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The Tragedy Of Lebanon Is That Sectarian Identities Are Central Both To The State’s Foundations And To Their Collapse’. Discuss With Reference To The Civil War And The Post-ta`if Era.

Politics of the Middle East, Sectarianism, Sunni, Shia, Political Factions, Political Theory, International Relations, Politics, Asia and Africa

Date : 05/01/2020

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Haasan

Uploaded by : Haasan
Uploaded on : 05/01/2020
Subject : Politics

Sectarian identities have been viewed as fundamental as part of Lebanon, and especially in the light of the civil war. Firstly to define sectarian identities or sectarianism, a sectarian is: (a person) strongly supporting a particular religious group, especially in such a way as not to be willing to accept other beliefs 1 Sectarianism would be an extension of this and this definition according to the Cambridge dictionary should be something to bear in mind in regards to the situation in Lebanon.

The area of Lebanon has long been a refuge for religious minorities, seeking to escape into the mountains which accounts for its high amount of diversity of religious groups and sects. Under the Ottoman rule the main political players were the Maronite Christians and the Druze. But when the French mandate was established it was expanded to create Greater Lebanon in order to create a viable state as the Maronites felt the area too small and vulnerable without the coastal cities and fertile hinterland,2 this led to a greater diversity of religious groups and Lebanon became a composite of many large and small religious groups. 3

At this time roughly half the population were Christian and half belonging to Islam, these were divided into further divisions with Catholic Maronite, Greek, Armenian and Syrian and eastern Orthodox divided into Greek, Armenian and Syrian. 4

The Muslims on the other hand were also divided into the Sunni and Shi`a, in addition to the large minority of Druze, who with heterodox beliefs would be hard to place within the Muslim community. 5

Under the rule of the Ottomans, religious confessions were part of the state with the millet system whereby the different communities such as Christians would manage its own affairs, the Druze and Shi`a as heterodox Muslims were under Sunni law, but in practice living in the mountains they had as much autonomy as their neighbours. 6

It shows that under the Ottoman empire in the region of Lebanon, the idea of communal identity was built into the political structure.

However it also has to be noted that in discussing sectarianism in Lebanon, political identities also played a role in addition to religion. For example communism was identified by the Russophile Greek Orthodox, the Druze with socialism, liberalism with Maronites and Pan-Arabism with the Sunni Muslims, thus adding a different dimension to sectarianism. 7

Under the French mandate from 1920 it inherited the system of confessional law in terms marriage, divorce and inheritance but also maintained confessional representation in the parliament, in 1943 when it became independent it kept the system with the presidency reserved for a Maronite and the assembly with a ratio of 6 Christians to 5 Muslims. 8

In addition because each religious community had the ability to administer law, each Lebanese for legal reasons had to belong to a confession. 9

However the idea of Lebanon as a state was first put forward by the Maronite community during the mid 19th century with their ideology of the mountain , Mount Lebanon and a state with the co-operation of the Sunni elites and the Druze. 10

But the ideas for the identity of the state differed, with the Maronites wishing for a non-Islamic, non-Arabic and Hellenistic identity, looking back into the mythology of the Pheonicians for their identity, while the Muslims took a different stance and looked to the ideals of Pan-Arabism. 11

Both agreed that Lebanon should be a liberal, democratic republic, non-aligned and independent, but it was to be the communal identity of the state which led to disagreements. 12

The solution was to compromise with the 1943 National Pact, Lebanon was given an Arab face but no clear identity, but it was not to become part of the greater Arab nation nor an eastern

bridge-head of the Christian west, it was not an exclusive homeland for the Maronites and Christians but also not an Arab country for the Sunni Muslims. 13

The National Pact of 1943 also institutionalised the confessional system with the allocation of places in the parliament, judicial and administrative positions by confession, according to Article 95, which also continued with the 6 Christians to 5 Muslims ratio in parliament. This was based on the size of the communities from the 1935 census, the last official census to be conducted. 14

Some posts were reserved for certain sects for example the army commander and head of secret service would be Maronite. 15

In addition the Lebanese state received legitimacy because it was based on various sectarian identities which it gave authority to and its non-assimilationist policy, the communal autonomy gave the system legitimacy 16

Thus when Lebanon became independent in 1943, sectarian identities were the basis of the National Pact and so in turn sectarianism was central to the foundations of the state of Lebanon. However was sectarianism central to the collapse of the Lebanese state in 1975?

