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Dialogues in Arab Politics: Negotiations in Regional Order
Michael N. Barnett
Fall 1998
1. A Narrative of Arab Politics
Many of the best-known accounts of Arab politics are informed by a realist narrative. Realism’s defining and cyclical narrative—the ongoing pursuit of states to provide for their security in an environment that is uncertain and dangerous because of the condition of anarchy, conflict as a way of life, and war as ever present or looming—seems to capture Arab politics. 1 Arab politics is renowned for its contending bids by Arab states for leadership, shifting alliances, steady stream of crises, occasional war, and ongoing pursuit of security and survival in a very rough neighborhood. If Arab politics has any distinguishing traits, it is the dramatic relief of the supposed existence of a community and shared identity against the harsh reality of anarchy and rivalry. Arab states ranked their survival and security ahead of Arab sentiments, and when they pledged their devotion to Arabism, the pledge usually came with empty rhetoric and false promises, a manipulative attempt to shore up a domestic situation, or an effort to bludgeon and embarrass an opponent. 2 Realist imagery dominates our understanding of Arab politics, and Arab politics “best fits the realist view of international politics” for good reasons. 3
But realism has a difficult time addressing some fundamental features of Arab politics. Consider realism’s reliance on hegemonies, balances of power, and alliances for understanding international stability. Realists would expect that in such a high-threat environment Arab states would attempt to increase their security against each other by accumulating arms and forming military alliances. But where are the arms races? Curiously, Arab states have shunned any noticeable effort to enhance their security by amassing weapons. 4 That they have refrained from this classic security-building option is not because they lack the wherewithal, for they certainly have raced with their non-Arab rivals, or because they have forged arms-control agreements, for there were none. Much of the history of Arab politics shows few recorded instances of an Arab government’s taking cover or trying to bolster its security against an Arab rival through military accumulation. Exceptions to this observation exist, but such exceptions only animate the anomaly.
Perhaps Arab states chose not to develop their military arsenals but to increase their security through alliances. But a neorealist student of the region concluded his exhaustive survey by noting with some curiosity that “a different form of balancing has occurred in inter-Arab relations” as Arab states allied to protect their image and not in response to shifts in military power. 5 Security, in other words, was not tied to material power but to presentational politics. The unification of Syria and Egypt in 1958 is a case in point. The establishment of the United Arab Republic (UAR) sent shivers of insecurity throughout the Hashemite palaces in Iraq and Jordan, but Iraqi and Jordanian leaders did not fear the military power of the UAR; rather, they were concerned about their image as conservative states amid a tidal wave of support for pan-Arabism and unification. They responded as would any leader seeking survival under such circumstances: they unified their states—in other words, they did not construct a security alliance—in the hope of answering their domestic and regional critics. The case of the UAR is not alone in the annals of Arab politics; few alliances among Arab states were a response to shifts in military power, and many more were efforts at impression management.
The relative absence of arms races and security alliances is tied to another feature of Arab politics that appears peculiar from a realist view: Arab leaders were more practiced in the ways of symbolic politics than they were in the ways of military politics. More often than not Arab leaders deployed symbolic power, not military power, to enhance their security and to control each other’s foreign policies. Simply put, Arab politics was symbolic politics. Arab leaders frequently took to the airwaves to portray their adversaries as outside the Arab consensus as a result of policies they had recently enacted or proposed. They took such charges seriously, expended tremendous energy pleading innocent of such crimes, and often adjusted their policies to avoid the appearance of impropriety, because they knew that to be perceived as violating a norm of Arabism could easily summon regional censure and, more consequentially, domestic turmoil. A defining feature of Nasser’s foreign policy was his masterful use of the Voice of the Arabs radio broadcasts to accuse his rivals of threatening the Arab nation. In countless instances he mobilized people in the streets of Amman in his favor and made life difficult for King Hussein by portraying him as forsaking the Arab nation. Nasser did this not because it was good sport but because it was a highly effective way to control Hussein’s foreign policy. Nasser was not unusual among Arab leaders in his use of symbolic tools, just more expert. In Arab politics sticks and stones had little effect, but words could really hurt.
Or consider the events leading up to the 1967 Arab–Israeli War. We have little evidence that military considerations drove Nasser to undertake a series of provocative actions toward Israel that pushed the region closer to war. Rather, he knowingly risked an unwanted war with Israel to preserve his image as the leader of Arab nationalism. Nasser was not alone in deciding to sacrifice state power for impression management; King Hussein calculated that if he went to war with Israel the worst that would happen was that he would lose Jerusalem and the West Bank, but if he stood on the sidelines an unforgiving Jordanian public would demand his crown. The king later reflected that the Arab mobilization for war was merely “propaganda, radio speeches, and talk.” 6 If ideologies such as Arab nationalism are simply instruments of state power, as realists contend, why would Arab leaders sacrifice state power on the altar of Arab nationalism?
Finally, a widely observed transformation has occurred in Arab politics during the last few decades. To capture such changes scholars and politicians speak of the “new realism,” the “maturation of the system,” the “return to geography,” the “end of pan-Arabism,” the “fragmentation of the Arab world,” “Middle Easternism,” and the shift from the language of qawmiyya [national identity] to wataniyya [state identities]. 7 These different labels represent different ways of describing normative fragmentation in Arab politics: whereas Arab states once were oriented toward each other because they presumed that their shared Arab identity generated shared interests, Arab states now are suspected of having state identities with separate interests that potentially orient them in distinct directions.
To explain this outcome realists elevate shifts in the distribution of power, notably the decline of the power of Egypt, Arab nationalism’s champion, and the rise of the conservative oil states. But even when the shifts are judged on the realists’ evaluative criteria, this view wilts: changes in the regional distribution of power do not correlate with the decline of pan-Arabism. Indeed, different accounts identify radically different moments for Arab nationalism’s passing: one identifies the failed unity talks of 1963 between Egypt, Syria, and Iraq, another elevates the 1967 Arab–Israeli War, and still another argues for the swing in power from Egypt to Saudi Arabia in the mid-1970s. 8 Shifts in the distribution of power are a poor predictor of this fundamental change in Arab politics. 9
Realism’s inability to explain regional stability, the strategic interactions between Arab states, and the fragmentation in Arab politics are not simply inconvenient omissions but severe theoretical deficiencies. Perhaps realism is not the problem—maybe it is the region; after all, a long-standing tradition treats the region as irrational and therefore inexplicable using the theories that explain the histories of other regions. But we have no reason to presume that the region is unique and impervious to theorizing. Only a poor social scientist blames the subject for a faulty instrument.
That said, the scholarship on Arab politics lends implicit and explicit support to realism in several ways. The analytical frameworks offered almost always derive from realism. Few frameworks explicitly attempt to construct an alternative approach to Arab politics; the result is that realism maintains a privileged theoretical place. 10 Moreover, many historical accounts implicitly accept realist categories; shifting alliances, bids for leadership, and the onset of war generally mark historical time and thus implicitly lend support to a realist narrative that organizes history in much the same way. Furthermore, an unstated assumption is that the mere existence of conflict and the actors’ attempt to maintain their security are properties of realism alone. But conflict is part of all social relationships and can have a source other than anarchy, few social theories presume that actors are not protective of their security, and we have no reason to assume that a shared identity necessarily and always leads to harmonious relations.
It is unfortunate that the scholarship on Arab politics is usually associated with realism because historical accounts of Arab politics depart significantly from how realism understands international life. Few narratives of Arab politics look to anarchy and the distribution of power to understand the state’s foreign policy; most begin with Arab nationalism and discuss how it constrained and shaped the Arab state’s foreign policy. Few accounts of Arab politics argue that the state’s interests stemmed from anarchy; most discuss Arab national interests that derived from their shared Arab identity. Most accounts of Arab politics highlight those rare moments when an Arab state used military means of influence and treat as a matter of course how Arab states routinely used symbolic technologies to embarrass their opponents into submission. In general, scholars of international relations write that Arab politics is realist politics, even though these scholars are unable to account for some gaping omissions. And scholars of Arab politics write narratives of the region that defy realist categories, even though they are generally read and advanced as supporting a realist imagery.
