ARAB SPRING

Case Study - The Arab Spring

The Arab Spring

Introduction

Arab Spring is a term used for the wave of protests and demonstrations taking place in the North Africa and Middle East since December 18, 2010. Till now, there have been revolutions in Egypt and Tunisia, a civil war in Syria and Libya, and also major objections and protests in Oman Algeria, Iraq, Bahrain, Jordan, Djibouti, and Yemen and minor protests in Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Morocco, Sudan, Mauritania, and Western Sahara. The protests encompass common practices of civil resistance in continued violent operations involving demonstrations, strikes, rallies, and marches, as well as utilization of social media such as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube, to communicate, arrange, and raise awareness and understanding among the population and the international community as an attempt to show oppression of the regimes.

The incident began in December 2010 when a young Tunisian, Mohamed Bouazizi, set fire to his own body as a form of protest against the living conditions, police corruption and ill treatment in the country he lived. He did not know, but the desperate act that ended with his life, later come to be called the Arab Spring.

Discussion

Democracy and Political development

Democracy is essentially a significant and non-violent mechanism of conflict resolution. In the Arab Spring, it can work as an alternative to violence. Democracy functions best where the individuals feel that they have enough in common with each other to accept the regime from one another's hands. If demos is taken out of democracy, then it is only left with kratos which means that the power of a state that must enforce what it cannot ask in the name of civil reliability. In the Arab Spring, democratic policies and structures can help in maintaining the peace by providing mechanisms for resolving or managing conflicts without exercising violence (Crick, 2002).

The democratic culture of diversity and participation is essential in the procedure of conflict resolution, and as a result conflict resolution advances greater inclusiveness and participation and therefore contributes to the democratic culture in the Arab. Democracy in the Arab Spring can result in successful transition to peace building, compromise and confidence building and most importantly representing as an alternative to violence. However, Collier-Rohner (2008) says that there are two effects of democracy which are:

Accountability - in which the democratic liability lowers rebellion's incentives. Collier also argued that democracy also restrains the technical options of government oppression, and this makes rebellion easier. It is also contended that democracy in rich countries makes the country safer because democracy below an income limit increases the tendency of violence. The rationale of this effect over the fundamental desirability of democracy is that if the state or government becomes more responsible, violence becomes less likely.

Technical regression in repression - Democratic successor regimes faces more violence because responsibility to the law is limited as what the security services are allowed to do. Therefore, democracy generates technical regression repression which can likely more than completely balance accountability so that democracy raises the ...