The thing that really astonishes me is that there's never any agency given to Iraqis, both during the war and the occupation, but also 20 years later. It always goes back to what the Americans did. There's a defeatism about Iraq's ability to do anything on its own and I think that's at the heart of why people can't see anything democratic in the country.

Marsin Alshamary

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A full transcript is available at www.democracyparadox.com.

Marsin Alshamary is a research fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Middle East Initiative and nonresident fellow at the Brookings Institution’s Center for Middle East Policy. She is the author of the paper "Iraq’s Struggle for Democracy" in the Journal of Democracy.

Key Highlights

• Introduction - 0:41
• Is Iraq a Democracy - 3:37
• Iraqi Social Cleavages - 9:20
• Iraqi Consociationalism - 26:33
• Challenges to Democracy in Iraq - 36:55

Key Links

"Iraq’s Struggle for Democracy" in the Journal Democracy by Marsin Alshamary

Follow Marsin Alshamary on Twitter @MarsinRA

Learn more about Marsin Alshamary

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