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Thread: Modernization/Development Theory, CORDS, and FM 3-24?

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    Default Modernization/Development Theory, CORDS, and FM 3-24?

    I didn't realize this thing times out on you and lost a huge post (my fault for not saving it elsewhere and cutting and pasting.)

    So, because I don't have time to recreate it now, I'll just post a few articles and return to the thread at a later date. Sorry, moderators, I am absolutely furious at myself for losing about an hours worth of work

    1. http://www.deepdyve.com/lp/universit...ess-e4cRc8JEqg

    The Illusion of Progress: CORDS and the Crisis of Modernization in South Vietnam 1965-1968

    2. Jacqueline Hazelton:
    The mechanism at work is gaining the support of most of the populace. The HAM understanding of the solution to insurgency grows from the Cold War literature on modernization theory.
    http://citation.allacademic.com/meta.../p498775-6.php

    3. Bernard Finel blog:

    Instead, they just assume that legitimacy is a function of the provision of goods services and government accountability. I have no idea where this comes from. It ignores, among other things:

    (1) The role of shared foundational myths;
    (2) The presence of an external enemy;
    (3) The importance of charismatic leadership;
    (4) The role of coercion (yes, coercion can contribute to legitimacy);
    (5) Traditional power structures;
    (6) Distributional policies;
    (7) Local autonomy;
    (8) Ethic, religious, and sectarian connections;
    (9) The presence of “escape” mechanics to supplement “voice.”
    http://www.bernardfinel.com/?p=1400

    4. Reframing the Historical Problematic of Insurgency: How the Professional Military Literature Created a New History and Missed the Past, Gumz Jonathan E.

    http://www.ingentaconnect.com/conten...00004/art00003

    5. Tony Corn: COIN in Absurdistan: Saving the COIN Baby from the Afghan Bathwater (and Vice-Versa)

    http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/jou...p/479-corn.pdf

    6. Doctrine of Eternal Recurrence, Austin Long:

    http://www.rand.org/pubs/occasional_papers/OP200.html

    (So what I lost were the various passages on modernization theory that I had culled, but you all can search for yourself....)


    Sorry, everyone, I'll add more when I have a chance and try and tie the different strands together.
    Last edited by Madhu; 07-02-2012 at 02:37 AM. Reason: adding new references

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    Default More to discuss....

    China is proof positive that the "Modernization Theory" is finally dead, for good.

    The theory in its most basic outline postulated societies passing through certain stages in history, culminating with the "modern" age. The main transition was formulated differently by different theorists.
    For Karl Marx, the crucial transformation was from the stage of Feudalism to Capitalism. For Ferdinand Toennies it was the replacement of Gemeinschaft type of society by Gesellschaft. And for the "Father of Sociology" Emile Durkheim, it was the progress from a Mechanical to Organic type of social solidarity and division of labor.

    Two main variants of this theory (Marxist versus Structural-Functionalist) postulated different "constitutive elements" of modernity.

    Marxists thought capitalist industrialization was what made "modern" societies so unique.

    For Structural Functionalists it was a long list of other factors including literacy, urbanization, democracy, rationality, Protestant Ethics and bureaucratization (Max Weber), etc.

    Marxists were certain that modern industrialization would trigger an age of revolution and the "dictatorship of the proletariat," which translated as "freedom for the masses" in their book.
    http://www.culturefeast.com/china-th...zation-theory/

    The book provides the first history of the progression of ideas that laid the groundwork for development of poor, postcolonial countries by the World Bank Group's IDA and copycat institutions; as such, it is indispensable for understanding how the world arrived at the juncture it is at today.

    Long after modernization theory was discredited it continued to shape how institutions in wealthy countries viewed societies in poor countries and administered to them. Not all the resulting development/aid programs have been 'bad,' by any means. But the intellectual constructs that supported them were just that, so when met with the cold light of events in this past decade they were as castles of sand meeting the ocean's tides.

