May 2019
Why -according to you- the on-going Arab Spring has the capacity to modify the established physiognomy of the MENA region?
During my second semester at Sciences Po Grenoble, I had the pleasure and joy of attending the course entitled “The Eastern Mediterranean in the 21st Century: Energy Policy Under the Sun”. In fact, Mr. Spyridon N. Litsas has honorned us by coming and giving us a drop of his knowledge for a week through interesting discussion about Eastern Mediterranean Politics. It is therefore in contact with this renowned teacher that we have addressed several topics, all as interesting as each other, and that our 4th lecture will have focused on the Arab Spring, a subject that is quite interresting and which I will treat through this homework.
The subject I am focusing on is : Why -according to you- the on-going Arab Spring has the capacity to modify the established physiognomy of the MENA region? The French dictionary Larousse defines physiognomy as being the general look, main lines of a process, a phenomenon. Thus, we will talk about the physiognomy of the MENA region by referring to the well-known characteristics of the region: political, social, religious, geographical etc.
How to consider approaching the Arab Spring without starting first by talking about the Tunisian case?
Tunisia, cradle of the Arab Spring, has been the pioneer country of the protest movements that have appear the Arab world since 2011. Indeed, it is following the self-immolation by fire of Mohamed Bouazizi – young street vendor – December 17 2010 in the city of Sidi Bouzid, in the center-west of the country, that the so-called jasmine revolution will break out in the whole of Tunisia. Mohamed Bouazizi, today the iconic figure because true trigger of the Arab Spring, overwhelmed by misery will find no other way than to immolate himself in front of the seat of the governorate in Sidi Bouzid. This act will sound the alarm in Tunisian society, and in less than ten days the dispute will spread to all of Tunisia reaching the capital. On January 14, 2011, president Ben Ali flees and finally goes to Saudi Arabia. Since then, the Tunisian case will arouse the interest of journalists, researchers, political scientists, Ph.D. students etc. The different spheres of Tunisian society will then be the subject of numerous research, articles and scientific publications. It is in this same logic that comes Anne Wolf’s book Anne Wolf, Political Islam in Tunisia the History of Ennahda. London, HURST, 2017, 256p.
Through this book, the author gives us the keys to understand the origins and coming to power of the Tunisian Islamist movement Ennahda since October 2011. Anne Wolf explains that the work done upstream to publish her book was a real work of investigation and field – it was very difficult to carry out such extensive research before 2011 – nourished by interviews, meetings etc. The reason why this work was almost impossible before 2011 was due to the fact that the movement was classified as a criminal organization and was therefore banned/repressed by the power. Anne Wolf will be able, as far as she’s concerned, to meet the leaders of Ennahda and will work in different geographical areas (Tunisia, France, United Kingdom). The author will look at all the forms of activism of the Islamist movement, going beyond strictly Tunisian borders. Throughout the book, the author puts the light on the fact that since Habib Bourguiba took the power in there, Tunisia has been considered as a kind of secular country where the role and place of islam was way less important than in other arab countries. But this was a huge mistake in analysing the Tunisian society. Thus, it is true that H. Bourguiba and his successor Zine Al Abidine Ben Ali have implemented secular modernization, but this neglected the fact that the vast majority of Tunisians remained attached to their Arab-Islamic roots. And here was the surprise when the islamic party Ennahda won 37 percent of the votes right after the revolution in 2011 for the Constituent Assembly elections (while other eight parties only got 35 percent of the votes all together). Who could have anticipated such results?
To understand such a situation, it is necessary to return to the 19th century, during which time was born a great current of thought that continues today to influence the Arab world. Indeed, it is in the 19th century that will appear the phylosophy of El Nahda. “The Arab Enlightenement”* of the nineteenth century, the Nahda, marks an era of intellectual, political, cultural renaissance and also religious in the Arab world. As Jean-Pierre Filiu explains in his book Jean-Pierre Filiu. 2015. Les Arabes, leur destin et le nôtre : Histoire d’une libération. Editions La Découverte, Paris, 2015. this nineteenth-century school of thought that has awaken the Arab world continues today to influence behavior in Arab societies. This same Nahda inspires the Arab peoples in their quest for democracy even today.
