The Contemporary Era
Gelvin, part 4, chapter 15,
notes by Denis Bašic
Naser, Tito, and Nehru, presidents of Egypt, Yugoslavia, and India respectively, signing in 1956
the declaration of the establishment of the Non-Aligned Movement
History of the
Contemporary Period
• ... can be subdivided into two parts :
• 1. the period that started from the onset of the Great
Depression and WWII (1929-1945) and ended in early
1970’s with the end of the unipolar (American centered)
world economy. This period is associated with nationalcapitalism and welfare statism.
• 2. period that started in 1970’s with the end of the unipolar
(American centered) world economy and the beginning of
the multi-polar world economy and it still lasts. Marked by
globalization.
Hod did the U.S. become the world economic giant?
Post-WWII American Foreign Aid
• The general purpose of American foreign aid-whether Marshall
Plan aid to western Europe, Alliance for Progress Aid to
Latin America, or Caribbean Basin Aid - has been to prevent
internal disturbances in the receiving countries that might make
those states fertile grounds for Communist revolution or attractive
targets for aggression. The rationale for foreign aid programs has
been that economic unrest leads to internal political unrest, which
leads to external (communist) subversion or assault.
• There is, of course, a second set of assumptions as well: that
economic aid will bring about economic growth and development,
that such growth will result in stable social and political
conditions, and that this will prevent the rise of strong, left-wing
radical groups.
Modernization Theory
• Western modernization theorists believed that the only way for the
underdeveloped world to progress and avoid the communist revolution was
through economic development. They assumed if the country had an
entrepreneurial middle class, a strong government committed to economic
growth and middle class values, small independent landowners not more
bound to rich landowners, political participation or some other “magic
bullet,” it could achieve a growth, stability, and eventually, Western
style democracy.
• By encouraging or financing the emergence of the elusive “magic
bullet,” Gelvin means that the US encouraged the military officers to take
over the reins of governments in the Middle East. Once they did, the US
encouraged them to adopt one or another development program. The US
also encouraged the shahs and monarchs it supported in the region to adopt
similar programs.
Period from 1929-1970’s
• The Great Depression and WWII changed the nature of social, economic
and political relationships in the Middle East. Changes :
• Migrations to the cities - More and more people moved to the
cities, sold their labor, and became integrated into the political process.
• Middle Eastern governments of the time were hardly democratic
and employed popular nationalist rhetoric to appeal to the new
urban settlers.
• Adoption of economic policies of post-WWII European and North
American welfare states : new labor laws, workman compensation
policies, food subsidies, and welfare for their most impoverished
citizens.
• Western countries (particularly the US), the UN, and international
banking institutions approached the “underdeveloped world” with the
so-called “modernization theory.”
Third Worldism
• Like the Western modernization theorists, Third Worldists also believed in
modernization and economic development for their countries.
• Like the Western modernization theorists, Third Worldists also felt that the
modernization and economic development could only be brought about by
strong guiding hands.
• Unlike the Western modernization theorists, however, Third Worldists
advocated social revolution to overcome economic inequities in their
societies, quasi-socialists policies to bring social justice, and non-alignment
in international affairs to avoid being caught up in the disputes between the
US and Soviet Union. (NATO established in 1949, the Warsaw Pact in 1955)
• For them, the cold war was an irrelevant but dangerous dispute between two
rival imperialist blocs. In essence, they considered themselves antiimperialists and anti-colonialists.
• The Middle Eastern hero of Third Worldism is Egyptian president Gemal
Abd al-Naser.
The founding leaders of the Non-Aligned states meet in New York in October 1960. From left: Nehru of
India, Nkrumah of Ghana, Nasser of Egypt, Sukarno of Indonesia, and Tito of Yugoslavia.
Non-Aligned Movement
• The Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) is an international organization of
states considering themselves not formally aligned with or against any major
power bloc. It was founded in the 1950s; as of 2007, it has 118 members.
