gregorian (1969) Mir Wais Hotaki succeeded in 1708 to defeat the Persians and assumed the power in the city and province Kandahar, thus providing a base for the nucleus of an Afghan state. The weakness and inability of Persia to reassert her sovereignty and on the other hand the success of Ghilzai revolt encouraged other afghan tribes as well to revolt. And so in 1716 the Abdali tribe revolted against the Persian forces and conquered the city of Heart. In the year 1722 the Ghilzai power reached its highest stage, when the Ghilzai forces defeated the Persian armies and conquered Isfahan, the Safawid8 capital. Ghubar (1990) and Farhang (1094) describe the Ghilzai rule as precarious, short and bloody. The Ghilzais were an outnumbered minority coming from tribal and nomadic society. That on the one hand and the disagreements of Ghilzais in Persian and back home in Kandahar along with the strenuous Ghilzai rivalry with the Abdali tribe on the other, made it impossible for them to a: secure their rule of a sedentary urban population with high culture and b: to establish and afghan state under Ghilzais. That inability led to the end of Ghilzai and gave birth to the rise of Abdali rule, which did succeed in establishing an Afghan kingdom. But since the aim of thesis was state building in contemporary Afghanistan and also because the Afghan kingdoms predate the modern concept of state, no further attempt will be made to discuss their rules. In stead the thesis will focus on the factors, which lead to the formation of present-day Afghanistan. At the heart of state building in Afghanistan, lays the European Imperialism.

                                                                                                                         8 Safawids or Safavids were one of the most significant ruling dynasties of the present day Iran. They ruled from 1502 to 1722

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5.3.1 European Imperialism and its impact on state formation in Afghanistan

The age of European Imperialism is by many scholars described as the new era of conflict in the Middle East, to which Afghanistan was no exception. Gregorian (1969) is convinced that the invasion of Egypt by Napoleon opened a new chapter in the history of Afghanistan. The Napoleonic expedition to Egypt had three major objectives, one of which was the opening of the Red Sea to open the trade route to India and to combat the English satellites and to drive the English from their oriental possessions. This was however, not a new desire. For, “there had been suggestions of a joint Franco-Russian expedition to India. Peter the Great had reportedly proposed in 1717 that the two powers cooperate in establishing a continental route to India through Central Asia and Afghanistan” (Gregorian, 1969: 91). The French and the Russians were not the only two powers who desired to conquer India through Afghanistan. British government of that time along with the East India Company too play a very important role within debate. As a reaction to the Franco-Russian designs to conquer India, the British came with a different policy towards Afghanistan and Indian, which expressed itself in two ways. Firstly they began to make a detailed study of the region to which Persia, Afghanistan and central Asia was no exception, and secondly they formed a policy designed to safeguard their interest in the region. It was this policy, which sowed the first seeds of an ever-growing diversity, animosity and inequality between different ethnic groups in the contemporary Afghanistan. Lord Mornington, at that time the governor-general in India and alter Marquis Wellesley along with the East India Company, undertook to neutralize the French from India. But the French were not their only fear and concern. Wellesley also sought to prevent the invasion of India by Zaman Shah9, the Afghan ruler at that time. The British believed that an Afghan incursion into India would stir up the Muslim population and that would lead to a revival of the Moghul power. In order to weaken the French political ties and presence in the region on the one hand and to prevent an Afghan incursion into Indian on the other, Wellesley persuaded a dual policy. He on the one hand encouraged discord in Afghanistan and on the other fostered to persuade the Persians to re-establish their sovereignty in the province of Khorasan. “He fostered discord within Afghanistan and, at the same time, encouraged the Persians to attempt to re-establish their sovereignty over the province of Khorasan. Both moves were successful. The renewed civil strife in Afghanistan and the threat of a full-scale war with Persia placed the Afghan ruler in a critical position and undermined his Indian plans” (Gregorian, 1969: 93). By doing so the British secured an anti-Afghan, and-French treaty with Persia, which contained that any attempt of the French national army to settle in Persia would

                                                                                                                         9 Zaman Shah Durrani (1770-1844) was ruler of the Durrani Empire from 1793 to 1800. He was the grandson of Ahamd Shah Durrani and the firth son of Timur Shah Durrani. Zaman Shah became the third king of present-day Afghanistan and at that time like his father and grandfather known as the king of Khorasan.

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be fought in conjoint force of the British and Persia. This led to a further agreement between Sir Harford Jones10 and the Persian monarch in 1809, in which the Persian monarch agreed, “not to permit any European force whatever to pass through Persia either towards India, or towards the ports of that country” (Gregorian, 1969: 94). Within this treaty in exchange for warlike ammunitions and subsidies Persia also agreed, “in the event that British dominions were attacked or invaded by Afghanistan or any other country to afford a force fro the protections of the said dominions” (Gregorian, 1969: 94). To make sure that neither Afghanistan nor Persia could become am threat to the British domination in the region, “the treaty of Tehran was concluded in 1814; it specifically provided for a Persian attack against Afghanistan in the event that Afghans invaded India” (Gregorian, 1969: 94). Meanwhile the British went on making diplomatic overtures to the Afghans, Amirs or Sind and the Sikhs. Their intention was to use Afghanistan as a buffers state against the Persian encroachment and the Sikhs against the Afghans. In doing so in the year 1809 “Ephinstone, secured an agreement from Shah Shuja (the first Afghan pact with a European power) that stipulated joint action in case of Franco-Persian aggression against Afghan or British dominions” (Gregorian, 1969: 94). But since he European powers were not the only concern of the British, Palmerston, the British foreign secretary at the time, adopted another policy in order to neutralise Persia against the Russian influences. This policy, the so-called ‘forward line’ was to secure the British hegemony in Persia and Afghanistan. It furthermore contained that no European nation would be permitted to carry out political or commercial activities directly or indirectly in the Afghan affairs. “To this end, Palmerston was ready to grant a British subsidy for the modernization of the Persian army, provided an agreement could be reached with Persia that would secure British economic interest, contain Russia and safeguard Afghan independence” (Gregorian, 1969: 94-96). This led to a disagreement between the political and military experts. For, some found it unadvisable to meet a Russian military threat against India. The British however, had to find a way to reconcile these two opposing views in order to formulate a desirable Afghan policy, since the fate of both Persia and Afghanistan was essential to British interest. Whether or not to tolerate a strong Afghanistan was the dilemma that British were facing. The re-emergence of a politically and military viable Afghan state would have meant the capacity to check Russo-Persian aggression. But if so, how would the British be able to stop an Afghan threat against India? “To resolve this dilemma the British authorities in India decided to continue to seek a balance of power in the area. They would tolerate an Afghanistan strong to resist Persian attempts to size Heart but not strong enough to reduce Sikh power. “It was in the pursuit of this policy, (…), that the British government in India adopted measure, destined to keep the Afghans weak and divided” (Gregorian, 1969: 96-97). The overall impact of the European Imperialism was the destruction of political

