18 NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2026 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL SPEAKING OUT Lynn Northcutt Vega served as a career Foreign Service officer with USAID in Nicaragua, Honduras, Jamaica, Colombia, and Moldova. Since retiring in early 2024, she has been the representative of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma in Washington, D.C. She currently co-chairs a well-known discussion group on Latin America and the Caribbean in Washington, D.C., and is an occasional editorial writer for the Sun Sentinel and the Orlando Sentinel, sister newspapers in Florida. W hen I arrived at the USAID mission in Nicaragua in 1991, I believed I was witnessing the beginning of a lasting democratic transformation. Thirty-five years later, after watching much of what Nicaraguans and the international community worked so hard to build completely unravel, I have come to question what we understood, and what we missed, about building a democracy that could endure. These questions have particular relevance today in many countries, including the United States, and a close examination of those defining moments in Nicaragua’s history might help us grapple with our own future and the future of the many countries in which we work to promote democratic values. Democratic Statecraft Comes to Nicaragua Violeta Chamorro had defeated Daniel Ortega in the historic 1990 election, ending a decade of Sandinista rule. Nicaragua had been devastated by revolution, civil war, economic collapse, and deep political divisions. With Chamorro’s victory, there was now a palpable sense of possibility and tremendous optimism. Nicaraguans who had fled the country were returning home, determined to rebuild their country. They were joined by diplomats, development professionals, economists, governance specialists, humanitarian workers, and public administration experts from countries around the world, the Organization of American States, the United Nations, international financial institutions, and countless nongovernmental organizations. We understood that an election alone did not create a democracy. All of us worked with our Nicaraguan counterparts to strengthen the National Assembly and courts, professionalize public administration, improve local governments, support civil society, and increase transparency. But democratic development extended far beyond national institutions. Because democracies also depend on educated and healthy citizens who have economic opportunities and confidence that government can respond to their needs, we built it in both directions—from national institutions downward and communities upward. So we trained mayors and city council members to govern more effectively and respond to their constituents. We helped civic organizations learn how to identify community needs, advocate for them, and hold the new government accountable. This expanded to schools, universities, health systems, and businesses. Democratic statecraft in its broadest sense was being exercised. Realizing a Shared Future I remember visiting a cooperative of widows in the mountains of Jinotega. Their husbands had died fighting on opposite sides of the war. Instead of remaining divided, they came together to rebuild their lives and communities. This kind of reconciliation among people who had decided that their shared future ultimately mattered more builds democracy at its most basic level. Democratic transitions are ultimately about relationships. Constitutions can establish rules and elections can transfer power, but societies emerging from conflict must also rebuild trust. Another memory takes me to the Río Coco, where we traveled by canoe to deliver new Azul y Blanco textbooks to isolated schools. With U.S. government support, Nicaragua had developed these textbooks and trained teachers to use them. Instead of being filled with revolutionary slogans and images of rifles, machine guns, and grenades, the books helped young children count with fruit and other everyday objects, and their lessons emphasized family, cooperation, respect, and citizenship. It was clear we weren’t merely replacing textbooks. We were investing in the successor generation of citizens. Democracy Has No Finish Line: Lessons from Nicaragua BY LYNN NORTHCUTT VEGA
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