• The purpose of the organization as stated in the Havana Declaration of 1979
is to ensure "the national independence, sovereignty, territorial
integrity and security of non-aligned countries" in their "struggle
against imperialism, colonialism, neo-colonialism, racism, Zionism,
and all forms of foreign aggression, occupation, domination,
interference or hegemony as well as against great power and bloc
politics."
• They represent nearly two-thirds of the United Nations's members and
comprise 55 percent of the world population.
• Important members have, at various times, included: Yugoslavia, India,
Pakistan, Algeria, Libya, Sri Lanka, Egypt, Indonesia, Cuba, Colombia,
Venezuela, post-1994 South Africa, Iran, Malaysia, and, for a time, the
People's Republic of China. Brazil has never been a formal member of the
movement, but shares many of the aims of NAM and frequently sends
observers to the Non-Aligned Movement's summits.
Non-Aligned Movement
• While the organization was intended to be as close an alliance as NATO or the
Warsaw Pact, it has little cohesion and many of its members were actually
quite closely aligned with one or another of the great powers. For example,
Cuba was closely aligned with the former Soviet Union during the Cold War
era. India was effectively aligned with the Soviet Union against China for
many years. Additionally, some members were involved in serious conflicts
with other members (e.g. India and Pakistan, Iran and Iraq). The movement
fractured from its own internal contradictions when the Soviet Union invaded
Afghanistan in 1979. While the Soviet allies supported the invasion, other
members (particularly Muslim nations) of the movement found it impossible to
do so.
• The Non-Aligned Movement has struggled to find relevance since the end of
the Cold War. After the breakup of Yugoslavia, a founding member, its
successor states of Yugoslavia have expressed little interest in membership
though some have observer status. In 2004, Malta and Cyprus ceased to be
members and joined the European Union.
period from 1970’s on
• By mid 1970’s, many states in the Middle East were in crisis.
• The roots of the crisis are international.
• From 1945 to 1960’s, the US had been the unrivaled economic power
in the world. The US dollar was strong and the US government guaranteed
that dollars could be exchanged for gold at an official fixed rate. Thus,
the dollar provided foundation for international exchange.
• By mid 1970’s Germany and Japan became America’s economic rivals
and began to accumulate dollars at the alarming rate. By 1971, the value of
American imports outran the value of its exports for the first time in the
post-WWII era and the dollars held outside the US began to exceed
the gold reserves in Fort Knox that backed those dollars. The
dollar began to sink.
• A new world financial arrangement was created. World currencies
were not anymore directly linked to the dollar, but rather to a mixture of
currencies.
G-7 group
• To prevent the financial chaos, the governments of the seven major
Western economies - the US, Japan, Germany, Britain, France, Canada,
and Italy - agreed to coordinate their economic policy and in 1976 formed
the Group of Seven (G-7). A new multipolar world economy arose from
the ashes of a unipolar (American-centered) world economy.
• The G-7 represents the group of finance ministers of the mentioned
seven states. The group meets several times a year to discuss economic
policy. Their work is supported by regular, functional meetings of officials,
including the G-7 finance deputies.
• The G-7 is not to be confused with the G-8, which is a group of the Heads
of government of the aforementioned nations plus Russia. The G-8 meets
annually. That meeting is generally considered more important than the
G7.
Globalization
• In the mid 1970’s, there was a notion that there were limits to growth.
This conclusion was made on the observations that competition over scarce
and more expensive commodities stalled economies in the West and that
the modernization in the underdeveloped world failed.
• After the financial decision making was dispersed among the G-7, they
believed that the recovery of the world economy is possible if it would be
truly global.
• After the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the cold war, the
Western bankers replaced the rhetoric of modernization theory by the
rhetoric of “Globalization” or “Neo-liberalism.”
• The globalization depended on the open markets that operated with a
minimum of governmental interference.
What is Globalization?
globalization - usually used to refer to the emergence [since 1970’s] of a global
economy based on the principle of free trade. Trade agreements such as the
North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the Uruguay Round of
the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) accelerated this process.
Advocates of globalization say it ensures growing prosperity for everyone; in the U.S.
it has resulted in benefits for consumers, since it enables large retailers to import
goods at low prices.
