Power-sharing in the Divided Asian Societies [1 ed.] 9783737015752, 9783847115755

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Adam W. Jelonek (ed.)

Power-sharing in the Divided Asian Societies

V&R unipress

Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available online: https://dnb.de. This publication was financially supported by the Jagiellonian University in Kraków, Poland. The publication was co-funded under the program “Excellence Initiative – Research University” at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków, Poland. © 2023 by Brill | V&R unipress, Robert-Bosch-Breite 10, 37079 Göttingen, Germany, an imprint of the Brill-Group (Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands; Brill USA Inc., Boston MA, USA; Brill Asia Pte Ltd, Singapore; Brill Deutschland GmbH, Paderborn, Germany; Brill Österreich GmbH, Vienna, Austria) Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Brill Nijhoff, Brill Hotei, Brill Schöningh, Brill Fink, Brill mentis, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Böhlau, V&R unipress and Wageningen Academic. All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without prior written permission from the publisher. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht Verlage | www.vandenhoeck-ruprecht-verlage.com ISBN 978-3-7370-1575-2

Contents

Adam W. Jelonek Conflict management in Asian segmented societies . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Krzysztof Trzcin´ski Power sharing in Indonesia: Stability through hybridity . . . . . . . . . .

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Adam W. Jelonek Multi-ethnic Malaysia. Consociational democracy vs. consociational authoritarianism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Michał Lubina Disunity in diversity. The failed attempts at power sharing in Myanmar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Antonina Łuszczykiewicz India as an Anti-Consociational Project under Narendra Modi

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. . . . . .

Kamila Junik Identity narrative and power distribution in Sri Lanka . . . . . . . . . . . 121 Agnieszka Kuszewska-Bohnert Consociationalism as a power-sharing solution in Pakistan. Obstacles and prospects for a democratic transformation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133 Michał Lipa The potential for power sharing in Bahrain: Opportunities and limitations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149 Łukasz Fyderek Iraq: Paradoxes of post-conflict power sharing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167

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Contents

Krzysztof Kos´cielniak The elite interactions. Elements of consociationalism and the intra-organisational factors in Syria in the pre- and post-Arab uprising periods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189 Przemysław Turek Lebanon – an exemplary consociational democracy state and its eventual failure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 213 Joanna Dyduch Israel’s democracy at the crossroads: What is left of power-sharing . . . . 223 Agata M. Karbowska The failure of consociational democracy in Cyprus . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251 Authors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 269

Adam W. Jelonek

Conflict management in Asian segmented societies

The book is a collection of analyses of the current situation of power sharing in selected countries in the Middle and Far East. Many countries in the region are inhabited by multisegmented societies diversified in terms of race, religion, language and economic status. They have repeatedly provided the basis for analysis of the search for consensus in the construction of a political scene that would ensure the participation in power of each group. Regardless of the chosen model, the distribution of power in multisegmented societies has always been characterised by a state of “unstable equilibrium”. Practical solutions constantly evolved between consociationalism, centripetalism, federalism. In extreme cases, they led to political disintegration of states or to the permanent domination of one of the segments, most often based on authoritarian solutions. In this volume, a group of scholars specialising in particular countries of the region, in addition to characterising the basic social divisions, try to point out the dynamics of the “unstable equilibrium” of power sharing in particular Asian countries and analyse the trends occurring in them over the last decades. In the first chapter, Krzysztof Trzcin´ski focuses on analysing the transformation of the power-sharing model in Indonesia. The author argues that a hybrid power-sharing political system has been designed to achieve political stability thanks to the implementation of political institutions of centripetal, consociational, and hybrid types. These institutions allow various social segments and sub-segments specified on ascriptive, cultural, and ideological foundations – including ethnic groups, religious communities, and ideological sub-segments – to be part of the decision-making process at different power levels. The main institutions discussed are segmental Islamic parties. They are hybrid in character due to having both consociational and centripetal traits. The chapter demonstrates the origin, nature, and importance of this institution. The thesis adopted states that religious parties contribute to stabilising the political situation in Indonesia by sharing power with non-segmental supra-religious parties and channelling political Islam within the legally permitted limits. The

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research is based on analysis of the content of published primary and secondary sources, as well as interviews with Indonesian political scientists. In the second chapter, Adam W. Jelonek focuses on Malaysia which provides a textbook and oft-described example of a multisegmented society that has undertaken numerous experiments with consociational power sharing. The racially, ethnically, religiously and linguistically diverse Malay, Indus and Chinese segments live side by side. The social mosaic is further complicated by the numerous tribal communities living in northern Borneo and the growing number of immigrant groups. In May 2018, Malaysians elected a new coalition to power, ending 61 years of a de facto one-party monopoly of power. However, the new government failed in reforming a system embedded in an old political culture of patronage. The democratisation that many expected to this day has not yet materialised. Is Malaysia capable of building a modern democratic political scene that ensures participation in power by all segments of society or is it doomed to return to authoritarianism stemming from traditional patron-client relationships? In the next section of the book, Michał Lubina analyses the failures of powersharing projects in Myanmar/Burma. Although Myanmar never tried to implement any power-sharing model in full, it did, however, attempt to carry out some power-sharing aspects of governance in its short period of democracy in 1948– 1962 and again after 1988. Unfortunately, these all ended in failure for both objective and subjective reasons. Myanmar society is a quintessential plural society, divided into segmental cleavages, the most important ones being ethnic. Officially Myanmar is inhabited by 135 ethnic groups divided into eight major ethnic groups (Bamar/Burman, Shan, Kayin/Karen, Kachin, Mon, Rakhine/ Arakanese, Chin, Kayah/Karenni). Myanmar also represents a highly elite-driven nation where the dominant elites from the major segmental group – the Bamars (Burmans) – do not believe in power-sharing arrangements, with fatal consequences for the country. The Bamars, instead of accommodating other segments, have been trying to integrate them, often forcefully, into the Bamardominated state. Therefore, instead of power sharing, Myanmar has a constant power struggle that undermines the state, complicates nation-building process and at times – such as now, after the fourth coup d’état – leads to anarchy. Another anti-consociational vision of power sharing, but this time in India, is the subject of Antonina Łuszczykiewicz. India – the largest democracy in the world, and one of the most internally diverse countries in terms of ethnicity, language, and religion – has been an interesting, yet challenging case for the theorists of consociationalism. This paper focuses on the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) vision of India under the leadership of Narendra Modi. Based on the ideology of Hindu nationalism known as Hindutva – which assumes the consolidation of philosophies and religions born in India under Hindu dominance,

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and exhibits hostility towards non-Indian constructs (especially Islam) – the BJP promotes the idea of pan-Indianism summed up as “one nation, one culture”. Analysing the process of delegitimising federalism, reluctance towards castebased quotas, promotion of Hindi as the national language, and strengthening Hindu-Muslim antagonism, this chapter reconstructs the anti-consociational dimension of the ideology, narratives, and policies of the BJP. In the following chapter, entitled Identity narrative and power distribution in Sri Lanka, Kamila Junik provides an analysis of power sharing in another multiethnic country in South Asia. She discusses its social diversity, addressing the question of identity and communalism, as well as power attribution, inherited from its colonial past and projecting on the current relation between the various segments of society. Focusing on recent times, this chapter proposes a critical approach to Sinhala identity narration, which allows this majoritarian group to act as if under constant threat and re-construct itself only against the “other”. Thus, noticing the recent shift of focus from Tamils to Muslims, it will aim at proving that the current government’s policy would maintain the already known framework of hierarchy rather than working towards “political empowerment and reconciliation”. Agnieszka Kuszewska-Bohnert focuses on Pakistan – a strategically located key regional player in South Asia, with a deeply divided society, incessant (and often intentionally bolstered) ethnonational and sectarian tensions which have never been properly addressed. It has an elected civilian government, albeit genuine power rests primarily with the military establishment and a small number of other privileged groups. She argues that Pakistani political cohesion is forced rather than negotiated; specific correlations between the social structure and political culture are inherited from the rough colonial past, with a persistent lack of adequate sociopolitical and economic inclusion. Notwithstanding some reforms, the power-sharing model is still highly exclusivist and faces overwhelming challenges, originating in domestic specificity, where the decision makers project, domestically and internationally, the ideological features of the state, intermingling them with defence objectives. Power-sharing arrangements in post-authoritarian and post-conflict settings are the subject of Łukasz Fyderek’s analyses focusing on contemporary Iraq. The author argues that, in the case of Iraq, power-sharing institutions enshrined in the federal constitution proved to be both resilient and unstable. In the postconflict setting, the main segments of Iraqi society: Arab Shiites, Arab Sunnis and Kurds adopted different political strategies. While Shiite parties were able to dominate the system soon after 2005, several Sunni actors contested the powersharing arrangements in 2008–2010 and again in 2014–2017. The Kurds, on the other hand, adopted the system most of the time, while contesting it during the independence referendum in 2017. Despite the tensions, the Iraqi power-sharing

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system proved to be robust, yet unstable. This paradox may be explained by the multilayered power-sharing arrangements in Iraq, which results in the compartmentalised behaviour of the three relevant segments of society. The chapter by Michał Lipa looks at the prospects for power sharing in another authoritarian multisegmented country in the Middle East region – Bahrain. Shia Muslims make up the majority of the population, although political power is held by the Sunni elites. Bahrain’s authoritarianism is hybrid in nature, meaning that the country has had a semi-pluralist parliament, in which the Shiites were represented mainly by Al-Wefaq “party”. However, this did not result in the Shiites achieving greater political participation. Thus, in 2011 they initiated protests (known as the Arab Spring in Bahrain), which did not lead to a thorough political transition, but to a sort of consociational democracy. In this paper, the major internal and external factors, hindering the implementation of power-sharing institutional arrangements in Bahrain that would enable Shia Muslims to participate in governance, are analysed. In the following chapter, Krzysztof Kos´cielniak looks for the elements of consociationalism in the pre- and post-Arab uprising period. For more than half a century, Syria has been one of the few secular states in the region, inhabited for centuries by a multi-ethnic and multireligious population. Coexistence in such a fragmented society was maintained by the one-party system of the Baath party. The domination of the Baath party, however, caused a split among the Sunni population, especially Muslim fundamentalists opposed to its secular social agenda. His text shows how President Assad’s consociational pragmatics, other than consociational democracy, used both ethnic composition, territorial fragmentation, socio-economic divisions and multiple belief practices, generating different (and sometimes contradictory) collective Sunni identities before 2011 as well as during the civil war. The next chapter by Przemysław Turek focuses on another “classic” case of power sharing – Lebanon. The chapter is divided into two parts. The first part presents the consociational system of Lebanon in the period up to the Lebanese war of 1975–1989/1990. Emphasis will be placed on such features of Lebanese consociational democracy as segmental autonomy, proportional representation based on communal and/or religious bases, the numerical strength of the 18 sects, and the relatively continuously preserved democratic stability. The second part is dedicated to the ethnic/political/religious conflict during the 1975–1990 period, Syrian occupation of the state until 2005, and the slow erosion of the consociational system caused by a serious incongruity between the country’s socio-economic and political development. The cause of that erosion could be cultural differences and the clash of incompatible values, the role of the elites in the war and the militarisation of the ethnic conflict.

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Israel’s political system specificity, to a great extent, stems from numerous political cleavages, empowered by long-standing, and deeply rooted in the Israeli society, tensions and conflicts. Nevertheless, Israel is considered to be, maybe not perfect yet still, a stable and consolidated democracy. The chapter by Joanna Dyduch aims to investigate the course of changes occurring in contemporary Israeli society with respect to the characteristic of its major segments. Secondly, and more importantly, it aims to track the linkages and causalities between the societal changes, political turnovers, legal-institutional reforms and efficiency of the political system in the State of Israel. The chapter also raises a question about the actual trends of power sharing in Israel in the context of the evolution of democracy variants. And last, but not least, an analysis of a country located on the border of Asia and Europe by Agata Karbowska – Cyprus. This chapter is an incentive to polemics of the Lijphart model of consociational democracy, showing how it has failed in the Republic of Cyprus and which options are still on the table for this country. Although consociationalism as a system was chosen for the newly established republic, there is still a multifaceted conflict between the Greek and Turkish populations living on the island. This conflict emerged sharply on the international arena in the 1950s. A division was created into Greeks and Turks, which the inhabitants, who lived on good terms, did not previously feel. This constitution is still in force, although there are no Turkish Cypriots in the Cypriot government. The individual case studies in this book undoubtedly encourage the reader to reflect on the prospects for contemporary democracy around the world. None of them carries ready-made theses. Drawing on diverse methodological and theoretical apparatuses, the authors attempt to offer their opinions on the future of democratic solutions in Asia. At the same time, they try to identify the fundamental barriers that underlie instability in multisegmented societies.

Krzysztof Trzcin´ski

Power sharing in Indonesia: Stability through hybridity

This chapter is dedicated to the power-sharing political system functioning in Indonesia.1 This system, thanks to employing specific institutions, allows the members of various segments (including ethnic groups and religious communities) and sub-segments, defined especially on ascriptive, cultural, and ideological foundations, to be part of the decision-making processes at different power levels. The main aim of power sharing is to achieve political stability understood in the context of a multisegmental state as a peaceful arrangement of relations between diverse segments and sub-segments as well as between them and the state authority.2 Thanks to institutional engineering in Indonesia under the conditions of democratisation, at the turn of the 20th and 21st centuries, a powersharing political system of a hybrid type was constituted, since it combines the dominant centripetal institutions with consociational ones and a hybrid one (consociational-centripetal) in the form of religious parties. The following thesis was adopted at the beginning of the research: hybrid religious parties operating in Indonesia contribute to the stabilisation of the political situation by sharing power with non-segmental supra-religious parties (nationalist, secular, and Pancasila-based political parties) and channelling political Islam within the legally permitted limits. To prove the truth of the thesis, I demonstrate first the main types of segmental divisions existing in Indonesia. Then, I present, from a historical perspective, the problems that hinder the achievement of political stability, which were fundamental for the creation of a power-sharing political system in this country. Next, I identify the main powersharing institutions in Indonesia and assign them to two classic power-sharing models, centripetalism and consociationalism, which, when utilised together, 1 I am grateful to Michael G. Breen and Muhammad Mushtaq for offering valuable comments on this chapter. 2 An extended conceptual analysis of the term “political stability” is developed by Trzcin´ski (2015b).

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make up the hybrid model. Later, I discuss the main ideological divisions created within the Muslim segment, referring to its members’ attitude towards so-called political Islam. Afterward, I explain the origins and essence and present arguments about the significance of the segmental Islamic parties. Finally, I highlight, from the perspective of political stability, the importance of implementation in the mostly centripetal institutional environment of consociational elements and thus a hybrid model of power sharing is created. In my work, I have employed inductive reasoning developed during a case study of the Indonesian political system along with institutional and legal analysis of the content of primary (interviews conducted in the field, legal acts, reports of official election results) and secondary sources (scholarly studies and press sources).3

The multisegmental nature of Indonesian society Contemporary Indonesia is the fourth most populous country in the world, with a population of about 278 million inhabitants at the beginning of 2022 (Worldometers, 2022). Indonesia occupies an area of almost 2 million km², and its territory on the equatorial axis extends to more than 5,000 km. The country is made up of about 17,000 islands, over 6,000 of which are inhabited. Indonesia has 37 provinces, 32 of which are located in Southeast Asia and five (Papua, Central Papua, Highland Papua, South Papua, and West Papua) in Melanesia, in the western part of New Guinea and its smaller neighbouring islands. Indonesian society is multisegmental. The basic segments are races, ethnic and linguistic groups, and religious and denominational communities. Indonesian society is especially divided ethnically. According to data from 2010, the largest ethnic group in Indonesia is Javanese (a little more than 40% of the entire population), followed by Sundanese (approx. 15.5%), Malay (approx. 3.7%), Batak (approx. 3.6%), Madurese (approx. 3%), Betawi (approx. 2.9%), and 3 The fieldwork sought to establish if a blend of centripetal, consociational, and hybrid institutions contributed to achieving/maintaining political stability. Interviews with Indonesian political scientists took place during five visits to Indonesia between 2013 and 2018. The questions referred primarily to the following general issues: the origin of the implementation of power-sharing institutions and their blend; the way power-sharing institutions allow members of different segments to take part in the decision-making processes; the way the institutional blend operates, including any possible collision between institutions of different power-sharing models; the way and the extent to which the blend itself and specific institutions (like segmental religious parties in this case) contribute to achieving/maintaining political stability. Some of the findings have been or will be utilised in other works focusing on how hybrid power-sharing in Indonesia functions. The research leading to this work has received funding from the National Science Centre, Poland (Grant No. 2014/15/B/HS5/01174 entitled “Centripetalism as a Model of Political System for the Multi-ethnic States: Comparative Analysis of Two Cases”).