                                                                                                                         10 Sir Harford Jones (1764 –1847) was a British diplomat at that time and also a working assistant of East India Company.

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and economic structure and social order of Afghanistan. Present-day Afghan historians and statesmen attribute Afghanistan’s backwardness to Imperialism and Capitalism. “After a long struggle, the Afghan people have only in the past few years acquired an opportunity for making efforts to liquidate our backwardness and to concentrate attention on moral and material progress as well as on the development of our country” (Gregorian, 1969: 124). But European Imperialism was not the only source of Afghanistan’s backwardness. The cultural backwardness of the Afghan tribes, the feudal character and structure of the state and army, the incapacity and disability of the Afghan rulers to translate the political opportunities to the country’s interest and the tribal, ethnical and cultural diversity were as essential as any external factor. Therefore, in what follows an internal image of Afghanistan’s political and social structure during the European Imperialism will be depicted.

5.3.2 Afghanistan: from anarchy to absolute monarchy

Before coming to Afghanistan under the reign of Amir Abdul Rahman, there are two other historical events that were of tremendous importance for the creation of what later became to be known as Afghanistan. These were the first and the second Afghan-Anglo wars. It was the first Afghan-Anglo (1839-42) during the reign Amir Dost Muhammad Khan that incorporated Afghanistan in the international state system. “The system was approaching Afghanistan not only from India, but also from the north, where the Russians were subduing the peoples of Central Asia” (Rubin, 1997: 47). Both the first and the second Afghan-Anglo wars were in a result of British concerns about the Russian advances in the region. Dost Muhammad who took the throne in 1835 by defeating Shah Shuja11, defeated the British and reused his rule. Dost Muhammad was facing one problem of consolidating British imperial power in India. As a result of that consolidation the tribes could not longer be unified “through the distribution of the fruits of conquest” from India (Rubin, 1997: 47). Therefore, to consolidate their power the Afghan rulers either had to play groups against each other or by building alliance to receive aid from other powerful states. They needed this aid, Rubin (1997) argues to on the one hand quieten the Afghan peoples and on other extract tax. Dost Muhammad “who had spent several years as an exile in British India, became the first Afghan ruler to see the power of modern state institutions firsthand” (Rubin, 1997: 47). It was due to that experience that he determined to modernize his state in order to defend its independence. Dost Muhammad received military assistance both from Qajar Iran and the British India. Since the Qajars had copied the European forms of military organization he sought to learn from them. He also backed by the British because of his neutrality in the Indian revolt of 1857-59. Although the military force of Afghanistan under Amir Dost Muhammad was detribalized, he gave the command of major cities to his sons. His sons throw the country into civil wars. After his death in 1863 one of his sons, Sher Ali regained power and continued to build a

                                                                                                                         11 Shah Shuja-ul-mulk was of the Saddozai tribe of Pashtun. He was also the last ruler of Saddozai tribe and known as the British puppet.

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professional army. In contrast to his father he “delegated administration not to his sons but to ministers of diverse social origins” (Rubin, 1997: 48). Much of the state building achievements by Dost Muhammad and his son were undone by the second Afghan-Anglo war (1878-80). As the war started the influential religious leaders declared a holy war and mobilized the tribes to fight the invader. The war lasted for almost two years. At the end the Afghans succeeded to maintain “their internal sovereignty but ceded control of their foreign relations to the British” (Rubin, 1997: 48). In 1880 after the withdrawal of British forces, Amir Adbul Rahman Khan, a nephew of Sher Ali seized the throne. Abdul Rahman agreed not to extend his administration across the frontier, which later became known as the Durand Line12. The major and concentrated attempt to reform Afghanistan began in 1880 when Amir Abdul Rahman ascended the Afghan throne. The new Amir was left with a country weakened by wars and foreign interventions and occupations. There was a total anarchy. The Amir himself described the situation as; “every priest, mullah and chief of every tribe and village considered himself an independent king, and for about 200 years past, the freedom and independence of many of these priest were never broken by their sovereigns. The Mirs 13of Turkistan, the Mirs of Hazara, the chief of Ghilzai were all stronger than their Amirs” (Gregorian, 1969: 129). Due to above described structures the power of the central Afghan government was very limited. In order to construct a strong central government, the first challenge the new Amir was facing was to break the feudal and tribal structures, but how and where to start? The new Amir was aware of the importance of religion. Therefore, he ascribed a divine sanction and purpose to his rule. “As God wished to relieve Afghanistan from foreign aggression and internal disturbances, he honored this, his humble servant, by placing him in this responsible position and he caused him to become absorbed in thoughts of the welfare of the nation and inspired him to be devoted to the progress this people, (…), for the welfare and true faith of the holy prophet Mohamed” (Gregorian, 1969: 129-139). What Amir did was in effect two things. Firstly he provided a religious justification for monarchy and secondly he invoked the concept of the divine rule of the King. But he had still a long path to walk. As Amir himself said, in the past 200 years the Mirs and the tribal chieftains had been stronger than their sovereigns. In other words the first steps towards a centralized and authoritative regime was to break the tribal resistance to legitimate his rule. And in order to break that tribal resistance, what Amir did was beyond sheer sentimental appeals. “Force, bloody reprisals, matrimonial alliances, bribes and intrigues were all used in his battle” (Gregorian, 1969: 132). Besides the political and the coercive means, he also “used his own marriages and those of his sons to tighten his ties with tribal chieftains,

