THE LIMITS OF STATE POWER IN THE MIDDLE EAST.

INTRODUCTION

WITH THE ONSET OF THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY, many Middle Eastern countries continue to face several socioeconomic and political problems. Some of these problems pause a challenge to the institutional foundation of the states and the legitimacy of the regimes, while others question the effectiveness of the state concerning the provision of the goods and services to the people and the presence of adequate rules and institutions for the growth of a healthy economy. Still others cast a shadow of doubt upon the ability of the state to adapt to the demands of an ever-growing globalizing world economy.

We seek in this article to examine some of these challenges, describe their domestic and external sources, and explore how they limit the political power of the Middle Eastern states. In particular, we employ four variables to explore the challenges that these Middle Eastern states have faced in the past and are likely to continue to face in the new century. The four variables include Democracy versus Authoritarianism, Ethnicity and Nationalism, Demographic Surge, and Economic Dependency and Economic Mismanagement. Though our list could have included additional variables, the limitations of space compelled us to focus on what we consider the most serious non-military and non-security challenges to the political power of the Middle Eastern states. Space limitations have also forced us to give a brief analysis of these challenges and problems.

Our conception of the Middle East is broad and it includes Arab and non-Arab countries. According to this conception, the Middle East consists of 27 countries including the 22 members of the Arab League and Afghanistan, Cyprus, Turkey, Iran, and Israel. While we use the terms "state" and "government" interchangeably throughout this study, we do not assume that the two are the same. The state is a broad construct, which incorporates the government and comprises territory, people, governmental structure, armed forces, and resources. By contrast, the government is a much narrower concept that refers to the process of governing and the manner and the method of the exercise of power as well as the structure and distribution of political offices. We conceive of the state's political power to rest on governmental legitimacy, its ability to maintain public order and stability, sound economy, abiding by the rule of law, and providing for basic needs for the population.

BACKGROUND FOR THE EXPANSION OF MIDDLE EAST STATES POWER

The expanding powers of the states in the Middle East, their roles, and the challenges that face them are consistent with the patterns of state development at the global level. [1] We observe that throughout the 20th century, the size and the scope of state activities worldwide have expanded greatly, particularly in the economic, social, and military spheres. The expansion of the states' activities, however, yielded mixed outcomes. While state activism has brought about tangible advancement in the level of education, health conditions, and a drop in social inequality in many societies, governmental intervention has also produced a myriad of failures and problems. The mixed outcomes are seen in the collapse of the states' controlled economy in the former Soviet Union and Central and Eastern Europe, the financial crisis of the welfare state in Western Europe, Japan, and the United states, the role of the state in the economic growth of East Asia, and the breakdown of several states in Africa and Asia.

Like many countries in the world, and especially in the Third World, the size of the Middle Eastern states has increased significantly in the areas of military forces, military spending, internal security apparatus, bureaucracy, and control over the economy. Countries such as Syria, Iraq, Iran, Turkey, Egypt, and Israel maintain among the largest armies in the world, allocating a considerable portion of their budgets to the military and stockpiling vast quantities of modern military equipment. A similar trend is exhibited in the economic sphere, where the Middle Eastern states have a sizable public sector and employ great numbers of civil servants, workers, and managers. The states also control many of the existing resources including energy supply, large investment budgets, the banking system, minerals, the roads, railways, ports, and play a pivotal role in providing social services. [2]

A configuration of forces and motives explains the predominant economic, political, societal, and military role of the state. Though the majority of the Middle East states gained their independence in the three decades following World War II, the series of dramatic events that took place in the inter-world war periods furnished the background for these states. The first was the Russian Revolution of 1917, which entrusted the state with the task of central planning and placed it in control of economic activities. The second was the expansion of the welfare state in the West resulting from the devastating economic and social consequences of the Great Depression of the 1930s, which caused the state to introduce policies to restore economic productivity and to provide for social welfare. [3] The third development was the breakup of European empires and the collapse of colonialism after World War III. The three developments ushered in a new phase of a more activist role for the State and generated greater confiden ce in its capacity to resolve social and economic troubles.

In addition, public expectations helped in the expansion of the role of the state. Though many people in the Middle East may not consider their governments legitimate, they entrusted their governments to define national priorities, use public resources to attain these priorities, manage the economy, and create strong armed forces. The Islamic conception of the obligations of the state towards the community, especially its duty to promote the collective interests of the Ummah, provided a moral rationale for the expanding role of the state. [4]

The politics of state building and development are also behind the expansion of the economic and military functions of the Middle Eastern State. Most of the countries in the Middle East and North Africa came out of the colonial period with a strong belief in the state's management of the economy. The task of state building prompted the new leaders of the Middle East to embrace central planning and state managed development strategies. Those leaders, moderate and radical alike, wanted to modernize their society, bring about economic prosperity, educate the citizenry, diversify the economy, and build national military power. They believed that the attainment of these goals required the state's intervention and its mobilization of available resources.

Irrespective of their political orientation, the Middle Eastern governments did not believe that the market forces could revive their backward economy. [5] To the moderate leaders, the private sector alone was seen as incapable of bringing about large-scale economic growth because of its financial weakness and its concern with immediate profit making rather than development. Their belief was reinforced by the general acceptance of state activism and its impressive gains as reflected in the New Deal, the Marshall Plan, the emergence of the welfare state, and the European economic recovery. The radical leaders distrusted the private sector altogether because of its close ties to the West. While the Great Depression signified to them the failure of the market economy, State control of the economy, following the Soviet model, provided them with a model for success.

Regardless of their ideological stands, the rulers of the various states were concerned about economic inequalities and rising poverty in their societies. They took upon themselves the task of eradicating this poverty and bringing about social justice through industrialization, urbanization, education, agricultural productivity, redistribution of wealth, and building a credible military force. By the 1970s and the 1980s, the Middle Eastern states had also become involved in virtually every aspect of the economy: owning large industrial enterprises, administering prices, and increasingly regulating labor, foreign exchange, and financial markets. The dramatic rise in the price of oil in the international market during the 1970s and early 1980s enabled the Middle East governments to expand further the size of their states. Oil producing countries used the revenue during the oil boom decade to expand their public sectors and spending. To a lesser extent, the poorer Middle Eastern states that were dependent upon the financial assistance from oil producing countries, workers' remittances, and foreign aid from the Superpowers, expanded the state bureaucracy, governmental expenditure and the public sector.

Yet, the vast economic and military resources of the Middle Eastern states have not been translated into political power, governmental legitimacy, popular acceptance, economic growth, efficiency in rendering public goods, and maintenance of public order. Rather, the political, economic, and social institutions of many of the Middle Eastern countries are weak and vulnerable. [6] Their economic hegemony has also led to red tape, bureaucratic corruption and patronage. The state military dominance has also resulted in the squandering of financial resources on military adventures. The challenges to the political power of many Middle Eastern states nowadays emanate from domestic and global sources as well as economic and social changes. In the following pages, we will explore these challenges under the headings of Democracy versus Authoritarianism, Ethnicity and Nationalism, Demographic Surge, and Economic Dependency and Economic Mismanagement.

THE DEMOCRACY CHALLENGE

The feebleness and, in many cases, the absence of democratic institutions constitutes one of the primary challenges to the political legitimacy of many Middle Eastern countries. With the exception of Israel and Cyprus, and to a lesser degree Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan, Morocco, and Kuwait, and recently Iran, little progress toward the institutionalization of democracy has occurred in the Middle East. The introduction of quasi democratic institutions by Britain and France to each of Egypt, Sudan, Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, Jordan, Syria, Iraq, and Lebanon during their colonial rule in the region and the close ties that these Middle Eastern governments maintained with the two colonial powers gave a negative connotation to democracy. [7] To the nationalist leaders at the time, freedom and independence did not entail individual freedoms and rights; rather political freedom meant freedom from Western tutelage. The political development in the 1950s and the 1960s further put several countries in the Middle East on an anti-Western anti-democratic and anti-capitalist path. In particular, the advent of "revolutionary Arab nationalist" governments in Egypt, Syria, Algeria, Iraq, Yemen, and Libya introduced a socialist-populist alternative to democracy and the free market. The leaders of these revolutionary governments wanted to attain political independence from the West rather than borrow Western democratic norms or model their political institutions after Western political parties and associations. [8]

In response to mounting economic hardships and some domestic political pressures, countries like Egypt, Jordan, Tunisia, Algeria, Yemen, Sudan, and Morocco introduced some limited democratic reforms in the second half of the 1980s. To varying degrees, these states liberalized their political systems, held periodic parliamentary elections, legalized political parties, and reinstated constitutions. [9] The rulers of the Gulf States also appointed consultative councils. [10] The 1990s, however, registered serious setbacks to the democratizing trend in Sudan, Tunisia, and Algeria. Only in Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, and Kuwait and Yemen (after the Iraqi occupation of the former and the civil war in the latter), did the liberal openings somewhat continue. [11] Although these countries have allowed general elections, convened parliaments, and licensed political parties, democracy still operates within prescribed limits.