This book advances a narrative of Arab politics that is theoretically distinctive and historically instinctive. Beginning in 1920 with the period of the establishment of the mandate system and continuing through the contemporary era, I examine the dialogues among Arab states concerning the desired regional order, that is, the rival imaginings about the relationship between the desired regional order, the norms of Arabism, and their identities as Arab states. These dialogues have been an enduring feature of Arab politics. The creation of the Arab League, the 1955 Baghdad Pact, Egypt’s path to Camp David—these and other events triggered a hailstorm of debate among Arab states and societies about the norms of Arab nationalism. Does Arab nationalism demand political unification? Under what conditions can Arab states ally with the West? How should Arab states organize their activities to confront the Zionist threat? Arab states had rival opinions of what these norms should be, and a defining feature of these dialogues is that the Arab states competed through symbolic means to determine the norms of Arabism. But the legacy of these dialogues has been normative fragmentation in Arab politics. To understand the fragmentation that defines contemporary Arab politics requires a detailed understanding of how Arab leaders have related and competed over the years. By following these dialogues we are positioned to understand the dynamics that have defined, shaped, and transformed the Arab states system.
This narrative is informed by a constructivist approach to international relations theory. Building on various strands of sociological theory, constructivism posits that the actions of states, like individuals, take on meaning and shape within a normative context, that their interactions construct and transform their normative arrangements, that these norms can in turn shape their identity and interests, and that the “problem of order” is usually “solved” through social negotiations and a mixture of coercion and consent. 11 By adopting a constructivist approach, we are able to reconceptualize the history of inter-Arab politics, approach the debate over the desired regional order as Arab states and societies did, understand why Arab states competed through symbolic means to establish the norms of Arabism, and recognize how and why those ongoing struggles over the desired regional order caused the fragmentation in the Arab states system.
Dialogues and Regional Order
I organize Arab politics according to the ongoing negotiations about the desired regional order. States can be understood as engaged in a never-ending process of negotiating the norms that are to govern their relations. All groups of actors, including states, have norms that regulate their relations, govern their conduct in public life, and delimit the types of behaviors and actions that are permissible, prohibited, and desirable. Regional order, in this view, emerges not only because of a stable correlation of military forces but also because of stable expectations and shared norms. 12 But such normative arrangements are not givens; they are the result of political contestations and social interactions. 13 An additional feature of these struggles frequently goes unappreciated by scholars of international politics: states implicate their identities as they defend or advance a regional order. Norms, in short, might be not only regulative of their interests but also expressive of their identities. As is evident in the post–cold war shuffle, states are sorting out their future arrangements by asking who they are and what the ties that bind should be.
Arab states and societies have been involved in a continuous negotiation about the desired regional order, the norms of Arabism, and the Arab state’s identity. Since the creation of the mandate system Arab states have been actively debating how they should organize their relations to achieve their shared concerns, which have largely revolved around the desire to protect the Arab nation from the West, confront Zionism, and strengthen the political community. Although Arab states defined these three issues as the consummate Arab interests, they had a more difficult time determining the appropriate means to further those goals. Should Arab states be allowed to negotiate separately with Israel? Can they conclude strategic alliances with the West? Must they work for integration to strengthen the Arab political community, or can they cooperate as sovereign states? As Arab states debated the answer to these questions, they usually claimed that some policies were proper for and expressive of their identities whereas others were not.
These debates about the desired regional order are most evident during a dialogue, an event that triggers an intensified discussion among group members about the norms that are to guide their relations. 14 At such moments states become fixated on the norms that define the regional order and how those norms are related to their identity. Arab politics has had many such instances. The creation of the League of Arab States in 1945, rumors that Jordan was considering relations with Israel in 1950, the 1955 Baghdad Pact that established an alliance between Iraq and Turkey, the Arab unity experiments of 1958 to 1963, the Arab summits of the mid-1960s, the Khartoum meeting after the 1967 Arab–Israeli War, the contest over the Camp David accords, the tremors from the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990—these and other events unleashed a dialogue about the desired regional order, which norms should organize their relations, and how those norms related to their identity as Arab states.
The Game of Arab Politics
A defining feature of these dialogues was that Arab states fought about the norms that should govern their relations. Understanding the creation, repair, and transformation of the norms of Arabism requires a detailed exploration of the interactions between Arab states. Social processes, not social structures, produce norms. 15 Norms do not operate behind the backs of actors; rather, actors determine what the norms are. Actors struggle to determine these norms because they have differences of opinion that stem from divergent principled beliefs and from opposing political calculations. But scholars are justified in looking first to instrumental reasons. After all, the norm that is advantageous to one actor can be detrimental and constraining to another. Arab leaders vied to promote a definition of the situation and to repair or reform the norms of Arabism that were connected to the desired regional order, because doing so could further their various interests and control the foreign policies of their rivals.
Defining the norms of Arabism was an exercise of power and a mechanism of social control. Some international relations scholars have an unfortunate tendency to portray norms as married to cooperation. Indeed, Arab leaders frequently claimed that these norms were intended to allow them to further the collective aspirations of the Arab nation. But frequently lurking beneath the lofty expressions of cooperation was the more base desire to determine the norms of Arabism because doing so would establish the parameters of what constituted legitimate action and thus represented an act of power. Nasser’s power derived not from Egypt’s military capabilities but from his ability to impose a meaning on the events of his time, to establish the norms of Arabism, and to weave a compelling image of the future. Arab leaders did not compete to increase their “relative gains,” as measured in terms of military or economic power, but they did compete to establish the meaning of events and to define the norms of Arabism. A corollary was that the “threat” was not from the barrel of a gun but from the establishment of a norm or vision of political life that was contrary to the regime’s interests. Jordan and Iraq did not view the creation of the UAR in 1958 as a threat because of Syria and Egypt’s newly combined military power but because the UAR offered a powerful vision of how Arab politics should be governed, and this had immediate implications for domestic stability.
A central ambition of this book is to explore how Arab states competed to define the norms of Arabism. To do so we must examine the social and strategic interactions between Arab states. 16 What makes these interactions social is that Arab leaders were in a structural condition of mutual dependence: because of their shared Arab identity they determined the norms of Arabism collectively and could hardly declare a sovereign prerogative over such matters, were expected to honor those norms, and generally did so because of their desire for social approval and the recognition that they were Arab leaders in good standing. What makes these interactions strategic is that Arab governments recognized that achieving their goals depended on the norms that were established and the actions of other Arab leaders, and they manipulated information and images in order to increase the likelihood that their preferred definition of the situation was accepted and that their desired norm was stabilized.
These social and strategic interactions inform what I call the game of Arab politics. The concept of a game, which dominates international relations scholarship and informs most analytically driven analyses of Arab politics, recognizes that states are in a social situation defined by the distribution of power; it assumes that states attempt to maximize security, survival, or power because of anarchy; and it attempts to determine the logic of their choices and the pattern of their interactions as prescribed by their preferences and identified constraints. 17 Many scholars of international politics have implicitly adopted this approach to organize their reading of Arab politics. 18 In this view Arab states were attempting to foster their security and survival, which depended on their assessment of the goals and determinations of other Arab leaders and on the distribution of power.
An alternative understanding of games, however, is that they are normative structures, that is, they contain the socially determined norms that restrict and guide what is considered acceptable. This approach suggests that the social situation contains norms that constrain the behavior of states; the social situation not only constrains these self-interested and faceless states but also is a source of identity and interests; and the logic of their choices and the pattern of their interactions is shaped by the normative structure that constitutes their identities and constrains their behavior. By embedding state action within a normative structure, I am attempting to blend homo economicus with homo sociologicus; if economic humans are calculating, utility-maximizing agents, sociological humans—though still calculating and pursuing interests—define their interests and modify their behavior within a normative context.
