The Possibility of a More Moderate Taliban Governance
Afghanistan is regressing under new Taliban rule — but will its ideology last under international pressure?
The rapid takeover of Afghanistan by the Taliban throughout early- to mid-August 2021, and the subsequent botched evacuation attempt by the U.S. and allies, have captured headlines across the globe. Questions have arisen on how the group was able to advance to Kabul, the nation’s capital, in the span of less than two weeks, surprising the U.S. political establishment and the countless nations involved in the nation-building project in Afghanistan.
Further questions come to mind as new facts start to surface — the reality that the most of the country’s armed forces surrendered their weapons, the relatively bloodless transition of power, and the massive evacuation crisis that include people hanging onto the underside of an aircraft and later plummeting into their deaths. When President Biden made the decision to withdraw the U.S. involvement in Afghanistan starting in May 2021, he was bolstered by the conviction that two decades of training and support would ensure that the Afghan military had been in good enough shape to be able to fend off insurgencies by itself. The new development shows the opposite, highlighting the fragile condition of the Afghan state that could not prop itself without U.S. presence.
However, as much can be said regarding the whys of the matter, few have said about the current reality and how the nation will shape itself in the near future. Suppose that the Taliban of today is the same as they were twenty years ago, then the prospects become eerily similar to what occurred then — the lack of any rights for women, terror as the default mode of maintaining public order, campaigns against literacy, and the destruction of modern institutions. It may even return to being a safe haven for terror groups worldwide, training insurgents and launching attacks in countries such as the United States, India, and Indonesia. Meanwhile, Afghanistan of today is not the same as it was in 2001, with higher educational enrollment, increase in gender parity, as well as relatively better standards of living. Thus, there is merit in thinking that the situation has evolved beyond the ideological Taliban that they might need to be more pragmatic in their governance of the new society.
Taliban and the New Afghanistan
Two reasons stand out in support of the argument. One, the speed in which the Taliban has advanced, surprising even the Taliban itself, suggests an unprecedented ability to broker power between opposing factions, as Afghanistan itself is not a unified country but one ruled by various warlords and ethnic leaders. An unnamed U.S. intelligence official said that it is highly likely that the Taliban had cut deals with Afghan officials long prior to the seizure. The group had even gained the support of former president Hamid Karzai, now leader of the Popalzai Durrani tribe of Kandahar, whom it tried to assassinate multiple times but is now involved in talks to form a new government, further compounding the Taliban’s interest in fomenting a lasting political base. From this, it can even be gathered that the Taliban has learned from its costliest mistake decades ago — by not accommodating the ethnic Tajiks and Uzbeks to the north, it allowed the tribes to form the Northern Alliance and ally itself with U.S. forces to depose the Taliban government in Kabul. In return, the Taliban may be expected to concede some of its ideological underpinnings to allow for power-sharing arrangements, though to what extent this affects social issues remains hard to say.
Two, as the country transitions back to a Taliban-led government, the group must now face the reality of governing a developing Afghanistan. As of 2021, there is now approximately 38 million Afghans living in the country, almost 61% of which belong in the 0–24 years old age group and lived their lives after Taliban rule had been deposed. Coupled with overall better literacy rates (43% in 2018 compared to 28% in 2001), new economic opportunities for all, and relatively better standards of living, maintaining order upon a public that may be resistant to regression can prove costly. Now under control by the Taliban, women in Kabul have reportedly taken to the streets to protest for women’s rights, underlining the shift in social consciousness that had not been present in 2001. Not to mention the various challenges that remain to ensure welfare for Afghans, including political rights, the state’s ability to ensure that wages are paid, and reducing the economic and political gap of all the major ethnicities in the country. One crisis that occurs in Afghanistan may become a catalyst for bigger things to come, which the Taliban would likely prefer to avoid if it wanted to maintain long-term rule of the country.
It is difficult to precisely determine whether these two reasons are enough for the Taliban to reorient itself to a more politically moderate character. The main hindrance to making an accurate prediction is the fact that the Taliban itself has evolved — it has leveraged various instruments of power to secure its foothold on the country, particularly by taking advantage of the peace deal with the U.S. However, it must be noted that, when compared to 2001, the world has become increasingly more connected, and there are close to eight million internet users in the country as of January 2020 that could be purposed as informal monitoring agents against the Taliban regime. Any violence perpetrated by the Taliban could be shared online and be used against them by forces hostile to the regime, including other states. This also gives the international community some degree of leverage against the Taliban government going forward.
International Implications and What Comes Next
The observations above seem to be in line with the Taliban’s public messaging for outside observers to win the hearts and minds of the international community. As outlined by the BBC’S jihadism specialist Mina Al-Nami, the Taliban’s information operation has begun its campaigns to reassure banks, businesses, foreign investors and workers that it does not wish to disrupt the security and stability of Afghanistan. Seemingly speaking to concerns regarding social issues, the Taliban had mentioned that women are allowed to work and study under Islamic law, though no details have yet been given. Naturally, Al-Nami mentioned that these developments may not be popular with some hardline Islamic terror groups, though it highly depends on whether the Taliban wishes to further its ideology or to create a legitimate government in the international arena.
While what may have been said could very well be a farcical attempt to gain sympathy, it suggests a degree of effort exerted by the Taliban to gain political legitimacy abroad, which could translate to real practical actions. Nevertheless, it does not remove the possibility of the Taliban enforcing the same kind of rule they had prior to 2001 — currently, reports have emerged that Taliban fighters have started to beat women and children in Kabul, an allegation that Taliban officials have denied. The New York Times covered the difficult path that women in Afghanistan must take to simply get to the Kabul airport, which is now increasingly a life and death decision.
Despite the ongoing crisis, the Taliban may eventually become increasingly aware of the need to include the international community in ensuring the bare minimum of welfare for its citizens. After all, excessive violence becomes a hindrance to even allied states and non-state actors when the crisis that follows become less manageable, such as mass exodus to neighboring countries. Therefore, international partners must embrace their more crucial role to ensure that the Taliban fulfills the needs and rights of Afghans, while at the same time being very careful to maintain such tools so that the world could still influence what happens in Afghanistan in the ensuing future. There is a chance that the renowned terror group can be more pragmatic as it governs the country, though the road towards a possible political moderation may very well be costly to the lives of ordinary Afghans.
