The Arab State and Neo-Liberal Globalization: The Restructuring of State Power in the Middle East

401 Pages·2012·1.651 MB·English

by  Laura Guazzone, Daniela Pioppi

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The The The
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This collection of essays by leading academics offers an
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alternative approach to the study of today’s Arab states by
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focusing on their participation in neo-liberal globalization rather
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than on authoritarianism or Islam.
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The effects of the restructuring of traditional state power -
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engendered by globalization are analyzed separately, through
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updated empirical research in the political, economic and security b
processes of each country considered. Egypt, Lebanon, Morocco e The Restructuring of State
and Saudi Arabia are the case studies selected to represent different r
a Power in the Middle East
paths towards a shared model of “new” Arab state which, far from
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representing an exceptional case of resilience against global trends,
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may be seen in many instances as typifying their effects.
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This book thus offers both an overall conceptualization of change o
affecting the Arab states, domestically and in their relations with b
the international system, and a series of in-depth case studies by a
country and functional areas. l
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About the contributors a
Laura Guazzone is Professor of the Contemporary History of t
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the Arab Countries at ‘La Sapienza’ University of Rome. Daniela o
Pioppi is Senior Research Fellow at the Italian Institute of n
International Affairs.
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Other contributors include Paul Aarts and Joris van Duijne, Joel nd a d
Beinin, Myriam Catusse, Philippe Droz-Vincent, Issandr el Amrani, Daura ited
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Steffen Hertog, Karam Karam, Charbel Nahas, POLITICS e
ISBN 978-0-86372-339-1 laua
Elizabeth Picard, Tim Niblock, Maria Cristina Pz
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Paciello, Karen Aggestam, Helena Lindholm ioo Edited by
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Schulz and Ulrich Wurzel. 9 780863723391 pe Laura Guazzone Daniela Pioppi
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www.ithacapress.co.uk
ITHACA
PRESS
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The
Arab State
and
Neo-Liberal
Globalization
The Restructuring of State
Power in the Middle East
Arab State TP 11/5/09 5:56 PM Page ii
Arab State TP 11/5/09 5:56 PM Page iii
The
Arab State
and
Neo-Liberal
Globalization
The Restructuring of State
Power in the Middle East
Edited by
Laura Guazzone Daniela Pioppi
and
ITH ACA
P R E S S
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THEARABSTATEANDNEO-LIBERALGLOBALIZATION
The Restructuring of State Power in the Middle East
Published by
Ithaca Press
8 Southern Court
South Street
Reading
RG1 4QS
UK
www.ithacapress.co.uk
Ithaca Press is an imprint of Garnet Publishing Limited.
Copyright © Laura Guazzone and Daniela Pioppi
for the Istituto Affari Internazionali, 2009
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by
any electronic or mechanical means, including information
storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing
from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote
brief passages in a review.
First Edition
ISBN: 978-0-86372-339-1
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
TypesetbySamantha Barden
Jacket design byDavid Rose
Printed in the UK by the MPG Books Group
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CONTENTS
List of Figures vi
Preface and Acknowledgements vii
List of Contributors ix
1 Interpreting Change in the Arab World 1
Laura Guazzone and Daniela Pioppi
PART I
CHANGING PATTERNS OF POLITICAL MOBILIZATION
2 Neo-liberal Structural Adjustment, Political Demobilization, 19
and Neo-authoritarianism in Egypt
Joel Beinin
3 An Analysis of Political Change in Lebanon in the Light 47
of Recent Mobilization Cycles
Karam Karam
4 Saudi Arabia’s Political Demobilization in Regional 73
Comparison: Monarchical Tortoise and Republican Hares
Steffen Hertog
PART II
CHANGING PATTERNS OF WEALTH ACCUMULATION
AND DISTRIBUTION
5 The Political Economy of Authoritarianism in Egypt: 97
Insufficient Structural Reforms, Limited Outcomes
and a Lack of New Actors
Ulrich G. Wurzel
6 The Lebanese Socio-economic System, 1985–2005 125
Charbel Nahas
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THE ARAB STATE AND NEO-LIBERAL GLOBALIZATION
7 Globalization and the Saudi Economy: Gains and Losses 159
Tim Niblock
8 Morocco’s Political Economy: Ambiguous Privatization 185
and the Emerging Social Question
Myriam Catusse
PART III
CHANGING PATTERNS OF GLOBALIZED SECURITY
9 The Security Sector in Egypt: Management, Coercion 219
and External Alliance under the Dynamics of Change
Philippe Droz-Vincent
10 The Virtual Sovereignty of the Lebanese State: 247
From Deviant Case to Ideal-type
Elizabeth Picard
11 The Saudi Security Environment: Plus Ça Change . . . 275
Paul Aarts and Joris van Duijne
12 Security Policy and Democratic Reform in Morocco: 299
Between Public Discourse and Reality
Issandr el Amrani
13 The Arab State and Neo-liberal Globalization 325
Karen Aggestam, Laura Guazzone, Helena Lindholm Schulz,
M. Cristina Paciello, Daniela Pioppi
Bibliography 351
Index 381
LIST OF FIGURES
4.1 Composition of the Saudi GDP in the 1960s 78
6.1 Age and unemployment rate 131
6.2 Cumulative migration rate 131
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PREFACE AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The drive to write this book originated in our growing frustration with
