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The Arab Spring Revisited

By Dr Salim Nazzal

19 September, 2013
Countercurrents.org

In more than two and a half years, Arabs are still in the atmosphere of the Arab Spring. In the earlier stage of the Arab spring, optimism was strong as never before, in contemporary Arab history. This event came after decades of frustration and disappointments, referred to by Arabs as (The Arab bad time).

It was assumed that the Tunisian experience with its less complication is the model that will be applied in the rest of the Arab countries, but this belief was not in place. I've written several articles in that period warning against the over- optimism. I was almost certain the spring transition to countries with religious pluralism and Ethnic divide will blow these societies.

The reason is that the tribal and sectarian cultures are still strong in the communities of the Oriental societies, in Syria and Iraq. And that the co-existence among these communities was mostly due to the iron fist of the central state. And more, the level of political consciousness has not reached an advanced level that citizens put their loyalties to the state before their subcultures.

There are previous experiences from the history of the region worth to be mentioned, such as, the movement of Tanios Shaheen in Mount Lebanon in 1840. Shaheen a Christian Maronite called for the establishment of a republican system, a new concept then in the Orient. This turned into a civil war between Druze and Christians.

The current Iraqi experience is yet another example of the bitter between the sunni and Shia Muslims in the (new Iraq!). These examples emphasize that the issue of political change in the Orient is complicated. This, of course, if you add the factor of political Islam, which does not offer a real democratic alternative, and looked at with concern and skepticism, mostly from non Sunni Muslim communities. And in a society like the Syrian society composed of several minorities, the arrival of the Muslim Brotherhood party to power is likely a recipe for conflicts .

However, despite the current dark picture, I think it is difficult to stop the train of the Arab Spring in Syria. Something has changed in the region and it’s next to impossible to go back to how things were before. That's why, it is difficult to agree with the view that the Arab spring has become (autumn) as some writers assume.

The question is much more to change the head of states. Social and political changes are a long process, which goes through phases of progress and failure .This explains why we cannot ignore the fact, that the existing of socio cultural barriers are serious hindrances towards the change towards democracy. However until we get to that stage, I think that the communal and the sectarian conflicts will continue for quite some time.

Dr. Salim Nazzal, a Palestinian-Norwegian historian on the Middle East, He has written extensively on social and political issues in the region.



 

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