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- Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
- Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
- Sprache: Englisch
The fourth edition of this dynamic and popular text provides a comprehensive introduction to contemporary politics in the Middle East. Fully revised and updated throughout, it features a new chapter on the Arab Spring and its aftermath, plus a wide range of vibrant case studies, data, questions for class discussion and suggestions for further reading. Purposefully employing a clear thematic structure, the book begins by introducing key concepts and contentious debates before outlining the impact of colonialism, and the rise and relevance of Arab nationalism in the region. Major political issues affecting the Middle East are then explored in full. These include political economy, conflict, political Islam, gender, the regional democracy deficit, and ethnicity and minorities. The book also examines the role of key foreign actors, such as the USA, Russia and the EU, and concludes with an in-depth analysis of the Arab uprisings and their impact in an era of uncertainty.
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Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018
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Table of Contents
Dedication
Title page
Copyright page
Tables and Figures
Tables
Figures
Preface to the Fourth Edition
Map
Introduction
The Muddle East?
Who invented the Middle East?
Orientalism – the enduring debate
State types: making sense of multiplicity
Questions for discussion
Recommended reading
CHAPTER ONE: Colonial Rule: Shaping the Destiny of a Region
Introduction
Merchants and missionaries
The First World War and the death of the Ottoman Empire
1918 and after: mandates, protectorates and colonial power
Inter-war European decline
Sunset empire
Case study
Case study
Case study
Questions for discussion
Recommended reading
CHAPTER TWO: Nationalism: the Quest for Identity and Power
Introduction
Nationalism as theory turned into practice
The birth pangs of Arab nationalism
New identities and hopes
The first Arab Revolt: the Arab princes at the helm of British imperial ambition
Taking state power
Unification nationalism: the United Arab Republic and beyond
Case study
Case study
Case study
Questions for discussion
Recommended reading
CHAPTER THREE: A Very Political Economy
Introduction
Regional wealth and extremes of inequality
Many models make poor work
Evolution of oil-based economies
Sheikhdoms and petro-power
Rentier futures, profit in decline?
Labour mobility and employment
Case study
Case study
Case study
Questions for discussion
Recommended reading
CHAPTER FOUR: Conflict and Lack of Peace
Introduction
The bigger battle: Arab–Israeli hostility
Killing dreams: the Israeli–Palestinian dimension
East against West in the Suez Crisis
Arab versus Arab
The lion and the peacock: Arab–Iranian relations
Sectarian politics
Case study
Case study
Case study
Questions for discussion
Recommended reading
CHAPTER FIVE: Past, Present and Future Politics: Islam
Introduction
Islam and politics
Thoroughly modern Muslims
Muslim Brotherhood
Fervour
Arab Spring and Islamist Autumn
Case study
Case study
Case study
Questions for discussion
Recommended reading
CHAPTER SIX: The Ephemerals of Democracy in the Middle East
Introduction
Clash of civilizations
Democratization or liberalization?
Socio-economic indicators
Democracy and civil society
Islamism and democracy – an oxymoron?
The Arab Spring and democracy
Case study
Case study
Case study
Questions for discussion
Recommended reading
CHAPTER SEVEN: Women: the Invisible Population
Introduction
The role of women in nationalist movements
Identity and independence
Women and Islam
Subjugation
Feminism and gender discourses
Case study
Case study
Case study
Questions for discussion
Recommended reading
CHAPTER EIGHT: Endangered Species: Ethnicity and Minorities
Introduction
Defining ethnicity
Minority status
The state and ethnicity
Modernity in the post-modern age
Ethno-national and religious battles
Conflict management and regulation
Case study
Case study
Case study
Questions for discussion
Recommended reading
CHAPTER NINE: Them and Us: the United States, EU and Russia in the Middle East
Introduction
National interest
Relations and rivalries
Europe, the EU and the Middle East
The bear awakens: Russia and the Middle East
Case study
Case study
Case study
Questions for discussion
Recommended reading
CHAPTER TEN: The Arab Spring and the New Era of Uncertainty
Introduction
Underlying factors
Winds of change
Teenage kicks: youth and the Arab Spring
Rebellion and extremism
Unfolding spectacle of political change
Authoritarian resilience
Uncertain future
Case study
Case study
Case study
Questions for discussion
Recommended reading
Bibliography
Index
End User License Agreement
List of Tables
Table 1.1 European disengagement from the Middle East, 1945–1971
Table 2.1 Coups, revolts and revolutions: post-war Arab nationalist impulse and regime change in the Middle East 1952–1970
Table 4.1 Major attacks attributed to al-Qaeda in the Middle East, 2000–2017
Table 5.1 The Muslim Brotherhood in the Middle East
Table 6.1 The democracy deficit in the Middle East and North Africa 2017
List of Illustrations
Map 1
Map of the contemporary Middle East
Figure I.1
Middle East buzzwords
Figure I.2
Frozen in time: the Middle East
Figure 1.1
Spoils of war? Arabs and T. E. Lawrence at the Paris Peace Conference 1919
.
© CORBIS
Figure 2.1
Futile politics, Pro-Mossadeq demonstration, Iran 1953
Source:
Iranian Historical Photographs Gallery.
Figure 2.2
Khaled Saeed
Figure 2.3
Hail the tyrant, Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. © Stephen Farrell
Figure 3.1
Oil fields afire, Operation Desert Storm 1991
Source:
Wikimedia.
Figure 3.2
Saudi Vision 2030
Source:
www.arabnews.com/news/vision-2030-may-lead-saudi-ratings-boost.
Figure 4.1
Map of the Suez Crisis
Figure 4.2
Distribution of Lebanon's main religious groups
Source:
Library of Congress, Geography and Map Division.
Figure 4.3
Brotherly love
Source:
Wikimedia.
