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Hisham Melhem has a piece on what he calls the collapse of Arab civilization.

The piece is riddled with contradictions and fuzzy thinking and with all due respect to Milhem, who is a knowledgeable and experienced correspondent, I am going to disagree with it vehemently. I think he is arguing that Arabs bear a moral burden for the atrocities being committed in the region, and that they cannot duck it by blaming regional problems on European colonialism or the US invasion and occupation of Iraq.

Let’s take the 22 Arab League members (which include for political reasons non-Arabic-speaking countries like Somalia and Djibouti). There is nothing wrong with their civilization.

In the past 50 years, Arabic-speakers have gone from being perhaps 80% rural to being 80% urban. (There are still some significantly rural Arab countries like Egypt and Syria but even there the urban-dwellers are a majority). Even Saudi Arabia, which a century ago had a lot of pastoral nomads, is now as urban as the United States. They have gone from being largely illiterate to being, especially at the level of 15-30 year-olds largely literate. The proportion with high school and college educations has skyrocketed. They have access to world news through satellite television. Civilizationally, the average Arab today is way ahead of her parents and grandparents.

Obviously, the states of the Arab world are undergoing important transitions and some have collapsed. But state collapse is not the same thing as civilizational collapse, nor caused by it (whatever “civilization” is).

Why the states are collapsing is a good question for social science, but it isn’t the moral failing that Milhem makes it out to be, nor is it unique. I’d look at the following:

1. Demography. The Arab world is full of states that have had relatively high rates of population growth for 150 years. I have a hypothesis that this population boom is related to global warming, which also began in earnest about 150 years ago, and which may have reduced pandemics in the region which we know were common and cyclical in the medieval and early modern period (“plague”). Tunisia underwent a demographic transition and began leveling off, but most of the rest continue to have high birth rates (Egypt began to level off in 2005 but apparently the instability of the last three years has caused a new baby boom). High rates of population growth can contribute to instability if there aren’t enough jobs for the waves of young people coming on the job market every year. Gross Domestic Product is a matter of long division. So if the population grows 3 percent in a year, and the economy grows 3 percent, the per capita increase in GDP that year is … zero. Go on like that for decades and you’ll have economic and social stagnation. This is why China’s one-child policy was so smart. You couldn’t have had the post-1980 take-off in the same way if the rate of population growth had been like Egypt’s.

Is it an accident that the two countries that began undergoing a demographic transition in the 1970s, Tunisia and Turkey, are the two more stable ones in the region?

2. Productivity. Most Arab states were under European colonialism in the 19th and until the mid-20th century. No colonial administration was interested in promoting industrialization (in contrast, e.g., to Meiji Japan, which was independent and cared about Japan’s place in the world). Arab countries after WW II were mostly agricultural and poor. Some 80% of Iraqis were landless laborers and 2500 families had the best land, and a lion’s share of it, in 1958. While there has been some state-led industrialization, about half of Syria’s population is still rural. Farming has low rates of productivity gain. And most urban workers are in services, which also aren’t characterized by much increase in productivity. High population growth plus low productivity growth equals economic and social stagnation.

3. The distortions of the oil economies. Urbanization in Egypt, e.g., may have stalled out since the 1970s because workers that might have gone to labor in factories in Egyptian cities instead went to Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the UAE. When and if they returned with savings, they often returned to their villages and opened a shop or other small business. The oil economies of the Gulf also drew off the more enterprising teachers and engineers. Oil economies have hardened currencies because of the value of their primary commodity, which makes made goods expensive and harms handicrafts, industry and agriculture because export markets like India can’t afford these goods if they are denominated in a hard currency. (This phenomenon is known as the Dutch disease because the Netherlands suffered from it in the early 1970s when its natural gas industry took off). Also, having small but enormously wealthy and authoritarian states like Qatar, Kuwait, the UAE and Saudi Arabia in the region is destabilizing. They spread money around to support their factions, who then fall to fighting and have the wealth to buy good weapons.

4. Aridity and climate change. The Arab world lies in a longstanding Arid Zone stretching from Morocco to the Gobi Desert. Much of this region cannot engage in rainfall agriculture and depends on irrigation. But climate change is producing increased aridity over time, with long-term droughts. The collapse of Syria is certainly caused in some important part by climate change. Egypt also has a water crisis, and in villages in Upper Egypt protests over insufficient water were part of the unrest during the 2011 revolution and after.

These sorts of causes have contributed to the difficulties the Arab world faces, not moral or civilizational deterioration. Of course, state collapse can create a social maelstrom in which horrific groups like ISIL can grow up. But they are typically caused by the other factors and attendant instability and displacement. They aren’t the original cause of anything themselves. Nor are the Arabs alone even in the region. The brutality and disproportionate force deployed by the Israeli army in Gaza is another form of barbarism.

