What Next for Honduras

The leaders of the Americas have failed to resolve the political crisis in Honduras. President Manuel Zelaya is still in exile and the de facto government remains, defiant and unmoved.

Make no mistake -- this failure comes not for a lack of trying. In an unprecedented show of unity, the other 33 voting members of the Organization of American States have unanimously agreed to suspend Honduras from the organization. Costa Rican President Oscar Arias, on behalf of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and others, tirelessly worked with Zelaya and the interim government to find a compromise that would have restored the ousted president and guaranteed political immunity to all involved in the coup.

On Aug. 24 and 25, OAS Secretary-General Jose Miguel Insulza and foreign ministers from seven member nations flew to Tegucigalpa, the Honduran capital, in a final attempt to get interim President Roberto Micheletti to sign Arias' proposal, the San Jose Accord. Insulza returned to Washington empty-handed.

The two opposing parties remain where they started two months ago. Micheletti still rejects the possibility of Zelaya's return, insisting that the ouster was legal. Meanwhile, Zelaya insists on acting in ways that don't seem to help the effort: For instance, the day before Insulza arrived, he pledged to seek a life sentence for the military leader responsible for the coup.

Insulza has referred to Sept. 1 as the deadline for Micheletti to sign the accord -- the first day of Honduras' presidential campaign season. So, absent a last-minute breakthrough, it is clear that Zelaya will not return to Honduras to finish his term. The failed accord and the upcoming presidential election pose new challenges -- but perhaps they also offer the best opportunity to move forward.

The leaders of the Americas could continue to obsess over Zelaya's return, but their energies would be misdirected. Instead, they should call on the OAS -- the hemisphere's pre-eminent political body, with decades of experience observing regional elections -- to ensure that the November elections are free and fair.

Most likely, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and his allies in the region will reject outright the results of the election if Zelaya isn't restored to office first. But other leaders might not stand in the way.

"I doubt that anybody else will," says former Costa Rican vice president Kevin Casas-Zamora, a senior fellow with the Latin America Initiative at The Brookings Institution. "No one has a strong intention to continue prolonging this crisis." Historically, he points out, most transitions to democracy in the region have entailed elections under nondemocratic regimes.

For his part, Micheletti has pledged to do what he can to prove that the vote is legitimate: That should include, at the very least, welcoming international monitoring. But the election will have to be more than just clean -- even if, as expected, Micheletti's now-divided party loses power.

For true legitimacy, Hondurans must be dissuaded from boycotting the election and encouraged to re-engage in the political process. Many Hondurans have lost faith in their government and believe the system protects the interests of the elite at the expense of the majority. As former U.S. ambassador to Honduras Cresencio Arcos put it, the Central American country is ruled by "a political class that has no leaders, but accomplices."

The system's fundamental flaws should be aired in a national dialogue and ultimately addressed by a constitutional assembly. Insulza or another high-ranking envoy could convince all of the presidential candidates to commit, during the campaign, to implementing such a process once in office.

Still, a key question remains: What sort of dangerous precedent has Honduras set for the prospect of democracy in the hemisphere?

Four years ago, Ecuadorean President Lucio Gutierrez purposefully undermined the independence of his country's judiciary, threatening the balance of powers. Despite warnings from U.N. observers, among others, the OAS remained silent. In the end, Gutierrez was impeached and the OAS merely drafted a report detailing his final days, while Ecuadorean democracy limped along.

The OAS' involvement in Honduras has been far greater. However, as with Ecuador, the organization did not get involved in the Honduran crisis until the president had been removed. This reluctance stems from the OAS' propensity to favor presidential power rather than the democratic process as political crises unfold: It defers to the country's leadership rather than inserting itself into the situation early enough to help address the root causes of an emerging crisis.

While early engagement is fraught with complications, acting after the fact has proven to be very costly. The OAS should remain committed to restoring and improving Honduran democracy. But more importantly, it should once and for all evolve into a more proactive agent in defense of democracy in the region.