If America were in Africa
. . . US diplomats would be ringing alarm bells
IN April 2013, when I was the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, I accompanied former US Ambassador to the United Nations and Mayor of Atlanta Andrew Young to a meeting with Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe. Then Secretary of State John Kerry had dispatched us to Harare to convince Mugabe to allow free and fair elections later that summer.
For years, Zimbabwean elections had been marred by a lot of irregularities. We told the Zimbabwean president, the United States was prepared to ease sanctions that had been in place since 2001 and fully normalise relations with his country if he dealt with the irregularities.
Mugabe and Young were well acquainted from the heady days following Zimbabwe’s independence from the United Kingdom. It was said that Young was the only man left on earth to whom Mugabe would listen with a friendly and willing ear.
Mugabe listened to us, but he did not heed our advice. On July 31, 2013, the Zimbabwean president was re-elected to a sixth term in office amid allegations of widespread irregularities at the polls. ZANU-PF won a two-thirds majority in Parliament.
A little more than four years later, Mugabe resigned following threat of an impeachment his own party members and those of the opposition. He died in exile in Singapore in 2019.
As a US diplomat in Africa, I often raised concerns with my African interlocutors about the quality of elections and the state of democracy in their countries.
From Kenya to Cameroon, Burundi to Burkina Faso, my colleagues and I spoke up wherever we saw democracy under threat. We encouraged African leaders to adhere to the rule of law and to refrain from violence against their own people.
We called on ordinary African citizens to put aside their tribal affiliations and cast their votes for the common good of their countries. And we advised local media to stick to reporting the facts and to avoid fanning the flames of sectarian animosity.
Such engagement is not unique to US diplomacy in Africa. Under Republican as well as Democratic administrations, US diplomats have long defended democracy around the globe – in Latin America, Eastern Europe, Central Asia, the Middle East, and beyond. And in any of these regions, if US diplomats observed the same troubling signs that are currently on display in the United States, they would ring the diplomatic alarm bells at the highest levels of government.
Primed to explode
On the eve of the 2020 presidential election, the United States arguably faces the greatest risk of civil unrest and violent revolt since 1860, when 11 states refused to accept Abraham Lincoln’s election as president and eventually seceded from the Union.
American citizens are armed to the teeth, with record firearms sales during the coronavirus pandemic, especially among first-time gun buyers.
Partisan loyalties have hardened to such an extent that they now resemble tribal divisions, making it seemingly impossible for Americans to find personal or political common ground across party lines.
Foreign adversaries are using “bot farms” to spread disinformation that will further divide the electorate. The percentage of Americans who have no trust whatsoever in the media is at an all-time high.
The potential for electoral violence in the United States has been evident for months.
During the protests against racial injustice and coronavirus restrictions this summer, citizens clashed with one another and with the police. In Portland, Oregon, unidentified “security forces” dragged demonstrators into unmarked vans. In Seattle, left-wing protesters seized an entire section of the city, setting up a so-called autonomous zone that local authorities were forbidden to enter.
A 17-year-old counter-protester shot and killed two unarmed people and injured a third in Kenosha, Wisconsin. Members of the far-right boogaloo bois assassinated law enforcement officers in Oakland and Santa Cruz. And in Michigan, the FBI foiled a plot by members of a rightwing militia to kidnap the state’s Democratic governor, Gretchen Whitmer, and try her for treason. In the final weeks before the election, President Donald Trump has primed his supporters to reject any result except his victory.
In a year in which a record number of Americans have cast their ballots by mail because of the pandemic, Trump has repeatedly asserted that mail-in ballots are inherently illegitimate, laying the groundwork to claim that the election was “rigged” if he doesn’t win.
Both he and Vice President Mike Pence have refused to commit to a peaceful transfer of power, the only time in American history that a major party ticket for the presidency — let alone the current occupant of the White House—has not committed to honouring this sacred
tradition of democracy.
For the first time in living memory, the United States is at risk of suffering a disputed election with a potentially violent aftermath.
Every presidential election offers a choice for the future.
The election of 2020, no less than any previous election, presents different visions for US society at home and US engagement abroad.
Reasonable and well-meaning people can disagree on all manner of important issues of domestic and foreign policy.
They should cast their votes accordingly. Yet no matter who wins the White House, the United States must conclude this election season with its democracy intact. At the moment, that is not assured.
Heeding our own advice
In this moment of crisis for American democracy, the United States must heed the advice that for years it has dispensed to fragile governments in Africa and around the world.
That means demanding of American citizens the same spirit of civic engagement that US diplomats seek to inspire in citizens in foreign countries and demanding of US leaders the same respect for the rule of law that they demand of foreign leaders.
Americans of every political tribe must categorically condemn violence against people and property in all circumstances, making clear that Americans do not resolve their political differences at the barrel of a gun or by hurling rocks in the street. In a democracy, every vote is said to matter. — www.foreignaffairs.com. ◆ Reuben E Brigety II is an American diplomat and academic and currently vice-chancellor and president of the University of the South, in Sewanee Tennessee
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