Figure 4.4
Conflict in a region, British troops and Iraqi civilians. © Stephen Farrell
Figure 5.1
Shi’a clerics through the ages. © Stephen Farrell
Figure 5.2
Young and at prayer, a future for Islam. © Stephen Farrell
Figure 5.3
The power structure in post-revolutionary Iran
Source:
BBC, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/spl/hi/middle_east/03/ iran_power/html.
Figure 5.4
The ‘flag of ISIL’ with the ‘seal of Mohammed’ design
Source:
Wikimedia.
Figure 6.1
Clash of civilizations
Figure 6.2
Free to vote, Shi’a leader Abdel Aziz Hakim, Iraqi elections 2005
Source:
Wikimedia.
Figure 6.3
Arab respondents’ definitions of democracy (Doha Institute 2015)
Figure 7.1
Women: not seen and not heard. © Stephen Farrell
Figure 7.2
Habibi love (@khloekardashian, 2015)
Figure 7.3
Women in the labour force
Figure 8.1
Threatened minority, Sabaean Mandean follower of John the Baptist. © Stephen Farrell
Figure 8.2
Kurds in Iraq, an evolving map
Figure 9.1
Anti-American sentiment: Tehran mural
Figure 9.2
US imports from Saudi Arabia of crude oil and petroleum products
Source:
US Energy Information Administration (2016).
Figure 9.3
Middle East sympathies, 1978–2016
Source:
Pew Research Center, survey conducted 12–19 April 2016, Q52
Figure 9.4
People killed by Russian airstrikes in Syria
Source:
Armstrong, 2016
Figure 10.1
Youth unemployment landscape in the MENA region
Figure 10.2
Libya's institutions under the Libyan Political Agreement
Guide
Cover
Table of Contents
Start Reading
Preface
CHAPTER 1
Index
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Dedication
For
Joshua Antar – my magnificent son
Who hung on long enough on the inside
To make it all worthwhile on the outside
Copyright page
Copyright © Beverley Milton-Edwards 2018
The right of Beverley Milton-Edwards to be identified as Author of this Work has been asserted in accordance with the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
First edition published in 1999 by Polity Press
This fourth edition published in 2018 by Polity Press
Polity Press
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Cambridge CB2 1UR, UK
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All rights reserved. Except for the quotation of short passages for the purpose of criticism and review, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.
ISBN-13: 978–1-5095–2082–4
ISBN-13: 978–1-5095–2083–1 (paperback)
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Names: Milton-Edwards, Beverley, author.
Title: Contemporary politics in the Middle East / Beverley Milton-Edwards.
Description: Fourth edition. | Cambridge ; Malden, MA : Polity Press, 2018. | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017023463 (print) | LCCN 2017025588 (ebook) | ISBN
9781509520855 (Mobi) | ISBN 9781509520862 (Epub) | ISBN 9781509520824 | ISBN 9781509520824q(hardback) | ISBN 9781509520831q(pbk.)
Subjects: LCSH: Middle East–Politics and government–20th century. | Middle East–Politics and government–21st century.
Classification: LCC DS62.8 (ebook) | LCC DS62.8 .M55 2018 (print) | DDC 956.05–dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017023463
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Tables and Figures
Tables
1.1 European disengagement from the Middle East, 1945-1971
2.1 Coups, revolts and revolutions: post-war Arab nationalist impulse and regime change in the Middle East 1952–1970
4.1 Major attacks attributed to al-Qaeda in the Middle East, 2010-2017
5.1 The Muslim Brotherhood in the Middle East
6.1 The democracy deficit in the Middle East and North Africa 2017
Figures
I.1 Middle East buzzwords
I.2 Frozen in time: the Middle East
1.1 Spoils of war? Arabs and T.E. Lawrence at the Paris Peace Conference 1919
2.1 Futile politics, Pro-Mossadeq demonstration, Iran 1953
2.2 Khaled Saeed
2.3 Hail the tyrant, Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein
3.1 Oil fields afire, Operation Desert Storm, 1991
3.2 Saudi Vision 2030
4.1 Map of the Suez Crisis
4.2 Distribution of Lebanon's main religious groups
4.3 Brotherly love
4.4 Conflict in a region, British troops and Iraqi civilians
5.1 Shi'a clerics through the ages
5.2 Young and at prayer, a future for Islam
5.3 The power structure in post-revolutionary Iran
5.4 The ‘flag of ISIL’, with the ‘seal of Mohammed’ design
6.1 Clash of civilisations
6.2 Free to vote, Shi'a leader Abdel Aziz Hakim, Iraqi elections 2005
6.3 Arab respondents' definition of democracy
7.1 Women: not seen and not heard
7.2 Habibi love
7.3 Women in the labour force
8.1 Threatened minority, Sabaean Mandean, follower of John the Baptist
8.2 Kurds in Iraq, an evolving map
9.1 Anti-American sentiment, Tehran mural
9.2 US imports from Saudi Arabia of crude oil and petroleum products
9.3 Middle East sympathies, 1978-2016
9.4 People killed by Russian airstrikes in Syria
10.1 Youth unemployment in the MENA region
10.2 Libya's institutions under the Libyan Political Agreement
Preface to the Fourth Edition
The first edition of Contemporary Politics in the Middle East was published in 1999 at a time when the region – like the rest of the world – was on the cusp of a new century and great change and development seemed increasingly likely. The second edition came in 2006 at a time when the region was in fact gripped by great uncertainty, conflict and turmoil. In addition, in 2011, as the third edition was just being published, the Middle East and North Africa were convulsed in a popular people's uprising against autocratic and corrupt rule, which became known as the Arab Spring. I remain deeply appreciative of the positive response that the publication of the previous editions of this book elicited from readers. This fourth revised, updated and expanded edition of the book is a response to such readers and a reflection of their appetite for the study of the politics of the Middle East.