However, globalization also allows U.S. companies to move their operations to lowwage regions of the world, thus causing a loss of domestic jobs. Critics also point to
the downside of the economic interdependence that globalization has produced: an
economic crisis in one area will produce a ripple effect throughout the world, as
happened as a result of the economic crisis that began in the United States in 2008.
Still other experts are concerned that economic globalization gives too much power
to multinational corporations, at the possible expense of human rights and
democracy. (Source: iAmerican Spirit Political Dictionary)
See the movie: John Perkins on Globalization.
1970’s & The Middle East
• After the Arab-Israeli war of 1967 the reputation of the post-colonial
revolutionary Arab governments was jeopardized and the position of the
US in the region improved.
• The Arabian oil monarchies also started playing an important role after the
1967 events. They became major donors to the oilless states in the region.
• Because the oil countries had a stake in the new financial arrangements (the
prices of oil were raised), they used their leverage to convince the
revolutionary regimes to moderate their internal and external goals.
• States from Egypt to Iran were weakened as a result of the inefficiency of
centralized economic planning and social dislocations caused by the sudden
rise and equally sudden collapse of oil prices.
1970’s & The Middle East
(cont’d)
• In order to keep promises given to the people during the revolutionary
years of 50’s and 60’s, ME governments kept many elements of the welfare
states (like subsidies on basic commodities and employment guarantees) and
tried in the same time to open some sectors of their economies to foreign
investments.
• Partial liberalization proved to be inefficient. Productivity did not
increase. On the other hand the separation between rich and poor did.
• As often as not, when the ME governments proved to be incompetent to
meet the needs of their citizens, the Islamist movements stepped into
the breach.
• The Islamist movements promised the same social justice and social welfare
as had the governments before the 1970’s.
• ME governments repressed anybody who challenged them. In the case of
Iran, it did not work. In 1978-79, the revolutionary movement overthrew
the shah.
State and
Society
in the Contemporary
Middle East
Democracy in the ME
• After the fall of Soviet Union, the Carnegie Endowment for
International Peace pronounced that
“The idea of instant democratic transformation in the Middle East is a
mirage?”
• How come that the Middle East has become a bastion for
authoritarian governments resisted by equally authoritarian
opposition movements?
• Why do the governments in the region appear so tenacious
and powerful?
Democracy in the ME
(cont’d)
• Over the course of the 20th century, the great powers not only established the
states in the Middle East. They have also directly intervened into their internal
affairs, both political and economic; they have dictated policy to them and have
granted them financial assistance. They supported the authoritarian leaders who
served their interests. In a true democracy (as Iran got close to it in 1953), it
would be hard to control the entire parliament and to prevent the leadership
from nationalizing the wealth of the country. For the West, it was much easier to
control one leader.
• Because governments, not individuals or private corporations, control revenues
derived directly or indirectly from oil, governments - not individuals or private
corporations - have achieved unrivaled economic power throughout the
region. With unrivaled economic power came unrivaled political power.
• Over the course of the past two centuries, both elites and non-elites in the
Middle East came to equate economic development with social justice
and nation-building. They also came to view the government as a
primary engine for economic development.
Pro-Westerners & Islamic
Modernists
• At the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century, not
only the pro-Western secularists, but also Islamic modernist
movements were for technological advancements and
introduction of Western-developed sciences and technologies
into the Middle East.
• Thus, the Orthodox ‘ulama of Damascus warned the Young
Turk government that
“Whoever does not work to advance economy strays from Islam.”
MEHMET ZIA GÖKALP
• The Turkish nationalist (of Kurdish origin), Mehmet Zia Gökalp
(1876-1924), wrote in the early 20th century,
“In the future, Turks must possess the same economic well-being that they once enjoyed in
the past, and the wealth which is earned must belong to everyone ... The large sums that
will result from collecting surplus values in the name of society will serve as capital for
factories and farms to be established for the benefit of society. Earnings of these public
enterprises will be used to establish special refuges and schools for paupers, orphans,
widows, invalids, cripples, the blind and the deaf, as well as public gardens, museums,
theaters and libraries; to build housing for workers and peasants; and to construct a
nation-wide electric power network.”
