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Title: Government and Politics of the Middle East
Question 1
Edward Said wrote Orientalism, a canonical text dwelling on cultural studies, in 1979. In this text, Said challenged the notion of orientalism, or as he puts it, differences between West and East (21). He asserts that with the advent of European colonization, Europeans came into contact with countries of the East that were lesser developed. According to them, the culture of the East was very exotic, and this observation influenced them to establish the science of orientalism, which entailed the study of orientals, that is, people belonging to these exotic civilizations.
Said argues that Europeans are responsible for dividing the world into East and West, or orient and occident, or the uncivilized and civilized. According to him, this boundary was totally artificial, and it was defined on the basis of theirs and ours or them and us. In this regard, Europeans defined themselves by the use of orientalism. Some attributes were strictly associated with the orientals, and whatever occidents were the orientals were not.
The arguments raised in Orientalism by Said can be used to explain the relations between the Middle East and the West today. the relations are in such a way that the impression of ‘them against us’ is created. According to Said, the Europeans considered themselves as the superior race and the orientals the inferior one. It is on the basis of this concept that they justified their move towards colonization. Similarly, it can be said that it is through this mentality that the West has failed to embrace the Middle East as an equal player in international relations.
Said also observes that the Europeans insisted that it was their duty to the world to bring civilization to the uncivilized world. Today, the same may be said of the West’s self-proclaimed role in the peace process in the Middle East. The West has taken it as their responsibility to the world to unite the warring factions, notably the Palestinians and Israelis. If one looks back into history by assessing the events of 1948, it is clear that the West took it as their right to spearhead the creation of a state of Israel. By pushing forward the idea of creating this Zionist nation in the heart of the predominantly Muslim Middle East, the West presupposed that it held the position of prominence over the people of Middle East.
According to Said, the main problem arose after the Europeans began making generalizations regarding the attributes that are normally associated with orientals. They started portraying all of these artificial characteristics in the Western world mainly through literary work, scientific reports, and other media sources. This had the effect of creating a certain image regarding orientals within the minds of Europeans. In so doing, it infused a mentality of bias in Europeans towards people from the oriental world. A similar trend may be said to have occurred towards the Muslims in the Arab world. Since the global war on terrorism began, particularly in the wake of 9/11, the image of the typical Middle Eastern Arab Muslim has been vilified in the Western mass media, literary texts, public policy documents, and intelligence reports. This negative portrayal has permeated people’s minds, thereby creating an image of prejudice and negative stereotyping.
Question 2
The Ottoman Empire was a vast Turkish Sultanate that existed in Southwest Asia, Southeast Europe, and Northeast Africa. It was founded in 13th century and its rulers were the descendants of Osman I, and they continued to rule till after the end of the World War I. originally a very small state under the control of Ottoman, this empire spread very rapidly to a point where it superseded the Byzantine Empire to the east (Karpat 30).
Two main approaches are normally used to explain the stagnation and ultimate loss of superiority of the Ottoman Empire between 17th and 20th centuries: culturalist and structuralist approaches. From a Culturalist perspective, individuals are understood first and foremost through their culture, and that all cultures constitute closed, organic wholes (Acer 56). Individuals are viewed as being unable to leave their own cultures, but rather having only the ability to realize themselves within the cultures. In culturalism, cultures have a permanent claim to certain special rights and protections, even in cases where these protections violate individual rights.
From a culturalist approach, it is true to say that the organic whole within the cultural fabric that had held the Ottoman Empire together for centuries started disintegrating in the 17th century, culminating in the eventual dissolution of the empire in 1918. The Ottoman Empire lost control of some large sections of its key territories in the late 19th centuries as well as early 19th century. These sections broke away under the weight of sentiments relating to indigenous sub-cultures. These sub-cultures arose after the affected people lost a sense of belonging to the larger cultural fabric of the empire. These indigenous cultural groups were reinforced by certain indigenous nationalist movements, including Serbian and Greek groups.
The wave of cultural disintegration continued unabated with the loss of large sections following the creation of the states of Bulgaria and Romania. Additionally, Bosnia was lost to Austria while the eastern regions of Anatolia were lost to Russia. All these groups possess some cultural idiosyncrasies that only became manifest following lack of cultural cohesion within the wider fabric of the Ottoman culture.
From a structuralist perspective, the demise of the Ottoman Empire is described as part of a long-winding, broad process of continued structural change that occurred in different historical stages, with each one being differentiated from the previous one solely by the actions of a specific social group (Karpat 82). In essence, this approach disapproves the existence of any unilinear sequence of particular generic development periods or an evolutionary law describing historical events within the empire. Rather, it theorizes about the forces that caused political growth and decay within the society.