Singling out the Arab world is unfair. Spain came to be ruled from 1936 by a fascist military dictatorship, which lasted into the 1970s. The exemplar of civilization, the country of Goethe and Schelling– Germany– went fascist in the 1930s. Italy likewise had a fascist government from the 1920s, and it was overthrown by an American invasion, not by Italians alone. Even in the past decade, Italy was demoted by Freedom House from being a first-tier democracy because of the corrupt and authoritarian practices of PM Silvio Berlusconi (journalists working for his media, and he owned a lot of it, were coerced to report positively on him). It is not at all clear that Europe would have ended up democratic, or would have done so quickly after the War, if left to its own devices. What we think of democratic practices were imposed on Western Europe by the US.

Southeast Asia had its own difficulties transitioning from being agricultural and colonial to being independent, urban and industrial. Indonesia polished off hundreds of thousands of –some say a million– Communists in 1965. Vietnam was in turmoil for decades and then turned to one-party dictatorship, remaining desperately poor. Laos and Cambodia were destabilized by the American war in Vietnam. Of the 7.5 million Cambodians in 1975, about 25% were murdered in the Khmer Rouge genocide, i.e. about 1.88 million.

There isn’t any Arab country where a percentage of the population (25%) has been killed, similar to Cambodia. The Algerian Revolution (1954-1962) cost between 500,000 and 1 million lives in a population of 11 million, but a large proportion of these were killed by French troops. The Lebanese Civil War probably killed about 100,000 out of 4 million, or 2.5 percent. The Iran-Iraq War probably left 250,000 Iraqis (some say twice that) dead, out of 16 million, with similar numbers of Iranian casualties. The Arab-Israeli Wars, horrible as they were, were relatively low-casualty affairs as wars go– with casualties on the Arab side in the tens of thousands. Tunisia wasn’t involved in a war after WWII. The US invasion and occupation of Iraq, which destabilized that country, resulted in excess mortality of between 200,000 and a million, in a population of 30 million since 2003 (and despite Melhem, I think we know whose fault this latter was).

One could also compare to Africa. I won’t go into the massive destabilization and loss of life in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, by Belgian colonial policy, which killed half the population. Over 5 million have died because of political turmoil (and related disease) in DRC since 1995.

The fact is that European colonialism and neocolonialism has had a demonstrably destabilizing effect on the region. But Milhem is right that there are lots of other contributing causes. They aren’t, however, the ones he points to. Population growth, the shape of the economy, and resource-poverty (especially in water, which he mentions with regard to Yemen but only as a jeremiad) are all implicated.

Melhem’s piece stands in a very long tradition. After the fall of Baghdad in 1258 to the Buddhist and animist Mongol armies, many Muslim intellectuals concluded that God was angry at the Muslims for having become decadent, and so delivered them into the hands of the infidels from the East for punishment. But the Mongol invasions were not a moral failing of the people of Iran and Iraq. They resulted in some important part from the sophistication of Mongol warfare.

Don’t beat yourself up so much, Hisham.

By the way, some of this is explained in my new book:

The New Arabs: How the Millennial Generation is Changing the Middle East

Firedoglake Book Salon on Juan Cole, The New Arabs: How the Millennial Generation is changing the Middle East

See also this recent NYT review by Irshad Manji

FDL Book Salon Welcomes Juan Cole, The New Arabs: How the Millennial Generation is Changing the Middle East
Author: CTuttle
Sunday, September 7, 2014 12:15 pm Pacific time

Welcome Juan Cole (Informed Comment)(twitter) and Host Charles Tuttle (CTuttle)(twitter)

The New Arabs: How the Millennial Generation is Changing the Middle East

In his new book, Professor Cole charts the ‘Arab Spring’ revolutions in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya, touching upon Syria and Yemen. He credits the Millennial Generation (those born between 1977 and 2000) as a major force behind the varying attempts to change the status quo. As he wrote, “the millennial generation of young Arabs took to the streets, in the millions, chanting ‘bread, freedom and social justice.’ Basically calling for ‘dignity’ (karama), a sense of personal autonomy and rights to freedom of one’s person and one’s political beliefs that must not be infringed by the security forces of each ‘Republican Monarchy.’” Utilizing the latest social media tools on the internet, the youth were very adept at networking and coordinating the numerous direct actions that rattled the regimes.

As Prof. Cole wrote, “Young people are the key to the rapid political and social change in the Arab countries that have been in turmoil since 2011,” Arguing that members of this “Arab Generation Y” are more literate than their elders, more urban and cosmopolitan, more technologically savvy and less religiously observant than those over 35. He further states that many Arab millennials, a generation suffering from “Depression-era” rates of unemployment, used their free time to agitate for democratic change:

they were ‘biographically available’ for meetings, Internet communications, and small demonstrations

In extensive interviews with many student activists and bloggers in Cairo, Benghazi, Tripoli, Tunisia, and even Paris, often during the height of the Arab Spring, Prof. Cole takes the reader inside the youth movements in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya, showing us how activists used technology and social media to amplify their message and connect with like-minded citizens across the region. As he wrote in his preface:

The rise of the internet may not have been as central to these social movements as some Western press coverage assumed. Nevertheless the revolutions were at least to some extent enabled by blogging, Facebook and Twitter campaigns, satellite television, and smartphones. New media allowed activists to get the word out about torture and corruption in ways that the state-dominated press would not have. The internet worked in tandem with popular social and political movements that moved like deep currents to produce these waves of change.