    The above is another way of saying that a study of Gilman's work is the best talisman against the fear that the world is going to hell in a hand basket. One finds assurances within the pages of the book that the world is just doing what it's always done: going its own way, raucously independent of how social scientists and economists think it should behave -- a point shored by Gilman's study of black globalization
    http://pundita.blogspot.com/2008/12/...alization.html

    So, my question to the probably two whole people that are interested in the topic, is how much did the general intellectual climate of our larger foreign policy intelligentsia find representation in current COIN doctrine? If these theories are discredited, why do we continue to interact with nations based on such theories? Is what I am postulating even true, and is it contributing to our current problems in A-stan?

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    So, my question to the probably two whole people that are interested in the topic, is how much did the general intellectual climate of our larger foreign policy intelligentsia find representation in current COIN doctrine? If these theories are discredited, why do we continue to interact with nations based on such theories? Is what I am postulating even true, and is it contributing to our current problems in A-stan?
    Because these beliefs are part and parcel of our strategic culture, political culture, and even our media culture. It is hard to shed bad ideas when they're so intertwined with our culture at that level.

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    The Illusion of Progress: CORDS and the Crisis of Modernization in South Vietnam 1965-1968



    Definitely worth reading, and ensure you read the footnotes. This should quiet the constant barrage of empty rhetoric from many who believe they are on the cutting edge of COIN because they're pushng a development agenda to indirectly defeat the adversary. This approach to some degree was pushed in the Philippines at the beginning of the last century, but it became the rage during the Cold War, and it didn't work then either.

    http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j...KUIX3EELpD3Mjg

    A few excerpts to wet the appetite.

    Modernization theory gained policy and academic prominence
    during the 1950s. Under the fog of fear and suspicion that defined the Cold War, it gave policymakers a dynamic theory of accelerated growth, based upon a hierarchy of measurable stages they could apply without conflict or contradiction across a broad spectrum of nations, races, and cultures.
    Modernization theory also held that rational societies were intrinsically good, fundamentally alike, and perpetually dynamic. The theory’s assumptions spawned a gospel of development, with all the trappings of religious dogma. Moral certitude, however, concealed a dark side of the theory that made development such an abstraction that it excused human suffering as the unavoidable but acceptable price of growth
    .

    examining the 1964 Special Operations Research Office (SORO), Project Camelot. The Army and Department of Defense created this program with a mandate to “determine the feasibility of developing a general social systems model that would make it possible to predict and influence politically significant aspects of social change in the developing nations of the world.
    even Huntington extolled war as an appropriate precondition for modernization. The erosion of authority, social disintegration, human displacement, and infrastructural upheaval that accompanied war provided a clean slate for seeding development.
    Military modernization’s danger, however, rested on its propensity to incubate despotism and to sanction what Nils Gilman has called the “indefinite deferral of democracy in the name of stability.
    Komer remarked that he had to remind Johnson to focus on the realities of the conflict, at one point jesting, “Boss, why don’t we win the war first. Then we’ll turn on the lights.” In 1966, when CORDS was in its gestational stage, rural electrification was a ridiculous ambition, and Komer knew it. Nevertheless, it succeeded at framing Johnson’s vision for the region as he refocused on the Other War.
    The CIA exacerbated Komer’s problems with a report that found increased communist insurgency against pacification in the backcountry

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    Council Member ganulv's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Madhu View Post
    The theory in its most basic outline postulated societies passing through certain stages in history, culminating with the "modern" age. […] For Karl Marx, the crucial transformation was from the stage of Feudalism to Capitalism.

    http://www.culturefeast.com/china-th...zation-theory/
    I don’t know how deeply you want to dig into the intellectual history of this stuff, but if you do… Marx’s stages of history draw upon Lewis H. Morgan’s ethnical periods outlined in his magnum opus Ancient society.* Over the past century+ of ethnological/archaeological/historical research Morgan’s reconstruction of human history has been convincingly shown to be wanting, ergo the Marxist work based upon Marx and Engels’s work based upon it is in need of reevaluation.† And that’s just the Marxist stuff. Dig into non-Marxist ideas about modernization and you’ll find analogous (and maybe homologous!) stuff going on.