                                                                                                                         12 The Durand Line refers to the border between the present-day Afghanistan and Pakistan. It was established after the 1893 Durand Line Agreement between the Government of British India and Afghan Amir Abdul Rahman Khan for fixing the limit of their respective spheres of influence. It is named after Henry Mortimer Durand, the Foreign Secretary of British India at the time. 13 Mir or Amir means Sultan or kinglet

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religious leaders and important members of non-Afghan14 ethnic groups” (Gregorian, 1969: 132). Within this fight, religion was an important and effective weapon. Religious injunctions were used against any revolting tribe, leader or feudal lord. Any opposing authority to the King was branded as traitor and outlaws. In the struggle with the powerful Shi’a Hazaras in 1888 The Amir used for example “the orthodoxy and fanaticism of the Sunni Muslims, a move that secured him thousands of volunteers” (Gregorian, 1969: 132-133). At the end according to scholars and foreign historians who somehow have completely misinterpreted the situations, these policies were largely seen successful, for he succeeded to unify Afghanistan politically. The reason for why this thesis disagrees with such statements is that one cannot measure these successes in the history of the present-day Afghanistan. And this failure is nowhere more apparent as it is in the administrative, social and political reforms of Amir.

5.3.3 Administrative reforms

Two things drove Amir Abdul Rahman Khan, firstly unifying15 Afghanistan at any cost and at the same constituting administrative changes and social, political and economic reforms. In order to do so he was to form a constitutional government. “He established a general consultative assembly made up of three constitutive categories of representatives: Sardars (aristocrats), (…), Khawanin-Mulki (commoners), (…), and mullahs (religious representatives” (Gregorian, 1969: 134). Amir had no intentions of truly sharing his power and the selection of members of members of this assembly who had no executive or legislative power, were subject to Amir’s approval. The only function of this assembly, “aside from symbolizing and promoting the concept of unity under the monarchy was to serve in a consultative capacity to help the Amir gather war supplies and advise him in various state activities” (Gregorian, 1969: 134). Amir also established another executive body as supreme council, “but it was equally powerless. Not only was there no office equivalent to that of prime minister; the council could not give advice to the monarch unless he requested it to do so” (Gregorian, 1969: 134). Its only function was to execute the will of Amir. The quest for the political absolutism, unification of the country and the administrative reorganization of the country, led the Amir into a fierce struggle with the religious establishment16. By whatever means, either through peaceful or coercive it was essential fro the Amir to gain their support. Therefore, he again used religion to win the hearts of the people. As he did with the revolt of 1888, in 1896 he conquered Kafaristan (what now is called Nooristan) and converted its inhabitants to Islam. That way he

                                                                                                                         14 Non-Afghan refers to other ethnic groups like, Tajiks, Hazaras, Uzbeks and the like in Afghanistan. 15 What the new Amir meant by unifying Afghanistan was not building a state, which represented all ethnic groups. In contrast by unifying Afghanistan he mean bringing the country under one rule and authority only. In that context any form of politico-social justice, as well as participation and representation of other ethnic groups was excluded from his view of state building. 16 As is today, back then too was religion a great means to mobilize masses. The religious reestablishment represented the will of Allah and therefore, was very powerful.

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strengthened his position with respect to religious establishment (Gregorian, 1969: 135-136). One should of course not judge a king of the nineteenth century with today’s standards, but the question that here is, what was the need for these administrative reforms, if the constituted bodies were only subject to the will of the monarch and had no share in the power, and could not enjoy any authority?

5.3.4 Legal and social reforms

In order to get a better and further grip and control over the kingdom, Abdul Rahman divided the existing laws of his kingdom into three categories: Shari ‘a (the proper Islamic law), Qanun (the administrative or civil law) and the tribal laws. He established also three types of courts: “religious courts, which dealt with religious and civil affairs, criminal courts, which were administrated by the chief of police (kotwals) and judges, and a board of commerce, which was made up of merchants Afghan and non-Afghan, Hindus as well as Muslims who settled business disputes” (Gregorian, 1969: 136). But again, like the administrative reforms and early-constituted assemblies, “although the decisions of the courts were based on Islamic law, they were subject to the Amir’s approval. He retained the powers of a supreme courts in his hands” (Gregorian, 1969: 137). Despite all these reforms, Afghanistan was not in possession of a universal code of law. Though the Amir did establish and administrative unity, but the legal system remained ill and weak of character and very complicated, because every law had to conform the adat (the customary law) or at least to the Afghan tribal code, Pashtunwali. Another effort of Amir Abdul Rahman was the attempt to abolish the long-standing customary law, which “in violation of Islamic law bound a wife not only to her husband but to his entire family as well; windows who wanted to remarry had to marry their husbands next kin, often against their will” (Gregorian’s, 1969: 138). But again as any other reform there is unfortunately no way “to check to what extent this reform was enforced” (Gregorian, 1969: 138). Historians from Afghanistan, like Farhang (1994), however believe that the Pashtunwali or the Afghan tribal law always prevailed the Islamic as well as the civil law of the State. Another reform that the Amir brought was the abolition of slavery. But even his anti-slavery law failed to free those already enslaved from economic bondage.

