The White House has a sound reason to feel upbeat about the referendum on the Iraqi constitution on October 15. The turnout was satisfactory, and the day passed relatively calmly. What is more, the disaffected Sunnis participated in the voting on a large scale. But this participation may not signal an end to the insurgency, facilitating the withdrawal of Anglo-American troops. Nor would the successful adoption of a democratic constitution in Iraq necessarily presage the flowering of democracy in the rest of the Middle East.
What motivated the change among Sunnis? The answer lies in the changing appreciation of their political prospects in new Iraq. In the January election, as well in the recent referendum, the overall voter turnout was 61 percent. But whereas participation of the majority Shia Arabs was constant – roughly 70 percent – there was wide variation among the two minorities, ethnic Kurds and Sunni Arabs, each of them forming one-fifth of the national population.
Last time, Kurds turned up in huge numbers at the polling stations whereas most Sunni Arabs stayed away. This time the roles were reversed. Kurds were lukewarm towards a constitution that lacks a provision for an independent Kurdistan in the near future.