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Minangkabau (approx. 2.7%) (Ananta et al., 2013: 14). The share of any of the several hundred other native ethnic groups in the Indonesian population is minor.4 Among the immigrant population, the most numerous are Chinese (approx. 1.2%) (Ananta et al., 2013: 15). The vast majority of Indonesians, approx. 87%, are Muslim, overwhelmingly Sunni (Shia Muslims make up about 1% of all Indonesian Muslims). In the Sunni Muslim segment, there are serious divisions of a doctrinal nature (traditionalists vs. modernists). The number of Christians (Protestants and Catholics) is just under 10%, and Hindus represent approx. 1.7% of Indonesian society (Index Mundi, 2020; Macdonald, 2013: 6–7). Indonesia is a peculiar case where power is shared between different groups, which is very complicated due to the indicated differentiation of types and numbers of segments that can participate in different levels of power (Trzcin´ski, 2016a, 2017b, 2019). Moreover, within the Muslim segment, almost entirely Sunni, Indonesia is a prime example of power sharing between ideological subsegments.5 Concretely, the Muslim segment is far from homogeneous concerning recognition (or lack thereof) of the role of political Islam and thus the essence of the mutual relations between the state and religion. Much of the Muslim segment, which can be called the liberal Islamic subsegment, sees no need for the interference of Islam in the political system. This part votes in elections for the non-segmental parties of a supra-religious nature. Another important part of the Muslim segment, which can be called the illiberal Islamic sub-segment, sees the need for the close interrelation between the state and religion, which, however, is limited by state law. This part mostly votes in elections for Islamic parties. A smaller part of this sub-segment, which is usually not directly represented within the party system, supports the idea of strictly basing political life on the principles of Islam (and a lack of separation between state and religion), and supports radicals, and even striving to achieve this goal by violent means, and supports extremists.

Problems of political stability To understand the premises of the implementation of a power-sharing political system in Indonesia, attention should be paid to its state-building process, including the internal and external challenges to political stability. Indonesia was 4 According to Macdonald (2013: 4), there are “over one thousand ethnic and subethnic segments” in Indonesia. 5 In this respect, analogies can be drawn with historical power-sharing cases, e. g., in the Netherlands (Lijphart, 1968; Andeweg, 2019), Austria (Luther, 1992; Luther and Müller, 1992), and Colombia (Dix, 1980; Hartlyn, 1988), although the Indonesian case is more complicated especially due to its hybrid nature.

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founded in the colonial domain of the Dutch East Indies. It declared independence in 1945, which the Dutch recognised in 1949.6 The first decades of the state-building process and the functioning of Indonesia as an independent state were very rough. State power was initially under the leadership of the wellrespected founding fathers of Indonesia and the heroes of the independence struggle: Sukarno of Javanese-Balinese origin (the first president, formally ruling in the period 1945–67) and Mohammad Hatta of Sumatran Minangkabau descent (vice president in the years 1945–56). Their alliance was known as the Dwitunggal (duumvirate). This authority struggled with various threats to political stability, the process of building the national identity, and the territorial integrity of the newly established political entity. These included an attempt by radical Muslim elites to overthrow the secular nature of the state and create an Islamic state (Darul Islam, or House of Islam, rebellion in 1942–62), separatist movements (including an attempt to establish the independent Republic of South Maluku in 1950–63) and the dynamic growth of the strength and importance of the Partai Komunis Indonesia (PKI, Communist Party of Indonesia). The government of Indonesia was originally built on a democratic foundation, however, in response to the centrifugal tendencies and complexity of the political situation, over time it began to become more authoritarian and centralised, and increasingly based on the Javanese. Consequently, Hatta severed the alliance with Sukarno. Hatta’s departure came as a shock to Indonesians of non-Javanese origin, for whom he was the main exponent of their interests in a Javanese-dominated government. In the aftermath of Hatta’s resignation, the legitimacy of Sukarno’s power began to be more strongly questioned, which was reflected, inter alia, in several rebellions that broke out in 1956 in various parts of Sumatra and the Permesta rebellion in Celebes in 1957–61, as well as in the creation by rebels from both islands of a joint government called the Pemerintah Revolusioner Republik Indonesia (PRRI, Revolutionary Government of the Republic of Indonesia), which operated in 1958–61. The rebels expressed dissatisfaction with the level of development of their regions and the whole of Indonesia under the conditions of centralised power and demanded, inter alia, the limiting of the influence of the Javanese and Sukarno in state power, as well as granting autonomy to their regions. However, the military suppression of the rebellions by the government meant the further progress of authoritarianism and power centralisation, as well as strengthening the Javanese dominance in politics and the army. 6 The national liberation movement declared Indonesia independent in 1945 and adopted the constitution. In 1945–49, in the area of what is now Indonesia (then the Dutch East Indies), there was an independence war, also known as the Indonesian National Revolution, aimed at removing the Dutch colonisers.

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In 1963, Sukarno led the Indonesian administration in taking power in an area inhabited by Papuans, the so-called Dutch New Guinea, the decolonisation of which, according to the original Dutch plans, was to lead to independence. In 1969, the territory was successfully formally incorporated into Indonesia. From the very beginning, the Indonesian presence there has been contested and fought, albeit unsuccessfully, by the Fri Wes Papua Grup or Organisasi Papua Merdeka (OPM, Free Papua Movement), an armed representative of Papuan interests.7 In 1971, the OPM declared West New Guinea’s independence as the Republic of West Papua. The main goal of the OPM is the genuine independence of this territory. In 1963–66, during the so-called Konfrontasi, Indonesia unsuccessfully tried to militarily seize northern (British) Borneo and prevent it being taken over by the nascent Federation of Malaysia. In the mid-1960s, the activities of Indonesian communists became the major threat to the political stability of Indonesia, at least in the eyes of the army. This should be seen in the context of broader international realities at the time, including the war in Indo-China. Since Sukarno was passive against the communist threat or downplayed it (perhaps in part due to his leftist views), the army, de facto, removed him from power in 1965 although he formally held the president’s office until 1967. From 1965, General Suharto played a key political role in Indonesia. In 1965–66, the Indonesian army, together with various local militias, carried out a pogrom against communists and people with leftist sympathies. According to different and divergent estimates, from several hundred thousand to more than a million Indonesians died in this purge. In its aftermath, Suharto’s political position strengthened strongly, and in 1968 he formally assumed the office of president, which he held until 1998. In 1975, the Indonesian army brutally invaded East Timor (Timor-Leste) shortly after its independence from Portugal was declared by the Frente Revolucionária de Timor-Leste Independente (Fretilin, Revolutionary Front for an Independent East Timor). Indonesia incorporated the territory and declared it a province (Timor Timur) in 1976. Fretilin opposed the Indonesian occupation by force for several decades, which was met with ruthless reaction by the Indonesian army and meant that tensions remained permanent in the province. For most of the period of his power, Suharto exercised it in an authoritarian and highly centralised manner, which, inter alia, contributed to the outbreak of a separatist rebellion led by the Gerakan Aceh Merdeka (GAM, Free Aceh Movement) in the most conservative province of Aceh in northern Sumatra. The rebellion lasted from 1976 to 2005. The end of Suharto’s dictatorship was mainly 7 In 2014, as a result of the unification of several smaller organisations, the United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP, 2022) was formed, which aims to use peaceful means to gain independence for the present Indonesian provinces in Western New Guinea.

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due to the so-called Asian financial crisis that broke out in 1997 and hit Indonesia’s society very hard, including rampant inflation and a drastic increase in basic products prices. In 1998, in the wake of a rising tide of discontent that took the form of extensive protests and riots, Suharto was forced by the army to resign. Social frustration was often accompanied by large-scale aggression against the well-off Chinese minority, as well as looting and the destruction of property. Immediately after the fall of Suharto in Indonesia, there was a deepening of political instability, which, among other things, manifested itself in the rise of tensions between certain segments of Indonesian society. In Indonesia, under the rule of Sukarno and Suharto, almost from the moment of actual independence from the Netherlands, the state authority implemented various policies aimed at uniting a multisegmental society and at the same time maintaining the territorial integrity of the state. Among these, a crucial role was played, in particular, by adopting the Pancasila nationalist ideology; establishing and implementing the national language, that is, the Indonesian language (Bahasa Indonesia) in education, administration, and public life; the declaration of Indonesia as a secular state and the disagreement of leaders with the constitutional recognition of the dominant role of Islam; and the introduction of universal primary education, part of which is pro-state propaganda. Under the conditions of authoritarianism, the indicated policies were, however, either insufficient to fully achieve the intended aims or, at times, generated effects contrary to the planned ones since the authoritarian government banned autonomy and used coercion and terror against its political opponents. As a consequence, authoritarianism influenced the development of separatism and the independence aspirations in some areas of Indonesia, especially in Aceh, Western New Guinea, and East Timor. The fuel for the development of these phenomena was also the so-called transmigration (Transmigrasi) programme consisting of the relocation of part of the population from overpopulated areas (mainly Java, but also, among others, Madura and Bali) to less populated areas (including Sumatra, Borneo, Western New Guinea, Celebes, the Moluccas, Riau Archipelago, and Lesser Sunda Islands). In many places, transmigration has resulted in the involuntary mixing of ethnically, linguistically, religiously, and even racially different people. The transmigration programme was dynamically developed especially during the Suharto rule, accelerating and promoting the process known as the Javanization of Indonesian society,8 which is the key to understanding Indonesia’s intersegmental relations. Simply put, it means the pursuit of the Javanese people for hegemony in the spheres of culture and social life, but also in politics and the 8 Important for the development of this process is, among others, the fact that Suharto was born from ethnic Javanese parents in the vicinity of Yogyakarta, the very centre of Javanese culture.

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economy (Bebbington et al., 2004: 191, 193). Culturally and socially, it is a process by which the Javanese culture dominates, assimilates, or influences other cultures in various ways. It includes the conscious or unconscious dissemination of Javanese norms and values, including the imposition of Javanese patterns of thinking and behaviour (Mulder, 1994: 29–41). Under conditions of high intensity, this process may even mean cultural imperialism. In the spheres of politics and economy, the term Javanization is sometimes used to describe the popularisation of Javanese norms and values in the Indonesian political culture. However, it is usually used to describe a process by which the Javanese gradually gain an overwhelming majority among the ruling elite of independent Indonesia, out of proportion to their percentage of society as a whole. Dominance in politics places the Javanese people in crucial positions in the civil service, military, police, and security services, as well as in state-owned enterprises. An element of Javanization, both as a political concept and as a practical activity, is the largescale spread of Javanese settlements in areas outside Java. The tool of this process was the transmigration programme (Abdoellah, 1987: 189; Tirtosudarmo, 2019: 103), through which the state authority – as some Indonesians say – carried out a kind of internal colonisation of the so-called outer islands (Tirtosudarmo, 2019: 42). Transmigration favours Javanese Muslims and, at the same time, discriminates against indigenous people, often non-Muslims, of migration target areas, which they perceive as far unfair.9 As A. Sutarto (2006) claims, “in the view of

9 The dissatisfaction of the native population in the areas to which Javanese and other migrants were relocated has been associated with a variety of factors (Abdoellah, 1987; Fearnside, 1997; Hoey, 2003; Tirtosudarmo, 2019). First, in mostly Christian areas (e. g., Western New Guinea, East Timor, and the Poso region of Celebes), Muslim settlement has felt like a hidden form of Islamisation. Second, transmigration has often been seen as a form of cultural Javanization. Third, transmigration discriminated against the native population in various ways (due to their lack of participation in the decision-making process concerning, e. g., administration and the local economy; the threat to local cultures; the insensitivity of migrants and the state authority to local legal traditions; the so-called adat, e. g., concerning land ownership; the threat to the natural environment, among others, through deforestation and mining). Fourth, it has privileged the immigrant population, bringing them various economic benefits (such as alleviating poverty, unemployment, and overcrowding; obtaining free agricultural land and non-returnable funds for development). Fifth, transmigration has provided foreign (mainly Javanese) labour in areas where there is extraction of natural resources, which strengthened the belief of the native population about their economic exploitation by the state authority, dominated by the Javanese. Some Indonesians are still dissatisfied with the level of development of their regions and believe that Java’s higher level of development is financed by the extraction of natural resources from their regions (Both, 2011: 36–37). Sixth, to assist migrants, for their safety, and to protect their interests, the authorities used to send additional police and military forces to the migration areas and in many cases filled the main local administrative positions with retired Javanese army officers. These and other phenomena have increased the sense of lack of agency and dominance by the Javanese among the native population.

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some ethnic groups (Acehnese, Papuans, and Dayaks, for example), the Javanese are conquerors or pillagers”. Of course, the most crucial conflicts in East Timor, Aceh, and Western New Guinea had a broader historical, political, and economic context than the one related to transmigration. This concerned, inter alia, such problems as the way these borderland territories became part of Indonesia, their loose ties with the rest of the country, the evident cultural differences between their inhabitants and other Indonesians, the feeling of exploitation and oppression by the Javanese and by the state authority, and the inability to obtain actual autonomy. The problems developed by the relocation of mainly Javanese (and Madurese) also arose in many other places in Indonesia and generated various communal conflicts. These occurred with the fall of the authoritarian rule of Suharto in, among others, Borneo (Sambas and Sampit), Celebes (Poso), and the Moluccas (including Ambon, Halmahera) (Schulze, 2017). On the other hand, a separatist movement called the Gerakan Riau Merdeka (GRM, Free Riau Movement) started in the mainland part of the Riau region (McCall, 2000; Amri and Rianto, 2021: 193). However, these minor conflicts have been extinguished over time. In the late 1990s, in the face of significant economic problems, it was rather costly for Indonesia to maintain an active military presence in East Timor. The Timorese took advantage of the period of political instability associated with the fall of Suharto’s rule to intensify their demands for independence. However, in Indonesia, the belief prevailed that East Timor’s independence would threaten the territorial integrity of the entire state, especially in the face of separatism in Aceh and attempts to gain independence by the Papuans. New President B. J. Habibie10 tended to give East Timor special autonomy. Ultimately, however, under international pressure, he agreed to hold a referendum there in 1999, in which the population of the occupied territory voted against autonomy within Indonesia and for independence. The periods before and after the referendum were marked by a serious increase in tensions as the Indonesian militias, supported by the army, did not want to allow East Timor to become independent. However, this territory eventually became a sovereign state in 2002. The conflict between the Indonesian authorities and the OPM in Western New Guinea continues. However, its intensity was limited after the Indonesian parliament passed a law in 2001 introducing special autonomy for the province of Papua (now five Papuan provinces) (Indonesia Law 21/2001). However, some of its provisions have not yet been implemented (Trzcin´ski, 2016a, 2019: 135–143). The conflict in Aceh culminated in the signing of a peace agreement between the Indonesian government and the GAM in 2005 (Memorandum of Understanding, 10 B. J. Habibie originated from southern Celebes. His father was from the Gorontalo ethnic group, and his mother was of Javanese descent.

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2005). As a result of this agreement, the Indonesian parliament adopted a law granting this province special autonomy (Indonesia Law 11/2006). Some of the conflicts resulted in the separation, in the spirit of the centripetal model of power sharing, of new provinces from those in which independence aspirations, separatism, efforts to obtain greater autonomy, or communal conflicts were more or less vivid. For example, in 1999, the province of North Moluccas was separated from the Moluccas; in 2004, the Riau Archipelago from the Riau (Kimura, 2013: 104); in 2003, West Papua from Papua (Amri and Rianto, 2018: 3), and in 2022, Central Papua, Highland Papua, and South Papua from Papua.