The 1998 Sahliyeh-Lohse study "Measuring Procedural Democracy In The Middle East" substantiates these observations about the pervasiveness of autocracy and the weakness of the democratic institutions among the Middle Eastern countries. [12] This study covers 24 Middle Eastern countries for the years 1970-1994. [13] The Sahliyeh-Lohse study, which is based upon Gurr's polity III data, presents a model, which consists of "elite" and "mass" dimensions. [14] This elite/mass model reflects the variation in the distribution of political power

in any society. [15] It also highlights the crucial role of the elite in the distribution of political authority and their support for the stability of any political or economic order.

The following figure presents this elite/mass procedural-political authority measurement model and illustrates the structure of the relationships between and among Elite Accord and Mass Accommodation. [16]

Based upon the Sahliyeh-Lohse model, Table 1 presents the distribution of political power in the Middle East among the four types of political authority: autocracy, oligarchy, statarchy, and democracy and compares the Middle East with other regions of the world along these four categories. The table includes two columns for the Middle East where column 1 consists of 24 Middle Eastern countries and column 2 excludes Israel and Cyprus from the list.

Table 1 indicates that 25% of the total 520 country-years (as in the Middle East 2 column), fall in the Autocracy category, and 66% fall in the Oligarchy category, while only 9% fall in the Democracy category. These findings clearly indicate that Oligarchy is the prevalent procedural-political authority category in the Middle East and the Arab World, followed by Autocracy, and then Democracy. With the exception of Israel, Cypress, and to some degree Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan, Morocco, and Kuwait, the Middle East and the Arab states have not made any significant progress toward the institutionalisation of mass procedural democracy. This generalization is confirmed by the fact that when we combine the scores for both Autocracy and Oligarchy in Table 1, we find that in 91% of the country-year cases, the Middle East executives did not promote elite competition, increase executive public accountability, or encourage mass participation.

Table I also compares the distribution of political authority in the Middle East with each of Central and Latin America, Africa, and Asia along the democracy, oligarchy, and autocracy categories. The table indicates that when we exclude Israel and Cypress, only 9% of all the country-years in the Middle East between 1970 and 1994 fall in the High Elite Accord-High Mass Accommodation category (Democracy). This finding makes the Middle East the least democratic, followed by Africa, Asia and Central and Latin America. The table also shows that with 66% of all the cases falling in the High Elite Accord-Low Mass Accommodation category (Oligarchy), the Middle East has the most cases of oligarchic rule, followed by Asia, Africa, and Central and Latin America. With regard to the autocracy category, Table 1 denotes that the Middle East has the most cases of autocratic rule only next to Africa by a small percentage (29% and 25%).

Table 1 also includes an estimation of the probability of change in the combination of elements from autocracy to democracy and vice versa. The table shows that the probability of change for the Middle East and the Arab states from low mass and low elite to high mass accommodation and high elite accord is 1% and 4% respectively, making the probability of change toward democracy in the Middle East lower than Africa, Asia, and Central and Latin America. The table also reveals a tendency away from democratic mass accommodation as evidenced in the 12% probability of change from high mass to low mass accommodation, a percentage which is much higher than the other regions.

The prevalence of autocracy and oligarchy among the vast majority of the Middle Eastern countries is behind the problem of legitimacy of these states. [17] According to mainstream political science literature, the legitimacy of the government is derived from the consent of the people and reflects public consensus concerning the rightness of the authority and the rule of law. Legitimacy is rooted in the principle of popular sovereignty, which conceives of the people as the legitimate source of power.

For most of the post-World War II period, the governments of the Middle East won over their people by generous economic rewards rather than through popular political participation. The availability of external rents in the form of oil revenues, foreign aid from the oil producing states, the superpowers, and Western Europe, external borrowings, tourism, and fees imposed on the transport of oil enabled many of the Middle Eastern countries to provide a vast array of services and benefits and meet societal needs at little or no cost. These external rents afforded the Middle Eastern governments the opportunity not to extract taxes from the citizens. Indeed, and with the exception of Israel, direct taxes on incomes, profits, and capital gains in the Middle East are among the lowest in the world. In exchange for these services and minimum taxation, the governments expect citizen's loyalty and their non-interference in political matters. [18] The net effect of this political arrangement has been the close dependence of the economic interests of the citizens upon those of the state.

Some writers maintain that the rentier state and the low level of taxation among many countries in the Middle East explains why there has been few public demands for political participation. [19] In the West, the question of "no taxation without representation" is behind the formula that ties the government's need to raise revenue through public taxation with the public right to constrain the government through elections and governmental accountability before the legislative branch. In the words of Bill and Springborg "low rates of taxation and the absence of effective formal institutions of political participation both testify to the wide gap between state and society." [20]

As long as the exercise of political power did not cause too many economic hardships, few people questioned the authoritarian nature of many of the Middle Eastern regimes. This political apathy enabled the ruling elites to exercise their authority unconstrained by popular pressure. However, as the section on the economic challenge indicates, the extension of material rewards alone is insufficient to sustain governmental legitimacy. Mounting poverty, unemployment, demographic serge, lack of capital, and economic recession, whether resulting from strains in the economy or from interstate political conflicts, constrain the capacity of many Middle Eastern governments to meet the material needs of the people.

As the ruling elite have to ultimately take up the reduction of governmental spending, governmental subsidies, the downsizing of the public sector, and the cutback of social services, it is necessary for them to have active public support for policy implementation. Public acceptance and legitimization of governmental actions require mass political participation, free elections, and governmental accountability. As Table 1 clearly indicates, with very few exceptions, the Middle Eastern regimes are not democratic but are either autocratic or oligarchic. The net result is that public support for governmental austere economic policies has been questionable.

ETHNICITY AND NATIONALISM

A second source of challenge to the political power and legitimacy of several Middle Eastern state systems stems from the presence of marginalized and disgruntled ethnic and religious groups, who are divided across, rather than within, national boundaries. With the exception of Algeria, Tunisia, and Libya, the rest of the Middle Eastern countries have sizable ethnic groups as part of their population. Table 2 suggests that 22 out of the 25 countries have a noticeable proportion of their population that belongs to different ethnic or religious groups. The Table indicates that in some countries, such as Sudan, Cyprus, and Israel, the ethnic demarcations coincide with religious divisions, while in Iraq, Syria, and Bahrain, minority religious groups are in control of the government.

The Table also reveals that the Gulf countries have a significant number of Asian workers ranging from 50% of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) population, to 13% of Bahrain, 10% of Saudi Arabia, and 9% of Kuwait. The table also shows the distribution of the Kurdish and Shi'a communities among several Middle Eastern countries. The Kurds comprise 20%, 17%, 10%, and 5% of the population of Turkey, Iraq, Syria, and Iran. Table 2 also indicates that the Shi'a are dispersed across several state boundaries and that they make up 93% of Iran's population and is the majority in Iraq and Bahrain. A considerable proportion of Shi'a minorities also exist in Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Oman, and Syria.

In the opinion of many scholars, the inconsistency between state geographic boundaries and ethnic and religious lines resulted in the outbreak of a number of civil conflicts In the Middle East. [21] Although the constitutions of many of the Middle Eastern states do not use ethnicity and religion to define the rights and the obligations of the citizens or to differentiate among them on ethnic and religious grounds, many of the multi-ethnic Middle Eastern countries such as Iraq, Turkey, Iran, Israel, Afghanistan, Cyprus, and Sudan have used invariably these primordial and group traits to relegate their ethnic, religious, and geographic minorities to a subordinate economic, political, and social position. These governments oppose granting meaningful political concessions to their ethnic groups, as they fear that any loosening of their control over the country will split the society into competing factions. They insist upon maintaining a powerful central government that can preserve public order, political unity , and national security.

