Arab Spring

This article consists of: - the summary below; a chronology of main events; notes on individual national movements; a catalogue of major personalities, and notes on the international response.

The term Arab Spring (also known as the "Arab Awakening") refers to the sequence of protest movements that started in Tunisia in December 2010. The protests there, and subsequently in other Arab countries, were intended to put an end to government oppression, corruption and incompetence. They have led to the overthrow of existing regimes in Egypt and in Libya as well as in Tunisia, and to the initiation in those countries of transitional plans that include the election of representative assemblies and the adoption of new constitutions. Major protest movements in Syria and in Yemen have so far been frustrated by governmental violence, and protest movements elsewhere in the Arab world have achieved little more than promises of minor reforms.

Background: the Arab condition

The political structures of nearly all of the countries involved in the Arab uprisings have been categorised as authoritarian (with Syria, Libya and Saudi Arabia ranking among the 15 least democratic countries), and the governments of five of them have been categorised as exceptionally corrupt (Morocco, Egypt, Algeria, Libya and Yemen appear among the upper half in the ranking of Transparency International's Corruption Perception Index) . Their populations are predominately ethnically Arab with small native Berber minorities. They include two mixed oil economies (Algeria and Libya); three oil economies (Bahrain, Oman and Saudi Arabia); six diversified economies (Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Syria and Tunisia); and one primary export economy (Yemen). The oil-producing countries of Oman, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Libya are among the world's more prosperous countries, but the prosperity of each of the others is below, or well below the world average in terms of GDP per head, with Syria ranking 153rd out of a total of 228. At least 19% of the Arab population lived below the poverty line at the end of the 1990s (according to an estimate based upon data from Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, Tunisia and Yemen,.)

The development of national protest movements

Protesters in Tunisia and in Egypt succeeded within a few months in ousting their governments, and regime change was achieved in Libya after eight months of civil war. The governments of Morocco, Algeria, Jordan and Oman responded to more limited protests with promises of political and constitutional reform. In Saudi Arabia the administration sought to avoid confrontation by a programme of infrastructure investment, and its forces were used to suppress dissent in Bahrain. Political instability in Lebanon inhibited governmental response to demonstrations for constitutional change. In Yemen and in Syria, continuing protests were frustrated by violent military opposition.

The processes of creating democratically-elected governments now dominate the situations in Tunisia and Libya, and in Egypt they are being accompanied by sporadic demonstrations against the behaviour of its transitional military government. The transitional process in Libya may be hampered by the need to disarm its local militias. The undeterred vigour of the protest movements in Syria and Yemen suggests a continuing prospect of democratic transition. Elswhere in the Arab Spring countries, the prospects appear to be limited to partial relaxations of authoritarian governance.

Civil war in Libya

In mid-February 2011, government forces opened fire on demonstrators in the Libyan second city of Benghazi. A bitter conflict ensued in which the rebels took control of the city. The government responded with an aerial bombardment that caused thousands of casualties. There was international outrage at the brutality of its actions and, on 18th March, the United Nations Security Council responded to the Arab League's request for the imposition of a no-fly zone with a resolution that authorised member states to to take all necessary measures to protect civilians under threat of attack. In the course of the following week, air attacks by US, British and French and other NATO aircraft destroyed the Libyan air force. In the following months there developed a civil war between government forces based in Tripoli in the west of Libya and rebel forces based in Benghazi in the east. After six months of fighting with continuing NATO air support, rebel forces entered Tripoli, then the principal government-held city. Fierce fighting continued after the fall of Tripoli, however, until the fall of the remaining government-held town of Sirte and the killing of Colonel Gaddafi in October 2011.

International reactions

There is no evidence of non-Arab influences upon the Arab Spring uprisings, and every indication that they came as a sudden surprise to all who were not directly involved. (Among the explanations for the rapid spread of the protest movement from its origin in Tunis, Amnesty International has suggested that the leaks of candid diplomatic cables by the whistleblower organization WikiLeaks served as a trigger for the uprising.) There were supportive reactions from many western governments, however, and in May, the G8 countries promised $20bn (£12bn) of loans and aid to Tunisia and Egypt over the following two years and suggested more would be available if the countries continued on the path to democracy. However, there was no support for active participation until the news of Libyan air force attacks upon the areas held by rebels. Expressions of condemnation were followed by calls for protective action.

The main support for military intervention came from the governments of the United States, France and Britain, but a crucial factor was an Arab League recommendation to the United Nations for a no-fly zone. The Libya resolutions 1970 and 1973 that were subsequently passed by the Security Council have been described as "the most wide-ranging that it had passed for more than 20 years".

The European Council later declared its commitment to "the full implementation" of Security Council Resolutions, but there was also opposition to military intervention, even from within the European Union. There was opposition by Germany and reluctant participation by Italy. Among other reactions was the condemnation of the UN resolution on Libya as comparable to "medieval calls for crusades" by Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin (repudiated, however, by President Dmitry Medvedev). NATO air strikes were also condemned by the governments of China, Venezuela and Cuba.. However, Libya's National Transition Council has since been almost universally recognised as the legitimate government of Libya.

Political and constitutional change

While there is little evidence that any of the protest movements had a predominately religious motivation, it is likely that religious organisations will influence the political and constitutional changes that are to follow. In several Arab Spring countries a variety of religiously-motivated political parties, collectively referred to as Islamist, are set to be opposed by a spectrum of secularist groups. In the Tunisian election of October 2011, a single Islamist party gained more assembly seats than any other party, but the majority of seats were shared among its four secularist opponents. In Egypt, there is one dominant Islamist party , at least six other Islamic parties (of which one is Sufist and two are Salafist), and at least ten secularist parties. In Libya, the process of forming political parties may be expected to follow the end of the civil war, in preparation for the election of a constitutional council and the parliamentary elections that are to follow.