Saturday, January 2, 2010

Socio-Cultural Issues: Democratization in the Middle East

The big players in Western politics commonly espouse the values of spreading democracy in the Middle East. After all, why wouldn't they? Democracy represents the views of the majority and as such is fairest....right? Let's assume that for this post, this makes perfect sense (at least in theory). If it makes sense, then doesn't it also stand to reason that the peoples of the Middle Eastern region would demand and fight for democracy? It's a hot topic in politics and as such I want to shed some light on some of the factors stunting the spread of democracy in certain parts of the globe. Namely: geo-political interests and internal economics.

Politics: Former US president George W. (dub-ya) Bush began "his second term...with a promise to the people of the United States and the world -- vowing to promote democracy both at home and abroad." (CNN). Hmm....that didn't really pan out. And whilst it is very fun to hop on the anti-Bush bandwagon, it's only fair to point out that he was not the only Western leader to go on about the spread of democracy. So what's the problem? Why can the most powerful and wealthy nations in the world not succeed in a task that appeals to 'common sense'? Hmm....either democracy is a paradigm that simply cannot function in a Middle Eastern setting (as per Huntington's 'Clash of Civilizations') or....could the spread of democracy be a false promise? Scholars like Norton (in Fawcett) argue that Western countries do not genuinely wish to promote democracy due to the possible instability and subsequent conflict this could create. In simple terms our leaders reckon that given proper democracy countries in the Middle East would elect extremists into power which of course is against Western goals; both in the sense that this could cause international conflict and simultaneously jeopardize long-standing economic assets (eg cutting off oil supplies like in 1973). This brings me to the next point of economics.

Economics: There are a few things to consider here, and whilst international interests play a large role I'm just going to focus on the existing internal barriers to effective democratization. It's no secret that in many regions women are subverted in society. Often they are not allowed to work. Ergo, countries which find themselves in these situations essentially cut their work force in half. The lack of a large work force can concordantly mean that it is impossible for a strong middle class to arise in society. The issue with this is that wealthy middle classes are the only economically powerful enough and numerically large enough capable of standing up to the government by means vis-a-vis taxation. The old edict goes 'no taxation without representation'. Well unfortunately it works both ways. In most Middle Eastern countries there is no taxation. Instead we find rentier states whereby the country pays its citizens an amount of money which comes from oil revenues (for a more detailed definition see SEMP). Thus 'no representation without taxation' comes into play and the masses find themselves with no voice in governments who feel they owe their people next to nothing. Thus the populace have no facilitated means of standing up for what they believe in (whether it is democracy or something else - but this is not the point here) and demanding it.

They are but a few theories. Knock 'em, support 'em or add a different view. As always, food for thought.

Manuel