This book aims at providing a general introduction to the contemporary politics of the Middle East and in the following chapters a number of major issues or themes are identified that have shaped and characterized the variety of political systems and social relations which exist across the region. For the purposes of this book, ‘the Middle East’ refers to nineteen states, from Morocco on the Atlantic seaboard to Iran on the Asian continent. This book is written explicitly with the non-specialist reader in mind. The themes that are examined, therefore, are broad, linked to particular cases or events and interwoven with the other topics under discussion to provide a comprehensive account of the factors which influence and shape the development of politics in the region.
The first and chronologically significant theme is the impact of colonialism on the region, particularly during the latter half of the nineteenth and first half of the twentieth centuries. Chapter 1 outlines the relationship of domination and subordination established by the West (Britain and France in particular) over the Middle East. It looks at the nature of political rule and government and the prevailing economic motive behind this imperial and colonial relationship. It has been argued that the colonial experience has had a lasting impact on the region, and the role that the West played, as part of its colonial ambitions, in carving out the state system of the present-day Middle East has seriously disrupted political life in the region since this time. The colonial experience in the Middle East also raised a number of significant debates about the economic and social impact of such strategies, and the extent to which the experience has altered or disrupted pre-existing socio-economic relations and patterns. These debates have, in turn, informed academic analyses of modernization and associated theories of development. These theories and concepts have also led to a growing interest in the processes of state formation initiated by the West and the legacy for Arab attempts at state-building in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.
One of the first indications of this impact is discussed in chapter 2, which charts the rise and development of Arab nationalist ideologies, such as Ba'thism and Nasserism, that characterized many populist regimes in the region in the 1950s and 1960s. The historical overview of this theme is put in context in relation to current theories of nationalism. The growth and popularization of nationalist ideologies in the Middle East are important in understanding the concomitant secularization of politics in the region and the impact of western-style political ideas such as nationalism and socialism on patterns of politics. In addition, recent debates about the historiography of Arab nationalism, particularly during the so-called era of independence and personified by figures like the Egyptian leader Gamal Abdel Nasser, will be addressed.
Ideologies aside, the importance of oil and associated issues of political economy, including the political and strategic competition for other scarce and valuable natural resources such as water, are addressed in chapter 3. The focus on political economy, and more specifically the politics of oil and the wealth this has generated in the area, resonates in relation to the nature of political systems within the region. As I shall argue, it is no coincidence that political life in wealthy Gulf States is governed by the same elites who own the wealth derived from the oil fields of Arabia. This chapter will also examine other issues of political economy vital to any understanding of the region, including the debate about rentier economies, policies of economic liberalization – or infitah (opening), as they are referred to locally – and the poor economic performance of the region as a whole in the global market. The immense wealth and patterns of distribution have altered relations within as well as outside the region and, as I explain in chapter 4, go some way to explain the nature of conflict that has characterized the Middle East in the contemporary era. While the Arab–Israeli conflict has dominated the region, other conflicts have played their part in undermining the stability of the area as a whole. Thus, sectarian, economic and territorial disputes, as well as the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, are examined along with specific case studies that also invoke the increasing threat of terrorism that has marked the region in the past decade. The perspectives of conflict outlined in the chapter are by no means conclusive but they do highlight associated issues such as the role of international actors, the role of the military in politics and issues of internal legitimacy, and traditional state-to-state rivalries such as those between Iran and its Arab neighbours.
In many respects, the themes addressed in the next three chapters of the book – political Islam, women, and ethnicity and minorities – reflect the concerns of non-state actors and say more about the politics of ‘below’, or the politics of protest and discontent, than about the ruling regimes of the region. In chapter 5, the impact of political Islam is discussed at length. I argue that the manifestation of political Islam encompasses a far broader political spectrum than we are encouraged to believe in the West – indeed, that one is talking about many political Islams and dimensions of Muslim politics that incorporate debates about women, human rights, democracy, state and politics, liberalism and fundamentalism, and violence. Linked with the apparent resurgence of Islam as a political force, the debate addressed in chapter 6, on democratization, first outlines the initial emergence, fall and partial rebirth of democratic politics in the region. The chapter then focuses on recent debates about democratization that have been promoted from outside the Middle East as a means of combating tyranny within the region, particularly the perceived anti-democratic nature of political Islam. This section includes a review of current analyses of democratization and the argument forwarded by some theorists relating to the culture of receptivity to ideas about democracy which are largely western in inspiration and practice. The next two chapters of the book address issues which hitherto have remained on the margins of formal politics in the region – women, and ethnicity and minorities. For a number of decades, however, the role of these groups in the political life of the region has been an increasing focus of attention and debate. Largely, systems of governance have ignored, suppressed and even attempted to eliminate the politics raised by women or by ethnic groups such as the Kurds. I will, therefore, examine some of the recent literature that addresses the interpretation of the role of women and ethnicities and minorities in the Middle East. Such studies have paid more attention to the private than the public political arena: the politics of the family, issues of leadership in households, and debates about women's status and reproduction. They reflect studies in general, recognizing new methodologies that place greater emphasis on gender politics, and ethnic or ethno-nationalist ideologies. This in turn links back to the debate which currently rages in the Middle East: to what extent can primordial definitions of ethnicity, religion and tribe explain the relative resistance of Middle Eastern societies to the institutions and ideologies of the West?
The next chapter, on international – but primarily American – foreign policy in the Middle East, explores the deep and intimate relationship between the United States of America and the various states of the region in terms of American national interest and the wider ideological debates of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The chapter also examines the role of Europe, and more specifically the EU, in the Middle East, highlighting the important part this plays in the politics of the region. The re-ascendant role of Russia, particularly in Syria, is examined in this chapter. This highlights how global power balances impact the region. The final chapter is about the Arab Spring and the events which have unfolded from it since the first outbreak of protest in Tunisia in December 2010. It examines and provides analysis of the factors which drove protest, the nature of protest, and regime responses to a form of crisis which has afflicted large parts of the region. Since 2010, the region has been shaped by the politics of transition, authoritarian resilience, new conflicts and an era of uncertainty.