Arab leaders were embedded in a structure defined by Arabism and sovereignty that shaped their identities, interests, presentation of self, survival-seeking strategies, and strategic interactions. It all begins with Arabism. International relations theory has a penchant for treating the social fabric of global politics as either an instrument in the hands of self-interested actors or as a constraint on their behavior, but in both cases it gives priority to the material foundations of the environment. But the structure of international politics is comprised of normative and material elements, and that structure might not simply constrain but also constitute the identity and interests of states. Arabism was why Arab states were expected to pursue Arab national interests and act in concert to achieve their shared goals. In this way Arab leaders were regarded as representatives of the Arab nation and not only of the territorial state and were expected to be agents of the Arab political community and not only of their citizens.
Yet these were Arab leaders who frequently demonstrated a greater concern for their survival than for Arab nationalism. The observed gap between theory and practice has encouraged scholars of the region to conclude that Arab leaders proclaimed their commitment to Arab nationalism but through their actions demonstrated a greater commitment to themselves. 19 From such observations come realist conclusions. But ample historical evidence exists that Arab nationalism shaped the foreign policies of Arab states in consequential ways. So how should we conceptualize the relationship between the norms of Arabism and the actions of Arab officials who honored, exploited, and ignored these norms?
I draw from the work of Erving Goffman and others to claim that although Arab leaders occupied social roles that derived from the Arab nation as they interacted on a regional stage, they also maintained some autonomy from their roles that allowed them to be creative occupants and cynical manipulators. I assume that Arab leaders were deeply committed to their own survival. Recognize that at issue here was not the survival of the state that dwelled in anarchy but the survival of the Arab leader who dwelled in Arabism. 20 But because their legitimacy, popularity, and sometimes even survival depended on whether they were viewed as adhering to the norms of Arabism, Arab leaders expended considerable energy conveying the image that they were genuine disciples of Arab nationalism. 21 Such a perspective begins to answer the enduring theoretical mystery in Arab politics regarding how to conceptualize the relationship between the apparently strategic and self-interested behavior of Arab leaders and the demands placed on them by Arab nationalism. Norms can be a source of the actor’s interests, and actors are likely to use society’s norms for ulterior purposes; the issue is not one of norms versus interests but of the relationship between the two.
A defining feature of this game was that Arab leaders selected their technologies of power from a “cultural tool kit” as they competed to define the situation and the norms of Arabism. 22 Building on various sociological and anthropological statements that consider how collective mobilization and event definition are facilitated by the manufacture, manipulation, and deployment of symbols, I claim that Arab leaders competed for the hearts and minds of Arab populations at home and abroad and attempted to define the norms of Arabism in two central ways. First, Arab governments framed the events of the day, that is, offered a schema for interpretation that would help to organize experience. Because events do not have an objective meaning outside of how they are framed, because the norms of Arabism were contested and debated in relationship to the events of the day, because Arab leaders often had rival interpretations of the content of those norms, and because those rival interpretations were generally related to the regime’s interests, Arab governments battled to offer the winning interpretation.
Second, Arab governments manipulated and deployed symbols that derived from their shared cultural foundations to, first, persuade their audience that their definition of events and proposed response was appropriate, legitimate, and consistent with Arabism and, second, control the foreign policies of their rivals. Symbolic exchanges defined the strategic interactions between Arab leaders. Arab leaders competed on the regional stage with the symbols of Arabism, many of which derived from important historical events that suggested injustice and weakness, to mobilize sentiment on their behalf and to create a set of norms consistent with their interests. Arab officials often portrayed their rivals as straying from the Arab consensus—and did so in the most colorful language—to mobilize a target state’s population and to ridicule its leadership. This was Nasser’s forte, the real source of his power, and why Arab leaders viewed him as a threat. Symbolic politics, in short, is no less related to issues of power, domination, and social control than is military politics. Arab politics is rightly renowned for its conflict. But this conflict derived not from anarchy and the desire to preserve the balance of power but from Arabism and the desire to define the norms of Arabism. The tools of conflict did not came from a military arsenal. They came from a cultural storehouse.
A remarkable feature of Arab politics is that amid this pervasive conflict were solidarity and cooperation on several outstanding issues over the years. To explain this outcome most international relations scholars would suggest that Arab states either established a set of norms to overcome collective action problems or had a hegemon that had the carrots and the sticks necessary for such sustained cooperation. 23 But the norms of Arabism encouraged cooperation in two additional ways. First, Arabism shaped the definition of the interests of Arab states and the means that they could use to pursue those interests. Therefore, in contrast to utilitarian and rational choice theories that assume a randomness to ends, Arabism was a source of identity and interests and caused Arab states to orient themselves toward each other and in the same direction. Second, that Arabism shoved and pushed Arab leaders toward consensus and solidarity is attributable not only to their self-understandings but also to their keen sense of self-preservation. Arab leaders who disregarded or blatantly manipulated the tenets of Arab nationalism soon would have their credentials and character questioned. Arab leaders therefore had to practice what they preached. Indeed, at various moments they followed a course of action in order to salvage their reputation, even though they privately feared that doing so might jeopardize state power. All this would be familiar to Erving Goffman, who understood that actors who appropriate society’s norms for ulterior motives might be compelled to make good on their talk in order to save face. Although I allow for the possibility that Arab leaders were genuine Arab nationalists, I analytically and historically favor the claim that Arab leaders were nudged toward mutual orientation by their desire for social approval that was critical for regime survival.
In sum, dialogues represent moments when Arab leaders were debating the norms of Arabism and how those norms were expressive of their Arab identities. To understand the social and strategic interactions that ensue at such moments, that is, the game that is played and how it is played, requires recognizing how: 1) Arabism constituted their identities and interests as Arab states and therefore shaped their behavior; 2) Arab leaders honored and manipulated those norms because of self-image and self-preservation; 3) Arab leaders vied to draw a line between the regime’s interests, the events of the day, and the norms of Arabism through symbolic technologies; and 4) Arab leaders were likely to honor stabilized norms because of a sense of self and a sense of survival.
Normative Fragmentation
How Arab leaders played the game of Arab politics had the potential to transform that game. By focusing on dialogues as sites of norm creation and historical change, I am highlighting how their interactions generated a map of potential roles and worlds. In this respect events can be moments of change, bounded periods of time when a transformation of thought, experiences, and social relations occurs. 24 Recognizing that events can be transformative moments shifts our attention away from structural explanations to the microprocesses upon which structures are built and transformed, away from the language of structural determination and to that of social negotiation. This event-centered and process-oriented approach is generally consistent with many previous studies of Arab politics. These accounts have produced detailed considerations of the idiosyncrasies, diplomatic intrigues, and nuances of various events, which typically are selected because they are understood as turning points in Arab history. The creation of the Arab League, the Baghdad Pact, the rise and demise of the UAR, the 1967 war, the Camp David accords, the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait—these and other events are frequently forwarded as moments of rapid change when Arab leaders reconsidered the meaning of Arabism and their relationship to one another.
I hope to contribute to our understanding of these events in two ways. First, by focusing on the mechanisms that produced the observed outcomes, I am suggesting how these individual dynamics are indicative of more enduring and fundamental processes. Second, many studies implicitly or explicitly favor a realist explanation even though they concentrate less on how the regional balance of power shapes interstate interactions and more on how social processes shape regional structures. Therefore my reading of the historiography of Arab politics is that it is more consistent with constructivism than with realism. The focus on the social interactions between Arab states as a source of change provides a more consistent and compelling understanding of how and why these were transformative events in Arab history.
