Understanding the MidEast revolutions: Hope for democracy; plan for something worse
So which is it to be: the end of communism or the rise of the ayatollahs? As we consider the extraordinary wave of revolutions sweeping the Middle East there is a certain inevitability about the struggle for an appropriate frame of historical reference against which to judge what is happening. This, after all, makes sense.
Those of us who do not have the habit of consulting fortune tellers to make our political predictions are always on the lookout for familiar structures, recognizable patterns matching events from the past or, if it really comes down to it, something to at least pin our hopes (or fears) on.
Vaclav Havel, one time dissident and former Czech president, is convinced that it’s 1989 all over again: “The authoritarian Arab regimes are the product of the same decades that produced the Iron Curtain,” he said. “It turns out that there are core moral and political standards common to all cultures.”
The Times of London also had its analytical sights set on Havel’s part of the world, but from a different era yielding a very different outcome. Drawing on the ill-fated Prague Spring of 1968 which ended with the fall of the reformist Slovak leader of communist Czechoslovakia Alexander Dubcek and the Soviet invasion, it splashed across a front page the headline: “Rebellion spreads as ‘Arab Spring’ takes hold.”
For Israel’s prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, the great worry was a re-run of Iran in 1979. Referring to Egypt and the prospects of the Muslim Brotherhood in that country, he said: “If extremist forces are allowed to exploit democratic processes to come to power to advance anti-democratic goals — as has happened in Iran and elsewhere — the outcome will be bad for peace and bad for democracy.”
Washington Post columnist Richard Cohen preferred to look at continental Europe after World War I where, he reminded readers, Germany “reeled from Weimar Republic to Nazi dictatorship in virtually no time at all”.
Taken together, the choices on offer run the full gamut from magnificent success to total disaster. And it is not unreasonable to point out that three of those four possible frames of reference predict outcomes that are unedifying, to say the least.
So, how should we understand what is currently going on in the Middle East? Ultimately, it is probably best to discard all such frames of reference and substitute a political cliché: Hope for the best; plan for the worst. Here’s why.
First, the mainly Sunni, Arab speaking Middle East is not Europe or, for that matter, Farsi speaking, Shia Iran. Divorcing political analysis from the prevailing political-cultural context is a recipe for analytical failure. What happens now in countries such as Egypt will depend to a great extent on what feels right to decision makers who are unlikely to be searching through the history books for blueprints. In addition to calculations of personal risk and reward, as well as of economic advantage and diplomatic congeniality, they will make their decisions on the basis of what resonates with the people who have given them power.
Second, the Arab Middle East has no tradition of liberal-democracy or law based, constitutional government. Nor is there a tradition of developmental liberalism with universal suffrage as a long term outcome. From the signing of Magna Carta – the first legal document limiting the power of the English king – to universal suffrage in 1928, 713 years had passed. In that time, battles had been fought, won, lost, and won again, embedding liberal practices in culture and law. It may not be necessary to wait three quarters of a millennium but it takes time to establish the customs associated with liberal democracy.
Third, those people who remain obsessed by comparisons with the collapse of the Soviet bloc should take note that, in alphabetical order, the following post-communist countries are still ranked “Not Free” by Freedom House more than two decades after the fall of communism: Azerbaijan; Belarus; Kazakhstan; Russia; Tajikistan; Turkmenistan; Uzbekistan. Several others are ranked as only “Partly Free”. The majority of people born in the Soviet bloc do not live in countries designated as “Free” by Freedom House.
Fourth, brute anti-Semitism is rife in the Arab world. No country in history has ever produced enlightened political outcomes when anti-Semitism (and anti-Americanism) has dominated the political discourse. According to a major survey conducted by Pew in 2006, 97 percent of Egyptians admitted to holding “somewhat unfavourable” or “very unfavourable” opinions about Jews while none (zero percent) said they had favourable opinions. In Jordan 98 percent said they had unfavourable opinions of Jews with one percent holding favourable opinions. Do with those figures as you please. But history will laugh at you if you ignore them.
Fifth, the best organized political forces in many Arab countries are Islamist groups, the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt being the most widely talked about example. Islamism is best understood as a form of fascism, an ideology incompatible with liberal-democratic values and practices.