In this regard, the developments that best define the history of the Ottoman Empire should not be seen as a straight path that lead to ‘modernity’ or ‘progress’, but rather as a long dialectical process that was influenced by many internal and international forces. Before losing superiority, the Ottomans first struggled to consolidate their empire in an international environment that was changing first. In this new environment, Europeans started gaining control over highly lucrative trading routes. Moreover, they started consolidating a European identity and contrasting it to Muslim ‘other’. Moreover, an unlinear development started to be perceived with regard to the transformation of the European society from Greece of the ancient times to modern-day Christendom. This perception was reinforced by what the Europeans referred to as ‘notion of Ottoman despotism’.
Question 3
In Egypt, one of the structural factors greatly influenced the sort of independence struggles that this Middle Eastern state went through. In Egypt, people were disillusioned with the monarchical rule. This contrasts sharply with the case of Syria, where the people’s disillusionment arose from parliamentary forms that reinforced class domination. In Egypt, the structural delineation of opportunities by the monarchy led to the emergence of a new voice for socio-economic, political, and identity problems. These voices emerged in the form of socialist and communist parties, and eventually the formation of Muslim Brotherhood.
In Egypt, there was limited sovereignty in the face of foreign-power domination. Foreign powers used the monarchy to create ambiguity regarding who was really in control. The notion of a ‘constitutional’ monarchy that ruled in Egypt before independence was a British invention. It was simply a concealed idea of creating ‘foreign’ dynasties. The mistrust of British intent that followed this strategy triggered the struggle for independence.
In the Anglo-Egyptian Treaty of 1936, Egypt was told that it had been granted sovereignty. However, the British retained an occupation force of 10,000 inside the Suez Canal. Moreover, under this treaty, UK was granted to reoccupy Egypt in the event that an international crisis sprung up. This clearly puts into focus the structural factor of sharpening resentments during the World War II, particularly the British ‘reoccupation’. As part of the World War II effort, the Suez Canal was suddenly an area of great strategic importance. This triggered ambivalence among some Egyptian politicians, especially those closest to King Faruq. The British engineered a coup against King Faruq in February 1942. After the World War II, the British troops started withdrawing from the Suez Canal Zone.
For Syria, the main structural factor is the French legacy and its influence on the struggle for independence. Before the departure of the French in 1946, Syria had to put up a spirited struggle for independence. The French legacy was molded in such a way that controversy arose regarding the shape of Syria and Lebanon. Before independence, the French also created controversy regarding the confessional allocation of the country’s senior posts. The masses were also angered by the way in which the French government bought loyalty by appointing the socially privileged members of society into the parliament. The masses were also angered by the way in which the king, as the chief guarantor of the country’s power, identified with and maintained the structure of dominance of state institutions by the privileged classes.
Question 4
By the early 1970s, the Middle Eastern countries were facing problems relating to failure of state capitalist measures, which were no longer propelling the economies forward, particularly that of Egypt. The open-door policy of infitah emerged as a sweeping program of imposing a neoliberal agenda across the economy (Kamrava 71). The activities of ‘opening up’ the economy involved loosening of all currency controls, creating investment zones that were tax-free, and returning of public sector industries back to private control. At the minimum, these public sector industries had to be subjected to market pressures.
One of the main causes of economic liberalization policies of Middle Eastern states was the economic logic of the 1970s and 1980s (Gray 95). During this time, the new discourse was on ‘opening up’, liberalizing, and privatizing the economy. This discourse was motivated by the hegemonic argument that pervaded economic literature at the time, whereby public enterprises were viewed as being less efficient compared to private ones. They were also seen as being overstaffed and overly expensive to maintain. Moreover, a widespread trend was one whereby profitability and efficiency remained at all-time lows.
This state of affairs in the public sector was blamed in delays in decision making, excessive bureaucratic regulation, and lack of expertise. There were also problems with firms being overburdened with a lot of economic tasks, thereby constraining profitability. Additionally, investment choices were skewed by political patronage at the expense of economic considerations.
The notion of Infitah started being regarded as the best alternative to nationalization following widespread claims on the ability by privatization to improve the economic situation in Egypt and other countries of the Middle East. The governments of these countries also acknowledged that efficiency improves when there is competition. The reduced role of states was being viewed as the best approach in managing the economy, particularly considering that during the early 1970s, there were coups and counter-coups as authoritarian rulers tottered in and out of power.
With liberalization, ownership could be shared among a larger number of people. Moreover, this could lead to a reduction in government expenditure. The outcome of intifah, whose meaning is ‘economy opening’ was increased emphasis on the private sector, opening up of the economy to international markets, reform of decision-making in the public sector, and greater level of reliance on market forces. The consequences were evident both in the conservative, oil-producing states of the Arabian Peninsula as well as the ‘socialist’ states such as Iraq and Algeria.
