The Arab World Takes a Hard Look at Itself - Page 2

Eli · July 17, 2002, 14:15

Unbelievable. 30 posts and only one man blamed Israel.

Az · July 17, 2002, 14:26

A step in the right direction.

I've read about this report around 2 weeks ago in the papers.

Of course ,everyone will forget , and nothing will be implemented.

Imran Siddiqui · July 17, 2002, 14:43

Quote:

Originally posted by Eli
Unbelievable. 30 posts and only one man blamed Israel.

It's all Israel's fault!!!!

Adam Smith · July 17, 2002, 14:58

When I started this thread I was mainly thinking of the points Roland raised. There have been plenty of areas such as East Asia and Latin America with US or other intervention. Most of these may have received more development aid than the Arab world, but none has come close to the foreign exchange earnings the Arab world has from its oil. And yet the Arab world compares very unfavorably with these areas in human development. Does this suggest that giving more aid in the hope of improving human development and reducing terrorism is pushing a rope?

There are places where the US has provided aid or impetus for reform in the Arab world. We gave Egypt a fair amount of aid for going out on a limb and signing a peace treaty with Israel. And Sadat got assassinated for his trouble. We pushed the Kuwaitis to enact political reforms after the Gulf War, and supported libralization groups there. At present these groups constitute a 40 percent minority bloc in their parliament which supports reform, but they are getting stiffed by the majority.

Che
I dont think I buy the argument that fear of nationalization is suppressing democratic reforms. Most (all?) Arab oil companies have been nationalized since the 1970's. For example,

Quote:

In 1973 (1392/93 AH), the Saudi Arabian government took a 25% stake in Aramco. In 1974 (1393/94 AH), this share was increased to 60% and in 1980 (1400/01 AH) it was amicably agreed that Aramco should become 100% Saudi-owned, with the date of ownership back-dated to 1976 (1396/97 AH).

HERE is the source.

edit: wording change

Kropotkin · July 17, 2002, 15:54

Cybergnu: I'm from the western traders area too so it's not my fault either.

CyberGnu · July 17, 2002, 17:09

Oh, I thought you were from Norrland :-)

Now who can we blame?

Eli, Israel has been used as a scapegoat for most arab leaders. There is no question that without Israel, the arab leaders would most likely face a lot more internal pressue for change. But even so, it is those leaders fault... No one is forcing them to use the scapegoat.

Kropotkin · July 17, 2002, 17:10

I just live here...

CyberGnu · July 17, 2002, 17:21

Gnu is stupid.... Completely missed your signature...

Sirotnikov · July 17, 2002, 19:37

Gnu realised that Israel is usualyl a scapegoat?

Wow....

Messiah? Is that you?

CyberGnu · July 17, 2002, 20:15

Nah, I'm just rational.

Faeelin · July 17, 2002, 21:12

It's cheap to blame the west for this.

The Arab world has had, on the whole, almost the LEAST amount of intervention by the West, compared to the rest of the world. China was maimed, robbed, occupied, carved up, and so forth, and today is a world power.

Eastern Europe was occupied for 50 years by the Russians.

And you're going to compare the support of a few dictators to those two?

Hmm. This brings up an interesting question. Why has the arabic world alone failed to produce any success stories? Most other regions have at least one successful nation which is pretty modern.

To put it another way, Who broke islam?

Oerdin · July 17, 2002, 21:38

I agree it is to easy to blame the west. Why is it that Asian countries suffured longer under Impirialism yet today they are still so much further ahead of Arabs economically, democratically, and via human rights? The fault for this failure must rest squarely upon the sholders of Arabs themselves.

They must first take responsibility for their past failure then take action to correct it. Anyone want to bet they don't do this?

Imran Siddiqui · July 17, 2002, 21:43

Quote:

Hmm. This brings up an interesting question. Why has the arabic world alone failed to produce any success stories? Most other regions have at least one successful nation which is pretty modern.

That WAS Iraq... unfortunetly after the Gulf War they became very much less modern. It was amazing, in the 80 they were on their way to becoming an economic power.

The Vagabond · July 17, 2002, 22:21

Wow, the combined population of the Arab World is 280 million.

[I don't know why, but I thought it was just about 100 million]. If united they would make a formidable power.

DinoDoc · July 17, 2002, 22:26

Quote:

Originally posted by The Vagabond
If united they would make a formidable power.

China would crush them.

