The debate of democratisation in the Middle East
Introduction
As current events have established, one of the most widespread phenomena of the Arab’s states is the resilience and persistence of its undemocratic government. Current regimes in these nations reveal an essential paradox despite the fact they have encountered only limited challenges from their societies despite the blatantly poor performance of the economic and social elite and their poor performance. Outside the Gulf region, unemployment, illiteracy levels, poverty rates in the rest of these Arab nations are very high. At the same time, public service standards in essential sectors like schools and university education, social and health for low-earning workers, the elderly and the poor plumbed to new heights. These authoritarian governments are still failing to stop rampant corruption, abuse of public office, nepotism, even though there is a complete absence of accountability and transparence-principles which ought to oversee the performance of the private and public sectors.
The debate of democratisation in the Middle East
These nations face autocratic regimes that no legitimacy in any real development sense and bear no resemblance to what should be taken as better governance. Narrow elites are instead controlling the society, citizens and the state with an iron fist. There is no real competition that is allowed in the political field and citizen’s rights are variously denied and restricted. There is no freedom of expression, participation, and organisation. Despite this, the leaders do not face any actual or significant opposition from society since the cost of controlling the masses is very minimal. The paradox lies between the economic and social ineffectiveness and the illegitimacy of Arab regimes and the not so complex and low-cost means by which they thrive.
Oppression and surveillance
In order to analyse this paradox, various approaches from the fields of political sociology and science can be invoked. The first perspective is to look at the actions of the security intelligence, military that have become widespread and embedded in the regime and whose financial allocations have been using a constantly rising share of the country’s Gross Domestic Product. The role of these security apparatus is not restricted to the monitoring and tracking of the opposition and the systematic use of authoritative measures against those seen by the ruling elite as a potential or existing threat to its rule. The current security set-up in the Arab world goes away beyond this and now incorporates the direct administration of several important political and social portfolios. It starts with restricting the activities of civil society organisations and other trade unions and also limiting the freedom of the press. It extends to the detail and nature of the electoral systems both at the national and regional levels and even the division of electoral constituencies and continues as far as changing the constitutional laws and articles regulating civil and political rights.
Currently, the security and military intelligence agencies and the military have the last say as far as determining the ruling elites is concerned. They have the final say in putting policy into use, thereby progressing their influence and control over other executive institutions. The security agencies have advanced and expanded to incorporate their personnel in the state bureaucracy, thus establishing a soft network of intelligence that is ubiquitous and all-encompassing. This will make it hard for citizens to organise so that they can confront the tyranny of the state. It is much easier for the ruling government to use such methods to continue and prolong their autocratic regimes to re-establish themselves.
Fear of anarchy and chaos
The second approach that explains the endurance of authoritarian rule in the Arab nations in fear of anarchy and chaos and the ready availability of the elite’s rank notwithstanding their lack of legitimacy and the failure to meet expectations of the people. These elites maintain convincing official rhetoric that leads the masses, despite their harsh realities in preferring the continuation of failed leaders, while refusing demands for democratic change. The ruling elites use religious authorities and media whether the state controls them or they are under private control. They do this to produce a constant sense in the collective memory that the need for change implies a threat to public order and the fall of the state. This, in turn, prevents the genuine complaints of people from being directed at the institutions or towards popular action that surpasses the limited and spontaneous protests that can be observed in the Arab nations.
Also, there is no apprehension that the official rhetoric concerning the perils of change and is somehow linked to the frequent breakdown of public order and republican nations like Libya, Iraq, Syria, and Yemen. In addition, it was also linked to the opposition’s failure, which had adopted slogans concerning human rights and democracy, but which needs to practice what it says. Also, there is a lack of opposition to come up with a clear programme for the change they need in a manner that can reassure people. The hardships that the citizens have suffered make them consistently wary, and their experiences teach them to safeguard the little they have from future interferences that may take away even that.
