Calls for civil disobedience have increased throughout the Middle East. Often, these calls are issued by geographically-defined minorities, Islamist political movements, cyber groups, quasi-governmental organizations, or factions lacking a clear social identity. The motivations behind these calls vary, but they encompass calls for regime change, calls for independence or secession, protesting general policies, and voicing objections to the dominance of armed militias. The motives also include pressuring factions vying for state power, or seeking quick resolutions to issues facing specific social segments.
Those enacting civil disobedience face a host of obstacles, such as internal schisms within the disobeying factions, lack of cultural receptivity to the concept of civil disobedience, fears of regional chaos, and resisting foreign interventions.
The notion of civil disobedience in comparative political literature indicates the refusal of segments of the society to abide by the laws, decrees or regulations of the relevant authorities, due to viewing them as being inherently unjust. Non-violent resistance movements have utilized this tactic in India, South Africa, Egypt and the United States, throughout different times and to attain varying aims. These aims included independence from colonial occupiers, resisting racism, and attaining civil rights and social justice, in a manner reflecting how civil disobedience is predicated upon a social consciousness that is aware of injustice. Such disobedience is also predicated, crucially, on eschewing armed violence, damage to public facilities, and the hampering of state functions. Avoiding such conduct is essential to maintaining the legitimacy of the disobedience’s goals.
A Variety of Patterns:
There are many forms of civil disobedience that have manifested within Middle Eastern countries:
1-Disobedience by minorities: Some social segments have carried out disobedience on an ethnic basis to protest government policies. An example of this can be found in the actions of the residents of the Algerian province of Tizi Ouzou, on June 5th 2016. A number of locals pulled down the Algerian flag throughout different state institutions, raising a tribal flag in its place, in addition to carrying out mass protests calling for independence. These actions were preceded by local students refusing to sing the national anthem.
2-Disobedience by politicized Islamic groups: Certain Islamist factions, most prominently the Muslim Brotherhood, have sought to exploit new technologies to express their demands, which are shared by other social segments. For example, social media websites were used for campaigns instigating Egyptian citizens to refuse paying their utility bills and to protest the rising prices. These campaigns, titled “We’re not Paying” and “You’re Starving Us” in the colloquial Egyptian dialect, did not receive popular support, especially in light of the military and the Ministry of Supply deploying vehicles throughout the country to provide foodstuffs to help alleviate the inflation’s impact.
In 2015, the Syrian branch of the Brotherhood issued a communiqué titled “The Alawite Prison…and the Keys Remain in Your Hands”. The statement was meant to incite the Alawite sect to carry out civil disobedience and defect from the Syrian military, and to join with anti-Assad forces. The Brotherhood stated its “appreciation for the stand taken by a significant number of Alawites, Christians, Druze, Ismailis, Kurds, and Turkmen, in siding with the Syrian people against the Assad regime, in contrast to the majority of their sects which stand with the regime”. This reflected the Brotherhood’s intention to replace the Assad regime upon its collapse.
3-Civil disobedience of cyber groups: organizers of civil disobedience often take to the internet to disseminate their message. For example, there are approximately 11 million internet users in Sudan according to the National Telecommunications Corporation. In light of this number, utilizing the internet for political purposes is an action that some consider akin to a cyber war against the al-Bashir regime.
Conversely, some movements promoting civil disobedience lack popular backing. This was demonstrated by the experience of the “Disobedience” movement in Egypt, which called for civil disobedience on November 4th 2016 in response to the Egyptian government’s decision to float its currency and raise the price of fuel. This was not the first time the movement made such a calling. On June 2nd, 2015, it called for a partial two-hour general strike, from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. The call fell on deaf ears, in light of the apparent influence of the Muslim Brotherhood on the Disobedience movement, especially given that its demands were simultaneous with calls to halt the execution of Brotherhood leaders.
4-Government disobedience: This is an unusual phenomenon, which only applies to the situation in Libya. The government of Abdullah al-Thani released a statement on its Facebook page on October 21st, 2014, urging the Libyan army led by Khalifa Haftar to march upon Tripoli and liberate it from the armed militias controlling it. The government also called on citizens to carry out civil disobedience across the city in preparation for the army’s mobilization.
5-Prisoner disobedience: There are indications of acts of civil disobedience being carried out in prison. A dramatic example of this occurred on August 4th, 2016 in the Syrian prison of Suwayda. The prisoners were protesting maltreatment by the regime, and succeeded in taking control of parts of the prison, capturing officers of varying ranks and a number of policemen. An understanding was reached between the prison administration and the representatives of the prisoners, who were captured by the government from the provinces of Suwayda and Daraa and the Damascus countryside.