Power-sharing major models and institutions The presented problems are related to the turbulent beginnings of Indonesian statehood and its limited stability, for example, in the intersegmental relations and between the segments and the state authority. The democratisation process of Indonesia that started in 1998, which meant, inter alia, the need to resolve or limit conflicts and disputes peacefully, contributed to a thorough reform of the Indonesian political system and the establishment of a power-sharing political system in this country at the turn of the 20th and 21st centuries. After the fall of Suharto, attempts were made to implement power sharing based mainly on centripetal institutions, which is deeply justified. It is the result of the concerns of the Indonesian elite, especially Javanese and at the same time Islamic, about consociational institutions and is often the result of pragmatism. First, consociational institutions may have a centrifugal effect that threatens the integrity of the state. Second, there are too many segments in Indonesia (most of which are small) to give each one, for example, autonomous status or allow some policies to be vetoed. Third, not all segments make (decisive) demands for consociational arrangements (like, for example, Malays or Christians). Fourth, under the conditions of centripetalism dominating Indonesian power sharing (that is, its “softer” model than consociationalism), the main segments and subsegments (Javanese, liberal Muslims) more easily retain a key influence on the decision-making process, which is also less complicated (Trzcin´ski, 2015a). It may happen since centripetalism is designed to ensure the participation in power of various segments at the level of intersegmental institutions like interethnic parties; decentralisation leading to a division of large segments into parts so that they live in several administrative regions, and establishing multisegmental regions where members of political elites of different segments are “forced” to cooperate; the procedure of electing a “supra-segmental” president applying the requirement of territorial distribution of votes (Trzcin´ski, 2016c,

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2017a); the requirement of preferential voting in the form of the single transferable vote or alternative voting systems or other electoral patterns promoting vote pooling (Horowitz, 1985: 601–652, 2007: 958–962, 2008: 1218; Reilly, 2011: 290–296). Such an approach is designed to create among members of segmental elites moderating, accommodating, and possibly integrating political behaviours across segmental divisions and to depoliticise segmental separateness (Reilly, 2007: 83–91). Currently, the following essential centripetal institutions operate in Indonesia (Trzcin´ski, 2019: 73–92, Reilly, 2021: 471–473): 1) supra-regional, interethnic political parties, the nature of which contributes to the formation of a multiethnic parliament and cabinet (Indonesia Law 2/2011 art. 3 [2] [c], [d]; Indonesia Law 7/2017 art. 176 [3], 177 [1]);11 2) the procedure of electing a “supra-ethnic” (moderate) president based on the requirement of territorial distribution of votes (to win the presidential election in the first round, an absolute majority of votes must be obtained statewide and at the same time at least 20% of votes in more than half of the 34 provinces) (Indonesia Constitution 1945, art. 6A [3]; Indonesia Law 7/2017, art. 416); and 3) a territorial structure consisting predominantly of multi-ethnic provinces and, at the same time, dividing the main ethnic group, the Javanese, into as many as six provinces on the island of Java (Trzcin´ski, 2017b: 174–176). However, centripetal institutions are not or would not be able to reduce all conflicts. At mostly the vertical level, that is, the regions (and the ethnic groups they live in) and the relationship between the state authority and regions (ethnic groups), it was decided to introduce “tougher” than centripetal institutions, namely consociational ones, aimed at segments that show separatist tendencies (the Acehnese), independence aspirations (the Papuans) and autonomous demands (the Dayaks). The essence of consociationalism can be summarised in the statement that under the conditions of a divided multisegmental society, individual (racial/ ethnic/national/linguistic or religious/denominational/ideological) segments should have, as sui generis interest groups, their separate representation in state power structures by which they gain real participation in making political decisions. Consociational institutions – especially a grand coalition of mainly segmental parties; a segmental cultural or territorial autonomy; proportionality in elections, distribution of government positions, employment in public offices, and even in the security institutions, judiciary, media, and state-owned enterprises; and a minority veto – are designed to directly protect segmental interests (Lijphart, 1977, 2008; Trzcin´ski, 2018b: 22–23).

11 To be supra-regional, political parties must function first of all in all provinces.

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Prominent institutions of the consociational type in Indonesia are: 1) special autonomy for the provinces of Aceh and five Papuan provinces;12 among the crucial autonomous aspects are: Sharia law and ethnic parties in Aceh (neither operate in other parts of Indonesia) (Indonesia Law 11/2006, art. 75–76, art. 125– 137; Indonesia Law 7/2017, art. 569); a requirement for the native origin of governors and their deputies in the Papuan provinces (Indonesia Law 21/2001, art. 12 [a]; Indonesia Law 11/2006, art. 67 [2] [a]); a guarantee that the six provinces will preserve a substantial part of the financial revenues generated by the exploitation of their natural resources (Indonesia Law 11/2006, art. 181–182; Indonesia Law 21/2001, art. 34); 2) a proportional electoral system to the lower house of parliament (with party lists) (Indonesia Law 7/2017, art. 168 [2]);13 3) (mostly) cultural autonomy for the Dayak people in Borneo14 in the framework of the customary council15 and its Batamad16 paramilitary wing tasked to curb Islamic extremism; 4) the segmental provinces of Gorontalo,17 and Bali,18 each of which is overwhelmingly inhabited by members of one ethnic group and one religious community. It is also worth noting that the vice president of Indonesia is most often a nonJavanese. Since 2004, the president has been directly elected, along with the vice president, four times. A Javanese has always been elected president. However, on three occasions, a vice president has been a politician of ethnic origin other than

12 In the case of the Papuan provinces, the legally guaranteed special autonomy has been only partially implemented (Trzcin´ski, 2016a). 13 From a power-sharing perspective, a proportional electoral system is important in Indonesia in the context of the division of the political party scene into non-segmental supra-religious parties and segmental Islamic parties. This is because it allows both groups of parties to win a number of seats in the lower house of parliament proportional to the scale of social support and influence and gives an image of the real division of power between them. However, proportionality is partially distorted by the high national threshold, as experienced in 2009 by, for example, the PBB party that did not enter parliament. 14 The Dayaks have a tradition of creating institutions of the consociational type. In 1945–59, the Dayak party, Partai Persatuan Dayak (PPD, Dayak Unity Party), operated in the Indonesian part of Borneo (Davidson, 2003). It was closed down as a result of the decree issued by Sukarno in 1959 prohibiting the activity of ethnic parties. 15 Majelis Adat Dayak Nasional (National Dayak Customary Council). 16 Barisan Pertahanan Masyarakat Adat Dayak (Indigenous Dayak Defence Line). 17 In 2000, the province of Gorontalo, where the vast majority are Muslims (mainly members of the Gorontaloan ethnic group), was separated from North Sulawesi. By forming a new province, the Muslim-dominated Indonesian government purposely stopped Christian (mainly of the Minahasan ethnic group) political and economic domination over Muslims. Such a conclusion is derived from my discussions with Indonesian political scientists (cf. Kimura, 2007: 85–92). 18 The specificity of the functioning of this segmental province, mainly inhabited by Balinese Hindus, is related to the existence of a tradition of administrative distinctiveness and natural borders within one island.

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that of the president: in 2004 and 2014 (Jusuf Kalla, Buginese) and 2019 (Ma’ruf Amin, Sundanese). Having both centripetal and consociational institutions, the current Indonesian political system is one of the best examples of, what I call, hybrid power sharing.19 Hybrid power sharing occurs especially when, in the same multisegmental state, there are simultaneously institutions that come from the two major power-sharing models, which hold different conceptual assumptions. But hybrid power sharing is also developed by adding its “own” institutions, in which the components corresponding to centripetalism and consociationalism overlap. I call these hybrid institutions (Trzcin´ski, 2022, 2020b). In Indonesia, at least one of these institutions can be identified in the form of religious political parties. Religious parties are of a mixed, consociational-centripetal nature. The consociational component of this institution is that they are segmental parties, open mainly to members of a specific religious segment and representing its needs and interests. On the other hand, the centripetal component manifests itself in the fact that religious parties must be supra-regional and interethnic. Religious parties, specifically Islamic ones,20 are the most important Indonesian powersharing institution, which is not purely centripetal. The significance of this institution has not been sufficiently analysed in the literature; therefore, it is the Islamic parties that the main attention will be devoted to in this chapter.21

The Muslim segment and its sub-segments facing political Islam Indonesia is a multireligious country, but with a predominant share of adherents of Islam. At the beginning of 2022, about 240 million inhabitants of Indonesia were Muslims, making it the largest Islamic state in the world. The vast majority

19 Other examples of hybrid power sharing are especially Nigeria, Burundi and Kenya (Trzcin´ski, 2016b, 2018a, 2020a, 2020b, 2021). 20 Christian political parties currently play virtually no role in the Indonesian political system. The two requirements for participation in the elections to the lower house of parliament in Indonesia – the centripetal (supra-regional and inter-ethnic) nature of the political parties and the election threshold (4%, previously 3.5% and 2.5%) – effectively eliminate such parties at the statewide level (Trzcin´ski, 2017b: 180–181). Christian parties could only count on substantial support in the areas of Indonesia inhabited by Christians, mostly belonging to small ethnic groups. The most important such areas are Western New Guinea, Flores Island, South Moluccas, and some parts of Celebes and Sumatra. The issues of political Christian parties in Indonesia from a historical perspective will be discussed in another work. 21 Other power-sharing institutions, including those designed for Aceh and Western New Guinea, have been discussed, among others, by Trzcin´ski (2016, 2017b, 2018a, 2018b: 25–27, 2019).

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of Indonesian Muslims (around 99%) are Sunni.22 From the very beginnings of Indonesia, its politics has been operating between the Scylla of supporters of the limited influence of Islam and religious elites on the state, including its political and legal system, and the Charybdis of supporters of making Indonesia an Islamic state, or at least a state based on Sharia law. In 1945, shortly before the declaration of independence, the elites of the national liberation movement, both nationalist/secularist and Islamist, prepared the so-called Jakarta Charter, that is, the preamble to the future constitution. This document, at the will of Sukarno, included the principles of the future national ideology of Pancasila (including leaving space for the professing of various religions in Indonesia), and, at the will of the Islamic elites, the order to observe Sharia law by Indonesian Muslims, the so-called tujuh kata (Seven Words). The Islamic elites also tried to force through the constitution a provision stating that the president of Indonesia must be a Muslim. Ultimately, however, thanks to Sukarno and other supporters of the separation of religion and state, the constitution that entered into force on 18 August 1945 did not incorporate such content. This shows how sensitive the important part of the future political elites of independent Indonesia was to the issue of the role of Islam in the new state. The prevailing trend was to separate political and religious matters to diminish the political significance of Islamic elites and counteract the development of religious fanaticism. But to also better integrate, within the nation being formed, followers of various religions, including Christians and Hindus, whose elites were afraid of emphasising the status of Islam in the constitution. Among Indonesian nationalists, Sukarno and Hatta, among others, believed that constitutional references to Islam would alienate non-Muslims and harm the state-building process. The implied constitutional separation of religion and state was consistently enforced under the rule of Sukarno, Suharto, and their successors. However, Islamic elites have repeatedly highlighted their dissatisfaction with the failure to include content in the constitution that emphasises the particular role of Islam in Indonesia (Elson, 2009; Al-Hamdi, 2015; Salehudin, 2018). The elites operating within the political system have repeatedly tried to legally force a change in this state of affairs.23 On the other hand, Indonesia has tragic experiences of the functioning of extremist Muslim organisations. For example, Darul Islam tried in 1942–62 with the help of its armed arm Tentara Islam Indonesia (Indonesian Islamic Army) to establish a theocratic state, Negara Islam Indonesia. In later years, Indonesia

22 The remaining Muslims in Indonesia are mostly Shiites and members of the Ahmadiyya community. 23 The most important such attempts took place in 1959, 1968, and 2002.

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experienced numerous terrorist attacks and other violent acts committed by Islamic extremists, including Jemaah Islamiyah (JI, Islamic Congregation).24 Within the Muslim segment, which dominates the religious segments of Indonesian society in terms of size and political role, various sub-segments can be distinguished. The researchers of religion most often indicate two types: religious (e. g., Sunnis and Shiites) and doctrinal within the prevailing Sunniism (e. g., traditionalists and modernists). However, from the political perspective, including political activity and stability, the most important is the division of the followers of Islam into sub-segments defined in terms of their attitude to socalled political Islam. The term “political Islam” is understood here as the treatment of Islam by a group of people as the basis for their political identity and activity. The concept of political Islam assumes the functioning of society and the political and legal system of the state based on the values and norms of the Muslim religion and, therefore, opposes the separation of religion and state (Ayubi, 1991; Burgat, 2002; Deneoux, 2002; Kepel, 2002). Political Islam is associated with the Islamic revival, especially with the political mobilisation based on Islam, a dynamically developing phenomenon, especially since the end of the 20th century (Kramer, 2003; Voll and Sonn, 2009).25 The literature distinguishes various types of political Islam, especially conservative, progressive, and those usually operating outside the law: militant, radical, and jihadist. However, the boundaries between them are not always clear. In Indonesia, there are very different degrees of perception and interpretation of the political role of Islam and tolerance towards non-Muslims and minorities within Islam. Members of the liberal Islamic sub-segment do not show much interest in the goals of political Islam and vote in elections for candidates of nonsegmental supra-religious parties, the most important of which are currently the parties in the ruling coalition: Partai Demokrasi Indonesia Perjuangan (PDI-P, Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle), Partai Gerakan Indonesia Raya (Gerindra, Great Indonesia Movement Party), Partai Golongan Karya (Golkar, Party of Functional Groups) and Partai NasDem (Nasdem Party); and Partai Demokrat (Democratic Party) opposing the government. On the other hand, among Muslims favouring political Islam and, therefore, members of the illiberal Islamic sub-segment, three main groups can be distinguished: systemic, non-systemic, and intermediate, the size of which may

24 JI is recognised as responsible, inter alia, for the famous attacks on the island of Bali in 2002 (over 200 victims) and for attacking Christian churches and hotels in Indonesia (Ramakrishna, 2004: 54). 25 The politicisation of Islam is linked, especially in Arab states, with growing disappointment with secular nationalist governments, which have often failed to generate development and improve the economic situation of their citizens.

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change as a result of flows of adherents.26 The systemic group sees the need for Islam and Islamic organisations to play a significant role in politics, but at the same time does not want supporters of political Islam to resort to the use of radical and extremist measures. Therefore, this group prefers a peaceful political Islam and wants, or at least agrees with, the idea that Islam plays a political role limited by state law. The manifestation of the needs and interests of this group are numerous Islamic political parties for which a significant number of Indonesian Muslims vote in elections at various levels of power. The non-systemic group consists of Muslims who support, sometimes actively, extremist organisations (including jihadists), calling for a radical reconstruction of Indonesia’s political and legal system based on the principles of Islam, which Indonesian law does not allow (or, in the case of Sharia law, allows only to a limited extent). As a consequence, such organisations operate, or have operated, outside the political and legal system, pursuing their goals violently. In the early days of the Indonesian state, state institutions and their officials were the main targets of their attacks. Currently, they most often attack Christians, non-Sunni Muslims (Shiites and members of the Ahmadiyya community), liberal Muslims, the Chinese minority, and foreigners (Ufen, 2009: 319; Barton et al., 2021: 9–10). The exponents of the beliefs and needs of members of the nonsystemic group are or were, inter alia, such organisations as Komando Jihad (Jihad Commando), Laskar Jihad (Warriors of Jihad), Majelis Mujahideen Indonesia (MMI, Indonesian Mujahedeen Council), and Jemaah Islamiyah. These organisations usually do not have direct links to religious parties, although in 2021 the Indonesian police revealed that JI had infiltrated the political system by penetrating one of the smaller Islamic parties, Partai Dakwah Rakyat Indonesia (PDRI, Indonesian People’s Da’wah Party) (Llewellyn, 2021). The intermediate group consists of Muslims who do not identify themselves directly with the activities of Islamic terrorists and militias but are inclined to occasionally support violent actions to achieve the goals of political Islam. The needs of members of this segment are met by some hard-line Islamic organisations, actually anti-democratic (Wilson, 2014), including the recently banned Front Pembela Islam (FPI, Islamic Defenders Front) and Hizb ut-Tahrir Indonesia (HTI, Party of Liberation). During the authoritarian regime, they operated in hiding and on a small scale. In democratic conditions, using the liberal law granting freedom of association, they registered their activities as non-political organisations and formally recognised the legal limitations of their activity to openly function, expand the group of supporters and collect funds. Some of them created their paramilitary forces and carried out illegal raids, such as the FPI’s military wing Laskar Pembela Islam (LPI, Islamic Defenders Paramilitary). 26 This conclusion is derived from my discussions with Indonesian political scientists.

