The Known Unknowns

When U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld referred to the "known unknowns" that remained in Iraq in 2002, he was mocked endlessly -- and those mysterious black holes ended up confounding his administration's project there. Rumsfeld's not the only one to encounter this epistemological puzzle: Known unknowns are everywhere, waiting to trip us up. Here are a few of the most enigmatic.

BY JOSHUA E. KEATING | JULY/AUGUST 2010

LEBANON'S POPULATION

What we know we don't know: No one knows who exactly lives in Lebanon. The country hasn't held a census since the French colonial government conducted one in 1932.

Why we don't know it: A census would likely reveal the uncomfortable truth -- for Lebanon's Maronite Christians -- that their numbers have been slipping as a percentage of the population. When Lebanon became independent in 1943, a national pact divided power between Christians and Muslims on a 6-5 ratio based on the 1932 census, later changed to an even split after the country's brutal 1975-1990 civil war. Since then, the Shiite Muslim community is believed to have grown faster than any other group, but Christians, despite making up only an estimated quarter of the population, still hold half the parliamentary seats. They'd prefer to keep it that way.

JOSEPH EID/AFP/Getty Images

 

Joshua E. Keating is associate editor at Foreign Policy.

SURESH SHETH

11:01 PM ET

June 20, 2010

Communism unites while Democracy divides

If Shiite population has increased in Lebanon since even split after 1975-1990 civil war, Jammu’s population has increased far more than that of Kashmir since 1947 independence and yet meek Indian government has been unable to change the number of seats in State assembly in proportion to population, thereby giving Muslims an unfair advantage in power sharing.

In contrast China has been able to flood Tibet with Han Chinese, thereby diluting the impact of independence-seeking Tibetans within Tibet itself. Similarly China has flooded its Mumlim-majority province of Xinjiang with Han Chinese as well. It clearly shows that Communism has united China while Democracy has divided India further.

 

NYGDAN

9:04 AM ET

June 22, 2010

Communism??

What does communism have to do with a demographic attack on the Tibetan and Uighar ethnicities?
I mean, Saddam Hussein was able to get demographic control of Kirkuk and the Kurds by moving in lots of arabs and trying to outbreed them, and he was able to control the marsh arabs by killing them and draining their swamps.
Hardly seems like any of that is /real/ unification, or a victory for Baathism or Communism.
I mean, its pretty crazy that you would say that letting people have representation in their own government is 'dividing' them and that they'd be better off if the government just picked an ethnicity and supported it while suppressing the rest.

 

RAMIMOR

6:15 AM ET

June 21, 2010

there are 5 things we dont know

how about Israel's nukes

 

GRANT

5:31 PM ET

June 21, 2010

On Lebanon it isn't just

On Lebanon it isn't just normal politics, a census that confirms what everyone knows would start another war.

 

DRUMMER05

12:22 PM ET

June 22, 2010

true dat... lebanon..

I agree, there is no politics in lebanon!!......... the people dont really have a choice, they are all subjected and put down. grr!!

YLOD