Civil Society in Iraq?

When the United States first invaded Iraq you could tell that the Iraqis only knew to obey.  When will “security” be restored, they asked.

It’s possible, top-down peace and security, but it’s not the best kind.  It’s the difference between “society” and the “state.”  The state is the agency of force and compulsion.  Society is the medium of peace and reconciliation.

Now it looks like the Iraqis are finally fed up and they are taking responsibility for peace and security from the bottom up.  That’s what I get from Cliff May’s report on the situation in Iraq.  He talked to “Col. Wayne W. Grigsby, Jr., who commands a ‘surge’ brigade based in a mixed Sunni and Shia area near Baghdad.”

“The Iraqi people are fed up with the violence and with the extremists, both Sunni and Shia,” Grigsby said. Far from “resisting” the American troops in their communities, “they want to join the fight and protect their neighborhoods. They are coming to us and saying, ‘How can we help? We don’t want to live like this.’”

I’d say that you can’t read any better news than that.

Let’s hope it’s true.