Why does the Iraqi hate the state yet demand everything from it?
This contradiction is not hypocrisy or ignorance -- it is a psychological and social effect of a broken relationship between citizen and state, with deep historical roots.
Hatred and need: an apparent contradiction, not a real one
When an Iraqi says 'the state has failed and is worthless,' then in the next sentence demands that it provide him a job, electricity, medicine, security, and education -- this does not mean he is irrational. It means he is living a complex emotional and practical relationship with an institution that has repeatedly let him down but that he has no alternative to. The state in the Iraqi experience is not an apparatus that delivers services in exchange for taxes under a clear liberal social contract -- historically it has been an instrument of repression and patronage distribution. But at the same time it is the largest source of jobs, services, and dispute resolution.
This equation produces a citizen living in a state of cognitive dissonance: he despises the state as an institution because it has not respected him as a citizen, yet he keeps it as the last resort because the structures of social trust outside the state -- independent unions, business communities, an active civil society -- are also weak or politicized.
Historical root: the state as instrument, not covenant
The state in modern Iraq did not evolve through the accumulation of a social contract as it did in Western Europe, where societies passed through long experiences of negotiation between citizen and authority that ultimately produced a concept of the state as servant of the public interest. In Iraq, the state came first as a colonial instrument, then as an instrument for consolidating elite power, then as an instrument of pan-Arab ideology, then as an instrument of overt repression under the Baath. The Iraqi citizen never lived a historical experience that genuinely convinced him that the state existed for him.
The Iraqi does not hate the abstract state -- he hates the historical experience with every state that has governed him. And when he demands everything from it, he is in reality expressing a denied right more than expressing a demand.
Oil rent and the distortion of the social contract
After the oil boom of the 1970s, the Iraqi social contract -- as in many Gulf states as well -- evolved into a strange formula: the state gives without asking. Taxes are virtually non-existent, government jobs are open, and subsidies on fuel, electricity, and food are broad. In return, the citizen is not required to participate democratically, monitor, or hold accountable. This equation produced a citizen who sees the state as a source of deserved patronage rather than a partner in a collective project.
When these patronages erode -- as happened during periods of low oil prices or after the wars -- the citizen feels a deep sense of betrayal. Not because he expected too much, but because the implicit compact under which he lived said: 'You govern and I stay silent, in return for your securing me a dignified life.' When the state defaults on its part, the citizen is left having defaulted on his part too, but without having received the return.
What is the way out of this cycle?
The way out begins with rebuilding the social contract on the basis of genuine citizenship rather than rent. Real taxes that create a sense of ownership and responsibility. Genuinely democratic institutions that give the citizen accountability tools. Education that builds a citizenship identity rather than a sectarian or tribal one. This is a long and difficult path, but it is the only path that transforms the relationship between the Iraqi and his state from a pathological love/hate relationship to a mature partnership.
Analytical conclusion
The Iraqi hates the state and demands from it simultaneously because his historical experience with the state taught him that it is an instrument of repression and an instrument of support at the same time -- and it was never once a genuine partner. What appears to be a contradiction is in reality a rational response to a broken social contract. Reforming this contract -- not just reforming the budget -- is the true challenge before any serious Iraqi government.