To chart the changes in the norms of Arabism is to consider the different meanings of Arab nationalism and to uncover why Arab nationalism underwent the conceptual transformation that it did. Scholars of Arab politics have implicitly recognized that Arab nationalism has demonstrated tremendous conceptual elasticity and has always been a work in progress, but surprisingly few studies have traced the changes in its meaning and its political implications. Much early work on the emergence of Arab nationalism has been generally attentive to its socially constructed nature, carefully considering the social and political processes, and the external challenges and intellectual movements, that were responsible for its emergence. But the debate over the “end of Arab nationalism” has been rather polemic and has had an essentializing tone that revolves around Arabism as unification or as nothing at all. I hope to offer a modest corrective to that debate. By examining the sinews of Arab nationalism as it has evolved during the debates about Zionism, the West, and Arab unity, I am attempting to provide a more nuanced understanding of the influence of Arab nationalism on inter-Arab dynamics and how the strategic interactions between Arab states were responsible for Arab nationalism’s changing and recently declining fortunes. In general, by detailing and following the debate about the norms of Arab nationalism, I am allowing for the possibility of collective mobilization for political projects short of political unification, recognizing that various norms have been associated with Arab nationalism over the years, exploring how these changing norms had varying effects on state behavior and regional politics, and isolating how these norms were sustained or transformed as a consequence of inter-Arab interactions.
Scholars generally agree that Arab politics is not what it used to be. Whereas Arab states once were actively considering how to strengthen their ties and to integrate their polities at all levels, the defining theme of the past few decades has been normative fragmentation to the extent that Arab states are no longer as pressed toward mutual orientation because of underlying shared identities and interests. I observe two analytically distinct but historically related issues. Some rules of the game that have emerged revolve around sovereignty and its norms. A dramatic development in Arab politics is the greater agreement among Arab states that regional order should be premised on the norms of sovereignty. And the emergence of sovereignty in this instance is descriptively and analytically connected to the rise of statist identities that are better able to compete with an Arabism that generates alternative expectations. Indeed, the features that once defined Arab politics and Arabism—confronting Israel, shunning strategic alliances with the West, and territorial unification—have declined in prominence and have left many wondering what is distinctive about Arab politics.
The debate has been considerable among scholars of Arab politics regarding how to explain this fragmentation. Whereas some look to systemic politics and the shift in the distribution of power, and others look to domestic politics and state formation processes, I argue that the fragmentation was a result of how Arab leaders played the game of Arab politics. The strategic and symbolic exchanges that occurred between Arab leaders during a dialogue led to differentiation and fragmentation. Whereas Arab states professed an eternal devotion to the cause of Arab unity, their mutual suspicions and symbolic competition led to the creation of separate identities, roles, interests that encouraged Arab leaders to adhere to the norms of sovereignty and to privilege the discourse of state interests over Arab national interests. The strategic interactions between Arab leaders were largely responsible for the fraying fabric of Arab politics.
The claim that strategic and symbolic interactions were responsible for this normative fragmentation challenges the most compelling alternative: that state formation processes created a more “realist” environment. 25 Simply stated, this literature claims that the softer the state is, the more it will gravitate toward transnational ideologies to bolster its domestic and regional standing; the harder the state is, the easier it finds the forwarding of its interests. Conversely, that societal actors are no longer responding to the prospect of unification in the same way or demanding that their governments be associated with the norms of Arabism suggests a transformation in state-society relations and relatively successful state formation projects. 26 In general, this literature properly notes that Arab states were more likely to lean on transnational forces if their societies perceived these states as artificial, that Arab leaders attempted to reduce their vulnerability to the dictates and demands of other Arab leaders by encouraging their citizens to identify with the capital city and the regime in power through state formation processes, and that as a general rule the search for integration at the local level correlated with the increased fragmentation and decreased sense of collective obligation at the regional level. 27 State formation processes are connected to the changes that have taken place in the Arab states system for good reasons.
But this second-image approach suffers from two limitations that point to the necessity of examining the interactions between Arab states to understand the cause of this normative fragmentation. First, this literature nearly assumes that “stateness” must be theoretically and logically linked with a particular set of practices tantamount to realism and realpolitik. Yet stateness can be related to a host of practices. Nasser, who presided over the Arab world’s only “national state,” was Arab nationalism’s most articulate and forceful spokesman. Although the European states rank high on indexes of legitimacy and capacity, they exhibit a pattern of politics that is far from the realist model now forwarded by some students of Arab politics. Indeed, the same European states that have high levels of stateness have been integrating—that is, in the exact opposite manner of Arab states. Second, state formation processes are decades-long developments and do not correspond directly with many of the important events usually identified as having transformed Arab politics. In a subtle recognition of this gap many explanations that center on domestic politics first examine how domestic politics shapes the state’s foreign policy but then quickly shift attention to interstate interactions to understand the outcome. Domestic structures are not the wellspring of international norms; rather, they emerge from interstate interactions. The quality of inter-Arab interactions was what contributed to the differentiation among Arab states and not to successful state formation alone.
In sum, Arab politics can be understood as a series of dialogues concerning the relationship between identity, norms, and regional order, and by tracing these dialogues over time we are in a position to understand the fabric of Arab politics. Dialogues represent a moment when Arab leaders think aloud about the norms that should govern their relations; during these dialogues Arab states act strategically and deploy symbols to repair, stabilize, or transform the norms of Arabism that are consistent with their various interests; and these exchanges led to the widely observed fragmentation in Arab politics. These dialogues about the regional order animated Arab politics for years, and by tracking them through time we are positioned to follow the debates and dynamics that defined, shaped, and transformed the Arab states system.
Which Dialogues Among Which Arab States?
I am offering a narrative of Arab politics as the ongoing debate about the desired regional order. Briefly, a narrative concerns a story that is joined by a plot. 28 All theories of international politics have an implicit narrative. In realism that narrative is associated with the state’s struggle for survival, balancing behavior and the ever-present threat and preparation for war; history, in this sense, is cyclical, and events are logically and causally connected by virtue of the story that realism tells. In this fundamental respect my approach is no different than realism; a narrative provides a way of approaching and organizing history, and realism represents one such approach.
Whether my narrative is more convincing, however, depends on the evidence that I bring to bear and how compellingly I connect these events causally and theoretically. I am not uncovering new facts, but I am generating an alternative interpretation and understanding of these events by situating them within an alternative narrative. For instance, if the Baghdad Pact receives relatively little attention in Stephen Walt’s realist interpretation of Arab politics because it has little demonstrable influence on the balance of power, its standing is elevated once it is connected to the debate about the desired regional order. These events, moreover, are causally connected to the changes that follow in the debate about the desired regional order. The Baghdad Pact reestablished the parameters of Arab politics as it inaugurated the radical Arab agenda. That is, its causal consequence is not tied to the balance of power but to a change in the desired regional order. Although the narrative might be distinct, the social science methods that I use to provide theoretical leverage over these individual events and to causally and theoretical connect them in an intelligible way are quite familiar.
Thankfully, I do not have to examine all the dialogues among all the Arab states in order to gauge the changing content and nature of the debate about regional order. Although the League of Arab States has twenty-three members, I limit my investigation of the dialogues about regional order to Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Iraq, Yemen, and Saudi Arabia for both practical and theoretical reasons. On the practical level these countries, the original members of the League of Arab States, were at the forefront of and defined the debate about regional order. On occasion other Arab states entered the discussions, including the Persian Gulf and the North African states by the late 1960s, but by and large these seven Arab states provide a fairly good if not exhaustive representation of Arab politics over the decades. The other principal contributor to this debate was the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). Before the creation of the PLO in 1964, various leaders from the Palestinian community were important to this debate, particularly as it pertained to the confrontation with Zionism; however, Arab states largely vied for the claim to represent the Palestinians. The emergence of the PLO, however, gave the Palestinians an organization recognized by other Arab states, and eventually by non-Arab states as well, as their sole and legitimate representative. Beginning in 1964, therefore, the PLO played an increasingly prominent role in shaping inter-Arab dynamics and the debate about the desired regional order. These eight actors—seven states and one nonstate actor—were most important in shaping the dynamics that I observe. In this respect my goal is not to tell the complete and definitive history of Arab politics but to understand one important feature—their dialogues about regional order. To do so convincingly does not require a complete survey and accounting of the positions and foreign policies of all Arab states but rather a structured and selective slice.
