If 9/11 defined the last decade, will the Arab Spring define the next?

As a democracy activist, I hope so. But defence of vital interests is always a more powerful policy driver than supporting others’ idealistic aspirations.

The fact is that the zeitgeist of the Arab Spring (a name Arab activists dislike as trivializing their revolution) is going global. One-man and junta dictatorships will go down, in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia. Theocracies and ideological one-party states, prospering China or failing Cuba, will need to open up. Clashes may again involve daunting challenges at the UN over using international force to override the national sovereignty dictators hide behind.

The crucial perception for democracies is to recognize the arc of history in all this, to ensure we don’t embrace dictators for the sake of a “war on terror” as we did last decade, but line up at last on the right and winning side. It’s who we are as much as what they want.

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Yes, if we take a myopic “western” view. We in the West, especially since the 1890s, have defined each decade (“the gay ’90s for example); while 9/11 had world-wide significance as signalling that the world’s only superpower was itself vulnerable and no longer (if ever) exceptional, the Arab Spring could be regional or perhaps more….we don’t know yet.

If the Arab Spring evolves into an Islamic Renaissance or Enlightenment, including the Turkish-speaking peoples as well those speaking Urdu, Bengali, or Baha Indonesian, that would define the decade. Or China by 2020 attaining-near military parity with the United States, backed by rising economic/political power could define our decade. Or the collapse of the European experiment if that were to happen…or the rise of Orthodoxy in Russia and the near-abroad, which would restore Christianity to where it was (East and West) before 1453 (the capture by the Turks of Constantinople).

All this to say that the Arab Spring, while important regionally, is not complete and could resemble more the socio-political-theological uprisings in the West from the thirteenth century onward, or the convulsions in the Islamic world since the late seventh century, than anything more.

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The Arab Spring is potentially in the same category as the end of colonialism in the Fifties and the collapse of communism in the late Eighties.  It is not clear yet what its full consequences will be but it seems likely to produce more representative governance than before  and probably much more representative/populist foreign policies. That will mean, probably, that Israel will be given a lot less slack by the new, more representative Arab governments than it was under Mubarak and Gaddafi. It might also mean that leaders whose success is due in some degree to outside support national sovereignty will take a less absolute position on national sovereignty than their autocratic predecessors did.

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I have my doubts.

9/11 changed everything, and the consequences haunt us still.

The incident provided the neocons with the pretext  they needed to seize the day. On their watch, civil and constitutional rights were rolled back, the national security and surveillance state constructed, and the middle class hollowed out. As the USA lurched from Afghanistan to Iraq and back to Afghanistan in the context of pursuing its ill-conceived and  disastrous Global War on Terror, it squandered its unipolar moment and ruined its economy, its reputation, and its global leadership.

Assuming that the world can find a way out of the continuing economic crisis, itself a long term consequence of 9/11, exactly where the emerging heteropolar world order is going is anyone’s guess.

We are entering uncharted territory, and the key challenge will be to manage the new accommodations peacefully.

Arab spring? Beyond cosmetic changes in the top level leadership of three countries in North Africa, what has really changed? To date, for the vast majority of those populations affected, not very much.  Uprisings and (partial) regime change in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya are not to be confused with what happened in Russia in 1917, China in 1949, or Cuba in 1959. These were revolutions, and they represent something far more profound than anything we have seen to date in the Greater Middle East.

Meanwhile, little has come from the stirrings in Jordan, revolts in Bahrain and Yemen, and the full scale rebellion in Syria.

To date, while change has been elusive, what we have witnessed is a convincing expression of the people’s thirst for political reform. Moreover, that conviction has been expressed in an overwhelmingly secular manner, with the more extreme iterations of radical Islamism notable mainly for their absence.

For analysts, that observation, which not coincidentally relates directly back to the consequences of 9/11, may represent the Arab Spring’s more enduring legacy.

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It is way too early to make such a determination as events in the Arab world are still unfolding. However, if both were momentous events in their own right, there are important differences between 9/11 and the Arab Spring that are worth underlining. One can think about the nature of the event (terrorist attack vs. mass mobilization for regime change), the intended target (a democratic society vs. authoritarian regimes) and the actor responsible for bringing it about (a transnational non-state terrorist organization vs. dissatisfied citizens). Most importantly, 9/11 targeted a major power and as such its ripple effects went around the world. Although the Arab Spring will likely change politics in (parts of) the Arab world, it is not clear that it will have a worldwide impact. Thinking about relations between Muslims and non-Muslims in the West, for example, these are likely to continue to be affected mostly by domestic politics around immigration, employment and the like. Democracy in the Arab World might have a marginal effect on these relations; it will not fundamentally be a game changer.

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The melting waters of the Arab Spring are fast turning into an uncontrollable flood. Authoritarian regimes are being swept away and the banks look ready to burst and drown those that remain. When the flood waters finally recede there will no shortage of challenges to build a new order in the Arab world. Alas, there is no master plan here and no master builder. The Arab Spring has already marked this decade, but its definition is unclear.

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In a memorable moment in The Social Network, Mark Zuckerberg says of some rivals, who were claiming he had stolen their idea, “If they had invented Facebook, they would have invented Facebook.”  I’m inclined to say that if the Arab Spring were another 9-11, then there wasn’t a 9-11.  Events that have such enduring, widespread, and obtrusive consequences for everyday life, as well as for the preoccupations of public officials, do not occur at a rate of one per decade.

What is most striking about the consequences of the Arab Spring, at this stage, is their extraordinary uncertainty.  How many revolutions will occur, and where?  What kinds of governments will emerge?  The answers (or the process of learning the answers) could define the next decade.  On the other hand, the whole development could amount to marginal changes in 2-3 moderately important countries.

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