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	Democracy's not a devil for Islamists by Saad Eddin Ibrahim Project Syndicate / Financial Times Egypt   May 23, 2005   Election results around the Middle East mark a new trend: Islamist political parties – those that base their platforms on Islamic law – are highly popular.   Where elections are held, Islamists do well: Hamas among Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza; the religiously oriented Shi'ite coalition in Iraq; a parliamentary faction in Morocco; and, most significantly, the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) in Turkey.   Democracy movements in Lebanon, Egypt and elsewhere in the region must face the challenge of incorporating Islamist parties into democratic systems.   But can the Islamists be trusted? If they rise to power, will they respect the rights of minorities and women and leave office when voted out? Will they tolerate dissent? Or will such elections be based on "one man, one vote, one time?"   As a sociologist, I have been studying these issues for 30 years. As an inmate of an Egyptian prison, I discussed them with my fellow prisoners, many of whom were imprisoned as supporters of Egypt's Islamic movement. My conclusion? Islamist parties are changing.   These parties understand the social transformations under way in the Middle East that are leading towards democracy, and they want to take part. In my view, we may be witnessing the emergence of Muslim democratic parties, much like the rise of Christian Democratic parties in Europe in the years after World War II. The Islamists' popularity is not difficult to understand.   Since autocratic regimes in the Middle East left little room for free expression, the mosque emerged as the only place where people could freely congregate. Religious groups responded to this opportunity, emerging first as social welfare agencies, and then becoming the equivalent of local politicians.   In the process, they gained credibility as trustworthy advocates of the people – a real distinction from repressive and corrupt governments.   In principle, it would be hypocritical to advocate democracy and at the same time the exclusion of Islamists from peaceful political participation. But the practice of electoral politics also gives us reason for optimism. By my count, some two-thirds of the 1.4 billion Muslims in the world now live under elected governments in which Islamist parties are players.   When Islamist groups are denied access to electoral politics, their cause takes on a mythic aura. Their principles remain untested ideals, never forced to confront the practical realities of governance.   The late King Hussein took up this challenge in 1989, after bread riots in the southern Jordanian city of Maan. The king brought all the political forces together to draft a national charter for political participation. The Islamists signed on, pledging their respect for the rules of the game.   In the years since, Islamists have participated in four Jordanian elections. The first time, they gained a governing plurality, put their slogans into practice, and failed to maintain their popular support.   In the four ministries the Islamists ran, they imposed restrictions on female staff members, triggering widespread protests that ultimately forced the four ministers to resign. Their share of the vote in subsequent elections declined sharply.   By contrast, it is a mistake to believe that force can eliminate Islamist movements. Instead, political reform ought to include them under the following conditions:   * Respect for the national constitution, the rule of law, and the independence of the judiciary.   * Acceptance of the rotation of power, based on free, fair and internationally monitored elections.   * Guaranteed equal rights and full political participation for non-Muslim minorities.   * Full and equal participation by women in public life.   The role of external actors in promoting democracy in the Middle East is also critical.   Much has been said of President George W. Bush's American-led "crusade" to bring democracy to the Muslim world. Wars in Afghanistan and Iraq were predicated, at least in part, on spreading freedom; similarly, the Middle East Partnership Initiative is supposed to make democracy the centrepiece of American assistance in the region.   It is important to remember, though, that democracy was on the international agenda well before the US was attacked in September 2001. Under the Barcelona Accord of 1995, the European Union offered aid and trade to several Arab countries, in exchange for progress on democratic reform.   The trade improvements have been delivered, but little has been accomplished on Arab domestic reform. In the 1970s, the Helsinki Accord helped bring down the Soviet empire. We need a comparable formula for the Middle East.   Whatever one thinks of American military intervention, one must concede that it has altered the region's dynamics. Domestic opposition forces, while distancing themselves from the US, have been markedly emboldened in Lebanon, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and elsewhere. We are all watching for signs of opening among our neighbours.   Something about the past few months feels new and irreversible. Too many people in too many places are defying their oppressors and taking risks for freedom.   (Saad Eddin Ibrahim, an Egyptian pro-democracy and peace activist, is Professor of Political Sociology at the American University in Cairo and heads the Ibn Khaldun Centre).   Published: May 28 2005   "US should open dialogue with Islamists", by Roula Khalaf. (Financial Times / UK)   US officials have a selection of colourful expressions to describe the recent democratic stirrings in the Middle East, for which they are always quick to claim credit. In the past week alone, high-level Americans have variously said that the Arab world is living a "springtime of hope", undergoing a "metamorphosis" and experiencing a "vital moment of incredible events".   In a region where the US has been deeply unpopular, US officials - so often on the defensive - are now also addressing Arab audiences with new-found self-confidence. In a more amusing moment at a recent World Economic Forum gathering in Jordan, Elizabeth Cheney, daughter of the US vice-president and head of Middle East democratisation efforts at the US State Department, snapped at Amr Moussa, head of the Arab League, accusing him of bringing up the Palestinian issue just to win applause: "We should stop using [the Israeli- Palestinian conflict] as an excuse not to deal with reform and not to deal with democracy." She had a point, of course, even if she was booed by the audience while Mr Moussa was cheered.   But the US may be getting ahead of itself. It is true that Washington has helped unleash feverish debate over reforms in many Arab countries, but whether it will persist in its push for political change is far from certain. For while it celebrates political progress, the US is already being forced to confront an uncomfortable reality: that Islamist groups, moderate as well as radical, may be the greatest beneficiaries of its policy. Perhaps more quickly than it imagined, America has to decide whether it would be ready to accept the outcome of greater democracy in the Arab world. That includes the assortment of political groups rooted in religion and broadly labelled "Islamist".   The gains made by Hamas, the Palestinian militant group, in last month's local elections in the West Bank and Gaza Strip marked a sober awakening for the Palestinian Authority, Israel and Washington. By winning a majority of council seats in some of the largest constituencies, Hamas has given the mainstream and secular Fatah movement an additional reason to try to delay the legislative elections next month.   I suspect we will not hear calls from Washington to hold the Palestinian poll on time, at least not with the same intensity that the US has approached Lebanon's legislative elections starting on Sunday. Although Hizbollah, Lebanon's Shia Islamist group, is taking part, the vote is expected to hand a majority of parliament seats to the anti-Syrian opposition, an outcome strongly favoured by Washington. There are also worrying signs that US eagerness for political reforms in Egypt, where the largest opposition is the banned but non-violent Muslim Brotherhood, is waning. When Ayman Nour, a liberal Egyptian MP who wanted to run for president, was arrested earlier this year, the US loudly protested, in effect winning his release.   The vigorous American defence of Mr Nour encouraged others, including the Islamists, to step up their criticism of Hosni Mubarak, the Egyptian president. But the subsequent detention of numerous Muslim Brotherhood members - including, in the past week, some of its top leaders - seems to have gone largely unnoticed in Washington.   The Bush administration is understandably torn between a desire to promote democracy and a real fear of political Islam. One way to address this dilemma is to launch a dialogue, starting at least with non-violent Islamists. Ms Cheney argues that armed groups have no role in the political system and must choose between bullets and ballots. Islamists who reject violence, meanwhile, should be held to certain standards and accept red lines such as respect for women's rights. Liberal, secular groups, she says, are at a huge disadvantage: unlike governments and Islamists (who at least at times have had access to the mosque) the liberals have been denied outlets to express their ideas. If people in the Middle East have an honest choice, she maintains, they will not choose the extreme option.   But while Islamists have used the mosque and promoted their cause through a network of social services, they have also born the brunt of government repression. And that has contributed to their radicalisation. Governments, moreover, cannot be encouraged to adopt selective policies, in which Islamists are repressed and liberals are embraced. Nor is there any guarantee that greater opportunity to express liberal views will prove convincing in societies that are still largely religiously conservative.   So it may well be a long time before liberals acceptable to the US are able to challenge Islamists as the largest and most organised opposition in the region. The risk for the US is that failure to show understanding of Islamist demands could wreck its entire democratisation project.   Perhaps a better strategy for Washington would be to speak to the more moderate Islamists. A dialogue could help convince Americans that such groups are not necessarily undemocratic. It would also reassure groups committed to pluralism that their political aspirations would not be blocked.   The British government is considering a more ambitious strategy of direct engagement with Hizbollah and Hamas, recognising that both could soon be participating in governments that will be formed after elections. Political parties based on religion and usually opposed to US policies may be unpleasant - but they are part of the Middle East reality.   (The writer is the FT's Middle East editor)