In this connection, the Sudanese, Iraqi, and the Turkish governments fear that the non Arab minorities in Southern Sudan and the Kurdish quest for autonomy in both Iraq and turkey increases the potential for the breakup of these countries. [22] For the Iraqi rulers, the seriousness of the Kurdish rebellion also lies in the fact that the area of Kurdistan contains fertile lands and two-thirds of the country's oil fields and reserves. Likewise, Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf States developed a feeling of mistrust about their Shi'a minority population following the Iranian Islamic revolution and the transnational links between the Shi'a minorities and Iran and the recourse of some radical Shi'a groups to violence to achieve their goals. [23]

Many of the ethnic groups articulate demands, which sharply differ from those of their government's. They call for a new social contract that would recognize their particular religion, language, culture, and that would redistribute political power and economic resources to redress existing inequities. In this connection, the Southern Sudanese and the Kurds demand political autonomy and recognition of their separate ethnic identity, while the Shi'a, put forward demands for democratization and equal political representation in their particular state of residence. [24]

The seriousness of the ethnic challenge is well exemplified by the breakdown of the political systems in Afghanistan, Sudan, Somalia, and Lebanon. Since 1978, Afghanistan has been experiencing domestic violence among the four main ethnic groups (Pashtuns, Tajiks, Uzbeks, and Hazaras) that comprise the country. [25] The coup and counter-coup in Afghanistan in the late 1970s also lured the Soviet Union to invade that state and prompted the United States, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, and Egypt to extend economic, military, and political support to the Afghan rebels. Although the Soviet hegemonic design eventually failed, Afghanistan was left with a ruined infrastructure and ongoing factional infighting sustained by outside rival powers including Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Russia, Iran, Pakistan, India, Saudi Arabia, and the United States. [26]

Since its independence, Sudan too has endured incessant internal discord and division over the place of ethnicity, language, and religion in the determination of one's membership in the country's political life. [27] The Sudanese central government has been reluctant to grant the 30% ethnic and religious minorities who reside mainly in the southern parts of the country, complete self-autonomy, fearing that a step of this sort would undermine the Arab-Islamic character of Sudan, its political stability, and territorial integrity. The State of Somalia also was dismantled by a bloody civil war. [28] The collapse of this African country originated in the ethnic-nationalist divisions and anxieties, the presence of incompetent political elite, ineffective and autocratic governmental institutions, combating local tribes, as well as the intrusion of outside powers. The diverse Lebanese religious groups also posed a serious challenge to the state. The deep-seated social, economic, and religious cleavages among the Le banese resulted in the outbreak of a bloody civil war between 1975 and 1991.

THE DEMOGRAPHIC CHALLENGE

The third challenge to the Middle Eastern states is rooted in the serious demographic surge. As Table 3 suggests, the demographic challenge is characterized by three main features. First, 40% of the population of the Middle Eastern countries in 1996 was below the age of 14. This large proportion of young population is above the average for the other regions of the world and is only 5% lower than that of the Sub-Saharan African countries. In many Middle Eastern countries, 60% or more of the population are below the age of 25. This demographic reality creates a generation gap between the bulk of the young population and its aging political leadership. With the exception of the recent succession to the throne of young leaders in Bahrain, Jordan, Morocco, and Qatar, the rulers of the vast majority of the Middle Eastern countries are in their 60s and 70s and many of them have been in power for more than a decade and a half. Given this generational gap, the young population does not share the political experience of its rulers nor does it view itself heavily invested in their historical legitimacy, nor sees those leaders embodying their political aspirations. Moreover, the high percentage of young people places additional strain upon the overburdened educational system, the housing sector, and the labor market. [29]

The second feature indicates that there has been a significant improvement in the life expectancy among the Middle Eastern countries. As more people live longer, additional stresses are created upon the financial resources of the Middle Eastern states. Those countries have to provide more services in terms of health care, social security, nursing care, and even employment opportunities for an ever-growing aging population. As Table 3 shows, this increase in the life expectancy, however, is uneven varying from one group of countries to another. The low-income states such as Yemen, Sudan, Mauritania, Djibouti, and Somalia, have a life expectancy at birth of less than 54 years. The middle-income group, which includes Syria, Tunisia, Jordan, Iraq, Lebanon, Algeria, Egypt, Morocco, Iran, and Turkey, has a life expectancy of 68 years. The upper-income countries such as Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Oman, and Israel have a life expectancy of above 72 years.

The third conclusion suggests that the Middle Eastern countries have experienced high birth rate. With the exception of the Sub-Saharan African countries, the annual population growth of the Middle Eastern states is the highest in the world. Table 3 suggests that in the first half of the 1980s, the Middle East has the world's highest birth rate with 3.2 compared to 1.5, 2.2, and 2.4, for East Asia and the Pacific, Latin America, and South Asia respectively. This high birth rate is reflected in the increase of the total population of the region from 165 million in 1962 to 270 million in 1980 and 415 million in 1996.

Stated differently, the population of the Middle Eastern countries has increased, on average, by 250% in about three decades.

During those years, the population of the Gulf oil producing countries increased 457%. Indeed, the birth rate among these states in the l980s reached a new alarming level of 6.2. It ranged from 4.4% in Libya to 9.7% in the United Arab Emirates. Fortunately for the Gulf countries, the birth rate dropped to 2.6 in 1996 and ranged from 1.8% in Oman to 3.7% in Bahrain. The average birth rate for the Middle Income and the Lower Income countries for 1980 and 1996 was 2.7, 1.9, 3.8 and 2.8 respectively. It ranged from 2.5 in Mauritania to 6.6 in Djibouti for 1980 and from 3.3 for Somalia and Yemen to 2.1 in Sudan in 1996. While there was a general decline in the average birth rate for the Middle Eastern countries by 1996, Israel, Cyprus, Lebanon, and the Palestinian territory of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip experienced an increase in their birth rate between 1980 and 1996.

The decline in infant mortality rate, the overall improvement of health standards, and the increase in life expectancy are likely to sustain the current population growth in the region. This population growth rate will further be maintained by the fact that fertility rate is still above replacement level and that many Middle Eastern women are entering their childbearing years. It should be noted that the total fertility rate of six children for the average Middle Eastern woman is still among the highest in the world.

This rate of population growth has serious economic and political ramifications for the Middle Eastern states. As the section on unemployment below demonstrates, population growth contributes to rising unemployment among the young. The literature on Islamic resurgence in the Middle East and the rise of right-wing political parties in Europe amply shows that unemployment among the young is likely to attract them to extremist social and political movements. Population growth is also likely to compel the various states to divert capital away from improving labor productivity and economic development to building more houses, schools, sewage and water systems, meeting the soaring demand for food and water, and creating jobs for the ever growing number of young people. The surge in the population of the Middle East is also associated with the growth of large cities and poor urban centers with unwelcome consequences of draining investment capital, straining the administrative capacity of the state, and generating u rban violence and widespread poverty.

THE ECONOMIC CHALLENGE

The Middle Eastern states and, to a lesser degree, the rich oil producing countries face a host of serious economic problems ranging from insufficiency of food resources, capital shortages, rising unemployment, and vast external debts. These countries have not been able to attract significant foreign investment or to reduce their military budgets. Most of these countries also experienced substantial demographic surge. [30] The Middle East as a whole also suffers from uneven regional economic growth, the state's mismanagement of the economy, economic corruption, and economic dependency.

The formation of regional trading blocs such as the North American Free Trade Agreement and the European Community, together with the emergence of multilateralism as an approach to international issues, and the redistribution of power capabilities in the international system in the 1990s created additional economic challenges and complications for the Middle East. The political conditions of fear and suspicion among the Arab states, the Arab-Israeli conflict, the perennial tension between Syria, Iraq, and Turkey, and the animosity between Iran and its Arab neighbors have in the past inhibited the formation of a Middle Eastern trading regime and reduced the incentives for interstate cooperation. The interstate trade among the countries of the Middle East is at a low level of around 6% and many economic barriers among these countries continue to exist.

THE INEQUALITY OF ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

By comparison to the Latin American, East Asian, and East European economies, the per capita growth rate of the economy of the Middle Eastern countries has been slow and uneven. Leading Middle Eastern economists such as Alan Richards and Ibrahim Oweiss attribute this economic slump to the 1990 world recession, the decline in the price of oil, the failure of the public sector, the slow process in adopting structural economic reforms, and the strain of Arab financial resources in the wake of the Gulf War. In this connection, Oweiss maintains that the unevenness in the economic growth is manifested in the presence of three economic groupings of states: the low-income, middle-income, and the upper-income.

The low-income states such as Afghanistan, Yemen, Sudan, Mauritania, Djibouti, and Somalia, have adult illiteracy of 60% to 81%, and a per capita income of less than $900. [31] These countries also suffer from low labor force productivity, scarce financial and natural resources, crude technology, lack of training, and research facilities. In addition, they experience a series of social problems including malnourishment, widespread poverty, famine, diseases, epidemics, poor health condition and domestic violence. [32]

Oweiss's middle-income group includes Syria, Tunisia, Jordan, Iraq, Lebanon, Algeria, Egypt, and Morocco. This group of states has an adult illiteracy between 20% and 50%, and per capita income between $1000 and $2700. [33] Although in the 1990s many of these states adopted structural reforms and a policy of privatization and economic liberalization, their economies continue to face serious challenges. Such challenges include 20% unemployment, budget and balance of payments deficits, declining national revenues, severe shortages in housing, and a drop in workers' remittances. In addition, these countries have accumulated enormous external debts.

