TRANSITION, TRANSFORMATION,
AND DEMOCRATISATION IN THE
MENA REGION
Professor Christian W Haerpfer
President of World Values Survey Association-WVSA
First Chair of Politics
Department of Politics and International Relations
University of Aberdeen
Director of ArabTrans ‘Political and Social
Transformations in the Arab World’ research program
15th October, 2014 – CESEDEN, Madrid
Waves of Democratisation
• First Wave:
American and French Revolutions in 18th
century until 1930
• Second Wave:
Post Second World War 1945 – 1967
• Third Wave:
1968 – 2009 Southern Europe, Post-Communist
Europe and Post-Soviet Eurasia
• Forth Wave:
2010 - * MENA Region & Asia
Third Wave of Democratisation
• Commencement:
Youth Revolution of May 1968
• First sub-wave:
Portugal, Spain, Greece in early 1970’s
• Democratization in post-communist Europe:
1989 – 2009
• 20 years of political transformation
Third Wave of Democratisation
• November 1989: Start of democratization in
Central and South-East Europe
• January 1992: Beginning of democratization
in Eastern Europe and collapse of Soviet
Union
Forth Wave of Democratisation
• December, 2010: Beginning of protests in
Tunisia & Algeria
• 2011-2014: Protests and uprisings in Tunisia,
Morocco, Egypt, Algeria, Jordan, Lebanon,
Kuwait, Yemen; civil war & disorder in
Libya, Syria, Bahrain, Iraq
• 2014: Authoritarian regimes overthrown in
Tunisia,
Libya,
Egypt
&
Yemen;
governmental changes introduced in
Jordan, Oman, Iraq, Kuwait, Morocco; ongoing changes in most of MENA countries
Figure 4.2 Emergence of democracies, 1800-1998
Waves of Democratization
80
70
60
50
N 40
30
20
10
0
1800
1820
1840
1860
1880
1900
1920
1940
1960
1980
2000
Year
Source: Based on Jaggers and Gurr (1996).
Note: Countries scoring 8 and higher on the Polity III scale are coded as democratic.
= ‘positive’ conjuncture
= ‘negative’ conjuncture
= ‘mixed’ conjuncture
Global Distribution of Political Regimes, 1972-2012
Distribution of Political Regimes in MENA, 1972-2012
Democracy in World Regions
Figure 5.1 Mean level of democracy by world regions, 1972-2004
10
5
Mean
POLITY IV
score
0
-5
-10
1972 1974 1976 1978 1980 1982 1984 1986 1988 1990 1992 1994 1996 1998 2000 2002 2004
Year
World region
∆ North America, western Europe, and Oceania
□ Latin America and Caribbean
+ Soviet/communist bloc
○ Asia
0 Sub-Saharan Africa
x Middle East and North Africa
Stages of Democratisation
Stage 1: Decline of Ancient Regime
• Stagnation and decline between 2000 and
2010
Stages of Democratisation
Stage 2: Liberalisation of Ancient Regime
• Perestroika and Glasnost in Soviet Union 1985
– 1991
• Attempts of liberalisation in Jordan, Morocco
Stages of Democratisation
Stage 3: Regime Transition
• Non-violent transition in Tunisia, Egypt
• Violent transition in Iraq, Syria, Libya
Stages of Democratisation
Stage 4:
• Creation / Birth of new political regime,
mostly a ‘new democracy’
• Triple transition of society, economy and
politics
Stages of Democratisation
Stage 5:
• Consolidation of new and partial democracy
towards a full and complete democracy
Dynamics of Democratisation
Path 1:
From new democracy towards consolidated
democracy
• Tunisia
Dynamics of Democratisation
Path 2:
• From new democracy towards ‘Electoral
Democracy’
• Jordan, Algeria, Morocco
Dynamics of Democratisation
Path 3:
• From new
Democracy
Autocracy’
• Egypt
democracy
towards
via Electoral
‘Competitive
Dynamics of Democratisation
Path 4:
• From new democracy via Competitive
Autocracy towards ‘Full Autocracy’
• ???
Dynamics of Democratisation
• Path 1: New democracy towards
consolidated democracy
• Path 2: New democracy towards electoral
democracy
• Path 3: New democracy towards
competitive autocracy
• Path 4: From new democracy towards full
autocracy
Levels of Democratisation
• Level 1: consolidated democracy – Tunisia
• Level 2: electoral democracy – Morocco,
Algeria, Libya, Iraq, Jordan
• Level 3: competitive autocracy – Egypt
• Level 4: full autocracy – Saudi Arabia
Transformation and Democratisation
• Democratization = open process of political
transformation, not an inevitable and
necessary transition towards democracy
• Democratization can lead to democracy but
also to autocracy and hybrid political
regimes
Transition and Democratisation
• Transition = Stage 3 of Democratization
• Regime from non-democratic regime to
democratic regime
• Transition is not automatic historical process
towards democracy and free market economy
• Transition is not the ‘end of history’ (F. Fukuyama)
• Transition is not blind and automatic process
towards full democracy
• Transition = Stage 3 of Transformation within the
process of Democratization
Three Processes of Transformation on Three levels
Field of
Transformation
Process of
Transformation
Level of
Transformation
a. Macro-level
b. Meso-level
c. Micro-level
Political Regime
Social System
Civil Society
Democratisation
Social
modernisation
Development of
civil society
Political System
Social System
Civic System
Political
institutions and
parties
Social
institutions and
factors
Political
activities
Social activities
Citizens and
voters
Social actors and
households,
Social networks
families
Civic institutions
(Media, Trades
Unions,
Churches)
Forms of public
participation,
NGOs
Future of Democracy
Countries in open-ended democratization
processes:
•
•
•
•
Tunisia
Egypt
Libya
Syria
Elections in Tunisia 2011
Importance of Politics for personal life
(Percentage ‘Very Important’ & ‘Important; source: WVS-6)
#
Country
%
1
Egypt
75%
2
Bahrain
70%
3
Qatar
67%
4
Kuwait
59%
5
Libya
57%
6
Palestine
50%
7
Lebanon
47%
8
Yemen
44%
9
Jordan
40%
10
Iraq
42%
11
Tunisia
40%
12
Algeria
39%
13
Morocco
16%
TOTAL MENA AVERAGE
51%
Interest in Politics
(Percentage ‘Very interested’ & ‘Interested’; source: WVS-6)
#
Country
%
1
Egypt
74%
2
Qatar
69%
3
Bahrain
65%
4
Kuwait
61%
5
Palestine
60%
6
Libya
59%
7
Lebanon
54%
8
Yemen
49%
9
Iraq
47%
10
Tunisia
42%
11
Jordan
39%
12
Algeria
36%
13
Morocco
15%
TOTAL MENA AVERAGE
52%
Assessments of Democracy
(MEANS according to scale from 1 to 10 where “1” is the lowest mark
and “10” – the highest; source: WVS-6)
#
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
Country
Jordan
Algeria
Lebanon
Yemen
Iraq
Egypt
Palestine
Libya
Morocco
Tunisia
Bahrain
Kuwait
Qatar
MENA AVERAGE
Importance
of democracy
8,29
8,12
8,00
8,49
7,95
8,95
7,78
8,13
8,49
8,46
7,22
8,17
8,33
How democratically
is country today
6,69
5,79
5,76
5,08
4,58
4,58
4,46
4,31
4,29
3,92
N/A
N/A
N/A
8,19
4,90
Thank you for your attention!
Christian W Haerpfer
c.w.haerpfer@abdn.ac.uk
www.arabtrans.eu