The Failure of Realism: Diagnosis Without Any Prescription

These two posts by Melanie Phillips on the situation in Egypt are very useful. Clarifying, even. They merit a response not because it’s Melanie and she’s a neighbour but because she publishes a view that’s more widely held than you might think if you only consulted the broadsheets and the BBC. It may, I think, be summarised as: Barack Obama is throwing Mubarak under the bus and we’ll soon have Tehran on the Nile.

A lot of people believe this or fear it the most probable outcome. They may, alas, be proven right. I’m struck, however, by their certainty that the Muslim Brotherhood will soon be running Egypt and, furthermore, that the Muslim Brotherhood in power will behave and speak in just the way it has in opposition. Perhaps this too will prove the case. There are, despite what Melanie implies, very few people (“dhimmi dummies” or not) who expect a “western-style” liberal democracy to emerge in full flower in Egypt. On the contrary, most of the optimists are cautious (and their optimism is relative) and careful to stress the unknowns, acknowledging that any number of outcomes are possible. Some of them are better, for us and more importantly for Egypt, than others. The pessimists are convinced hell is upon us and cannot be avoided. Unless we support Hosni Mubarak and find a way to keep him in power.

Still, let’s begin where we agree. Melanie writes:

There is no doubt that, in large measure because of the mainly subterranean debate that has been taking place within the Arab and Muslim world as a result of events on and since 9/11, there are powerful yearnings there for democracy and human rights and for an end to the tyranny and oppression under which the inhabitants of such places generally live.

True. But she then adds:

The unhappy fact is, however, that in Egypt and Tunisia and elsewhere  in the Arab world where ferment is growing against the tyranny of their regimes, the crucial infrastructure of the rule of law, independent judges and police, free press and so on that are the necessary precondition of democracy just don’t exist.

As a result, when tyrants there fall the outcome is generally not the emergence of a free society but a tyranny far worse even than the one that has fallen – an Islamic theocracy.

There’s some truth to this too. However this is a diagnosis with no prescription for a cure. How, at this stage, is Egypt supposed to develop the vital institutions that support civil society without overthrowing Mubarak’s regime? How much worth should anyone attach to any promise by the regime that it will begin the reform process? It’s too late. The game is up and, for better or for worse, Egypt faces a Big Bang moment (figuratively, I trust). This makes the process more difficult and more dangerous but what, again, is the alternative?

To insist upon all these pillars of the open society being present before there’s anything approaching democracy is, wittingly or not, to say that there can never be any kind of democracy anywhere in the muslim middle east. Ideally they would be there but it’s hard to imagine the present Egyptian regime committing to the reforms needed to build this infrastructure. It’s surely too late for that. Which is one reason why Ayman Nour’s call for a constitutional convention of all parties offers a better way forward.

Next:

Through the tyrannical measures which have caused him to become so hated, Mubarak has suppressed the Muslim Brothers – but only just. The nightmare has always been what will happen when Mubarak departs the stage – a development that Obama actually appears to be trying to accelerate, having belatedly discovered the attractions of promoting democracy in the Arab world at the very moment that the Islamists are poised to take control. This is but the latest astoundingly inept or malign action by Obama against the interests of America and the west.

The logic of this position, again, is that Mubarak must be supported until the conditions for any kind of democratic reform are more favourable. But, as mentioned above, this in turn is subject to a set of qualifying criteria that are extremely unlikely to be met and that are actually, perhaps, impossible to meet. So where does that leave us?

As for the notion that Obama has “discovered the attractions of promoting democracy in the Arab world” (belatedly or not), well, this is something that will be news to his critics on both right and left. There has been some occasional talk but little action. See Leon Wieseltier for more on this.

In her next post Melanie’s position offers a usefully pure distillation of “Realism”:

Political commentators in Israel have apparently expressed shock at how the United States as well as its major European allies appear to be ready to dump Egypt’s President Mubarak, the west’s principal strategic ally of three decades in the Middle East. This is indeed astounding. Sure, Mubarak is a tyrant – but if anyone thinks that the current upheavals will lead to a kinder, gentler, freer Egypt they must be out to lunch. Just because the demonstrators on the streets of Cairo are young and are on Twitter and Facebook is no guarantee that this upheaval will result in greater freedom for anyone.

True, but again there is no guarantee that it won’t and nor is there a guarantee that the Muslim Brotherhood will replace Mubarak (should he fall). There really isn’t. The fact that the Brothers are the best organised opposition group under a dictatorship does not mean they must be the best organised group in a post-dictator scenario. That may prove the case but it’s not certain this will be so.

