TEPAV’s Agenda: “Arab Democratic Wave” One Year After… Assessing the grassroots movements in the North African and Arab countries, Alvaro de Vasconcelos, Director of European Union Institute for Security Studies, associates the democracy in the Middle East with Turkey’s EU membership.
ANKARA – With a meeting held at TEPAV, successive grassroots movements in North African and Arab countries which started one year ago were addressed. The meeting hosted as a keynote speaker Alvaro de Vasconcelos, Director of European Union Institute for Security Studies (ISS). Vasconcelos said that if the European Union (EU) wanted to support democratic transition in the Middle East, it had to accept Turkey as a member. He said there was no way the EU could do it by itself, especially while dealing with economic problems.
On January 30, 2012 Monday, a meeting themed “Arab Democratic Wave: One Year After” was held at TEPAV. Keynote speaker Alvaro de Vasconcelos first clarified the terminology and said that he preferred using “Arab democratic wave” instead of “Arab spring” as the latter did not lay down the democratic dimension of the movements.
Country groups by specific experiences
Vasconcelos defined four groups of countries in terms of their specific experiences during the process. He said Tunisia and Egypt, where the wave first erupted, were “countries that are in a democratic transition.” Stating that Morocco was seeking to protect the liberal monarchic regime, he maintained that the country was going through a process of liberalization, not democratization. He told the third group involved Syria and Libya, where the dictatorship was against any change and tried to protect the regime via violence and oppression.
Stressing the need for humanitarian assistance in Syria, he touched upon Turkey’s importance in this respect as a bordering country. The fourth group which he called “the others” comprised of Lebanon, Algeria and Palestine. Stating that protests did not succeed in these countries, he emphasized the fear among people of going back to civil war period and the presence of military forces.
Islamic identity rather than the Western model
He called the movements in the Arab world as “post-Western” arguing that the wave did not follow from the Western model and preserved the Islamic identity. The movements set forth the demand for democracy of people who did not call themselves western. The movement was against the standing power and the regime in protestors’ homelands as well as the European powers that supported the power and the regime. The main challenge was the conflict between revolutionary legitimacy and democratic legitimacy. Also, he drew attention to social dimension of the movements raising the question whether or not the social and economic demands which started the revolutions will be met. The meeting ended after a question and answer session and comments from the audience.
Who is Alvaro de Vasconcelos?
Álvaro de Vasconcelos has been the Director of the European Union Institute for Security Studies since May 2007. Prior to this, he headed the Institute of Strategic and International Studies (IEEI) in Lisbon, of which he is a co-founder, from 1981 to 2007. He is a columnist, an author and co-editor of many books, articles and reports, notably in the areas of the EU’s Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) and Euro-Mediterranean relations.
