The Role of Models for Reality in the Transition Period of Communities Especially in the Aftermath of Crises: The Kurdish Experience in Northern Iraq

Abstract

The formerly deported people in Kurdistan in Northern Iraq were turning back to their devastated villages after the Kuwait crisis in 1991 and began to reconstruct their villages. Their former socio-cultural life-world (Habermas 1992) had been fully destroyed between 1975 and 1988. Before repatriation the deportees were forced to construct a new life-world in the alien environment of collected villages or exile, in which they were forced to live. After repatriation the returnees were under the strong influence of their newly established modern life in collected villages and/or exile; nevertheless traditions of their former village life were still determining their behaviour and minds as a model of reality (Geertz 1973). The political environment in 1991 was fully uncertain; in the aftermath of crisis state failure caused a vacuum of power. No rules and no regulations – total freedom? The non-existent sphere of power (Weber 1998) was a source of uncertainty and chaotic development. It could not contribute to future orientation in the sense of creating a new and appropriate model for reality (Geertz 1973). Without having future oriented policies and social and financial resources (Weber 1998), reconstruction of the new villages was not future oriented, and the new villages did not become an integrated and dynamic part of the settlement system. The food distribution policy of the UN agencies further aggravated the difficulties of shaping a new model for reality because it seemed no longer reasonable for the new villagers to engage in farming activities. As a response to missing services such as schools and health care, the returnees in the newly reconstructed villages began to emigrate back to larger settlements like former collected villages and the three large cities of Dohuk, Erbil and Sulaimaniya. The returnees were composed of different subgroups with the younger ones interested in modern life (electricity, roads, water, schools – but also radio and television) and the elderly dreaming of their former village idyll. Lack of organisation was hindering the returnees to articulate their interests; communicative action (Habermas 1992) through interaction of different actors was not possible. In this general frame of anomy (Gerhardt 2002) the international actors were not interested in the establishment of a new order and new political powers, while the local actors were not able to develop policies for future orientation. The transition period after crisis is a period with strong impulses for social change which can be defined as a period of liminality (Turner 2008). The challenges of this period are huge but they include also chances and opportunities as the experience in Northern Iraq illustrates.