6-Anonymous disobedience: A call to disobedience may come from an anonymous source due to fear of reprisals from the security forces. This can impact the popular response to such initiatives, demonstrating that individual initiatives are insufficient to oppose the political establishment. Anonymous Syrian activists declared a civil disobedience in December 2011, in order to pressure the Assad regime through paralyzing the economy, decreasing government revenues and thus crippling government spending. This also occurred with a largely inconsequential act of disobedience by a group of merchants, a faction, which constitutes a significant bloc of the Assad regime.
Varying Explanations:
There are a number of reasons, which explain the calls to disobedience across the region, which can be listed as follows:
1-Overthrowing the regime: Political activists and members of political parties, as well as journalists and singers, launched a civil disobedience campaign against Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir, from the 27th to the 29th of November 2016. Streets were emptied of pedestrians and most public bussing for two days, while shops and restaurants and pharmacies closed their doors. Mosques, public transport stops, and markets were used to spread word of the campaign, especially after the government declared an increase in the price of oil products and other goods. These events occurred in the context of difficult economic times the country has faced since 2011 after the split of South Sudan, which has acquired 75% of the formerly united Sudan’s oil revenues.
Some observers see this campaign as a warning to the regime to halt some of its economic and social policies, as occurred when the government backtracked on its decision to lift subsidies off medicines for chronic illnesses, or its removal of the General Secretary of the National Medicines and Poisons Board. Others believe that the main purpose of the campaign is the preparation for the overthrow of the regime itself. Sadiq al-Mahdi, the head of the National Umma Party, has openly declared that the Sudanese people should “mobilize via protesting and striking against tyranny and corruption, without violence or sabotage, so that the people may stand united as they have throughout history to attain a total and just peace, and a complete democratic transformation”.
The Khalas (Deliverance) movement, one of the spearheads of the civil disobedience campaign, stated its plans to gradually escalate the campaign until December 19th, upon which it will become an open and total disobedience on the anniversary of the declaration of independence within the parliament. The mass strike is planned to continue until the “true” flag of independence is raised on January 1st, presumably upon the regime’s fall.
In light of this, lawyers have raised banners denouncing rising prices, corruption, and repression in front of the Supreme Court in Khartoum. Scores of journalists belonging to the Sudanese Journalists Network, an organizational counterpart to the government-owned Journalists Syndicate, have placed preambles for journalists on strike. Such strikes encompass a refusal to carry out daily tasks, boycotting news coverage, and halting any editorial tasks within newspapers.
On November 30th of 2016, a coalition of Sudanese political parties known as the National Consensus Forces, issued a memorandum outlining its goals for a political transition. The Consensus was founded in 2009 and is made up of 17 parties, the most prominent being the National Umma Party, the Popular Congress Party, and the Sudanese Communist Party. The Consensus’ demands included ending one-party rule, sending aid to the afflicted, an end to the decline of the economy and standards of living, holding an economic conference, setting up a constitutional conference to determine the nature of the political regime, and carrying out free and fair elections during the transitional period.
Political instigators in Sudan draw upon the country’s heritage of activism, as the Sudanese people played a vital role through their civil disobedience in bringing down former president Ibrahim Abboud, who ruled from 1958 to 1964. Another mass disobedience overthrew Gaafar Nimeiry, ending his reign, which lasted from 1969 to 1985.
2-Calling for independence or secession: The secessionist impulse is most strongly exhibited by the struggle of southern Yemen. Tens of thousands across the southern provinces gathered on November 30th, 2016 to celebrate the anniversary of independence from Britain in 1967. Flags of the now-dissolved southern state were raised on rooftops and cars and across cities, as chants echoed a southern desire for self-determination, what is referred to as “ending the commitment” to the north and re-establishing the former southern state of the People’s Democratic Republic of Yemen.
Southern Yemen witnessed mass civil disobedience in December 2014, heeding a call by southern secessionist movements. Most governmental and educational facilities were paralyzed, as well as local institutions and shops. In Tunisia, a similar event was witnessed in the Tunisian city of Thala on the Tunisian-Algerian border. Residents carried out mass civil disobedience from October 8th to the 16th, 2012, calling for the city to be excised from the Kasserine governorate and to be re-classified as a governorate in and of itself, in order to end the marginalization it had suffered.
3-Protesting general policies: This was encapsulated by the “You Stink!” campaign in Lebanon, launched in response to the garbage crisis in 2015 and 2016 and in exacerbated by the vacuum within the presidential office. The protesters called for mass civil disobedience aimed at forcing the incumbent Minister of the Environment Mohamad Machnouk to resign, and the protests escalated into a full-scale denunciation of the government’s overall policies, especially policies pertaining to electricity and healthcare.
Civil disobedience also notably occurred in the Jordanian governorate of Ma’an, in opposition to governmental mismanagement particularly in the security sector, following the cover-up of the deaths of two of the city’s residents. Such campaigns also occurred in the southern Algerian city of Ain Salah. The city is located near a newly established fracking site, which prompted its residents to mobilize on April 22nd, 2015, in order to pressure the government to halt fracking activities and prevent the pollution of groundwater resources.