Let’s suppose this view proves correct, however. Are there any credible grounds for supposing that a Muslim Brotherhood government is capable of addressing the economic and demographic pressures that have contributed mightily to this present crisis? Will the Brothers really be able to offer Egypt’s young a better future? Can they ease the pressures on an over-stretched education system, unlock economic growth for all and reduce unemployment? Given that such a government would surely rely upon patronage and cronyism, it is difficult to see how it can address the frustrations and needs that have brought Egypt to this present, overdue, crisis. Should that be the case then a Brotherhood-led Egypt might be seen as a staging post along the way to something closer to what we might hope to emerge this time not next time.

Again, that will be difficult and pose many challenges to just about everyone. Again, however, and despite the realists’ certainty a Muslim Brotherhood takeover is not inevitable not least since it is a minority enthusiasm itself and because, as I say and have said, it makes little sense to swap one regime incapable of meeting aspirations for another, equally incapable, regime. Nevertheless there is a case for arguing that nothing will better prove fundamentalism’s failure than government. That has been the Iranian experience at any rate even if, alas, that failure is not yet complete nor consigned to the history books.

Melanie offers a grim conclusion:

el Baradei is being described by the dhimmi dummies of the western media as a ‘moderate’, and the Obamites are reportedly looking upon him with favour. This is astounding. If Egypt Islamises, Jordan is next – and both will turn into Iran/Gaza in a matter of a few years. Yet Obama’s desertion of Mubarak, effectively fuelling the frenzy on the streets of Egypt, is helping bring that about. And even if the Mubarak regime survives this turmoil, Jordan, Saudi and the rest have now seen that America cannot be relied upon. That in itself will have dire consequences in pushing these countries towards accommodating the region’s perceived ‘strong horse’ that Obama’s treacherous folly is making ever stronger – Iran.

The west’s reaction to this crisis shows how moral confusion has rotted its collective brain. When the people of Lebanon made their genuine pitch for democracy, which would have helped in the defence of the free world, the west was totally indifferent. When the people of Iran made their genuine pitch for democracy, which would have helped in the defence of the free world, the west was totally indifferent. But when the Egyptians look like they may be about to repeat the pattern of the 1979 Iranian revolution and bring about another Islamic theocracy which would further threaten the free world, the west cheers them on.

Madness.

Again, I’m not concerned with Melanie but with the argument and the reasoning here. I’m not persuaded by this argument. In the first place it’s credulous for any country anywhere and at just about any time in history to rely upon a “great power”. Secondly, these countries’ own interests, independent of US support, lie in frustrating Iran’s meddling ambitions. Of course that could change were there to be a series of Islamist revolutions. Even so, this line of argument depends too much, I hazard, upon the notion that the muslim world and even muslim extremists are a monolithic entity.

Furthermore, if ElBaradei, whatever his flaws, is not a “moderate” and just another Muslim Brotherhood stooge or fellow-traveller then what you’re saying is that there are no meaningful differences between any of the people with any chance of leading any muslim country at any point in the foreseebale future. This is another counsel of despair that traps us, demanding we support appalling regimes at any cost. In the short to medium to long term this can surely only increase resentment and encourage the very extremism it’s designed to thwart.

Nor am I wholly persuaded by the Iran comparison. The west kept pretty quiet during 2009’s post-election protests because keeping quiet was the best way of helping the protestors. Speaking out more forcefully would have made life even more difficult for the protestors. They would have been even more easily caricatured as western stooges than was the case anyway. People can certainly disagree with this view and perhaps more fine words would have been a good thing even if, alas, it’s hard to see how they would have helped the opposition. Nevertheless, perhaps we – London, Paris, Washington – should have said and where possible, even on the margins, done more.

Still, I hope the person who wrote this in June 2009 won’t mind being quoted here:

People say the crumbling of the Soviet Union is not comparable because the situation in the Muslim world is very different. So it is. But certain things are not so different – indeed, they are constant the world over. Such as the fact that the yearning for freedom is a human given and it is unstoppable. And the fact that appeasement of tyranny always leads to worse; and that if those who are fighting for freedom are properly supported, they have a much better chance of winning.

This, the author lamented, has been:

One of the greatest explosions of the desire for freedom by a subject people in our time, and all the west did was to sit on its hands while making eyes at the oppressors.

Fine words and a noble sentiment just as true in Egypt today as it was in Iran then and still is now. The author of these lines? Melanie Phillips.

(Now this isn’t quite fair since Melanie believes, persuasively, that toppling the Mullahs will help ease tensions while toppling Mubarak could, by her analysis, increase them. Nevertheless, a post-mullah Iran is likely to be a proudly nationalistic state and so, in whatever form it takes, is a post-Mubarak Egypt. It may well be a difficult and messy and sometimes dangerous place. But those risks are I think, on balance, worth it and preferable to the risks of supporting Mubarak and the failed “stability” of the status quo.)

Meanwhile, elsewhere in the Spectator blogosphere’s broad kirk, Martin Bright has more.