There isn’t a magic bullet or a catch all solution to every country’s governing needs. Each country has its own form of government with its own quirks and particularities. No government is perfect – they all have their problems – even our own. I realize that by saying this I’m committing an act of supreme heresy against The American Religion, but the truth must be told: democracy is not always the answer.

I imagine I just lost about half of my readers with that statement, but it had to be said.

To most people, you either support democracy or you don’t. You support the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan because you support democracy. You refuse to work with dictators because you support democracy. You support the troops because you support democracy. America is a republic that elects its leaders via democracy. You just aren’t a good American if you don’t support democracy – but those arguments are completely nonsensical.

Democracy is a tool. It’s a system. It’s a method. It’s a technique. I’m quite capable of supporting my government without blindly and evangelically spreading democracy to all corners of the globe. I can choose to support or not support the war in Iraq regardless of how I feel about its system of government. I support our troops because they serve and defend this country, its people, and its interests – and I do it all without giving a damn one way or the other about how other countries choose to run themselves because that choice has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not I’m a good American.

Americans do not like to admit this fundamental truth. We love the republic because it works for us. We pioneered the push for modern democracy. We’ve made it our mission in life to spread its virtues to the rest of the world. We’ve become infatuated with it. We’ve romanticized it. We’ve fought and bled for it. We worship at the alter of democracy and we sing its praises. To Americans, democracy is both our birthright and our legacy.

My friends, our republic was not created simply because the founding fathers loved democracy and wanted to see it in action. They were trying to solve real problems with real solutions that evolved into the system that we know today – democracy was not The Answer™ then and it is not The Answer™ today. Our founding fathers debated everything from the role of government to the unity of states. We weren’t even really sure we even wanted a democracy at all.

Alexander Hamilton lead a group of politicians who offered the crown of the American monarchy to Prince Henry of Prussia. If it hadn’t taken months to cross the Atlantic and given them time to change their minds, history would have turned out very differently. The first government that reigned over the newly independent United States of America, one might recall, was not that which was established by the Constitution, but rather one laid out by the Articles of Confederation. We were not, at first, a republic at all. For six years we were a federation of independent states ruled by an ineffectual system of super-majority votes that was drowning in debt and couldn’t get anything done.

For the record, the first President of the United States was John Hanson.

All governments exist because there are certain problems each society faces that it simply can’t handle without a public body coming up with solutions, making decisions, and then translating those decisions into organized action that addresses society’s needs. Every society is different. Every society faces different problems. Every society favors different solutions. Every society faces different resistance to its leadership. Every society reacts differently to both authority and chaos.

There is tremendous strength in democracy. Discourse and debate slow the decision making process thereby encouraging more scrutiny and generally leading to better considered laws. Because every decision requires a majority vote, it becomes almost impossible for a minority to oppress the majority. Internal disagreement tends to lead to the moderation of radicals that choose to work within the system if they want to get things done. Democracies bow to the will of the people and government policies that are unpopular get reversed. If the military and law enforcement support the government, democracies can be quite stable in times of political turmoil.

Democracies are not perfect, however. Basic freedoms that are typically associated with them, like the ability to travel without papers, restrictions on law enforcement, and guaranteeing the right to assemble result in higher rate of crime and civil unrest. Democracies are subject to sudden and drastic changes in the style and direction of government as various factions trade control. These shifts can sometimes result in dramatic differences, abruptly changing a state from capitalist to socialist, realigning its foreign relations, or even result in the end of the government entirely.

Direct democracy has no guarantees against the tyranny of the majority and as such, minorities can just as easily be treated as second class citizens. Democracy does not guarantee a free market, civil liberties, women’s rights, or even that a country will respect its neighbors.

Dictatorships, on the other hand, are not inherently evil. While democracy is (with two major exceptions) mostly a modern invention, dictatorships have been with us since the dawn of civilization. The progress of the last 250 years of democracy would not have been possible without the last 5750 years of monarchs, emperors, kings, warlords, generals, and chieftains.

They’ve worked so long because they work so well. They’re simple, they’re effective, and they have some major advantages. The biggest advantage of a dictatorship is a lack of bickering over policy issues. One person sets the rules, everyone else follows. This means the system is incredibly quick at responding to problems as they occur. It also means there’s less criticism of the leadership, leading to a greater legitimacy and loyalty among the average man on the street. There’s no political push back when it comes to limiting the rights of the innocent to crack down on those who would abuse them.

The other major advantage is stability. An election will never change the government’s response to an issue in a dictatorship. Political protests do not occur, nor do they turn into riots. As long as the leader lives, the underlying philosophy of the state does not change – a corrupt and greedy dictator does not nationalize the multinational corporations that keep him in power. A religious fanatic won’t suddenly liberalize a nation only to crack down on his people in a series of bloody raids a few years later. More reasonable leaders like Pakistan’s Pervez Musharraf or China’s Hu Jintao can reasonably be counted on to consistently act in their nation’s best interests without risking anything by rocking the boat.

There are places in the world (and America is not one of those places) where what the people really need, more than anything else, is to stop arguing amongst themselves and ripping their country apart. Democracies only really work when people agree to stop fighting and take their fights to the ballot box. Dictatorships are really good at quelling civil unrest, reducing crime, and controlling the way a country functions.

The choice between a democracy and a dictatorship isn’t good versus evil – there is a real utility to picking one over the other. Likewise, a democratic but oppressive and belligerent Iran is not necessarily a better place than an autocratic but progressive and moderate Jordan, a country that is consistently rated as having one of the best human rights records in the middle east. Why? Because they’re just systems. They’re tools. And like any tool, they are neither good nor evil – they’re merely extensions of the people who use them.

When we discuss government types in this country, there is a bias that seriously harms this nation’s foreign policy. We are a nation obsessed. We are a nation blinded by the religion of democracy. We can’t let a certain type of government mislead us into supporting democracies that work against the American people or prevent us from working with friends simply because their bureaucracy doesn’t match our own. Methods do matter. Human rights abuses are totally unacceptable, but life, liberty, and freedom are not confined to democracy. Oppression, tyranny, and hostility are not the sole domain of the dictatorship.

We can’t be afraid to confront our enemies, just because they are democracies. We can’t insist others convert to our ways as a condition of friendship. We can’t abandon our allies simply because they aren’t cast in our own image. We must reach out to and engage with the international community, regardless of their choice in governments.

We have to be rational, realistic, practical people – and part of that means accepting that just because it’s different doesn’t mean it’s evil.