This book, then, paints a broad picture, not of a monolithic Middle East populated by the caricature figures of Arabs, Israelis, Turks and Iranians that we are familiar with through our own media in the West, but a richer vista which includes significant groups of political actors which, in the past, have either been ignored or severely misunderstood in an attempt at reductive accounts of this fascinating region of the contemporary world.
I hope that readers of this book remain as stimulated by this newest edition as I have been in terms of revisiting the topics and themes of this book and looking at them afresh. I would like to offer my thanks to all those cited in the earlier editions of this book, plus Charles E. Kiamie III at George Washington University for a timely prompting, and Heather Wilson, a former student of Middle East politics, who worked to provide research. I am also very grateful to all my colleagues at the Brookings Doha Center and in particular the Director of the Center Tarek Yousef, as well as Nadine al-Masry, Sumaya Attia, Fatema al-Hashemi, Noha Abdoueldahab, Françoise Freifer, Baha Omran, Ranj Alaldin, Firas al-Masri, Bill Hess, Kais Sherif, Luiz Pinto, Kadira Pethiyagoda, Abdel Abdel Ghafar, Sana, Thana, Hamad and Walid from Georgetown University and the Qatar Foundation, who not only fully supported me but gave me an opportunity to be located in a place where I could learn and benefit from world-class expertise on the Middle East and North Africa. I want to express my appreciation to H. E. Cristian Tudor, Romania's Ambassador to Qatar, a student of the first edition of this book who has also fortified me with his interest in the topic. I want to extend my thanks to all my students at Queen's University Belfast, whose enthusiastic interest in this topic constantly encourages me. Many of these students today are in professions and careers where not only their knowledge of, but their ability to analyse, the Middle East region contribute to better forms of understanding. I am deeply appreciative of the assistance offered to me by Fahad al-Dahami. Fahad's sojourn into the world of the contemporary politics of the Middle East allowed me to look anew at the topics and debates in this book.
To Johnny, I offer my thanks for his support. His loyalty has made a world of difference to me. My wonderful children Cara and Joshua have always encouraged me in my scholarship – their thoughts and wisdom are a true inspiration. My particular thanks are extended to Louise Knight at Polity for her unstinting support and encouragement, and to Leigh Mueller for her conscientious attention to copy-editing.
Beverley Milton-Edwards
Queen's University Belfast, Northern Ireland, and Brookings Center Doha, Qatar
Map
Map 1
Map of the contemporary Middle East
Introduction
This book is designed to act as a useful introduction to contemporary politics in the Middle East from the end of the Ottoman Empire at the start of the twentieth century to the present day. The definition of the Middle East that I adopt in this book refers to the following nineteen countries: Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Tunisia, Turkey, United Arab Emirates and Yemen. We can also include Palestine, recognized by the UN as a ‘non-member observer state’ in 2012, as a twentieth state. Politics here is not just about the state, the politics of government and institutions, or party systems – the obvious point here being that this doesn't inform us well enough about the nature of politics within and across state boundaries in the region or take into account the political impacts of non-state actors.
My approach is to look at the region through a number of important themes, without which any understanding of politics would be meaningless. Thus, as well as charting a chronological path, the book will address such themes as political Islam, democratization, gender, ethnicity and political economy. The connection between these themes is apparent because they are all interrelated in a series of dynamic and intricate layers. Thus, in order to understand the politics of a state and its people, such as Lebanon, one can examine specific themes such as ethnicity, minorities, colonialism, nationalism and Islam, as well as conflict. The justification for the themes that I have chosen for analysis is that simply to study the state in isolation from such dynamics or to look at one perspective rather than a series of other viewpoints misleads the reader.
By ‘politics’, I mean something broader than the mechanisms of power that relate to and revolve around the modern nation-state and its institutions. This permits us to look at the politics of other non-state actors and elements such as Islamists, women or ethnic groups like the Kurds. How, for example, could one truly understand the politics of Iraq after the fall of Saddam Hussein without understanding the impact of ethnic issues, the sectarian dimension, democracy promotion, conflict and political Islam, in the forms of al-Qaeda and ISIS, on this fragile state? The connections that emerge from the study of such themes will become increasingly apparent to the reader and allow them to determine independently which factors or theoretical frameworks are most effective in terms of wider regional comparisons. In other words, I am offering an emancipation mechanism to the reader so they can determine their own perspectives and analysis.
Traditional studies of the politics of the Middle East have tended to focus overly on the state and its associated actors. This approach has its value but it limits the scope for the study of the political dynamic in a wide geographic region such as the Middle East, and ignores key factors as outlined above. Other approaches have centred on a country-by-country study and this too has its value in terms of looking at power distribution and analysis, but is restricted in terms of a comparative overview of the region. With the themes that I have selected, the reader can take a comparative overview or look more specifically at a country through the tool of the case studies and recommended reading sections. Indeed, I hope to avoid overgeneralization by presenting case studies in each chapter to illustrate the issue at hand. Each chapter will also contain questions for discussion and highlight useful sources of recommended reading, so that students of the subject will be able to grasp quickly the important conceptual frameworks constructed around the region which help support patterns of scholarship and research. In this way, we will avoid falling into the trap of assuming that all politics in the Middle East is alike, and give ourselves an opportunity to see the various forms of politics that operate.
The contemporary Middle East is still portrayed by the western media as mysterious, a region of intrigue and war, the cradle of terrorism, religious extremism and barbaric rule. Journalists and news reporters regularly appear on the airwaves to relate stories of unending conflict and dispute, the abuse of privilege and power, and the desperation behind popular calls for reform and political change. A sample of news stories from March 2017 highlights the almost perpetual framing of the Middle East in stereotypes by the western media. In the UK, for example, the Daily Mail tabloid newspaper carried news stories of a visit by King Salman of Saudi Arabia to Indonesia. In the reporting, the King arrived in a ‘gold-clad plane’, travelled down a ‘golden escalator’, was flanked by ‘flunkies’ who were ‘armed’ with ‘umbrellas’ (Davies, 2017). From Mosul in Iraq, western war reporters wearing body armour were covering the rout of ISIS. Syria's war was ‘recognized’ at the Oscars with an award for the makers of the film White Helmets, followed by an HBO screening to American TV audiences. And though it is true that not all media portrayals point to such stereotypes, the media do still continue to frame the Middle East as being unique or part of a package of exceptionalism. However, it is not.
