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Reform as Euphemism for Stagnation
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The
Arab people hope that their leaders espouse reform
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The
Arab reform debacle is widening as Arab leaders fail to achieve
either a unified or a comprehensible position on the collective
future of their own countries. Under various guises and pretences,
coupled with Qaddafi’s usual and pre-orchestrated fiascos, an Arab
Summit held in Tunisia last May only deepened the unfavorable,
albeit unsurprising belief that Arab leaders are incapable of
formulating indigenous reform initiatives.
One’s
worst fear is now actualizing: an imported foreign vision of reform
and democracy in the Middle East may be the only feasible—even
though the least beneficial—option.
The
utter failure of Arab leaders to espouse a genuine reform agenda in
Tunis—substituting the urgently needed strategy with an
inconclusive and ill-devised Tunis Declaration that will not absolve
them from their historic responsibility before the world and their
own nations—must have generated untold bitterness among millions
of already disheartened Arabs.
On
the other hand, such a shortcoming must have also represented an
unequalled opportunity to the US government to further market its
own designs in the region. Cleverly, the US government responded to
regional dissatisfaction and European reservations to its Greater
Middle East Initiative (GMEI)—leaked to a London-based newspaper
last February—with some cosmetic changes: It is now the
Partnership for Progress and a Common Future with the Region of the
Broader Middle East and North Africa.
The
long worded title, of course, can also be referred to as the GMEI,
since the condescending tone of the earlier leaked plan retains its
spirit. To appease some critical Arab governments, the repackaged
plan now refers to the “resolution of long-standing, often bitter
disputes, especially the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (as) an
important element of progress in the region,” as if such a clause
will override scores of UN resolutions that the greatest
international political body, the United Nations, has repeatedly
failed to enforce.
However,
it seems that the main players in this reforms charade are catering
to each other’s political and economic needs, rather than
fulfilling the conditions that a true democratic endeavor
stipulates.
For
example, the Arab League Summit’s final statement last May
condemning the “indiscriminate killing” of Israeli and
Palestinian civilians was obviously responding to outside pressures,
particularly from the US, which has been adamant in its insistence
on labeling any form of Palestinian resistance “terrorism.” This
murky condemnation—certainly not an ideological stance—came at a
time when Arab countries remain almost completely out of the loop as
far as tangibly supporting the Palestinian aspiration to achieve an
end to the Israeli occupation of their land.
This
position compelled reciprocation from the US government: an
invitation to some Arab countries to attend the G8 summit, so that
it might appear that Arab governments have a say in their nations’
future, feared to be wholly shaped by the will of the world’s only
superpower.
In
the midst of these seemingly more lenient positions, there has been
a change of emphasis on the nature, scope and reach of reforms.
Certain
neoconservative elements in the US administration that have touted
Middle East reforms on exclusively ideological and strategic grounds
are being silenced in favor of others who are now discussing
different reform values in which business and economy claim
prominence.
It
was quite a shift to see officials, such as Undersecretary of State
of Economic, Business and Agricultural Affairs Alan P. Larson,
telling a group of Arab journalists in Washington early June that
reforms are good for business (compare this to the rhetoric of moral
responsibility to change the “Arab mind” infused by the same
neo-cons who wanted to make Iraq a beacon of democracy in the Middle
East).
“We
think it is possible for business leaders from the region and from
outside the region to give good advice to governments about the sort
of policy environment that would make it possible to see those
investments increasing greatly,” Larson said, adding, “We do
believe that creating the circumstances that make the investors
confident about bringing money to the Middle East is one of the
single most important things we can do.”
From
the timing and the composition of the US reform initiative in the
Middle East and the subsequent Arab response—and to a lesser
extent the European handling of the matter—one can confidently
conclude that the intensely debated Middle East reform is a play out
of self-centered values, be it strategic, economic or political.
What has been almost completely discounted is the plight of those
whose welfare should have been kept at the forefront of any sincere
democratic change: the disfranchised, largely unemployed and
freedom-deprived Arab masses.
Although
it is never easy to measure Arab public opinion, it seems that while
many Arabs distrust the US government policies in the region, they
don’t reject the concept of reform out of hand; they simply hope
that their leaders will be prudent enough to espouse internal
reforms that cater to the individual Arab, rather than merely
attempt to secure their turf from uninvited American intervention in
their affairs. At one point, there seemed to be a hidden desire
among ordinary Arabs that US pressure to reform would inspire the
region’s leaders to hurriedly look for homegrown alternatives that
are focused on the well-being of the people, rather than the
maintenance of the self-serving regimes.
Arab
governments are capable of negotiating their way out of the reform
debacle through well-examined concessions, most likely made to US
interests and to the interests of the its favorite regional ally,
Israel. The US government is equally capable of rearranging—or
renaming its priorities—in the Middle East, with nonbinding
cosmetic assertions, such as the addition of the
Arab-Israeli–conflict clause in the recent GMEI version.
If
such reconciliation of interests defines the current reforms legacy
in the Middle East—which seems to be the case—the ultimate
beneficiary of genuine democratic reform, the people of the region,
will ultimately become its fatality. Unless there is some serious
reconstruction of priorities and the emergence of an Arab civil
society that is capable and willing to take charge of its own
destiny, such a gloomy end will prevail. Then, no matter what it’s
called, the “Greater Middle East” will remain a euphemism of
greater political stagnation, injustice and imperial designs.
The
content of this article was the subject of discussion on National
Public Radio’s “Talk of the Nation” with Neal Conan, aired
Monday, June 07.
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Ramzy
Baroud is an Arab-American journalist.
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