4-Opposition to the ascendancy of armed militias: Civil disobedience began to take shape in the Libyan city of Tripoli, on the 27th of November 2016, which was the first of its kind there since the UN-backed Government of National Accord came to power in March 2016. Activists called for pressuring the authorities to re-examine the economic and security situation, given that armed militias had been in control of the capital for two years. The calls were heeded strongly in universities and schools, in light of the fact that freedom of movement within the capital was severely limited.
5-Pressuring factional holders of power: This is most apparent in countries where political power is shared or where there are several factions with state-level power. In Libya, government institutions carried out civil disobedience in Benghazi on April 6th, 2014. The aims were to pressure the ruling General National Congress to approve early parliamentary elections, to hamper the Congress’ activity, the election of a president through direct voting, adjusting the election law and instituting a mechanism of electoral representation, and dividing the constituencies which were commissioned by said election law.
6- Quick resolutions to issues facing specific social segments: Residents of the Jordanian city of Petra carried out civil disobedience on November 23rd 2015, calling for the reimbursement of their credit sales. Petra and its surrounding areas were rendered impoverished after the majority of their residents invested their money in credit sales, involving the selling of cars and real estate and possibly animal resources to merchants. Such sales would increase the value of merchandise by 40%, to be provided by government checks issued four months after time of sale.
Jordanian banks failed to issue these checks for months, after the country’s Attorney General on behalf of the Anti-Corruption Commission confiscated the moneys and properties of credit sales merchants. This issue continues to have broader ramifications in spite of its relevance to a specific social segment. The problem came close to threatening the social and economic security of vast areas in southern Jordan, as many government facilities and banks were paralyzed, and many shops were closed.
Formidable Obstacles:
A number of obstacles exist which may impede the success of civil disobedience campaigns within the Middle East, which can be summarized as follows:
1-Internal divisions within the campaigning ranks: One of the main obstacles to the success of civil disobedience is the occurrence of divisions within the factions attempting to spearhead it. These divisions can relate to the actual grievances or the methods through which the campaign will be carried out. For example, internal divisions within the Lebanese anti-garbage protests become very prominent and rendered the protests uncontrollable. Some of the literature on these protests concluded that they were not properly thought out, given that many of the participating groups ended up withdrawing from them. These groups included “Badna Nhaseb” (We Want Accountability), “For the Republic”, “Human Rights Advocates Against Corruption”, and the “Association for Civil Democratic Mobilization”.
2-Fears of regional chaos: The partially successful response to the recent calls for civil disobedience in Sudan have increased fears among factions within Sudanese society that their country may be heading towards becoming a failed state. After all, popular uprisings in Libya Syria and Yemen escalated into civil wars, a fact that was not lost on government television, which issued news bulletins warning of the chaos that might ensue should protesters clash with security forces.
3-A lack of cultural receptivity to the concept of civil disobedience: A culture of civil disobedience is sorely lacking across significant portions of Middle Eastern societies. Some exceptions do exist, such as the work-related strikes of doctors, workers, lawyers and journalists. These exceptions only amount to partial or incomplete civil disobedience. There is a general absence of peaceful dissemination of the ideas and details pertaining to civil disobedience among the populace, due to the possibility that such disobedience might deviate towards violence, an outcome, which would be the very antithesis of the concept.
4-Social campaigns opposing civil disobedience: Elements within the media, as well as members of parliament, are waging a vicious campaign against calls for civil disobedience in Egypt via withholding the payment of water and electricity bills. This campaign coincided with a threat from the Egyptian Minister of Electricity Dr. Mohamed Shaker that electricity would be cut off from any citizen who refuses to pay his or her bills. In Libya, the municipal authorities of Tripoli preempted the strikes by calling on public sector employees to ignore any calls for civil disobedience and to continue their work, especially those working in education, healthcare and public service facilities.
5-Resisting foreign intervention: This concept was brought to light through the general rejection of a campaign carried out by the self-proclaimed “Egyptian Revolutionary Council”. Named “I’m Not Paying”, the campaign was launched on September 3rd, 2016, calling on Egyptians to withhold from paying their bills across the country. Though some individuals did heed the call, there was no public or even localized support for it. Many Egyptians perceived the campaign as a form of foreign intervention, given that Turkey currently hosts the members of the “Revolutionary Council”. Therefore, ignoring the calls for civil disobedience was seen as akin to a national duty in the face of a Muslim Brotherhood plot.
Other Alternatives:
To summarize, the basic message behind the calls for civil disobedience is that Middle Eastern societies have other means of resisting their governments, means which the security forces alone cannot succeed in quashing. This might necessitate that the governments become more receptive to the demands of such disobedience, in order to avoid more unpredictable scenarios that may put national security at serious risk.