• In one of his poems Gökalp also wrote,
“Minarets are our bayonets, Domes are our helmets, Mosques are our
barracks, Believers are our soldiers.”
Muhammad ‘Abduh
• Muhammad ‘Abduh (1849-1905), Egyptian reformer and
pioneer of Islamic modernism and nationalism, was also for
technological advancement of the Islamic societies.
• Thus, in 1899 he wrote,
“Establishing industries is a delegated duty. The nation must have a
group within it to establish industries necessary for survival ... if the
industries are not available, whoever is in charge of the affairs of the
nation must establish them so that they might provide for the needs of
the people.”
Interwar Period
• During the inter-war period the British and the French relied on
the local notables and sympathetic rulers to maintain their
influence on the region, because of four reasons:
• 1. They did so for both sides had the same economic interests. The
notables derived their wealth from landownership and the lands produces
the commodities (cotton, silk), which sustained the British and French needs.
• 2. Local population would better tolerate indirect control of their
compatriots.
• 3. Indirect control was also cheaper. The mandatory powers were
exhausted by WWI.
• 4. Competition among notables and between notables and sovereigns for
power and influence impeded the emergence of the unified
nationalist movements that might have dislodged the imperialist
powers.
Consequences of the
Imperialism
• As a result of playing notables against each others, in the areas of French
and British influence, weak governments appear after WWI.
• There was no tradition of kingship either in Egypt or in Iraq before WWI.
Egypt became a monarchy in 1922. In Iraq, the establishment of kingdom
coincided with the invention of the state itself.
• Some of the notables could have traced the roots of their wealth only as
far back as to the Ottoman Land Code of 1858. To recall, the code
gave the peasants right to register the lands they were working in their own
name. Uninformed, uneducated, or afraid, they did not do so and many
landlords and opportunists registered the land in their names.
• Additionally, during their mandates, the British and the French granted
tracts of land to rural and tribal leaders.
Land Ownership
in the Middle East
in the mid 20th century
• By the mid 20th century :
• 1% of the population of Syria owned 50% of the land;
• 1% of the population of Egypt owned 72% of the land.
• The newness of many of these land holdings and the disparity of
wealth in societies that were still predominantly rural would
make land reform a priority in the period following the WWII
Compare the statistics with the U.S. today in the research by
professor G. William Domhoff of the UC Santa Cruz
“Liberal Age” of the
Middle East
• Some historians look at the Egypt from the 1920s through the mid-1930’s
with nostalgia and talk about the “Liberal Age” or even “Golden Age”
of their societies.
• The age of liberalism is characterized by cosmopolitanism. Thus, as late
as 1940s, 40% of Alexandria’s population were foreigners (Greeks, Italians,
Syrians, Jews). Until the early 1950s the largest single group in the multiethnic, multi-religious Baghdad were Jews who made 50% of the
population.
• Also, during the “liberal age” parliaments were convened, political parties
formed, constitutions promulgated, secular rights institutionalized, and
newspapers published.
• In 1923, Egyptian feminists returning from a women’s conference in Italy
removed their veils in public.
Impacts of the
“Liberal Age”
• The unveiling of Egyptian women is a weak argument for the
“liberal age” idea, for veiling was practiced among upper-class
women only.
• In cosmopolitan Alexandria, for example, the foreign community
enjoyed the privileges unavailable to most Egyptians. As a matter of
fact, it was common practice to native Egyptians to be segregated in
or excluded from tramways, clubs, and cafes, etc.
• Although there were parliaments, the franchise were limited and
assemblies were unrepresentative. Although political organizations
and trade unions were founded, associational life was restricted and
often curtailed by imperialist powers or local autocrats. Although
newspapers were published, they were subject to censorship.