Populism, Praetorianism, and patrimonialism
The other approach, which epitomised the authoritarian rule in Arab nations was praetorianism. It arose because mobilisation exceeded the slower rate of economic growth and also the political institution-building required to accommodate and satisfy it. What caused and increased this situation as analysed by the Marxists was the accumulation of capital in modernising nations needed high profits for investors while offsetting workers and the poor. The result was that, inequality increased in the process of development. The effects of frustration demands led to class conflicts and chaos not contained by other democratic organisations. It gave rise to revolution and military intervention and a conservative dictatorship and authoritarian protective of the property rights of the ruling and dominant classes. According to the Kuznets’s curve, inequality increased in the process of development. The findings from Kuznets that when high levels of income are attained, inequalities began to decrease appeared compatible with other findings that democratisation was linked to and more sustainable capitalist societies.
In the Middle East nations, modernisation was linked with new inequalities since new landed elites and classes were created through peasant deprivation and new bourgeoisies enhanced from export and import trade. Early democracies were destabilised because of radicalisation of the modern middle classes. The military also became a tool for the new created middle class. Even some of the states that boast of most prolonged democratic capabilities, intervention by the military in Turkey and the civil war in Lebanon could be related to the lack of semi-democratic bodies to include newly organised social forces. The social structures of the Middle East nations do not appear to favour the process of democratisation. In every place, the bourgeoisie was inefficient and weak, failed to break with property owners and caused no democratic or capitalistic uprisings. Considering the pre-modern relative hostility of the imperial state concerning private property, and the role of the region’s periphery regarding the capitalistic economy of the world, the dominant classes, consisted of tribal oil sheikhs and influential property owners and landlords. After 1950-60s, the only remaining part of the private sector was a fragment of small enterprises that relied on the state for favors and contracts. These types of crony capitalists do not have any interest in leading a democratic coalition. Even those working in the industries are not independent enough to offer shock for such types of coalition. Although modernisation has increased the growth of the educated middle class in those regions, the class was initially the result of and dependence on the state.
A second hindrance to democratisation was the incompatibility typical in less developed countries between identity and state to the random imposition of territorial borders under imperialism. It meant that less developed countries could not appreciate the essential consensus concerning political community which could allow groups to differ over fewer interests and issues peacefully. According to Rasto, the amalgamation of national identity was the initial mandatory stage in democratic change since, without this, electoral competition could only cause and increase communal conflicts.
In the Middle East, the expected outcomes of the obligatory fragmentation of the Arab world into a unit of small weak states was the determination of supra-and sub-state identities which destabilised state identification that was required for a stable democracy. In these type of conditions where political mobilisation has a tendency to cause communal conflict, elites are likely to turn to authoritarian solutions. Besides, in the arb world sub-divided into fragile states, intellectuals, activists alike tended to give significance or priority not to democracy but to overcome this lack of unity. This means that the major political movements such as pan-Arabism and political Islam were preoccupied with gaining authenticity, unity, and identity as opposed to democratisation. Whey they seized state power, the state organs often took an authoritarian approach with elites pursuing legitimacy not through democratic processes but championing for identity. Hence, there will be less momentum for democratisation when political forces tasked with leading these fights to engage in other concerns. Another effect of the way the system of the state was imposed was that artificial borders created irredentism in the very fabric of the policies of the state. This meant that the new states were caught unaware with acute security problem where they perceived each other as a threat. The threat mainly took the form of ideological subversions in these Arab states.
Lastly, the short-term outcomes concerning economic liberalisation dampens the spirit of democratisation. The authoritarian rule is reinforced through access to new sources of revenue and the inclusion of former hostile advantaged social forces in the coalition. Integration of these forces reinforces the capability of rulers to marginalise the opposition, the elites, and even the masses.
Conclusions
The modal form of governance in the Middle East is purely authoritarian, as discussed above. There are many hostile factors which have caused these conditions. Unsolved national problems, limited modernisation, and class configuration are among the factors that have caused limited democracies. Their authoritarian heirs found the resources that developed modern forms of authoritarianism congruent within the society. For these nations to have a democratic society, they should increase the rule of law, promote regulatory frameworks, and engage in educational reforms. The states can also increase the investment and economic development required to improve the middle class, independent bourgeoisie, and civil society. It will, in turn, create conditions that can bring about a democratic society.