In a way sectarianism was central to the foundation and collapse of the state, the confessional system worked to a certain extent in keeping stability at times by balancing the groups, but it failed to develop a common identity as a nation, the Lebanese defined loyalty to family and confession first rather than the state. 17As a state is a social community it is supported by a common culture, values and symbols, but in the case of Lebanon, the sectarian divides meant that the separate groups prevented national unity from occurring. 18

So that while the system worked to a certain extent during periods of calm, during times of crisis the various groups would feel loyalty to their confession rather than any state.

An example of one of the failings of the confessional system is in education, the state failed to provide a unifying educational system that would promote community cohesion, but as the schools were divided by confession it encouraged the mentality of separation. A way of showing this is that illiteracy rates differed by confession, student enrolment in public or private school also differed by confession and the general educational levels in regions of Lebanon also varied by confession. 19 lt;br> lt;br> In 1958 illiteracy among the various groups were :

Shi`a-79%

Sunni-59%

Druze-51%

Greek Orthodox-50%

Maronites-42%20

Because of the sectarian foundation of the state, Lebanon failed to develop a single Lebanese identity as the system reinforced the sectarian divides and increased loyalty to various groups rather than the state. 21

On the other hand the gap between the communities was narrowing, government policies were inadequate but still helped to narrow the gap between the confessional groups, on the eve of the civil war, all groups had benefited and were better off than they had been two generations ago. 22

In addition the sectarian structure of the state meant that it was inflexible to changes in Lebanon, the Maronite and Sunni elites controlled and shared most of the power in the system due to the allocation of posts by confession. The Shi`a on the other hand were generally ignored by the leaders, they were officially recognised by the 1932 census and at the time the 3rd largest community and was allocated the position of speaker in parliament, but generally they were powerless. However with demographic changes taking place in Lebanon, the Shi`a community 50 years after the census became the largest, but still were not fairly represented in the inflexible political system. 23While at the start power was meant to be shared according to the census, it was not able to adapt to change and those in power were unwilling to give it up to others, which led to dissatisfaction with the system and hastened the collapse of the Lebanese state.

In my opinion the sectarian foundations of the Lebanese state did not simply lead to its collapse, if this was the case then surely the state should have crumbled as soon as the 1958 crisis instead of 1975? in addition if the sectarian nature of the system was purely responsible for its collapse then why was Lebanon in the 70s much less confessional then in the 50s ? before the 1958 crisis Lebanon was much more divided confessionally than before the 1975 civil war and the state`s collapse. 24

It has to be taken into account that other factors were also responsible for the collapse of the state in 1975.

The economy of Lebanon in the pre war period was open and liberal and attracted a lot of foreign investment, and the government helped Beirut to become a banking and commercial centre. 25

At the same time as other Arab states were turning towards socialism which made Lebanon attractive for investment from overseas, and as a banking hub and a tourist haven in the Middle East. 26However there were some problems to come, firstly one of the leading banks in Lebanon was the Intra Bank, founded by Palestinian businessmen it was the pride and glory of the Palestinian community in Lebanon. However this was unacceptable for the Lebanese elite to have one of their leading banks to be owned by Palestinians and they engineered a run on the bank in 1966. It was refused help by the Central Bank of Lebanon and it collapsed which was firstly a blow to the growing economy and to the Palestinians of Lebanon. 27

Adding to the economic problems were the effects of the 1967 Six Day War on the Middle East which meant that tourism declined, millions of lira were transferred out of the country to Europe and the US and the Arab oil money which had been invested in Beirut was diverted for investment elsewhere.28 The decline showed the weakness of the service based economy of Lebanon, where employment prospects for the majority of the population was low. There was also a rise in inflation which was caused by land speculation and created a rise in rents which affected the middle classes a well, the elites had made a good profit but the majority of the population felt a decline in living standards. 29The uneven economic growth had created problems for Lebanon, the growth had resulted in migration to the cities and in particular surrounding Beirut were new slums populated by peasants from the countryside, or Palestinian refugees. 30The effects of this uneven development could be seen during the war when youths from the slums burnt the Hotel District and the old souks, showing their dissatisfaction at being left out of their share of Lebanon`s prosperity. 31