Oweiss's third category of states refers to the upper income countries of Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Oman, and Libya. These countries rely upon oil as the primary revenue. Until the Gulf war in 1991 and the overall drop in the price of oil, these states did not incur external debts. The main challenge for these rich states is how to adjust their budgets to correspond with the fluctuations in the price of oil. [34] Indeed, the drop in the price of oil and the decline in the world demands for oil after the second half of the 1980s, the financial burden of the Gulf War, Iraq's resumption of limited oil export, and the increase in oil production from the former Soviet Union have exacerbated the financial difficulties of the Gulf countries and forced them to rely more on domestic revenue sources and in some cases to resort to foreign borrowing. [35] In this connection, Saudi Arabia is reported to have $60 billion in foreign debt.

EXTERNAL INDEBTEDNESS

The accumulation of vast external debts is another aspect of the economic challenge that faces the Middle Eastern states. The amassing of large external debts has not been only confined to the poor Middle Eastern countries, as the oil producing states have been experiencing a monetary crisis, dramatic decline in per capita income, and increased external debt. The mounting Middle East foreign debts have resulted from a number of internal and external economic forces and developments. Governmental overspending and the allocation of a large proportion of the GDP to central government consumption are major contributors to external indebtedness. As Table 10 below shows, on average, the Middle Eastern region has dispensed 19% of its GDP on governmental consumption between 1980 and 1996. The policy of generous economic allocation such as food subsidies and services has also contributed to budget deficit and foreign borrowing.

In addition to governmental consumption, the overvaluation of local currencies, a general reduction of tariffs, limited governmental economic liberalization, and the modest steps to stimulate the private sector in the 1970s and the 1980s favored imports over exports and led to a consumption spree and consumerism. Moreover, many countries tried to allocate more financial resources for economic domestic investment than available domestic savings, resulting in a resource gap in percentage terms considerably larger than that for other developing countries. This large resource gap was filled for the most part with continued foreign borrowing and with aid from the United States, the European Economic Community, and the Arab Gulf oil producing states.

Still, another reason for external indebtedness is rooted in the fact that the Middle Eastern region spends more than the other regions of the world on the military. As Table 11 below indicates, the Middle Eastern countries dispensed between 1980 and 1996, on average, 5.5% of their total import on military purchases, the equivalence of 20% of their central budget or 6.3% of their GNP. The outbreak of several civil wars in a number of Middle Eastern countries, the numerous Arab-Israeli wars, the Iraq-Iran war, Iraq's invasion of Kuwait and the resulting Gulf war, inter-Arab divisions and rivalries, and conflicts with non-Arab states like Iran, Turkey, and. Ethiopia have fueled a bitter race for the acquisition of highly advanced weapons. This heightened sense of the security dilemma prompted the Middle Eastern countries, poor and rich alike, to borrow money to satisfy their growing appetite for advanced weapons.

The net effect of these factors is the accumulation of a large foreign debt by the Middle Eastern countries. Most of the Middle Eastern debt peaked in 1990 and 1991. The two exceptions are Egypt, whose debt reached a high point of 124% of its GNP in 1986; and Mauritania, at 244% in 1993. After 1991, the level of Middle Eastern indebtedness has declined.

Despite this drop, the Middle Eastern non-oil producing countries registered the world's second highest level of indebtedness. As Table 4 shows, by comparison to other regions of the world, the Middle East has higher external debt per GNP than Latin America, South Asia, and the Far East and was only next to Sub-Saharan Africa (76.6% to 77.2%). Because of the term of the loans, the debt service of some of these states occupies a significant proportion of their GNP. For instance in 1996, the external debt for Algeria was at 10% of its GNP, Jordan at 9% and Mauritania at 12%.

THE SHORTAGE OF CAPITAL

Another dimension of the economic challenge to political power and the effectiveness of many Middle Eastern states is the insufficiency of capital. The scarcity of capital has been the result of the reduction in the flow of foreign assistance, the drop in worker remittances, and the low level of foreign investment. With the exception of Libya and the rich Arab Gulf countries, the Middle Eastern states are dependent upon foreign assistance. These countries have secured $126 billion from official foreign sources between 1980 and 1996. As indicated in Table 5, the amount of foreign aid, however, has been unevenly distributed.

For instance in 1996, Egypt, Israel, and Jordan secured 54% of the aid to the Middle East region, which was an increase from the 30% they received in 1980. The three countries also captured around 60% of the total aid given to the Middle East region for the period 1980-1996. [36] The share of the rest of the aid receiving countries in 1996 averaged around $245 million, a decline from the 70% they obtained in 1980. This decline resulted from falling oil prices starting in the mid-1980s.

The inter-Arab disputes and the drop in the price of oil between 1985 and 1999 have been behind the decrease in the flow of foreign aid to the poorer Middle Eastern countries. The end of the Cold War and the demise of the Soviet Union also lessened the value of many Middle Eastern countries to the West. This situation produced additional retraction of foreign assistance to the region and compounded further the economic misfortunes of the poorer Middle Eastern states. With the exception of the aid to each of Jordan, Egypt, Israel, and the Palestinians, there has been a sharp reduction of assistance to the Middle East by comparison to the other regions of the world. As Table 6 suggests, between 1991 and 1996, East Asia and Latin America received increased aid of 10% and 37% respectively. The Sub-Sahara region experienced a slight decrease of 5%, while South Asia has received 30% less, and the Middle Eastern countries have a 48% cut in foreign assistance.

WORKERS' REMITTANCES

In addition to the reduction in foreign aid, the shortage of capital for a number of Middle Eastern governments has resulted from the sharp decline in the workers' remittances or cash flows from Arab workers working in the Gulf region. Countries like Yemen, Lebanon, Jordan, Sudan, Tunisia, and Egypt experience a variation in the flow of workers' remittances through time. In this regard, workers' remittance to Lebanon dropped from almost half of its GNP to 19% in the course of eight years. There is also a wide discrepancy among the Middle Eastern countries' reliance upon workers' remittance. As it is indicated in Table 7, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon and Yemen have received over 10% of their GNP at any time since 1980 from workers working in the Gulf region. Other countries like Somalia, Mauritania, Morocco, Algeria, Turkey, Tunisia, and Djibouti are considerably less reliant on this type of income. Still other states such as Cyprus, Syria, Israel, Iran, Iraq, Libya, and the Gulf Oil producing countries do not rely upon workers' remittances.

Like foreign assistance, the flow of remittances is subject to political and economic considerations. In the 1970s and the 1980s, these remittances furnished a large portion of public revenue for the labor exporting countries. For example, between 1973 and 1987, remittances covered 30% of imports for Egypt and Jordan and 60% of imports for the Yemen Arab Republic. The drop in oil prices in the mid-1980s sharply reduced the amount of worker remittances, and led to the shrinkage of the labor market in the Gulf region. The 1991 Gulf War also dealt a heavy blow to the flow of remittances from the Gulf States to several poor Middle Eastern countries. Because of that war, hundreds of thousands of workers lost their jobs in the Gulf region.

FOREIGN INVESTMENT

The low level of foreign investment is another contributing factor to the scarcity of capital among the non-oil producing states in the Middle East. In contrast to Europe, East Asia, Eastern Europe, and Latin America, the Middle East is not an attractive market for foreign investors. The level of investment has been consistently low by comparison to these other regions. The flow of foreign investment is also uneven among the countries of the Middle East. Though some of the non-oil producing countries like Egypt and Jordan have obtained foreign direct investment averaging at about 1% of their GDP in the early 1980s, these foreign ventures did not come close to the 4% direct foreign investment of the GDP of the oil producing countries. During the second half of the 1980s, a steady decline in the level of foreign investment to the Middle East began to take place. As Table 8 shows, this decline continued in the 1990s where in 1995 it dropped to less than 1% of the GDP of the oil producing countries and 0.4% of t he GDP of the non-oil producing countries.

As Table 9 below shows, though Egypt was the favored place to receive foreign direct investment in the 1980s, by the 1990s, the amounts of foreign investment flowing in to Israel, Turkey, and Tunisia surpassed those flowing into Egypt. Indeed, following the signing of the Oslo Peace Accord with the Palestinians in 1993, the flow of direct foreign investment to Israel increased to 2.2% of its GDP. Few of the Middle Eastern states, however, attract above $100 million US foreign direct investment. In 1996, these countries included Egypt, Israel, Morocco, Tunisia, Turkey, and Yemen.

UNEMPLOYMENT

Unemployment is another facet of the economic challenge that threatens to undermine the political stability of several states in the Middle East. [37] With an annual 3% increase, the labor force in several parts of the Middle East is growing at a faster pace than the demand for workers. According to Alan Richards, the rate of growth of the Middle Eastern labor force is greater than any other region of the developing world. He estimates that by the early years of the 21st century, the work force of the region is likely to increase by 36%--or 20 million new workers.