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These organisations are sometimes responsible for hate crimes, discrimination against minorities, and religious intolerance (Heiduk, 2012: 32–33; Facal, 2020: 15–16), which sooner or later leads to their outlawing. Some activists then carry out activities underground or create new organisations of a similar type. Some members of the intermediate group vote in various elections mainly for the most conservative Islamic parties that share or meet some of their needs.

Islamic organisations and parties Indonesia has a long tradition of religious organisations and parties, including Islamic ones. Some of the political elites of the Malay Archipelago, even in the period of the Dutch East Indies, believed that the political system of a predominantly Muslim society should be based on the values of Islam. At the beginning of the 20th century, these elites created the first organisations that, originally, were non-political. One of them was Sarekat Islam (Islamic Union or Islamic Association), some of whose members later founded the Partai Sarekat Islam Indonesia (PSII, Indonesian Islamic Union Party).27 During the colonial period, two leading religious civil society organisations also emerged, competing for Muslim influence: Muhammadiyah (Followers of Muhammad), which merged with part of Sarekat Islam, and Nahdlatul Ulama (NU, Revival of the Ulama).28 Muhammadiyah is regarded as a modernist organisation, and NU as a traditionalist one (Asyari, 2010; Burhani, 2013). Modernist Muslims in Indonesia claim to be reformists, but advocate a return to the orthodox roots of Islam and the purging of Indonesian Islam of centuriesold local syncretic practices that spoil the purity of Islam. Modernists emphasise the authority of the Koran and the Hadith and oppose the original interpretations of Islam by the local ulema (Ali, 2007; Wajdi, 2018). In opposition to modernism, traditionalist Islam in Indonesia is an inclusive and tolerant religious orientation that emphasises the importance of locally created rituals and the wisdom and teachings of native scholars, often recognised as prominent religious figures. Traditionalists, underlining that Indonesians are the largest Muslim nation in the world, oppose the primacy of the Arab Islamic tradition. They emphasise that, as a result of the centuries-long presence of Islam in the sociocultural realities of the Malay Archipelago, for example, under the influence of Javanese spiritualism, the principles of Islam have been subject to contextualisation and indigenisation processes, which have led to the re27 Originally under the name of Partai Sarekat Islam (PSI, Islamic Association Party). 28 In addition to Muhammadiyah and the NU, there are many other smaller Islamic organisations in Indonesia.

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interpretation of some of the elements of the religion (Qodir, 2016; Qomar, 2019). The traditionalist orientation is now known as Islam Nusantara and is sometimes contrasted with the global Islam dominated by the influence of Saudi Wahhabism (Nurhisam and Huda, 2016). The main organisation that promotes Islam Nusantara is NU, currently the largest Muslim organisation in both Indonesia and the world. Although Muhammadiyah and NU are involved in a religious dispute on the interpretive level of Islam, these organisations are currently widely recognised as tolerant and peaceful, opposing the radicalisation of Islam and religious extremism. Officially, they are not political organisations at all, although they were and are associated with some religious parties, which are the most important political organisations in Islam within the political system of Indonesia. Historically, the most important religious party in Indonesia, originally established with the support of NU and (partly) of Muhammadiyah, was Partai Majelis Syuro Muslimin Indonesia (Masyumi, Council of Indonesian Muslim Associations). Masyumi was founded in the 1940s and became the strongest political party in Indonesia at the end of that decade, which in 1950–52 allowed its leaders, Mohammad Natsir and Soekiman Wirjosandjojo, to become prime ministers of Indonesia, and Masyumi to participate in subsequent governments. The paths of Masyumi and NU quickly parted ways, and in the first parliamentary elections in 1955, NU ran on its own as a political party. The election was won by the Partai Nasional Indonesia (PNI, Indonesian National Party), which supported Sukarno. Masyumi took second place and NU third. Other Islamic parties, the PSII (formerly part of Masyumi for some time) and Pergerakan Tarbijah Islamijah (Perti, Islamic Education Movement) that represented mainly Sumatran Muslims, also entered parliament. In the second half of the 1950s, some Masyumi activists, a large part of whose electorate came from outside Java, supported the rebel government of the PRRI in Sumatra and Celebes, which led Sukarno to ban the party in 1960. The next parliamentary elections were not held until 1971, and the Golkar party, which supported Suharto, won. The parliament also welcomed, inter alia, the aforementioned Islamic parties. However, the disbanded Masyumi was replaced by its successor, Partai Muslimin Indonesia (Parmusi, Muslim Party of Indonesia), associated with non-Javanese politicians, especially Sumatran ones. Suharto, wanting more control over political life in Indonesia, decided to abolish the existing party system and forced political parties other than Golkar to merge into two groups, one created by nationalist and Christian political parties and the other by Islamic parties. In 1973, the NU, PSII, Perti, and Parmusi formed a joint Islamic party, the Partai Persatuan Pembangunan (PPP, United Development Party), which was the only religious party to operate legally. The PPP quickly became the main opposition force in parliament, confirming this posi-

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tion in subsequent parliamentary elections, which Golkar was winning thanks to sharp electoral practice and various actions of the functionaries of state institutions subordinate to Suharto. However, the compulsion to unite Islamic parties in the PPP meant, in fact, an effective marginalisation of political Islam under authoritarianism, which was perceived as discrimination by a large part of the Islamic elites. However, in the final phase of his rule, Suharto began a “stateled Islamization” policy to weaken the growing social influence of the prodemocratic opposition and the disapproval of his rule by parts of the army’s officer corps (Ufen, 2009: 316–317). Suharto’s turn towards Islam laid the ground for the redevelopment of political Islam. After the fall of Suharto in 1998 and the start of the democratisation process in Indonesia, party pluralism emerged. In addition to the PPP that continues to function today, new Islamic parties (often officially presenting themselves as secular) have started to operate. Currently, the most important religious party in Indonesia is Partai Kebangkitan Bangsa (PKB, National Awakening Party), which is associated with NU activists. Another big party is Partai Keadilan Sejahtera (PKS, Prosperous Justice Party). The PKS was originally associated with the influence of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood (Mujani and Liddle, 2009: 581–582; Heiduk, 2012: 34). The PKS is sometimes considered a successor to Masyumi, as well as a party with loose ties to some radical Islamic organisations. In turn, Partai Amanat Nasional (PAN, National Mandate Party) was founded by activists linked to Muhammadiyah.29 Another Islamic party that labels itself as a successor to Masyumi is Partai Bulan Bintang (PBB, Crescent Star Party). Since 2009, the PBB has only been present in government structures at the provincial and local levels. Another Islamic party, Partai Bintang Reformasi (PBR, Reform Star Party), was represented in the lower house of parliament in 2004–2009, and in 2011 joined the nationalist Gerindra party. From time to time, new small Islamic parties appear on the Indonesian political scene. Islamic parties have very similar agendas. The main ones are that education should be based on Islam and that religion has a vital role to play in terms of a spiritual signpost for Indonesian Muslims, including in matters of morality, justice, and material development. Islamic parties are more or less willing to accept the functioning of the Republic of Indonesia as a state based on the national ideology of Pancasila, democracy, and respect for the constitution, which, de facto, introduces the secular nature of the state.30 However, they consider that political morality should be grounded in Islamic values. The 29 In 2020, some PAN activists, opposed to this party’s entry into the government, split away and founded a new party, the strongly conservative Partai Ummat (Ummah Party). 30 However, for example, the conservative PBB seems to openly demand the incorporation of Sharia law into Indonesia’s the legal system.

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agendas of Islamic parties also address crucial social issues such as the status of women, job creation, eradicating poverty, and increasing social assistance. Since the programmes of the Islamic parties are quite similar, why is there a high degree of fragmentation among these parties? There are several main reasons for this. First, Islamic parties differ in their attitude to the role of political Islam in Indonesia. Consequently, the PKB can be considered moderate, the PAN as centre-conservative, and other parties more conservative (PKS, PPP, PBB, Partai Ummat).31 Second, and related to the first point, these parties are directly or indirectly linked to Islamic civil society organisations with different orientations and are created and managed by people from different Muslim backgrounds. Third, smaller Islamic parties, in particular, are often formed as a result of factional splits in larger parties (Umam and Junaidi, 2017: 7), arising from internal programme disputes regarding political activity (e. g., the question of joining a coalition government or not) or from personal conflicts.32

The role of Islamic parties in the political system One of the essential dimensions of the power-sharing political system in Indonesia is the sharing of power between, on the one hand, non-segmental suprareligious parties of the centripetal type, and, on the other, segmental parties, and therefore of the consociational type, namely religious (Islamic) parties. The first type of parties can represent both liberal Muslims and Christians, as well as Hindus and followers of other religions, and for the second type, the target segment is the entire Muslim community. However, in the case of Indonesia, segmental parties are not purely consociational, as they must be supra-regional and interethnic, just like non-segmental supra-religious parties, and therefore also have some centripetal traits. Some researchers of Indonesian politics emphasise that after the democratisation period began, Islamic parties did not dominate the Indonesian political scene and see their weakness in it (Assyaukanie, 2004: 33; Mujani and Liddle, 2009: 576, 583; Miichi, 2015: 128; Umam and Junaidi, 2017: 2, 5). L. Assyaukanie (2004: 39–43) claims that a key reason for this is the rejection, especially among young Muslims, of the essential concept of political Islam, namely making Indonesia a theocratic state (which, in fact, is not part of the official political agenda of Islamic parties). This rejection is vital from the perspective of the durability of 31 This conclusion is derived mostly from my discussions with Indonesian political scientists, although opinions among the discussants regarding particular parties sometimes differed (cf. Tanuwidjaja,2010: 42). 32 For example, parties which split from the PAN such as Partai Ummat and Partai Matahari Bangsa (PMB, National Sun Party).

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democracy in Indonesia. However, most scholars refer to the argument of “rational voters” and indicate the poorer or “less attractive” political programmes of Islamic parties compared to the non-religious ones. Whatever the reason, a downward trend in electoral support for Islamic parties is visible in the elections to the lower house of parliament, Dewan Perwakilan Rakyat (DPR, People’s Representative Council),33 from more than 36% in 1999 and about 40% in 2004 to around 30% in the 2009 and 2014 elections, as well as in 2019 (Tanuwidjaja, 2010: 30, 34; Umam and Junaidi, 2017: 3; Trzcin´ski, 2017b: 180; KPU, 2019). However, I have a very different point of view. I consider Islamic parties crucial to the entire political system mainly because of their role in limiting political Islam and being part of the power-sharing scheme. The current political system in Indonesia is based on legal principles that limit the prospects for the development of political Islam in this country. Although the functioning of Islamic parties is allowed, their elites can only implement some of the objectives of political Islam, especially those promoting the functioning of society based on the values of this religion. The activity of religious parties is limited by state law and must comply with the nationalist ideology of Pancasila, which implicitly indicates the multireligious nature of Indonesian society and does not emphasise the dominant role of Islam. As a consequence, striving to introduce Sharia law or building a theocratic state, and therefore a radical reconstruction of the political and legal system in Indonesia, is legally unacceptable. The elites of the Islamic parties, being part of the political system operating based on the existing law, thus themselves contribute to the weakening of political Islam, eliminating its radicalism in the form of aims contrary to the idea of the secular nature of the state. As a reward, they can fully function within the political system, participating in executive and legislative power at various levels. And they derive profits from it, such as salaries, jobs, participation in the decision-making process, or the possibility of implementing their programme goals through representation in parliament and government. However, the politicised Islamic elites in Indonesia can choose a different path and strive to ensure that the state’s political and legal systems function according to the principles of Islam. This path implies full loyalty to the concept of political Islam, but is contrary to state law. Thus, followers of this path cannot act legally and be part of the political system and consequently obtain the benefits due to 33 The upper house of the Indonesian Parliament is the Dewan Perwakilan Daerah (DPD, Regional Representative Council). The DPD represents the interests of the provinces. It does not have direct legislative power. It can propose bills to the DPR on issues concerning provinces and must be heard on any draft laws proposed by the DPR that affect them (Indonesia Constitution 1945, Chapter VIIA). Each province of Indonesia elects four members to the DPD who should be non-partisan, although some have ties to political parties. The DPD consists of 136 senators.

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those who are part of it. The supporters of political Islam operating outside the system, therefore, have a limited range of activities. As a consequence, they risk being permanently on the margins of political life. They often succumb to extremist tendencies and resort to violence. In addition to being important in limiting political Islam, Islamic parties play a very important role in the creation and functioning of power in Indonesia. The elites of Islamic parties occupy high state functions and can also serve to strengthen the political position of non-segmental supra-religious parties and their politicians. This role for Islamic parties is perhaps best seen in the presidential election, which is extremely important given the presidential system of government of Indonesia. So far, a politician of an Islamic party has held the office of the president of Indonesia only once, in the years 1999–2001. This was Abdurrahman Wahid (nicknamed Gus Dur), the founder of the PKB and former chairman of the NU.34 Wahid was elected president by the upper house of parliament35 due to the formation of the so-called central axis of Islamic political parties that wanted to prevent a woman, Megawati Sukarnoputri from the PDI-P, assuming the office of president. Wahid’s election was inspired by the chairman of the upper house, an influential politician, Amien Rais, a former leader of Muhammadiyah, a member of the PAN. So far, in the 21st century, the candidate of the Islamic party has not been elected president. However, the influence of religious parties on the election of the president of Indonesia is vital. It is much easier for a presidential candidate to win when their political base includes at least some Islamic parties that can provide them with the votes of some adherents of political Islam. Therefore, the leading candidates are very interested in including Islamic parties in the pre-election coalitions. The more of them support a given candidate, the greater is their chance of winning the presidential election. The support of Islamic parties also increases the chances of candidates meeting the centripetal requirement of territorial distribution of votes in presidential elections, that is, obtaining at least 20% of the votes in more than half of all provinces. Some candidates, unable to gain the support of Islamic parties, seek the support of respected members of the religious elite, including clerics. And sometimes candidates use non-standard means. For example, Hamzah Haz from PPP, who unsuccessfully tried to be elected president in 2004, vigorously strived for, among others, the votes of the Muslim electorate of radical 34 Gus Dur came from a conservative Muslim family with Chinese roots. As president, he became famous, among other things, for understanding the interests of different minorities (including Indonesian Chinese, Christians in the Moluccas, Papuans, Acehnese), which the political establishment and the army did not like. Wahid was dismissed from office following an impeachment procedure. 35 Direct, universal presidential elections were introduced in Indonesia in 2004.

