Afghanistan’s political culture has been rendered dysfunctional by the decisions of those running the externally imposed monocenteric government systems in the country since the 1880s.  It is also to hypothesize that socio-culturally inappropriate governance system based on centralization of powers; combined with Afghanistan’s predominantly tribal political culture may have hindered the establishment of an effective governance system.

Afghanistan’s political culture, produced and reproduced during more than a century of failed attempts to build a strong centralized and often tribalized nation-state in a multi-ethnic Afghanistan, gives Afghanistan’s political culture its distinctive dynamics and outcome. Indeed, I argue here that the principle reason for the failure of the US and NATO forces to bring peace and stability in post-Taliban Afghanistan is the insistence by the current squabbling specific Afghan elites to re-establish the same old hegemonic centralized governmental system by relying on the use of the same old traditional dysfunctional political cultural norms.

The ideals and practices of the elements of Afghanistan’s political culture, formed over a century of violence-ridden, oppressive tribalized dynastic rule, have consistently and dialectically affected choices and decisions of rulers and subjects alike. The ultimate wish of the rulers from the very start has been to build a strong centralized state structure by means of modern arms and financial subsidies/aid provided by foreign patrons. This was accomplished by terrorizing, subjugating and trying to homogenize the diverse populations of Afghanistan.

Therefore, proper attention to understanding of myriad disturbing historical legacies of state-building attempts in Afghanistan which have rendered key components of its political culture dysfunctional is critical to the current U.S. and international community’s efforts to end the cycle of violence in Afghanistan.

A society may be one in which all the members, may be of the same ethnic group, subscribe to similar religious beliefs and in which disparities of wealth and social status are small. Another society may be multi-racial, have many religious and sectarian groups, and show marked caste, class and social distinctions; Afghanistan being such a society.

In the former, decision- taking may be simple whereas in the latter the conflict potential is much greater and its politics may, consequently, be more acrimonious and decision-taking result from the interaction of numerous clearly defined groups. Whatever the social environment, the relationships existing in non-political spheres may be expected to carry over into the political. There is, thus, a continuous interaction between the physical, social and political endeavors. The physical setting both affects and is affected by the social, as the social and political also affect both each other and the physical situation.

The individuals who make up a society in which a political system is set may be categorized according to ethnic group, wealth, economic ideology and even religion, but really there is more to the setting than what is often termed the social structure. In the social system there exists also the culture of the society.

The individual members of the society will have certain values, beliefs and emotional attitudes which make up the culture the community of which political attitudes are a part. Such social behavior has its basis in the culture of a society and, similarly, political behavior has its basis in the political culture.

A political culture is a pattern of individual values, beliefs and emotional attitudes. Individual notions of what is right or wrong, good and bad in political affairs, together make up the value pattern—the pattern of norms, of what it is considered ought to be.

Closely linked with such values will be the beliefs about what it really is, that is, of what exists in the world of politics. The values and beliefs of an individual are such that his emotions are aroused in the realm of politics. Such political emotions sustain values and beliefs and are evoked by symbols.

If a political culture were merely the individual writ large, then one might speak of a completely homogeneous culture. However, it is more; it is a unique pattern of values and beliefs and emotional attitudes of a collection of individuals.

In the modern world, while in some countries the degree of cultural differences is relatively small, differences will, no doubt, be found. Such heterogeneity of a political culture rests in differences between the political culture of groups and in differences between individuals. Where the differences between a group and the whole are substantial, there is a political sub-culture.

In some countries the military form just such a group, in others the political culture of the bureaucracy, the parliamentarians, an extremist party, a particular ethnic group, class or religion may provide a political sub-culture. In any individual case one, few or many subcultures may exist. Afghanistan is a notable example of many sub-cultures and her unity is born out of this diversity.

A political sub-culture most likely to be found is that of rulers and the governed. Within the group of rulers there may be many who retain important elements of the political culture of the mass, but those who exercise vast influence are found, in general, to vary from the many in their orientation to politics.

The important political values and beliefs of a society are those which concern the political arrangements as a whole; particular institutions and policies of how they are produced and the place of the individual within the political process. At the general level the value placed by members on the total political unit—the nation in a nation-State – is especially significant.

The value placed on the overall political unit and other units, such as the tribe, the region, even the village is reflected in a hierarchy of loyalties and depending on the placing of units in the hierarchy, nationalism or particularism will predominate.

After independence of the country regionalism reasserted itself more vigorously and today particularism is the norm, universalism is the exception. Recently, it has been coupled with fundamentalism which is really a disturbing phenomenon.

Political elites in any society will act strategically and ideologically in the hope of defining and delimiting which strands of their society's culture should become dominant. Those who are successful in establishing a dominant cultural framework form a 'hegemonic bloc.' The dominant cultural subsystem, once chosen, spins political life into a 'web of significance' which grasps elites and masses alike.

The continuity of the culture, even in the face of such occurrences and alterations, is a sign of the effectiveness of the process by which political culture is passed from generation to generation—the nurturing process of political culture.