Political Life from
1920’s to 1940’s
• The overriding fact of political life from the 1920’s through the
1940’s was that there was a little that governments of nationalist
parties in Egypt, Syria, and Iraq could or would do to change
the social and economic concerns.
• Nationalist movements reflected the interest of the elite who
dominated them.
• Their primary interest was national independence.
Economic Life from
1920’s to 1940’s
• Groups of industrialists and bankers that emerged in the early 1920’s first
in Egypt and then in Syria and Iraq started spreading the doctrine called
“economic nationalism” - a combination of developmentalism and
nationalism.
• They motivated Egyptians to “buy Egyptian.”
• They attempted to infuse the nationalist movement with enthusiasm for
economic and social reform.
• True independence, they claimed, was not limited to the political
independence. True independence meant economic independence as
well.
Social Changes From
1920’s to 1940’s
• As poverty in the countryside increased during the Great Depression and as
cities began to lure peasants with the promise of employment and
educational opportunities, the population in urban centers exploded.
• In 1917, for example, the population of Cairo and Alexandria combined
was 1.25 million; by 1947, it was over 3 million.
• As urban population increased so did the number of those available for
political mobilization.
New Political Parties
• As a result of socio/demographic changes, a host of political parties
emerged on the socio-political scene, from assorted communist parties, and
Muslim brotherhoods to the Syrian Social Nationalist party, the League of
National Action (Syria), the National Democratic Party (Iraq), the Wafdist
Vanguard and Young Egypt.
• These parties and organizations differed from the earlier parties in the
following ways :
• 1. they were tightly structured;
• 2. they possessed a middle class leadership and middle class and lower
middle class following;
• 3. they championed doctrines that went beyond the mere calls for
political independence, i.e., they sought to address the existential
concerns of their new constituents.
Free Officers Coup
Egypt 1952
• While the first military coup in the post WWII period took place
in Syria in 1949, it was the Free Officers coup in Egypt in 1952
that would set the standard and provide a model for other states
in the region.
• The Free Officers movement was established in the late 1940’s
by a group of mostly young officers.
• Their resentment toward their government was fueled by their
defeat in the First Palestine War of 1947-49.
• Soon after the coup, Gamal ‘Abd al-Naser became the leader
of the group and of the country.
Gamal ‘abd al-Naser
• (1918 – 1970) Egyptian army officer
who was prime minister (1954–56)
and president (1956–70) of Egypt. In
his youth, he took part in anti-British
demonstrations and in 1948 fought
the First Palestinian war. As an army
officer, he also led a coup that
deposed the royal family (1952) and
installed Gen. Muhammad Naguib as
head of state. In 1954 he deposed
Naguib and made himself prime
minister. The Muslim Brotherhood
tried to assassinate him, but failed. In
1956, he promulgated a constitution
that made Egypt a one-party socialist
state with himself as a president.
Gamal ‘abd al-Naser
• In 1956, he also nationalized the Suez Canal (Suez Crisis) and secured
Soviet assistance to build the Aswan High Dam after the U.S. and
Britain canceled their offer of aid. Soon thereafter, Egypt weathered
an attack by British, French, and Israeli forces. A charismatic figure,
he aspired to lead the Arab world and succeeded briefly in forming
the United Arab Republic with Syria (1958–61). He led the Arab
world during the disastrous Six-Day War against Israel. He had
tentatively accepted a U.S. peace plan for Egypt and Israel when he
died of a heart attack. He was succeeded by Anwar el-Sadat.
• He is considered one of the most important Arab politicians in
modern times, and is especially well-known for his Arab nationalist
and anti-colonial foreign policy. The pan-Arabist ideology
named after him, Naserism, won a large following throughout the
Arab world in the 1950s and 1960s, and though its importance
declined after his death, his person is still seen throughout the Arab
World as a symbol for Arab dignity and freedom.
The Egyptian Free
Officers Movement
• claimed to have launched they coup to put an end to the corruption,
ineptitude, and treason of the old regime.
• They did not have any grand ideological visions in the beginning.
• They promised to work with the private sector and the least
objectionable political parties, and to restore democracy once they
had ironed things out.
