SIWPS Member Dipali Mukhopadhyay has coauthored a blog post for the Washington Post about the political role of warlords in Afghanistan’s nascent democracy.

“Even as the international community looked to Karzai to promote ‘good governance,’ his own survival remained contingent on forming alliances with regional, muscular power brokers. The president performed the acts required of him as a young democrat, but he was forced to cut deals with strongmen as well. In some ways, the partnerships he forged with these men undercut the very project of democratization; on the other hand, these power players afforded him a kind of clout outside Kabul he had no other way to obtain.”

Professor Mukhopadhyay coauthored the post with Frances Z. Brown, a doctoral student at the University of Oxford.

The blog post, titled “Lessons from Afghanistan: Warlord Politics Aren’t Always Bad for Democracy” can be read in its entirety on the Washington Post website.