Professor Huntington introduced the concept of the third wave of democratization in five phases. They are the emergence of reformers, acquiring powers, failure of liberalization, backward legitimacy and co-opting opposition. The third wave of democratization further focused through the lenses of modernization, social equality, mass mobilization and elite pact approach. According to Huntington, the third wave of democratization occurs with the emergent of opposition groups and indigenous sources against local power’s enforcement, particularly when there is a military regime, a one-party system, or an autocratic dictatorship. In these contexts, this essay examines Huntington’s five phases in the context of the Arab Spring in Egypt. Further, this essay examines whether what happened in Egypt can be considered as a common structure of the third wave of democratization by comparing the exploration of revolution in Syria.
Reviewing the brief history, the exploration of the Arab Spring kicked off in Tunisia following the suicide of Mohamed Bouazizi. The existential crisis resonated with the revolution. Protesters marched with the slogan “The people want the fall of the regime,”to build democratic societies, all the way to Egypt to finally in Syria. In the case of Egypt, the brutal death of Khaled Said by the autocratic government of Hosni Mubarak instigated reformists to rebel against the government.
According to Huntington, the first phase is the emergence of reformers. Reformers demand change from an autocratic, tyrannical regime to a democratic, transparent government. This phase encourages the public to voice for their rights through protests, which will lead toa revolution against the existing government. Revolution instigated on January 25, 2011, in Egypt subsequently evolved to overthrow the government, which was in power since 1952. The autocratic government indicted for the enactment of Emergency Law, which extended the police power, further suspended constitutional rights, including the abolishment of habeas corpus. These acts severely condemned the validity of political subjectivity and the rule of law.
The report from the U.S. State Department in Human Rights pointed out the Ministry of Interior, State Security Investigative Service (SSIS)of Egypt and the police employed torture to extract information. According to the report, police brutality shut down all civilian protection mechanisms, led to massive human rights violations. It deterred the significance of individualism, individual autonomy and social control in the name of absolute state sovereignty.
However, it is worthy to note that the former United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan comments, the state sovereignty should be the relationship of an individual to the state regarding being responsible as well as responsive. That means the sovereignty is not about the state interest, but about the interest of the individuals against state actors. Schumpeter notes that the idea of sovereignty is connected with representative governance, determined by the votes of the people by fair elections (Schumpeter, 1970). In the case of Egypt, the protestors claimed that no fair election conducted in the country since 1952. The Guardian addresses that the manipulation of election results swung in every election, while the international election monitoring groups noted the high level of corruption and coercion. Blaydes articulated that “competitive electoral authoritarianism” was in place in Egypt since Mubarak comes to power.
Cook argues the parliamentary election 2010 was the initial provocation for the protest in 2011. The opposition to the Mubarak’s government claimed that the government intervened in the electoral process and restricted the opposition party to participate in the election ,both caused political illegitimacy. The action of the president to dismiss the shadow parliament further instigated the protest, with the demands for fundamental freedom and fair and transparent election. Protesters also assembled in large numbers against the excess amount of unemployment, inequality economic status, political corruption, particularly through the Ministry of Interior, and on the monopolized steel industry.
The second phase of democratization occurs when the reformers acquire power. Huntington argues that this can happen in three formats. The first format is when the autocratic dictator dies, and the successor becomes in control with more democratic indications. For example, in Libya,the Arab spring overturned the dictatorship of Gadhafi in 2011, opened an opportunity for the first parliamentary election and to draft a new democratic constitution to be approved by referendum. The second format is the power acquisition, from dictatorial ruler through a procedural based transition, where the autocratic leader asserts the transition to avoid revolution by reformed oppositions like Portillo’s concession of power to De la Madrid in Mexico. The third format would be the transition caused by the pressure from the reformers to the existing autocratic leader, eventually, cause to resign. In Egypt, the dictatorship government of Mubarak brought up to the end through the occurrence of the third way of acquiring power. Although in the last phase of the revolution, Mubarak transferred his power to the Military Council, ordered to follow his instruction, he was driven to resign in eighteen days due to the protest by the Egyptian people. The protest indicated the strong desire of the public for the change of regime and his decision prevented further insurrection.