5.3.5 Political reforms

The political reforms of Abdul Rahman and their consequences were essential to the process of state and nation building in Afghanistan, in particular his isolationist position towards the use of European technology to modernize the country. At the end of the nineteenth century there were many European plans to connect Afghanistan into the international railway system. The plan was to connect “Paris (and Calais) with Calcutta, via Orenburg, Tashkent, Balkh and Peshawar” (Gregorian, 1969: 152). The plans however were not carried out due to political tensions between Russia and Britain. But even if there had been an agreement between those two powers, Abdul Rahman wouldn’t have allowed it. Because he “firmly resisted all efforts to introduce railways into Afghanistan. In this, he acted against the advice of some of his own advisers as well as

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the British government in India, who argued that Afghanistan could not fully exploit its natural resources or market its products unless modern means of transportation, production and communication were available” (Gregorian, 1969: 153). But that was not enough to convince the Amir of the importance of the modern means of transportation and communication. Fro eh believed that technological advances and specially the introduction of railways would make Afghanistan vulnerable and accessible to the foreign powers. In Amir’s words, “I again advise my sons and successors not to listen to these people. I now what they say is quite true, but, at the same time, they do not consider that by making the country easily acceptable, foreign powers would not find so much difficulty in entering and spreading themselves over our country. The greatest safety of Afghanistan lies in its natural impregnable position” (Gregorian, 1969: 153). Abdul Rahman had his reasons to believe so. He was not all the way against introduction of railways and modern means of transportation and communication, but Afghanistan was not ready yet, he argued. The first and foremost priority of Afghanistan he claimed was to build an army that was able to defend Afghanistan against the foreign invaders. Once that was realized, the process of modernization would follow automatically. It was this desire, to build a strong and independent Afghanistan, which did and does dominate politics in Afghanistan. The economic and political policies of Abdul Rahman were mostly determined by a constant fear of European Imperialism. Therefore, he did not only oppose any attempt towards modernization, but also the training of Afghan officers y the British and sending young Afghans abroad to study. “He held that such a measure would cost the government huge sums of money, in return for which the students might acquire such vices as gambling, and drinking, lose their faith, and, above all, become partial to alien interest” (Gregorian, 1969: 155). The Amir rejected any reform that was not in the interest of the monarchy. As he always claimed, “reform and modernization were only the means, independence under an absolute monarch, the end” (Gregorian, 1969: 155). Another element, which deeply affected and still does the politics of Afghanistan, is the so-called Durand line. In 1893, caught between two powers, the Russian pressure on the one hand and the British intransigence on the other, Abdul Rahman signed the Durand agreement with the British. “In this pact which increased his subsidy from 80,000 to 120,000 pounds, the Amir renounced Afghanistan’s right to intervene in tribal belt” (Gregorian, 1969: 158). The Durand agreement shaped the politics of Afghanistan in many serious ways. Besides having other serious consequences, “it gave the British control of the border passes, (…), with this diplomatic and economic weapon, the authorities in India believed they could induce the afghans to compose any difference they might have with the British government” (Gregorian, 1969: 159). The reign of Abdul Rahman ended with his dead in 1901. Despite certain achievements on the administrative, political and economic fields, he failed to form the Afghanistan he wanted to build. This failure had many external and internal contributing factors, but the most important of all, “what the overwhelming number of divisive forces within Afghanistan itself: the ethnic differences, the religious animosity between Shi’a

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and Sunni Muslims, the tribal jealousies, the feudal obligations and prerogatives, the conflict of regional interest and the traditional values” (Gregorian, 1969: 160). Another factor, which contributed to this failure, “was the lack of resources, both material and human, that a successful and sudden leap into modernity required” (Gregorian, 1969: 160). The end of Amir Abdul Rahman was not particular the end of the desire to form a unified and independent Afghanistan. His successor and son Habibullah Khan continued to walk the same path, though facing new challenges and political difficulties. The rise of Habibullah Khan gave birth to the first movements towards limited modernization, enlightenment and nationalism both in a tribal as well as in a national sense. Briefly, State building in Afghanistan has mainly been a desire to form a central authority. That is to say that a great deal of state capital, mainly from foreign aid, has been invested in the developing a modern Afghan army, capable of defending Afghanistan against the foreign aggression. Due to this political choice of the Afghan statesmen at the time, the Afghan state failed to provide its inhabitants with other public services as health care, labour, education and infrastructure. As discussed earlier the effectiveness of a state is measured in terms of its functionality and ability in providing public services. And since, defending Afghanistan against foreign aggression, that is Russian and British occupation at the time, had been the only aim of Afghan authorities, one can argue that state building, as defined earlier, did not fully take off in Afghanistan. The focus on building an army and a central authority at any cost, structurally and in some cases deliberately excluded the non-Afghan population of Afghanistan to partake in the process of state building and decision-making. This brought the legitimacy of the state under question and the desired political order and authority was never fully achieved.