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and extremist beliefs, presenting himself in the company of the spiritual leader of Jemaah Islamiyah. On the other hand, Prawbowo Subianto, the leader of the large Gerindra party, who in the 2014 and 2019 elections took second place in the race for the presidency, losing to the current head of state, Joko Widodo (called Jokowi) from the PDI-P, not only each time secured the support of some religious parties (which happened in Jokowi’s case as well) but also included some Islamic politicians in his party by its absorption of one of the Islamic parties.36 On the other hand, the lack of support from religious parties for a given candidate may make it impossible for them to obtain the presidency, especially if the candidate is a woman. And so, for example, in the 2009 presidential election, all major religious parties at that time (PKB, PKS, PAN, PPP, PBB, and PBR) supported the candidacy of Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (known as SBY) from Partai Democrat against Megawati, who, among the Islamic parties, was supported just by the small Partai Persatuan Nahdlatul Ummah Indonesia (Indonesian Nahdlatul Community Party). SBY won in the first round, gaining more than twice as many votes as Megawati (approx. 61% to 27%) (IFES, 2009), who took second place in the election race. In the previous election in 2004, Megawati also lost to SBY, who was supported by almost all religious parties. SBY won roughly a third more votes than Megawati in the second round in 2004 (approx. 60% to 40%) (IFES, 2004), but at that time her running mate was Hasyim Muzadi, a cleric and chairman of NU. However, even Muzadi’s support did not help a female politician form a pre-election coalition with Islamic parties and become the president of Indonesia in a direct presidential election.37 In turn, some Islamic circles criticised Muzadi for his support of Megawati. It is also worth noting that both Megawati and Muzadi were candidates of Javanese origin. In the same elections, SBY’s running mate was a passionate Muslim, Jusuf Kalla,38 a Celebes Buginese, who participated in solving intersegmental conflicts in Poso and the Moluccas. The different ethnicity of a vice-presidential candidate, especially when accompanied by their commitment to Islam, may be an additional advantage for a presidential candidate.39

36 Each of these statements is based on the content of interviews with Indonesian political scientists. 37 Previously, Megawati took office as the president of Indonesia for about three years (in 2001– 04) after Wahid’s removal from office, during whose presidency she was the vice president. 38 Kalla held the office of vice president for the second time during the first presidency of Jokowi in 2014–19. 39 In the elections for the office of president and vice president, apart from the issue of gender, support from Islamic parties, or ethnic origin, of course, other factors also play an important role. It is especially worth mentioning here that SBY gained voters more easily and was a more popular politician than Megawati due to his personality (including how easily he communicated with people) and his military past.

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The position of Islamic parties in the Indonesian political system is also evidenced by the fact that in the period after the fall of Suharto, their candidates held the office of vice president twice. Hamzah Haz of the PPP was vice president in 2001–2004. The second vice president representing the milieu of Islamic parties is the conservative cleric Ma’ruf Amin, a Sundanese (the second largest ethnic group in Indonesia), who has been in office since 2019 (Fealy, 2018). Amin was previously the chairman of Majelis Ulama Indonesia (MUI, Ulema Council of Indonesia)40 and leader of the NU and was also linked to some of the Islamic parties, including the PPP and PKB.41 After the supported candidates win, Islamic parties participate in coalition cabinets under their leadership. Members of these parties hold various government positions, including ministerial, and also parliamentary ones. However, some Islamic parties remain in opposition. Sometimes, at some point in its duration, the coalition government may be joined by an Islamic party that did not support the incumbent president in the elections but another candidate. And so, for example, the PAN party in the presidential elections in 2014 and 2019 supported Prabowo (who lost both elections), but both times later joined the coalition government of President Jokowi. In the subsequent presidential election, it happens that some Islamic parties change their preferences regarding candidates or try to do so, which may be their negotiating strategy concerning their future role in the government, but also a result of a new assessment of the chances of particular candidates.42 For example, in 2014, the PPP supported Prabowo against Jokowi, and in 2019 supported Jokowi against Prabowo. Islamic parties won approximately 30% of the lower house (DPR) seats in the last few parliamentary elections (Umam and Junaidi, 2017: 3, Trzcin´ski, 2017b: 180; KPU, 2019). And so, for example, after the 2019 elections, four Islamic parties entered parliament, obtaining a total of 171 out of 575 MP seats (PKB – 58, PKS – 50, PAN – 44, PPP – 19) (KPU, 2019), two of them (PKB, PPP) joined the government right away, while one (PAN) joined the ruling coalition later, and the most conservative among them (PKS) remained in the opposition. However, the example of the absorption of the Islamic PBR party by Gerindra in 2011 shows that Islamic politicians can also enter parliament from the lists of non-segmental 40 The MUI is the most significant Indonesian institution of Islamic scholars, uniting various Sunni organisations, including the largest, the NU and Muhammadiyah. The MUI cooperates with the Indonesian authorities, issuing opinions and fatwas on various subjects at the intersection of Islam, state law, and public life. It is also trying to dictate the general direction of life to the Indonesian Sunnis. 41 In 2006, he founded the Partai Kebangkitan Nasional Ulama (PKNU, Ulema National Awakening Party), which, however, did not gain a significant position in the political arena. 42 This conclusion is derived from my discussions with Indonesian political scientists.

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supra-religious parties. It happens that Islamic politicians are also elected from the lists of other non-Islamic parties.43 The actual number of politicians representing political Islam in the DPR may therefore be slightly higher after each election than the sum of the MPs of the Islamic parties. Last but not least, Islamic parties also participate in elections at the regional and local levels in Indonesia, and their members perform various functions in local government bodies. Islamic parties are often effective in passing Shariabased bylaws in the local legislative assemblies regarding, for example, the traditional dress of Muslim women or prohibiting them from being in public places at night, and generally banning some activities, including gambling or the sale and consumption of alcohol (Salim, 2007: 126–131; Tanuwidjaja, 2010: 43–44). As A. Salim (2007: 118) notes, such local “Muslim politics” is often “advocated not only by Muslim groups and Islamic institutions, parties, and publishers but also by regional bureaucracies and even secular political parties”. Therefore, certain “soft” Sharia law content can be introduced through the back door with the support of various interest groups in some areas of Indonesia, bypassing the national parliament, which shows the strength of the influence of political Islam. Furthermore, in the context of support of some part of the Muslim segment for Islamic parties and its need for the legal enforcement of some conservative moral norms, some non-segmental supra-religious parties are, therefore, becoming more “accommodative towards religious agendas” (Tanuwidjaja, 2010: 31, 40– 41). Religious parties are the most significant non-purely centripetal institution in Indonesian power sharing. They play a very important political role, operate throughout the country, and have the support of a multimillion part of the population. For example, in the 2019 elections to the DPR, the five major Islamic parties received a total of more than 42 million votes from less than 140 million votes cast (KPU, 2019). Assuming that approximately 122 million voters were Muslims (who represent 87% of the population), this would mean that every third Muslim voting in this election voted for Islamic parties. Of course, the number of supporters of political Islam in Indonesia is greater, taking into account that some members of the illiberal Islamic sub-segment do not have candidates to vote for, and some voters support Islamic politicians who run for elections on the lists of non-segmental supra-religious parties.

43 This information is derived from my discussions with Indonesian political scientists.

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Stability through hybridity The functioning of power-sharing institutions in Indonesia is a response to existing conflicts and disputes, often lasting for many years but still current. This response is to help reduce these where they occur in relations between segments (or sub-segments) and between them and the state authority. In order to allow members of different segments to participate in power at various levels, different centripetal institutions were employed in Indonesia, which most often seem effective from the perspective of achieving/maintaining political stability. However, in some areas they have not or would not have produced a sufficient stabilising effect. Here, there was a need to strengthen them with consociational institutions or institutions with a consociational component, thanks to which Indonesian power sharing took on a hybrid dimension. Apart from the conflict in East Timor, which regained independence, the three crucial conflicts – in Aceh, Western New Guinea, and the ideological one in the Muslim segment between opponents and supporters of political Islam – have been limited by supplementing the dominant centripetal institutions with strictly consociational institutions (under special autonomies) or a hybrid, consociational-centripetal institution (in the form of Islamic parties).44 Employing selected consociational institutions has allowed the native people and elites in Aceh and, to a much lesser extent, Papua to be self-governed and has enabled the participation in the political system of those members of the Muslim community who support limited political Islam. Islamic parties play a key stabilising role among non-purely centripetal institutions. This is because they participate in pre-election presidential coalitions and after the elections share power with the non-segmental supra-religious parties in consecutive cabinets. They limit the radicalisation of the Muslim segment and simultaneously meet the political needs of a large part of its illiberal sub-segment. At the same time, they enable the realisation of some of the goals of political Islam and the political ambitions of its elites, formed by various religious activists, including Muslim scholars and clergy. Through political parties, these elites gain access to various goods, such as participation in power, but on the condition they renounce radicalism and extremism. They influence the views of their followers and their actions, creating patterns of activity at the interface between religion and politics. 44 The consociational institutions in Aceh and Western New Guinea are also accompanied by centripetal arrangements. In the case of Western New Guinea, these are supra-regional interethnic parties (operating under the conditions of a lack of ethnic parties) and the division of this territory in the spirit of centripetalism into five Papuan provinces. On the other hand, in Aceh, apart from consociational ethnic parties, centripetal (supra-regional/inter-ethnic) parties also operate (Trzcin´ski, 2017b).

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Consequently, through Islamic parties, the state controls, to a large extent, the development of political Islam. Religious parties channel political Islam in Indonesia within the limits permitted by law and diminish the non-systemic political activity of religious activists. Indonesian law allows only those Islamic parties to function that de facto agree to partially “disarm” political Islam from its most radical goals, such as building a theocratic state and implementing Sharia law in all of Indonesia. The state law thus introduces a certain clinch or impasse that effectively tames political Islam. Moderate supporters of the lack of separation of state and religion can vote for Islamic parties. On the other hand, for people with radical and even extremely radical views, the programmes of these parties are usually too “soft” and opportunistic and, consequently, unacceptable. Usually, they do not vote in elections at all and remain outside the political system. As a result, the concept of political Islam has little empirical room for manoeuvre and its adherents are unable to pursue radical goals. Mostly due to the introduction into the political system of a hybrid institution (partially a consociational one) in the form of Islamic parties, as well as consociational institutions in the form of autonomy in Aceh and limited autonomy in Western New Guinea, in the 21st century Indonesia achieved the highest level of political stability in its history. This is because consociational and hybrid institutions have reduced some conflicts and strengthened centripetal institutions where necessary, generally affecting the sustainability of power sharing in Indonesia. As a result, Indonesian hybrid power sharing can be considered as an appropriate response to existing needs. This system can also serve as an example for other countries struggling with the challenges of being multisegmental. And for power-sharing theorists, the constitution of a hybrid power-sharing political system in Indonesia is an indicator of the direction in which the development of consociational or centripetal systems may go in a situation where they do not fully fulfil their stabilising role.

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Sutarto, Ayu (2006). Becoming a True Javanese: A Javanese View of Attempts at Javanisation. Indonesia and the Malay World, 34: 39–53. Tanuwidjaja, Sunny (2010). Political Islam and Islamic Parties in Indonesia: Critically Assessing the Evidence of Islam’s Political Decline. Contemporary Southeast Asia, 32 (1): 29–49. Tirtosudarmo, Riwanto (2019). The Politics of Migration in Indonesia and Beyond. Singapore: Springer. Trzcin´ski, Krzysztof (2015a). Centrypetalizm – integruja˛cy system polityczny dla pan´stw wieloetnicznych. Zarys teorii empirycznej. Studia Polityczne, 39 (3): 183–213. Trzcin´ski, Krzysztof (2015b). Czym jest stabilnos´c´ polityczna pan´stwa? Przegla˛d Politologiczny, 2: 37–47. Trzcin´ski, Krzysztof (2016a). The Consociational Addition to Indonesia’s Centripetalism as a Tactic of the Central Authorities: The Case of Papua. Hemispheres, 31 (4): 5–20. Trzcin´ski, Krzysztof (2016b). How Theoretically Opposite Models of Interethnic PowerSharing Can Complement Each Other and Contribute to Political Stabilization: The Case of Nigeria. Politeja, 42 (3): 53–73. Trzcin´ski, Krzysztof (2016c). Wymóg uzyskania terytorialnego rozłoz˙enia głosów (poparcia) w wyborach prezydenckich. Athenaeum, 49: 113–137. Trzcin´ski, Krzysztof (2017a). The Centripetal Spatial Vote Distribution Requirement in Presidential Elections: Cases of Nigeria and Indonesia. Acta Asiatica Varsoviensia, 30 (1): 89–107. Trzcin´ski, Krzysztof (2017b). Hybrid Power-Sharing in Indonesia. Polish Political Science Yearbook, 46 (1): 168–185. Trzcin´ski, Krzysztof (2018a). Hybrid Power Sharing: On How to Stabilize the Political Situation in Multi-segmental Societies. Politeja, 56 (5): 86–107. Trzcin´ski, Krzysztof (2018b). What is Power Sharing? Consociationalism, Centripetalism, and Hybrid Power Sharing. Studia Polityczne, 46 (3): 9–30. Trzcin´ski, Krzysztof (2019). Ograniczanie konfliktów w Nigerii i Indonezji: Hybrydowy model power-sharing. Warszawa: Elipsa. Trzcin´ski, Krzysztof (2020a). Centripetal Federalism. In: S. Keil, P. Anderson, eds. 50 Shades of Federalism. Canterbury: Canterbury Christ Church University, Montréal: CRÉQC. http://50shadesoffederalism.com/theory/centripetal-federalism/ (accessed: 17. 12. 2021). Trzcin´ski, Krzysztof (2020b). Hybrydowe power-sharing. Koncepcja i instytucje. Studia Polityczne. 48 (3): 11–32. Trzcin´ski, Krzysztof (2022). Consociationalism Meets Centripetalism: Hybrid Power Sharing. Nationalism and Ethnic Politics. 28(3): 313–331. Published online 17 December 2021. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13537113.2021.2004761 (accessed: 31. 01. 2022). Ufen, Andreas (2009). Mobilising Political Islam: Indonesia and Malaysia Compared. Commonwealth & Comparative Politics, 47 (3): 308–333. ULMWP: United Liberation Movement for West Papua (2022). https://www.ulmwp.org/ (accessed: 19. 12. 2021). Umam, Ahmad Khoirul, and Junaidi, Akhmad Arif (2017). Political Islam: The Shrinking Trend and the Future Trajectory of Islamic Political Parties in Indonesia. Masyarakat, Kebudayaan dan Politik, 30 (1): 1–12.

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Adam W. Jelonek

Multi-ethnic Malaysia. Consociational democracy vs. consociational authoritarianism

Democracy is a consensual system of government, that is, a system based on the consensus of decision-making reached by society. However, according to Apter (Apter, 1965), consensual systems are not necessarily democratic systems. Sometimes historical, cultural, religious or ethnic circumstances cause that consensus and the relative stability of a political system contribute to a gradual erosion of democratic institutions. A hypothesis somewhat trying to explain these deviations is formulated by Gabriel A. Almond and Sidney Verba in The Civic Culture (1963). Perhaps, Almond and Verba surmise, these states have managed to develop their own version of political culture and create a practice of adjusting the contradictions permeating society leading to institutional compromise. Verba believes that in cases of these so-called fractured democracies, the principle of parallel belonging is of limited application, as such societies are divided into two closed and isolated camps. The only channels of communication between the two camps can be imagined at the level of the innermost leadership of both camps. Doing politics in such a system is akin to conducting negotiations between rival states, where a breakdown of negotiations and war are always possible. One might say, in Verba’s words, that the instability of such systems is endemic (Almond and Verba, 1963: 135). Arend Lijphart also went in the same direction in his exploration of the concept of consociational democracy questioning majority rule as a necessary condition for the preservation of democracy (Lijphart 1977:1). Majority rule, Lijphart continues, under the so-called majoritarian (Westminster) system of democracy excludes minorities from the decision-making process (Lijphart, 1994). Lijphart points out that in societies deeply divided along religious, linguistic, ethnic or racial lines, majority rule is not only undemocratic but also dangerous, as minorities are permanently excluded from the political process and thus feel marginalised and discriminated against. In his opinion, the agreement of the elites of particular segments of society, while preserving other normative conditions of democracy, should contribute to permanent stabilisa-

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tion of the political system and protection of the rights of minority groups (Hoffmann, 2002: 216–275). This assumption has underpinned many political systems in multisegmented societies. Many researchers, such as Lucian W. Pye, believe that the segmented social character reveals it influence with particular force on the organisation of political life in developing countries. Clifford Geertz explains this phenomenon by the specific “communal” social structure of these countries based on the socalled “primary loyalty”, which favours the creation and consolidation of subcultures of a linguistic, religious, moral or racial character (Geertz, 1980). Defining the social structure in this way has led some to draw unequivocal conclusions about the possibility of building a lasting democratic system in any of these countries. Furnivall (1956), for example, says that it is impossible to build a civil society at all in a disintegrated system. This is similarly argued by Michael Smith, who even stresses that the dominance of one segment over another is integral to the definition of a plural society, and that “cultural pluralism automatically enforces the structural necessity of non-democratic regulation of intergroup relations” (Smith, 1965). Malaysia turns out to be a case which proves that while the sacrifice of majority democratic principles contributes to the stability of a political system, an “elite cartel” inevitably replaces the country’s other democratic institutions, which contributes to the deepening of authoritarian tendencies.

