Elite Theory and the 2003 Iraq Occupation by the United States

How US Corporate Elites Created Iraq’s Political System

Bamo Nouri

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• Print ISBN: 9780367706913
• eBook ISBN: 9781000416688
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

This book locates US elites as members of corporate elite networks and drivers of corporate elite interests, arguing that studying the social sources of US power plays an important part in understanding the nature of their decisions in US foreign policy.

Exploring the decisions taken by American elites on the Iraq War, the author argues that the decisions and agendas US elites pursued in Iraq were driven by corporate elite interests – embedded in them as individuals and in groups through the corporate elite networks they were rooted in – which they prioritised, using democracy promotion as a cover up. Using elite theory, membership network analysis and content analysis, this book explains who these elites were, how their backgrounds and social influences impacted their world-views, and what this looked like in a detailed exploration of their decision-making on the ground in Iraq. Nouri examines the nature of US power, what drives it, what it looks like and its legacies.

This volume provides valuable understandings and lessons to scholars and students of International Relations studying democracy, US foreign policy, post-colonialism, elite theory, US imperialism, neoliberalism, orientalism, Iraqi politics, and the making of the Iraq constitution.

1 Theories and methods

This chapter explains the theories and methods of analysis that are adopted in the rest of this volume. This will begin with a brief exploration of literature from the central research areas of this study – US imperialism, democracy promotion (DP) and elite theory (in the order presented) – before presenting a more elaborate emphasis of this volume’s contributions in all three areas. The latter part of this chapter will outline the methods that will be deployed in the empirical chapters of this volume.

Imperialism

Despite one of the posits of elite theory being that elites are imperial, there is little discussion concerning the role of elite decision-makers, their backgrounds or their agency in existing studies of imperialism. This is surprising, given how far the studies of imperial powers have transformed over the last century. The concept of imperialism has advanced in parallel to the developments in its nature and aims which have simultaneously metamorphosed.¹ There has been noteworthy accounts² since the ‘age of imperialism’ in the 1880s, with liberal and Marxist critiques³ developing further as economic influence became considered a form a domination. With the contribution of capitalism and the newly developed methods of imperial domination becoming more apparent, alternative explanations and theories came to the forefront in attempting to explain the actualities, with the emergence of neo-imperialism being one of them.⁴ Neo-imperialism can be connected with the concept of informal empire and the process where economic control is effectively used to diminish the effective sovereignty of subject states without the need for de facto territorial occupation or control.⁵ Modern definitions of Imperialism have incorporated these transitions, to include formal or informal regulation of a subordinated society by an imperial society through coercion, political collaboration or economic, cultural and social dependence.⁶ This has expanded further to include spheres of influence and even empire,⁷ where the majority of scholars have accepted that the latter is determined through asymmetrical rule hinged on coercion.⁸ This is based on modern empires exercising influence through “direct military and political intervention, the threat of intervention, the mediation of proxy states, or multilateral institutions in which the imperial power is the dominant member”.⁹ Postcolonial theory focuses on developing critiques of colonialism and imperialism, with a focus on the ways in which cultures are represented within discourses of development, modernisation and capitalism.¹⁰ In understanding that colonialism has been typically defined as overt coercion through territorial occupation and that imperialism is an economic and political domination that is carried out at the ideological level (as discussed above), it is important to also acknowledge neo-imperialism. Neo-imperialism defined the modern territories of imperialism, examining the connections of state, corporate power and international institutions in carrying out the interests of specific geographically based power structures.¹¹ Postcolonial deconstructions of neo-imperial agendas critically interrogate the narratives of separation between the West and the East. As Prasad states, postcolonial theory explains how the imperial West has historically established its dominance culturally and ideologically in addition to militarily, economically and politically.¹²

Despite developments in the way imperialism has been explored, current studies struggle to adequately explain the nature of US imperial power in the world today. Studies that classify the US as an empire base their analysis on the distant actions of the US.¹³ If one looks purely at the actions of the US from remoteness – with its empire-esque features – it can appear as an empire.¹⁴ However, the adequate explanation of the nature of these actions is caught in differentiated arguments, making it difficult to provide adequate substance or consistency.¹⁵ Arguments are discerned, with various scholars arguing that US power is inconsistent and in decline.¹⁶ Others argue that the nature of US power is the result of a thorough and well-defined strategy that aims to establish the long-term goal of a stable and formidable empire.¹⁷ If you look at US power and its efficacy, especially in terms of its universal appeal through ‘soft power’,¹⁸ the US is a successful dominant power. Though, not all scholars prefer to label the US as an empire, some prefer to not use such bold labels, and instead prefer to use the term ‘hegemon’ in order to avoid the split empire argument altogether.¹⁹ To make the debate more interesting, the US has never conceded that they are an empire,²⁰ nor have they admitted imperial ambition, causing scholars to be left with polarised views. One view is to boldly label the US an empire or imperial, without adequate substance in the mechanics that drive and dominate the nature of US power. The other view is that the US is a hegemony, an argument that arises where there is hesitancy to label the US as an empire.²¹

The current literature on US imperialism and defining US actions can be categorised through two separate – but related – points. The first issue is definitional; in the sense that scholars place an over-excessive focus on the issues in defining, redefining and comparing terms on a purely abstract basis. I argue that scholars place unnecessary focus on the linguistics in battling to apply old terms to new events and actualities. Here, the notion of ‘trying an old key in a new door’ comes to mind. This focus on the definition then causes a vacuum in the areas I argue need more concentration and deeper analysis, that is, the nature of US decision-making on an individual and collective basis, the origins of these decisions and the impact of individual decision-makers and networks in shaping these decisions.