My exploration of the ongoing negotiation of Arab states about regional order through dialogues has three layers. First, I examine the Arab states system from the beginning of the mandatory period in 1920 through today in order to trace the debate about regional order both at a particular moment and its historical development. Rather than treat the history of the Arab states system as one uninterrupted story, however, I divide it into periods according to the dominant debate about the desired regional order. Different periods have a different theme to their conversation. I have identified five distinct periods: from the mandate period up to the establishment of the League of Arab States in 1945; from 1945 through the debate about the Baghdad Pact in 1955; from the Suez War through the 1967 Arab–Israeli War; 1967 through the Gulf War; and the post–Gulf War period. Thus the content of these dialogues has changed over time, which suggests nothing less than a change in the underlying structure of Arab politics; tracing these dialogues provides something of a magnetic resonance device for examining the texture of Arab politics.
Second, within each period I examine three defining issues—the Arab states’ relationship to unification, the West, and confrontation with Zionism—as a way of gauging the debate about the desired regional order and the goals and the socially acceptable means to pursue those ends. A celebrated and infamous point of contention is Arab nationalism’s relationship to state sovereignty and whether Arab states were expected to work to bring the national identity and political authority into correspondence. Far from honoring the correspondence between statehood and sovereignty, a central debate in Arab politics involved whether its fundamental organization should rest on Westphalia, a gift from the West, or an alternative arrangement of the Arabs’ devising.
Another enduring issue concerns whether and under what conditions Arab states could enter into strategic arrangements with the West. Western intrusions, interventions, and imperialism gave Arab nationalism a kickstart, and consequently a defining concern was how to increase the Arab states’ power and security vis-à-vis the West. Beginning in the mandate period with anticolonialism, picking up steam in the mid-1950s (thanks to Nasser and his concept of positive neutrality), an article of faith among Arab leaders became they should shun strategic alliances with the West and practice the art of Arab self-reliance. Consequently, if realism assumes that states can enter into any alliance as they see fit, an emerging property of Arabism cautioned against alliances with the West not simply because it might reduce the state’s autonomy but because it might jeopardize the security of the entire Arab nation.
And then there is the Arab–Israeli conflict. That Israel represents a threat to the Arab nation is derived from the Arab identity, and over the years the Arab states have established a series of norms that not only helped to overcome collective action problems but also served to define the meaning of Arabism. Regardless of how Arab states calculated their strategic or material interests, what Mohamed Heikal described as the taboo in Arab politics left unquestioned (until recently) the assumption that relations with Israel or a separate peace could never happen. 29
Unity, the West, and Zionism have been salient, defining, and identity-expressive issues in Arab politics for several reasons. These were not simply foreign policy issues; they also were domestic issues, and in this respect they were not simply about domestic politics but also about identity politics. Because Arab leaders depended on Arabism to authenticate and support their rule of citizens who saw themselves as Arab nationals, the leaders’ domestic legitimacy depended on how they conducted, presented, and carried themselves on these matters. Moreover, because these were Arab issues, they properly belonged to—and should be decided collectively by—all Arab states. A central feature here was that an Arab leader could hardly insist on his right to act unilaterally because of state sovereignty. It was bad form to act unilaterally on these issues, and other Arab states were quick to remind the would-be renegade that it also was bad politics. Finally, Arab leaders were forced to take a stand on these matters and judged accordingly, and through their collective positions and interactions on these issues they waged, defined, and transformed the debates about the desired regional order. Because these issues provided a litmus test for an Arab state’s attitude toward Arabism, they also presented a moment when historical transformation was possible.
Third, rather than survey all the events that might be covered by, say, the relationship between the Arab states and Israel in the 1956–1967 period, I examine those that were decidedly salient and causally consequential for the future path of Arab politics. In other words, although I examine some events that led to the repair of a norm, most of those I examine were consequential for understanding the path and development of Arab politics. I want to understand events theoretically and causally, and instead of treating them as mere data points, I dissect them to understand how they represented moments at which norms were established, debated, and potentially transformed and when new historical roads opened up and others became more difficult. I emphasize the importance of path dependence—that when things happened and how they happened matter for what follows and what is subsequently possible or unlikely. 30 Therefore within each period I examine specific regional crises and events to observe both the nature of the dialogue and to consider whether and how its dynamics led to the creation of new normative arrangements and shifts in the desired regional order. Understanding the contemporary map of Arab politics requires following the trail of the states’ interactions, the historical turning points at which Arab states reconsidered their relations, and how those turning points became consequential, given the subjective understanding of those moments in relation to earlier turning points.
Organization of the Book
Chapter 2 presents my framework for conceptualizing the dialogues in Arab politics as Arab states debated the norms of Arabism. The central concern here is to consider how the normative structure of Arab politics, constituted largely by Arabism and sovereignty, shaped the strategic, symbolic, and social interactions that ensued between Arab states in this encounter. Specifically, while Arab leaders maintained a strong interest in regime survival, Arabism and not anarchy provides leverage over the Arab governments’ central objectives, presentation of self, and strategies; the technologies of power that they used as they debated the norms that were to govern their relations; and why their interactions repaired or reformed a norm and contributed to normative fragmentation in Arab politics.
The five periods categorized by the debate about the desired regional order comprise chapters 3 through 7. Chapter 3 examines the historical evolution of the Arab states system and the events leading up to the establishment of the League of Arab States. The breakdown of the old order—a consequence of the demise of the Ottoman Empire, the emergence of nationalism, and the spread of the world economy—and the fight for the “Ottoman succession” caused the region’s inhabitants to consider how the Middle East should be organized and ordered—who constituted the political community. Anticolonial and Arab nationalist movements emerged in this context, and their meaning cannot be divorced from how individuals responded to and attempted to make sense of these fundamental transformations. These forces offered different visions of the future and had different prospects for success, given their relationship to institutionalized power and the state. In many respects this is the genesis of the Arab states system, when Arab nationalism’s defining issues are crystallized: the West’s segmentation of the Arab nation into separate mandates and territories, thus creating the fledgling demand for territorial unification; Britain’s and France’s hold over these states, establishing an Arab nationalism that became associated with anticolonialism and independence; and the increasingly strong Zionist presence, particularly the Great Palestinian Revolt of 1936, which placed Palestine on the map as an Arab issue. The defining and closing event of this period is the debate about the League of Arab States. Arab leaders gathered in Cairo to consider—and then rejected—an institutional architecture that would be more favorable to the idea of territorial unification; indeed, an inescapable feature of the League’s charter was its nod toward sovereignty and nearly possessive statism.
Chapter 4 examines the period from the establishment of the League of Arab States through the yearlong debate about the Baghdad Pact in 1955. I examine three issues. The first, revolving around the relationship between Arab nationalism and Zionism, had two defining moments: the decision by the Arab states to invade Palestine upon the termination of the mandate in May 1948, and the subsequent decision by the League of Arab States to prohibit a separate peace with Israel in April 1950. What is striking about both cases is that the embryonic norms of Arabism and symbolic accumulation led Arab states to alter their policies in decided and highly consequential ways. Although Arab leaders expressed an array of attitudes toward Zionism—including moderate hostility, indifference, and seeing a potential political ally—the desire to be associated with the norms of Arabism, the use of symbolic sanctions against one another, and symbolic competition led them down the path of prohibition.