In closing Prof. Cole wrote about the seriousness of the times, “The rise of crime and of political terrorism from Muslim extremists and the constant instability and changes in the executive, while serious problems, should not blind us to the achievements of the youth in putting increased personal autonomy and dignity on the table for societal negotiation. They have kicked off what is likely to be a long inter generational argument, in which there will be both advances and setbacks. We are still two or three decades from the time when the Arab millennials will come to power, but they have laid down markers on the future of the region.”

[As a courtesy to our guests, please keep comments to the book and be respectful of dissenting opinions. Please take other conversations to a previous thread. – bev]
78 Responses to “FDL Book Salon Welcomes Juan Cole, The New Arabs: How the Millennial Generation is Changing the Middle East”
BevW September 7th, 2014 at 1:49 pm
1

Juan, CT, Welcome back to the Lake.

CT, Thank you for Hosting today’s Book Salon. . . .

CTuttle September 7th, 2014 at 1:53 pm
2
In response to BevW @ 1

Aloha, Bev, Juan and FDL pups…!

CTuttle September 7th, 2014 at 1:57 pm
3

Prof. Cole in your book you cited many wikileaks cables, how widely read were/are they in the various countries…?

dakine01 September 7th, 2014 at 2:00 pm
4

Good afternoon Juan and welcome back to Firedoglake this afternoon. Good afternoon CTut!

Juan, I have not had a chance to read your book but do have a question and forgive me if you address this in the book. So often in the reporting by the Traditional Media, we see the stories about groups like ISIS and how they are fighting the West and do NOT see the stories about the non-violent social change, even as they did manage to topple long time dictators.

Does the non-violent social change just not resonate with the Traditional Media and US political forces?

Juan Cole September 7th, 2014 at 2:03 pm
5

Hi, Charles. Thanks so much for doing this.

Many of the youth activists in the Arab world were very wired. Some were even members of the local Pirate Party or had serious, let us say, internet skills. So they knew immediately about the State Department cables published by Wikileaks and began locating and translating the ones relevant to their critiques of the dictators they opposed. In fact, Nawaat.org re: Tunisia spent much more time on the Wikileaks revelations about Zine El Abidine Ben Ali than on the death of Tarek (“Mohammad”) BouAzizi in fall of 2010.

CTuttle September 7th, 2014 at 2:05 pm
6
In response to dakine01 @ 4

While reading the book, dakine, JFK’s famous quote; “Those who make peaceful revolution impossible, will make revolution inevitable” resonated throughout…!

Juan Cole September 7th, 2014 at 2:09 pm
7
In response to dakine01 @ 4

The Arab and Muslim worlds constitute 1.5 billion people, sort equivalent to of Europe, North America and South and Central America taken together– so it is just an enormous swathe of the world. Obviously they have all kinds of societies. The ones I was talking about (mainly Egypt and Tunisia) are highly institutionalized with strong central states, and fairly educated and urbanized. So there, in North Africa, nonviolent social and political movements are common. The US public has mainly recently dealt with much more rural societies like Afghanistan or al-Anbar Province in Iraq, where clan violence is common. It has given them a skewed view of the region, sort as if you were to generalize about Buenos Aires from an experience in Honduras.

CTuttle September 7th, 2014 at 2:11 pm
8
In response to Juan Cole @ 5

One thing that impressed me was how much the internet empowered many Arab women, do you think they’ll keep the gains made and will continue to have a voice against the rapid rise in the Salafist extremism…?

BevW September 7th, 2014 at 2:11 pm
9

As background for the book, how did you define “millennial generation” of young arabs?

bigbrother September 7th, 2014 at 2:14 pm
10

Hi Juan thanks for bringing some light to the ME torment. I find your blog informed comment helpful in getting my brain around a complex set of circumstances that are interrelated. Thank you for this diary. I read the conclusion of your book on Amazon. Why do the super powers keep pouring gasoline on the fires of ME discontent? What solutions do you see as alternative?

Juan Cole September 7th, 2014 at 2:17 pm
11
In response to CTuttle @ 8

Salafis and other really hard line Muslims hostile to women having a public role are a tiny minority in Tunisia; the interior minister estimated them at 5,000 in a population of 10.5 million. There are more in Egypt, but even there they are not a big group, proportionally.

On the other hand, Arab Muslim societies do have a lot of patriarchs in them uncomfortable with women in the public sphere, even where the patriarchs aren’t that religious. For young women, the internet has been a place where they can exercise leadership and make themselves heard. A YouTube rant can after all be more effective than a speech in a square on a soapbox. A lot of women have blogs or are active on Twitter or Facebook and can garner huge followings. This is a new arena of leadership for them that cannot so easily be blocked.

