Arabs between Bush and bin Laden

Lebanon Reporting:
Rami G. Khouri
Daily Star staff

Aflurry of short trips recently has allowed me to sample political and social sentiments in several different parts of the Arab world, including Amman, Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Cairo, Doha, and my normal home routine in Beirut. My sense from this mini-tour of Arab attitudes is that this region is defined by severe and growing polarization, but without radicalization or extremism for the most part. The two militant extremes that drive action and attitudes - George W. Bush's triumphalist neoconservative unilateral militarism, and Osama bin Laden's neo-nihilistic globalized Salafist terrorism - have both failed to take root among most Arabs, but an alternative consensus vision for the Arab region has not emerged either.

The vast majority of individuals and movements in the Arab world reject both the Bush and bin Laden ideologies, yet the region still finds itself driven and often defined by the policies of these two extremes. In between the Bush and bin Laden ideologies are the 300 million or so Arabs who seek lives of normalcy and moderation, safe and stable societies, equitable personal development opportunities, national configurations of statehood and nationhood that make sense to them, and credible means of governance and accountability.

However, a common problem everywhere in the Arab world is that structures or systems of credible national decision-making and consensus-building do not exist, despite the presence of many parliaments, elections, political parties and non-governmental organizations. Political power is exercised and usually monopolized by small elites that use various means of self-legitimization, including military legacies, Islamic religious lineage and identity, developmental progress, security for all, Arab nationalism, and, most recently, modernization and brisk economic reform and expansion.

Because existing governance systems are not credible for majorities of Arabs, people gravitate to other arenas where they find satisfaction by freely expressing their identity and working for their professional, personal or political goals. Not surprisingly, therefore, if you walk or drive through any major city in the Arab world today, you will find it is defined by the two less extreme manifestations of the Bush-bin Laden zealotry. The first are vast swaths of political and social Islamism that has provided major segments of Arab cities and people with a sense of identity, protection, and hope; the second is a spectacular brand of free-market globalized capitalism and consumerism that is now most dramatically manifested in the striking and often bizarre architectural extravaganzas - business towers, shopping malls, gated residential communities, hotels, public buildings - that are popping up all over the region.

In between these poles, a large number of ordinary, middle class Arabs surveys the politicized and badly fractured landscape of their own communities. They are attracted to both consumerism's promise of a good life through cell phones and high definition television, and Islamism's promise of a good life through more dignity, equity and justice.

The polarization of the Arab world is obvious at every level and in every sector - politically, socially, religiously, economically, and, now, architecturally. The physical layout of all Arab cities is now a convenient guide to political, social and economic ruptures in our societies. Pockets of super opulence and massive new real estate projects coexist with neighborhoods of poverty and marginalization. In the poor quarters, criminality and the desperate enticements of bin Ladenist Salafist militancy and terrorism are not far away. The poor are usually indigenous Arabs, but sometimes migrant workers from Asia or other parts of the Arab world.

This is not a sustainable situation, and anybody who takes a moment to analyze these trends honestly should grasp that the current polarization across all sectors of life and society will build up until it reaches a point of crisis or explosion. The mass breakout from the Gaza jail was just one sign of rebellion and self-assertion by human beings who will no longer acquiesce in their dehumanization. It is perhaps the most serious abuse of human and national rights in the region, but not the only one.

The region continues to suffer high inflation in the Gulf, active warfare in Iraq, Somalia, Sudan and Palestine, and political tensions in Lebanon, Egypt, Yemen, Algeria and other lands. Any open-eyed traveler around the region must recognize that the Arab world cannot long enjoy warfare, political standoffs, stability, prosperity and polarization at the same time. It is to their credit that the Arab people have rejected the Bush and bin Laden extremes, but they have gravitated instead to non-violent zones of proximity to those gun-based zealotries.

We still need a mechanism by which the Arab majority can express its will and the minority can be protected and enjoy its human and civil rights. Cell phone jamborees, lagoon palace estates, and fantasies of Islamist redemption through mass murder are not the answer - but they remain attractive to some, in the absence of accountable, decent governance systems.

Rami G. Khouri is published twice-weekly by