POMED Notes: Arab Countries: Dynamics of Change

On Friday, the Middle East Institute hosted a discussion with Adel Abdellatif, the chief of the Regional Program Division of the Regional Bureau of Arab States, a division of the United Nations Development Program. Abdellatif focused on the deficiencies of the socio-political system in Arab countries that led to the Arab Spring, as well as the processes that needs to take place to continue the pro-democratic trend that is currently being witnessed in the region.

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After a brief introduction by the moderator, Abdellatif began the discussion by describing his original report of Arab society, which he wrote in conjunction with his colleagues from 2000 to 2002. In this report, Abdellatif says one can see the seeds for the popular Arab protests over the past year. One of the main findings of this report was that the Arab World was suffering from three deficits: freedom, education and women’s empowerment. After briefly describing his reports, he elaborated on some of the other reasons for the Arab Spring. According to Abdellatif, the “social contract” between the people and the leaders in the Middle East began to decay in the 1970′s. This contract stipulated that the heads of state would provide nominal economic and social services in exchange for the people’s silence over lack of political freedoms. However, as economies began to open up and information became more widely available, the pressure on autocrats increased.

Abdellatif then began to discuss the current differences between Tunisia and Egypt and the rest of the Arab World. According to his analysis, Tunisia and Egypt are the only two countries that have fully experienced the Arab Spring. The reason for this was twofold: first, Tunisia and Egypt had serious divisions within their leadership and army. While this has occurred in Yemen and Syria to some extent, it has not been as widespread as it was in Tunisia. He added that division in leadership is what effects actual change. The second reason was the existence of institutions able to take control of the country, which is what excludes Libya from this category. Libya has had to rebuild from “scratch”.

He then concluded his discussion with a brief overview of how he sees the future of reform in the Arab world. Abdellatif afforded the most optimism to Tunisia, saying that it has a wide middle class with a strong economy. As for Egypt, he estimated that it would be two to five years before its future is clear. He ended by saying that the Arab World is like a roller coaster, with ups and downs, and requires solid leadership from the U.S.

The question and answer session focused on the issue of tying foreign aid to reform in Egypt, as well as the future for other countries around the world. Abdellatif stressed that the old system of governance in the Arab World inherently created the corruption that we have witnessed over the past several decades. So, in order to expedite the transition and to stop corruption from forming, he believes that the west should not supply much aid. Regarding other countries in the region, he expressed cautious optimism about the prospects for positive change, saying that even countries that have not experienced any uprisings have been taken out of their “comfort zone” and must now attempt to contain the ongoing revolutions.