The roots of Malaysian consociational democracy On the threshold of World War II, which also marked the beginning of the gradual dismantling of British colonial rule in the region, the Malay Peninsula was home to three major ethnic communities. The Malay population made up almost half (46.6%) of the population. Besides the Malays, there were also Chinese (37.5%) and Indians (14.4%). All three great communities consisted of diverse, more or less autonomous and more or less distinct nationalities, ethnic groups and tribal communities (Andaya, 1982). The Malays themselves were an example of a remarkable ethnic mosaic. Some of them were descendants of “local settlers”, as they used to call themselves, that is people who arrived from Parameswaran in the 14th century. The majority of the Malay population (such as the Bugi and Menangkabau peoples) arrived on the peninsula much later – in the 15th and 16th centuries. They were joined and completely assimilated by immigrants from India and the Middle East, as well as representatives of other ethnic groups that adopted Islam (e. g., the Khontai Thais) (Information Malaysia, 2000). No less diverse was the Chinese population of Malaya. Their arrival on the peninsula was not a matter of a moment, but a process that spanned centuries.

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This had a fundamental impact on the fundamental differences in socio-economic status and cultural character between the so-called Baba Chinese, descendants of the first settlers in Malaya, and groups of later immigrants, who arrived in Malaya mainly as a result of British settlement policy. They came from different parts of China. The largest group were the Hokkiens, speaking Minnan dialects, who came from the southern part of Fujian province. The next most numerous Chinese groups consisted of Cantonese (Yue), Hakka (Kejia), Chiaochou (Jiaozhou), Toechewi and many others. Indians, mainly emigrants from the then British India, also represented many national, ethnic, linguistic and religious communities. Among them we could find peoples speaking languages belonging to three language families: Dravidian (Tamils, Malayals, Telugu and Kannara), Indian (Panjabis, Hindustani, Bengalis, Rajasthani and Sinhalese) and Iranian (Pashtuns). They included followers of Hinduism, Islam, Buddhism and other Indian religions (Ryan, 1962). Among the remaining less than 2% of the population we have mainly the socalled orang asli – the remnants of the original population inhabiting this area before the Malay settlement – the Semang, the Senoese speaking a language from the Mon-Khmer family, using a Malay dialect of the Jakuns, and the indigenous people of Borneo-Dayak, Kadazan or Badjau (Carey, 1976). These various ethnic groups, as well as traditional kinship groups and clan and family communities have long been a natural source of individual identity. When individual contacts crossed the boundaries set for the individual ethnic groups, or when it became necessary for various reasons to manifest group interests, a sense of community solidarity was quickly established and strengthened. The divisions between the Malay, Chinese and Indian populations were exacerbated by emerging nationalisms and the events of World War II. The favouritism of the Malay and Indian populations by the occupying Japanese and the widespread extermination of the Chinese intensified the distrust between the ethnic groups living in Malaya. The situation worsened further in the post-war period, when there were pogroms against the Malayan population by the communist guerrillas of the MLNA (Malayan National Liberation Army). However, another political force was also emerging in Malaya in the 1930s and 1940s. At its core were young people from the homes of wealthy businessmen and the aristocracy. Educated in English schools, they were prepared to serve under the British system and were strongly influenced by Western democratic ideals. They came from different ethnic groups and it was they who were to make their mark on the country’s postwar political system. The planners of the British Colonial Office saw the need to create entirely new constitutional arrangements for Malaya, which was also, in a way, an attempt to take the strategic initiative in a long-term decolonisation plan. These included the creation of a new state organism, the Union of Malaya, consisting of nine

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sultanates and two former Straits Settlements: Penang and Malacca. All people living or born within its territory, regardless of racial origin, were entitled to citizenship of the new state. The White Paper, published on 22 January 1946, formulated more detailed principles for a political system based on the political empowerment of citizens. The initiative was copied from a colonial metropolis and as such met with resistance from almost all political groups at an early stage, as it was disconnected from the local reality. Both the Malay leadership and the Chinese elite were opposed, regardless of their political orientation. The project did not meet the fundamental and contradictory national ambitions of the various segments of society living on the Malay Peninsula. The disputes between the different ethnic groups were mainly economic, but also cultural and symbolic. They concerned the status of the dominant religion, the reform of the education system, and the potential role of the Bahasa Malaya language in public life. Each community floated its own plans to subjugate “outsiders”. The possibility of introducing majority rule into the political decision-making system was thus called into question. In organisational terms, initiatives aimed at building supra-ethnic political representations, such as the Malay Independence Party (IMP) established in 1951, were marginalised. Instead of appeasing the situation, the British project led to the emergence of political parties, for which all ideological divisions were put on the back burner, while the representation of the national interests of the ethnic communities in Malaya became the primary dimension. On 11 May 1946, the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) was formed, led by the Prime Minister of Johore, Dato Onn bin Ja’afar, with broad support from most Malay communities (Funston, 1980). Soon after, the political representation of the Chinese in Malaya became the Malay Chinese Association (MCA), founded in 1949. Thanks to the personal connections of its leaders, such as Tan Cheng Lock, it found it easier to access the Malay circles of power and the British colonial administration. Almost parallel to the efforts of High Commissioners Gurney and Templer to empower individuals in the political process, an alternative view of a possible way of doing politics in the Federation was beginning to gain ground. The idea that in the future the politics of the independent state might be based not on individuals but on community groups undertaking negotiations on essential solutions came from the British Commissioner-General for Southeast Asia, Malcolm McDonald. In 1948, on his initiative, a special Communities Liaison Committee (CLC) was formed. The CLC was an organisation without any formal authority. Its members officially represented only themselves. However, McDonald managed to invite some of the most prominent members of various communities to participate in the work of the committee. The CLC had Malay and Chinese representatives, as well as from the Indian, Ceylonese, Eurasian and European communities.

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The committee became a forum for very sharp polemics between the representatives of individual communities. However, its role in shaping the future consociational political scene in Malaysia can hardly be underestimated. The CLC defined the basic categories describing the potential platform for agreement – recognition of the supremacy of the Bahasa language with simultaneous provision of cultural protection for the Chinese and Hindu minorities, guarantees of full and effective access of Malays to the economy, as well as enabling full participation of the Chinese (and Indians) in the political life of the country. Clearly, there could be no revival of intercommunal relations without reaching agreement on these three key issues. The 1952 local government elections for the capital city of Kuala Lumpur served as a test case for the MCA formula. On the initiative of the MCA, the first round-table conference was held with representatives of the UMNO. Despite initial distrust, representatives of both parties quickly agreed that only the UMNO and MCA had the proper legitimacy to represent their respective communities. Based on this premise, agreement was reached in a matter of hours not only on a joint election declaration, but also on a joint list of candidates for the upcoming elections. In all constituencies where there was a Chinese majority, the candidates put forward by the MCA received official support from the UMNO. In Malay-majority areas, on the other hand, the UMNO candidates could count on the votes of Chinese voters, thanks to the support of the MCA. Although the election campaign of the alliance of the MCA and UMNO was very loosely coordinated, it posed a serious challenge to other smaller groups. The election results in Kuala Lumpur showed that the new ad hoc political formula was a resounding success. Of the 12 seats on the city council, nine were filled by the UMNO/MCA alliance. Over the next two years, local elections were held in several more cities. They constituted an important poll of voters’ support for particular political forces in the country. Their results were remarkably consistent. Without exception, they sent a clear signal about the public’s acceptance of the broad formula of a multi-ethnic alliance based, however, on independent political representations of respective communities. The vitality of a political solution based on the power of a cartel of ethnic parties was also finally confirmed in the first statewide elections in 1955. To emphasise its multiracial character, the alliance also included the politically marginal Malayan Indian Congress (MIC) in its coalition and fielded candidates in all constituencies. The coalition of ethnic parties won 51 seats in the 52member parliament marginalising other smaller ethnic parties like the PanMalaysian Islamic Party (PAS – Parti Islam Se-Malaysia) or those appealing to transnational interests – like Party Negara. There was no doubt that the UMNO/ MCA/MIC coalition had received a public mandate of confidence. If the independent Malay state was to be based on democratic institutions, it was this

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coalition that was to determine their form and procedures. Thus, the consociational arrangements inherent in the coalition practice of the alliance were to become the basis for the organisation of political life in the state. The powerful popular mandate of the new coalition allowed for the eventual passage of a new compromise constitution and paved the way for the country’s full independence in 1957. From the beginning, however, the agreement was of a very general nature. This general character was the cause of inevitable difficulties in trying to translate it into some concrete political formula. All ethnic groups looked forward to the early implementation of its fundamental provisions. Each, however, interpreted them somewhat differently. The expectations of the various communities were often contradictory and generally difficult to meet immediately. For the Indian and, above all, the Chinese community, the growing national aspirations of the Malays, especially the desire to ensure the supremacy of the Malay language and culture in the common country, raised concerns about the possibility of preserving their own identity. The Malays expected an imminent improvement in their economic situation. They often linked this expectation only to the expropriation of Chinese entrepreneurs. The Malays were still concerned about the key economic position of the Chinese and Hindu minorities. Of even greater concern were the constitutional agreement’s concessions to minority political participation. The alliance leaders were confident that they could work out some sort of compromise solution. Negotiations on core political issues, hitherto undertaken within a narrow circle of top ethnic leaders, proceeded smoothly. However, the stability of Malaysia’s system of consociational democracy, like the stability of any such system, required success on two crucial dimensions. First, it was essential to ensure vertical mobilisation by securing the broadest possible ethnic political support for the ruling arrangement. The individual ethnic political groupings united in the alliance – that is, the UMNO, MCA and MIC – had to demonstrate their prowess in ensuring the electoral success of the multi-ethnic grouping as a whole. On the other hand, it proved essential to maintain horizontal solidarity – a willingness to compromise, shared responsibility and mutual trust between the leadership elites of the different ethnic groups. There is much to suggest that the alliance, in assuming the role of grouping to manage the interethnic conflict, was not fully aware that this political dilemma must lead to a crisis of the entire system. The need to make sometimes painful compromises, inherent in the operating principle of consociationalism, must have led to a weakening of the group’s support in an ethnically divided electorate. In turn, the efforts of some alliance politicians to secure the popularity of the electorate inevitably led to conflicts within the narrow circle of the also ethnically divided leadership elite. They shattered the sense of shared responsibility, sol-

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idarity and mutual trust necessary for the survival of the system. The alliance’s leaders, fearing political destabilisation, postponed important and sensitive decisions indefinitely. When they finally decided to act, the compromise solutions, while fair, did not satisfy either ethnic group. The alliance was spectacularly successful in parliamentary and local elections in 1959 and 1964, and its leadership maintained internal consistency on fundamental issues. Behind the facade of the political stability of the system, however, clear cracks were appearing that heralded the possibility of crisis. The temporary admission of Singapore, dominated by a Chinese population, into the Federation of Malaysia, and the permanent addition of the ethnically and religiously diverse states of Sabah and Sarawak, located in the Borneo, did not contribute to the stability of the system. The other major threat to the maintenance of the alliance’s solidarity was already of a very different nature. Undoubtedly, its sources lay in the very structure of consociationalism, where a significant number of decisions were taken behind closed doors in order not to antagonise individual ethnic groups. It was the multiplying financial scandals, the trail of which clearly led to representatives of the highest authorities of the ruling coalition. The opposition increasingly began to formulate accusations against the ruling group that the coalition was not only jointly making the most important decisions for the country, but was also complicit in the gradual plundering of state assets. The end of the 1960s made it increasingly clear that the critical moment was approaching for a real test of the effectiveness of consociationalism, at least in its democratic version. The alliance was becoming a party with an increasingly scandal-ridden reputation among voters. The ossified party structures were becoming completely resistant to change, and the managerial elites gathered in the ruling elites were slowly losing touch with reality and knowledge of the prevailing social moods. The legitimacy of the constitutional contract slowly began to reach its natural limits. The ruling coalition of ethnic parties entered the 1969 elections in a difficult situation. Having become hostage to a tenuous consensus, it could not tolerate the increasingly evident aspirations of individual communities. Adopting such a strategy, however, increasingly discredited the various ethnic segments of the alliance in the eyes of voters. Moreover, the increasingly numerous opposition parties had their own reasons to be optimistic about the results of the upcoming elections. Shortly before the elections were to be called, the opposition groups, which were generally also organised along ethnic lines, the Chinese-dominated Democratic Action Party (DAP) and the radical Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party (PAS) agreed to field only one candidate in single-mandate constituencies. This meant an end to the previous practice of competition for the electorate’s votes.

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The election campaign took place in an atmosphere of radicalisation of the various ethnic groups and a rush of populist promises by their political representatives. The 1969 elections were a resounding success for the opposition. They were also an expression of the public’s rejection of a consensual agreement. Although the alliance coalition maintained its majority in parliament, the counting of votes was followed by a campaign of settling accounts and mutual accusations within the group. The radicalisation of moods found expression in bloody ethnic riots and pogroms in the streets of Kuala Lumpur and other Malaysian cities. The system of consociational democracy collapsed. It appeared that the fact, repeatedly pointed out by the theorists of consociationalism, that consociational democracy was an unsustainable system, was once again making itself known. The outbreak of the 1969 crisis provided an excuse for many radical Malay politicians to suspend their democratic practices. As a result of events and the introduction of martial law, he consociational democracy ceased to be a democracy. The future of the political scene in Malaysia was in question.

Consociational democracy vs. (un)consociational authoritarianism The year 1969 marks a clear caesura in the country’s political system. While the arrangements of the first 12 years after independence showed a significant attachment of the ruling elite in Malaysia to the British models of parliamentary democracy, the events of 1969 marked the beginning of a new period of the gradual erosion of the institutions of democracy in general and the institutions of consociational democracy in particular. Authoritarian tendencies resulted primarily from the course chosen by the ruling political elite to maintain political control in the state at all costs. The shift away from democratic arrangements was manifested in the enactment of new legislation such as the Internal Security Act (ISA), the Associations Act, the Subversive Activities Act, the Universities and Colleges Act, the Official Secrets Act, and the Publications Act, all of which significantly curtailed earlier political freedoms. The major changes in the organisation of the political system were accompanied by equally major transformations of an economic nature. The year 1969 began two decades of impressive economic growth allowing for a significant strengthening of the foundations of legitimising power. State institutions played an increasingly crucial role not only in the conduct of financial or monetary policy, but also became an active actor involved in financing and organising production. The new circumstances allowed a new political reality to take root in Malaysia, dubbed by observers as “money politics”. This meant the gradual spread of a wide range of practices that allowed the transfer of surpluses earned by the state to politically privileged groups. The consequence of the “politics of

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money” was the gradual merging and intertwining of state, economic and political structures (Gomez, 1991). Transformations in the political and economic spheres were accompanied by the phenomena of a major reconstruction of the social structure. The analysis conducted so far has shown that ethnic factors were the main factor determining the shape of the political scene. After 1969, this factor gradually began to lose its importance. Certainly, the issue of ethnic identity, as the key to understanding Malaysian society, remained extremely important. However, the diversification of social structures in the modernising society allowed for a significant expansion of choices between alternative identities to ethnicity (Ackerman, 1986: 145–167). The revolutionary nature of the post-1969 changes has been ambiguously assessed by scholars. Proponents of the plural society theory interpret 1969 as the collapse of the Malaysian system of liberal democracy, assuming that the existing consociational solutions proved inadequate to prevent the outbreak of ethnic conflicts. These observers point out that the consociational solutions enjoyed far more support in state administration circles than the country’s voter-regulated political elite. The weakness of the consociational solutions, they argue, lay not in the alliance’s political elite but rather in the need to appeal to the masses in repeated electoral acts. The temptation of ethnic populism in electoral campaigns proved to be too strong, and the violation of the rules of the consociational game led in turn to a permanent internal crisis of the entire system. This meant that the system, in order to ensure itself a minimum of efficiency, necessarily had to evolve towards the supremacy of the executive bodies over the legislative bodies (Esman, 1972: 6). By the same token, this meant that in order to maintain the potential of executive power, it was necessary to effectively limit potential challenges from the free play of political forces and the restriction of democratic freedoms (Mauzy, 1982). In January 1970, the National Council for Operations, which administered the state during the state of emergency, decided to set up a special consultative council to study the fundamental political, economic and cultural issues affecting relations between the main ethnic groups. Its 67-member membership included representatives of trade unions, labour organisations, religious institutions, and the major political parties. Although the state of emergency was theoretically lifted in 1971 when parliament was reconvened, the government was still endowed with a number of powers that gave it virtually unlimited authority. Many of the regulations, laws and ordinances that emerged from the state of emergency, such as the Emergency Regulations, the Maintenance of Public Order and the Prevention of Crime have become embedded in Malaysian law and are an integral part of Malaysian law. These powers allowed the government to have virtually complete control over public life.

