Political and economic cooperation in the region has been thwarted by a complex tangle of hostilities between neighboring countries. Many of these hostilities are the legacy of outside interference by Europe and the United States in regional politics, including colonial intrusions in earlier times, and more recently, by the activities of global oil, gas, industrial, and agricultural corporations. The Israeli–Palestinian conflict, which has profoundly affected politics throughout the region, is rooted in the persecution of the Jews in nineteenth-century Europe, culminating in the Holocaust during World War II. The Iran–Iraq war of 1980–1988 and the Gulf War of 1990–1991 were instigated in part by pressures on petroleum resources, again from Europe and the United States. The siege of violence in Iraq, though begun by a homegrown dictator, came to a head when the United States invaded and occupied Iraq, beginning in March of 2003. Though the United States formally withdrew on December 15, 2011, violence continues to plague Iraq.

The political protests that swept across North Africa in 2010 and into Syria by 2011 eventually resulted in the toppling of longstanding dictatorships in Tunisia, Egypt, and then Libya. The protest movement also presented an increasingly serious threat to President Assad in Syria. The early demonstrations were precipitated by high unemployment and rising food prices caused by the global recession that began in 2008; poor living conditions; government corruption; and the absence of freedom of speech and other political freedoms. An undercurrent of dissent among women was also palpable in every country. Movements for women’s rights specifically and human rights generally were rejuvenated (see the opening vignette).

The political disquiet reflected that, for much of their history, most governments in this region gave citizens very little ability to influence how decisions were made. Constitutions were not constructed to facilitate widespread participation in public discourse or to protect the rights of women and minorities. Laws were simply interpreted to suit the factions that held power. Elections were either nonexistent or were rigged to reelect those already in office or their chosen successors. Meanwhile, freedom of speech and of the press was strictly limited, especially if it involved criticism of the government. As a result, most people across the region saw their governments as unresponsive and corrupt and viewed themselves as powerless to influence government in any way other than by massive protests.

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The role that Islam should play in society has been a contentious issue, and it relates directly to determining which system of laws should be adopted as well as which protections women should be afforded.

Which First: Elections or Constitutions? The Arab Spring movement began in Tunisia and spread to Egypt, then to Libya, and eventually to every country in the region—including Iran—with the exceptions of Israel, Qatar, Turkey, and the UAE. The size and focus of the protests varied, but they all raised hopes for real political reforms. However, there were no viable reform models extant within the region to follow. Should constitutions be revised first to guarantee freedoms and equal participation for all, or should elections come first, with the winning majority framing the new constitutions? Tunisia and Egypt chose to have elections first, but turnout was so low that not even one-third of the eligible voters participated. In both cases, Islamist-oriented governments were elected. These governments then proceeded to adopt constitutions that did not adequately protect the rights of more secular political groups, minorities, or women. In the case of Egypt, political turmoil and violence resulted as the Islamists governed in ways that outraged their numerous political opponents, women, and minorities. In 2013, the Islamists were removed from power by Egypt’s military.

More incremental approaches to reform were chosen by the kings of Jordan and Morocco, resulting in less chaos and violence. In both cases, the respective kings negotiated with reformists well before full-blown Arab Spring mass movements developed, bargaining to keep some of their royal powers while agreeing to give up others. They both supported the idea that lasting political reform should begin with constitutional reforms hammered out not by elected bodies but by constitutional councils made up of a broad range of people. These councils were charged with making the political systems more democratic and inclusive, and in both cases women were significantly represented, as were religious minorities and those with secular points of view. When elections were held, candidates from a wide range of political perspectives won positions. In Morocco, for example, an Islamist party won enough seats in parliament (107 out of 395 seats) to form a government with allies; but with only a little over a quarter of the total seats, the Islamists had to accept cooperation and compromise as a necessity, an important precedent for the future.

In Egypt, by contrast, where elections were the first priority, the highly organized and Islamist Muslim Brotherhood mobilized their supporters and swept to power with only a minority of the electorate voting. Having won, the Muslim Brotherhood then controlled the writing of an authoritarian constitution that gave the government sweeping powers, such as the ability to curtail freedom of speech, especially that of journalists. The custom that all women required the guardianship of a male was revived and the rights of religious minorities were undermined. Shortly before he was removed from office, President Morsi, a Muslim Brotherhood stalwart, eventually declared that he had powers that superseded those of the Egyptian courts, thus appearing to give himself absolute power.

Islamism in a Globalizing World Ironically, the Arab Spring, with its emphasis on political freedoms, actually opened up space for Islamist groups, especially Salafists, who took momentary advantage of the new openness to assert a tightly closed agenda. Salafism is an extreme, purist Qur’an-based version of Islam that has little room for adaptation to modern times. Globalization is a particular problem for these conservative Muslims, who lament what they see as the global spread of open sexuality, consumerism, and hedonism, transmitted in part by TV, movies, and popular music. Salafists were once explicitly peaceful, focusing mostly on the much-needed social services they provided to the poor. But since the 1990s, the idea of jihad (a fight) against the West has gained popularity among young Salafists. Many conservative Muslims—Salafists or not—object to what they see as the Western emphasis on the liberalization of women’s roles, especially the idea that women should be educated and active outside the home (see Figure 6.27).