Juan Cole September 7th, 2014 at 2:20 pm
12
In response to BevW @ 9

Hi, Bev. These generations are often defined by marketers who are trying to sell them things based on generational interests and networks. The Millennials or Gen Y are defined as people born roughly 1977 – 2000. Because they came of age after the end of the Cold War and at a time when the Internet was coming on line, I do think they have some things in common as a group that distinguish them at least somewhat from their elders.

ThingsComeUndone September 7th, 2014 at 2:20 pm
13

I am interested in knowing if less water intensive methods of farming like vertical farming with drip irrigation is of interests to Arabs or will they stay with their current methods of farming. High prices for food, Fuel and lack of jobs were all cited as reasons for Arab Spring.

bigbrother September 7th, 2014 at 2:22 pm
14

The Saudi Sunni brand of Muslim seems very supportive of extremists. The Iran Shites has their own pet extremist. Gaza massacre victims seem to be ignored by both. Mind commenting on this?

ThingsComeUndone September 7th, 2014 at 2:24 pm
15

Next about Jobs what are the young Arabs ideas for creating more jobs? Is there a difference between Young blogger ideas, Young Fundamentalist ideas and Young supporters of the current regime’s ideas on how, what kind of jobs to create plus how and who should pay for those jobs?

Glenn September 7th, 2014 at 2:25 pm
16

Prof. Cole, the United States and other Western countries have had a profound impact on Arab countries in a variety of ways, ranging from providing a role model, to having supported some dictatorial regimes like Saudi Arabia, to using military force both covertly and overtly to try to overthrow other regimes like Iraq, Libya and Syria. What do you think the US should have done differently than it has? Do you, in hindsight, wish you personally had given any different advice to Western policy makers at the time than you actually did, especially in cases like the US’s wars of aggression against Iraq and Libya?

RevBev September 7th, 2014 at 2:25 pm
17

To follow bigbrother at 10, is there a big contrast in the way ME has to reacted to W and to Obama?

Juan Cole September 7th, 2014 at 2:26 pm
18
In response to bigbrother @ 10

The great Powers all think they have interests in the Middle East, and one of those interests is not being displaced by other great Powers.

But I wouldn’t overestimate external impacts on the region. Iraq is an obvious place where outside meddling made things much worse. On the other hand, I think Syria’s collapse is largely because of problems in Syria, not least the impact of Climate Change in causing a long term drought that drove farmers from their land to urban slums in search of non-existent work as construction workers.

Once a conflict like Syria breaks out, the great Powers take stances toward it. Syria had been a Soviet and then Russian client, and Putin did not want the Baath government to fall, so he gave it a lot of money and weapons without which the regime might well have collapsed. Iran likewise needs Syria as a land bridge to Hizbullah in Lebanon and so supported Damascus in key ways.

In Tunisia and Egypt, I don’t think the US or the Russians were that important, but there was a rivalry between Saudi Arabia and Qatar for influence over the outcome of the 2011 upheavals that proved ruinous for Egypt’s hopes of democratic transition. Still, even there, internal Egyptian developments were more important than Gulf money.

ThingsComeUndone September 7th, 2014 at 2:26 pm
19

I just started reading the book and I was very struck with how much Young Arab bloggers are similar to bloggers on the internet. That suggest something to me maybe we both view our ruling classes the same way since we have similar responses to our ruling classes? Just wondering if I’m on the ball or out in Left field.

CTuttle September 7th, 2014 at 2:28 pm
20

One thing that I’d noted in most cases was the fact that the initial protests in Tunisia, Egypt, and elsewhere, were based on Israeli actions in Lebanon, Gaza and/or the West Bank…! It seemed like they first cut their teeth on the Israeli wars…!

Juan Cole September 7th, 2014 at 2:29 pm
21
In response to ThingsComeUndone @ 13

The Arab world is in a long-lasting Arid Zone that is becoming more arid because of human-caused climate change and other developments. Rivers like the Tigris and Euphrates are being dammed near their headwaters or irrigated off of in ways that reduce water flow. Iraq is facing soil salinization as a result. Rain, never abundant, is becoming scarcer in Syria. Much more efficient use of water is crucial, but even that may not be enough to deal with the crisis.

ThingsComeUndone September 7th, 2014 at 2:32 pm
22

What do Arab bloggers think about ISIS some of us think America and the Saudi’s created, funded, armed them. What do they think of America first wanting to attack Iran and Syria now barely a year later we want their help with ISIS?
What do the Arab bloggers in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain the Arab Emirates think of this?

Juan Cole September 7th, 2014 at 2:37 pm
23
In response to bigbrother @ 14

The funny thing is that the Saudi leadership does not see its Wahhabi brand of Islam as extremist. They think Wahhabis are just very good (i.e. what we would call fundamentalist) Muslims who are characterized by loyalty to the king. I suppose they’re a little like some of the urban 16th century Protestant groups who were frankly fanatical but loyal to a Protestant prince, in contrast to the peasant revolutionaries.