A combination of inter-related developments has been fueling the present unemployment in the region. Unlike the 1970s and the 1980s when employment by the government and labor migration to the Gulf states accounted for 70 to 80% of the new jobs in the non-oil producing states, in the 1990s, governmental employment and labor migration have slowed down significantly. Moreover, the decline in oil prices in the 1980s and the 1990s and the termination of the Iran-Iraq War shrank the Gulf countries' demand for foreign labor. The Gulf War also created massive unemployment in some of the labor exporting countries. Approximately 200,000 and 900,000 workers returned to Jordan and Yemen respectively. The influx of this substantial number of migrant workers strained housing and job markets in both countries. The poor economic planning and slow economic growth of many Middle Eastern countries has also held up the demand for new workers.

In addition to these economic forces, demographic factors are likely to further intensify the problem of unemployment. The high rate of population growth in the 1980s of many Middle East countries will put more and more young men on the job market. Likewise, the increase in the number of educated women demanding employment will bring additional pressure upon the labor markets of various countries in the Middle East. As Alan Richards remarks, rather than improving the already existing jobs and investing in developmental projects, the rising unemployment will compel the Middle Eastern governments to divert the scarce capital for the creation of new jobs to absorb the growing number of the unemployed.

GOVERNMENTAL ECONOMIC AND MILITARY SPENDING

Part of the economic challenge to the effectiveness and power of the Middle Eastern states can also be observed in the problem of overspending. Table 10 shows that a large proportion of the GDP of the Middle Eastern countries is allocated to central governmental consumption. On average, the Middle Eastern region has dispensed 19% of its GDP on governmental consumption between 1980 and 1996. The average spending for the rich oil producing countries was higher than the regional average with 26% during the same period while the non-oil producing states expended 18% of their GDP. The other regions of the world have disbursed much less on governmental projects. For example, between 1980 and 1996, Eastern Europe and Central Asia and

Sub-Saharan Africa expended on average 15% of their GDP, while East Asia spent 12% and Latin America and South Asia disbursed 11% each.

The Middle Eastern region also spends more than the other regions of the world on the military. Between 1980 and 1996, the Middle Eastern countries dispensed on average 5.5% of their total import on military purchases. By contrast, Latin America, East Asia (excluding China), South Asia, and Eastern Europe appropriated out of their total import bill 0.7, 1.4, 1.6, and 0.5 to military imports for the same period. The economic burden of the military can also be observed in the allocation of a high proportion of the budgets and the GNP to military expenditure. As Table 11 reveals, on average, a Middle Eastern country spends 20% of its central government budget and 6.3% of its GNP on the armed forces. By contrast, Latin America, East Asia (excluding China), South Asia, and Eastern Europe expend on average 3% of their GNP on military expenditure. While it is of no surprise that the oil producing states devote higher proportions of their financial resources to the military, the non-oil producing countries maintain higher averages than the other regions of the world. These states disperse on average 16.4% and 4.9% of their budgets and GNP on the military.

The economic encumbrance of the Middle Eastern military is further manifested in the number of men conscripted in the Armed Forces. According to Table 11, on average, 3.7% of the Middle Eastern labor force serves in the military, with countries like Jordan, Israel, Syria, and Iraq employing between 7% and 10% of their total labor force in the army. In contrast, the Latin American and South Asian military employs 0.9% and 0.8% of their labor force while the Eastern European military employs 1.9% of its work force. In absolute numbers, the Middle Eastern countries have a military force that supercedes other regions. With 3.7 million armed men, it is larger than that of East Asian countries (3.6 million, excluding the 2 million Chinese army), South Asia (2.1 million) Latin America (with 1.2 million), or Eastern Europe (less than a million).

CONCLUDING OBSERVATIONS

In this study, we have tried to describe four of the challenges that face the Middle Eastern countries. Our article has demonstrated that by comparison to the Latin American, East Asian, South Asian, and East European economies, the Middle Eastern states have uneven regional socioeconomic development, lower level of economic growth, substantial demographic increase, capital shortages, rising unemployment, greater external debts per GNP, insufficiency of foreign investment, and higher public consumption and military budgets. These states also have been trailing behind the other regions in developing efficient institutions, rules, and norms that would have enabled them to provide collective goods and services to the citizens and cope with the demands of a growing global economy more effectively. By their monopoly of power, they also have not provided sufficient room for mechanisms for public accountability, popular participation, ethnic and religious minority interest representation, market forces' initiatives , and with few exceptions, have not made significant progress toward the institutionalization of democracy.

Although we recognize that the expanding powers and roles of the Middle Eastern states and the reasons behind them are consistent with the patterns of state development at the global level and that many states in the world suffer from similar problems, the findings of our study allow us to conclude that such challenges are more pronounced in the Middle East. The multiplicity of these challenges and problems leads us to further confirm that the substantial functions and powers which the states assumed in their formative years and after, as well as public expectations and demands, went far beyond the existing institutional capabilities and resources of these states.

Though the responses of the states to these challenges go beyond the confines of this article, it suffices to say that they took several forms. These responses include the introduction of limited measures to reduce the scope of state control of the economy, curb its ownership of public enterprises, deregulate prices and trade, lift governmental subsidies, limit the provision of social and welfare services, and introduce circumscribed democratization reforms. Still, in other countries, the challenges to state power have led to the rise of nongovernmental organizations and civil society institutions to perform some of the tasks that the state has traditionally assumed. [38] In other countries, the severity of the challenges has contributed to the outbreak of civil conflict and even to the collapse of the state itself.

Although the challenges of development, governance, and security are grave and urgent and the growing global economy and the wave of democratization constantly alter the setting in which the Middle East state functions, the findings of our study lead us to believe that there are powerful forces that work to limit the ability of the state to deal with these challenges. The pains associated with the downsizing of the state, the slow returns of privatization, and the market failures in some countries are examples of these forces. The absence of institutionalized democracies and the Middle East security dilemma are additional factors. Indeed, the predominance of autocracy and oligarchy in the Middle East perpetuated in the past the sentiments of uncertainty, fear, and suspicions at the expense of the norms of democracy, interstate cooperation, and trust. If this pessimistic outlook were to persist well in the 21st century, it is likely to preserve the autocratic power of the state and reduce the prospects for ec onomic development and democratic governance.

Emile Sahliyeh is an associate professor of Middle East Politics and International Relations, Department of Political Science, University of Texas, Denton.

ENDNOTES

(1.) According to The World Development Report, New York Oxford University Press, 1997 chapters 1 and 2.

(2.) Alan Richards and John Waterbury suggested this in their A Political Economy of the Middle East, Colorado, Westview Press, 1996, 171-184

(3.) According to The World Development Report, 1997, 22-24

(4.) Mamoun Fandy in "Tribe versus Islam: The Post-Colonial Arab State and the Democratic Imperative" Middle East Policy, 3:2 1994, 40-51

(5.) Richards and Waterbury in A Political Economy of the Middle East, 173-174

(6.) Joel Migdal, Strong Societies and Weak States: State-Society Relations and State Capabilities in the Third World, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1988.

(7.) In this connection, see Majid Khadoury Political Trends in Contemporary Arab Politics, Maryland, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1973.

(8.) Malcolm Kerr, The Arab Cold War: Gamal Abd El-Naser and his Rivals, Berkeley, University of California Press, 1971.

(9.) Several authors address the question of Democratization in the Middle East including Heather Deegan in The Middle East and Problems of Democracy, Colorado: Lynne Rienner, 1994; Ghassan Salame (ed.), Democracy Without Democrats? The Renewal of Politics in the Muslim World, London: I.B. Tauris, 1994; Rex Brynen, Bahgat Korany, and Paul Noble (eds.), Political Liberalization and Democratization in the Arab World, vol 1, "Theoretical Perspectives," Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 1995; Jill Crystal, "Authoritarianism and its Adversaries in the Arab World," World Politics, 46:2 January 1994): 262-89; and Mustapha K. Al-Sayyid, "Slow Thaw in the Arab World: Breaking the Bonds of Authoritarianism," World Policy Journal, Fall 1991, 711-38.

(10.) Gregory F. Gause III, Oil Monarchies, New York: Council on Foreign Relations Press, 1994.

