The Arab Spring represents a series of uprisings which had less in common with each other than its broad-brush characterization suggested and each uprising in its own way pointed to future crises born out of tribal, sectarian, or ideological rivalries. It is now apparent that the Arab Spring set off a complex milieu of prolonged crises with political process, legitimacy, and ultimately state authority itself, unraveling at their own pace inside their distinctive national contexts. A lasting impact of these transformations will be the creation of new linkages between state and non-state actors inside a region that may just be embarking on rather than seeing off the most radical period of change since the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire.
The Arab Spring - Leaderless and Directionless
Debates surrounding the Arab Spring, its causes and implications have raged for as long as the political transformations it supposedly refers to themselves. For some, the Arab Spring was an Islamic awakening - for others, a new era had dawned with an empowered youth and middle class emancipated from the ills of unaccountable government. Internationally, one group of states welcomed the Arab Spring as an opportunity while others saw in it a spiraling crisis destabilizing an entire region - by design, even. Few though questioned the correctness of the broad-brush term of Arab Spring, which conveniently sought to explain a series of complex political upheavals across a region monolithically. Aside from their general timing, each upheaval was a separate story and inertly different from political developments occurring anywhere else. Still, the temptation to explain a pan-regional geopolitical transformation through an overarching explanation and a single point of reference over-rode the far more challenging alternative of developing a more nuanced and intrinsic understanding to each development within their distinctive socio-political contexts.
The most damaging result of those impulses was to fall into the trap of believing that the trajectories of each country affected by the Arab Spring flowed in the same direction - a direction that had been pre-determined as being positive for all. However, as ruling regimes were overthrown, each uprising fragmented into the myriad of socio-political forces that comprised them - each with its own identity, narrative, and aspirations to fill the political vacuum they had engineered. Amidst the frenzy of political changes occurring, the long-term ramifications of the tribal, sectarian, and ideological ruptures rapidly being brought into play drew less attention than was warranted. As a non-homogenous spectrum of political forces and tastes congregated under a temporary cause, the gaping absence of a unified leadership, refined political agenda, or future roadmap to address national challenges pointed to future crises in political process, legitimacy and, ultimately, with state authority itself. Those crises have now emerged into the foreground and are set to impact the role and viability of the nation-state around the region in no uncertain terms.
Prolonged Crises in Political Process, Legitimacy and State Authority
Reformists and traditionalists were quickly overshadowed in street and voting power by Islamists in Tunisia and Egypt. With credibility among their own supporters the priority, ideological loyalties repeatedly trumped considerations on building broader political consensus for the new Islamist governments. The mantra of political engagement had limited impact, but also carried limited risks in the context of domestic realpolitik where the focus was placed firmly on enacting constitutional amendments and a state-wide consolidation of power by Islamists. Alienated political opponents began to reject the political process itself that brought and would now sustain Islamists in office. As the Muslim Brotherhood sought to regenerate a relapsing system based on their own ideological convictions, with limited constitutional alternatives available to them the opposition adopted a strategy of confrontation -still hoping to trigger a military coup d'état by creating civil unrest and government paralysis. The opposition strategy is however shortsighted as Islamists could begin reacting to assaults on their mandate with less restraint, and because any military intervention would be both reluctant and unable to sustain for long.
