Thank Goodness for Iraq's Census Disaster

One of the silent victims of Iraq's political paralysis has been the country's long-delayed census. On Oct. 3, the census was postponed for the third time since 2007, when the cabinet pushed it back from Oct. 24 to Dec. 5. The main reason for the latest delay was the concern of some Iraqi politicians, neighboring states such as Turkey, and the United States that going ahead with the census now could just foment unrest in the disputed territories that border the federal Kurdistan region in northern Iraq.

Given the current configuration of the census, however, a delay is not such a bad thing. If anything, Iraq's caretaker government should give serious consideration to delaying the census even further, until the new government can correct its flaws and turn it into something that will be truly useful for the whole country.

The Iraqi census stands to play a critical role in the country's development. Its data will help in drawing electoral districts, allocating funds, projecting future population growth, and planning education, public health, housing, transportation, and other essential elements of a well-regulated state. Particularly in Iraq, which has witnessed several false starts in reconstruction following the 2003 invasion, having accurate socioeconomic data will be indispensable to sound economic planning.

But there's reason to believe that this census, as it is currently designed, will polarize rather than unify Iraqi society. The problem lies in a question that asks Iraqis to define their ethnicity, aiming to get a sense of how big the country's various ethnic groups are. Although such a question will no doubt provide interesting information for academics and analysts, it is not in Iraq's national interest and risks destabilizing some of Iraq's most sensitive hot spots.

The ethnicity question is particularly likely to inflame passions in areas that Kurdish leaders have said they want to incorporate into the federal Kurdistan region in northern Iraq. Along with Kurds, these areas are home to a diverse population of Arabs, Turkmens, and smaller minorities, all of which have been engaged in a tense standoff over Kurdish aspirations, which they resist almost unanimously. The situation holds the potential for violent conflict. Several incidents in these disputed areas over the past two years required U.S. commanders to establish joint military checkpoints along the so-called trigger line dividing Iraqi Army troops from Kurdish regional guards. Finding a negotiated solution to the tug of war over these areas, with the city of Kirkuk at their center, will be critical for Iraq's future.

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STEVE358

11:19 PM ET

October 10, 2010

Census

Joost:

The Iraqi bureaucracy has always known how many Iraqis are where, when.

Iraq's Census system established from Ottoman days through UN work has continued to count things, including people, throughout. Kurdistan has its own bureau; the remaining provinces report to Baghdad.There is no mystery they have not already cracked.

There is an illusion maintained by census folks that the Count is actually like aDoomsday Book of halting everything and counting it all at once---a perfect picture.

Reality, even in the US, is that a census is a reasonable snapshot (plus or minus 5%) at any point in time. The US census typically reports two to three years later, after all the alibis and challenges are completed.

With more than the routine level of census accuracy, Iraqis are all, by and large, registered for public services (food rations), all of which are tabulated and reported monthly by location. It's better than the census.

The handful of bedouin, and former Bathists hiding out are diminimus to an accurate census.

What's the likely result? More Kurds and, maybe, more Sunnis, but its just as unstable not to announce as to announce.

I have all the census records through 2008, down to the nahias, and the maps that go with them. One day, I will trace the movements, but nobody else seems to really care...

Steve

JOOST R. HILTERMANN

4:16 PM ET

October 15, 2010

Steve Nolastname:

Your argument misses the point. Yes, Iraq, the US and also UNAMI have very good data on Iraq’s population. But if published, none of it will have the cache of an official census, with data collected and tabulated transparently and then released publicly. For Iraqis, the outcome of the new census will have credibility (unless there are lots of shenanigans during the process), whereas any other population data, collected in other ways or by outside agencies or governments seen as partisan by Iraqis, simply does not have that credibility, even if it is just as or perhaps even more reliable.

Underlying the perceptions of demographics is the dynamic of fear. What matters to populations living in the disputed territories, in particular, is some sort of official ratification – in the form of credible census data – of the notion that x ethnic group constitutes the majority in certain parts of these territories, e.g., Kirkuk. In the case of the Kurds, they want to be able to say that the census shows they are the majority in a given area, and inversely, Arabs and Turkomans are afraid that the census might show this, even if there are no legal consequences to such a finding. It is a highly emotive issue.

The swipe at “bedouin and former Bathists” is totally unwarranted. The people opposed to the census that I am talking to are anti-Baath and quite settled. To think that this somehow has little or nothing to do with disputed territories and the boundary of the Kurdistan region – a real conflict over which there is a legitimate debate – is to profoundly misunderstand the issue.

Joost Hiltermann

ALILUAY22@YAHOO.COM

4:28 AM ET

October 20, 2010

A crime with no fingerprints............

What amaze me is that the U.S. has already invaded Iraq , occupied it for this many years with no fingerprints what so ever... such as one article of the American institution to prohibit any type of discrimination according to sex,color ,nationality or faith........... wouldn't that will fix it all.........

Foreign Policy Magazine

It's been postponed three times due to tension over disputed territories in the north. But unlike most of Iraq's bureaucratic messes, this one could save lives.

BY JOOST HILTERMANN | OCTOBER 8, 2010

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