Extremely difficult negotiations. For the simple reason that the Taliban want to alter the current Afghan state to a Sunni Afghan version of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Whereas the other side wants to preserve as much of the current setup as possible. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/12/world/asia/afghanistan-taliban.html

The Taliban know that they can't go back to their old emirate and will need to compromise. But their desire to dominate a post-American Afghanistan is only getting stronger, especially given battlespace dynamics and the US desire to get the hell outta dodge

Meanwhile, the other sides represents a divided state + an array of regional factions, which have come to the table from a position of relative weakness. Their desire is to concede as little as possible but lack military leverage to drive a hard bargain.

The anti-Taliban camp (the best word I can come up with to describe them in absence of an Afghan mainstream) will likely accept to large-scale constitutional engineering - even to the extent of a new state architecture.

If all things were to go well (I know I'm assuming way too much but bear with me for a moment) what kind of power-sharing arrangement or post-American Afghan polity are we looking at it?

There will be a republican component to the future state BUT one heavily circumscribed by a thick theocratic layer. Wouldn't be surprised if an apex religious leadership post was established. In other words, not exactly an emirate but an emir atop a complex hybrid edifice.

Most new political dispensations are built on modifying existing models. The Taliban know that an outright emiratic theocracy won't fly so they will have to improvise. A hybrid between their medieval Sunni ideal and a modern western style state.

They don't have look too far. Iran is next door & its Islamic Republic (being first past the post & despite being Shia) has influenced a great deal of Sunni Islamist actors - even those who deeply oppose them theologically. The Talibs have actually grown close to Iran since 9/11.

Some remarks from U.S. Afghan and Taliban leaders at the peace confab that clearly show that regime-change (via talks) is underway. Consider the following....

"The choice of your political system is yours to make."

- @SecPompeo

"My delegation are in Doha representing a political system that is supported by millions of men and women from a diversity of cultural, social and ethnic backgrounds in our homeland."

- @DrabdullahCE

Afghanistan should "have an Islamic system in which all tribes and ethnicities of the country find themselves without any discrimination and live their lives in love and brotherhood."

- Taliban leader Mullah Baradar Akhund

Ironic paradox: The choice is between continued war or #regimechange. IOW, the only scenario in which these talks succeed is one in which an Islamist polity emerges. The Taliban will likely make cosmetic compromises while their opponents will be making most of the concessions.

These talks should not be viewed from the lens of the number of accommodations that the anti-Taliban camp will be making to the jihadist movement. Rather in terms of how much of the current setup will it be able to preserve - once all is said and done.

The Taliban extracting far greater concessions than what they will concede is not simply a function of the upper hand they have in the battlespace. But also because of ideational conditions - both within the current Islamic Republic of Afghanistan and Afghan society.

Let us not forget that many of the factions within the anti-Taliban camp are also Islamists - remnants of the original jihadist insurgency that fought the Soviets in the 1980s.

In addition, the ‘92 collapse of the People’s Democratic Republic of Afghanistan (the last real state that the country had) led to the empowerment of medieval religious interpretations - a key reason why Taliban emirate emerged in ‘96.

This is also why the existing US-backed Afghan state has had many Talibanesque legal features. The negotiators of the jihadist movement will be leveraging these factors big time in order to roll back the many democratic gains made in the 19 years since they were last in power.

The US and the anti-Taliban Afghan camp are well aware of these huge risks. But they take comfort from the assumption that the jihadist movement also undergone ‘political learning’. They are not wrong. But they’re also only correct in a limited sense.

Political learning is an extremely complicated non-linear & terribly long-term process. Geopolitical constraints and latitudes may have brought the Taliban to come to the table but we are very far from genuine ideational change. That takes decades.

So, when I hear the Taliban saying they’re now cool with women getting educated and having jobs, I can’t help but ask WTF does that mean?!