What we owe Iraq : war and the ethics of nation building /

In this short penetrating study, Feldman (New York Univ.), former constitutional adviser to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq, examines the ethics of nation building, exploring its challenges from the perspectives of law, democratic theory, and political morality. The book addresses three major topics: the goals of nation building, trusteeship and the problem of paternalism, and the place of elections. Feldman argues that since international security depends on well-ordered states, self-protective nation building is a morally legitimate enterprise, provided the nation builder exercises political authority temporarily and for the benefit of the people. Above all, once an intervening power has destroyed an existing regime, it has the duty to maintain security and develop legitimate governmental institutions. So long as the emerging institutions are fragile, the occupying power has the responsibility to ensure public order so that political negotiations can lead to the consolidation of a new regime. This timely, carefully reasoned, and elegantly written book is an important contribution to the literature on political development. ^BSumming Up: Highly recommended. All academic and professional libraries. Upper-division undergraduates and above. M. Amstutz Wheaton College

Though there are books on the "how-to" of nation-building, there are none on the ethical theories behind it, says Feldman, author of After Jihad: America and the Struggle for Islamic Democracy and former senior constitutional adviser to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq. Feldman, who teaches law at NYU, does not address the legality or wisdom of the removal of Saddam Hussein's regime, nor the question of when international intervention is justified. He includes some useful anecdotes from his Iraqi tenure, though he doesn't aim to produce a comprehensive account of political negotiations there. But his knowledge of the facts on the ground does lead him to conclude that the U.S. needs to stay in Iraq for democracy to take; his book, based on lectures delivered at Princeton in April 2004, constructs an ethics for doing so. Considering trusteeship, he argues that the American presence in Iraq should facilitate public speech, assembly and participation in administration. He also warns Americans to abandon the notion that they know how to produce a functioning democracy, something that has already come to pass. Written with tempered passion and a grounded sense of the possibilities, Feldman's book nicely bridges theory and practice, even as some events outpace it. Agent, Heather Schroder of ICM. (Nov.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved