Ruling But Not Governing: The Military and Political Development in Egypt, Algeria, and Turkey (Council on Foreign Relations Book)

206 Pages·2007·1.05 MB·English

by  Steven A. Cook

Ruling But Not Governing
a council on foreign relations book
Ruling But Not Governing
The Military and Political Development in
Egypt, Algeria, and Turkey
steven a. cook
The Johns Hopkins University Press
Baltimore
∫ 2007 The Johns Hopkins University Press
All rights reserved. Published 2007
Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper
2 4 6 8 9 7 5 3 2 1
The Johns Hopkins University Press
2715 North Charles Street
Baltimore, Maryland 21218-4363
www.press.jhu.edu
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Cook, Steven A.
Ruling but not governing : the military and political development in Egypt, Algeria,
and Turkey / Steven A. Cook.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN-13: 978-0-8018-8590-7 (hardcover : alk. paper)
ISBN-13: 978-0-8018-8591-4 (pbk. : alk. paper)
ISBN-10: 0-8018-8590-6 (hardcover : alk. paper)
ISBN-10: 0-8018-8591-4 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Civil-military relations. 2. Armed Forces—Political activity. 3. Authoritarianism.
4. Democracy. 5. Democratization. 6. Egypt—Politics and government. 7. Algeria—
Politics and government. 8. Turkey—Politics and government. I. Title.
JF195.C5C66 2007
322%.50961—dc22 2006026075
A catalog record for this book is available from the British Library.
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For Lauren and Madelyn Sophia
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contents
Preface ix
1 A Logic of Regime Stability 1
2 The Egyptian, Algerian, and Turkish Military Enclaves:
The Contours of the O≈cers’ Autonomy 14
3 The Pouvoir Militaire and the Failure to Achieve a ‘‘Just Mean’’ 32
4 Institutionalizing a Military-Founded System 63
5 Turkish Paradox: Islamist Political Power and
the Kemalist Political Order 93
6 Toward a Democratic Transition?
Weakening the Patterns of Political Inclusion and Exclusion 133
Notes 149
Index 183
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preface
The idea for Ruling But Not Governing crystallized when I began asking questions
about the intersection of religion and mass politics, the resilience of certain types of
regimes confronting what seem to be serious challenges, and the inadequacy of
prevailing scholarly work to explain authoritarian stability. This book brings the
issues of Islamism, the military and politics, and the evolution of institutions together
in an e√ort to explain, first, why some states have proved resistant to democratic
change and, second, how external actors can play a role in breaking the authoritarian
logjam.
Despite increasingly vocal questions about the sources of political power, legit-
imacy, and authenticity, regimes in the Middle East have remained remarkably stable.
In the first half of the 1990s, scholars devoted considerable energy to what many
believed to be an imminent wave of democratic transition in the region. In the latter
part of that decade, when expectations of a more open and democratic Middle East
were not realized, analysts turned their attention to understanding the staying power
of authoritarian regimes. Although this work contributed important insights into
authoritarian stability, it tended to overlook the e√ect of militaries and the legacies of
military rule in a variety of Middle Eastern countries on this phenomenon.
The militaries of the Middle East relinquished their direct control of the ministries
and agencies of government long ago, but countries like Egypt, Algeria, and Turkey
have remained military-dominated. The soldiers and materiel of Middle Eastern
militaries are the obvious outer perimeter of regime protection, but it is actually the
less apparent, multilayered institutional legacies of military domination that play the
decisive role in regime maintenance. The character of the military’s interest in both a
facade of democracy and in direct control of key aspects of political control is com-
plex and nuanced. The o≈cers seek to rule but not to govern.
Ruling but not governing has insulated Egyptian, Algerian, and Turkish o≈cers
from the vicissitudes of day-to-day governance; however, this strategy does pose risks