• For this reason, the Free Officers referred to themselves and their
coup merely as a “movement.” Only later, did they retrospectively
overstate their sense of purpose by replacing the word “movement”
with “revolution.”
The Suez War of 1956
• The war was a debacle, an ill-conceived invasion of Egypt by
British, French, and Israeli forces.
• The three states launched their invasion, because Naser proved
to be an obstacle for their interests in the region.
• Naser nationalized the Suez Canal and supported the Algerian
insurgents against France, and had just concluded an arms deal
with Czechoslovakia that threatened the regional balance of
power.
• However, the invasion did not topple Naser’s government. As a
result of the failure of Britain, France, and Israel to realize their
goal, Naser became even more popular both in Egypt and
worldwide.
Consequences of the
1956 invasion of egypt
1. The war made Naser aware that the twin threats of domestic
reaction and foreign imperialism had not diminished. As a
consequence he decided to eliminate landlords’ political power by
eliminating their economic power. - Land reform in Egypt.
2. The overthrow of the monarchy in Iraq by a military coup in
1958.
3. Naser’s anti-imperialist stance incited political grouping in Syria to
demand unification with Egypt. The unification of Egypt and
Syria took place in 1958 with the establishment of the United Arab
Republic (UAR). The republic lasted for three years during which
time Egypt exported its political models to Syria.
Ba’ath (Resurrection) Party
‫اك‬#$%&‫(' ا‬#)*‫ ا‬+),*‫ب ا‬./
• was founded in 1947 as a secular Arab nationalist political party at its first
congress in Damascus. It functioned as a pan-Arab party with branches in
different Arab countries, but was strongest in Syria and Iraq coming to
power in both countries in 1963. In 1966 the Syrian and Iraqi parties split
into two rival organizations. Both Ba'ath parties retained the same name and
maintain parallel structures in the Arab world.
• The Ba'ath Party came to power in Syria on 8 March 1963 and attained a
monopoly of political power later that year. In 1972, the Syrian Ba’ath party
also became the leader of the 7 Syrian parties forming the National
Progressive Front (NPF.) The national committee of the Ba’ath is still
effectively the decision making body in Syria controlled by President Bashar
Hafez al-Assad.
• The Ba'athists ruled Iraq briefly in 1963, and then from July 1968 until
2003. After the de facto deposition of Saddam Hussein's Ba'athist regime in
the course of the 2003 Iraq war, the occupying authorities banned the Iraqi
Ba'ath Party in June 2003.
Ba’ath (Resurrection) Party - 2
‫اك‬#$%&‫(' ا‬#)*‫ ا‬+),*‫ب ا‬./
• The Arabic word Ba'ath means "resurrection" or "renaissance" as in the
party's founder Michel Aflaq's published work "On The Way Of Resurrection".
Ba'athist beliefs combine Arab socialism, nationalism, and pan-Arabism.
The mostly secular ideology often contrasts with that of other Arab
governments in the Middle East, which sometimes tend to have leanings
towards Islamism and theocracy.
• The motto of the Party is "Unity, Freedom, Socialism" (in Arabic wahda,
hurriya, ishtirakiya). "Unity" refers to Arab unity, "freedom" emphasizes
freedom from foreign control and interference in particular, and "socialism"
refers to what has been termed Arab Socialism rather than Marxism.
• Governments of Iraq and Syria nationalized banks, insurance companies,
and commercial and industrial establishments. The key element of their
program was the expansion of land reforms.
Arab Socialist Reforms
• Wherever military officers and their successors took control (first in
Syria, Egypt, Iraq, then in Yemen, Libya, and Sudan), their first goal
was to weaken or break the political power of previously existing
elites.
• In Egypt, Iraq, and Libya the monarchs were deposed, confiscated
their properties, dissolved the courts, dismissed parliaments, and
disbanded political parties.
• The coup leaders also attacked the economic power of the elites and
started land reform.
• Land reform was hardly a novel idea and it was also advocated by the
American and British government and the world bank to alleviate
rural poverty.