So the Saudis are afraid of the Muslim Brotherhood, which is not loyal to any monarch or government and is rather populist and sometimes revolutionary. They see the Brotherhood as the extremists.

So there are two things going on here, strictness in obedience to Muslim canon law as fundamentalists construct it, and the question of loyalty to the king or to the state. People can be quietist and apolitical and yet fundamentalist believers, as with some of the peace churches in the US.

The strain that is dangerous is what I call fundamentalist vigilantes, those who reject mainstream government authority and think individuals are authorized to act violently on their own account.

Glenn September 7th, 2014 at 2:38 pm
24

Prof. Cole, are there any blogs written in English by Arab or Iranian bloggers that you would especially recommend to people who don’t speak the native languages but want better insight into what the people in these countries are actually thinking?

Juan Cole September 7th, 2014 at 2:40 pm
25
In response to ThingsComeUndone @ 19

There were a lot of political blogs among Arab youth, though maybe some of that energy has now gone to social media. They are diverse– leftist, liberal, fundamentalist, loyalist.

The internet was important to dissidents because the government or relatives of the president often controlled the newspapers and in-country television, and the internet allowed people to get the word out about taboo subjects like police torture. Although the tensions between netroots and the Establishment (including MSM) are structurally similar, those tensions are much more vehement and stark in a dictatorial police state.

ThingsComeUndone September 7th, 2014 at 2:41 pm
26
In response to Juan Cole @ 21

Vertical Farming reduces the use of water by up to 99% by using aeroponics and recycling all the water, which is not used by the plants!

http://agrilution.com/vertical-farming

I doubt the old Arab Monarchs read the latest on farming and they control the government but are the young interested, actively looking for technological solutions to their societies problems?

BrandonJ September 7th, 2014 at 2:42 pm
27

Hello CTuttle! Hello Professor Cole! Glad to be here for this Salon.

I thoroughly enjoyed the book since it provided great context for what was happening in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya.

Based on the conversations so far, I cannot help but ask a question on climate change. You mentioned in the book the Milennial generation will take power in the future. However, it seems climate change will get worse as time goes on. What are Milennials doing about this?

cherwell September 7th, 2014 at 2:42 pm
28
In response to bigbrother @ 10

thanks for letting the FDL readers know: https://www.juancole.com/

ThingsComeUndone September 7th, 2014 at 2:43 pm
29
In response to Juan Cole @ 25

Although the tensions between netroots and the Establishment (including MSM) are structurally similar, those tensions are much more vehement and stark in a dictatorial police state.

So they are more extreme versions of us very cool:)

Juan Cole September 7th, 2014 at 2:44 pm
30
In response to ThingsComeUndone @ 22

You’d have to look at it on a country by country basis. The vast majority of Egyptians at the moment have a bad taste in their mouths from fundamentalist attempts at power-grabbing and they hate and fear ISIL. On the other hand, some Saudis are more aware of the oppression of the Iraqi Sunnis at the hands of the Shiite government of Nouri al-Maliki and so are more sympathetic to ISIL as a Sunni backlash.

ThingsComeUndone September 7th, 2014 at 2:45 pm
31

They are diverse– leftist, liberal, fundamentalist, loyalist.

Do the groups, fight, cooperate, I know its probably different in each country but what they fight about and what they cooperate on might I think have something in common and if not that information is also interesting.

TarheelDem September 7th, 2014 at 2:47 pm
32

Thanks for hosting this Book Salon, CTut, and thanks Prof. Cole for chatting with folks at the Lake.

I’m wary of discussions about generations. After all the rip-roaring generation that was supposed to change the world for the better (per Life Magazine) did indeed have Barbra Streisand and Yitzhak Perlman and Stephen Hawking, but it also had Dick Cheney and W.

What in the social life of the Arab world leads you to believe that the Millennial generation there will indeed make over the politics of the region in a helpful way for the people who live there?

Juan Cole September 7th, 2014 at 2:49 pm
33
In response to Glenn @ 24

This is not a cop-out– really– I cite a lot of blogs in my book with URLs. But you might look at Baheyya for Egypt e.g.

http://baheyya.blogspot.se/

ThingsComeUndone September 7th, 2014 at 2:51 pm
34

Many of the Arab Monarchies have old rulers and when they die their younger brothers and or sons who are also very old as dirt will take over.
The Arab nations have a bunch of young unemployed people from what little I’ve read the young want jobs.
But from what I see on the news the old seem more intent on playing foreign policy games.
Do any of the Arab Monarchies have a plan to get their young working.

CTuttle September 7th, 2014 at 2:51 pm
35

It seems Tunisia was the only successful ‘Arab Awakening,’ do you forsee any hope for Libya, or even Egypt, in the near future…?

cherwell September 7th, 2014 at 2:53 pm
36

mr. cole — thanks for all that you fearlessly contribute as an authentic, investigative journalist aka an agent of change.

while i have not read your book — yet — reviews have stated your book is most illuminating when chronicling, in fascinating detail, their [ME] pioneering use of Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and cellphone technology to network and organize.