6. Recent state building and the fragmentation of Afghanistan Why did state building fail in Afghanistan? The efforts of Abdul Rahman and his successors as well as that of different regimes to build an Afghan state with a central and strong authority, ended in a political nightmare. As discussed above the policies of Abdul Rahman to unify Afghanistan and to break down the local and tribal authorities had very harsh consequence for the autonomous and non-Afghan population of Afghanistan. In breaking down the Hazara autonomy in the central of present-day Afghanistan, according to Rasanayagam (2005), the Amir, through massacres, serfdom, expulsion and resettlement reduced the Hazara population to a fifth of a the former size. Nooristan, Badakhshan and other parts were not exception to this policy. Dupree (2002) states that from the beginning of the twentieth century there have been many attempts to foster unity through nation building activities, but the Afghans still uphold their traditional values and custom to distinguish themselves from one another. He further states that the last attempt to cast Afghans in an Islamic mould, met with disaster. Goodson (2001) too believes that any examination of the recent history of Afghanistan shows how on-going ethnic, religious and social divisions have occurred

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during 24 years of conflict and economic upheaval. Shahrani (2002) argues that different efforts of Afghan statesmen failed to unify Afghans under one identity and that the ethnic factionalism prevented Afghanistan from become a strong state. Lack or failure of state building becomes even more evident in what follows. In contrast to other scholars Barfield (2010) argues that the belief that Afghanistan was an artificial creation and doomed to collapse was rooted in confusion between the effectiveness of its institutions and the cohesion of its people. He believes that in 2001 when United States invaded Afghanistan, Afghanistan was a failed state but a failed nation. His argument is based on the unity of different ethnic groups against the Russian aggression. Rasanayagam (2005), Rubin (1995) and Manochehr (2007) argue that in years of resistance against the Soviet Union, the oppressed ethnic groups sought for opportunities to rise can claim their identity again. Among the others Hazaras of Hazarajat were the first to wage a war against the communist regime of PDPA (Peoples Democratic Party of Afghanistan). The Khans of the villages led the resistance against the PDPA, and by 1979 except for the capital Bamiyan, they liberated the province from communist rule and remained autonomous for the best part of the two coming decades17. The political nightmare mentioned earlier was the total fragmentation of Afghanistan along ethnic and regional lines. This fragmentation was a consequence of two things, firstly the problem that President Najibullah was facing after the departure of Soviets to secure the vital supply routs from the north to the capital, and secondly the interest of Pakistan to keep Afghanistan divided. Rasanayagam (2005) argues that most of the Soviet forces were concentrated along the important routes, like the Salang tunnel, which was of great strategic importance, after their departure Najibullah lacked adequate forces to defend this areas. Therefore, he patronized local authorities and warlords to become a fighting force against the mujahedeen. Naderi, was one of this local authorities backed by PDPA who by 1989 had 13,000 trained troops and acted as intermediary in distributing Soviet aid and a channel of communication between communist regime and the mujahedeen. The Uzbek, General Adbul Rashid Dostum, led another effective pro-government militias, who originally safeguarded the natural gas company’s installation in north. His earliest recruits were the oppressed Uzbeks of Juzjan province, who had been exploited by the monarch supported Durrani-Afghan landlords. His political movement became to be known as Jenbesh (movement in Persian) and by 1989 he had an army of 40,000 armed and well-trained men. “Their main task was to replace the Soviet troops protecting the gas fields and the supply routes from the Soviet border and southwards through Mazar-i-Sharif” (Rasanayagam, 2005: 130). There are many other examples of Najibullah’s defence policy that later led to formation of strong and regional warlords and authorities. Secondly, President Zia’s policy with a long-term Pakistani interest played a vital role in the fragmentation of Afghanistan after the Soviet withdrawal. His problem was

                                                                                                                         17 See Rasanayagam (2005) p. 130 – 132.

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the mutual desire of Pashtuns in both Afghanistan and Pakistan for a greater Pashtunistan. For this reason the earlier attempts of Afghan nationalist in Pakistan to form a unified command though which weapons and cash could easily be channelled to fight the jihad, was discouraged by Zia. Instead he chose to distribute to the resources separately to the seven hostile parties based in Peshawar. As a consequence of this policy, the seven parties had been operating independently and “had never been able to agree on a common political platform for the exercise of power in a post-communist Islamic republic” of Afghanistan (Rasanayagam, 2005: 135). In other words the mujahedeen had a common enemy but a common future had never been subject of discussion. Once the Soviet troops left, the communist regime fail and Afghanistan fell into the hands of mujahedeen Afghanistan turned into chaos. The tribal structure of the state and its organizational character along ethnic lines becomes once again clear in the transitional period. When the political settlement talks between USA and Soviet Union started, the foreign aid to Afghanistan was too ended. As a consequence Najibullah could not longer buy the loyalty of his created militia in north and west. According to Rubin (1995) he turned to the only remaining tool of Afghan rulers, “manipulations of social segmentation” (Rubin, 1995: 269). He tried to assert control north, where Adbul Rashid Dostum his created militia had become a strong challenge for his government, by using the Pashtun solidarity method. Najibullah instructed General Juma Asak, a Pashtun who was known for his Pashtun chauvinist views and the commander of the Northern Zone, to replace General Mumin, the Tajik command of the Hairatan garrison where the weapons where strode. General Mumin not only refuses to obey the presidential order, but establish ties with both Dostum and Massoud. As a consequence the Najibullah administration sought to find a “Pashtun solutions” (Rubin, 1995: 271). The Pashtuns in Afghan military force, mainly Khaliqis18, arranged the infiltration so unarmed fighters of Hizb-i-Islami of Hekmatyar, into the city, where they got arms from their co-ethnics in the Interior Ministry. But the pro-Masoud branch of PDPA had already seized control over bigger parts of the capital including the airport where Najibullah was prevented from leaving the country. In between Masoud in alliance with Dostum and General Mumin had seized control over all military bases of North and strategic routes and post from Mazar-i-Sharif to Kabul and on April 25th their forces were in control of Kabul. Commander Masoud of the Jamiat was aware the fact that no single group could govern the fragmented country and therefore, he urgently called for the Peshawar arrangement and talks on power sharing. According to Rasanayagam on April 24th, according to Rubin on April 26 and according to Afghan scholars on April 27 an agreement was reached and became to be known as the Peshawar Agreement19. The agreement soon became inoperative because Hekmatyar commander of Hizb-i-Islami refused to sign it. He argued that his position as prime minister “should not be

