May  06 Newsletter

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On the Effort of the EU to Promote Democracy in the Middle East
Moheb Zaki

 A diplomatic conference – in the form of a workshop – assembling all Belgian ambassadors accredited in the Middle East and North Africa was convened by the Belgian Minister for Foreign Affairs, in Cairo on May 9th 2006.  The topic of the conference was the overall situation and trends in the Arab-Muslim World, with particular focus on democracy, human rights and good governance, in addition to the strengths and weaknesses of the dialogue and co-operation between the European Union (EU) and the countries of the region.

            Two Egyptian scholars were invited to address the assembly of ambassadors and engage them in a discussion of the issues: Dr. Ahmad Kamal Abou El-Magd, the noted Islamic scholar, former minister and current vice-president of the state-sponsored Egyptian Organization for Human Rights, and the Ibn Khaldun Centers’ senior advisor Mr. Moheb Zaki.  Below is a brief resume of the points made by Mr. Zaki in his address to the assembly. considers that the promotion of democracy in the region will go a long way towards enhancing the security of the Western democracies. However, European democracy-promotion in the Middle East has fallen short of what would have been hoped for following the Barcelona Declaration. 

          A.  The effort to spur political reform has yielded very limited results, for the following reasons: Firstly, the EU was largely concerned with traditional economic development. Thus no more than 10% of the EU funds went toward political reform. Secondly, The strategy adopted by the EU was to deal largely with governments rather than with civil society organizations. In dealing with the Arab governments the EU proceeded with extreme caution, shying away from the application of any effective pressures. The autocratic governments in the region, despite their oft-repeated promises, have not shown any willingness to implement genuine reform.  In addition to this, despite the fact that the bilateral partnership agreements include conditionality clauses, the EU was extremely reluctant to employ them as an instrument for reform despite the unwillingness of Arab governments to institute genuine reforms. It appears that the EU’s democracy-promotion effort has become bogged down in bureaucratic red-tape. 

                        The lack of coordination between the efforts of the United States and the EU and the shared failure to adopt a broad common strategy has allowed many Arab countries to delay reforms by playing the (idealist) U.S. approach to reform, which envisages rapid results through strong pressure, against the (so-called “realistic”) EU approach, which represents a belief that significant political reform might require a generation. The EU’s more cautious efforts rely heavily on positive incentives, such as funds and access to European markets, to spur reform, with little pressure involved.

       B.  The Western efforts to promote democracy in the Middle East have so far focused largely on pushing the various Arab countries to conduct free and fair elections. Such a focus in the absence of viable democratic institutions will most likely lead to illiberal Islamist parties coming to power.

            Thus, while not denying the importance of free contested elections a parallel effort should be made to build the institutions which would generate conditions that produce a liberal democratic transition.

            As things stand now almost all Arab regimes can justifiably claim to have conducted in the last few years relatively free legislative and municipal election (e.g., Jordan, Yemen, Egypt, Morocco, Tunis, and the Palestinian Authority), yet it is quite clear that they continue to exhibit the features of a firmly entrenched and robust semi-authoritarianism (with the notable exception of Lebanon) that enables them to maintain a firm grip on power.

            Elections, therefore, have served to provide the incumbent autocratic regimes with the opportunity to present to the Western powers an image of a democratizing polity while in fact the ruling elite are actually engaged in subtle forms of institutional manipulation to produce compliant parliaments.

    C. In light of this reality the road towards the goal of fostering genuine liberal democratic reforms requires close attention to the following five major institutional factors: (i) the rules governing the formation and activities of political parties; (ii) the impact of electoral rules on the ability of political parties to compete in contested elections; (iii) the constitutional balance between executive and legislative power; (iv) the laws governing the formation and activities of NGOs; and (v) the crucial need to purge primary and secondary school curricula from religious teachings (both explicit and implicit) that foster intolerance and exclusion of the “other.”

             (i)   No restrictions should be placed on the formation of political parties. But also no government support or privilege of any kind should be given to any party (This would limit the creation of “paper parties” that survive on such support)

 (ii)  Since democracy cannot function properly in the absence of effective political parties, the present endemic weakness of parties in all Arab countries is a major hindrance to democratic transition. To strengthen political parties voting for all legislating bodies should be by party slates, with only a very limited space allowed for independent candidates. (This electoral system can be adopted for a decade or so only until the current fragile parties develop strength and those that cannot simply become extinct).  Also, to encourage greater mass participation it is necessary to adopt an electoral system that allows for “some form” of proportional representation with a low threshold (say 2 %).

 (iii) The current sweeping powers of the Presidents / Monarchs embodied in all the constitutions of the Arab countries must be cut back. Changing constitutions is of course very difficult, but it is not impossible to at least introduce significant democratic modifications.

 (iv)  No restrictions should be placed on the formation of NGO’s, or on their freedom to interact with their international counterparts. Also of importance is the need to give effect to the clauses in the Barcelona Declaration that allow EU countries to provide direct funding to independent domestic NGOs. All Arab countries impose restrictive laws on civil society associations. Conditions that are particularly constraining are those  that  allow the government to close down an NGO if it engages in political activities ( ignoring that  almost every activity may  be constructed  as political ) and/or if the NGO engages in activities other than those for which it is licensed (ignoring that NGOs develop, and that it  is virtually impossible to prevent the overlap in the characterization  of activities).  These two restrictions act as the sword of Democeles, as well as open the door for abuse by authoritarian governments.

(v) In many Arab countries primary and secondary education include history and religious courses that demean women and teach hostility and hatred toward non-Muslims.  A striking example of this is the textbooks of students in the Azhar high schools. To quote only a few examples from the textbook currently in use (al-Iqna’): (a) if a Muslim kills a non-Muslim (an infidel) he is not subject to capital punishment since the life of a “superior” cannot be forfeited for killing an “inferior”; (b) the blood-money for a  Christian or Jew is one third that for a Muslim, and for a woman it is half that for a man; (c) there can be no stewardship of a non-Muslim over a Muslim, but the infidel Christians and Jews can be each other’s guardians, since all infidels are of one kind; (d) it is mandatory to kill an apostate (unless he repents), as well as one who abandons prayer out of laziness (unless he repents).

 Concluding Remarks:
The proclivity of the regime to use force against its citizens is the defining feature of authoritarianism.  To help the domestic liberal forces the international community must demonstrate a greatly reduced tolerance for brutal crackdowns by the state’s security forces against opposition groups or against peaceful demonstrations

            The long periods of authoritarian rule has created a general apathy and cynicism among the Arab peoples. Unless this attitude is changed there can be no meaningful political engagement, electoral contestation notwithstanding. The Cedar revolution in Lebanon and the Kefaya movement in Egypt, however, indicate that there is still considerable vitality in some civil societies. These beginnings if supported morally and politically by the EU can develop a momentum that would open wide spaces for civil society-driven political reforms.