    Quote Originally Posted by Madhu View Post
    If these theories are discredited, why do we continue to interact with nations based on such theories?
    Short memories? Group think? Laziness? I second Bill’s recommendation regarding having a look at the U.S.’s past half century of interaction in Vietnam. The fact that a development project for the Mekong based upon the TVA was in the pipes for years speaks volumes to me. As a native of Western North Carolina the most charitable thing I will say about the TVA is that it overpromised and underdelivered.

    *If you are interested in the relationship of Morgan’s upon Marx and Engels’ understanding of human history I strongly recommend the 1964 John Harvard Library edition of Ancient society edited by Leslie White. A big part of the value White adds to this versus previous editions is in his discussion of the relationship of LHM’s work to M&E’s.

    †Which in no way invalidates the roles of Morgan—whose work and life I have a great affection for for a number of reasons—or Marx and Engels as great question askers. Some of their answers still hold up pretty well after all these years, too, just not on this particular score.
    If you don’t read the newspaper, you are uninformed; if you do read the newspaper, you are misinformed. – Mark Twain (attributed)

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    Quote Originally Posted by Madhu
    So, my question to the probably two whole people that are interested in the topic, is how much did the general intellectual climate of our larger foreign policy intelligentsia find representation in current COIN doctrine?
    They are one and the same. The COIN doctrine is fundamentally neoconservative in its approach, with the same basic assumptions governing American foreign policy. There was a huge push to intellectualize our approach to the conflict -- professional soldiers had to justify subordinating their careers and principles to wars that quickly lost credibility among the American public. The decision was made first. The ideas and justifications came afterward. By the time Bush came to office in 2001, America was already basking in its superpower status, and all the privileges thereof in propagating its ideas and methods. The GWoT was preceded by the humanitarian interventions of Somalia, Yugoslavia, and Haiti and the hope to the end of history. We had unfinished business with Iraq and the inconvenience of Al-Qaeda's base of operations in Afghanistan, wars to be explained by the Bush administration that terrorists "hate our freedom". So of course, we end up in Iraq and Afghanistan, only to find to that there are inexplicably more legitimate grievances against Americans than hatred of freedom. But it can't be that these people are actually content with their way of life, or have values which differ from our own. It must be that rampant corruption, religious radicalism, and lack of legitimate government (I'm talking about Afghanistan, not Saudi Arabia), prevent these populations from enjoying the freedoms we have in America. Notwithstanding the evidence in Lebanon and Palestine (and possibly in Egypt), if only people were given democracy, they would come to love our freedom like we do. So we went about building new governments and norms and ethics for them in the hope they would find that inner American within themselves.

    Quote Originally Posted by Madhu
    If these theories are discredited, why do we continue to interact with nations based on such theories?
    In my view, these ideas are institutionalized in America's academies, agencies, and think tanks. American foreign policy is not rational -- it is not developed on the sole basis of pursuing universalized and idealized American interests. Instead, it is formed within the context of on-going political battles between numerous factions and private interests, all of them armed with deep pockets, friendly think tanks and media outlets, and influential friends. Our foreign policy is ad-hoc, short-sighted, subordinate to the prevailing partisan interests of the time, and some times the cart pulls the horse. But all of these are within a narrow range of acceptable ideological boundaries -- namely the orthodoxy of democratic capitalism. The language may have changed since the Cold War with the emergence of neoconservative triumphalism but remains firmly rooted in its militancy and the hostility towards "heretical" political and economic beliefs. The blow back of 9/11 and the shake-up of the on-going financial emergency have not stirred up any serious contender to the foundation of these ideas. And quite frankly, so long as Americans remain largely ignorant and immune (which won't last forever) of the consequences of our policies abroad, it doesn't matter if the ideas aren't credible since nobody knows any better.