This is indeed a bleak and austere summary. But it is better to be aware of the problems the region is going to face in building free societies than to censor them out of our consciousness. We will know soon enough which way things are going to go. The first clues will come with the conversation the emerging leaders start having with their peoples. If you start hearing too many references to Jews, Islam and the perfidy of the West don’t expect things to turn out well. I say again, hope for the best; plan for the worst.
Tags: communism, egypt, Israel, libya, vaclav havel
March 2nd, 2011 at 11:34 am
Thank you Robin for one of the few honest appraisals of what we see unfolding before us. It does not make for pleasant reading to be sure, but I suspect that there will be much “I told you so” when all the dust settles from this upheaval. Sadly, by that stage the politicians, diplomats and the parasites in the Western media who feed off them will have moved on to their next great cause.
March 2nd, 2011 at 11:54 am
“Third, those people who remain obsessed by comparisons with the collapse of the Soviet bloc should take note that, in alphabetical order, the following post-communist countries are still ranked “Not Free” by Freedom House”
And Russia is little better than a mafia state. I think Britain should hang her head in shame that she has welcomed with open arms individuals who have effectively stolen much of the wealth rightfully belonging to the Russian people:
WikiLeaks cables condemn Russia as ‘mafia state’
“Russia is a corrupt, autocratic kleptocracy centred on the leadership of Vladimir Putin, in which officials, oligarchs and organised crime are bound together to create a “virtual mafia state”, according to leaked secret diplomatic cables that provide a damning American assessment of its erstwhile rival superpower.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/dec/01/wikileaks-cables-russia-mafia-kleptocracy
Mikhail Gorbachev lambasts Vladimir Putin’s ‘sham’ democracy
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/feb/21/gorbachev-birthday-putin-democracy-russia
—————-
Compare and contrast
Roman Abramovich’s vast wealth revealed for first time
“the £11 billion estimate of his wealth from Finans magazine in Russia”
“It is a far cry from Mr Abramovich’s first declaration as a Russian MP in 1998 when his only car was a modest Lada, and he reported he had no land or properties.”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1358004/Roman-Abramovichs-vast-wealth-revealed-time.html
Life expectancy at birth – Russia
male: 63.03 years
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Russia
March 2nd, 2011 at 2:26 pm
Worth bearing in mind that many of the Arab world’s problems relate to high birth rates, poverty, urbanisation and poor education. These will not go away under a democracy.
My only cause for optimism is that for decades power in most Muslim countries has been held via the barrel of a gun. Yet these demonstrations have pitted mainly unarmed protesters against the gun. In Egypt and Tunisia the protesters won. Libya is still to be decided.
I suggest differentiating between countries where the army is restrained, like Egypt, and regimes that will use whatever it takes against their own people, such as Iran. This has kept Khamenai and Ahmedinajad in power. By that measure, Saddam Hussein would still be ruling Iraq, but for American intervention.
If the West has any conviction about its own interests and values, then it must take the long-term view. I would like to see the Iranian Revolutionary Guard bombed out of existence and, if necessary, Western troops redeployed from Afghanistan and Iraq into Iran. Teheran is a much greater danger to future world peace and stability.
March 2nd, 2011 at 4:00 pm
An excellent piece Robin.
Another angle to this question is what are these changes likely to have on Europe with its over dependence on oil? How will Europe start to shape out as a result of this? For example will workers under contract in Libya return? Will they be allowed to return?
The tyrants that dominated these regimes had their limits as to how they would play with Europe despite their despicable conduct. So long as they got their money, rich toys and support in the UN for anything Arab (and little or no censure), the European could sit back and not worry too much.The Arabs were a known quantity and so long as the Arab’s focus was mainly on Israel, Europe played along with it. The “new” order, if it replicates Iran, is going to be a much tougher undertaking since in order to receive its much needed fuel Europe will have to dance to a different tune and may be pressed to engage in yet more despicable deeds with regard to Israel first, and then to be expected to adopt a more Islamist-friendly position – perhaps as a start, to allow Turkey into the EU?