Following his abdication, until the new government formed through a democratic election, the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces governed Egypt. However, it is worthy to note, that according to Rabau, the role of the Supreme Council was an uncertain one. He noted that, although the people of Egypt accepted the newly drafted constitution in March 2011, there was a legitimate fear among the public of the role of the Supreme Council, whether it might have influenced the democratic election. Further, vagueness towards the role of the military, particularly after the election, brought further challenges in the democratization process in Egypt. That means the transition did not get accomplished the second phase of democratization, ‘acquisition of power by reformist.’
The third phase of democratization, according to Huntington, is the failure of liberalization. That means the existing government would make minor, temporary, superficial reforms towards liberalization to respond to the demand by international and domestic actors against economic stagnation or political autonomy. Saudi Arabia is a good example, where the existing government has conceded to give political rights to women by allowing them to vote in the elections in 2011, which was then seen as a minor reform to avoid uprisings in Saudi Arabia. Note, this approach is entirely different from the ideal theory of liberalization, genuinely anticipated by Gorbachev to save the Soviet Union from economic stagnation through glasnost and perestroika reforms.
In the context of Egypt, Mubarak developed the liberalization through economic and political reforms. In the economy, the establishment of a foreign exchange market lifted formal and informal restrictions on access to foreign exchange. It encouraged the private sector to involve in the economy and decreased the level of customs duties. Further, the introduction of the new Tax Law Act reduced personal and corporate taxes. These reforms increased the economic growth by7 % between the years 2006-2008 and Egypt was honoured as the ‘top reformers’ in the world in 2007.
Despite economic growth, these reforms did not raise the standard of living of ordinary people. The absolute poverty increased from 16.7% to 20% of the entire population. Further, 20% survived with less than $2 per day increased as 44% in 2009.The inflation rate rose to 11.49%, and the unemployment rate was over 20% in 2009. On the other hand, the illiteracy rate was 27% and the rate of underemployment of youth between the ages of 15-24, still at 24.8%.These indicate that the reforms were just superficial and benefited only the high-class people.
Political reforms also did not make any qualitative change in governance or the political system. The First Amendment of Article 76 of the Constitution was enacted to allow multi-candidates for the presidential election. Although the Amendment legally allowed other candidates to participate in the election, in reality, due to the autocratic power, no candidates were free to challenge Mubarak. Banning of Muslim Brotherhood from nominating a presidential candidate and the rejection of Talaat Sadat from participating in the election ultimately resulted in the seventh victory of Mubarak with 88.6%.
Second, the announcement about the removal of party restrictions to increase party independence was considered as another liberalization of reform. Nevertheless, in reality, the Political Parties Committee (PPC) was formed to decide the eligibility of every party to participate in the election and interestingly, the General Secretary of the National Democratic Party head by Mubarak appointed as the head of the PPC.
Third, Mubarak promised in the campaign 2005 to re-elect him, for restricting presidential power, power devolution to the parliament, for the judicial reformation and independency. Sharp mentions, it was seen as a real possibility to change the entire regime among Egyptian people; however, unsurprisingly, Mubarak was persistent in keeping the power himself after the victory. He further jailed his opponent, Ayman Nour. That election in 2005 made many criticisms at home and abroad. Larry Diamond points out that “Arab autocrats adopt the language of political reform to avoid reality.”Addressing the third phase, in reality, none of the reforms made by Mubarak attempted for real democracy in Egypt. Nevertheless, unexpectedly, they motivated the opposition to demand liberal improvement with greater desperation, ultimately reasoned for the ‘uprising’ of Egyptians.
The backward legitimacy and co-opting opposition worktogether in the third wave of democratization. The reformers invoke when they texture difficulty on rebel against the existing leadership. They then attempt to damage the legitimacy of the autocratic leader by co-opting their opposition by working together against the dictatorship. The collaboration could be taken place among political leaders, social groups, civil societies or military who wanted to reform the democratic government.