    Quote Originally Posted by Madhu
    Is what I am postulating even true, and is it contributing to our current problems in A-stan?
    It depends what you define as the "current problems" in Afghanistan. Is it the existence of a fairly weak, thoroughly corrupt central government with a keen eye towards its own survival? Is it widespread underdevelopment? Is it the use of Afghanistan as a safe haven by terrorist organizations? Or the emergence of an international consciousness in Taliban ideology? Afghanistan was not a big deal in the 2008 election and it doesn't look like it will be in 2012 given the slow economic recovery and the death of OBL. Obama's national security credentials are essentially unassailable at this point, so I doubt Romney will bother bringing them up since he's going to be more focused on Hispanics, women, and the upper class (none of whom particular care for the conflict). So really, perhaps the "problem" is that the war is continuing on auto-pilot with a deadline of 2014 (for now) and there's no longer much at stake to change what will be a foregone conclusion of American withdrawal. The COINistas won the battle. But who lost the war?
    When I am weaker than you, I ask you for freedom because that is according to your principles; when I am stronger than you, I take away your freedom because that is according to my principles. - Louis Veuillot

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    Default Here Is My Theory

    During the late 50's and early 60's COIN(called Brush Fire Wars back then) was largely based on American Indian Wars, that is why all Army helicopters were named after them. Clearing was done by the Cavalry, Holding and Building was done by the American settelers. This theory morphed into what we are calling COIN today but with the belief that the lcoal population can be substituted for the original American Setteler and thus we would save the rest of the world from whatever we (USA) decided they needed to be saved from.

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    Quote Originally Posted by slapout9 View Post
    During the late 50's and early 60's COIN(called Brush Fire Wars back then) was largely based on American Indian Wars, that is why all Army helicopters were named after them. Clearing was done by the Cavalry, Holding and Building was done by the American settelers. This theory morphed into what we are calling COIN today but with the belief that the lcoal population can be substituted for the original American Setteler and thus we would save the rest of the world from whatever we (USA) decided they needed to be saved from.
    Actually, Slap, for the most part the Army was dragged into areas by settlement patterns, not the reverse. In many cases the Army aided settlement, but it was a paired relationship (like a dog with fleas...the only question turns on who was the dog and who was the flea in this particular relationship). I tend to think that generic COIN ideas morphed more out of British Imperial practice combined with what we took away from the Philippines. The Army tended to be somewhat dismissive of the Indian Wars (remember that even at the time the leadership sent Upton to see if he could glean any lessons from the British in India...even though he came back with a strong admiration for the Prussian military system and wrote almost exclusively about that), and even now doesn't really study them in a practical or meaningful way.
    "On the plains and mountains of the American West, the United States Army had once learned everything there was to learn about hit-and-run tactics and guerrilla warfare."
    T.R. Fehrenbach This Kind of War

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    Quote Originally Posted by slapout9 View Post
    During the late 50's and early 60's COIN(called Brush Fire Wars back then) was largely based on American Indian Wars, that is why all Army helicopters were named after them. Clearing was done by the Cavalry, Holding and Building was done by the American settelers. This theory morphed into what we are calling COIN today but with the belief that the lcoal population can be substituted for the original American Setteler and thus we would save the rest of the world from whatever we (USA) decided they needed to be saved from.
    It might be a post hoc explanation, but I’ve read that the practice of using tribal names for Army aircraft stems from the importance of Fort Sill in the early years of Army Aviation. It makes sense, I guess; I spent a week or so in Fort Sill once and the only things I really remember about it are that there were a lot of Indians and that it smelled like cow####.

    If you look at the career of Phil Sheridan you have someone who participated in the Civil War, Reconstruction, and the Indian Wars and with Nelson Miles you have someone who participated in the Civil War, Indian Wars, and the invasion and occupation of Puerto Rico. Just with those two there’s a lot of grist for the mill. It would be nice to think there was some institutional memory of them.
    If you don’t read the newspaper, you are uninformed; if you do read the newspaper, you are misinformed. – Mark Twain (attributed)

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    Quote Originally Posted by ganulv View Post
    It might be a post hoc explanation, but I’ve read that the practice of using tribal names for Army aircraft stems from the importance of Fort Sill in the early years of Army Aviation. It makes sense, I guess; I spent a week or so in Fort Sill once and the only things I really remember about it are that there were a lot of Indians and that it smelled like cow####.

