'Arab Spring' reduction
hits N Africa By Ramzy
Baroud
A
discourse can be described as reductionist if it
selectively tailors its reading of subject matter
in such a way as to only yield desired outcomes,
leaving little or no room for other inquiries, no
matter how appropriate or relevant.
The
so-called Arab Spring, now far removed from its
initial meanings and aspirations, has become just
that: a breeding ground for narratives solely
aimed at advancing political agendas which are
deeply entrenched with regional and international
involvement.
When despairing Tunisian
street vendor Mohamed Bouazizi set himself on fire
on December 17, 2010, he ignited more than a mere
revolution in his country. His excruciating death
gave birth to a notion that the psychological
expanses between despair and
hope, death and rebirth and
between submissiveness and revolutions are
ultimately connected.
His act, regardless
of what adjective one may use to describe it, was
the very key that Tunisians used to unlock their
ample reserve of collective power. Then-president
Zine El Abidine Ben Ali's decision to step down on
January 14, 2011, was in a sense a rational
assessment on his part if one considers the
impossibility of confronting a nation that has in
its grasp a true popular revolution.
Egypt
also revolted less than two weeks later. And it
was then that Tunisia's near-ideal revolutionary
model became prey for numerous, often selective
readings and ultimately for utter exploitation.
The Egyptian January 25 revolution was the
first Arab link between Tunisia and the upheavals
that travelled throughout Arab nations. Some were
quick to ascribe the phenomenon with all sorts of
historical, ideological and even religious
factors, making links whenever convenient and
overlooking others, however apt. Al-Jazeera's
Arabic website still has a map of all Arab
countries, with the ones experiencing
revolutionary influx marked in red.
Many
problems have arisen. What tools, aside from the
interests of the Qatari government, for example,
does Al-Jazeera use to determine how the so-called
Arab Spring manifests itself? And shouldn't there
be clear demarcations between non-violent
revolutions, foreign interventions, sectarian
tension and civil wars? Not only do the roots
and the expressions of these "revolutions" vastly
differ, but the evolvement of each experience was
almost always unique to each Arab country. In the
cases of Libya and Syria, foreign involvement (an
all-out North Atlantic Treaty Organization war in
the case of Libya and a multifarious regional and
international power play in Syria) has produced
wholly different scenarios than the ones witnessed
in Tunisia and Egypt, thus requiring an
significantly different course of analysis.
Yet despite the repeated failure of the
unitary "Arab Spring" discourse, many politicians,
intellectuals and journalists continue to borrow
from its very early logic. Books have already been
written with reductionist titles, knitting linear
stories, bridging the distance between Tunis and
Sanaa into one sentence and one line of reasoning.
The "Arab Spring" reductionism isn't
always sinister, motivated by political
convenience or summoned by neo-imperialist
designs. Existing pan-Arab or pan-Islamic
narratives however well-intended they may be, have
also done their fair share of misrepresenting
whichever discourse their intellectuals may find
fitting and consistent with their overall ideas.
Some denote the rise of a new pan-Arab
nation, while others see the "spring" as a
harbinger of the return of Islam as a source of
power and empowerment for Arab societies. The fact
is, while discourses are growing more rigid
between competing political and intellectual
camps, Arab countries marked by Al-Jazeera's
editorial logic seem to head in their own separate
paths, some grudgingly towards a form of democracy
or another, while others descend into a Hobbesian
"state of nature" - a war of all against all.
But reductionist discourses persist,
despite their numerous limitations. They endure
because some are specifically designed to serve
the interests of certain governments - some with
clear ambitions and simply trying to ride the
storm. In the case of Syria, not a single country
that is somehow a party in the conflict can claim
innocence in a gory game of regional politics,
where the price tag is the blood of tens of
thousands of Syrians.
Western media
continues to lead the way in
language-manipulation, all with the aim of
avoiding obvious facts. When necessary it
misconstrues reality altogether. US media in
particular remains oblivious to how the fallout of
the NATO war in Libya had contributed to the
conflict in Mali - which progressed from a
military coup early last year, to a civil war and
as of present time an all-out French-led war
against Islamic and other militant groups in the
northern parts of the country.