                                                                                                                         18 See Rubin (1995), p. 269 – 271. 19 See Rasanayagam (2005), p. 141 – 142 and Rubin (1995), p. 271.

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subordinate to that of the president, and the position defence minister (to which Masoud was appointed) should fall under the control of the prime minister” (Rasanayagam, 2005: 142). He was also against the inclusion of General Dostum, the Uzbek commander who had had served communists, and overlooked his own alliance the former communist minister of defence, Shahnawaz Tani. The interim government for a term of two months by Mujadidi and a term four moths by Rabbani, arrived in Kabul on April 28 to proclaim the establishment of the Islamic State of Afghanistan. But as Rubin correctly argues, “perhaps this entity was Islamic, hut it was hardly a state and certainly did not rule Afghanistan” (Rubin, 1995: 272). The disagreement of Hekmatyar to sign the agreement was a growing issue and a great threat for political stability. The long standing rivalry between Masoud and Hekmatyar and therefore, between Jamiat-i-Islami and Hizb-i-Islami became to be associated with the rivalries of Khalq and Parcham, the non-Pashtun and Pashtun, branch of DPPA and the endeavour to dominate political arena in Afghanistan. Hekmatyar claimed that the new government was a genuine mujahedeen government and consequently intensified his fights on Kabul, that had began before the agreement was reached in Peshawar, and that gave birth to a destructive civil war. As a consequence of this civil war, Afghanistan divided into seven regional power centres. The most important ones will be discussed accordingly.

5.1 The North

As mentioned earlier, Abdul Rashid Dostum had already an army of 40,000 men. By the summer 1993, Dostum had integrated Uzbeks from different parts of country and had an armed force of 120,000 men. Because of his control over airfields, main roads and fuel depots, he was able to offer salaries and carrier prospects to even Pashtun officers of the former regime who had fled to north. Soon mujahedeen commanders of different parties too joined his Jenbesh. At that time, Balkh (Mazar-i-Sharif) was the only stable region of Afghanistan. Dostum succeeded in both keeping the formal functioning structures intact and in creating a “political space for himself as the only powerful figure who supported secularism and (…), minority rights” (Rubin, 1995: 275). Many former government officials and high cadres and leader, including Babrak Karmal one of the former presidents of Afghanistan, took up residence under his protection. In august 1992 the UN moved main office in Afghanistan to Balkh and the neighbouring countries established their consulates there. Balkh became also the centre of expanding private trade and Dostum a regional power holder who started official trips to neighbouring countries (Uzbekistan, Turkey, Pakistan but also Saudi Arabia) where high-ranking government officials received him. Even though Dostum did verbally recognize the juridical sovereignty of Afghanistan, “The government in Kabul exercised no empirical sovereignty over his area” (Rubin, 1995: 275).

5.2 The Northeast

Most of the Northeast remained under the control of Supervisory Council of the North

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(SCN). According to both Rubin and Rasanayagam, the area was sufficiently institutionalized to function, while Massoud and Rabbani were in Kabul (Rasanayagam, 2005: 132-133; Rubin, 1995: 276). In contrast to Dostum, Masoud lacked any reliable foreign support. To gain foreign aid, Masoud allowed the exiled leadership of the Islamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan20 to establish an office in the capital of SCN, Takhar province. The only area that remained outside Masoud’s control was part of Kunduz province populated by the Pashtun settlers who had returned their weapons to the Pashtun regional Amir Chughai, a member of Sayyaf’s Itihad party.

5.3 The West

The Herat province, a major trade and cultural port, fell under the control of Amir Islamil Khan, who peacefully took control of the garrison and the Seventeenth Division. Ismail Khan succeeded in integrating the former military commanders into his council. He defeated the pro-Hekmatyar militia in the region. Herat under his rule, turned into a centre of economic revival. The economic growth enabled Ismail Khan to bring many more local commanders under his sway. Until 1993, despite the Iranian interference and pressure to bestow the Shi’a with more power, Herat remained stable and functioning.

5.4 The East

Besides the rival council of Kanar founded in 1988, the mujahedeen of the east established a new council in the Pashtun areas of Jalalabad and Gardez. Two political parties, Hizb-i-khalis and NIFA, dominated the region. Many wars between SCN and Hekmatyar supporter was fought in the region. The east became a cradle to foreign radicals that had no other place to operate. “Many radical Arab Islamists continued to train in Jalalabad” (Rubin, 1995: 277). The autonomy of both Hizb-i-Khalis and NIFA led to development of opium crop and its trade in the region.

5.5 The Hazarajat

The Shi’a in Afghanistan had never been this powerful before. Besides dominating certain parts of the Capital, they were fully autonomous in Hazarajat, central Afghanistan. They enjoyed the intellectual support of former governmental officials of Watan Party and were backed the Shi’a regime of Iran21. Ironically, despite their decades old animosity with Pashtuns landlords and regimes, they built alliance with Hekmatyar’s Hizb-i-Islami in order to cope with the Uzbek and Tajik force and therefore, Dostum and Masoud alliance. But as with other alliances, within a few years every tie and alliance broke down and it became a war of all against all. Scholars like Rasuly, Rasanayagam, Rubin and Farhang believe that state building in Afghanistan has always been based on foreign aid. When one pages through different chapters, histories seems to have repeated it over and over again. The biggest obstacle Abdul Rahman and the Afghan modernist faced was lack of