    If you look at the career of Phil Sheridan you have someone who participated in the Civil War, Reconstruction, and the Indian Wars and with Nelson Miles you have someone who participated in the Civil War, Indian Wars, and the invasion and occupation of Puerto Rico. Just with those two there’s a lot of grist for the mill. It would be nice to think there was some institutional memory of them.
    Part of the helicopter naming had to do with the projecting scouting role they'd play. Indian scouts and all that...

    Sheridan was one of those who backed sending Upton on his world tour, although as I recall it was mainly Sherman's project. Sheridan had some vision regarding Indian fighting, but on the whole he was pretty conservative and didn't move much to change the Army as an institution. Miles...he was too wrapped up in himself to really make the sort of changes that would have been needed to preserve lessons from this period. After all, many of these guys were still fighting in print about who captured just how many cannon at the Battle of Cowflap Road during the late unpleasantness or worrying about the revolt of the working classes in the streets back East. Much of the Army's attention was focused elsewhere...perhaps the only "lesson" they preserved from this time...
    "On the plains and mountains of the American West, the United States Army had once learned everything there was to learn about hit-and-run tactics and guerrilla warfare."
    T.R. Fehrenbach This Kind of War

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    Default Modernization Theory is not dead, but ...

    Modernization Theory was largely the creation of Seymour Lipset in a 1959 article "Some Social Requisites of Democracy: Economic Development and Political Legitimacy"(Seymour Martin Lipset,The American Political Science Review, Vol. 53, No. 1. (Mar., 1959), pp. 69-105. Stable URL:http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=000...3E2.0.CO%3B2-D ). It was a synopsis of a research symposium conducted to try to determine what conditions were necessary for democracy to flourish. Out of that article came a number of ideas, most of which were centered on the structural/functional aspects discussed above. But there were other ideas that were tossed around.

    The most resilient one has been built on the idea of the economic capacity for a country to transition to and maintain a democracy. Work is still ongoing into this idea. The most vocal advocate of this idea is Adam Przeworski. (See for example "Modernization: Theories and Facts" http://muse.jhu.edu/login?auth=0&typ...rzeworski.html or dss.ucsd.edu/~mnaoi/page4/POLI227/files/page1_13.pdf ). Przeworski's work ties a minimum per capita GDP to functional democracies of about $6,000 in 1985 dollars; about $12,800 in today's dollars. Below that level a democracy cannot survive. It might be worth noting that the CIA World Fact Book lists China's per capita GDP at only $8,400. Well below what Przeworski postulates is require to transition to democracy.

    Another idea dealt with values. Certain values, particularly individualistic ideals, were tied to the transition to democracy. The cheerleader of that idea has been Ronald Inglehart. You can see some of his work at http://www.worldvaluessurvey.org/. Of particular interest is his use of secular/rational values vs traditional values and survival vs. self-expression values to map world cultures with specific clusters for "modernized" democracies. A more in depth version of his theories can be found in "Modernization, Cultural Change, and Democracy: The Human Development Sequence" (http://www.amazon.com/Modernization-.../dp/0521846951).

    Modernization Theory is not dead but the structural/functional version of it has been largely discredited. You cannot simply build democratic institutions and expect democracies to spring up. There must be a fundamental change in the society. This change seems to begin with a general increase in the opportunities available to the citizens due to an increase in their income level (per capita GDP) that is followed by a change in attitudes from a traditional, communal value set that is interested in surviving to an individualistic value set that is interested in personal self-expression and fulfillment. Those types of changes do not happen overnight and certainly do not happen because you built a school in a town where there is no disposable income.

