The Arab Quarter Century - NYT

The future of Islam and the future of the individual Arab nations blend together into what he characterises as  a “clash within a civilisation” rather than a clash of civilisations. Certainly when the revolutions which toppled dictators in Tunisia,Egypt and Libya reflected the fall of communism and rthe Berlin wall in 1989. Whilst east and west Germany are still at different levels economically  they are unquestionably united and the former eastern block countries are nation states which are now facing the economic crisis in the eurozone but for the most part they are not divided.

Friedman points out that the dictatorships in North Africa brought stability at the cost of their populations: half the women in Egypt cannot read he points out.In East Germany and most of the communist states education levels were high despite the repression, but not in the Arab World. The Arab youth who sought to overturn the tyranny which denied them jobs and a future found their revolutionary aspirations betrayed by the Islamists who took over their revolution and turned it to their own ends.

He is surprised by the incompetence of the Muslim Brotherhood but the islamists do not have the experience to repair their economies and the more extreme want no truck with western institutions like the IMF and the World Bank.Everytime the Brotherhood had a chance to act in a mature and democratic way it chose to act in a divisive sectarian manner in an effort to grab more power rather than to govern democratically.Infact there is a reall question as to whether there is any interest in democracy at all other than the interchange between islamist groups.

The second factor he raises is the woeful inability of the secular opposition to unite and achieve a clear sense of direction or positive political development. They are just as lost as the Islamists. instead of boycotting elections the secular opposition  should participate to gain political experience and a sense of a shared objective. They know what they are against: the previous dictatorial regime and the islamists but theyhave no clear programme of their own.

America should, he says, encourage  democratic constitutional rules, regular elections and political openness. The trouble is that the United States and the West has been discredited by their support for Ben Ali,Mubarak and Gaddafi. The Arab youth will not forget this,so that, what it encourages it may find deters the young. The Arab world has to find its own way forward and the disposed youth have to find their futurewithout returning to more dictatorship of one sort or another which seems to be the curse of the Arab World.