(11.) A number of scholars have examined the causes behind the setbacks in the democratic process in the Middle East including Lisa Anderson, "Peace and Democracy in the Middle East: The Constraints of Soft Budgets," Journal of International Affairs, 49:1 Summer 1995; Bahgat Gawdat, "Privatization and Democratization in the Arab World: Is there a Connection?", Journal of Social, Political and Economic Studies 18:4, Winter 1993; Michael Becker and Paul Aarts, "Dilemmas of Development and Democratization in the Arab World," International Journal of Political Economy, 23:1, 1993; Heather Deegan and Fred H. Lawson, "The Middle East and Problems with Democracy", Studies in Comparative International Development, 29:3 1994; Ghabra Shafeeq, "Democratization in a Middle Eastern State: Kuwait," Middle East Policy, 3:2 1993; and Larry P. Goodson and Saha Radwan, "Democratization in Egypt in the 1990s: Stagnant or Merely Stalled?" Arab Studies Quarterly, 19:1 1997.

(12.) In their Paper "Measuring Procedural Democracy in the Middle East," which was presented at the Middle East Studies Association annual conference, Chicago, 5 December 1998.

(13.) The countries that are included in the study are: Afghanistan, Algeria, Bahrain, Cyprus, Djibouti, Egypt, Iraq, Iran, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, and Yemen.

(14.) In their study of democracy in the Middle East, Sahliyeh and Lohse relied upon Keith Jaggers and Ted Robert Gurr, Polity III: Regime Type and Political Authority, 1800-1994 (ICPSR 6695) (computer file and code book), Ted Robert Gurr, producer (Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research, 1996).

(15.) In their study, Sahliyeh and Lohse use Mass Accommodation as the dependent variable. Mass accommodation is an aggregated construct consisting of three Polity III variables -- Participation Competitiveness, Participation Regulation and Executive Constraint. The study also uses Elite Accord as the independent variable. Elite Accord is also an aggregated construct consisting of three Polity III variables -- Executive Recruitment Regulation, Executive Recruitment Competitiveness and Executive Recruitment Openness. The authors use cross-tabulations and tau-b statistics to measure the mutual association between the two ordinal-level variables.

(16.) Emile Sahliyeh and Stephen A. Lohse present the figure in their paper "Measuring Procedural Democracy in the Middle East," p. 7.

(17.) According to Michael C. Hudson in Arab Politics: The Search for Legitimacy, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1977, especially chapters 1-4, and his article "Democratization and the Problem of Legitimacy in Middle East Politics," Middle East Studies Association Bulletin 22:2 1988, 157-72.

(18.) Gause proposed this in Oil Monarchies, 59.

(19.) Ibid., p. 80.

(20.) According to James Bill and Robert Springborg in Politics in the Middle East, New York: Harper Collins, 1994, 413.

(21.) Emile Sahliyeh and Sangeeta Sinha, in their paper "Measuring Ethnic Protest in the Middle East," which was presented at the Midwest Political Science Conference, Chicago, 17 April 1999, present a summary of six explanations for the rise of ethnic and religious activism in the Middle East and Central Asia.

(22.) Samir Al-Khalil, The Republic of Fear: The Politics of Modern Iraq, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989.

(23.) As indicated by Robin Wright in Sacred Rage: The Wrath of Militant Islam, New York: Simon & Schuster, 1985, and John L. Esposito, ed., The Iranian Revolution: Its Global Impact, Miami: Florida International University Press, 1990.

(24.) Numerous writers have discussed the causes behind the Shi'a political agitation including Augustus Richard Norton, Amal and the Shi'a: Struggle for the Soul of Lebanon, Austin: University of Texas Press, 1987; Madawi AI-Rashid, "The Shi'a of Saudi Arabia: A Minority in Search of Cultural Authenticity," British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies, May 1997, 121-38.

(25.) Khalilzad pointed this out in his article "Anarchy in Afghanistan," Journal of international Affairs, 51 Summer 1997, 37-56.

(26.) Ibid., pp. 40-50.

(27.) See numerous articles on the Sudan by Anne Mosely Lesch, "Confrontation in the Southern Sudan," The Middle East Journal, 40:3, Summer 1986; "Negotiations in the Sudan," Foreign Intervention in Sub-Saharan Africa: Making War and Waging Peace, ed. David R. Smock, Washington, DC: U.S. Institute of Peace, 1993; and "A View from Khartoum," Foreign Affairs, 65:4, Spring 1987, 807-26.

(28.) In their writings on Somalia, Chris Searle, "Agony and Struggle in Northern Somalia", Race and Class, 34:2, 1992, 23-32; Aristide Zolberg, "The Specter of Anarchy: African States Verging on Dissolution," Dissent 39:3, Summer 1992; and Basil Davidson, The Black Man's Burden. Africa and the Curse of the Nation-State, New York: Random House, 1992.

(29.) See chapters 4 and 6, The Political Economy of the Middle East.

(30.) A number of economists have examined the myriad of problems and challenges confronting the economies of several Middle Eastern states including Alan Richards, "Economic Imperatives and Political Systems," Middle East Journal 47:2 (Spring 1993): 217-27; Henri Barkey, ed., The Politics of Economic Reform in the Middle East, New York, St. Martin's Press, 1992; Iliya Harik and Denis J. Sullivan, eds., Privatization and Liberalization in the Middle East, Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1992.

(31.) According to the United Nations Development Program, Human Development Report, London: Oxford University Press, 1994, 102-103.

(32.) Ibid., p. 155

(33.) Ibid., pp. 120-22

(34.) Ibrahim Oweiss, "Economic Development of the Arab Countries in the 1990s," Unity Versus Separatism Conference, Santa Monica, California, 26 August 1994.

(35.) Eliyahu Kanovsky, The Economy of Saudi Arabia, Washington, DC: The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, 1994), p. 83.

(36.) The World Bank Indicators had only six years listed for Israel. We averaged for Israel for 1980-1996.

(37.) Alan Richards, "Economic Roots of Instability in the Middle East", Middle East Policy, 4:12, 1994.

(38.) Augustus Richard Norton, "Civil Society in the Middle East," Middle East Journal, special issue on "Civil Society in the Middle East," 47:2, Spring 1993.