(Erdogan appears to be at the ready to take on a role: http://www.worldtribune.com/worldtribune/WTARC/2011/me_turkey0214_03_01.asp )
It may be that Europe will not want this to happen and may revert to an older style colonialist model to gain back some of its spheres of influence, but will it have the money or armed forces to do anything to resist?
March 2nd, 2011 at 5:10 pm
It IS annoying when the current Arab revolts are compared with 1989. The implication is that people revolted in the former Communist countries, overthrew the system. But this is untrue. In reality all that was prearranged, subject of previous US-Soviet agreements, no popular movements would have taken place at all unless the change was encouraged by Moscow. They let the comrades to know that they ‘ll leave and the rest followed with some differences country by country. Yes, in Czechoslovakia and Roumania it is possible to talk about revolutions, but these were not the countries where the change started, and the question remains open to what extent was the outbreak of these was arranged from without. Poland may well qualify for quoting pressure from below, yet very different from the mass riots in Arab lands. Also 1989 was not so much regime change as achieving de facto independence. Almost everything was different, the comparison is highly superficial.
About what you – Robin – say as to the essence I completely agree, but if I am allowed to nitpick two minor points.
One is that I would not use ‘liberal’ in the context of “embedding liberal practices” Perhaps the outcome was liberal, no doubt this was what you meant, but given the historical aspect I ‘d rather vote for ‘pluralistic’. Its lack at Muslim lands would be equally applicable as a source of difficulty if the aim is to create democracy.
My other unpleasantness is about the listed ‘Soviet bloc’ countries. I would not name them as such. The listed ones were all constituents of the USSR, not thought of normally as ‘members’ of the Soviet bloc, nor is the 1989 label is quite applicable to them. Perhaps I am overpedantic, but when referring to the Soviet bloc countries I would expect reference to members of the Warsaw Pact other than the USSR.
March 3rd, 2011 at 9:32 pm
Now who’s thirsty for power in the region? Ah yes, Erdogan, who’s quoted as saying “Democracy is a product of western culture, and it cannot be applied to the Middle East, which has a different cultural, religious, sociological and historical background”.
How about that influential prelate Qaradawi, with his “Islam is not democracy, and democracy is not Islam” thing? A little high-flown, so just to prove that he can go down an octave and sing the same song: “Any legislation contradicting the incontestable provisions of Islam shall be null and void because Islam is the religion of the State and the source of legitimacy of all of its institutions and therefore may not be contradicted” and “Democracy is the channel through which…poisons flow into the separate countries where they are able to remain effective for long enough for these infections to lead to a crippling of intelligence.”
Ahmadinejad has something to say on the subject, too. His bon mot is: “Capitalism and liberal democracy cheated the world for 100 years.”
You don’t need a Weatherman to tell which way the wind is blowing.
In this matter Erdogan is right. Even if none of the above insights had ever been voiced, there is no democratic tradition in the Islamic Middle East except briefly in Turkey (now who’s tried to put a stop to that, I wonder) and Lebanon and a long tradition of subservience to dictators who, if nothing else, provide some sort of order and stability. Do people there even know what democracy is? Do they have the education and information which would allow them to really, really know? The Mensheviks did, but what about the peasant masses? I think that when a dicatator falls, it’s mother’s milk natural to look to that part of the opposition to the deposed regime which can offer the same order and the same stability. No prizes for saying what that is.
By the way, one of the Qaradawisms isn’t. Just the one. Not irrelevant, though.
March 4th, 2011 at 12:31 am
An interesting analysis Robin.
If there is any optimism, it is in my view that one of the most striking elements in Libya was the huge poster declaring that the Libyans could do it themselves; i.e. US and UK please keep away.
Secondly, in Egypt, there appeared to be little if any conflating Mubarak with Israel – Israel is not part of the Egyptian problem – their own leadership is.
Thirdly, we have discounted the power and influence of social networking and the internet in these revolutions. I think they have had a much bigger effect on what is happening than we give credit for and as a result of this, the failed state of Iran can be seen across the Arab world as just that, failed. Most Arab states are mainly peopled by young people and they will not want to go the way of Iran, if they can avoid it.
If these revolution turn out well, these are some of the main reasons why, in my opinion.