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EW BACKGROUND BRIEFING
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Democracy's mixed fortunes
in the Arab world
All but three Arab states – Iraq, Lebanon and the Palestinian Authority – are authoritarian regimes and even they, according to the Democracy Index of The Economist, qualify only as ‘hybrid regimes’, well below the categories of ‘full democracies’ or ‘flawed democracies’.
That the only Arab countries to scrape into this lowest category are unstable states emerging with highly fragile institutions from years of occupation and war doesn’t say a lot for the state of democracy in the Arab world. Although most countries in the region now hold elections, in some cases including all-women lists, their legislative assemblies have very limited powers compared to the executive.
Most Arab countries remain a one-man – or one-family – show, according to Jordanian academic Mustafa Hamarneh, with bureaucracies that work for the leader, not the state.
The seven emirs of the United Arab Emirates appoint the prime minister and cabinet, while the legislative assembly, half of whose members are elected, has only consultative powers. Morocco holds multi-party elections, has a national list for women and is led by a coalition government, but the king appoints the prime minister and cabinet, and is able to dissolve parliament.
In Egypt, the principal opposition to the government is the Muslim Brotherhood, and it is forbidden from organising as a party so its members must stand as independents. But presidential candidates are now allowed to challenge Hosni Mubarak, who won 88.6% of the vote in the last election. Mubarak has been in power since 1981 and rules under a state of emergency.
Elsewhere in the Arab world, gerrymandering is reportedly widespread. Elections in Bahrain are described by observers as free and fair, but electoral districts are skewed against the Shia Muslim opposition: The size of constituencies varies from 500 in Sunni districts – favourable to the ruling al Khalifah family – to 12,000 in Shia-dominated areas.
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This trade-off has not always led to mutual prize giving. Sticks as
well as carrots have been used and not only by the powerful West
against weak Arab regimes, but more surprisingly in the opposite
direction too. The Western agenda for reform and democracy has been
used more often than not as a threat, a typical message being: “help
out in the war against Iraq or we press for democracy and human rights
in your own country. An Arab message in return would be: “stop pressing
on the reform issue or we won’t cooperate in the ‘war on terror’!”
Two
other major issues have sustained the trade-off; Israel and the rise of
the Islamist movements. Israel has been seen by the vast Arab public
majorities as an alien and illegitimate entity imposed by force on
Palestinian land with Western support. To have this perception
channelled through democratic means and shaping policies towards Israel
would further complicate any hopes of a peace deal between Arab
countries and Israel. It is far easier to launch negotiations and
eventually sign peace agreements between Israel and authoritarian
regimes like Egypt and Jordan, and in the future with Syria, where
there is no need for any parliamentary agreement. In Morocco, Tunisia,
Mauritania, Qatar, Oman and Bahrain, where various low-level contacts
and Israeli representations exist, these countries’ undemocratic nature
has allowed the ruling elites to impose whatever relationship with
Israel they choose.
The rise of radical Islamism has been no
less obstructive when it comes to the democracy debate in the Arab
world. The decades of unholy alliance between Arab autocrats and the
West have seen radical Islam emerge as a ‘salvation’ force. If free and
fair elections were to be held in any Arab country, the Islamists would
come to power. That was the case in Algeria in 1991/2, in Iraq in 2005
and in the Palestinian West Bank and Gaza in 2006. In most other cases
where a ‘limited space for democracy’ was allowed, such as in Jordan,
Morocco, Kuwait, Yemen and Bahrain, the Islamists immediately filled
that space. For the southern shores of the Mediterranean to be
controlled by Islamist parties is seen as worse than a nightmare for
the West in general and Europe in particular.
The reality is
that we have wasted decades and missed our chances to establish
democracies that could have empowered Arab liberal and democratic
forces. The West’s blind support for autocratic Arab regimes has
eliminated all hope of peaceful change. The democratic process has lost
its aura and its thrust, not least because democratisation seems to
lead to the rise of political movements the West finds unacceptable.
Palestinian democracy that led to the victory of Hamas is only the most
recent example, for over the decades the illiberal and undemocratic
policies of the West in Arab countries have weakened liberal forces,
and led instead to the rise of Islamist fundamentalism.
The
whole notion of democracy has been eroded and discredited, with the
radicalisation that engulfs many Muslim societies now spilling over
into their emigrant communities in the West. It is a phenomenon that
has wider causes and deeper historical roots than current affairs
because it results from the closing down of all avenues of change
thanks to the active involvement of the West.
When in 2002 the
Bush Administration launched its Middle East Partnership Initiative for
democratisation in the Middle East, it turned out to be too little, too
late – and it died too soon. The allocated budget was just $29m, but
its rapid death can also be ascribed of its short-sighted design. Yet
the official burial of the idea of democratising the Middle East in
fact took place at the hands of Barack Obama, who has shown little
interest in the issue right from the start of his presidency. Obama’s
praise of Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak as a man who one could do business with
demoralised opposition groups in Egypt who have been struggling against
the long-serving autocrat and his designs to pass power on to his son,
Gamal Mubarak.
Not only the United States has furthered the
non-democratisation of the Arabs, for Europe has been no less active.
Two recent examples are Libya and Saudi Arabia, with Europe playing a
major role in ‘rehabilitating’ Libya and ‘bringing it back to the
international community’. Internationally ostracised, Tripoli has
become the new Mecca for European leaders trying to win multi-billion
dollar oil and investment deals. The rehabilitation of the Qaddafi
regime has never included any push to ease political oppression in
Libya, but an even more telling case is Saudi Arabia. No European
leader risks antagonising the Saudis by raising the issue of democracy
and human rights there. Saudi women are prohibited from driving cars,
travelling on their own, working or studying without the permission of
a male member of the family. Saudi societies and those of some other
Gulf States lack minimum levels of political freedom and participation.
The status quo is excused by Arab regimes in the name of cultural
specificity; the same pretext used by Western governments to justify
their ‘value-free’ policies towards these regimes.
Lump
together all the trade-offs between the West and a number of Arab
regimes, along with the Israel factor and the Islamist factor, and the
alarming conclusion is that the West cannot afford democracy in the
region. Western talk about the necessity of democracy in the Middle
East rings all too hollow. |