Mali is not
an Arab country, thus doesn't fit into the
carefully molded discourse. Algeria is however.
Thus when militants took dozens of Algerian and
foreign workers hostage in the Ain Amenas natural
gas plant in retaliation of Algeria's opening of
its airspace to French warplanes in their war on
Mali, some labored to link the violence in Algeria
to the Arab Spring. "Taken together, the attack on
the US embassy in Benghazi, Libya, the Islamist
attacks on Mali, and now this Algerian offense,
all point to north Africa as the geopolitical
hotspot of 2013 - where the Arab Spring has
morphed into the War On Terror," wrote Christopher
Helman, in Forbes, on January 18.
How
convenient such an analysis is, especially when
"taken together." The "Arab Spring" logic is
constantly stretched in such ways to suit the
preconceived understanding, interests or even
designs of Western powers. For example, it is now
conventional media wisdom that the US is wary of
full involvement in Syria because of the deadly
attack on the US embassy in Benghazi.
When
seen from Washington, the Arab region appears less
compound and is largely understood through
keywords and phrases, allocated between allies and
enemies, Islamists and liberals and by knee jerk
reactions to anything involving Israel or Iran.
One only needs to compare media texts
produced two years ago, with more recent ones.
Whereas the first few months of 2011 were mostly
concerned with individuals and collectives that
had much in common with Mohamed Bouazizi - poor,
despairing, disenfranchised, and eventually
rebellious - much of the present text is concerned
with a different type of discussion.
Additionally there are almost entirely new
players. The Bouazizis of Tunis, Egypt and Yemen
remain unemployed, but they occupy much less space
in our newspapers and TV screens. Now we speak of
Washington and London-based revolutionaries. We
juxtapose US and Russian interests and we wrangle
with foreign interventions and barefacedly
demarcate conflicts based on sectarian divisions.
"Arab awakening is only just beginning",
was the title of a Financial Times editorial of
December 23. Its logic and subtext speak of a
sinister interpretation of what were once
collective retorts to oppression and
dictatorships.
"The fall of the Assads
will be a strategic setback to Iran and its
regional allies such as Hezbollah, the Shia
Islamist state within the fragile Lebanese state,"
the editorial read. "But that could quickly be
reversed if Israel were to carry out its threats
to attack Iran's nuclear installations, enabling
Tehran's theocrats to rally disaffected Muslims
across the region and strengthen their grip at
home. It is easy to imagine how such a conflict
would drag in the US, disrupt the Gulf and its oil
traffic, and set fire to Lebanon."
Note
how in the new reading of the "Arab Spring",
people are mere pawns that are defined by their
sectarian leanings and their usefulness is in
their willingness to be rallied by one regional
power or another. While the language itself is
consistent with Western agendas in Arab and Muslim
countries, what is truly bizarre is the fact that
many still insist on contextualizing the
ever-confrontational US, Israel and Western
policies in general with an "Arab Spring"
involving a poor grocer setting himself on fire
and angry multitudes in Egypt, Yemen and Syria who
seek dignity and freedom.
Shortly after
the Tunisian uprising, some of us warned of the
fallout, if unchecked and generalized discourses
that lump all Arabs together and exploit peoples'
desire for freedom, equality and democracy were to
persist.
Alas, not only did the
reductionist discourse define the last two years
of upheaval, the "Arab Spring" has become an Arab
springboard for regional meddling and foreign
intervention.
To advance our understanding
of what is transpiring in Arab and other countries
in the region, we must let go of old definitions.
A new reality is now taking hold and it is neither
concerned with Bouazizi nor of the many millions
of unemployed and disaffected Arabs.
Ramzy Baroud
(www.ramzybaroud.net) is an
internationally-syndicated columnist and the
editor of PalestineChronicle.com. His latest book
is: My Father was A Freedom Fighter: Gaza's
Untold Story (Pluto Press).
Head
Office: Unit B, 16/F, Li Dong Building, No. 9 Li Yuen Street East,
Central, Hong Kong Thailand Bureau:
11/13 Petchkasem Road, Hua Hin, Prachuab Kirikhan, Thailand 77110