While the economic issues and uneven development of Lebanon had some effect on the start of the war leading to collapse of the state it seems unlikely to be the main reason and merely a contributing factor, after all there was nothing that unusual about the economic issues facing Lebanon and say for example that the government had implemented a socialist command economy would that have prevented the war and collapse of the state? The country was facing issues that couldn`t be contained by either socialist or capitalist economic measures. 32

Other factors also played a role in the start of the civil war and collapse of the state, the direct intervention in Lebanon by other states such as Syria and Israel, in addition to the indirect role of Saudi, Iraqi and Libyan financial backing of various militias. As well as the role of the Palestinians and PLO in Lebanon. 33

The situation in Jordan in 1970 was that the Palestinian movement in the country had grown so strong that the monarchy felt threatened by its existence and started to crack down on the Palestinian commandos which resulted in Black September and caused the movement to be expelled from Jordan. 34

The PLO moved to Lebanon where it was able to recover from the conflict with Jordan and create a base there, it managed to build a powerful influence which had an effect at political, diplomatic and military levels and so it was inevitable that the Palestinians would become involved in the political scene in Lebanon. 35The PLO required a base in Lebanon from which to put pressure on Israel, as well as other Arab states to find a solution to the Palestinian problem, it needed to create a state within a state and to create this it needed to exploit sectarian tensions in order to keep the Lebanese state weak and to complete their project. At the same time it only increased mistrust from the Maronites and Christians and the Sunni and Shi`a Muslims too. 36

The growing PLO presence in Lebanon also gave reason for Israel to intervene in Lebanese affairs, for example in 1968 after PLO raids from southern Lebanon, Israel had a pretext for operations against Lebanon and sent in commandos to Beirut airport, blew up 13 civilian airliners and after 40 minutes returned to Israel. 37For Israel a stable and unified Lebanon was not in its interest, especially as part of its strategy against Syria, on the other hand sectarian conflict was, to keep everybody continue to fight each other and prevent unity from occurring. 38

Competing with the Israelis the Syrians too were involved in Lebanon which they viewed as their backyard. And their policy was to prevent Israeli, American and other Arab interventions there and to prevent a division of the country on sectarian lines in order to create a political hegemony on its neighbour. But in order to dominate the country the Syrians also used the confessional system and exploited sectarian divides to play regional states against one another. 39

By 1989 after seventeen years of civil war came the Ta`if accords which attempted to reform the Lebanese political system and end the war. 40

Firstly it changed the structure from a hierarchical communal partnership to a inter-communal collective partnership, in effect there was a three-headed body of the state giving more power to the Sunni and Shi`a. As well as a more equal representation of groups in the parliament and abolishing confessional appointments in the lower ranks of administration. 41Also in a way the collective experiences of the civil war helped to shape a national consciousness that was not there before, and helped to give legitimacy to the Ta`if accords. 42

However this does not mean that sectarian identities were written out of the state`s foundations with Ta`if as they still play a role as before, but they helped to reform the political system with sectarianism still playing a part.

To conclude, in my opinion, sectarian identities were central to the foundation of the Lebanese state, and it carries on from the Ottoman era, through the mandate to independence and post Ta`if. But to a certain extent the collapse of the state during the civil war happened for reasons other than sectarian identities being central to the state although it played a big part in shaping the conflict. The economic situation of Lebanon and the uneven development had its role too in making the situation worse, but it seems unlikely to be the main cause. The political situation Lebanon was in and various actors played a bigger role, with the PLO needing to create their state in a state project, had to weaken the Lebanese state by exploiting sectarianism, Israel and Syria viewed Lebanon as a backyard to fight proxy battles and also exploiting sectarianism, in addition to the other Arab states such as Saudi, Iraq and Libya who backed various militias which destabilised Lebanon. The blame for the collapse of the state cannot just be laid at the centrality of sectarianism to the state but the other factors must also be taken into account.

Bibliography

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(Washington DC: Middle East Institute, 1989)

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