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Apart from the breakthrough in the government’s approach to democratic solutions, the year 1969 also marked a watershed in the resolution of the burning issues related to ethnic matters. In this area, too, the Malay political elite that dominated the political scene in the 1970s undertook a far-reaching redefinition of their policy. The UMNO leaders concluded that the policy of incremental concessions and negotiations followed in the past did not translate into real progress. In 1971, the government began to implement a programme, for the economic reconstruction of the country called the New Economic Policy (NEP) (Pye, 1956: 262–265). The objectives of the NEP are clearly spelled out in the Second Malaysia Plan (Faarland, 1990). Chief among these are the reduction and eventual elimination of poverty among all Malaysian citizens, regardless of race, by raising income levels and increasing employment, as well as accelerating the process of restructuring Malaysian society to correct economic imbalances, reduce and ultimately eliminate race as a determining factor in the economic situation. The architects of the plan made it clear that they saw the fundamental cause of ethnic tensions and a serious threat to political stability in the persistent disparity between the economic situation of the Malays and the non-Malay population. Reducing and eventually eliminating this disparity, according to the authorities, would help maintain political stability and avoid future ethnic conflicts (Mahathir, 1997). Although the statistics show a gradual increase in Malay control of the economy in the 1970s and 1980s, the vast majority of the new class of Malay entrepreneurs were those with very close ties to the Malay power elite. Success in the economy was mainly achieved by either UMNO activists, retired officials, or representatives of the Sultan’s courts. They almost never built their businesses gradually as generations of Chinese had done. In general, they simply acquired existing companies using their connections in government circles. The process of Malayizing the economy carried out under the banner of the NEP also directly served the interests of the various ruling parties, most notably the UMNO, which directly sought to exploit the privileges of legislation favouring Malay interests (Searle, 1994). Although one can speak of a partial activation of entrepreneurship among the bumiputra, the new group of Malay entrepreneurs created by the NEP programmes became increasingly dependent on the political apparatus of the state. The boundaries between the economic elite and the power elite were gradually blurred. Entrepreneurs, on the one hand united in their support for the UMNO, were, on the other hand, also competitors in the struggle for a single pool of economic privileges. When the Malaysian economy was booming in the 1970s, this construction of the political and economic scene seemed to bring tangible benefits to both groups. However, the temporary economic collapse of the mid-

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1980s, when the state coffers began to be empty, meant bankruptcy for many Malaysian enterprises. In 1970, with new Prime Minister Tun Abdul Razak in the ranks of the UMNO top leadership, a decision was made to expand the existing coalition to include individual parties from the ranks of the opposition. Less than four years later, a broad coalition called the Barisan Nasional (National Front) was registered at the national level. The formation of the Barisan Nasional served two main purposes. First, it brought the opposition parties into the ranks of the ruling coalition. Parties forming the Barisan Nasional were guaranteed adequate representation in parliament, government and state legislatures. This allowed for the resolution of political conflicts behind closed doors, similar to the previous alliance formula. Second, the formation of the Barisan Nasional allowed the UMNO to further consolidate its control of the government. By bringing the Panmalayan Islamic Party (PAS) or the relatively small Chinese party Gerakan into the coalition, the UMNO gained protection from attacks by the opposition. The parties forming the Barisan Nasional after 1970 acted more and more clearly as typical patronage groups towards their activists, members and supporters. We can see this phenomenon particularly clearly in the case of the UMNO, which dominated the Malay coalition. As already mentioned, one of the main objectives of the NEP policy was to create a class of Malay entrepreneurs. Even during the first years of the new economic arrangements, it turned out that almost all new Malay entrepreneurs had strong ties to the ruling party. On the other hand, members of parliament or deputies to the state legislatures were usually given seats on the boards of directors of major state enterprises or companies in which the state retained a stake. The non-Malay patios comprising the Barisan Nasional also gradually moved away from the model of representing the interests of their own ethnic communities to competing for access to resources guaranteeing participation in the construction of their own patronage structures. The new governing coalition formula of gradually moving away from representing the interests of ethnic communities and towards consistently applying the principles of patronage to its activists and supporters that the Barisan Nasional became proved to be a remarkably coherent construct. The Barisan Nasional was not the classic party coalition as the alliance formula that preceded it was. In fact, the Barisan Nasional was a unified community of interests dominated by UMNO activists. The ideological divisions between the parties that made up the Barisan Nasional were losing their importance. The progressive monopolisation of the political scene by the ruling party made the previous need to mobilise popular votes less and less relevant (Lijphart, 1994: 105–107). However, the distribution of privileges based on Barisan Nasional channels, apart from the obvious benefits for the party’s homogeneous political image, did not bring the benefits themselves. Popular support mobilised for the alliance by

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authentic local authorities turned into a competition for access to privileges without ideological basis. Increasingly, authoritarian measures were also used to calm internal conflicts within the ruling coalition itself. The process of appropriation of the democratic system by political elites is, according to many theorists of democracy, including Lijphart himself, as much a natural as a universal process. Lijphart has repeatedly warned against the processes of progressive homogenisation of the political scene and the increasing degree of elite consensus in democratic systems. Apart from centripetal and centrifugal democracy and the widely analysed consociational democracy, Lijphart proposes a scheme in which the fourth model of democracy is the so-called “de-politicised democracy”. In this type of democracy, interest groups slowly begin to dominate the entire political scene on an oligopolistic basis. While in consociational democracy, consensus was a necessity for alleviating the internal tensions of the system, an excess of consensus among community leaders necessarily leads to the erosion of democratic institutions. The post-1969 processes in Malaysia seemed to confirm these concerns.

Multi-ethnic political system in search of an alternative Until the mid-1980s, the Barisan Nasional formula of total domination of the political scene by the Malay elite, using authoritarian instruments, worked quite well. Its sustainability, however, rested on at least two premises – first, that the UMNO as the party of the Malay elite would remain united and, secondly, that the opposition parties would remain divided along lines roughly corresponding to the ethnic divisions found in the state. Although the UMNO leaders took a number of steps to fully control the political scene, the formal constitutional framework of the state as a parliamentary democracy remained unchanged. While the majority electoral system derived from the constitution as well as the extra-constitutional instruments used after 1969 guaranteed the UMNO some comfort, theoretically the possibility of the ruling coalition losing control at the federal or state level still existed. Instead, breaking up the ruling camp or uniting the opposition would have posed a challenge that would have been difficult to meet with limited authoritarian means while maintaining the state’s constitutional framework (Seeberg, 2014). The 1970s and 1980s brought, as already mentioned, a fundamental change in the social and professional structure of the Malay ethnic group. An increasing number of Malay youth gained access to secondary and higher education. These changes were also reflected in the image of the ruling party itself. More and more educated youth joined the party. Another result of the NEP was the influx of a number of Malay businessmen into the UMNO. Many of them rightly felt that

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party membership itself was a prerequisite for the success of their businesses. For many of them, politics offered a path to instant social advancement. These socalled Melayu Bahru (new Malays) also betrayed a much greater tendency to question the role of the traditional leaders of the Malay community. When the country’s economy was booming, the ruling party’s patronage networks functioned very smoothly bringing in a lot of profits for both participating politicians and businessmen. But as the economy began to show the first signs of crisis in the mid-1980s, it became clear that centrifugal tendencies within the party would intensify. The split in the UMNO was preceded by a fierce struggle for leadership within the party during the first half of the 1980s. Growing dissatisfaction among some activists resulted in the formation of a new Malay party called Semangat 46 (Spirit of 46) in 1989, referring to the founding date of the United Malays National Organization in 1946. Semangat 46 faced a choice between two alternative political strategies at the dawn of its existence. It could have sought to take a radically ethnic stance or it could have emphasised its supra-ethnic character and tried to forge alliances with other opposition parties. Pragmatism prevailed and Semangat 46 politicians eventually decided to copy the pattern of the Barisan Nasional coalition of ethnic parties, this time in the ranks of the opposition. In working closely with the Chinese-dominated DAP and the radical Malay PAS, Semangat 46 saw this as the only way to confront both the UMNO and the Barisan Nasional that dominated it. The strategy of a broad alliance of ethnic opposition parties was not easy to implement. Like the ethnic representations in the former alliance, the potential partners seemed more divided than united. Mutual recriminations among radical potential politicians compounded the atmosphere of distrust. However, the benefits of seeking consensus in a spirit of depoliticised democracy and the prospect of gaining power and building their own opposition patronage networks seemed to prevail. In mid-1989, Semangat 46 formed an electoral alliance with PAS and two small Islamic parties, Berjasa and Hamim, called the Angkatan Perpaduan Ummah (APU – Muslim Unity Movement), which ensured that the coalition could compete effectively with the ruling Barisan Nasional in the north of the country. In 1990, it was expanded to include Chinese activists of the DAP, which had its base mainly in the cities of the west coast of the Malay Peninsula within the so-called Gagasan Rakyat (People’s Concept) coalition. As had happened in the early days of the alliance, ideological debates receded into the background in favour of a pragmatic agreement on multi-ethnic support for single candidates fielded by opposition parties in single-member constituencies. Regardless of the contradictions between the coalition partners, the multi-ethnic opposition alliance appeared to pose a significant challenge to the ruling Barisan Nasional. Nevertheless, it failed to succeed in either the 1990 or 1995 elections.

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The opposition tried to continue its attempts to unify ethnic parties with varying degrees of success. However, internal tensions within the opposition coalition on the one hand, and an elaborate solidarity network of patron-client relationships within the ruling coalition on the other, meant that the Barisan Nasional’s system of consociational authoritarianism was to persist for years to come. In 1999, following the arrest of the charismatic former deputy prime minister Anwar Ibrahim, the Barisan Alternatif (literally, Alternative Front) – another coalition of opposition ethnic parties of the Islamic Party of Malaysia (PAS), the DAP, the Justice Party (Keadilan), and the Malaysian People’s Party – was formed. The moderate increase in support for the opposition did not translate into success in the 2000 elections. The Barisan Nasional retained a 77% absolute majority, winning 148 of 193 seats. The disappointing result was blamed largely on the Chinese electorate’s distrust of an alliance with PAS which was still preaching a radical agenda of building an Islamic state in Malaya. Soon after the 9/11 attacks, the Chinese DAP announced its withdrawal from the Barisan Alternatif (Hai, 2002). Attempts to revive the alliance in the 2008 elections saw the opposition’s ratings rise again. The PAS partially abandoned its radical rhetoric, and even fielded its first non-Muslim candidate. The opposition marched to the elections under the banner of the newly formed Pakatan Rakyat (People’s Pact) alliance. In the 2013 general election, the still officially unregistered Pakatan Rakyat won a majority of votes nationwide. Due to its majority electoral orientation and common gerrymandering practices, this still did not translate into a majority of seats in parliament. The Barisan Nasional still held 133 of the 222 federal seats. It was only in the subsequent general election (the 14th) on 9 May 2018 that the government, which had run the country for 61 years and was one of the longestserving governments in the world, lost power to a united opposition. Najib’s government had widened the social safety net by introducing modest, needs-based cash transfers known as 1Malaysia People’s Aid (BR1M) vouchers in 2012. It attempted to increase government revenue through a 6% consumption tax on goods and services, but this measure proved to be wildly unpopular among poorer people and was a key factor in Najib’s loss to Mahathir in 2018. The Harapan government removed the tax, as promised, but was forced to cut social security programmes due to the lost revenue and because of high debts incurred in the aftermath of Najib’s 1MDB scandal.

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Return of the system of (un)consociational authoritarianism? Has the Alliance of Hope’s rule turned out to really carry the hope of a democratic alternative to the Barisan Nasional’s formula of consociational authoritarianism? There is little evidence of that. Pakatan Harapan remained the ruling coalition only for 22 months at the federal level after it won the election. In February 2020 it lost power as a result of the so-called “2020 Malaysian political crisis” when its chairman and the then Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad resigned, and the Malaysian United Indigenous Party together with 11 members of parliament from the People’s Justice Party left the coalition. Once again it is the largest opposition coalition in the federal parliament, and it remains the ruling coalition in three of the 13 states in the country. At the state level, Pakatan Harapan lost control of Johor, Malacca, Perak and Kedah. In mid-February 2020, after months of internal negotiations, a new party coalition called Perikatan Nasional, or National Alliance, formed to oppose Mahathir’s government. The coalition was comprised of an old pillar of the Barisan Nasional coalition – the UMNO, the Panmalay Islamist Party (PAS) and disgruntled members of Mahathir’s and Anwar’s parties, as well as a few members of regional parties from the states of Sarawak and Sabah in Northern Borneo (East Malaysia). The newly appointed prime minister, Muhyiddin Yassin, was one of the most prominent defectors from Harapan to Perikatan (Ratcliffe, 2020; Nile, 2020). Muhyiddin, according to his opponents, clearly lacked a popular mandate as he overthrew the government, and returned the UMNO to power in defiance of the 2018 general election results. In reality, however, the situation was much more complicated. The return to the days of (un)consociational authoritarianism stability was more difficult than it might have seemed at first glance. Several parties under the Perikatan umbrella have a poor record of cooperation, especially the PAS, which has left every coalition it has entered, and the UMNO, which cannot dominate the new government, as is its habit. The number of independent political actors in the coalition has multiplied. From 1957 to 2018, the Malaysian political scene functioned at the federal level as a coalition system dominated, however, by the UMNO’s strong position. After 2018, Perikatan had to contend with a true multiparty coalition system that required sharing power and making uncomfortable compromises in ways that were not necessary before. The nine largest political parties or mini-coalitions – motivated by various ethnic, religious, regional, and left-right considerations – controlled between 5 and 20% of the seats in parliament. This meant that the governing majority had to be drawn from a collection of parties with widely varying political views and programmes. In turn, the numerous minority parties showed a tendency to switch sides and

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empower the opposition if their concerns were not addressed (Ostwald and Subhan, 2021; Fann, 2019). Ethnicity, religion and nationalism were still the most important factors causing factional divisions. Still, the major political parties were affiliated – as before – with different ethnic groups. The UMNO, PAS, and Bersatu provided political representation for the Malays, while the DAP remained close to ethnic Chinese and smaller minority groups. By resisting Malay groups and appointing PAS members to his cabinet, Muhyiddin risked disintegrating his own coalition, alienating parties from Sarawak, where the population is predominantly Christian and Buddhist. However, the existing dividing lines between political actors were further reinforced by new differences in views on the role of the state in the economy, the fight against corruption, social welfare programmes or international politics. The instability of the newly created political system deepened. Political instability persisted and was exacerbated by the COVID-19 outbreak. In January 2021, Malaysia declared a state of emergency suspending parliament and most civil liberties. The Perikatan government, however, came under increasing public pressure to successfully revive the economy after the end of the strict lockdown, while at the same time saving vulnerable communities from economic disaster, which was exacerbated by the fall in international oil prices, one of the country’s main sources of revenue. Unemployment was rising and the sphere of poverty was expanding. The government, facing criticism from inside and outside the coalition, struggled to respond to the emerging health and economic crises resulting from the spread of COVID-19. Muhyiddin and his cabinet decided to step down in August 2021 after 17 months in power. A few days later, his successor Ismail Sabri Yaakob was appointed in his place. Malaysia has thus had three federal governments in just two years, with huge upheavals in between. The attempt to return to (un)consociational authoritarianism proved to lead to the anarchising of political life and a permanent crisis of state institutions (Sejahan, 2021).