• In any case, socialists were those who did the reform.
Land Reform
• On the eve of the 1963 revolution in Syria, for example 60% of
peasants were landless.
• In Iraq the figure was 80%.
• The Egyptian government limited the size of land property to 200,
then 100, then eventually 50 feddans (1 feddan = 1.038 acres.)
• By 1971, nearly one million feddans of land had been distributed to
about 350,000 peasant families.
• Peasants who received the land had to join cooperatives set by the
state.
• At their hight, there were 5,000 cooperatives in Egypt with 3,000,000
members.
• Similar cooperatives existed in Iraq and Syria.
The Rule of
the Middle Class
• In Egypt, 8 of the 12 members of the governing Revolutionary Command
Council established after the Free Officers coup had rural roots. Naser
himself came from a provincial middle-class background.
• Equally, 13 of the 15 members of the Revolutionary Command Council
that ruled Iraq from 1968 - 1977 came from small peasant or petitbourgeois background.
• Throughout the region, employees of the expanded bureaucracy came
from similar provincial and lower-middle class background.
• These strata had never before been the object of government concern. Now
they were the main beneficiaries of expanding services, such as healthcare,
education, rent stabilization, and food subsidies provided by government.
Nationalizations
• enabled the Middle Eastern governments to diminish the influence of
foreigners, political enemies, and “resident-aliens” (Greeks, Italians,
Syrians, Jews, whose families had lived in Egypt for decades, if not for
centuries.)
• Egyptian government nationalized the Suez Canal (1956), took
control over most British and French investments, and took
charge over 100 million Egyptian pounds locked in the vaults of the
largest Bank of Egypt.
• By mid1960’s, the Egyptian government found itself in control of banks,
insurance companies, textile mills, sugar-refining and food processing
facilities, air and sea transport, public utilities, urban mass transit, cinemas,
theaters, department stores, agricultural credit institutions, fertilizer
production, and construction companies.
• According to pre-2011 statistics, government expenditures still accounted
for about 60% of the Egyptian gross domestic product.
• Is this a socialist or capitalist government?
Expenditures & Achievements
• Before Mubarak’s fall, over 50% of the Egyptian government
expenditure went toward subsidies on food, education, and
healthcare.
• By administering strategic industries, the state was able to cut
unemployment and even guarantee employment to many of its
citizens.
• In 1962, the Egyptian constitution promised employment to all
graduates of the national university.
• During Mubarak’s reign, college graduates that worked for the
government were more often than not underemployed and paid very
low salaries. Many were forced to spend their off hours working
another job.
rights of workers
• In Egypt, Syria, and Iraq, the state destroyed the
organizational independence of trade unions.
• First, these states purged liberals, leftists, and Islamists
from union leadership.
• Then the state integrated unions into broader labor
confederations.
• These state-controlled confederations had the
exclusive right to represent their members.
Rights of Women
• While revolutionary states curtailed the rights of workers,
they expanded the rights of women.
• The Egyptian constitution of 1956 and 1962 guaranteed
equal opportunities to all Egyptians regardless of gender.
• The Egyptian state granted women the right to vote (as had
the Syrian state after its first military coup in 1949), and
granted women paid maternity leave and the right to paid
child care if employed at a large facility.
• The Ba’athist regimes of Syria and Iraq legislated similar
measures in 1970.
White Revolution - 0123 ‫ب‬456‫آ‬
• in 1963 the Iranian shah Muhammad Reza also committed his empire to
wide-ranging social and economic reforms including the land reform.
• The shah felt that land reform would placate American policy makers
who continued to believe that the land reform imposed from the top would
prevent a social upheaval from below.
• The shah also ought to undermine the influence of his liberal and
leftist opponents who were influenced by the third world doctrines.
• Besides, land reform would break the power of rural landlords and
strengthen the power of the central government.
• The shah limited the number of villages a landowner could own and gave
the land to the peasants. The landowners were compensated with shares in
state-owned industries that the White Revolution also expanded.
