Iraq after the December 2005 election: social education staff.

In an article in 2004 on Islamist movements in Iraq, Social Education pointed out that Iraq might be headed toward a juncture from which "one road leads to sectarian and ethnic strife and the other to the establishment of a new Islamic republic in the Middle East." (1)

The events of 2005 propelled Iraq further in that direction. Elections for a national assembly in January and December confirmed that the Iraqi political scene in the era following Saddam Hussein has fragmented on a sectarian and ethnic basis. The dominant parties of the new Iraq-Arab Shia, Arab Sunni and Kurdish--each represent their own communities and have little appeal to Iraqis of different communities.

The December 2005 election offered a snapshot of the new political order that has evolved in Iraq after the overthrow of Saddam Hussein's Baathist regime. Among the Arab population (almost four of five Iraqis) Islamic fundamentalism has become the major political force in both the Shia and Sunni communities. Among Kurds, two leading secular nationalist parties remain dominant.

The results of the December election, in which about 78% of registered voters went to the polls, showed that:

* The largest Iraqi political movement is the United Iraqi Alliance, a coalition of Arab Shia groups led by Islamists. While it held the majority of seats in the parliament elected in January to write an Iraqi constitution, the December elections left it short of a majority in the new Iraqi parliament.

* The secular Iraqi and Arab nationalism represented by the Baath Party has been replaced in the Arab Sunni community by Islamic fundamentalism. Most of the Sunni community voted for a coalition of Islamist groups, the Iraqi Accord Front. A secular nationalist group with an ideology close to that of the Baath Party got less than 20% of the Arab Sunni votes.

* Almost all Kurdish voters supported one or other of the two Kurdish nationalist parties that have gained ascendancy in the Kurdish community, and are close allies of the U.S. in Iraq.