In Egypt, where the idea of infitah was hatched, people have tried to evaluate its effectiveness after several decades of experimentation with liberalization. However some scholars, such as Waterbury, argue that it is too late to carry out an evaluation (65). Nevertheless, Egypt appears to have made very decisive steps ahead economically, and it is among the most economically-stable economies in the Middle East. One of the most outstanding consequences of infitah in Egypt today is increase and continuity in savings and wealth accumulation among the citizens. With liberalizations, the economies of the Middle East have been unable to extract surplus from its citizens through the use of the previously popular public ideologies and policies. These policies tended to promote forced savings as well as deferring consumption gains so as to save for future generations. In such an environment, the policies would create a scenario where the entire society was in a state of militant austerity (Waterbury 65).
Liberalization also reoriented the economies of the Middle East, placing them on the path of increased partnerships with the West. Private initiatives started being more appreciated than public initiatives, and this led to an increase in the number of export-oriented industries operating in the Middle East. This move hastened the countries’ move towards reintegration with the most developed market economies in the world. In the case of Egypt, the country was able to redress the problem of staggering food deficits, which had made the country economically dependent on other countries of the world.
However, as observed by Ates, some critics argue that the gradualist approach to economic opening that was taken by both the governments of both Sadat and Mubarak has made the level of liberalization in the Egypt to be limited (15). This criticism has inspired the coinage of the term ‘reluctant liberalization’. For Sadat, most of the enthusiasm was on ensuring that Egypt became the commercial and financial center of the Middle East. This influenced his government into introducing policies that encouraged commercial activities, especially importation of advanced technology as well as stimulation of exportation. The government even introduced the Foreign Investment Law, whose aim was to stimulate foreign capital inflows, especially from the neighboring oil-rich countries in the Arab world. The Arabs were encouraged to come to Egypt and spend their money on housing, social amenities, and luxury establishments. The core argument was based on the underlying assumption that the most prudent thing was to let the market forces, which were already operational, to be allowed to function in a proper manner.
Question 5
The Middle East remains a region with the highest number of authoritarian regimes. This has led many scholars to investigate the issues of state control methods that facilitate continued survival of authoritarian regimes. In this regard, many studies have examined the role played by sectarianism, ethnicity, and Islamism in perpetuating power structures that remain dominant for many years. However, certain forms of popular politics and activism have been possible even under these authoritarian governments. With the recent ‘Arab Spring’, these forms have appeared to somewhat change.
The dominant way in which the practice of popular politics and activities has changed is the continued reliance on the internet as a political tool. By getting alternative sources of information that are necessitated by the internet, Middle East politicians and activists have been empowered a great deal. They have been able to reach out to even those sections of the population that had been cut out by the traditional media that was under the control of the authoritarian governments (Abootalebi 51). With this new medium, people in authoritarian Middle Eastern countries have been encouraged to interact creatively with the new medium so as to facilitate progressive communication in an environment of repression and censorship.
Electronic activism is the latest form of activism that was out of the continued use of the internet (Kuebler 32). In Egypt, this form of activism was well alive in the build-up to the popular uprising that threw President Hosni Mubarak out after three decades in power. Through the April 6th Facebook Group Egyptians mobilized many people online. Specifically, FAcebook has been touted as the latest weapon against Middle Eastern authoritarian regimes.
With regard to popular politics, the most predominant forms are those that highlight the deplorable conditions under which marginalized people live. An excellent example is the poor people’s movement in Iran. This movement was inspired by the presence of many poor people who had been neglected by the Iranian government. In most cases, the overarching sentiment among populist politicians has been that of struggle for survival, whereby the needs of the marginalized populations take center stage. In some instances, however, nationalistic sentiments have been dominant. In most cases, these sentiments have been defined along tribal, sectarian, and religious lines.
Works Cited
Abootalebi, Ali. “Civil Society, Democracy, and the Middle East”, Middle East Review of International Affairs, 2.3 (2010): 46-59.
Acer, Zabit. “Corruption of the Ottoman Inheritance System and Reform Studies Carried out in the 17th Century”, Journal of World of Turks, 1.2 (2009): 39-96.
Ates, Hamza. “A Story of Infitah: Egyptian Liberalisation under Stress”, Yapi Kredi Economic Review, 17.1 (2006): 1-29.
Gray, Matthew. “Economic reform, privatization and tourism in Egypt”, Middle Eastern Studies, 34.2 (1998): 91-112
Kamrava, Mehran. “Non-democratic states and political liberalisation in the Middle East: A structural analysis”, Third World Quarterly, 19.1, (1998): 63-85
Karpat, Kemal. Social change and politics in Turkey: A structural-historical analysis, New York: Penguin Books, 1973.
Karpat, Kemal. Social change and politics in Turkey: A structural-historical analysis, New York: Penguin Books, 1973.
Kuebler, Johanne. “Overcoming the Digital Divide: The Internet and Political Mobilization in Egypt and Tunisia”, CyberOrient, 5.1 (2011): 1-35.
Said, Edward. 1978, Orientalism, New York: Pantheon Books, 1985.
Waterbury, John. “The “Soft State” and the Open Door: Egypt’s Experience with Economic Liberalization, 1974-1984”, Comparative Politics, 18.1 (1985): 65-83.
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