Given that most of the arguments around US imperialism claim the US is an empire or label their actions as imperial without adequate substance to back up these arguments, I argue the need for an alternative approach. Cox correctly identifies that the US is a case that is to be treated separately in the contextual analysis of empire.²² Although the description of the US as an empire seems befitting, the argument here is that single definitions of empire lack the detail and therefore substance in understanding the nature of US power. Despite arguments for the US to be more open about the true nature of its power,²³ only very few of the mentioned studies have discussed US imperialism as a product of a decision-making elite. The above-mentioned literature on US imperialism explains US economic and military power without examining the social sources of this power. I argue that social sources of power, in particular corporate elite networks, are fundamental in explaining the true nature of US power, which I argue to be the product of a process where ideology passes through corporate elite networks into decision-makers, before eventually becoming decisions in foreign policy (FP). Although Harris refers to transnational capital seeking elites, and Agnew refers to elites but does not meticulously examine their role, there is minimal understanding of how elites mobilise FP to achieve their goals.

The role of constructed discourse on US foreign policy: ‘Americanism’ in the US self-concept and ideology

The contributions of US ideology and its influences are also important to understand, given the significant impact they have had historically in influencing all aspects of US life in addition to the decisions of US elites in FP. The role of ideology through the self-concept of American power – known as ‘Americanism’ – has been influential in US imperial expansion from 13 states in 1776 to 50 states by 1959. Frederick Jackson Turner famously argued that in order to understand America, one must understand the advancement of American settlements in the ‘frontier thesis’.²⁴ From as early as the school years, Americanism becomes firmly embedded in the hearts and minds of Americans through the ‘The Pledge of Allegiance’, with America being commonly seen and believed to be ‘a nation chosen by God’ or the shining ‘city upon a hill’ as John Winthrop – who led the founders of Boston in 1630 – coined the term.²⁵ By 1831, Alex de Tocqueville had observed that Americans cared about their country’s interests as if they were their own, with feelings towards the homeland being similar to what a person feels for his family.²⁶ Liberty, freedom and opportunity for all to prosper, regardless of colour, ethnicity, class, gender or religion in the land where everything was possible with limited barriers, rang appealingly both inside and outside America. However, the American dream – dominated by capitalism and limited government, and the idea that the world should replicate America – had to justify its imperial pursuits from the outset. These justifications came in the way of meticulous uses of discourse and imagery in order to sell the American imperial pursuit. From John O’Sullivan’s ‘manifest destiny’ conception of the American march from East to West in 1845,²⁷ to John Gast’s painting of ‘American Progress’ in 1872, through to the Iraq War, the US has consistently contrasted the picture of ‘civilised America’ with the ‘uncivilised other’. Orientalist knowledge production has been a common feature of imperial powers, in morally justifying and legitimising imperial pursuits.

The foundational concepts of understanding ‘Orientalism’ were established through Edward Said, who observed that there was a fundamental difference between studying to understand the compassion and emotion of another culture, with study that is part of an overall campaign of self-affirmation, belligerency and outright war.²⁸ The notion of Orientalism is crucial to acknowledge when understanding the ideology of the US in its FP decision-making. Said argued that Orientalism derived from the British and the French, whose domination lasted until after the Second World War²⁹; thereafter the US overtook the French and British in the domination of the Orient.³⁰ In imperial pursuit, the British in India for example, left legacies of a caste system that came directly from associating ‘whiteness’ with prosperity and advancement in advertisements of pear soap.³¹ Throughout the 18th century, British officials embraced Orientalism for self-serving purposes in a view that held Arabs, Africans and Asians as backwards, barbaric, incompetent and inferior. Such views would be used to justify and rationalise British imperial ambitions in territories ranging from India to Egypt. For the British, the need for Anglo-Saxon guidance was manufactured through orientalist perspectives on the Ottoman dictators, outdated Islam and a social-Darwinism based view on the Arab race.³²

The role the Occident (West) plays for...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Information
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of Figures
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• 1 Theories and methods
• 2 Backgrounds, world-views and networks in the George W. Bush elite
• 3 US elite decision-making in the creation of Iraq’s 2005 constitution
• 4 US elite decision-making in the privatisation of Iraq
• 5 The legacy of US democracy promotion in Iraq – Iraq’s elitist political system
• Conclusion
• Index