The complex debate around federalism

The Middle East has become overly focused on primary identities, Michael Young writes, and that is leading to a complex debate about federalism

Federalism is at the centre of a complex debate in the Middle East. Brendan Smialowski / Bloomberg News
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Last Saturday I moderated a panel on federalism and freedom at a conference of the May Chidiac Foundation in Beirut. The discussion revealed much about Lebanese attitudes towards federalism. However, it did not answer whether, in a Lebanese context, federalism was a guarantor of greater freedom.

This question is just as relevant in the Arab world. In recent years several Arab states in conflict, notably Syria and Iraq, both with mixed sectarian and ethnic populations, have broken apart largely because their social contracts failed to absorb diversity. The two were once centralised Arab nationalist states, yet were ruled by leaders from minority sects. In Iraq, this came to an end when the regime of Saddam Hussein was overthrown in 2003. A federal system was introduced by the American occupation authorities, yet it had few of the prerequisites necessary for success.

Federalism is usually introduced voluntarily by the different components in a society. It can either involve the joining together of separate units into one, such as Switzerland. Or it follows from an agreement at the centre to transfer significant powers to the regions, as in Belgium and the United States.

There was little common agreement involved in Iraq. Many Kurds saw federalism as tying them to a central government in Baghdad from which they sought to break free. The central government itself became a bastion of Shia power, in which government authority was employed mainly to enhance Shia interests. As a result, the relationship with the periphery, particularly majority Sunni and Kurdish areas, deteriorated.

Syria is a different case altogether. As the country has fragmented due to the uprising that broke out in 2011, federalism has been one idea circulating to eventually reconstitute the country and avoid total disintegration. Yet with Iraq as cautionary tale, it will take more than setting up the shell of a federal structure to put in place a workable order.

Federalism also has to be more than voluntary. It must speak to a desire of the different entities in a state, whether regions, sects or ethnic groups, to remain together. Many regard federalism as a form of partition. It is precisely the contrary – a formula to avoid partition by maintaining a unified state through a structure recognising its diverse components.

However, the modern Arab state has created few openings for collaborative efforts or consensus in this direction. For decades the states of the region were governed by despots, backed by the military and an array of repressive security services, who crushed all impulses that might threaten centralised authority. This ambience of fear and intimidation ensured that the state was regarded as an instrument of oppression, not mutual solidarity. At best it is perceived by many Arabs as a source of patronage. Yet almost nowhere is it viewed as a space for social amelioration and higher aspirations, established through the joint collaboration of its citizens and their representatives.

For federalism to succeed, such conditions are absolutely necessary. That is where the issue of freedom comes in. If a federal system protects freedom, for instance freedom as a sect or an individual, it has a better chance of lasting. To a large extent such freedom has to follow from economic prosperity, and the uneven distribution of resources in Iraq is a principal reason why the political system there is shattered.

In the Lebanese context the question takes on another dimension. In many regards Lebanon is already a de facto federal system. Each sect has its own personal-status laws and in general is concentrated in specific geographical areas, a consequence of the war years. But what federalists seek is to institutionalise an even greater devolution of power, particularly financial power, for Lebanon’s sectarian entities.

However, would freedom expand or contract? Lebanon’s traditional sectarian political leadership can be authoritarian in its way, though not at levels comparable to that of Arab regimes. An oddity of the Lebanese system was that by allowing the sects to be more powerful than the state, the system, usually reliant on a sectarian balance of forces and consensus, created openings allowing individuals to be substantially free.

A federal system will not necessarily end that, but by establishing entities much more autonomous one from the other, it may strengthen the power of sectarian leaders within their areas of control. With less sectarian interaction in society, the imperatives of consensus and compromise may diminish, so that federalist structures could reinforce authoritarianism.

That’s not to say it will happen, in Lebanon or anywhere else, but the regional underpinnings of federalism are rotten. Those who regard federalism as a solution fail to consider that if it is built on poor foundations – mainly a desire to effect a divorce – it might only increase fragmentation and autocracy.

Perhaps the problem is that the Middle East has become overly focused on primary identities. The religion, sect, tribe or ethnicity to which one belongs is regarded as the sole benchmark around which a state must be built. But successful countries are those that transcend this to imagine a broader community of interests. Federalism needs this to thrive.

Michael Young is opinion editor of The Daily Star in Beirut

On Twitter @BeirutCalling