The Middle East, like many other regions of the globe, suffers in part from the effects of persistent authoritarianism, lack of political participation, poor economic growth, foreign indebtedness to the West, competition for resources and increasing urbanization. As authors such as Berger and Weber (2014) and Svolik (2012) highlight, there are no myths to explode: in many respects, the Middle East is like other developing regions and characterized by similar forms of politics. In sum, it is not as unique as many authors would have us believe. Some generalizations, however, cannot be avoided, and are particularly necessary and useful in helping students new to the subject understand the Middle East and make sense of cultures, histories and politics so very different from their own. Most people new to the subject already carry with them a generalized – and often stereotyped – view that has played a part in their decision to find out more.
The students I have taught in the last two decades often come up with the buzzwords presented in figure I.1 below when we first talk about the politics of the Middle East.
Figure I.1
Middle East buzzwords
There is nothing wrong with this as long as biases are acknowledged and the further acquisition of knowledge is based on sound academic reading. Newcomers to the subject tend to see the region and its politics in the following way: as hot, bearded camel riders; desert-like; poor, undeveloped, backward; governed by Muslim fanatics and tyrants; characterized by rich Arabs in London and Arab terrorists blowing up planes. In some respects, this is a frozen image – as demonstrated by the image in figure I.2 – which was formed hundreds of years ago and often remains unchanged.
Figure I.2
Frozen in time: the Middle East
In the age of the millennials, the perception of the Middle East being a region characterized by war, violence, conflict and terrorism has grown as western powers have become increasingly militarily, diplomatically, and in terms of humanitarian intervention, embroiled in the region. It is important to recognize that we in the West do bring preconceptions and biases with us when we start to study the Middle East. It is no use pretending that we have no knowledge; our opinions, information and views will have come from sources as diverse as Sunday-school Bible stories, our Judaeo-Christian cultural context, presidential calls for a ban on Muslims, news of ISIS-perpetrated massacres, our own citizens becoming jihadis fighting in Syria or Iraq, social media, YouTube, films, books and television programmes. So we should, at the outset, stop for a moment and think about our own image of the region and the representations we have received. The objective of this book is to re-examine these images, see how they differ from reality and build a new store of knowledge that is more balanced and informed around the prejudices that we already hold.
In recent decades, the growing interest in the region has been accompanied by an increasing number of academic journals, texts and books devoted to the study of the area. Students of politics in the twenty-first century are able to access material through well-stocked libraries, journal collections and the World Wide Web. It is questionable, however, to what extent the proliferation of materials on or from the Middle East has encouraged an expansion of prejudices or new perspectives on the region. Views on the Middle East have hardened and narrowed.
The Muddle East?
It's a play on words of course – the Muddle East. Yet often, for the first-time student of the politics of the region, this is what their introduction to the topic can feel like. Students are asked to engage with a vast region characterized by forms of politics which they may not have encountered before. What we mean by the Middle East and where it starts and other regions end may initially seem a rather inane question. Nevertheless, these very basic terms of reference need to be discussed and examined from a number of perspectives. The political events taking place in the Middle East today are the subject of considerable attention and interest from across the globe. The region is fascinating, providing rich contrasts in political, cultural, social and economic spheres. The contribution of the peoples of this region to history, civilization, art, culture, science, religion, music and politics can no longer be neglected or ignored.
Ancient civilizations also have their roots in the Middle East. In addition, the three great monotheistic religions, Judaism, Christianity and Islam, were established in these lands. Throughout history, great empire-builders, political rulers, religious leaders, poets and scientists have emerged from the area to influence and inform European cultures. The golden age of Islam witnessed the spread of the religion to Europe in the West and Asia in the East. The rich heritage of literature, through poetry and story-telling, informs us of immense empires under the Muslim Umayyad, Abbasids and Ottomans, of just rulers, corrupt tyrants, dynastic power struggles, feats of military daring and scientific endeavour. In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the Middle East was subject to external colonial competition resulting in widespread processes of modernization and development. But the colonizers did not always find what they imagined of the Middle East. Commenting on the British occupation of Baghdad during the First World War, Iraqi novelist Khalid Khistainy mused:
Box I.1 Baghdad messpot!
Well, Baghdad was a terrible disappointment to them because they came with the story of Baghdad of the Arabian Nights and all the glory of the Arab states. And when they entered the city they really found only a big village. No more. There was no … not one single public road, no schools, no services, no hospital and one secondary school in the whole of the city. There was really very little in Baghdad to be proud of. And there were no paved roads at all, just little medieval lanes and when it was raining it was a terrible mess there in the city. I must say the English soldiers when they came to Baghdad they were told of course that the name Iraq did not exist at the time. They were told they were going to Mesopotamia. And they had one look at the city, the city of Baghdad and they said ‘Oh, this is Mesopotamia … This is a messpot!’
(Khistainy, 2002)
The impact of this foreign intervention was apparent in the emerging map and attendant state structures of the region in the wake of the First World War. Straight lines appeared on the maps of the region and government systems dreamt up in Paris and London were imposed as new states (see map 1). ‘Iraqis at the time’, remarks Khishtainy, ‘they regarded themselves as Muslim subjects of the Sultan in Istanbul and the country itself was divided into three provinces and they were not linked to each other, so there was no sense of nationhood in Iraq’ (Khistainy, 2002).