                                                                                                                         20 See Rubin (1995), p. 176. 21 See Rubin (1995), p. 278.

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a proper economic system to modernize the army and the country. The communist regime of Najibullah too collapsed once foreign aid was stopped. Rubin (1995) and Rasanayagam (2005) too believe that one of the main reasons for the failure of the interim government to control Afghanistan, beside ethnical issues, was lack of a stable source of income. In the northeast for example, Masoud did not only oppose tax collection, he spent part of his foreign aid supporting farmers and small trade initiatives Briefly, given the geopolitical position of Afghanistan and lack of responsible leadership the Afghan state was destined to fail. In addition to that the disability of Afghan statesmen at the time to break the feudal and tribal structure of Afghanistan too contributed to this failure. But the main reason for the failure of the Afghan state has been the dependence of Afghan statesmen on the foreign aid. As discussed earlier during the British dominance in the region Afghanistan had a very weak economy and a very ill organized market. The Afghan state, for a great deal, was dependent on the British aid. Therefore, it never became a priority for the Afghan statesmen to develop a well functioning taxation system to collect revenue. This legacy continues to be the faith of Afghan politics till now. Besides these historical and structural factors, recent history of Afghanistan demonstrates how the deep-rooted ethnic conflict and cultural differences led to the fragmentation of the country. The structural exclusion of non-Afghan population, Tajiks, Hazaras, Uzbeks and other minorities, from political power and decision making, gave birth to devastating civil wars which badly damaged the sense of unity and social harmony. The struggle of non-Afghan population for recognition and equal politico-social rights has caused new challenges to both state building and nation building in Afghanistan. This thesis is strongly convinced that, lack of state building in recent years and the failure of post-Taliban government to bring political stability and to stimulate political participation and to foster national unity are all outcomes of unsolved ethnic issues.

7. Analysis

Figure 7.1 Analysis diagram

NB = Nation building. EN = Ethnic nationalism. SF = State failure. CN = Civic nationalism.

NB SB  

EN

CN

SF

SSB

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SSB = Successful state building. SB = State building. Figure 7.1 is an analysis of the past, the current and the desired approach to state building in Afghanistan. Based on the literature discussed earlier, the failure of nation building in Afghanistan is mainly the outcome of nation building through ethnic nationalism. That is not to deny ethnic diversity in Afghanistan, but to demonstrate that the imposition of values and an artificial identity of the ruling group on others, has led to the failure of both nation building and state building. Based on this political reality and based on Mengisteab’s democratic approach to state building, this thesis states that, only through civic nationalism successful nation building and therefore successful state building can be achieved. The political reality of Afghanistan demonstrates two things. Firstly, state building through coercive means as proposed by Fukuyama and Ghani is not the desired option for Afghanistan and secondly, none of the discussed approaches have been fully applied. State building in Afghanistan has been through unresponsive approach to state building. That is to say that, as it was a reality during Amir Abdul Rahman and his successors, in order to exclude other tribes and ethnic groups from the process of decision making and in order to safeguard their own interest, the political elite in Afghanistan led the project of state building towards failure. In addition to that the Afghan statesmen at the time focused only on the creation of a strong central authority underestimating the importance of a well functioning bureaucracy as the core element of the Weberian approach to state building. Therefore, in contrast to Fukuyama, Ghani and other advocates of coercive approaches to state building, Mengisteab may rightly argue that, decentralization of power, economic and regional integration and the transformation of state from self-serving to a representative institution is the desired option for state building in multi-ethnic societies like Afghanistan. This is not to say that the coercive approaches have failed everywhere, but merely to emphasis that, as the political history of Afghanistan shows, for two reasons they are not applicable to Afghanistan. Firstly because Afghanistan had and has a too strong tribal and feudal structure and secondly one tribe or ethnic group has always ruled Afghanistan. Political opponents and oppositions were either banned from the country or murdered. Any political movement, which opposed the ruling regime, was brutally condemned. As a consequence state-society relation, which was of vital importance for the responsive model of state building, remained weak or absent. A third important element of responsive state building was the development of a well functioning taxation system to create a state-society linkage, to generate expectations and accountability and allow citizen to affect policy formation and therefore state behaviour. But due to availability of foreign aid on the one hand and the strong feudal and tribal structure of society on the other, Afghan statesmen (from past to present) failed to create such a system. State failure in Afghanistan becomes even more apparent when one focuses on the capacities ascribed to a well functioning state. All three capacities described in part

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two seem to be absent. Stimulation of economy, penetration of the society to extract resources and to evoke cooperation, economic network building and developing long term trade policies and relations are the core elements of those capacities. But due to lack a of central authority and taxation, lack of proper infrastructure, transportation and communications system, state in Afghanistan (from past to present) has failed to develop those capacities. State failure is also measured in term of state functionality. One of the core functions of the state is the provision of public goods. If the fragmentation of Afghanistan in the transitional years from communism to an Islamic state along with the years of civil war demonstrated one thing and one thing only, that is the inability of the Afghan state to provide the inhabitants of Afghanistan with security, means of communication, health system and infrastructure. And as Whaites rightly argues security is one of the most fundamental ingredients of state building. The fragmentation of Afghanistan also demonstrates the limited authority of the Afghan state over its territory and lack of its lack of political legitimacy. As figure 7.1 demonstrates state building and nation building are mutually interdependent. Although successful state building does not always have to mean successful nation building, but one cannot deny the fact that both processes could positively as well as negative effect one another. Therefore, to a degree the same obstacles that prevented Afghanistan from becoming a state, led to the failure of nation building too. The modernization approach to nation building could not be applied to Afghanistan because, Afghanistan failed to modernize and urbanization, homogenization of values, educational and administrative system and division of labour, which were of vital importance the process to take off, didn’t take place. One would not be wrong to argue that the process of nation building in Afghanistan has been more a process of nation destroying. The reason for the observation is that, if modernization did not take place, the Afghan statesmen at the time, could have built on exiting elements, like language, religion, cultural myths and historical values that, according to ethno-symbolist approach to nation building had the potential to bind the inhabitants of Afghanistan. But instead as discussed in part five, an artificial identity was imposed on the majority of the populations and by doing so the very desire to build a united Afghan nation led to its failure. In contrast to social constructivists the advocates of modernization theory rightly argue that, identities cannot be created. Instead nation building is the sum of many social processes, division of labour, urbanization and the creation of high cultures and homogeneous means of communication and values that leads to successful nation building. Besides modernization another important factor that led to national consciousness in the west was separation of state and religion. On the contrary in Afghanistan as discussed earlier, religion was used to in the first place legitimize monarchy and in the second as the force behind the nationalist movement. “Islam, Afghan history, and Pashtu tighter formed the mortar that would permit the country’s ethnic mosaic to be muddled into a single nation” (Gregorian, 1969: 176).

