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Despite the ongoing security threats, the sluggish economy, lower oil prices, and continued sectarian tensions, the new Haider al-Abadi government has an encouraging level of support from the Iraqi people according to a national survey conducted from December 2014 to January 2015. This confidence in the Abadi government, which spans religious sects, is fragile, though, and depends largely on the ability of Abadi to deliver solutions in the near future.
Results from the August-September 2013 National Survey show that over 60 percent of Iraqis interviewed think that things in Iraq are going in the wrong direction. Security concerns have skyrocketed, especially in Baghdad and the West, with perceptions of security forces ability worsening.
A national survey conducted in Iraq more than a year after the withdrawal of American troops reveals increasing divisions among the country’s ethnic and religious groups. While the national government made progress on providing basic services in some regions of the country, that progress is largely overshadowed by rising concerns about sectarianism and, with it, security. Additionally, relations between Baghdad and Iraq’s Kurdish region remain sour and are even worsening.
Iraq entered a critical period as citizens struggle with economic insecurity and increasingly felt ignored by the political class. With the withdrawal of all U.S. troops, a lack of confidence in the Iraqi government’s ability to run the country—creating jobs, providing basic services, and security—threatened to imperil the fledgling democracy.
Focus groups conducted in January suggest that, although Iraqis continued to have an optimistic view toward their country’s democracy, they had significant grievances about the lack of job opportunities and services that they expected from the government. Iraqis continued to question the self-interested motives of the political elites and pointed to administrative corruption and government appointments as prime examples of politicians putting their own interests ahead of the people’s.
NDI recently conducted 22 in-depth interviews with tribal, religious, community, and demonstration leaders in Iraq on the topic of political reconciliation, and a nation-wide public opinion survey. NDI’s research was conducted in partnership with Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research and funded by the U.K. Foreign Commonwealth Office.
The purpose of this publication is to provide a set of ideas and strategies for political parties that wish to become formal opposition parties within their country’s respective legislative branch. This guide includes institutionalized rules and traditions on the role of a formal opposition in many countries, and also includes advice from political parties in countries new to democratic governance who have served in the opposition.
The National Democratic Institute (NDI) conducts periodic, nationwide public opinion research in Tunisia to provide political and civic leaders with objective data on citizens’ attitudes. According to public opinion polling conducted in recent years, the central political concerns of Tunisian citizens are economic.