Q: if net netrality is abondoned in favor of the corporatacracy, what will be the impact in the Arab world?

Juan Cole September 7th, 2014 at 2:54 pm
37
In response to ThingsComeUndone @ 31

Again, it is different in different countries and changes over time. In Egypt, the youth movements from about 2005 began trying to cooperate across ideological divides. There was some of that in Libya, as well, in 2011.

But after the revolutions, when the question was not just getting rid of the dictator but of what came next, cooperation was hard to sustain. The left and liberal youth broke with the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt in 2012-13 when the latter came to power and cracked down on dissent. Libya is now riven by a fight between nationalists and fundamentalists that even has a regional/ clan substrate, thus Zintanis versus Misratans.

Twain September 7th, 2014 at 2:56 pm
38

Prof. Cole, I haven’t read your book yet but wanted to say thank you for Informed Comment. It is a must-read every day. Excellent information.

Juan Cole September 7th, 2014 at 3:01 pm
39
In response to CTuttle @ 35

I argue that it is way too soon to tell which of these movements was successful, and of course it depends on what you think their goal was. Ahmad Maher in Egypt (now unfortunately in jail) said that Jan. 25, 2011, was originally about getting rid of the Interior Minister. So obviously that succeeded.

And, it is very early days. At this stage in the American Revolution, the British still held Staten Island.

Tunisia has had the best (though still very rocky and imperfect) transition to greater democracy, but it is an open question about whether the elected government will be able to grow the economy fast enough to suit the youth.

Egypt seems to have gone authoritarian but when I was there in March there were massive and widespread labor strikes, including by postal workers (very debilitating to business), and the military clearly did not dare move against them. That is, spaces have opened that it is hard even for the generals to close back down. I don’t think the youth have gone anywhere, nor have their aspirations, and the old guys at the top won’t be there forever…

So, let’s keep an open mind about the changes kicked off in 2011. The story isn’t over. One thing seems clear though– presidents for life and their sons inheriting the presidency is not going to be the new paradigm for the region.

ThingsComeUndone September 7th, 2014 at 3:01 pm
40

Grass trials
Scientists from the United Arab Emirates have shown that greening arid and semi-arid areas has led to a 2 to 3°C reduction in temperature. The governments of these countries, therefore, have proposed that up to 10% of their region should be planted up, with the ambitious aim of reducing the ambient temperature by 8 to 12°C. In fact, a “Green Belt Project” sponsored by Abu Dhabi and Dubai, whereby all major cities will be planted with a perimeter of trees, shrubs and grass, has already been initiated.

http://www.new-ag.info/03-1/develop/dev04.html

Can you suggest where I might read more on this subject? Also does the government controlled media in the Arab world report on this subject? Are Arab Bloggers talking about the possibilities of this and vertical farming.
Producing food greening the desert can create jobs and provide Arab society much needed products like food.

ThingsComeUndone September 7th, 2014 at 3:03 pm
41

Overall will things get better or are will the Arab world get torn apart by war?

Juan Cole September 7th, 2014 at 3:03 pm
42
In response to cherwell @ 36

Ending net neutrality would harm the world wide web as a place for effective dissent, but the Net is such that people will still find ways to communicate on it. You might have to be patient while the non-MSM site you want to read loads into your browser. Or maybe we have to go to peer to peer filesharing, or torrents. Anyway, it would be bad but not fatal.

ThingsComeUndone September 7th, 2014 at 3:05 pm
43

Many Arab Monarchies have huge sections of their populations that are guest workers who are treated worse than illegal Mexican Immigrants are in America. How or do the Arab Bloggers have any ideas about improving their status?

Glenn September 7th, 2014 at 3:07 pm
44

Prof. Cole, on the subject of blogs, what do you think of the ways The Vineyard of the Saker is covering the wars in Ukraine and Iraq?

ThingsComeUndone September 7th, 2014 at 3:07 pm
45
In response to Juan Cole @ 39

Tunisia has had the best (though still very rocky and imperfect) transition to greater democracy,

Is America helping, hindering the transition to democracy and what help we do give are we giving it based on actual performance or based more on our geopolitical fears?
How are we helping, hindering?

ThingsComeUndone September 7th, 2014 at 3:09 pm
46

Is the NSA helping the Arab governments spy on their bloggers? If so how which Arab governments are cracking down the hardest on the internet? Which are the most effective at cracking down on the internet and how do they do it?

Juan Cole September 7th, 2014 at 3:09 pm
47
In response to TarheelDem @ 32

Good point. My book really isn’t about the generation so much as the youth movements that members threw up to organize it and make claims for its aspirations. Those youth movements will be consequential for politics for a long time to come. Most of the really effective ones are left or liberal, moreover.