the failure of current social sciences’ explanatory paradigms to foresee
and explain political change in the Arab world. Between 2000 and 2003,
we were both involved in a collective research project on the prospects for
democratization in the Arab region and we came to the conclusion that,
not only was the Arab world not democratizing, but the democratization
discourse in its international and regional dimensions was configuring
and legitimating a re-structuring of the power system which was in many
respects reinforcing the authoritarian and patrimonial nature of the
regimes.1 We also realized that the Arab world was not “exceptional”
in its neo-authoritarian trajectory and that the dynamics observable in
the region could be taken as local examples of more general, “global”
trends. In this respect, the Arab world could profitably enter the realm
of comparative politics, but new empirical data and analytical insights
were needed as to how the current Arab neo-authoritarian adjustments
interact with change at the global level: What are the effects of the Arab
regimes’ growing participation, in a subordinate position, in a renewed
globalized order? In what ways are current Arab neo-authoritarian regimes
different from their post-independence predecessors in terms of social
bases and ruling coalitions, distribution of resources, modes of governing,
political discourses?
To answer these and similar questions, in 2005 we launched a
research project by the Istituto Affari Internazionali (IAI) of Rome and
the Swedish Institute of International Affairs (SIIA) of Stockholm. The
project, concluded in 2008, was funded by a generous grant from the
Swedish Riksbankens Jubileumsfond (RJ) and the Italian Fondazione
della Compagnia di San Paolo. In a first stage of the project, we worked
out the overarching rationale of the research on the basis of which a core
group from the two participating institutes developed three sectorial
papers as the conceptual background to the research. We developed the
political concept paper; Maria Cristina Paciello, attached to the IAI for
this project, wrote the economic concept paper; while Karin Aggestam
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THE ARAB STATE AND NEO-LIBERAL GLOBALIZATION
and Helena Lindholm Schulz, attached to the SIIA for this project,
wrote the security concept paper. In a second stage, the core group
selected four country case studies (i.e. Morocco, Egypt, Lebanon and
Saudi Arabia) and invited an enlarged research group made up of 12
international scholars, three for each chosen country, to develop the
project.2This enlarged research group met in Rome at the IAI in February
2007 to discuss both the concept papers and the outline of their country
research in an informal two-day workshop. The project was concluded
in September 2008 with an international conference organized by
Gunilla Herolf (SIIA) in Stockholm to discuss the research results with
a wider public.
This book would not have seen the light without the help of many
people and institutions. First of all, we would like to thank the authors
of the country studies for their highly qualified contributions and their
stimulating and friendly cooperation for the entire duration of the project.
We are also very grateful to Maria Cristina Paciello for her valuable
intellectual and technical help. David Ashton efficiently language edited
or translated most chapters, while Gabriele Tonne (IAI in-house language
editor) did the rest of the language revisions. Last, but not least, we are
of course indebted to the two foundations, RJ and Compagnia di San
Paolo, whose financial support made the endeavour possible.
Finally, a brief note on transliteration. No diacritical marks have been
used in the text. The letter ‘ayn is represented by an opening quotation
mark and the hamzaby a closing quotation mark.
Laura Guazzone and Daniela Pioppi
Istituto Affari Internazionali (IAI) of Rome
November 2008
NOTES
1 Bicchi et al. 2004.
2 Unfortunately, the selected author for the political case study for Morocco defaulted
at the last minute. As a consequence, one of the chapters originally envisaged is
missing from the book.
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LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS
Paul Aartsis Senior Lecturer in International Relations at the Department
of Political Science, University of Amsterdam. He has published widely
on Middle East politics and economics. His most recent publications are
“Saudi Arabia walks the tightrope”, The International Spectator 42 (4),
December 2007; and (together with Joris van Duijne and Roos Meertens),
“Kingdom with borders: the political economy of Saudi-European
relations”, in Madawi Al-Rasheed (ed.), Kingdom without Borders: Saudi
Political, Religious and Media Frontiers,Hurst & Co, 2008.
Karin Aggestam is Associate Professor in Political Science and Director
of Peace and Conflict Studies at Lund University, Sweden. She is
the coordinator of a research project within the EU’s 7th Framework
Programme on just and durable peace in the Middle East and Western
Balkans. Aggestam has published widely in the field of negotiation,
diplomacy, conflict resolution and the Middle East peace process.
Issandr el Amrani is the Egypt and North Africa analyst for the
International Crisis Group. He is a former editor of the Cairo Times
and has contributed reports and analyses on Egypt, North Africa and
the Middle East to a range of publications, including The Economist,
The Guardian, Middle East Research Information Project, the Arab Reform
Bulletin.
Joel Beinin is Professor of Middle East History at Stanford University
and was Director of Middle East Studies at the American University
in Cairo from 2006 to 2008. His latest books are The Struggle for
Sovereignty: Palestine and Israel, 1993–2005 (co-edited with Rebecca
L. Stein), Stanford University Press, 2006; and Workers and Peasants in
the Modern Middle East, Cambridge University Press, 2001. In 2001/2 he
was president of the Middle East Studies Association of North America.
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