    To see more check out http://www.foreignaffairs.com/featur...ization-theory
    Last edited by TheCurmudgeon; 07-03-2012 at 02:00 AM.
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    Default Army Aviation Named After Indian Tribes

    Link to US Army Big Picture histroy of Army Aviation....very differant concept from all the others.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NpFg9...eature=related

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    Default a theory byu any other name ....

    Quote Originally Posted by Madhu View Post
    So, my question to the probably two whole people that are interested in the topic, is how much did the general intellectual climate of our larger foreign policy intelligentsia find representation in current COIN doctrine?
    I am not really sure about COIN doctrine in general, but American Coin doctrine that supports the policy objective of spreading democracy does not have to many other choices. Modernization Theory is pretty much the only game in town when it comes to exogenous (externally imposed) democracy.

    Quote Originally Posted by Madhu View Post
    If these theories are discredited, why do we continue to interact with nations based on such theories?
    Two points here. The first is that there are no alternatives. There are really no other competing theories out there to explain how a state becomes a democracy.

    The second point has to do with Modernization Theory itself. It is not really a complete theory. It is more a group of observations about what conditions have existed in a society when a country became or successfully continued to remain a democracy. There is really no coherant explination of why these things happen, just a lot of tables and charts that show that these things (education and literacy, wealth and a capitalist economy, egalitarian values, political activite citizenry, etc.) tend to coincide with democracy. It is kind of like claiming a theory of percipitation that states that when it is cloudy it rains. It is a largely accurate observation. But the theory does not explain why sometimes it is cloudy but it still does not rain or why, in places like Hawaii, it can rain from a largely cloudless sky.

    Quote Originally Posted by Madhu View Post
    Is what I am postulating even true, and is it contributing to our current problems in A-stan?
    I would say that it is contributing to our problems in A-stan, but that question is larger than I can answer here. I would suggest you go back and read the original article if you can find it. You will see how Lipset discussed various ideas. He also concludes that democracy is only one possible consequence of the various social requisites. Others since, like Larry Diamond, have tried to push this idea as a simple causal relationship. It is that kind of thinking that can be damaging.

    BTW, I am very interested in this topic and have spent the about four years now working through it. So you are not alone ... (insert theme from"The X-Files" here)
    Last edited by TheCurmudgeon; 07-03-2012 at 03:24 PM.
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    Quote Originally Posted by TheCurmudgeon View Post
    Modernization Theory is pretty much the only game in town when it comes to exogenous (externally imposed) democracy.
    My own common-sense definition of the term ‘democracy’ involves the consent of the governed. Do I misread the irony in your statement? Or do you define the term differently?
    If you don’t read the newspaper, you are uninformed; if you do read the newspaper, you are misinformed. – Mark Twain (attributed)

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    Quote Originally Posted by ganulv View Post
    My own common-sense definition of the term ‘democracy’ involves the consent of the governed. Do I misread the irony in your statement? Or do you define the term differently?
    Yeah, unfortunately, it is the policy types who miss the irony. But the idea of exogenous or imposed democracy is alive and well in the minds of some people. Particularly those who tie democracy with human rights. To ensure that all people live in a country that observes universal human rights the only way to accomplish it is by forcing democracy upon them.

    There are also those in the security arena that believe the mantra that democracies do not go to war with each other and therefore, the way to secure peace is by ensuring that every country in the world is a democracy.

    I do not share either view. I do not believe you can externally impose democracy or any other form of legitimate government. I also believe that a democracy will go to war (or engage in a "war of choice") with any other country under the right conditions.
    Last edited by TheCurmudgeon; 07-03-2012 at 04:11 PM.
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    After reading the article "The Illusion of Progress: Cords and the Crisis of Modernization in South Vietnam, 1965-1968" I didn't quit see Huntington as deriding modernization, only the way it was being conducted by CORDS. In fact much on Huntington's concerns mimic Inglehart's current ideas on Modernization; that it is based in societal changes in basic values and not in simple infrastructure changes:

    For Huntington, pacification illustrated a point that he had been considering for quite some time -- that modernization was a fact of human development and interaction. Consequently, to theorize an artificial process of development while not respecting the natural path of change missed the point and guaranteed failure
    From pp 46-7