Varieties of modernization have occurred within the region, many externally influenced and driven, some internally propelled as part of idiosyncratic visions of social, political and economic engineering involving whole societies. An example of this is best illustrated in the case of Libya's development, under the rule of Muammar Gaddafi (1969–2011), which involved the whole of Libyan society in a grandiose modernization project which was ultimately doomed to fail.
The Middle East is also a source of some of the world's most valuable energy sources: oil and gas. For high-energy consumer states like the USA, for example, access to oil reserves in the Middle East has been a national security concern vital to the nation's economy and survival. The discovery and subsequent export of oil and gas in the region have led to unimaginable wealth for some Arab states, the impoverishment of others, problems of import–export substitution, and the rise of rentier economies that have impacted on political rule. In addition, the production of so much oil and gas has shaped the relations the region enjoys with other parts of the world and its role in the international community, and impacted on capital markets.
Geographically speaking, the region is vast and its borders and boundaries are still open to debate – meaning different things to different people. The geography of the region reflects territorial and spatial dimensions which are being challenged, and re-shaped. National boundaries have proved impermanent and are being re-territorialized by new political challengers such as ISIS. Depending on which definition of the Middle East is used, the area stretches from Morocco in the west to Iran in the east, and can include sub-Saharan Africa, Turkey, Afghanistan and the Arabian/Persian Gulf. Colonial and neo-imperial cartographers display a penchant for redrawing the boundaries of the region in debates about solutions to problems posed by past enthusiasts. Within this region, territory has always been given meaning politically. The physical geography of the Middle East includes vast deserts, modern cities, snow-capped mountain ranges and important natural resources. Many states in the contemporary Middle East are relatively recent creations, their boundaries and borders being the product, one way or another, of the era of colonial interference in the region. Iraq, for example, is a twentieth-century invention of British officials who ‘united’ three provinces of ancient Mesopotamia and imported a new Arab monarch from the Hejaz of Arabia to sit on a British-inspired throne. The British then proceeded to squabble among themselves with respect to the cheapest and best way to manage the ‘native’ Arab population. We get such insights from the private letters of significant colonial figures such as Gertrude Bell (who herself invented Iraq and prevailed upon British officials to bring her dream to fruition). The following is an extract from Bell. The letter, in addition to discussions of the weather and who she has taken tea and dined with, also addresses the politics of the day and her frustration at the policy-makers back home – including a decision from London to cut and run from Iraq:
Box I.2 Extract from a letter home: Gertrude Bell in Iraq
… If we retain the mandate we must spend the money on it which it demands. There's no 9d for 4d – or 9d for nothing at all … but will rogues like Winston [Churchill] and Lloyd George use that honesty to the public? I'm afraid there can be no doubt of the answer. They will go on with their hanky panky until it leads to terrible disaster to this country … and possibly to very great inconvenience, if not worse, to ourselves – for I doubt our capacity to withdraw scatheless through anarchy. I shall not, however, mind what happens to us. We shall have deserved everything we get.
Father, think – if we had begun establishing native institutions two years ago! By now we should have got Arab government and an Arab army going; we should have had no tribal revolt; all the money and lives wasted this year would have been saved.
(www.gerty.ncl.ac.uk/letter_details.php?letter_id=4490)
As Bell highlights, political space was fluid and subject to competing interests. Furthermore, the independence of the majority of these states (such as Gertrude Bell's beloved Iraq) is a phenomenon located in the middle to latter part of the twentieth century and linked to the independence movement throughout the Third World and patterns of international politics and relations which subsequently resulted from these global changes. But by and large the independence movements were about breaking the power of foreign rulers, foreign influence and interference in domestic politics of the region.
The region is also the home of many religious groups. Among Muslims, there are Sunni, Shi’a, Sufi, Alawite and Druze. In the Christian community, there are Catholics, Greek Orthodox, Mandean, Sabaean, Maronites, Armenians, Coptics, Assyrians, Protestants, Anglicans and Melkites, to name but a few. In addition, Jews have populated the region, not just in the Holy Land but in countries like Egypt, Syria, Morocco and Yemen (Shabi, 2009). There are also small religious minority groups such as Yazidis and Samaritans. The religious importance of the region cannot be underestimated, as billions across the globe turn to it for prayer, pilgrimage and worship. They also venerate religious sites that are thousands of years old. Located in Mecca in Saudi Arabia is the Kaaba – the most revered spot in Islam. In Jerusalem, Jews pray at their most holy site, the Wailing Wall or Kotel; Christians worship at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre where they believe Jesus Christ was crucified and buried; and Muslims at al-Aqsa mosque, the third holiest site in Islam. In Bethlehem, Palestine, the birthplace of Jesus Christ is marked by the pilgrims at the Church of the Nativity in Manger Square.
Religious diversity, therefore, actually characterizes the region, though the Muslim faith enjoys primary status in many countries. Within the region, the religious tag is still used as a means of identifying and setting boundaries between people (Barth, 1969). Diversity has often led to difference within a particular faith, leading to breakaway sects or schisms, as well as between faiths, witnessed more recently, for example, by an upsurge in Muslim – Coptic Christian tensions in Egypt, or the state of near civil war in Iraq.
Ethnic and minority identity is an important and increasingly pertinent issue affecting the politics of the Middle East. Until the end of the Cold War, the Gulf crisis and the disintegration of the former Soviet Union, the ethnic dimension in politics was relatively neglected, largely suppressed and ignored. The emergence of ethno-national conflicts throughout the globe, and the subsequent resolution of some of them, have impacted on the Middle East in a variety of ways. Ethnic and minority diversity is a feature in the majority of its states and characterizes modern nation-states such as Israel (Jew – Ashkenazi or Mizrahi – and Arab), Syria (Arab, Kurd, Christian, Alawi and Druze), Iraq (Arab, Kurd, Christian, Yazidi, Turkman and Marsh Arab), Iran (Persian, Arab, Kurd, Azeri, Baluchi and Circassian) and Algeria (Arab and Amazigh). Thus, Arabs, Amazigh, Kurds, Marsh Arabs, Jews, Persians and Circassian all come from distinct backgrounds, embracing unique characteristics deemed fundamental to identity. In addition, some forms of ethno-national identity are relatively recent constructs created in response to the threat of annihilation or assimilation. Such ethnic differences have played a large part in shaping the identity of the inhabitants of the region, many of whom find themselves residing in a modern nation-state to which they feel little loyalty, remaining as marginal forces on the fringes of society. They oppose rule from an alien centre and agitate for a range of changes, from more ethnically sensitive policies on education, or the preservation of certain linguistic traditions, to outright secession and self-determination.