Muslim religious thinkers will lay the foundations of this religious renaissance such as Jamal Al Din Al Afghani, Abd al-Rahman Al Kawakibi, Muhamad Abduh who are still today emblematic figures of religious and spiritual rebirth in the region. This religious philosophy called Salafiyah will unite a part of the Arab peoples who will remain very attached to their Arab-Muslim roots (as in the Tunisian case) even if governments are detached from this religious rigorism. Thus in Tunisia the government will have been perceived as almost secular while a large part of the population will immediately vote for the islamist party upon the flight of Ben Ali. Thus, the events of the Arab Spring in Tunisia have reversed the political balance established in the country since the independence of 1956. The so-called jasmine revolution led to the coming to power of Ennahda. Although the last presidential elections were won by Beji Caid el Sebsi, leader of the party Nidaa Tounes** . But Ennahda enjoys today majority in parliament and remains the country’s leading political force.
We will now address the Syrian crisis, namely the civil war raging in the country since March 2011, which continues today. Arab Spring events that began in Tunisia soon found an echo in other Arab countries. Witness the case of Syria which very quickly, from March 2011, followed the traces of the Tunisian example in a momentum of revolution. Unemployment, misery, high cost of living and a need for democracy that is not just a facade will push people out on the streets. With a strong social dimension, the demonstrators demand the fall of the Bashar regime, the right to individual and public liberties, the end of kleptocracy and so on. But each country is different. And unlike Tunisia, in Syria the revolution will take a different turn and will quickly switch to a bloody civil war. For 8 years now, the civil war in Syria has killed more than 200,000 civilians and pushed millions of Syrians to flee their country. The Syrian crisis has a huge local, regional and international impact.
At the local level, the country is almost completely destroyed, some cities have completely disappeared and are now ghost towns. Let’s also talk about the considerable loss of historic sites and monuments in the country. It should be noted that 6 UNESCO Wolrd Heritage of the country were destroyed during this war. The following is a non-exhaustive list of losses in historical legacy since the beginning of the crisis: Krak des Chevaliers, Archaeological Villages of Northern Syria, Bosra, Palmyra, Old city of Damascus, Medieval buildings in the Ancient City of Aleppo, Al Madina Souq in Aleppo, Great Mosque of Aleppo, Apamea, Mosque of Idlib Sermin, Mosque of al Tekkiyeh Ariha, Grand Mosque of al Qusaayr, Monastery of St. Elian, Mosque al Herak, Our Lady of Seydnaya Monastery…
Moreover, it is important to underline that Syria quickly became the stronghold of Daesh (we will come back to the issue of jihadism during this work).
At the regional and international levels, the Syrian crisis has had a huge impact because of the refugee issue. Millions of Syrians have left the country and settled in neighboring countries but have also managed to go further and this is how the Syrian refugee crisis has become international. For instance and to explain my words, the Syrian refugee crisis had become a major issue in Canada in late 2015 because of the haunting images of a drowned 3 year old Syrian boy Aylan Kurdi washed up on a Turkish beach. This boy and his family were trying to reach Canada to live with their relatives, after escaping the war. Because of that, Canada today is known to be one of the most welcoming Anglo-Saxon countries for refugees and Asylum seekers. The government’s dedication and involvement has been shown throughout these recent years and it’s still continuing. The 11th of December 2015 marks the date when the first Syrian refugees were welcomed in the country. And the number of refugees is still growing nowadays. Over the last year, the world has been hearing about Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s open refugee policy, thus making the country the only one that does not fear Syrians arrival and one of the few that wants to help as much refugees as it can.
Australia seems to be moving at a very slow pace to resettle refugees fleeing from Syria and Iraq. Although the country announced in 2016 that 12,000 Syrian refugees would be resettled under the country’s program, it has only managed to welcome a sixth, which represents 2,000 people, therefore not keeping its full promise compared to the others. On the other hand, Canada managed to receive 30,000 Syrian refugees while the US has resettled 10,000 people. By 2016-2017, Syrian refugees represented about 28.7 percent of the total refugees arrivals in New Zealand.
As far as the US are concerned, Trump’s order singled out Syrians for the most aggressive ban, ordering that anyone from that country, including those fleeing civil war, are indefinitely blocked from coming to the United States.