139. WHAT MOTIVATES A TERRORIST?

140. NEW POLL OF ISLAMIC WORLD SAYS MOST MUSLIMS REJECT TERRORISM

144. JIHADIST IDEOLOGY AND THE WAR ON TERROR

Historically, Islamism is rooted in the interaction between religious and governmental authority (Figure 6.21). Governments in Saudi Arabia, Yemen, the UAE, Oman, and Iran are theocratic states in which Islam is the official religion and political leaders are considered to be divinely guided by both Allah and the teachings of the Qur’an. Elsewhere, such as in Turkey as well as in Tunisia, Libya, and even Syria (at least before the 2011 rebellion began), governments are officially secular states, where religious parties are not allowed and the law is neutral on matters of religion. In practice, even in this region’s secular states, Islamic ideas influence government policies. Combined with an authoritarian political culture, this has meant that political freedoms, such as free speech and the right to hold public meetings, were severely limited outside of Islam. In countries such as Egypt, for decades the only public spaces in which people were allowed to gather were mosques, and the only public discussions free of censorship by the government were religious discourses. In this context many political movements became rooted in Islam that might not have done so otherwise.

The militancy often associated with Islamism is characteristic of many popular political movements in this region, where challenges to the authority of governments are frequently met with violent repression (see the Figure 6.21 map). In both secular and theocratic governments, political freedoms are sometimes so weak that minorities have been denied the right to engage in their own cultural practices and to speak their own languages. Journalists and private citizens have been harassed, jailed, or even killed for criticizing governments or exposing corruption. While the Arab Spring protests were in part a response to these conditions, the extent to which the new governments and political reforms will protect political freedoms remains to be seen. 153. TURKEY VOTES FOR STABILITY

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Will There Be an Iranian Spring? When the political protests known as the Arab Spring erupted across North Africa, many wondered if Iran (which is not Arab) would join in the protests. A seeming prelude occurred in June 2009, when many Iranians suspected the presidential elections had been rigged. Hundreds of thousands of people in Tehran took to the streets in protest. The demonstrations first centered on election fraud, but when the Iranian police killed several unarmed demonstrators, the brutality of the autocratic, theocratic state became a major focus. The Iranian street protests persisted into 2010, when the activities of the Arab Spring in North Africa began. However, there were no major protests during the 2013 Iranian elections, in large part because the leaders of the 2009 protests were in jail or in exile.

In some countries—Turkey, Israel, and Morocco, for example—the press is reasonably free and opposition newspapers are aggressive in their criticism of the government. But in much of the region, journalism can be a risky career, often leading to imprisonment. Egypt has a checkered history where the press is concerned. For years, the Mubarek government harassed Hisham Kassem, editor of the independent English-language weekly, Cairo Times. When he became too critical of the government, he lost his license to publish in Egypt. For a time he took great pains to write and print his paper outside the country and smuggle it into Egypt, always risking arrest. Business leaders in Cairo began to provide backing for Kassem, enabling him to publish Al-Masry Al-Youm, a daily newspaper that specialized in domestic issues of corruption, election fraud, and the need for an independent judiciary. Kassem and many independent journalists like him participated actively in the 2011 protests in Egypt that brought an end to the 30-year regime of Hosni Mubarak. In this he shared a common cause with Egypt’s formerly repressed Islamist opposition group, the Muslim Brotherhood, which won control of the national government in elections in 2012. However, Kassem and many in the media were highly critical of efforts by the Muslim Brotherhood–led government to censor print and broadcast journalists’ criticisms of the government.

In Saudi Arabia, a dozen newspapers are available every morning, but all are owned or controlled by the royal Saud family, and all journalists are constrained by the fact that they may not print anything critical of Islam or of the Saud family, which numbers in the tens of thousands. When accidents happen or some malfeasance by a public official is revealed, the story is blandly reported with little effort to explore the causes of events or their effects, or to hold responsible officials accountable.

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A beacon of journalistic change is the broadcasting network Al Jazeera, founded by the emir of Qatar, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, but now privately owned and independent of the Qatar government. Al Jazeera is credited not only with changing the climate for public discourse across the region but with changing public opinion outside of the region through Al Jazeera English, the source of some of the information used in the opening vignette. The various versions of Al Jazeera now openly cover controversy, including reforms proposed by the most radical Iranian and Arab Spring protesters, with no apparent censorship. 147. AL JAZEERA LAUNCHES GLOBAL BROADCAST OPERATION

The role of the Internet and cell phone technology as a force for political change emerged first during the Iranian protests beginning in 2009, when the fact that so many Iranians had video-capable cell phones meant that via the Internet, the world saw instantly the brutality of the Iranian police and army. Use of the Internet (e-mail, Facebook, crowdsourcing, and Twitter) became commonplace during the Arab Spring, as ordinary Egyptians with nothing but an inexpensive cell phone were able to give real-time reports about activities in the streets of Cairo, Tripoli, and Benghazi. Twitter became the chief medium because it is free, mobile, and quick. The data from many sources could then be compiled via software such as Ushahidi, which was invented and made popular by several Kenyan engineers (discussed in the opening vignette of Chapter 7).

Most countries in this region now allow women to vote, and two countries—Israel and Turkey—have elected female heads of state (prime ministers) in the past. Nevertheless, women who want to actively participate in politics still face many barriers. In the Gulf states, where women’s political status is the lowest, circumstances vary from country to country. Oman gave all women the right to vote in 2003. In Kuwait in 2009, four highly educated women were elected to parliament; they quickly energized the pace of law making, often publicly criticizing their male colleagues, who were frequently absent for crucial votes. In Saudi Arabia, by contrast, women will be given the right to vote only in local elections in 2015, and only one Saudi woman serves as a public official. Across the region, women average less than 12 percent of national legislatures, the lowest of any world region and half the world average. By 2011, only in Bahrain, Iraq, Israel, Libya, Morocco, and Sudan did women make up more than 15 percent of parliaments. Women lost ground in Egypt when the post–Arab Spring elections in 2012 brought fewer women to office than there were before. Moreover, there is a tendency—even among women—to not support female candidates.