No discussion of the contemporary Middle East should ignore the enduring power of tribal, clan and family ties in explaining politics in the region. Despite modernization and globalization with their attendant homogenizing features, tribe – as a foundation of political, social and economic power – endures in many countries of the region. Colonial powers frequently perceived the tribe as an impediment to state-creation. Clan and family ties are mobilized in weak states and become the refuge for citizens who feel as if they have no stake in the state. Tribe, clan and family ties also maintain ‘insider’–‘outsider’ distinctions in the manifestation of power among ruling families, state systems and presidential dynasties across the region. Tribe, clan and family account for the legitimacy claims of the Hashemites in Jordan, the al-Saud in Saudi Arabia, the al-Assads in Syria, the Hariri in Lebanon, the al-Sabah in Kuwait, al-Qasimi in Sharjah, al-Maktoum in Dubai, al-Nuaimi in Ajman, al-Nahyan in Abu Dhabi, al-Thani in Qatar, the al-Khalifah in Bahrain and the tribal confederation of the Hashid in Yemen.
The Middle East, as described above, is different from the Arab world, which is composed of all of the aforementioned countries except Turkey, Iran and Israel. The Arab world is something different again from the Muslim world, which includes all of the aforementioned except Israel, but also encompasses countries such as Turkey, Pakistan, Afghanistan, etc. Other terms applied to the region include the Near East, and the Fertile Crescent, which refers to the area from Lebanon in the north, to Syria in the east and Israel/Palestine to the south. The Levant or Mashreq is also commonly used to describe Lebanon and Syria. Labels such as the Gulf states, the Arab-Afro states, the Islamic states and the Maghreb – which refers to the North African states of Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and sometimes Libya – are also frequently applied both within and from outside the region. Also within the region we can talk about the existence of other worlds, such as Jewish, Islamic, Christian, Arab, Afro-Arab and southern Mediterranean. The use of these labels has more to do with the diffuse notion of identity that often pervades the region than anything else. They also highlight the way in which the region interacts politically as well as in other spheres with these ‘other worlds’.
At the heart of this debate about the labelling of the region is a subjective/objective setting of boundaries, and the social and political space between the peoples of the region and the rest of the world (Barth, 1969). Borders have been artificially set but boundaries in the region remain contested and challenged in terms of tribal, class, gender and religious differences. Here, ‘the Middle East’ as a label becomes an exclusive term identifying a particular set of states distinct from others. Within the region, the issue of labelling also becomes one of identities, where the nation-state seeks to create and establish identities which compete with other group identities focused on tribe, family, gender, ethnicity or religion.
Who invented the Middle East?
The term ‘the Middle East’ is a relatively recent one, a product of contemporary rather than historical interest in the region. Previously, those from outside the region who had an interest in it referred to it, or parts of it, as the Near East, Persia, Mesopotamia, the Orient, the Levant, the Maghreb, Zion or the Holy Land. These terms have encouraged a particular association of ideas or a view of the region which is often simplistic and the product of crude reductionism and stereotyping. The Orient, for example, was a term that grew out of European fascination with the Middle East, particularly in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Oriental society, however, was portrayed in a negative manner and seen as symbolizing everything the West was not. As Turner (1994) argued, ‘Oriental society can be defined as a system of absences – absent cities, the missing middle classes, missing autonomous urban institutions and missing property’ (p. 40). Other terms and labels, such as Zion and the Holy Land, were used to convey a romanticized and reductive vision of certain parts of the region that had much to do with a utopian vision of redemption for Jew and Christian alike and resonated with Islamophobic constructed ‘memories’ of the Crusades.
The ‘Middle East’ label, then, was invented by individuals from outside the region who sought to make sense of or understand orders of political, economic, social and cultural relations in a geographic region stretching from Morocco to Iran. The cartographers of the Occident then set about – and continue to this day – re-drawing and re-fashioning the borders of the region to incorporate their own ideas of statehood, belonging and nation (Neep, 2015). It was not a term that those indigenous to the region used, though today it is self-referred to as al-sharq al-awsat (Middle East). Common usage of the label can be located in the Second World War when the British military established a ‘Middle East Command’ in the area under the authority of the War Office. It was an invention of the war, a military necessity, but it remained long after British – and, for that matter, French – influence in the region declined and was replaced by the superpower competition between the USA and the former USSR. The term also entered the lexicon of diplomats, academics and the media and increasingly replaced the usage, in Europe, of the ‘Near East’ that in the USA is still used to describe what I refer to as the Middle East. Turkey is sometimes included in this construction of the Middle East and for the purposes of this book is considered part of the region. Use of this label by those who study the region from outside its geographic boundaries has led to debate about the assumptions and prejudices they bring with them from their Eurocentric perspective and biases. By applying this label, the diversity of the region is reduced. Its cosmopolitan status and rich cultures are overlooked. This debate was largely initiated following the publication of a text that challenged prevailing western scholarship and perspectives on the region.