The second issue concerns the relationship between Arab nationalism and unification. Although Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Lebanon hoped that the League of Arab States would place an institutional blanket on this possibility, leaders of the Fertile Crescent circulated various proposals to this end for more than a decade. The most important motion occurred in the fall of 1949 when Iraq and Syria seriously contemplated unification. Egypt derailed a primary motivation for Syria’s unification drive, security and fear of Israel, by ingeniously proposing a collective security pact. This proposal led to the 1950 Arab Collective Security Pact and the first glimmer that Arab states might coordinate their foreign and security policies in a much more forthright manner. But it also put a momentary end to unification bids. The third issue concerns the relationship between Arab nationalism and strategic relations with the West. The Baghdad Pact represented a turning point in Arab politics; until that moment the dynastic rulers had largely kept the lid on radical Arabism. Iraq’s decision to ally with Turkey and the West, however, stoked the embers of Arabism, catalyzed a regional debate about the relationship between the Arab world and the West, led to the norm prohibiting alliances with the West, marked the passage to a more radical version of Arab nationalism, and crowned Nasser as the unchallenged leader of Arab nationalism.
Chapter 5 examines the third period, which is framed by the 1956 Suez and 1967 wars and defined by the clash between state and nation, which is symbolized by the rise and decline of unification on the political agenda. The Suez War’s principal effect was to institutionalize tendencies that were already present in the system, namely, the eclipse of the British Empire and the West and the undermining of all Arab leaders who were their political allies. During this period Arabism became synonymous with positive neutrality and self-reliance among the Arab states. The emergence of radical forces, however, also produced a greater interest among some societal forces and state elites for territorial unification. The shining moment was the creation of the UAR by Egypt and Syria in 1958, which completely altered the region’s political debate. Its ignoble demise in 1961 notwithstanding, the demand for unification retained some force and underwrote the tripartite talks of 1963 involving Egypt, Syria, and Iraq. These talks, which began with much fanfare and ended in wicked acrimony, had two consequences. The first was a general decline in the belief that unification was possible in the near future or even desirable. In short, the legacy of these failed experiments was greater suspicion of pan-Arabism and a growing acceptance of sovereignty. The second consequence was the elevation of Israel on the Arab agenda, symbolized by the era of summitry. Beginning with the Cairo summit in January 1964, the Arab states temporarily overcame their differences to convene a series of meetings intended to forge a collective Arab response to the Israeli challenge. The era of summitry soon descended into regional acrimony in 1966, and by late December and continuing through June 1967 Arab states engaged in symbolic competition intended to demonstrate their allegiance to Arabism through their strident actions toward Israel; the dance of symbolic competition, however, sashayed into symbolic entrapment and the 1967 Arab–Israeli war.
Chapter 6 examines the post-1967 period. What is striking is that the issues of the West and unification began to disappear from dialogues about the desired regional order. For the most part, the Arab–Israeli conflict took center stage and became, for all intents and purposes, how Arab leaders defined and demonstrated their credentials and the symbols of Arabism that they sought to accumulate; indeed, at roughly the same moment that they were converging on the norms of sovereignty, they entered into a more divisive and open-ended debate about how to organize the Arab–Israeli conflict. I begin with the aftermath of the 1967 war and the events leading up to and resulting from the Khartoum conference of September 1967; the significance of Khartoum was that it signaled Nasser’s withdrawal from radical politics and a further step toward sovereignty. The Jordanian Civil War of 1970 further institutionalized sovereignty; placed in the difficult position of either allowing King Hussein to bludgeon the PLO, the new symbol of Arabism, or intervening and perhaps undermining the principle of sovereignty, Nasser and other Arab leaders supported Hussein. For the next several years the defining events revolved around the Arab–Israeli conflict. Although the Arab states responded to their defeat in the 1967 war with a semblance of solidarity, the victory of 1973 stirred them toward the opposite direction as Anwar Sadat’s thinly veiled unilateralism—beginning with the 1975 Egypt—Israel disengagement agreement and continuing through the 1977 flight to Jerusalem, the 1978 Camp David accords, and the 1979 peace treaty—starkly challenged the norms of Arabism. Although the Arab states responded by ostracizing Egypt for its heresy, for the next decade they failed to act proactively to Egypt’s challenge, because Libya, the PLO, Syria, and Algeria (collectively known as the “Steadfastness States”) held virtual veto power and blocked anything other than the status quo. No other Arab state dared to venture publicly outside this consensus. Still, the emergence of statist identities and acceptance of the norms of sovereignty to organize regional politics were related to a growing disagreement among Arab states over both broad principles and short-term strategies concerning the Arab–Israeli conflict. Two other developments suggest a growing fragmentation of Arab politics. The first is the emergence of subregionalism, which first appeared with the establishment of the Gulf Cooperation Council in 1981. The second is a continuing effort to develop some common norms of interaction, although these norms are increasingly indistinguishable from those of international society. These post-1967 events, in short, signal the emergence of statist identities, a centrist definition of Arab nationalism that is consistent with sovereignty, and acceptance of sovereignty as the basis for regional order.
Beginning in the 1970s political Islam became part of the mix of political challenges confronted by modernizing and religious states alike. 31 But I will pay relatively little attention to political Islam because Islam’s principal challenge has been to domestic governance rather than regional governance. I am not denying that Islam has a transnational component. Westphalian sovereignty rests on a territorial logic that is denied by Islamists who assert that the authority of the state derives from religious principles and practices that know no territorial boundaries. Islamic movements also have strong ideas about how the state should conduct its foreign policy, particularly on the question of Israel and the West as a religious and cultural threat rather than as a nationalist threat. There is the Organization of Islamic Countries, and Saudi Arabia has sponsored various Islam-based interstate organizations to act as a counterweight to Arab-based organizations. And Islamic movements have received financial backing from outside and constructed cross-state organizations. But Islamic movements in contemporary practice have targeted their energies at state-society rather than interstate relations, demanding domestic rather than regional reforms. 32 Simply put, if the divide in regional politics is statism versus Arabism, in domestic politics it is Islam versus secularism.
Chapter 7 considers the question of whether the end of the Arab states system is at hand. The Gulf War unleashed a flood of discussion about the Arab regional order and what, if any, sorts of exclusive arrangements should be constructed in the ashes of Arabism. Whereas the decades-long debate about the desired regional order revolved around the premise that as Arab states they shared certain fundamental objectives that should be properly handled collectively, the Gulf War—coming on the heels of rising statism, sovereignty, a centrist definition of Arab nationalism, and political Islam—undermined these assumptions. Indeed, the post–Gulf War debates question whether an Arab states system is disappearing, for Arabism is no longer the defining principle of regional politics; the marker to differentiate membership in the group and its associated organizations; or able to make the same claims on or have the same force regarding the practices of Arab governments. The post–cold war debate about the concept of Middle Easternism and the readiness to acknowledge Israel’s legitimate place in the region and potential inclusion in regional institutions and organizations speaks to these issues.
In sum, these five periods are defined not simply by a change in the debate about regional order but, more specifically, by a changing relationship between the Arab states and the underlying structure of regional politics. My goal is to demonstrate how and why these fundamental changes have occurred in the underlying structure of Arab politics and the norms that guide and define the Arab states system and to show that such changes point to a shift in the game of Arab politics and the desired regional order. This transformation occurred through dialogues among Arab states and state formation processes. Both processes led to the relative salience of state-national identities over alternative political loyalties; a growing differentiation between Arab states; a growing interest by Arab leaders in presenting themselves in ways that are statist and more consistent with the demands of sovereignty; and a willingness by Arab leaders to more consistently occupy the roles and norms associated with sovereignty. But my central concern is to demonstrate the causal contribution of interstate interactions to these very developments. Such developments do not imply a termination of this debate over the desired regional order. Far from it.
Chapter 8 identifies several themes that suggest how constructivism helps us recognize what makes inter-Arab politics distinctive and familiar. To examine inter-Arab politics with a constructivist spirit is to reacquaint international relations theory and the study of the Middle East. Various features of inter-Arab politics have remained inexplicable from a realist perspective but intelligible from a constructivist perspective, including the prominence of symbolic exchanges, the character and quality of alliances and institutions, and the social processes responsible for transforming the character of Arab politics. But this study of inter-Arab politics also contributes to international relations theory in various ways and elevates several themes likely to be as present in other regions as they are in Arab politics.