Dr Strangelove · July 17, 2002, 22:37

Quote:

Originally posted by chegitz guevara

Iran was most definately a case of US control, though, as US forces (under the command of Stormin' Norman's father) landed in Iran and reinstalled the Shah.

edit: Re BD's comment:

Uhm, well, Iran has Arabs in it, yeah, that's the ticket.

Soviet forces were sitting in Northern Iran. The US was concerned that increasing agitation by Soviet sponsored political parties heralded a coup that would be quikly reinforced by those troops. The government in Iran then seemed unable to cope with the threat. Records made available by the democratic government of Russia in the past decade confirm that the Soviet Union planned to stage a coup in Iran and add it to their collection of puppet states. If that had happened the Iranian people would have fared far worse than they did under the Shah. Ask a Pole, a Czech or a Hungarian.

The Vagabond · July 17, 2002, 22:55

Quote:

Originally posted by DinoDoc
China would crush them.

China would ally with them.

Ned · July 18, 2002, 00:25

Clearly it is high time we supported true democracy in the region. The move against Arafat is a massive step in the right direction.

Alexander's Horse · July 18, 2002, 00:36

One of the most interesting observations was the description of muslim fundamentalism as a form of fascism.

Tingkai · July 18, 2002, 01:12

With regards to Asia, a lot depends on when you take the snapshot.

Take a picture in 1975 and things don't look so great.

Even today, the picture isn't so great. Truly democratic governments only exist in Taiwan, South Korea and Japan. Economic growth is rather fragile (HK now has 7.7 per cent unemployment and major economic structural problems).

Economically, East Asia benefited from massive investment that came from Japan and the US.

American investment into the Middle East is limited by regular cycles of anti-American sentiment.

The oil revenues may also have been a curse in disguise. As long as a country can reap money from oil, there is less incentive to develop other areas. Countries that lack natural resources are forced to be more creative. That happened in Singapore.

The countries in East Asia have also witnessed the devestation of war at a level that far exceeded the Arab world. That has created a disincentive towards the use of violence to solve international problems. the Arabs haven't learned that lesson yet.

Oerdin · July 18, 2002, 01:24

Quote:

Originally posted by DinoDoc
China would crush them.

So would USA & EU or aleast both of these powers have larger populations and Per Capita Incomes. BTW the communist Chinesed out numbered US forces 15 to 1 in korea and they still couldn't beat them.

Adam Smith · July 18, 2002, 10:31

Quote:

Originally posted by Tingkai
The oil revenues may also have been a curse in disguise. As long as a country can reap money from oil, there is less incentive to develop other areas. Countries that lack natural resources are forced to be more creative.

Good point. A few oil refineries and petrochemical plants aside, Middle East does generally look like an extractive economy. Combine that with the political / social situation and I wonder if you have something that looks like the colonial Spanish in the Americas.

DinoDoc · July 18, 2002, 10:37

Quote:

Originally posted by The Vagabond
China would ally with them.

Doubtful, given her own problems with Muslim fundamentalism.

Imran Siddiqui · July 18, 2002, 10:40

They have allied with Pakistan though.

Roland · July 18, 2002, 10:43

Well most non-oil arab states are in the 2000-5000 $ range for GDP/capita. That's not much, but still better than subsaharan Africa and about the same as the poorer latin american states.

What those regions have in common would be interesting. The first thing coming to mind is lack of institutions. Working courts, banks, universities, media....

DinoDoc · July 18, 2002, 10:43

Quote:

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
They have allied with Pakistan though.

Because of India.

DanS · July 18, 2002, 10:54

You would think that a country like Egypt could do better for itself. Only 1/3rd of women and less than 2/3rds of men are literate, which would seem to make any democratic institutions anemic. As I stated above, this is not so in Jordan, which shows the variability among Arabs.

I wonder what the literacy rates were for the US 200 years ago.

orange · July 18, 2002, 11:48

just slightly greater than they are today

Oerdin · July 18, 2002, 12:03

India & Thailand are both fully functioning democracies. Plus Malasia, Sigapore, Indonesia, & Mongolia are at least populist states with democratic pretensions which is more then I can say for any Arab state. The closest is Egypt but it is really just another Arab "strong man" state where we are supposed to believe the big Kahuna gets reelected by 98% of the vote each time each time for 20 years.

Oerdin · July 18, 2002, 12:10

Quote:

Originally posted by DanS
I wonder what the literacy rates were for the US 200 years ago.

The first public schools opened in New England in the 1680's. Being good Protestants they wanted to teach everyone to read the bible for themselves.