Moreover, in the Arab world, generational change is much more stark than in the industrialized West. Egypt’s population in 1980 was 40 million; it is now 85 million or so. A whole new Egypt has been added, of Millennials. And these new Egyptians are *much* more urban, literate and wired than their parents, and somewhat, at least, less religiously observant. That is, the social statistics suggest a genuinely different generational set of values– though of course there is as you say a spectrum and some a quite conservative or reacting against the New Left or the liberals.

ThingsComeUndone September 7th, 2014 at 3:12 pm
48
In response to ThingsComeUndone @ 40

How much of the world’s desert’s would we have to reforest to reduce temperature increases from climate change I think the United Arab Emirates is onto something here.

CTuttle September 7th, 2014 at 3:12 pm
49
In response to Juan Cole @ 39

One thing seems clear though– presidents for life and their sons inheriting the presidency is not going to be the new paradigm for the region.

That is a definitely a step forward…!

I remember an old Ali Abuminah article on “Where is Gaza’s Gandhi?” and basically he said they were all locked up in Israeli jails, individuals like Barghouti and other peace activists…! It seems that is the same MO throughout the MENA…!

mulp September 7th, 2014 at 3:13 pm
50

What hope is there when Assad, ISIS, al qaeda, the House of Saud, the Shia parties in Iraq, the emirate leaders, see the millennials as a greater threat than radical islamists and mass murdering terrorists from the West’s disaffected discriminated millennials who are liberated to murder without reservation because they have no connection at all to those they are murdering?

Assad and ISIS have found common cause: killing the millennials who look West to find their social and political values, and thus they leave each other alone for now.

Juan Cole September 7th, 2014 at 3:14 pm
51
In response to ThingsComeUndone @ 34

Of the some 350 million Arabs (depending on how you count), very few live under monarchies. Morocco is the most populous monarchy, at 32 million. The Saudis maybe have 22 million citizens. After that they are tiny. Qatar has like 250,000 citizens.

The oil monarchies are typically very young demographically, with big youth bulges, and are more dynamic and changing rapidly than they seem on the surface. Employment is a problem in part because of the “Dutch disease”– having a pricey primary commodity hardens your currency and hurts handicrafts, industry and agriculture by making those goods expensive to other countries and hard to export.

ThingsComeUndone September 7th, 2014 at 3:15 pm
52

How do top down government hierarchies respond to a lateral I think is the term organization? I assume mistakes in intent are made by both sides which unfortunately makes conflict more likely.
Are there any examples of governments in power interacting with and actually cooperating with their young bloggers across political religious divides?

Juan Cole September 7th, 2014 at 3:16 pm
53
In response to ThingsComeUndone @ 46

Regimes like that of Ben Ali in Tunisia were intensively spying on the internet right from the beginning and could have taught the NSA some things. Turns out, if enough of the population wants a change in government, merely spying on the population won’t keep you in power– they overwhelm you.

BrandonJ September 7th, 2014 at 3:19 pm
54

There’s been good amount of coverage on Egypt and Libya, however Tunisia has been underreported.

Are there any major changes in Tunisia since the book?

Juan Cole September 7th, 2014 at 3:23 pm
55
In response to mulp @ 50

Thanks for your observation, but it seems to me you are being too pessimistic.

First of all, the Arab Millennials got rid of four, count them, four “presidents for life” backed by police states, militaries, and corrupt elites. They also provoked constitutional change in Morocco. They had a positive effect on the lives of 150 million people despite the forces arrayed against them.

Syria is an enormous tragedy, but it isn’t very much like the rest of the region, in having a minority community at the head of the government and having an old Soviet-style one-party state. 40% of the population is probably not Sunni Arab, and the Sunnis are split between nationalists and fundamentalists, between wealthy and poor.

cherwell September 7th, 2014 at 3:26 pm
56
In response to Juan Cole @ 42

many thanks! [NNTR]

ThingsComeUndone September 7th, 2014 at 3:26 pm
57
In response to Juan Cole @ 51

Foreign workers in Saudi Arabia, estimated to number about 7.5 million as of April 2013,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_workers_in_Saudi_Arabia

The Saudis maybe have 22 million citizens.

So about a little more than 1 out of three are foreign workers who unlike the Saudis are all in their prime working years not children not to old to work. They are treated worse than Mexicans somehow I think this will be a problem for the Saudis.

Qatar has over 1.5 million people, the majority of whom (about 90%) live in Doha, the capital. Foreign workers with temporary residence status make up about four-fifths of the population.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Qatar

4 out of 5 people are foreigners and they are also treated bad.

Kuwaiti citizens accounted for 40% of Kuwait’s total population in 2011,[1] the rest is foreigners.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Kuwait

I could go on and on but you get the idea. Does the Arab Spring even consider foreign workers?

cherwell September 7th, 2014 at 3:26 pm
58
In response to Juan Cole @ 55

CTuttle September 7th, 2014 at 3:27 pm
59
In response to Juan Cole @ 53

You mentioned in the preface that many bloggers are still behind bars, what kind of sentences are they facing, Juan…?

