Direct Democracy
What is freedom and democracy? Freedom and democracy have multiple different meanings that can be interpreted in many ways. Countries that have never enjoyed these experiences before, for example Afghanistan should ease into this type of democracy. The ideal type of democracy for this county would most certainly be direct democracy where the people are far more intelligent and wise than selfish, greedy politicians, whose time horizon is just the next election.
Democracy is certainly not synonymous with freedom. For the most part, democracies are controlled by those people with the financial means to run for office or by those people who are backed by some external power. While we would like to believe that our votes count and that our voice is heard, for the most part, people find themselves increasingly told what to believe by those who have the money or power to have their message heard. If the people who represent us in the government are nothing like us, how can they represent us? They can't. However laws have been passed to make it difficult for anyone without the necessary capital or connections to run for any office for the most part. When the majority of us are slowly regressing towards poverty and the rich have absolute power and influence through both the people who represent us and through the power of lobbies then it is time to examine our options. We are essentially not free. We have been brainwashed into believing we are through the illusion of a vote and an elected government.
I see the definition of freedom as simply an absence of restrictions as an essentially immature or 'teenage' view of freedom. A more mature view of freedom accepts a trade-off, in some ways a form of delayed gratification: in return for payments of various taxes we lose the freedom to spend all our money as we like, but gain health care and retirement benefits, etc. If we accept driving rules, we enjoy greater 'freedom' to travel further than if there were no rules at all. Some may also argue that if we voluntarily accept some restrictions on sexual behavior, we may enjoy deeper and more fulfilling relationships.
Contrary to the propaganda from the mass media, Afghanistan has a tradition of representative, constitutional democracy that goes back in history. Political parties were recognized under the 1964 Constitution. In the 1960s the parties with the largest memberships were on the political left, which was of concern to the king and the political and economic elite. The right wing Islamist parties were weak until they began to receive massive economic and other support from the U.S. government. Today there are over 80 registered political parties, and there are around 50 broad based democratic parties committed to running on issues, rising above religion, ethnic ties, and regional loyalties. But they have received virtually no support from the countries allied to the U.S. government or the aid agencies (Larson & Lough). What the Afghan people want and need is the democratic right to self determination: the right to choose their own government, their own institutions, and their own economic development strategy. The fact that the people of Afghanistan have been denied these fundamental democratic rights is the main reason for the unpopularity of the government and the strength of the insurgency. We believe that freedom and democracy are inseparable, so that when a dictator is toppled the result is not only a more accountable type of government but also greater liberty throughout society.
This belief forms the justification of the repeated attempts by Western governments to export their own political model to countries such as Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya. In this simple and seemingly compelling story, freedom and democracy are a package that can be delivered anywhere in the world (Taube).
An older generation of thinkers recognized that freedom and democracy don't always go hand in hand. The 19th Century liberal John Stuart Mill was a life-long campaigner for greater democracy, but he also worried that personal liberty would shrink once governments could claim to express the will of the majority (Warnock). Where this older generation differed from many today is that they thought of freedom as a lack of restriction on how we can act. Being free meant simply the absence of obstacles to living as we choose. While it's a view that's been criticized because it seems to see individuals as being separate from society, it seems to me to capture better than any other what freedom means and why it's important for every human being.
We need freedom because our goals and values are highly diverse and often quite different from those of the people around us. Having a voice in collective decisions, the basis of democracy is a fine thing, but it won't protect your freedom if the majority is hostile to the way you choose to live.
Many will tell you that this danger can be dealt with by bills of rights that put some freedoms beyond the range of political interference. But politics has a habit of finding ways around the law, and when the state is weak declarations of rights tend to be unenforceable.
Once you think of freedom as living as you choose, you'll see that it's not just tyrants that stand in its way. The world is full of failed and enfeebled states in which the main threats to freedom come from organized crime, ethnic conflict and militant sectarian groups.
Today, if you're an Iraqi woman and opt for a lifestyle that fails to square with a narrow interpretation of religion, you're at risk of violent attack from fundamentalist groups. If you're known to be gay, you risk being hunted down and killed.
If you belong to a religious minority such as Christians or Mandeans (a branch of Gnosticism that was practiced in the region for about 2,000 years), you face persecution and the risk of extinction (Taube).
In promoting democracy, governments and private organizations should place at least as much stress on the liberal underpinnings of modern democracy as on the forms of political democracy. The emphasis should be on the absolute value of the individual and the universal applicability of basic rights. We should support movements that undercut tribal thinking. We should refrain from insisting on rapid transitions to the political forms of democracy when establishing these forms appears likely to threaten the eventual attainment of the freedoms due every individual and not just every group. We should be careful not to confuse the demand for self-determination with the demand for democracy. Thus the campaign for democracy, the campaign for human rights, and the campaign against war and armaments must become ever more closely identified with one another as we press on, both publicly and privately, toward a world of peace and freedom.
A democracy in Afghanistan must work with the reality of local indemnities and local structures of governance. We have previously seen that Afghanistan is comprised of a diverse population with a complex set of identities and interests, most of them at the local rather than national level (Taube). An Afghan democracy must recognize this reality both in developing support for the government and in building a system that works.
Direct democracy in its truest form must necessarily be a one-party system. This party would be a neutral party, whose only policies are to do what benefits the majority of people, be it through their own ideas or those of others. Before any policy is implemented, it will be scrutinized by the public, and they will vote for it via the polling station or postal service. If the majority of the people say yes, then it is made law and, if no, then it isn’t. The government will always provide the choice between various policies on these forms, including the option of “none of the above”. This is the only way to ensure that people get what they want (Warnock).
However, this direct democracy needs an intelligent and well informed public to make the correct decisions for the whole of society. Much of society is like this. If the public wish something to be made law or a certain policy to be seen through, but that it would be truly detrimental to the country it must be stopped by the government. This leads us into a grey area whereby we cannot know where to draw the line. The line is far easier to draw here along with the system being far more democratic that it is like under a representative democracy.
Having the right to decide on issue means that people feel concerned by them and they will pay attention. People are only uninformed and ignorant in countries where they feel that their opinion doesn’t matter anyways. The people who will pay the bill are also far more likely to have a real-long term interest in making good decisions. This is what type of democracy Afghanistan needs first and foremost.

Works Cited:
Larson, Anna, and Oliver Lough. "What do Afghans Think About Their Democracy? - by Anna Larson and Oliver Lough | The AfPak Channel." The AfPak Channel | FOREIGN POLICY. N.p., 9 Feb. 2011. Web. 21 Nov. 2012. <http://afpak.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2011/02/09/afghan_perspectives_on_democracy>.
Taube, Michael. "EDITORIAL: Progress for democracy in Afghanistan - Washington Times." Washington Times - Politics, Breaking News, US and World News. N.p., n.d. Web. 29 Oct. 2012. <http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/sep/21/progress-for-democracy-in-afghanistan/>.
Warnock, John W.. "US Imposed “Democracy” in Afghanistan | Global Research." Global Research. N.p., 21 Sept. 2010. Web. 21 Nov. 2012. <http://www.globalresearch.ca/us-imposed-democracy-in-afghanistan/21126>.