Endotes
Note 1: See, for instance, John Mearsheimer “The False Promise of Institutions,” International Security 19, no. 3 (1995): 5–49; Kenneth Waltz, Theory of International Politics (Reading, Mass.: Addison–Wesley, 1979); David Baldwin, ed., Neorealism and Neoliberalism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993); Benjamin Frankel, “Restating the Realist Case: An Introduction,” in B. Frankel, ed., Realism: Restatements and Renewal, pp. 3–14 (New York: Frank Cass, 1997). Back.
Note 2: See Stephen Walt, The Origins of Alliances (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1987); Shibley Telhami, Power and Leadership in International Bargaining: The Path to the Camp David Accords (New York: Columbia University Press, 1990); Yair Evron and Yaacov Bar–Siman–Tov, “Coalitions in the Arab World,” Jerusalem Journal of International Relations 1 (Winter 1975): 71–108; Alan Taylor, The Arab Balance of Power System (Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse University Press, 1982); Roger Owen, State, Power, and Politics in the Making of the Modern Middle East (New York: Routledge, 1992), pp. 90–92; P. J. Vatikiotis, Conflict in the Middle East (London: Allen and Unwin, 1971), pp. 18–22, 92, and Arab and Regional Politics in the Middle East (New York: St. Martin’s, 1984); Ellie Kedourie, “The Chatham House Version,” in E. Kedourie, The Chatham House Version and Other Middle Eastern Studies, pp. 351–94 (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1970). Back.
Note 3: Joseph Nye, Understanding International Conflicts: An Introduction to Theory and History (New York: HarperCollins, 1993), p. 147. Back.
Note 4: See Michael Brzoska and Thomas Ohlson, Arms Transfers to the Third World, 1971–85 (Oxford, England: Oxford University Press for the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, 1987). Back.
Note 5: Walt, Origins of Alliances, p. 149. Back.
Note 6: Associated Press, “Jordan’s King, in Frank Speech, Calls ‘67 War a Major Blunder,” New York Times, June 6, 1997, p. A6. Back.
Note 7: For the “new realism” see Bernard Lewis “Rethinking the Middle East,” Foreign Affairs 71, no. 4 (1992): 99–119; for “maturation” see Gabriel Ben–Dor, State and Conflict in the Middle East (New York: Praeger, 1983); for geography see Ghassan Salame, “Inter-Arab Politics: The Return to Geography,” in W. Quandt, ed., The Middle East: Ten Years After Camp David, pp. 319–56 (Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution, 1988); for pan-Arabism see Fouad Ajami, “The End of Pan-Arabism,” Foreign Affairs 57, no. 5 (Winter 1977–78): 355–73; for fragmentation see George Corm, Fragmentation of the Middle East: The Last Thirty Years (London: Hutchinson, 1983); for Middle Easternism see Mohammed Sid–Ahmed, “The Arab League and the Arab State,” Al-Ahram Weekly, April 6–12, 1995, p. 8; and for qawmiyya see Ghassan Salame, “ ‘Strong’ and ‘Weak’ States: A Qualified Return to the Muqaddimah,” in G. Luciani, ed., The Arab State, pp. 29–64 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990). Back.
Note 8: Regarding the failed unity talks see Walt, Origins of Alliances, p. 87; Vatikiotis elevates the 1967 Arab–Israeli War in Conflict in the Middle East, chap. 5; and Telhami argues for the swing in power in Power and Leadership, pp. 94–104. Back.
Note 9: Little evidence exists that the superpowers were responsible for the decline of pan-Arabism and the rise of statism or that the end of the cold war is responsible for the “new realism” in Arab politics. The overwhelming evidence is that the superpowers accommodated themselves to, accentuated, and mitigated already present inter-Arab dynamics. See Fouad Ajami, The Arab Predicament: Arab Political Thought and Practice Since 1967 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1981); L. Carl Brown, International Politics of the Middle East (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1984); Paul Noble, “The Arab System: Opportunities, Constraints, and Pressures,” in B. Korany and A. Dessouki, eds., The Foreign Policies of Arab States, pp. 41–78 (Boulder, Colo.: Westview, 1984); Walt, Origins of Alliances, p. 158; Yezid Sayigh and Avi Shlaim, eds., The Cold War and the Middle East (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997); Basam Tibi, Conflict and War in the Middle East, 1967–91 (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1993), chaps. 2 and 3. Back.
Note 10: There are some important exceptions. Prominent are those that begin with domestic rather than systemic politics to understand how Arab politics is shaped by states whose lack of legitimacy forces them to use Arabism as an ideological prop. See Michael Hudson, Arab Politics: The Search for Legitimacy (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1977); F. Gregory Gause III, “Sovereignty, Statecraft, and Stability in the Middle East,” Journal of International Affairs 45, no. 2 (Winter 1992): 441–67; Paul Noble, Rex Brynen, and Baghat Korany, “Conclusion: The Changing Regional Security Environment,” in B. Korany, P. Noble, and R. Brynen, eds., The Many Faces of National Security in the Arab World, pp. 275–302 (New York: St. Martin’s, 1993); Avraham Sela, The Decline of the Arab–Israeli Conflict: Middle East Politics and the Quest for Regional Order (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1997). Laurie Brand, in Jordan’s Inter-Arab Relations (New York: Columbia University Press, 1995), looks at “budget security.” Baghat Korany and Ali Hillal Dessouki (“The Global System and Arab Foreign Policies,” in Korany and Dessouki, Foreign Policies of Arab States, pp. 19–39) offer a framework that forwards the centrality of Arabism but accept many core realist assumptions and ultimately point to the dominance of realism. Back.
Note 11: Constructivism is not a research program that is organized around the attempt to explain a particular outcome–for instance, neoliberal institutionalism’s concern with the “cooperation question” and realism’s focus on the “problem of war”; rather, it attempts to understand how agents and structures are involved in a process of mutual creation and reproduction–that is, how structure broadly defined shapes the nature of the agents and their capacities, how their interaction is constrained by that structure, and how their interaction serves to either reproduce or transform that structure. See Nicholas Onuf, World of Our Own Making (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1989); Alexander Wendt, Social Theory of International Politics (New York: Cambridge University Press, forthcoming); Emanuel Adler, “Seizing the Middle Ground: Constructivism in World Politics,” European Journal of International Relations 3, no. 3 (September 1997): 319–63; Peter Katzenstein, ed., The Culture of National Security: Norms and Identity in World Politics (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996). Back.
Note 12: For sociological statements that inform this conception of order, see Dennis Wrong, The Problem of Order (New York: Free Press, 1994), p. 38; Erving Goffman, “The Interaction Order,” American Sociological Review 48, no. 1 (February 1983): 1–17; Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann, The Social Construction of Reality (New York: Anchor, 1967); Jeffrey Alexander, Twenty Lectures (New York: Columbia University Press, 1987), chap. 1; Onuf, World of Our Making. Back.
Note 13: This interactional theme has its roots in the works of George Simmel, Conflict and the Web of Group Affiliations (New York: Free Press, 1955), and “Group Expansion and the Development of Individuality,” in D. Levine, ed., On Individuality and Social Forms, pp. 351–93 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1971); George Herbert Mead, Mind, Self, and Society (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1934); and Erving Goffman, Strategic Interaction (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1969). For other sociological treatises see Anselm Strauss, Negotiations (San Francisco: Jossey–Bass, 1978); Barry Barnes, The Elements of Social Theory (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1996); Mustafa Emirbayer, “Manifesto for a Relational Sociology,” American Journal of Sociology 103, no. 2 (September 1997): 281–317; Paul Hare and Herbert Blumberg, eds., Dramaturgical Analysis of Social Interaction (New York: Praeger, 1988). Back.