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As discussed in both part five and six, lack of national sovereignty and therefore political legitimacy has always been once that greatest challenges to state building in Afghanistan. When is a regime or a state legitimate? The most basic answer to this question is, when governing law or a regime is accepted as an authority. Accepted by whom is the next question? The answer to this question is by the inhabitants the governed territory. Generally it’s the Hobbesian social contract idea, submitting one’s will to that of the Leviathan in exchange for security. When the state fails to provide its citizens with public goods, such as security, rule of law, work and infrastructure, they have the right to oppose the government of seek security elsewhere and through other means. The fragmentation of Afghanistan along ethnic lines is based on this logic. Once the oppressed ethnic groups who were excluded from the decision making process found access to means of violence, they could not take the risk of being oppressed and excluded again. As a result the central government collapsed and a century old ethnic resentment was awakened. From 1992 – 1996 more than million of different ethnic groups were killed and many millions were forced to leave the country. Lastly, the greatest challenges to state building in Afghanistan, are security and political legitimacy. This thesis argues as long as the ethnic conflict in Afghanistan is not solved, security and political legitimacy will always remain a challenge to state building. In addition to that the inability of current government in Afghanistan to stimulate mutual trust and cooperation between different ethnic groups and regions, clearly demonstrate that the presence of ethnic resentment. Ethnic clashes in the Afghan parliament on daily bases demonstrate that the agreements on Bonn conference after the fall the Taliban and the new effort to institution building and political participation seem to be symbolic only. This thesis also argues that, without political participation of other ethnic groups and power sharing a legal economy and well functioning institutions cannot be achieved.

8. Conclusion To what degree is nation building a necessary condition for state building in Afghanistan? The troubled of history of state building in Afghanistan reveals two facts, one the Afghan statesmen failed to form a strong central authority and two, the Afghan state failed to be a representative institution. This thesis states that among the other structural causes as is discussed through different chapters, lack of nation building is one of the main causes of state failure of Afghanistan. This thesis does not deny short and temporal periods of political stability in Afghanistan. But it argues that, during an age effort, dominated by the Afghans (Pashtuns), to build an independent Afghan state with a central and strong authority, other ethnic groups never found the political opportunity and means to oppose the course of state building. A century of political exclusion and the imposition of an artificial identity on the non-Afghan population of Afghanistan became to an end when the communist regime of Najibullah failed and the mujahidin prevailed. As discussed in part six as soon as the Russian backed regimes failed, different ethnic groups sought to

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dominate the capital and different regions of the country. The civil war of 1992 – 1996 and the devastating legacy and the total destruction of great cities clearly demonstrate how deep-rooted ethnic resentment in Afghanistan was. One can rightly ask, is at this globalizing age where according to liberal views, borders are becoming less and less important and universal value such as human and minority rights and democracy is spreading around, necessary to discuss state formation, because some believe that state itself is eroding. To those this thesis argues, even in the most liberal view of the world, competition and identity politics remain an inevitable reality. Therefore, be it a nation state, be it a liberal democracy, and be it a dictatorship or a totalitarian regime, some form of organization is needed to run a society. This is specially the case in a multi-ethnic society like Afghanistan with a variety of cultural difference. In addition that it’s a legitimate question to ask if it is desirable to build a state in Afghanistan, instead of dividing the country into small autonomous states as Shaw would argue, and that way gain political stability both in the region and within and between these new political entities. This thesis however, states that, building a sovereign state in Afghanistan is only possible through nation building and through civic nationalism. This is the case for two reasons. Firstly recent political history and reality of Afghanistan shows that Pashtunization of Afghanistan, that is nation building through ethnic nationalism, not only prevented the country from modernizing and unification, but it also intensified the ethnic conflict and led to the fragmentation of the country along ethnical lines. Secondly, it is the ages of recognition redistribution of power, economic and political means. The majority and minority politic as Lijphart (1999) argues, belongs to history. Politics today is driven by consensus and mutual recognition. Therefore, this thesis is convinced that as long as through civic nationalism an Afghan nation, which truly represents all ethnic groups a stable political entity is impossible to achieve. As is discussed earlier, the aim of certain regimes in Afghanistan has only been the unification of Pashtun of Afghanistan and Pakistan in order to realize the greater Pashtunistan. Hence, creating a common identity, defining national goals and political borders are the most important elements of state formation in Afghanistan. Security and political legitimacy are two of the greatest challenges to state building and political stability in Afghanistan. Once again, without involvement of other armed ethnic groups in the process of power sharing and institution building any effort to build a state is in vain. Therefore, nation building is a necessary condition for state building in Afghanistan.

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