ThingsComeUndone September 7th, 2014 at 3:28 pm
60
In response to Juan Cole @ 53

Great News I hope you expand more on that in your book. Both how people got around the spying and Arab attempts to spy that were not thought of by the West. To many books ignore non Western innovations and assume everything came from and is about the West.

Juan Cole September 7th, 2014 at 3:29 pm
61
In response to BrandonJ @ 54

Thanks, Brandon.

As the book went to press, the new constitution had just been passed by parliament, which is very good on freedom of conscience and women’s rights (there is no longer a government agency in charge of internet censorship!) The elected religious-right government stepped down in January in favor of a caretaker cabinet of technocrats who will oversee the next elections, in October. While the youth activists continue to be worried about police brutality and controversies over the limits of free speech, the political transition is going well in my view.

The worrying thing is that Libya has collapsed politically and its faction-fighting and refugees could spill over on Tunisia in destabilizing ways. So far, it hasn’t happened.

Ironically, Algerian and Libyan tourists have boosted Tunisia’s tourism economy this summer, since both those countries are pretty dreary right about now…

Juan Cole September 7th, 2014 at 3:31 pm
62
In response to ThingsComeUndone @ 57

The small oil monarchies didn’t have an Arab spring. It was the big republics that had the upheavals.

The youth bloggers are very exercised about workers rights, and their promotion of labor unions and strikes was key to the emergence of youth organizations into the political limelight in both Tunisia and Egypt. There is a lot about the youth-Labor coalition in my book.

ThingsComeUndone September 7th, 2014 at 3:36 pm
63

The small oil monarchies didn’t have an Arab spring. It was the big republics that had the upheavals.

Good to know if you try and see patterns. Still I can’t help thinking the small Arab Monarchies are sitting on a bomb.

CTuttle September 7th, 2014 at 3:36 pm
64
In response to Juan Cole @ 62

What’s happening in Bahrain and their brutal suppression should shock one’s conscience…! 8-(

ThingsComeUndone September 7th, 2014 at 3:38 pm
65

Do the Arab Governments have Fox News type channel that lies and tries to divide people foreign and domestic by hate or do they do propaganda a different way to maintain power. i assume the young distrust and dislike the government propaganda.

ThingsComeUndone September 7th, 2014 at 3:39 pm
66
In response to CTuttle @ 64

Seconded!

CTuttle September 7th, 2014 at 3:40 pm
67
In response to Juan Cole @ 61

The worrying thing is that Libya has collapsed politically and its faction-fighting and refugees could spill over on Tunisia in destabilizing ways. So far, it hasn’t happened.

I’d posit that it was all those Iraqi refugees from our illegal invasion, that seriously destabilized Syria…!

Juan Cole September 7th, 2014 at 3:41 pm
68
In response to RevBev @ 17

Hi, Bev. In 2011 the youth revolutionaries for the most part focused on domestic grievances and tried not to let the regimes distract the public with foreign policy issues. The US wasn’t very relevant to Tunisia, which is more in the French zone. The Left youth were scathing about both, and I don’t think they much cared whether it was Bush or Obama. I asked them if they felt better about the French socialists than about Sarkozy and they blanched. One said, “I’m quite sure we despise the French socialists.” Obama had some popularity after his Cairo speech but it quickly wore off for lack of follow through. In Egypt, there was some anti-Obama graffiti and sentiment in January of 2011, but once Obama urged Mubarak to go, he largely went away as an issue (the youth did refuse to meet with Hillary Clinton when she came to Cairo, because of her support for Mubarak). When I was in Egypt in March, everyone was mad at Obama. The fundamentalists thought he must have been behind the overthrow of the Muslim Brotherhood. The nationalists thought he was trying to impose the Muslim Brotherhood on Egypt in hopes that if the fundamentalists dedicated themselves to civil politics they would leave the US alone. Both are crackpot theories but widely believed.

Read the rest at Firedoglake

Mirrored from Firedoglake Book Salon

—–

Related book:

The New Arabs: How the Millennial Generation is Changing the Middle East

Today is the anniversary of the overthrow of Muhammad Morsi in Egypt, one year ago. I have a detailed account of this event and of the movement that led up to it in my new book, The New Arabs, which came out Tuesday. Here are some interviews I’ve done around it recently.

I was on The Majority Report with Sam Seder on Wednesday talking about my new book on the Arab Gen Y or Millennials, youth born from the late 1970s through about the year 2000, and their values and politics.

I was also on PRI’s The World on Wednesday:

On Tuesday, William O’Connor did a thorough and sympathetic review of the book for The Daily Beast; I was impressed that he took the time to interview me as well as reading and presenting the book itself!

“In his book, Cole looks at youth movements in three of the countries in the center of the Arab Spring—Libya, Tunisia, and Egypt. He examines not only why they rebelled, but also how. He traces the activities primarily of liberal, secular, and daring bloggers in the run-up to, during, and after the revolutions.”

Related book:

The New Arabs: How the Millennial Generation is Changing the Middle East