                           Procedural Democracy:
                     Logical Relationships Among Elite
                        Accord, Mass Accommodation,
                               and Democracy
                               Elite Accord
              Low        High
High          Stratarchy Democracy
Mass
Accommodation
Low           Actocracy  Oligarchy
               Procedural Democracy: Mass Accommodation and
                 Elite Accord The Middle East and Regional
                                Comparisons
                               Central Africa Middle   Middle   Asia
                               Latin          East (1) East (2)
                               America
High Elite Accord with         53.6%   21.1%  16.9%    9.2%     31.5%
High Mass Accommodation
(Democracy)
High Elite Accord with         25.6%   50.9%  60.2%    65.8%    60.0%
Low Mass Accommodation
(Oligarchy)
Low Elite Accord with          20.9%   28.7%  22.9%    25.1%    8.6%
Low Mass Accommodation
(Autocracy)
Low Elite Accord with          0%      0%     0%       0%       0%
High Mass Accommodation
(Stratarchy)
Tau-B                          .55     .32    .25      .18      .21
Pearson [X.sup.2] at 1 df      174.9   97.2   35.8%    18.4     24.7
Probability of Change:         4%      7%     7%       12%      5%
Mass (High-[greater than]Low)
Probability of Change:         2%      3%     1%       1%       1%
Elite (High-[greater than]Low)
Probability of Change:         8%      3%     1%       3%       4%
Mass (Low-[greater than]High)
Probability of Change:         9%      6%     4%       4%       16%
Elite (Low-[greater than]High)
N (countries by Years          552     896    568      520      540
(1970-1994)
                      Religious and Ethnic Groups in
                           Middle East Countries
             Religious Groups
             Shi'a            Sunni  Ibadhi Other  Christian Jew
             Muslim           Muslim Muslim Muslim
                                            Groups
Afghanistan  15               84
Algeria                       99
Bahrain      75               25
Comoros                       86                   14 [1]
Cyprus                                      18 [2] 78 [3]
Djibouti                                    94     6
Egypt                         94                   6
Iran         89               10
Iraq         63               34                   3
Israel                        14                   2         82
Jordan                        92                   8
Kuwait       30               45            10
Lebanon      23               30            70     30
Libya                         97
Mauritania                                  100
Morocco                                     98.7   0.2
Oman                          13     75
Qatar                                       95
Saudi Arabia 15               85
Somalia                       100
Sudan                         70
Syria                         74            16
Tunisia                                     98
Turkey                        99.8
UAE          16               80
Yemen                                       80     2
             Largest Ethnic          Minority Ethnic Groups
             Group
Afghanistan  38             Pashtun  25                     Tajik
Algeria      99             Berber
Bahrain      63             Bahraini 13                     Arab
                                     10                     Asian
Comoros
Cyprus       78             Greeks   18                     Turkish
Djibouti     60             Somali   35                     Afar
Egypt        99             Egyptian
Iran         51             Persian  8                      Gilaki
Iraq         80             Arab     17                     Kurds
Israel       82             Jews     18                     Arab
Jordan       49             Palest
Kuwait       45             Kuwaiti  35                     Arab(from other
                                                            Countries)
                                     9                      Asian
Lebanon      10             Palest
Libya        97             Berber
Mauritania   40             Maur/    30                     Maur
                            Black
Morocco      99.1           Berber
Oman         75             Arab
Qatar        40             Arab     10                     Persian
Saudi Arabia 90             Arab     10                     Asian
Somalia      85             Somali   10                     Arab
Sudan        52             Black    39                     Arab
Syria        90.3           Arab     9.7                    Kurds
Tunisia      98             Berber
Turkey       80             Turkish  20                     Kurds
UAE          23             Arab     50                     Emiri
Yemen        80             Arab
Afghanistan  19 Hazara
Algeria
Bahrain      8  Persian
Comoros
Cyprus
Djibouti
Egypt
Iran         5  Kurds
Iraq
Israel
Jordan
Kuwait
Lebanon
Libya
Mauritania   30 Black
Morocco
Oman
Qatar
Saudi Arabia
Somalia
Sudan
Syria
Tunisia
Turkey
UAE          19 Asian
Yemen
Notes: 1. Roman Catholics; 2. In northern Cyprus, the Turkish Group;
3. Greek Orthodox.
Source: CIA World Factbook, 1997.
                        Quality of Life Indicators
              Life expectancy             Population
             at birth (years)              aged 0-14
                                        (% of total)
                         1962 1980 1996         1965 1980 1996
Bahrain                    57   68   73           57   35   31
Kuwait                     61   71   77           54   40   37
Libya                      48   57   68           49   47   42
Oman                       41   60   71           47   45   48
Qatar                      55   67   72           45   32   27
Saudi Arabia               46   61   70           48   44   42
United Arab                55   68   75           44   29   28
Emirates
Afghanistan                34   40   45           44   43   44
Algeria                    48   59   70           50   46   37
Comoros                    43   50   59                48   47
Cyprus                     69   75   77           35   24   26
Djibouti                   37   44   50           50   44   41
Egypt                      47   56   65           47   40   37
Iran                       51   60   70           50   45   40
Iraq                       50   62   62           51   46   42
Israel                     72   73   77           39   33   29
Jordan                               71           54   49   41
Lebanon                    61   65   70           48   40   34
Mauritania                 39   47   53           45   44   43
Morocco                    48   58   66           50   43   36
Somalia                    37   43   49           48   46   47
Sudan                      40   48   54           47   45   41
Syria                      51   62   69           54   48   44
Tunisia                    50   62   70           49   42   34
Turkey                     52   61   69           45   39   31
West Bank                            68                     45
and Gaza
Yemen                      38   49   54           46   50   48
Oil                        52   65   72           49   43   41
Producing
States
Non Oil                    48   56   63           50   45   38
Producing
States
East Asia &                52   65   68           44   37   28
Pacific
             Population growth           Population (X 1000)
                    (annual %)
                          1962 1980 1996                1962    1980    1996
Bahrain                    3.8  4.6  3.7                 161     334     599
Kuwait                    10.3  5.9  2.8                 331    1375    1590
Libya                      3.6  4.4  2.4                1449    3043    5167
Oman                       2.5  5.4  1.8                 590    1101    2173
Qatar                      8.9  7.5  2.5                  54     229     658
Saudi Arabia               3.3  5.5  2.2                4365    9372   19409
United Arab                5.4  9.7  2.9                 103    1043    2532
Emirates
Afghanistan                2.0  2.6  2.9               10422   15950   24167
Algeria                    1.7  3.1  2.2               11142   18669   28734
Comoros                              2.5                         335     505
Cyprus                     0.3  0.1  1.0                 577     611     740
Djibouti                   5.0  6.6  2.9                  91     281     619
Egypt                      2.4  2.5  1.9               27145   40875   59272
Iran                       2.7  3.4  2.1               22724   39124   62509
Iraq                       3.0  3.3  2.8                7273   13007   21366
Israel                     4.8  2.4  2.6                2293    3878    5692
Jordan                     5.6  3.8  2.7                 943    2181    4312
Lebanon                    3.0  1.0  1.8                2088  3002.4    4079
Mauritania                 2.0  2.5  2.5                1031    1551    2333
Morocco                    2.7  2.2  1.9               12237   19382   27020
Somalia                    2.2  4.0  3.3                3940    6713    9806
Sudan                      2.0  3.0  2.1               11616   18681   27272
Syria                      3.1  3.3  2.7                4862    8704   14502
Tunisia                    1.7  2.7  1.6                4351    6384    9132
Turkey                     2.5  2.2  1.7               28949   44484   62697
West Bank                  0.6  1.0  5.8                1172    1195    2279
and Gaza
Yemen                      2.3  3.9  3.3                5498    8538   15778
Oil                        5.4  6.2  2.6            7053 [t]   16497   32127
Producing
States
Non Oil                    2.6  2.8  2.5              158354  253545  382811
Producing
States
East Asia &                     1.5  1.2              911188 1359400 1732500
Pacific
Latin       57 65 70 47 39 33 2.2 1.6 228514 358220 485810
America &
Caribbean
Middle East 48 59 67 48 44 40 3.2 1.9 106318 175380 276330
& North
Africa
South Asia  45 54 62 44 40 36 2.4 1.8 588258 902440 1265800
Sub-Saharan 41 48 52 48 45 45 3.1 2.8 233775 378520 596410
Africa
Note: The total does not include the population of Comoros.
                           External Debt Per GNP
                             1980  1984  1988  1992  1996
Oman                         11.2  20.9  44.8
Algeria                      47.1  30.9  45.8  57.6  76.7
Comoros                      35.5  98.0  96.8  70.3  89.4
Djibouti                                       40.0
Egypt                        89.2 112.6 131.6  75.5  46.3
Iran                          4.8   3.2   4.6  14.7  14.9
Jordan                       48.4  64.9  99.0 160.7 113.0
Lebanon                                        31.2  30.1
Mauritania                  125.5 193.5 231.4 186.8 227.7
Morocco                      50.7 112.2  98.3  78.8  61.1
Somalia                     109.5 201.3 213.4
Sudan                        77.4 102.6 116.6 260.4
Syria                        27.2  49.3 163.2 144.8 130.5
Tunisia                      41.7  51.2  70.8  57.5  53.6
Turkey                       27.4  35.7  45.1  35.2  43.4
Yemen                                         123.5 120.2
Non Oil Producing Countries  45.6  70.4  87.8  89.1  83.9
Middle East & North Africa   18.3  24.0  41.2  38.6
East Asia & Pacific          15.9  22.6  30.9  35.3  31.1
Europe & Central Asia                    16.5  24.0  33.2
Latin America & Caribbean    35.0  59.8  53.6  40.1  36.2
South Asia                   17.3  22.6  28.9  43.0  32.1
Sub-Saharan Africa           22.8  44.1  63.0  68.0  77.8
Source: World Development Indicators, 1998, published by the World Bank.
