As the transformation process of the Arab Spring is being held up in Syria, the issue of democracy in the Arab region has come to a head. The revolts may have succeeded in toppling a number of dictators and bringing about free elections, yet enthusiasm for democracy is still mounting.
The main tenet of democracy is that people are able to choose who governs them and the elected rulers are accountable for their decisions. Democracy stands as an alternative to ancient monarchies where kings and emperors claimed the right to rule and passed their crowns on to their heirs, instituting dynasties. In the Arab region, in the early days of Islam, the Caliph was chosen (elected) among a number of candidates. However, this changed with the rise to power of the Umayyad Caliphate (and the Umayyad dynasty) and this new state of affairs lasted until the collapse of the Ottoman Empire (which revolved around the dynasty of Osman I.). Within these regimes, despite the existence of the Shura councils which performed an advisory role, the last word always belonged with the Sultan or the Emir. In the aftermath of the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, most of the Arab region sooner or later was subject to colonial rule, and the colonizers brought with them their own practices and notions including democracy. More surprisingly, they began ‘assigning’ governments to Arab societies which were supposed to resemble their own democratically ‘elected’ governments.
As Bernard Lewis said in 1992: “for a long time the word ‘democracy’ in Arab political discourse has been used to refer to the sham parliamentary regimes that were installed and bequeathed by British and French empires.” The post-colonial era witnessed the establishment of new republics in the Arab region in which the rulers swiftly seemed to comply with these ‘installed’ practices. Hitherto, Arab leaders have tended to include democracy in their daily speeches, even if their practices were anything but democratic. With the advent of the Arab Spring, everybody felt democracy was close at hand and calls to adopt Western or Turkish democratic models began to echo throughout the Middle East. After holding seemingly democratic elections, the calls for democracy have gone beyond the mere issue of democracy seeing as the opposition forces have subsequently asked the newly elected rulers to stand down, and even without a major political crisis in the offing the new governments have been forced to comply.
The new rulers have also been accused of resorting to illegal practices including cronyism and arming their supporters to form militias in order to strengthen their hold on the levers of power. Thus both the concept and the exercise of democracy, on both sides, is distorted by the lack of long-standing democratic procedures and a system of checks and balances that restrains those in power from doing all they can to consolidate it. Although some observers believe that external factors are to be blamed for these particular conditions, I believe the main reasons are primarily internal.
Firstly, Arab societies have had no chance to put democracy into practice since the death of the fourth Caliphs Imam Ali Bin Abi Talib, 1352 years ago. Despite ruler’s claims to the contrary, the region has never managed to introduce sound democratic practices, which has led to a deterioration of democratic prerogatives in the Arab world. Society must be prepared. If the Central and Eastern European states that have recently managed to claim independence had been in the same condition as current Arab
As the transformation process of the Arab Spring is being held up in Syria, the issue of democracy in the Arab region has come to a head. The revolts may have succeeded in toppling a number of dictators and bringing about free elections, yet enthusiasm for democracy is still mounting.
