Folsom Monitors Freedom's Future

www.insightmag.com Posted March 6, 2003 By Hans S. Nichols Media Credit: Rick Kozak

The International Republican Institute (IRI) plants the seeds of democracy worldwide, then monitors their growth and celebrates their success. Founded in 1983, it is a nonprofit, nonpartisan advocacy group based in Washington that operates in approximately 60 countries, including some widely regarded as the world's most oppressive and authoritarian regimes.

IRI President George A. Folsom is decidedly enthusiastic about the future of democracy. "We are still very much a 'do tank,' not a 'think tank,'" Folsom tells Insight. The institute has program managers stationed across the globe, keeping IRI's headquarters apprised of democracy's ups and downs. Folsom believes he has good reason for optimism. In the era that has followed the Cold War, he claims, "Business is good for democracy; the world climate is right for democracy."

This reporter saw Folsom and his team in action in Macedonia in the fall of 2002, where IRI observed a successful multiparty election in a Balkan country that had been on the brink of civil war one year earlier. Insight recently caught up with Folsom at IRI's Washington headquarters.

Insight: Where are you most optimistic about the chances for democracy today?

George A. Folsom: Cambodia. They have parliamentary elections next July, and we will field a large election-observation mission, as in Macedonia. The Cambodians have shown the willingness to develop a deep democracy that one day will reach international standards. One of the reasons I am so optimistic is that we have been working with some truly courageous people on the ground there -- truly courageous.

Personal Bio

George A. Folsom: Fighter for democracy means business.

Currently: President, International Republican Institute, Washington.

Born: Jan. 2, 1955; Greenville, S.C.

Family: Wife, Suzanne Rich Folsom, and two children, Anderson, 5, and Rilly Ann, 2.

Education: B.A. in international relations, American University, 1977; a J.D. from the University of South Carolina, and an M.A. from the University of South Carolina in international affairs, 1982; Ph.D. candidate, May 2003, at the Johns Hopkins University School for Advanced International Studies.

Master's thesis: "International Law as an Instrument of Foreign Policy."

Favorite book: Markings, by Dag Hammarskjöld, "a short but intensive study of his personal relationship with God."

Favorite movie: Lawrence of Arabia or Doctor Zhivago. "I can't choose."

Q: In a land where the Khmer Rouge slaughtered an estimated one-third of the country only a generation ago, it must take real courage to fight for democracy.

A: Unfortunately, Cambodia still is a place where assassinations take place with regularity. And it's not just shooting someone in the head with a pistol. What they do is tie a victim's feet and head together behind their back and then hand them over to chop off the head. It's very gruesome.

Yet, in the face of even this kind of intimidation, the Cambodian people have exercised extraordinary courage. For example, we've been working with Kem Sohka, who has just started the Cambodian Center for Human Rights. He is a true Cambodian patriot, and we're in the business of helping patriots build democracies.

Q: How many countries did you visit in 2002?

A: Let's see: Cambodia, Russia, Ecuador, China, Mongolia, South Korea, Japan, Italy, Macedonia, Turkey, South Africa, Qatar, Ukraine and Thailand. That's 14.

I was just in Russia, met with the chairman of the Foreign Policy Committee at the Duma and came away with the view that when it comes to democracy Russia is a study in contrasts.

As the Russians say, you have many Kremlins "managing" democracy, but at the same time you also have the growth of political parties. What's exciting is that those parties are very interested in relating democracy and free enterprise -- tying them together to try to ensure freedom and economic prosperity.

That's something we believe very strongly in as well. You can't be truly free unless you have economic freedom. It's something practical I learned from my father and brother, from their experience running savings and loans: If you have people who own their own homes and finance them, they have a direct, immediate and material interest in local governance and in local schools.

And that's true all across the world.

Q: What's the best way to jump-start democracy in some of these countries, especially those where it has for so long seemed hopeless?

A: I don't believe in one size fits all, either in terms of democracy or economic freedom. Different countries have different histories, customs and traditions. The countries in Latin America, for example, are quite diverse, and you have to tailor your programs accordingly.

Q: How does IRI decide to get involved in a country?

A: There are three criteria to be considered before IRI might engage in operations in a country.

First: Is there an opportunity for IRI to play a role? This criterion used to be, is that country moving in the right direction? But that's been broadened, which could mean a negative direction, as in Argentina.

The second criterion: Is the country of strategic interest to the United States?

And third: Can IRI make a difference in moving that country toward democracy?

Q: How do these criteria fit with what IRI is doing in Latin America?

A: Sometimes a country such as Argentina will take a step backward. We have to accept that. But throughout all Latin America it boils down to governing with transparency.

When ordinary citizens suspect that the elites are not fairly governing the political economy, they are going to throw those elites out of power. That's what has happened in Venezuela, for example, allowing [President] Hugo Chavez to come to power.

Q: In how many countries do you maintain offices?

A: We try to operate with a very light footprint. Because we want to keep our overhead very low, we like to use regional offices. I think it was something like 57 countries at the end of this last calendar year.

But we're expanding all the time. When IRI was started back in 1984, we were in only 10 countries. During the last year we've experienced tremendous growth, increasing our size by 32 percent in one year.

And that's good business for democracy. In the years since the Cold War we have created a much more diverse organization to take advantage of this very good time for democracy.

Q: Where are the bright spots these days?

A: Our polling data indicate that, long term, we should be cautiously optimistic about the West Bank/Gaza after [Yasser] Arafat. But I need to stress the long-term part.

Q: Is it critical that Arafat goes first?

A: I am not going to be particular about the sequencing.

Q: Where are you most pessimistic?

A: I would say countries such as Belarus, where there is the last dictator in Europe. Closely behind Belarus would be Ukraine.

Still, we are working very hard with the democratic opposition and a broad array of political actors and political parties in both countries. But, at the end of the day, there's a relationship between the development of democracy and visible security. Right now the people who work for democracy in Belarus are subject to systematic physical intimidation.

Q: Do you have a program for democracy in Pakistan?

A: We have a very small one there, though it should be getting bigger this year. I am very excited about what's happening in Afghanistan and everywhere else in that region.

In Afghanistan we are working to recreate both the civil and political society. That's a big task, but we're making progress. For example, we have successfully moved an Afghan-language newspaper from Peshawar, Pakistan, back to Kabul, the Afghani capital. They are now publishing five days a week. The objective is that they publish in three different languages.

I am really looking forward to working with new Afghani political parties. I met with a coalition of them in Seoul, Korea, at the Community of Democracies conference. It was a very successful meeting.

It would make an interesting study to compare and contrast how political parties fare and operate in authoritarian environments such as Belarus, Cuba, Burma and Zimbabwe. Just what do they do under such adverse circumstances to try to advance democratic opportunities?

Q: What does globalization, that great nemesis of the current left, mean for democracy?

A: There's not a day goes by that I don't think about globalization from the democratic point of view. IRI is at the democratic tip of the globalization sphere. We are working at the micro level to build healthy democracies. Those democracies sometimes are nascent, sometimes robust. The important thing is that we are building. We are helping to build democracies and it is really exciting.

Q: Of the three countries in President George W. Bush's "Axis of Evil," where will we see democracy take hold first?

A: We already are seeing the beginnings of democracy in Iran. I would counsel that demographic trends in a country that increasingly is a nation of young people are very favorable to the development of a robust democracy.

North Korea probably would be dead last because of the extremely authoritarian nature of the regime.

Hans S. Nichols is a writer for The Hill.