Economists Explain the Taliban
By Anthony Gill, 8/25/21, Wall St. Journal

The Taliban’s rapid overthrow of the U.S.-supported regime
in Afghanistan came as a surprise to many in the West,
including Biden, who said in early July: “Do I trust the
Taliban? No. But I trust the capacity of the Afghan military,
who is better trained, better equipped, & more & more
competent in terms of conducting war.”

How could a ragtag group of religious fundamentalists be
so effective in capturing a territory that has resisted
rule by some of the most formidable world powers, incl.
the British, the Soviets & the Americans?

An answer can be found in a quirky academic subfield known
as the political economy of religion. It was developed in
the late 80s by sociologists Rodney Stark & Roger Finke &
economist Laurence Iannaccone. Political scientists incl.
Carolyn Warner & me added the political side of the
equation in the early 90s.

An insight from Iannaccone bears directly on the success
of the Taliban: Groups with strict behavioral rituals are
esp. effective at organizing collective action. He was
intrigued by the organizational vibrancy of some of the
strictest faiths in the U.S., incl. Mormons, Jehovah’s
Witnesses & Orthodox Jews. These groups all have demanding
behavioral codes & intensely devoted adherents.

Iannaccone argued that behavioral codes like a prohibition
on alcohol & stigmatizing behavior like wearing distinctive
clothing enhanced cooperation. Religious orgs are “club
goods,” wherein members share many collective benefits
such as welfare provision & fellowship. Those benefits
depend on active contribution. If everyone participates
willingly, the org is vibrant. If many members are free
riders—receiving the benefits without pulling their weight—
the quality of the good dissipates & the org becomes anemic.

To limit free riding, strict religious groups require
members to prove their loyalty via costly & visible
behavior that deters the lazy, such as going on 2-year
missions or memorizing holy texts. Such “sacrificial
signaling” can be seen in other groups, such as
fraternities & street gangs with strange hazing rituals.

Stigmatizing behavior also limits the outside opportunities
of group members & binds them more closely to the org.
Members find it difficult to betray the group because
they have few alternative social options.

Economist Eli Berman used Iannaccone’s insight to study
terrorist & rebel orgs. In his 2009 book “Radical,
Religious & Violent,” Berman explained that operating a
rebel group requires a high degree of loyal cooperation.
If an individual is captured or defects from the group,
the entire org could be compromised.

Linking a strict religious sect to a radical rebel group
is an effective way of enhancing loyalty & cooperation.
People who keep strict dietary habits, pray publicly
several times a day, write poetry, & study religious texts
to the exclusion of other activities make good cooperators.

The Taliban are an excellent example of Berman’s thesis.
Their fundamentalist version of Sunni Islam imposes strict
requirements on all members. It's easy for them to identify
& choose leaders who are the most cooperative & know that
they can be trusted not to defect. As a result, they have
become a disciplined org wherein leaders & lower-level
militants are unlikely to defect from the group’s mission
of creating an Islamic state.

That explained their rise to power in Afghanistan in the
90s. Following the withdrawal of Soviet forces in 1989,
Afghanistan collapsed into a disorganized mess of rival
clans vying for political & economic power. A disunited
governing system couldn’t effectively collect taxes. The
nation’s infrastructure, including the ability to guarantee
basic market interactions, fell into disrepair.

The Taliban was the only unifying entity that could guarantee
safe trade routes, collect taxes without excessively
plundering the population, & provide essential public
goods to key cities. They did this initially by securing
control of the Kandahar-Herat Highway, an important trade
route between Pakistan & Iran. Previously, competing tribal
orgs dominated sections of this highway, stopped all transit,
& excessively taxed truckers. With many different clans
extracting money every few miles, it became too expensive to
transport goods along this road, & commerce ground to a halt.

The Taliban eventually stationed militants at key locations
on the highway & taxed merchants only once while protecting
truckers from other bandits. Since devout Taliban members
proved their loyalty via adherence to strict religious codes,
they were unlikely to plunder the trucking caravans further,
allowing commercial transport to resume.

Successfully securing this road, the Taliban collected
tolerable taxes, which they used for infrastructure projects
throughout the country. The Taliban became reasonably popular.
Afghans might not have liked their repressive religious
policies, but at least the roads were open & the
electricity came back.

The Taliban also proved to be reasonably fair arbitrators
of civil justice, as imams adjudicated contract disputes
between merchants. If people trust that property rights
can be fairly enforced, they are more likely to make long-
term investments that promote economic growth. Even after
being overthrown in 2001, the Taliban continued to serve
as a shadow judiciary in some locales where the secular
regime proved ineffectual.

All this was possible because the Taliban are a strict
religious movement in which leaders & members prove their
loyalty by adhering to strict behavioral requirements. The
secular govt lacked this advantage. Little wonder that when
the Taliban rolled into a town, the local population usually
put up little resistance. For many Afghans, the strict &
predictable implementation of Shariah is preferable to the
arbitrary & kleptocratic rule that Afghans have endured for
two decades.

A classically liberal govt with broad-based civil liberties
would be far better. I offer only an explanation for why
the Taliban have been able to overrun the country in short
order: They represent a disciplined & tolerably trustworthy
alternative to a corrupt regime that needed U.S. troops to
guarantee its power.

Despite the seeming irrelevance of religion in the secular
West, policy makers & military strategists would do well
to understand its power elsewhere in the world.

Mr. Gill is a prof of poli sci at the U. of Washington &
author of “The Political Origins of Religious Liberty”
(Cambridge U. Press)

https://www.wsj.com/articles/economist-taliban-religion-islamist-jihadist-afghanistan-stark-finke-iannaccone-warner-11629916498

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