Eric Idle and lessons from Afghanistan

Just how bad is the situation in Afghanistan? At home we are obviously very concerned with the mounting death toll of British troops - 346 so far and 1536 wounded. However, the announcement in November that NATO forces intend to withdraw from Afghanistan by the end of 2014 means that President Hamid Karzai and his western allies are under mounting pressure to demonstrate that they have created a democratic framework with the strength to stand on its own.

For policy-makers looking for evidence, the publication of the BBC's and other news agencies annual survey on conditions in Afghanistan must be pretty painful reading. Carried out by the Afghan Centre for Socio-Economic and Opinion Research and published on 6th December, a sample of 1691 Afghans were asked 64 questions to provide a broad picture of developments and opinions within the country. Although news coverage focused on headlines such as 27% of people felt attacks against US or NATO troops were justified and only 23% supported continuing the fight against the Taliban, the survey provided a very confusing picture of the quality of life throughout Afghanistan.

Are things getting better for the average Afghan? 70% considered that the living conditions in their village were either good or very good, but, when asked about details of these conditions, two-thirds thought the economic situation was worse, 54% thought they were not properly protected from the Taliban and 41% did not have access to clean drinking water.

The majority (between 57% and 65%) of Afghans felt that the government and its institutions were doing a good job. 86% were in favour of the current government ruling the country with only 9% in favour of the Taliban, who 64% saw as the biggest danger facing the Afghanistan. However when the relationship with the government was examined it produced a rather depressing picture. 65% believed that government officials had any interest or authority to deal with a complaint. 91% felt that government or police corruption was a problem in their area and 87% thought it was a big problem within central government. 66% said that levels of corruption had either stayed the same or got worse in the last year. 
  
Two-thirds thought that the Taliban had either stayed as strong or grown stronger in the last year, and despite 63% believing the Taliban had not moderated their opinions since their fall in 2001, a massive 73% supported a negotiated settlement between them and the Karzai government. At the same time over 54% want the US troops to stay longer if the security situation continues to deteriorate. Despite these concerns 65% still believed that life a year from now would be better. Confusing isn't it?

Sorry for all the statistics but it's an interesting picture. Somehow the Afghans are managing to remain optimistic about the future in the face of terrible circumstances. It reminded me of some research I heard about last year. Researchers believe that human beings are naturally optimistic. The study from the University of Kansas was presented to the annual meeting of the Association for Psychological Science in San Francisco, found optimism to be universal and borderless. Data was collected from 150,000 adults across 140 countries and a remarkable 89% of individuals worldwide expect the next five years to be as good or better than their current life, and 95% individuals expected their life in five years to be as good or better than their life was five years ago.

Why are we optimistic? In a 1979 book "Optimism: The Biology of Hope" Lionel Tiger maintained that when early man left the forests and became hunters many of them suffered death and injury. He concluded that since humans tend to abandon tasks associated with negative consequences it was necessary for humans to develop a sense of optimism. This biological response was enhanced by the feelings of euphoria induced my endorphins in, what would generally be regarded, as negative situations.

So it seems that Eric Idle was on to something when he looked down from his cross and told us to  'Always look on the bright side of life.' Thank goodness that is the case. In the face of such terrible challenges a realist would have simply given up but despite all the evidence Afghans are managing to remain positive about their future. Realism is all very well but if you want to make things change for the better then optimism forms the bedrock of resilience. Thank goodness Gandhi, Nelson Mandela and Martin Luther king weren't just realistic thinkers.

I have a dream! Perhaps thingscanonlygetbetter.