                   Description of Aid Received by Middle
                     East Countries from 1980 to 1996
                      (in Current Million US Dollars)
                              1980   1984   1988   1992   1996
Bahrain                      155.8  199.3   -2.7   65.2    5.4
Kuwait                                              2.4    3.1
Libya                         16.5    4.9    5.5    6.4    9.9
Oman                         167.8   66.7    0.6   37.4   61.6
Qatar                                               2.1    1.4
Saudi Arabia                  15.4   35.5   19.3   55.4   28.5
UAE                                                -8.3    8.4
Afghanistan                   32.1    6.7   72.3  204.4  228.4
Algeria                      175.9  121.6  171.9  406.4  309.0
Comoros                       43.2   41.1   51.8   48.7   40.0
Cyprus                                             26.4   30.2
Djibouti                      72.8  101.8   92.8  113.1   97.4
Egypt                       1386.8 1775.1 1540.0 3603.5 2211.8
Iran                          30.8   12.9   81.5  106.6  171.0
Iraq                           8.5    3.8    9.7  139.8  387.4
Israel                                           2065.8 2216.7
Jordan                      1275.8  687.0  416.5  425.2  513.7
Lebanon                      237.0   77.0  140.6  123.5  232.8
Mauritania                   176.0  173.7  187.4  202.1  273.6
Morocco                      897.4  341.0  481.8  947.0  650.8
Somalia                      433.3  350.0  433.1  653.5   91.1
Sudan                        624.3  618.7  937.9  549.6  230.3
Syria                       1696.1  640.9  191.2  197.4  225.3
Tunisia                      232.3  178.0  317.5  390.3  126.4
Turkey                       952.5  241.7  268.0  268.8  232.5
West Bank                                                592.7
Yemen                        571.5  425.6  303.9  256.2  260.4
Oil Producing Countries       88.9   76.6    5.7   22.9   16.9
Non Oil Producing Countries  520.4  341.0  335.2  564.6  456.1
Source: World Development Indicators, 1998. The World Bank.
                     Foreign Aid (Current Million US$)
                    1991  1992  1993  1994  1995  1996
Asia                7541  9974  9433  9667 10241  8360
Eastern Europe      8890  8379  9742  9965 11863  8938
Latin America       5850  5434  5469  6062  6706  8025
South Asia          8114  6720  5337  7192  5359  5500
Sub-Saharan Africa 18207 19647 17725 19609 19033 17300
Middle East        10312  7043  5421  6581  5005  5343
                          Proportion of GNP from
                            Workers Remittance
           1980 1984 1988 1992 1996
Oman        0.7  0.6  0.6
Algeria     1.0  0.6  0.7  1.8  2.4
Comoros     1.3  2.0  3.6  6.0  7.4
Cyprus      0.0  0.0  1.6
Djibouti                   0.3
Egypt      12.6 13.8  9.5 13.3  4.1
Jordan     14.6 23.8 15.4 17.3 21.5
Lebanon                   34.8 18.8
Mauritania  0.8  0.1  1.1  4.5  0.6
Morocco     5.8  7.2  6.2  8.0  5.6
Somalia     9.5  0.0  0.0
Sudan       3.1  4.8  4.5  1.6
Tunisia     3.8  4.0  5.2  3.6  4.0
Turkey      3.0  3.0  2.0  1.9  1.9
Yemen                     19.1 21.5
Source: World Development Indicators, 1998, World Bank.
         Blanks indicate missing data.
                      Gross Foreign Direct Investment
                              in Middle East
                     Countries (as Percentage of GDP)
                     1980 1984 1988 1992 1995
Bahrain             10.75 3.23 3.88 0.12 0.30
Kuwait               1.80 0.46 1.72 4.99 1.73
Oman                 2.90 2.14 0.76 0.61 0.22
Saudi Arabia         3.04 5.14 0.25 0.05 1.00
Algeria              0.67 0.02 0.02
Comoros              0.00 0.00 0.52 0.18 0.10
Cyprus               2.34 1.02 0.73 1.02
Egypt                1.31 1.16 1.15 0.35 0.43
Iran                 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.01
Israel               0.19 0.21 0.52 1.65 2.21
Jordan               0.77 1.17 0.24 0.39 0.28
Mauritania           1.59 0.44 0.10 0.22 0.17
Morocco              0.29 0.12 0.14 0.61 0.37
Syria                0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.23
Tunisia              1.80 0.61 0.23 1.44 0.66
Turkey               0.02 0.08 0.15 0.31 0.29
Yemen                               7.06 1.78
Average of Oil       4.62 2.74 1.65 1.44 0.81
Producing Countries
Average of Non Oil   0.75 0.40 0.32 1.10 0.59
Producing Countries
Source: World Development Indicators, 1998,
World Bank. Blanks are missing data.
                 Net Inflows of Foreign direct investment
                           (current Million US$)
           1980 1984 1988 1992 1996
Algeria     349    1   13   12    4
Comoros                 4   -1    2
Cyprus       85   53   62  107
Djibouti                     2    5
Egypt       548  729 1190  459  636
Iran              43   61        10
Israel       51   53  235  539 2110
Jordan       34   78   24   41   16
Lebanon            5         4   80
Mauritania   27    9    2    8    5
Morocco      89   47   85  422  311
Oman         98  158   92  104   67
Somalia          -15  -43
Sudan              9
Syria                 121        89
Tunisia     235  113   61  526  320
Turkey       18  113  354  844  722
Yemen        34    7       714  100
Source: World Development Indicators, 1998,
World Bank. Blanks are misssing data.
                    Central Government Expenditures as
                                 % of GDP
Country                                    1980 1984 1988 1992 1996
Bahrain                                      13 20.6 26.2 25.9
Kuwait                                     11.2 20.9 26.3 55.5
Libya                                      21.8
Oman                                         25 26.5 32.7 31.4
Saudi Arabia                               15.7 34.4 34.2 32.3
United Arab Emirates                       10.9 17.4 21.5 17.7
Algeria                                    13.8   15 18.7 17.2 14.2
Comoros                                    30.9 28.3 27.1   21 19.1
Cyprus                                     13.7 14.1 16.7 19.1
Djibouti                                                  44.2 33.5
Egypt, Arab Rep.                           15.7   18 13.9 10.4 10.4
Iran, Islamic Rep.                         20.8 14.8 14.3 10.4
Israel                                     38.6   36 29.7 26.7
Jordan                                     28.8   27 26.7 22.6 23.2
Lebanon                                                   14.8 15.4
Mauritania                                 25.3 17.2   11 10.4 13.9
Morocco                                    18.3 15.6 15.4 16.4 16.4
Somalia                                    15.6   17
Sudan                                        16  9.7 12.3
Syrian Arab Republic                       23.2 24.5 13.2
Tunisia                                    14.5 16.9 16.6   16 16.3
Turkey                                     11.6  8.3  7.6 12.9 11.6
Yemen, Rep.                                               20.3 14.5
Oil Producing Countries in Middle East     16.3 24.0 28.2 32.6
Non Oil Producing Countries in Middle East 20.5 18.7 17.2 18.7 17.1
Regional Comparison
East Asia & Pacific                        13.6 13.2 11.1 11.9 10.6
Europe & Central Asia                      12.8 13.1 14.5 16.2 14.8
Latin America                              10.4   10 10.3 11.5 12.3
South Asia                                  9.4 10.4 12.3 11.4 10.9
Sub-Saharan Africa                         14.2 15.4 15.9 17.2 15.3
Middle East & North Africa                 18.4 20.1 19.9 17.4
NOTE: Blank cells indicate missing data.
              Military Spending of Middle East Countries,1995
                          Arms imports      Military       Military
                           (% of total expenditure(% expenditure (%
                              imports)    of central        of GNP)
                                          government
                                        expenditure)
Bahrain                            1.1          14.8            5.4
Kuwait                            11.6          25.5           11.6
Libya                              0.0                          6.0
Oman                              10.8          33.9           16.7
Qatar                                            9.4            4.4
Saudi Arabia                      31.3                         13.5
United Arab Emirates                            38.4            4.8
Afghanistan
Algeria                            2.2           6.9            3.2
Cyprus                             1.4          17.1            5.8
Djibouti                                                        4.5
Egypt, Arab Rep.                  16.2          13.7            5.7
Iran, Islamic Rep.                 2.2                          2.6
Iraq                               0.0
Israel                             1.1          21.1            9.6
Jordan                             1.9          21.7            7.7
Lebanon                            0.5                          3.7
Mauritania                                                      3.2
Morocco                                                         4.3
Sudan                              8.4
Syrian Arab Republic               1.5                          7.2
Tunisia                            0.5                          2.0
Turkey                             2.0          17.6            4.0
Yemen, Rep.
Oil Producing Middle East         11.0          24.4            8.9
Countries
Non Oil Producing Middle           3.2          16.4            4.9
East Countries
Regional Comparison
Middle East                        5.5          20.0            6.3
Latin East                         0.7           8.6            1.8
East Asia (Exclude China)          1.4          10.4            4.2
South Asia                         1.6          14.9            3.1
East Europe                        0.5           8.8            3.1
                             Military   Military
                            personnel  personnel
                          (% of total (in 1000s)
                                labor
                               force)
Bahrain                           3.1          8
Kuwait                            2.5         20
Libya                             5.3         76
Oman                              6.7         36
Qatar                             3.1         10
Saudi Arabia                      2.8        175
United Arab Emirates              5.3         60
Afghanistan                       0.2         20
Algeria                           1.4        120
Cyprus                            2.9         10
Djibouti                                       8
Egypt, Arab Rep.                  2.0        430
Iran, Islamic Rep.                2.4        440
Iraq                              7.1        390
Israel                            8.3        185
Jordan                           10.2        112
Lebanon                           4.2         55
Mauritania                        1.0         10
Morocco                           1.9        195
Sudan                             0.9         89
Syrian Arab Republic              8.1        320
Tunisia                           1.1         35
Turkey                            2.9        805
Yemen, Rep.                       1.5         68
Oil Producing Middle East         4.1        385
Countries
Non Oil Producing Middle          3.5       3292
East Countries
Regional Comparison
Middle East                       3.7       3677
Latin East                        0.9       1299
East Asia (Exclude China)         2.0       3588
South Asia                        0.8       2142
East Europe                       1.9        952
Source: World Development Indicators, 1998,World Bank.