If the Syrian refugee crisis has had and continues to have a significant international impact, it must be known that this impact is even more important at the regional level, namely in the Middle East and in Turkey because in any conflict, refugees flee to neighboring countries way before they do internationaly. That’s why there are more than 3.5 million Syrian refugees in Turkey for example.
The European Union Institute for Security Studies published in May 2017 a report entitled « After the Arab Spring: what’s changed? » through which we find several important studies that reflect the reality of developments in the MENA region since the events of the Arab Spring occured.
This graph shows the population growth in the MENA region and we can clearly see a decrease in this growth from 2009 and that will continue after 2011 in MENA as a whole, with a special motion for the red curve of the graphic that symbolizes Iraq, Libya, Syria and Yemen. This curve shows that Arab Spring events is the period when population growth is the lowest (between 2011 and 2013) and reaches less than 1.5%.
Another graph of the same study shows the press freedom of expression within the MENA region with a comparison between 2010 and 2016. For example in 2010 the press was not free in Tunisia whereas in 2016 it is partly free. Let us have a look on Libya : in 2010 the press was definitely not free at all and in 2016 it is less strict but the press remain not free. While in Egypt the press was partly free in 2010 the situation got worse and the press became not free in 2016. This situation, of getting worse and less free from 2010 to 2016 is also visible for Syria and numerous other countries (such as UAE, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Iraq…).
One last point that will have caught our attention through the study conducted by The European Union Institute for Security Studies is the youth unemployment rate with the comparison between 2010 and 2016.
this map shows that in all the countries mapped the rate of unemployment among young people increased between 2010 and 2016 (with the sole exception of Qatar). As it is written on the image above « compared to 2010, youth unemployment in the MENA has risen by 7 percentage points, and remains the highest rate globally at 32% ».
It must therefore be understood that Arab Spring events did not have a huge positive drastic changes in the region, especially with regard to the demands of peoples for more freedom of expression, to solve the problem of unemployment, and prison population trends has also been increasing since Arab Spring events within MENA region.
The phenomena of the Arab Spring have raised the security issue and in particular that of regional but also international jihadism.
Daesh is a terrorist organization based in Syria and Iraq, listed on the United Nations list of 1,277 sanctions against terrorist groups. Appearing originally in Iraq from 2006, the organization pursues an objective: to extend without limit its influence and its system of terror, beyond its initial zone of Middle-Eastern implantation. Daech is the Arabic acronym for “Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant”. The organization is originally an offshoot of al-qaida in Iraq. The majority of its members are from Iraq and Syria, but large contingents of “volunteers” from North Africa, Europe, the Middle East, Asia and the Caucasus have joined the ranks. The organization is demonstrating extreme violence against the civilian population, which it terrorizes to maintain its grip on the conquered territories. It derives its revenues from trafficking in human beings – particularly women and minorities it enslaved -, antiques and oil, but also the racketeering of local populations. Daesh is pursuing a totalitarian project based on the millenarian fanaticism of its leaders – that is, their belief in the imminence of the end of the world. Thanks to intensive use of the internet and social networks, daech has developed a global communication strategy that allows it to broadcast the films of its abuses, to recruit “volunteers” and to encourage its supporters to to commit attacks. Many terrorist groups in Libya, Egypt, Nigeria, and Afghanistan have pledged allegiance to Daesh. Daesh poses a double threat to the world: on all civilians in the Near and Middle East, mainly in Iraq and Syria, among whom religious and ethnic minorities (whose presence in the region is several thousand years old) suffer exactions and inhuman treatment, documented by successive reports of United Nations ; the states of the region and beyond, through its strategy of rallying other terrorist groups, its challenging of borders, state structures and the many attacks committed.
Terrorist risk has increased within the MENA region especially since the Arab Spring. Indeed, in Libya for example where the Arab Spring has ended up with the execution of Muammar Gaddafi, the situation is very unstable and the country is stuck in bloody guerrillas. Since the death of Gaddafi, Libya has struggled to find a viable stability without achieving it and has quickly become one of the strongholds of jihadism, namely Daesh and therefore Islamist terrorism. Libya is now a risky area, a dangerous territory and for example it is formally discouraged for any French citizen to go there (as we can see it on the official government website France Diplomatie). The same goes for Syria, where Daesh is established in particular in the region of Palmyra and where the terrorist organization was able to establish one of its stronghold during the civil war that the country has been living for over 8 years already. Borders stability and the territorial security are nowadays key stakes in the middle east which is strongly destabilized by jihadism. These threats have become even more important since 2011 with the many armed conflicts the region has experienced.
