روح الله اسلامی

After the fall of the republic in Afghanistan and the raising of the Taliban flag on the presidential palace, many thought that Afghanistan would GO back in time and return to the years before 2001. There WERE serious concerns about endangering the rights of women, the rights of ethnic-religious minorities, as well as the reappearance of foreign terrorist groups, especially Al-Qaeda, in Afghanistan. Considering these elements, many researchers question whether the Taliban has changed its principles, and whether or not the world is facing neo-Talibans. This study aimed to analyze the intellectual tradition of the Taliban with the framework of Laclau and Mouffe's theory, along with discourse methodology. The research examines the central signifiers of the Taliban discourse and their effect on the right of women, ethnic-religious, and foreign terrorist groups. The results indicate that the intellectual tradition of the Taliban is influenced by the powerful Pashtun culture of the governorate, which follows the three principles of honor, superiority, and hospitality, and affects the right of women, ethnic-religious, and foreign terrorist groups, along with the teachings of the Deobandy school.

By withdrawing from Afghanistan, the Soviet Union collapsed and the Cold War ended in the 1990s. Throughout that decade, western governments forgot the people of Afghanistan. But the 1998 attack on the U.S. interests in Africa and al-Qaeda attacks of the September 11, 2001 reintroduced the foreign aggression of the Western governments’ coalition against Afghanistan. In the late 2001, NATO countries led by the United States brought down the Taliban regime. Concomitantly, the UN conducted a conference in Bonn, Germany in which political and paramilitary groups agreed to form an inclusive government without presence of the Taliban. The Bonn Agreement contents show that most of its principles are based on the doctrine of Liberal Democracy. Accordingly, in most of the ratified articles of the Eighth Constitution of Afghanistan the doctrine of liberal democracy is reflected. In a country where many political regimes and systems were experienced, the effectiveness of Liberal Democracy doctrine was expected. Meanwhile, Liberal Democracy faced challenges and nation-state building development process witnessed deficiencies. The present paper uses systemic analysis of the liberal nation-state (system input, policy design, policy implementation, evaluation and outcome) to respond the research question. The question is, how have the nation-state building process and political development in Afghanistan been affected by the Bonn Agreement and liberal democracy doctrine? And has that led to the deficiencies in nation-state building and political development in the country? Hypothetically, nation-state building and political development in Afghanistan based on the Bonn Agreement suffered from deficiencies due to the following reasons: disregarding the historical-traditional contexts of Afghanistan, the weak presence of liberal democrats in power, disregard for the demands of the fragmented society, the continuation of nationalist policies, and the incorrect public-private divide in the liberal structure of democracy.