The demonstration was the initial stage to damage the legitimacy of Mubarak’s administration, conducted by the reformist. It questioned the validity of the existing government domestically but also rooted for severe policy changes and distinct perceptions against Mubarak’s administration internationally. President Barak Obama addressed on February 1, 2011, that “relinquishing power was the right decision, but the transition to a new government must begin now” clearly indicated the policy deviation since the protest had begun.
Protestors sought support from International Organisations as well as the Western States, including NATO alliances. Hillary Clinton, in her book, Hard Choices mentioned that she was consistently more cautious on taking the side of protestors based on their promise for an uncertain future over the autocratic in Egypt, but “swept away by idealism and approached swiftly to usher the regime of Mubarak.”The reformers then associated with the Egyptian military to takeover Mubarak’s regime by pointing out that the Mubarak cannot provide good governance for the country. This initiative ultimately offered no choice in Mubarak’s hand, forced him to resign after eighteen days of protest.
The above- analysis shows how Huntington’s five phases of democratization were put forward with the understanding of what has happened in the Arab Spring. However, the question arises that are these phases typical in every revolution, particularly in other Arab Springs. To examine this section of the essay compares the revolution in Egypt with the uprising in Syria. The purpose of this comparison is to understand common structures and virtual differences, which may lead to the conception of pseudo- democratization.
Mubarak received support from domestic and international actors throughout his regime until the reformist started to protest for the liberalization of reform. He maintained excellent economic and political relationships with regional powers and others, including Israel and the United States of America. Tony Karon comments, along with the falls of Mubarak, “a central pillar of U.S. regional strategy has become an untenable ruler.” However, after the revolution, those states were pushed to turn against Mubarak, particularly after they understood the fall of the Mubarak regime is inevitable. Although the marginal group supported the government of Mubarak to protect their prime economic, social and political positions, the religious groups, including the Muslim Brotherhood, supported the revolution. It found lately that the support of the Muslim Brotherhood was not to build a democratic Egypt, but for a Sharia Egypt.
On the other hand, although the military helped the revolution, their view was to build a powerful Egypt through the powerful army – not to transfer the power to the civil government. This complexity in priority created an unbalanced situation in Egypt for the democratic transition. Further, the external actors who played a critical role in the revolution, including the United States and European Union adopted, “wait and see” approach, headed an unlikely situation for an emergent of democracy in Egypt in the near future.
Considering the situation in Syria, Assad gained support from the same kind of groups who supported Mubarak. However, the situation varied in Syria since the military throughout the process of uprising supported the Assad regime like the military supported the government of Gadhafi in Libya. Further, the reformers in Syria were not the majorities as in Egyptian insurgency; they are middle class, oppressed Kurds. Professor Humphrey articulates the war in Syria is a “proxy war” in the default position. He addressed the proxy war undermined the diplomatic approaches, and the events turned from humanitarianism towards international security when Syria used chemical weapons.
On the other hand, although international democratic actors called Assad for resignation, they could not intervene or support the reformers directly as they have occurred in Libya due to the failure of the United Nations Security Council resolution and diplomacy. Hence, the only options that were available for the international community were to bring up international economic and travel sanctions against Syria. Assad’s step down would have been possible only if the military supported the reformers. However, even if Assad would have stepped down, such an event exclusively would not have provided a solid ground to the rising of democracy if the transition period could have been long enough to open for new conflicts as in Egypt. Such events would have led Syria to get in another civil war, rather than turning into democracy.
It brings to the conclusion that although the reformers fight against autocratic governments such as in Egypt, for sustainable democratic governance, finding the root for the anti-democratic system in the past, the expansion and the institutional transformation in political and economic arenas are significant. The individual freedom, transparent election, competitive political parties and vigorous civil societies are the backbones to democratization, thus for a democratic society, ensuring such fundamentals are significant. Huntington’s five phases of democracy might be the start-up to think and evaluate the third wave of democratization in countries like Egypt and Syria. However, that cannot be the only tool to evaluate every democratization that occurred since the beginning of the Arab Spring.