The physiognomy of the MENA region has changed since the Arab Spring occurred, but can we talk about a great positive change ?
Thus, many authoritarian leaders who were known for their longevity record in power left the political scene under the pressure of the people. For example, Ben Ali, Hosni Mubarak, Gaddafi and, more recently, Abdelaziz Bouteflika have disappeared from the political scene respectively because of exile, imprisonment, execution and resignation. Nevertheless, Arab authoritarian regimes have largely succeeded in weakening protest movements by maintaining their control over countries. It is necessary to mention the failure of those so-called Arab revolutions because as explained through this work, there is no clear improvement of liberties and conditions of life within the region.
Tunisia is litteraly struggling and has many difficulties in attracting as many tourists as before, the same goes for Egypt. Egypt is facing a hard time and is under the worst dictatorship in its history. In Libya, despite the fact that an official government has been established and recognized by the UN, we are witnessing a counter-revolution led by General Khalifa Haftar. Libya remains an unstable zone and threatened by Daesh since its Arab spring. In Yemen, the situation has now gone beyond the question of the Arab Spring as the country is experiencing a bloody war waged by Saudi Arabia and whose human toll is terrible.
As we have seen, Syria has been plunged into civil war since March 2011, cities are in ruins and a very large part of its historical heritage has disappeared because of armed conflicts. Becoming one of Daesh’s strongholds because the country is very unstable, Syria is one of the most telling examples of Arab spring failure and poses the problem of an international refugee crisis. In Morocco, the king did not let the population revolt and immediately put in place several measures and reforms to silence the protest movements.
In Algeria, the protest movements are very recent and started in February 2019 and led to the resignation of Bouteflika. But this revolution is very recent so we expect to see over time how all this will evolve.
From an economic point of view, the region is more than ever dependent on international aid because the countries were already experiencing great economic difficulties and the revolutions have plunged the States into a more important decadence (as evidenced by rising unemployment rates in all the countries in the region).
The only element that remains certain and a good omen is the willingness of peoples to selfdetermination, this desire for freedom, rights, transparency, and the fall of authoritarian regimes that continue to enliven populations, especially youth Arab and which come up with a wind of turbulence over arab authoritarian regimes.
In sum, it would appear that the only stable, democratic, developed, and prosperous country in the MENA region is Israel, but at what cost ?
*« The Arab Enlightenement » is the expression used by Jean-Pierre Filiu in his book Jean-Pierre Filiu. 2015. Les Arabes, leur destin et le nôtre : Histoire d’une libération. Editions La Découverte, Paris, 2015. to qualify the Nahda that has appeared in the Arab world during the 19th century. He uses it as a reference to the Age of Enlightenement (or Enlighteners) that started in France and spread throughout Europe during the 18th century.
** Nidaa Tounes is a large secular political party founded in 2012 by Beji Caid el Sebsi in response to the coming to power of the Islamist party
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Anne, Wolf. 2017. Political Islam in Tunisia the History of Ennahda. London, HURST, 2017, 256p.
Jean-Pierre, Filiu. 2015. Les Arabes, leur destin et le nôtre : Histoire d’une libération. Editions La Découverte, Paris, 2015.
Samir Khalaf, Roseanne Saad Khalaf. 2011. Arab Youth: Social Mobilization in Times of Risk. London, Saqi Books, 2011, 417p.
Pierre, Beckouche. 2011. Quand le printemps arabe redessine la Méditerranée. Annales de géographie, 681(5), 554-571. doi:10.3917/ag.681.0554. [Online] May 09, 2019.
Julia, Lisiecka. 2017. After the Arab Spring: what’s changed?. European Union Institute for Security Studies. [Online] May 09, 2019.
Dupret, Baudouin, 2014, La charia. Des sources à la pratique, un concept pluriel. Éditions La Découverte, Paris. 2014.
Rougier, Bernard, 2004, Le jihad au quotidien. Presses Universitaires de France, “Proche Orient”. 2004.