Note 14: I am modifying Erving Goffman’s concept. He observed a dialogue when some offense to the group’s norms compels actors to address not only the nature of the offense but also their “own role and the role of the other participants in a system of control through which corrective action can be handled reasonably.” Relations in Public (New York: HarperBooks, 1971), p. 120. Back.
Note 15: That norms are created by and through interactions is a long-honored tradition in sociological research in a wide variety of fields. See Deirdre Boden, “The World as It Happens: Ethnomethodology and Conversational Analysis,” in G. Ritzer, ed., Frontiers of Social Theory, pp. 185–213 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1990); Harold Garfinkel, Studies in Ethnomethodology (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice–Hall, 1967); William Gamson, Talking Politics (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1992); Berger and Luckmann, Social Construction of Reality; Nicos Mouzelis, “The Interaction Order and the Micro–Macro Distinction,” Sociological Theory 10, no. 1 (Spring 1991): 127. Back.
Note 16: Strategic interaction can be understood as a “level of analysis” in its own right. See Goffman, “Interaction Order”; David Lake and Robert Powell, “Strategic Choice and International Relations,” in D. Lake and R. Powell, Strategic Choice and International Relations (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, forthcoming); Wendt, Social Theory, chap. 4; Randall Collins, “On the Microfoundations of Macrosociology,” American Journal of Sociology 86, no. 5 (March 1981): 984–1014; Jonathan Turner, A Theory of Social Interaction (Palo Alto, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1988); Barry Buzan, “The Levels of Analysis Problem Reconsidered,” in K. Booth and S. Smith, eds., International Relations Theory Today, pp. 198–216 (College Station: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1995). Back.
Note 17: For game-theoretic treatments of international politics see Thomas Schelling, The Strategy of Conflict (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1980); Lake and Powell, “Strategic Choice”; James Morrow, Game Theory for Political Scientists (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1994). Back.
Note 18: See Taylor, Arab Balance of Power; Walt, Origins of Alliances; Telhami, Power and Leadership. Back.
Note 19: Clement Henry Moore, “On Theory and Practice Among the Arabs,” World Politics 24, no. 1 (October 1971): 106–26. Back.
Note 20: On the importance of distinguishing between state and regime survival, see Noble, Brynen, and Korany, “Conclusion”; Mohammad Ayoob, Third World Security Predicament (Boulder, Colo.: Lynne Reinner, 1994); Michael Barnett and Jack Levy, “The Domestic Sources of Alignments and Alliances,” International Organization 45, no. 3 (Summer 1991): 369–96. Back.
Note 21: See Robert Jervis, The Logic of Images in International Relations (New York: Columbia University Press, 1970), for a classic statement that builds on the work of Goffman to generate similar observations. Back.
Note 22: Ann Swidler, “Culture in Action: Symbols in Strategies,” American Sociological Review 51, no. 2 (April 1986): 273. Back.
Note 23: For rationalist approaches see Baldwin, Neorealism and Neoliberalism; Michael Hechter, Principles of Group Solidarity (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1987); James Coleman, The Foundations of Social Theory (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1990). Back.
Note 24: Also see Andrew Abbott, “Sequences of Social Events: Concepts and Methods for the Analysis of Order in Social Processes,” Historical Methods 16, no. 4 (Fall 1983): 129–46, and “From Causes to Events: Notes on Narrative Positivism,” Sociological Methods and Research 20, no. 4 (May 1992): 428–55; Larry Griffin, “Temporality, Events, and Explanation in Historical Sociology,” Sociological Methods and Research 20, no. 4 (May 1992): 403–27; William Sewall, “Three Temporalities: Toward an Eventful Sociology,” in T. McDonald, ed., The Historic Turn in the Human Sciences, pp. 245–80 (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1996). Back.
Note 25: A second domestic-centered explanation examines the rise and decline of domestic coalitions that support Arab nationalist goals. Sometimes domestic support is linked to class orientation; notably, the lower and middle classes are more accepting of Arabism’s goals, whereas the upper classes are more conservative and supportive of the territorial status quo. In other cases domestic support is connected to generational politics, as, for instance, a younger generation that leans toward radicalism. But this literature has generally focused on the rise and not the decline of Arab nationalism. On class politics see Hanna Batatu, The Old Social Classes and the Revolutionary Movements of Iraq (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1978); Philip Khoury, Syria and the French Mandate (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1987); C. Ernest Dawn, “The Origins of Arab Nationalism,” in R. Khalidi et al., eds., The Origins of Arab Nationalism, pp. viii–xix (New York: Columbia University Press, 1991); Nazih Ayubi, Overstating the Arab State (London: I. B. Taurus, 1995). On generational politics see Paul Salem, Bitter Legacy: Ideology and Politics in the Arab World (Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse University Press, 1994); Manfred Halperin, The Politics of Social Change in the Middle East and North Africa (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1963). Back.
Note 26: See Sela, Decline of the Arab–Israeli Conflict; Malik Mufti, Sovereign Creations: Pan-Arabism and Political Order in Syria and Iraq (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1996); Gause, “Sovereignty, Statecraft, and Stability”; Noble, Brynen, and Korany, “Conclusion”; Rex Brynen, “Palestine and the Arab State System: Permeability, State Consolidation, and the Intifada,” Canadian Journal of Political Science 24, no. 3 (September 1991): 606; Amatzia Baram, “Territorial Nationalism in the Middle East,” Middle Eastern Studies 26, no. 4 (October 1990): 425–48; Albert Hourani, A History of the Arab Peoples (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1991), p. 448. Back.
Note 27: Giacomo Luciani and Ghassan Salame, “The Politics of Arab Integration,” in Luciani, The Arab State, p. 398. Back.
Note 28: For discussions of narrative analysis see Lawrence Stone, “The Revival of the Narrative: Reflections on a New Old History,” in L. Stone, The Past and the Present Revisited, pp. 74–93 (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1981); Hayden White, Metahistory (Baltimore, Md.: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1973); William Sewall, “Introduction: Narratives and Social Identities,” Social Science History 16, no. 4 (Winter 1992): 479–88; Jerome Bruner, “The Narrative Construction of Reality,” Critical Inquiry 18, no. 1 (1991): 1–21; Alex Callinicos, Theories and Narratives (Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1995), chap. 2. Back.
Note 29: Mohamed Heikal, Secret Channels (London: HarperCollins, 1996). Ali Hillal Dessouki similarly argues that these were the defining Arab issues. “The New Arab Political Order: Implications for the 1980s,” in M. Kerr and E. Yassin, eds., Rich and Poor States in the Middle East: Egypt and the New Arab Order (Boulder, Colo.: Westview, 1982), p. 322. Back.
Note 30: See Sewall, “Three Temporalities”; Abbott, “Sequences of Social Events,” and “From Causes to Events”; Hendrik Spruyt, The Sovereign State and Its Competitors: An Analysis of Systems Change (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1994); Stephen Jay Gould, Wonderful Life: The Burgess Shale and the Nature of History (New York: Norton, 1988); Kathleen Thelen and Sven Steinmo, “Historical Institutionalism in Comparative Politics,” in S. Steinmo, K. Thelen, and F. Longstreth, eds., Structuring Politics: Historical Institutionalism in Comparative Analysis, pp. 1–32 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1992); Stephen Krasner, “Sovereignty: An Institutional Perspective,” Comparative Political Studies 21, no. 1 (April 1988): 66–94. Back.
Note 31: For the rise of political Islam see Dale Eickelman and James Piscatori, Muslim Politics (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1996). Back.
Note 32: Shirin Fathi, Jordan: An Invented Nation? (Hamburg: Deutsches Orient–Institut, 1994), p. 228; Eickelman and Piscatori, Muslim Politics; John Esposito, Islam and Politics, 3d ed. (Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse University Press, 1986). Back.
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