The Arab Spring: Democracy in the Middle East and North Africa

Events across the Middle East and North Africa appear remarkably similar in causation to what occurred in the 1970s in Latin America, sub-Saharan Africa and after 1989 across Central and Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. Many outsiders misread the Arab mind and heart as anti-Western and consequently came to depend on outdated stereotypes, overlooking that it was really about well-justified anger towards their own dictatorships.

Unemployment, corruption, brutality against peaceful protesters, incompetence—all played roles in each of the democratization waves since the ‘70s. What has been termed the ‘Authoritarian International’ has now taken major blows among 340 million Arabs, aided by Internet news, Facebook, Twitter and Al-Jazeera, the Arab TV network. Apologists for Muammar Qaddafi, for example, such as Mugabe in Zimbabwe, Chavez in Venezuela, and China’s party-state media, all look merely self-interested.

Tunisia

Who would have anticipated that the suicide of Muhammad Bouazizi, 26, the university graduate who was denied by police the right to sell vegetables in the street of his town, would spark protests among Tunisians and across North Africa? Twenty-three years of indifference by President Ben Ali towards most Tunisians became the key factor in the collapse of his government.

Tunisians have long had a reputation for moderation, education and intellect. The third of the population online, including two million with Facebook accounts, created a communications spike, which emboldened aspirations for fuller lives. What appears inherent in the DNA of the human family is zest for life, freedom of thought and expression, compounded by survival, creative and entrepreneurial instincts. One email caught the national mood: “The Tunisian peoples’ souls are burning.” When the military evidently defied orders to fire on protesters, the regime was finished.

Egypt

Hosni Mubarak probably launched the democratic revolution in Egypt when he attempted to have his son, Gamal, nominated as his successor as president. The protests in Tahrir Square were led by an alliance of secular groups, including Mohamed ElBaradei, a Nobel Peace Prize winner, with the Muslim Brotherhood staying in the background. Their disciplined efforts to maintain a non-violent opposition inspired the world. The army, gauging the depth of opposition support and its longer-term interests, stayed loyal to citizens.

As Dennis Ignatius, Malaysia’s former High Commissioner to Canada, put it, “For more than two weeks, Egyptians took to the streets to demand freedom and an end to decades of tyranny. They were shot at, beaten, bullied, and jailed, yet they kept going, numbers swelling with each new attempt to silence them or break their will. They were seeking the same basic rights that the West has always insisted are the birthright of every human being.”

Bahrain

The American journalist, Tom Friedman, offers an interesting perspective on Bahrain:

“While Facebook has gotten all the face time in Egypt, Tunisia and Bahrain, don’t forget Google Earth… On Nov. 27, 2006, on the eve of parliamentary elections in Bahrain, The Washington Post ran this report from there: ‘Mahmood, who lives in a house (with his extended family), said he became even more frustrated when he looked up Bahrain on Google Earth and saw vast tracts of empty land, while tens of thousands of mainly poor Shiites were squashed together in small, dense areas. ‘We are 17 people crowded in one small house, like many people in the southern district,’ he said. ‘And you see on Google how many palaces there are and how the al-Khalifas [the Sunni ruling family] have the rest of the country to themselves’.”

As the protests mounted, the king shamefully opened fire on pro-democracy protesters, with hundreds reported injured or killed. Under the misapplied banner of the Gulf Cooperation Council, Saudis moved troops into Bahrain, claiming it was to counter Iranian influence. In reality, it was to put down democratic aspirations in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia.

Street protests in Tunisia, Egypt and Bahrain helped ignite the ones in Libya, Algeria, Iran, Jordan, Morocco, Syria, and Yemen.

Libya

The U.N.-adopted doctrine of Responsibility-to-Protect (R2P), applicable when regimes turn on their own citizens, is being tested in Libya now; the ultimate result is unclear, but it must succeed.

We know that many residents of Benghazi would have been slaughtered—hunted from door-to door as “rats” according to Colonel Qaddafi—if NATO/French aircraft had not attacked his mostly hired-to-kill mercenaries advancing on the city.

It also seems clear that if Qaddafi keeps power in Tripoli he will probably seek to revert to his ‘mad dog’ role in the Lockerbie bombing and other international terrorism of earlier years. Ways must be found under Security Council resolutions 1970 and 1973 to continue to protect Libyans and to increase pressure on those around Qaddafi to remove him and his family from Libya.

Read More: Democracy Rising