    Huntington still seemed to have faith in the principles of modernization. He just did not believe that it could be artificially accelerated.
    Last edited by davidbfpo; 07-04-2012 at 09:39 AM. Reason: Fix quote
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    After a little more reading it has become clear that there are two parallel yet separate versions of Modernization theory. The one that seemed to garner the most favor with the Vietnam era crowd was Daniel Lerner’s version which was a vague, teleological concept of the stages that society pass through similar to Marx’s Historical Materialism. The more modern (pun intended) version of it that is advocated by the new generation of policymakers is the version that deals specifically with the transition to democracy. A short synopsis of it can be found at:
    http://democracy.livingreviews.org/i.../lrd-2009-4/13
    Sorry if my ramblings created any confusion.
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    Default Apples and Apricots ....

    Quote Originally Posted by Madhu View Post
    If these theories are discredited, why do we continue to interact with nations based on such theories?
    You proceed from a false assumption. These "theories" are two different theories. The Modernization Theory that could not be applied in Vietnam is not the same Modernization Theory that cannot be applied to Afghanistan.

    Although the theories are different the hubris is the same.
    Last edited by TheCurmudgeon; 07-05-2012 at 05:33 PM.
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    Default Thank you for the replies!

    This is a fantastic thread. I am definitely going to follow-up on some of the posted links.

    @ TheCurmudgeon - I think you're right about the democracy bit. I've got more to post on that, but for now, more quotes on modernization that might be helpful to this discussion:

    From a paper I linked above (History of Insurgency - How PME forgot history, The Journal of Strategic Studies, 2009, JE Gumz)

    Another glaring historically transcendent assumption in the current COIN literature is its reliance upon mobilization, modernization, and development leading to democratic forms of governance and free market economies as the answer to insurgency. In this sense, we are truly returning to the Vietnam War yet as with most modernization theories, history is jettisoned to the side as an obstacle to be overcome. As many have argued, modernization theory tends to flatten difference and place countries on a universal trajectory of develoment. Thus, in the section on logical lines of operations in FM 3-24, some of the goals include 'support and secure elections,' 'support broad-based economic opportunity (micro to macro development) and 'support a free market economy.

  20. #20
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    Default And yet more, I love looking for papers....

    ....it's writing things up that I don't like very much. For all the fun I tend to make of "writing up papers instead of doing the hard thinking first", I actually respect scholarly research of value.

    Hard Hearts and Open Minds? Governance, Identity and the Intellectual Foundations of Counterinsurgency Strategy, The Journal of Strategic Studies, 2008 M Fitzsimmons

    http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/1...024692#preview

    The 1950s and 1960s saw the emergence of "modernization theory" in western academic and policy communities (also known as "political development theory"), a theory of development that emphasized a teleological convergence of societies through several stages of modernization from primitive "traditional" forms toward western style industrialization, secularization, and political pluralism. Legitimacy in this framework was earned by whoever could most reliably guide the society along these hypothesized paths of modernization, with their characteristic signals of good overnance - economic growth, political representation and efficient administrations.
    From Counterinsurgency by David Kilcullen (page 21)

    The RAND corporation established an Insurgency Board that brought together external researchers, along with RAND analysts, to examine the new environment through the lens of RAND's work on counterinsurgency since the 1950s. In some ways, RAND acted as an institutional memory bank for the new counterinsurgency movmement, in part because some veteran researchers, Steve Hosmer among them, had been present at the creation - in the 1950s, when RAND had played a crucial early role in developing classical counterinsurgency theory.
    I started reading about all of this about 2009 on Abu Muqawama's blog. The comments section there sometimes spiralled out of control and the conversation on this topic became very bad-tempered at times. I do not wish to recreate those feelings and I have no interest in playing intellectual "gotcha." I simply want to learn. I don't regret that I was critical on that board, but the tone that I sometimes took was terrible.
    Last edited by Madhu; 07-06-2012 at 12:00 PM.

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