Political elites in New York City, just like American forces in Afghanistan, have become obsessed with the wrong kind of metrics in measuring success.

Today, Zohran Mamdani was sworn in as mayor of New York City. The next few months will test two things: his ability to deliver on what voters asked for, and the establishment’s ability to recognize it if he does. The same elites who refused to believe the evidence of his rise are now preparing to judge his governance. They are watching intently. But they are also calibrating their instruments to measure the wrong things.

I recognize this pattern because I have watched it unfold before. New York’s political elite did not fail to predict Mamdani’s rise. They simply refused to believe it. The signs had been visible for months: unexpected polling strength, restless energy on the ground, voters drawn to a message that defied convention. Democratic party elites did not lack information; they lacked the willingness to accept what the information meant.

When I worked in Afghanistan for several years between 2006 and 2016, the problem was rarely a lack of data. Attrition reports from 2015 showed 33 percent of Afghan soldiers deserting each year. Pentagon briefings assumed an Afghan army of 352,000 even as local commanders admitted many were ghosts. District maps disappeared once they showed Taliban gains. Military officials classified casualty figures to protect morale. Afghan officials told Washington what it wanted to hear because funding depended on arbitrary performance metrics, not reality. 

The instruments registered danger from every angle. Elites dismissed warnings that contradicted what they needed to believe. The instruments were not broken. They were calibrated to measure what comforted us rather than what mattered. We reassured ourselves with numbers that could not register the danger spreading through the system.

By the time Kabul fell to the Taliban in 2021, the collapse looked sudden only to those who had refused to read the signs. Acknowledging the warnings would have meant admitting failure, and that threatened too many interests and reputations.

New York’s establishment repeated that pattern with Mamdani. The signs of his viability were clear, but what was missing was the courage to face the implications. Endorsing him would have alienated donors. Supporting him would have unsettled real estate allies. Acknowledging his strength would have forced an admission that the coalition they built, funded by wealth while performing progressive virtue, no longer commanded working-class loyalty.

They dismissed his campaign as fringe and assured one another that voters would never choose someone so far outside the mainstream. When the signs became undeniable, some hedged without confronting what his rise revealed: the widening gap between their performance and voters’ reality.

Mamdani understood something fundamental. The system had stopped working for most New Yorkers. Housing costs and access had become extractive. Even multiple jobs no longer guaranteed stability. Upward mobility had turned into a cruel joke for those without inherited wealth or outside the narrow worlds of tech and finance. None of this was hidden. It was merely inconvenient to acknowledge for those whose influence depended on preserving current arrangements.

Political scientist Timur Kuran called this preference falsification—the systematic misrepresentation of one’s beliefs under perceived social pressure. In Afghanistan, soldiers professed loyalty they did not feel. Officials claimed programs functioned. Citizens participated in democratic rituals long after they had stopped believing in them. New York’s political elite operated under the same logic. Reassurance was rewarded, dissent carried a cost, and elite consensus hardened quickly. 

How to Measure Zohran Mamdani’s Success or Failure

The establishment is watching to see if Mamdani stumbles. They will measure his success through the standard instruments: polling numbers, donor satisfaction, media coverage, his relationship with Albany, and, importantly, his ability to navigate the machinery of city government.

These metrics are not useless. They measure real factors of political success or failure. But they don’t measure all of them. They tell you whether Mamdani is playing the game successfully, but not whether he is delivering what his voters asked for. If I were designing metrics to assess whether Mamdani is succeeding, drawing on what I learned in Afghanistan, I would focus on different questions entirely.

Trust over approval: Polling asks whether citizens “approve” or “disapprove” of the mayor. But it does not ask whether you believe the city government knows what your daily life is like. In Afghanistan, we learned that approval ratings told us nothing about whether people believed the state would protect them or whether the state would even endure. Ultimately, what mattered was trust. The sense that the government saw you, knew your struggles, and would act on your behalf. Approval can be performative; trust cannot.

Access instead of allocation: Measuring dollars allocated to affordable housing is straightforward. Measuring whether teachers, nurses, and transit workers can still afford to live in New York is more complex and far more revealing. In Afghanistan, schools were counted without asking whether children could attend them, and clinics were opened without asking whether they had medicine. The infrastructure existed on paper. Access did not.

Responsiveness over process: Measurement often focuses on whether procedures occur: meetings held, councils convened, elections conducted. It rarely captures whether anyone’s behavior changes as a result. In Afghanistan, voters were counted without asking whether anyone believed their vote mattered. In New York, the question is not whether community boards meet, but whether residents feel the city listens and responds when they speak. Process can become theater. Responsiveness requires power to shift.

Services delivered rather than announced: Governments excel at announcing programs but struggle to deliver them. In Farah, Afghanistan, I once visited a health clinic that existed only as a sign on a building. The metric had been met, but no patients received care. New York has its own version. Initiatives are unveiled at press conferences and never reach the neighborhoods they are meant to serve. They exist in budget lines but are absent from the streets. The announcement becomes the accomplishment.

These measurements resist easy quantification. They require talking to people the establishment does not usually talk to, in neighborhoods they do not usually visit, about problems that do not fit neatly into dashboards. They would be difficult to defend in budget hearings and less comforting to report in quarterly assessments. And that is precisely why the establishment will focus on the standard metrics and declare victory or failure based on those, regardless of what is actually happening in neighborhoods.

The Real Test for New York City

Mamdani won by refusing to play the game the establishment designed. His voters chose him because they were tired of politicians who knew how to work the system but could not make the system work equitably for them. He diagnosed the problem precisely: that the city had stopped serving most people, that progressive rhetoric masked the defense of privilege, that the coalition claiming to represent working people had long since abandoned them.

The test begins today, January 1. Can he deliver the affordable housing, transit, public services, and safety he promised? But there is a second test, and this one is for the establishment. If Mamdani delivers on what matters to ordinary New Yorkers but fails by the metrics elites watch, will they recognize his success? Or will they point to polling dips, donor defections, media criticism, and declare him a failure, while the neighborhoods he serves feel finally seen?

I have watched this before. In Afghanistan, elites measured what was easy to quantify while missing what mattered. The gap between their metrics and reality widened until it became undeniable. In New York, the same gap could open – with elites measuring one thing while people experience another. Whether they declare success while neighborhoods suffer, or declare failure while people’s lives improve, the pattern is the same: measuring the wrong things produces the wrong conclusions.

The danger for New York is not that Mamdani will fail. The danger is that he might succeed by measures that matter while failing by measures the establishment watches. And if that happens, if the gap between their instruments and reality becomes undeniable, the next insurgent will not be someone who diagnoses problems as clearly as Mamdani. The next one might be far more dangerous. And the establishment, still measuring what is easy rather than what matters, will not see that one coming either.

About the Author: Prakhar Sharma

Prakhar Sharma is a geopolitical analyst who worked in Afghanistan for several years between 2006 and 2016 and provided analysis for the US and Afghan governments and affiliated organizations. He designed and managed research on risks to governance and stabilization. He is based in New York.

Image: Lev Radin / Shutterstock.com.

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