Orientalism – the enduring debate
In 1978, a Palestinian Arab academic living in the USA published a book entitled Orientalism. The author, Edward Said, aimed to challenge, criticize and shake the foundations and assumptions at the heart of western-based academic study of the Middle East. He set out to describe the symbiotic relationship which scholars had ascribed to the Orient and Occident, in which the Orient symbolized the negative, the backward and the barbaric, and the Occident the positive, the enlightened and the progressive. Said argued that westerners had long depicted the Orient as societies with uncivilized values, repositories of supine rulers, and an area of sexual exoticism. In turn, as Said argued, this allowed for the West and the westerner to remain signified by superiority. He contended that this construction of the Orient masked European ambition for power over the Middle East. As Said stated,
Box I.3 Orientalism
Orientalism [is] a Western style for dominating, restructuring, and having authority over the Orient … Orientalism, therefore, is not an airy European fantasy about the Orient, but a created body of theory and practice in which, for many generations, there has been considerable material investment.
(1978, pp. 3 and 6)
Any student with a serious interest in the study of the Middle East should read Said's exposition in Orientalism, and his later work entitled Culture and Imperialism (1993a). While Said may not have been the first scholar to highlight orientalist scholarship (Turner, 1994), in essence he develops a three-pronged line of attack on western scholarship of the Orient. This Orient is geographically located in the Middle East and is primarily Muslim in religious character. First, Said criticizes western scholarship for its essentialist perspective on the region, and the way in which it both treats and presents Muslim society as one homogeneous and monolithic mass. Second, he argues that western scholarship on the region is politically motivated, and in particular was and remains associated with the political and economic ambitions of colonialism and imperialism. As such, western domination of the Orient is the political motive, according to Said, behind most scholarship on the region. Finally, Said presents an argument that academic tradition on the subject in the West has resulted in and created a body of ‘authoritarian truths’ which must, he argues, be challenged by new scholarship and new thinking. Ultimately, Said is asking the West to rethink its relationship with the ‘Other’. He constructs a critique of western assumptions about every aspect of the Middle East, whether cultural, political, religious, social or in the sphere of economic relations.
Does Orientalism persist in the present? Does domination persist in the cultural, political and economic relationship between the Middle East and the West? Cultural and media representations, it can be argued, still throw up such negative stereotypes. Popular TV and film franchises continue to depict unreconstructed and patronizing prejudices of the Middle East, its cultural mores, specific countries and its citizens. A new generation which is now aware of these factors continues with this rigidity within the realms of conventional scholarship and persists in characterizing the Middle East in ways basically unchanged since European domination was first established over the region. In a ‘critique of academic scholarship’, Hisham Sharabi (1990) identifies three fields of scholarship on the Middle East: Orientalism, area studies and liberal humanism.
As Sharabi declares, the point of his argument is not to undermine conventional discourse on the region but to present a meaningful critique of the way in which it is conducted, the hitherto unquestioned assumptions held by western scholars even in the present day. Thus, two principal assumptions are questioned: the first, ‘the specifically western experience of transformation and change understood as progress … The second … from the view that non-western cultures somehow belong to a different order of existence and develop according to a different impulse’ (Sharabi, 1990, p. 4).
Orientalism persists, but has been challenged by successive generations of young scholars and students of the region. For liberals and post-orientalists, the term (rather than the associated attitudes) is a thing of the past; they are conscious of their ‘westernness’ and struggle to dissociate themselves from the old lackeys of Orientalism. The debate persists. In 1993, Edward Said and Ernest Gellner engaged in a very public row about the persistence of Orientalism and Eurocentric bias in the study of the Middle East. In a review of Culture and Imperialism, Gellner accused Said of ‘inventing a bogy called Orientalism’ through which rigid lines of good and bad in the study and characterization of the region could be drawn. Gellner questioned this methodology, pointing out that some figures castigated by Said as orientalists had brought positive benefits to the region through the accompanying forces of industry and technology (Gellner, 1993, p. 4). Said's rebuke was vociferous. By this point, he had himself become a poster-boy for this movement of study, and a progressive voice for post-colonial analysis. At one point he remarks: ‘Let him [Gellner] delight in his sophomoric patter by all means, but let him not at the same time fool himself that what he says about Islam, or the formerly colonized world or imperialism or postmodernism, has anything to do with what any of them are really about’ (1993b, p. 17). Said's arguments, Said's work and Said himself drew many contesting critics and the helpfulness of Orientalism continues to be questioned to the present day (Varisco, 2017).
In the wake of 9/11, the rise of al-Qaeda threats across the globe and new military interventions in the Middle East by the West, attitudes did harden again. Political leaders employed the vocabulary of a war on terror as a war of values, pitting the apparently superior values of the West against the Middle East epitomized by the hate values of jihadi terrorists and leaders like Usama bin Laden and Omar al-Baghdadi. Today the same processes are evident in how Arabs and their politics are viewed by and in the West (Hom, 2016). The process of ‘othering’ has been mutual – many extreme religious fundamentalists now stereotype the West in a negative fashion and argue that the chasm between them is too wide to repair (Hegghammer and Nesser, 2015).
The academic row, symbolized by Said and Gellner, over the way in which the Middle East should be studied, is as important today as it ever was – if not more so. It is important because the primary lenses through which the Middle East is still represented in the West are filtered through a variety of online activities including gaming, the media and social media, which is highly reductive (Höglund, 2008). Other leading academic figures have come into conflict with Said's approach, among whom Bernard Lewis stands out. In his own work, including Islam and the West (1993b) and ‘The question of Orientalism’ (1982), Lewis argues that Said's success in writing Orientalism lay in its anti-western, pro-Third World perspective that served a purpose for those leftists and others intent on undermining American foreign policy. In addition, he criticized Said's work for simplifying and reducing complex problems affecting the Middle East and the Muslim world. Fred Halliday defined himself as falling into neither one camp nor the other, and instead criticized both for failing to recognize ‘what actually happens in these societies’ as opposed to their approach of writing about ‘what people say’ (1996, p. 201). The debate continues with academic and ideological foes on either side of a divide about the way in which the Middle East should be studied, its influence and its relation to power (Adib-Moghaddam, 2010).