	The myth of American exceptionalism by Richard Wolff Professor of Economics Emeritus, University of Massachusetts USA   The myth of American exceptionalism, by Richard Wolff.   Until the 1970s, US capitalism shared its spoils with American workers. But since 2008, it has made them pay for its failures.   One aspect of "American exceptionalism" was always economic. US workers, so the story went, enjoyed a rising level of real wages that afforded their families a rising standard of living. Ever harder work paid off in rising consumption. The rich got richer faster than the middle and poor, but almost no one got poorer.   Nearly all citizens felt "middle class". A profitable US capitalism kept running ahead of labour supply. So, it kept raising wages to attract waves of immigration and to retain employees, across the 19th century until the 1970s.   Then everything changed. Real wages stopped rising, as US capitalists redirected their investments to produce and employ abroad, while replacing millions of workers in the US with computers. The US women"s liberation moved millions of US adult women to seek paid employment. US capitalism no longer faced a shortage of labour.   US employers took advantage of the changed situation: they stopped raising wages. When basic labour scarcity became labour excess, not only real wages, but eventually benefits, too, would stop rising. Over the last 30 years, the vast majority of US workers have, in fact, gotten poorer, when you sum up flat real wages, reduced benefits (pensions, medical insurance, etc), reduced public services and raised tax burdens. In economic terms, American "exceptionalism" began to die in the 1970s.   The rich, however, have got much richer since the 1970s, as every measure of US income and wealth inequality attests. The explanation is simple: while workers average real wages stayed flat, their productivity rose (the goods and services that an average hour"s labour provided to employers). More and better machines (including computers), better education, and harder and faster labour effort raised productivity since the 1970s.   While workers delivered more and more value to employers, those employers paid workers no more. The employers reaped all the benefits of rising productivity: rising profits, rising salaries and bonuses to managers, rising dividends to shareholders, and rising payments to the professionals who serve employers (lawyers, architects, consultants, etc).   Since the 1970s, most US workers postponed facing up to what capitalism had come to mean for them. They sent more family members to do more hours of paid labour, and they borrowed huge amounts. By exhausting themselves, stressing family life to the breaking point in many households, and by taking on unsustainable levels of debt, the US working class delayed the end of American exceptionalism – until the global crisis hit in 2007.   By then, their buying power could no longer grow: rising unemployment kept wages flat, no more hours of work, nor more borrowing, were possible. Reckoning time had arrived. A US capitalism built on expanding mass consumption lost its foundation.   The richest 10% – those cashing in on employers good fortune from no longer-rising wages – helped bring on the crisis by speculating wildly and unsuccessfully in all sorts of new financial instruments (asset-backed securities, credit default swaps, etc). The richest also contributed to the crisis by using their money to shift US politics to the right, rendering government regulation and oversight inadequate to anticipate or moderate the crisis or even to react properly once it hit.   Indeed, the rich have so far been able to use the crisis to widen still further the gulf separating themselves from the rest, to finally bury American exceptionalism. First, they utilised both parties dependence on their financial support to make sure there would be no mass federal hiring programme for the unemployed (as FDR used between 1934 and 1940).   The absence of such a programme guaranteed that real wages would not rise and, with job benefits, would likely fall – as they indeed have done. Second, the rich made sure that the prime focus of government response to the crisis would benefit banks, large corporations and the stock markets. These have more or less "recovered".   Third, the current drive for government budget austerity – especially focused on the 50 states and the thousands of municipalities – forces the mass of people to pick up the costs for the government"s unjustly imbalanced response to the crisis. The trillions spent to save the banks and selected other corporations (AIG, GM, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, etc) were mostly borrowed because the government dared not tax the corporations and the richest citizens to raise the needed rescue funds.   Indeed, a good part of what the government borrowed came precisely from those funds left in the hands of corporations and the rich, because they had not been taxed to overcome the crisis. With sharply enlarged debts, all levels of government face the pressure of needing to take too much from current tax revenues to pay interest on debts, leaving too little to sustain public services.   So, they demand the people pay more taxes and suffer reduced public services, so that government can reduce its debt burden.   For example, California"s new governor proposes to continue for five more years the massive, broad-based tax increases begun during the crisis and also to cut state services for the poor (reduced Medicaid funding) and the middle class(reduced budgets for community colleges, state colleges, and the university system). The governor admits that California"s budget faces high interest costs and reduced federal government assistance just when the crisis increases demands for public services. The governor does not admit his fear to tax the state"s huge corporate and private individual wealth.   So, he announces an "austerity programme", as if no alternative existed. Indeed, a major support for austerity comes from the large corporations and wealthiest.   California"s austerity programme parallels similar programmes in many other states, in thousands of municipalities, and at the federal level. Together, they reinforce falling real wages, falling benefits, falling government services and rising taxes.   In the US, capitalism has stopped "delivering the goods", as it so long boasted. The reality of ever-deeper economic division clashes with expectations built up when wages rose over the century before the 1970s. US capitalism now brings long-term painful decline for its working class, the end of "American exceptionalism" and rising social, cultural and political tensions.   • Richard Wolff, is Professor of Economics Emeritus, University of Massachusetts. Visit the related web page
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