Embattled protests at Tahrir Square and, despite severe repression, tenacious opposition movements in Yemen and Syria indicate that the Arab Spring is far from over. In a further irony, the Middle Eastern protests seem to have found a second wind – pushing for an earlier transition to democracy in Egypt, thumbing their noses at the deal which offers President Saleh immunity – at the same time the Occupy movements in the developed world are losing momentum and disbanding. Yet grave doubts about the democratic future of the Middle East remain. The newly captured Saif Gaddafi, who knows more than most about the absence of law and order, has predicted chaos in the streets of Libya as the transitional government continues to find its way. And, given the strongman model of governance currently being dismantled throughout the Arab world, it is easy to see why so many share his pessimism.
Speaking recently in Toronto the Egyptian billionaire Naguib Sawiris warned his audience that “the majority of the active political forces [in Egypt] are religious.” Sawiris fears these religious parties want an Iranian-style revolution instead of the democratic dreams so cherished by Western observers. He says the “majority of the population are, unfortunately, passive [but they] will vote for a liberal civil state.” Sawiris, who has used his fortune to fund a political party in the emergent Egyptian democracy, suggests that the revolution would only fulfil its promise if the West takes a greater interest and actively bankrolls the political future of the region. It makes sense that a telecoms tycoon like Mr Sawiris should see the situation this way, and his fear of another religious revolution is not to be lightly dismissed, but the idea that money or better technology will make or break the Arab Spring is demonstrably flawed. The renewed protests in Tahrir Square will not succeed because of media interest or better communications, helpful though those may be, but because the men and women on the front lines of the protest no longer fear the military regime that has run the country for decades.
When the Arab Spring started there was a lot of talk about a “Facebook” revolution sweeping through the Middle East. This idea ignored the fact that technology companies are, at best, ambivalent about democracy movements in the region. At the height of the initial protests in Tahrir Square, for example, Egyptian mobile phone companies agreed to send their subscribers text messages urging them to stop supporting a Western conspiracy, and to go home. Last year the government of the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia refused to let the Blackberry instant messaging system into their countries unless national security services could access the traffic. (The telecoms regulator in UAE was quick to explain that “Censorship has got nothing to do with this” and insisted that he was only seeking “compliance with UAE telecommunications regulations.”) Conversely, western Occupy movements which were very tech-savvy and well financed could make little use of either advantage once their movements lost focus and got trapped into a political stalemate.
What has made the Arab Spring such a potent political movement is the power of its ideas. Born in the self-immolation of the Tunisian fruit vendor Mohamed Bouazizi, the revolution has never been afraid to take a stand against overwhelming odds, nor to risk the lives of thousands for the long-deferred dream of political self-determination. Large parts of the Middle East are in the throes of what might be called ‘democratic fundamentalism’ – in which courageous protests and, when necessary, armed insurrection, against longstanding tyrants have continued to produce startling results. Spurred on by a sequence of minor miracles, rather than some abstract notion of the separation of powers, or liberal political theory, men, women and children have continued to march for their rights even when security forces have used live ammunition to disperse public protests. Nothing remotely comparable has taken place in the West.
The Arab Spring is also a more intellectually fertile movement than many Westerners realise, its ramifications are spread across a larger canvas and are, almost inevitably, far more various. One of the best sources for news from the Middle East is the blog Informed Comment, scrupulously maintained by Juan Cole, a history professor at the University of Michigan. Each day this blog posts an update on “The Top Developments in the Arab Spring Today.” The entries range across half a dozen countries and often include references to double-digit death tolls and other human rights outrages. They also chart the astonishing resilience, inventiveness and political sophistication of the nascent democratic opposition movements throughout the region. Few documents give a better sense of the Arab Spring as a process rather than what is usually thought of as a ‘historical event.’
Perhaps apocryphally, when asked by Henry Kissinger about the consequences of the French Revolution, Zhou Enlai is said to have replied “It is too soon to tell.” Ten months after Tunisia erupted, regime change remains likely in at least one other Arab country and probable in several more. Clearly the Arab Spring is still a work in progress.
