The Trump administration’s “America First” approach to international relations is transforming the democratic world order the U.S. helped create.
An internal instruction from Secretary of State Marco Rubio to U.S. diplomats may be the arrow that finishes off what the U.S. has meant to those fighting through the ballot box for freedom and democracy.
In an apparent pursuit of policies that promote “national interests,” no longer will the United States comment on foreign elections except to offer “short, congratulatory” messages “toward the winner.”
Also, such messages “should avoid opining on the fairness or the integrity of an electoral process, its legitimacy, or the democratic values of the country in question.”
The integrity of democratic elections has been a cornerstone of international law and an important source of legitimacy for sovereign governments under the United Nations Charter’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The long-accepted standard has been that the votes of citizens in a free and fair election is a fundamental right.
Elections engage every major societal institution and constitute a dramatic stress test for societies. The reaction to a stolen election can be extreme and can result in violence.
At a minimum, a stolen election undermines the legitimacy of the sitting government. An election infected by fraud that undermines a sovereign government is hardly in America’s national interest.
The U.S. has been a global leader in election observation for the past 40 years. The process used to determine whether an election is free and fair has evolved. It involves an assessment of a nation’s election law, the integrity of its election commission’s rulings, the conduct of political parties during the pre-election period, the fairness of access to the media and a rigorous observation of the vote and the tabulation of results by local and international observers.
While there had been observation efforts by human rights groups in the 1980s, the most important breakthrough came when the U.S. sponsored major international observer groups for the “snap” election in the Philippines in 1986.
The U.S. government sponsored an official delegation to observe the election and USAID and the National Endowment for Democracy supported an international delegation organized by the National Democratic Institute and the International Republican Institute.
The international delegation sent observers from 30 nations to all corners of the Philippine archipelago. They partnered with a Philippine organization called the National Citizens Movement for Free Elections, a civic group with sponsorship from the business community and the Catholic Church.
The National Citizens Movement for Free Elections undertook a parallel vote count. Its members turned in the vote tabulations from every voting place, thus making it difficult for the ruling party to cheat in the vote counting process.
The citizens movement count and the examples of fraud collected by the National Democratic Institute-International Republican Institute delegation provided all the evidence that was needed. The voters rose up and a “People Power” revolution forced the Ferdinand Marcos regime to step down.
Less than two years later, Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet lost in a plebiscite that had been designed to keep him in power for another eight years. The National Democratic Institute sponsored another international delegation, this one led by a former President of Spain, Adolfo Suarez.
A parallel vote count was employed, and Chilean political leaders on the left and right who had witnessed the Philippines vote joined Suarez in calling upon the Chilean military to release the results showing that Pinochet had lost.
By now, the world embraced the concept of election observation, and many governments — particularly those in the new democracies of Central and Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union — wanted observers who would confirm election results.
Longstanding ruling parties, such as the Institutional Revolutionary Party in Mexico and the Socialist Party in Senegal, concerned that their legitimacy was being challenged, requested assistance in reforming their election systems.
USAID and other donor agencies began to finance election system reforms and observers. The United Nations Development Program and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe created election monitoring units to meet the new demand.
Now it appears that the world’s leader in democracy promotion and election observation is turning its back on a vital element of democracy.
The underlying motivation seems to be the desire to make “deals” with authoritarian governments the administration seeks to befriend. If these governments were called out for denying their people the right to a free and fair election, dealmaking might suffer. Better to turn a blind eye!
Yet the administration shows no reluctance to lecture our European allies on how to treat right-wing populist parties, as in the case of Germany’s neo-Nazi party, the Alternative for Germany Party. Or to endorse a right-wing opposition presidential candidate in Poland, or to chastise the High Court in Romania for canceling a flawed election, or to charge the government of South Africa with genocide because of the way white farmers are being treated.
It seems that interfering in the internal affairs of democratic nations is fair game. Yet commenting on the efficacy of elections is forbidden.
It is said that democracy is a journey, not a destination. The U.S. has never achieved democratic perfection, but it has worked assiduously to make it work better at home and abroad. President Ronald Reagan called it an obligation of democracies to share best practices with other nations.
Tremendous progress has been made in the management of elections around the globe thanks to pro-democracy organizations supported by the U.S. government.
Rubio was once a strong supporter of this effort. His latest message to American diplomats marks a sad day for the democracy promotion mission.
One hopes that 40 years of progress will not be extinguished by an ill-advised instruction.
J. Brian Atwood was president of the National Democratic Institute from 1985 to 1993. He served as administrator of USAID in the Clinton administration.
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