• Many remained unsatisfied which could be one of the reasons behind the
Iranian Islamic Revolution of 1978-79.
Violent Methods of The
Revolutionary Regimes
EGYPT
• Within a month of taking power in 1952, the Free Officers of
Egypt brutally suppressed a strike that had broken out at a textile
factory. They arrested 545 workers and staged a show trial after
which two workers were hung to demonstrate the commitment
of the Free Officers to maintain the order.
• Far worse came later. Naser filled prisons with political
dissidents, from leftists to Islamists.
• He also called Jordanians to “take the dwarf [king Hussein
whom the British and the Americans called “PLK” - plucky little
king] and hang him from the gates of the British consulate.”
Violent Methods of The
Revolutionary Regimes
• SYRIA
When in 1982 the Syrian government faced an Islamist
rebellion in the city of Hama, it shelled the city and killed
between 10,000-20,000 of its residents.
• IRAQ
During the notorious Anfal campaign waged by the Iraqi
government against its own Kurdish citizens in 1988,
government troops killed between 50,000 and 150,000
Kurdish fighters and non-combatants.
Post Cold-War Era
• From their inception until the 1970’s, Iraq, Syria, and Egypt kept
themselves alive through a combination of nationalizations, foreign
assistance, and oil revenues.
• By the early 1980’s, all three countries were compelled to change the
course, for centralized economic planning proved to be inefficient in
the Middle East as it was elsewhere.
• Oil prices went down, incapability of defeating Israel, loss of Soviet
support (for Syria and Iraq) after the end of the cold war, the world
economy in a crisis - all these factors contributed to the worsening of
the economic situation in all three countries in the last two decades
of the 20th century.
• This economic instability combined with popular dissatisfaction with
totalitarian regimes eventually led to the Arab Spring in 2011 and
on.
Infitah - Opening Up
• Three years after the death of Gamal ‘Abd al-Naser, the newly installed
president of Egypt, Anwar al-Sadat (1970-1981), launched a program of
economic liberalization known as “infitah” (opening up.)
• The infitah is an idiosyncratic mixture of the “Arab socialism” and free
market economy.
• Sadat learned hard way that the Egyptian economy could not be revitalized
at the cost of state welfare programs. (The attempt to curtail these
programs resulted in widespread strikes in 1975/76, regime-threatening
riots throughout the country in 1977, and a surge of support to the Islamist
opposition.)
• Learning from the Egyptian experience, in their late-20th-century
economic liberalization programs, Syria and Iraq did not entail a
weakening of a public sector or politically dangerous withdrawal of
subsidies, employment guarantees, or social security benefits from the
population.
Basic PolSci
Vocabulary
Addendum
Definitions: Economic, Political & Social Systems
FEUDALISM - the dominant political, economic, & social system in medieval Europe,
in which the nobility held lands from the Crown in exchange for military service, and
vassals were in turn tenants of the nobles, while the peasants (villeins or serfs) were
obliged to live on their lord's land and give him homage, labor, and a share of the
produce, notionally in exchange for military protection.
CAPITALISM - an economic and political system in which the means of production,
such as land and factories, are privately owned and operated for profit. Usually
ownership is concentrated in the hands of small number of people. Capitalism, which
developed during the Industrial Revolution, is associated with free enterprise, although
in practice even capitalist societies have government regulations for business, to prevent
monopolies and to cushion domestic industries from foreign competition. Opponents
of capitalism say that the economy should be organized to serve the public good, not
private profit. Supporters say capitalism creates wealth, which creates jobs, which
creates prosperity for everyone.
SOCIALISM - a political and economic theory of social organization that advocates
that the means of production, distribution, and exchange should be owned or
regulated by the community as a whole. As a form of social organization, socialism is
based on co-operative social relations and self-management; relatively equal powerrelations and the reduction or elimination of hierarchy in the management of
economic and political affairs.
COMMUNISM - a political theory derived from Karl Marx, advocating a classless
and stateless society in which all property is publicly owned and each person works and
is paid according to their abilities and needs.