Conclusions As history has shown, Malaysia has always been full of nationalistic ideals. It even owes its statehood to Malay nationalism. Within the ranks of the pre-1957 Malay nationalist movements, the ideological divisions between radical and conservative groups are very clear (Ariffin, 1983). When the conservative-nationalist faction represented by the UMNO succeeded in dominating the political scene in independent Malaysia, the nationalists’ aspirations relating to the construction of a Malay nation-state were by no means satisfied. Malay nationalists were

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forced to make a series of compromises in the name of creating a “pluralistic society” and sharing power with the non-Malay population, which largely consisted of immigrant communities settled in colonial Malaya in the 19th century. Notwithstanding the production of power-sharing mechanisms under the socalled consociational democracy model, Malay political supremacy remained a reality for quite a long time. The UMNO, representing the Malay majority, formed the foundation of the ruling Covenant Party (1957–1974) and then the coalition government of the Barisan Nasional. The established Malay dominance became the hallmark of the country’s political system. After independence, the principle of Malay hegemony was repeatedly challenged by the non-Malay population. They felt, and rightly so, that this principle ultimately threatened their ethnic identity and the foundations of the “nation of pluralistic societies”. In contrast to the solutions of “ideal consociationalism” (Lijphart, 1974,) the system prevailing in Malaysia evolved rapidly, first towards what Milne called “hegemonic consociationalism” (Milne, 1999: 18) and later reaching firmly towards authoritarian solutions with some power-sharing mechanisms between the Malay majority and other segments of society. While the system of consociational democracy, according to theoretical assumptions, naturally operates in a state of “unsustainable equilibrium”, the mechanisms of hegemonic consociationalism or (un)consociational authoritarianism introduced in Malaysia proved equally unsustainable. The retreat from authoritarian solutions brought only episodic recourse to the solutions of ideal consociational democracy under the Pakatan Harapan government. The power of consociational democracy also proved, in the Malaysian case, to be completely impervious to crisis situations such as the economic downturn and, ultimately, the COVID-19 pandemic. The future of the Malaysian political scene is difficult to predict and uncertain. The crisis of public institutions is likely to continue. It is difficult to expect a return to consociational solutions. However, it seems that the dominance of one party in Malaysian politics has changed for good. Unless there is rapid consolidation, which is highly unlikely, no single party will be able to dominate, and their rivalry may paradoxically lead to an improvement in the quality of Malaysian democracy in the future.

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Almond Gabriel A., Verba Sidney (1963). The Civic Culture: Political Attitudes and Democracy in Five Nations. Princeton University Press, Princeton. Almond Gabriel A. (1956). Comparative Political Systems, w: Politics, XVIII, 3 (Aug. 1956), s. 391–409. Andaya, Barbara Watson and Andaya, Leonard Y. (1982). A History of Malaysia. University of Hawai Press, Honoluliu. Ariffin, Omar (1993). Bangsa Melayu: Malay Concepts of Democracy and Community, 1945–1950. Oxford University Press, Kuala Lumpur. Carey, Iskander 1976. Orang Asli: The Aboriginal Tribes of Peninsular Malaysia. Oxford Univerity Press, Kuala Lumpur – London. Chan, Heng Chee and Evers, H. D. (1973). Nation-Building and National Identity in Southeast Asia, in: S.N. Eisenstadt and Stein Rokkan (ed.) Building States and Nations: Analysis by Region, Vol. 2, ISEAS Publishing, Beverley Hills. Dahl, Robert A. (1971). Polyarchy: Participation and Opposition. Yale University Press, New Haven. Esman, Milton J. (1972). Ethnic Politics. City University of New York, Cornell. Faarland J., Parkinson, J. R. and Rais, Saniman (1991). Growth and Ethnic Inequality: Malaysia’s New Economic Policy. St. Martin’s Press, New York. Fann, Thomas (2019, 12 July). Malaysia Begins Rectifying Major Flaws in its Election System, Perspective. ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute. https://think-asia.org/handle/11540 /10940 (accessed: 02. 03. 2022). Funston, John (1980). Malay Politics in Malaysia: A Study of the United Malays National Organisation and Party Islam. Heinemann Educational Books, Kuala Lumpur. Furnivall J. S. (1956). Colonial Policy and Practice. A Comparative Study of Burma and Netherlands India, New York, New York University Press. Geertz, Clifford (1980). Negara, The Theatre State in Nineteenth-Century Bali. Princeton University Press, Princeton. Gomez, Edmund Terence (1991). Money Politics in the Barisan Nasional. Kuala Lumpur. Hoffmann, Stanley (2002). Anarchical Society. Columbia University Press, New York. Horowitz, Donald L. (1985). Ethnic Groups in Conflict. University of California Press, Berkeley, California. Information Malaysia (2000). 2000–01 Yearbook. Kuala Lumpur. Ostwald Kai, and Subhan Mohamed Salihin (2 February 2021). Regional identity formation in Malaysia: Primacy of the political center and its essentialized ethnic identities. Asian Politics & Policy 13 (1): 37–55. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/asp p.12565 (accessed: 15. 02. 2022). Laothamatas, Anek (ed.) (1997). Democratization in Southeast and East Asia. Singapore: ISEAS. Lijphart, Arend (1976). The Politics of Accommodation: Pluralism and Democracy in the Netherlands. University of California Press, Berkeley. Lijphart, Arend (1977). Democracy in Plural Societies, A Comparative Exploration. Yale University Press, New Haven. Lijphart, Arend (1984). Democracies. Yale Lijphart, Arend (1994). Electoral Systems and Party Systems: A Study of Twenty-Seven Democracies 1945–1990 (Comparative European Politics). Oxford University Press, Oxford.

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Lim Hong Hai (2002). Electoral Politics in Malaysia: Managing Elections in a Plural Society. In: Bruns, Gabriele, Croissant, Aurel and John, Marei (eds.). Electoral politics in Southeast & East Asia. Friedrich Ebert Stiftung. pp. 101–148. https://library.fes.de/pdf -files/iez/01361005.pdf (accessed: 15. 04. 2022). Mahathir, Mohamad (1997). Vision 2020: The Way Forward, Keynote Address at the Vision 2020 National Congress, Petaling Jaya, 29 April 1997. Kuala Lumpur. Mauzy, Diane K. (1982). Barisan Nasional. Coalition Government in Malaysia. Marican and Sons, Kuala Lumpur. Milne, R. S. and Mauzy, D. K. (1999). Malaysian Politics under Mahathir. Routledge, London. Nile, Bowie (9 May 2020). Malaysia’s ‘Game of Thrones’ set for a sequel. Asia Times. https://asiatimes.com/2020/05/malaysias-game-of-thrones-set-for-a-sequel/ (accessed: 22. 03. 2022). Pye, Lucian (1956). Guerrilla Communism in Malaya. Princeton University Press, Princeton. Pye, Lucian (1996). Asian Power and Politics. Belknap Press, Yale. Ratcliffe, Rebecca (2020, 25 February). Malaysia’s political turmoil: Everything you need to know. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/feb/25/malaysias-poli tical-turmoil-everything-you-need-to-know (accessed: 3. 02. 2022). Ratcliffe, Rebecca (2021, 12 January). Malaysia declares state of emergency amid political turmoil. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/12/malaysia-de clares-covid-state-of-emergency-amid-political-turmoil. Ratnam, K. J. (1965). Communalism and The Political Process in Malaya. University of Malaya Press Kuala Lumpur. Roff, W. R. (1994). The Origins of Malay Nationalism. Oxford University Press, New Haven. Ryan, N. J. (1962). The Cultural Background of the Peoples of Malaya. Longmans of Malaya Kuala Lumpur. Searle, Peter (1994). Rent Seekers or Real Capitalists? The Riddle of Malaysian Capitalism. Canberra. Seeberg, Merete Bech (2014, 6 August). State capacity and the paradox of authoritarian elections. Democratization, 21 (7): 1265–1285 https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/1 0.1080/13510347.2014.960210 (accessed: 15. 04. 2022). Sejahan, Zareen Humairah (2021, 16 August). All Perikatan Nasional Cabinet resign. Utusan Digital. https://www.utusan.com.my/berita/2021/08/seluruh-kabinet-telah-leta k-jawatan/ (accessed: 2. 02. 2022). Smith, Anthony D. (1986). The Ethnic Origins of Nations. Basil Blackwell Oxford. Smith, Michael G. (1965). The Plural Society in the British West Indies. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. Vasil, R. K. (1967). Politics In Plural Society. A Study of Non Communal Political Parties in West Malaya. Oxford University Press, Kuala Lumpur. Vere de J. Allen (1967). The Malayan Union. Southeast Asian Studies, Yale University, New Haven. Wang, Gungwu (1988). The Study of Chinese Identities in Southeast Asia, in: Jennifer W. Cushman, Wang Gungwu (eds.), Changing Identities of the Southeast Asian Chinese Since World War II. Hong Kong University Press, Hong Kong.

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Zakaria, Haji Ahmad (1989). Malaysia: Quasi-Democracy in a Divided Society. in L. Diamond (ed.), Democracy in Developing Countries, Vol. 3. Cambridge University Press Boulder.

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Disunity in diversity. The failed attempts at power sharing in Myanmar

The much quoted and much argued John Stuart Mill’s opinion (Mill, 1972: p. 392) about the near impossibility of implementing free institutions in an ethnically diverse countries has been challenged by many democratisation scholars. Powersharing academics believe that it is possible to build a democracy in segmented, multi-ethnic, divided societies thanks to a system of well-thought-out institutions (Lijphart, 1996: 258; Stojanovic´, 2020: 37; Horowitz, 1985). Myanmar or Burma is a good case study that proves Mill right. Although Myanmar never tried to implement any power-sharing model in full (it did, however, attempt to carry out some power-sharing aspects of governance in its short periods of democracy in 1948–1962 and again after 1988), it is unlikely that any such model would be a political saviour for Myanmar, due to both objective and subjective reasons.

Power-sharing theories and Myanmar Power-sharing schools are employed to find ways to achieve political stability in divided, segmented, plural societies (multi-ethnic and/or multireligious). The major models of power sharing are communalism, the Lewis model (Lewis, 1965), consociationalism and centripetalism (Reilly, 2017: 262–268; Trzcin´ski, 2016) but as they have been described elsewhere in this volume there is no need to elaborate on them. As far as Myanmar is concerned, it represents a challenging ground for powersharing arrangements due to objective reality. The “father of consociationalism”, Arend Lijphart declared that democracy can “work even in divided societies if a number of conditions are met”; he then divided these conditions into four characteristics, sub-divided into two categories: 1) power-sharing executives (grand coalition governments) composed of all important linguistic (ethnic/ national) and religious segments; 2) cultural autonomy for minority groups; 3) proportionality in political representation, civil service appointments, and government subsidies; 4) a minority veto power with regard to the most vital

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issues, for example, minority rights and autonomy (Lijphart, 2018: 1). Furthermore, Lijphart presented subsequent background factors (initially three, which he then increased to nine) that may be (dis)advantageous for a consociational democracy: 1) the (non)existence of an external threat as it (dis)encourages cooperation between the elites from different segments; 2) the (non)existence of a multiple balance of power as it increases/reduces the possibility that one segment will try to dominate; 3) (not)overloading the decisionmaking apparatus as it helps/hinders successful implementation of power sharing; 4) a geographical concentration of segments (the bigger it is, the more possible is the establishment of a federal system); 5) population size (the smaller it is, the easier it is to make a political decision); 6) the (non)existence of overarching loyalties; 7) a (lack of) tradition of elite accommodation; 8) socio-economic (in)equality; 9) a number of segments (the more segments, the more difficult consociational democracy is (Lijphart, 1969: 217–19; Lijphart, 1996: 267– 274; Lijphart, 2008: 51–52). As will be shown later in the chapter, in the case of Myanmar almost all of these factors are disadvantageous. Lijphart emphasised, too, that the elites’ joint effort to stabilise the system is much more important that the formal arrangements. The elites’ behaviour remains the key factor in consociational democracy as cooperation-based and consensus-building attitudes counteract centrifugal tendencies, inherent for a plural society (Lijphart, 1969: 216; Kipgen, 2014: 235). The elites need to have “the ability to accommodate divergent interests and demands” from the minorities and to have the “ability to transcend cleavages and to join in a common effort with the elites of rival subcultures” (Lijphart, 1969: 216). In other words, the success of this kind of cooperation depends on the elites’ “commitment to the maintenance of the system and to the improvement of its cohesion and stability”; they should do this knowing the alternative: the “perils of political fragmentation” are far worse (Lijphart, 1969: 216). To reiterate, in consociational democracy the role of the elites’ behaviour is essential: they need to cooperate with themselves and – equally crucially – with other groups; they need to be able to accommodate different segments of society by sharing power; and they should make decisions by “consensus” or “unanimity” (Toit, 1987: 419; Kipgen, 2014: 235). The Bamar/ Burman elites are, unfortunately, unable to successfully accommodate other segments of society as it will be shown in this chapter. Consociationalism was specifically proposed for Myanmar only a couple of times (Smith, 2003; Breen, 2018; Callahan, 1998; Khin Zaw Win, 2007; Kipgen, 2014, 2016; Preecharush, 2017), although in the case of the latter four authors (two of whom come from Myanmar: Khin Zaw Win is a Bamar and the late Nehginpao Kipgen was born in Myanmar) only in passing. Its major theoretical competitor, centripetalism was sporadically proposed specifically for Myanmar, too. Although, naturally, the Burmese case appeared among other examples in

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the centripetalist literature, both classic (Horowitz, 1985) and new (Reilly, 2017, 2019). Moreover, some leading centripetalist scholars intriguingly claim that their research “have translated into direct policy changes in the real world, including democratisation and electoral reform (…) in Myanmar” (Reilly, 2021). Even if it was indeed so, it is clearly outdated now as the recent coup d’état in Myanmar (01. 02. 2021) nullified all democratisation reforms in this country for the time being.

The background: Myanmar’s ethnic conundrum Myanmar society is a quintessential plural society. Nowadays we define a plural society as one divided into two or more segmental cleavages: ethnic, racial, linguistic, cultural, religious, ideological or other (Jarrett, 2018: 37; Eckstein, 1966: 34; Lijphart, 1977: 3–4), although it is worth remembering that the term “plural society” was coined for the first time by John Sydenham Furnivall precisely in relation to Burma (Furnivall, 1954: 303–312). Since the times of Furnivall (the late colonial/early postcolonial period) the sociopolitical complexity of Burma/Myanmar has not changed, if not more complicated due to the ethnic civil war. Officially Myanmar today is inhabited by 135 ethnic groups divided into eight major ethnic groups (The Nationalities of Myanmar, 2013). This number is controversial, if not outright artificial. It was suddenly declared by the junta in 1989 (WPD, 1989) and is based on a dubious hundred-year-old colonial list compiled by amateur linguists, if not on a superstitious belief that the number 135 is lucky (ICG, 2020; Steinberg, 2017). This list is “an odd mixture” (ICG, 2020) of ethnic groups (artificially classified), languages, clans, village and town names, factual errors (e. g., some groups appear twice under different names) and deliberate exclusions, as some minorities, such as the Rohingya or Panthay, were intentionally left out (ICG, 2020; Gamanii, 2012; Ferguson, 2015; Cheesman, 2017). Nevertheless, the list “continues to be the basis for determining citizenship, the franchise and other rights in contemporary Myanmar, with potentially deadly consequences” (ICG, 2020) which will be described below. Internationally, the rejection of the list of 135 is almost universal, yet there is no consensus about the actual number of ethnic groups in Myanmar, with propositions ranging from around 30 via 40, 60 to around 100 (Gamanii, 2012; Cheesman, 2017; IWGIA, 2021). A similar problem emerges with the languages spoken in the country, as the colonial list of 135 (and, henceforth, the last colonial census from 1931) was originally determined mostly by language (ICG, 2020; Ferguson, 2015); today, the languages spoken in Myanmar are estimated to be over 100 (114 is popularly cited, Ethnologue, 2021). According to last official census from 2014,

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Myanmar’s population was 51 million (Myanmar Census, 2014); currently it is estimated to be more than 55 million (Worldometer, 2022). The population number dims when compared with the populations of Myanmar’s neighbours: China, India, Bangladesh and Thailand (only Laos has fewer people) and with the size of the country: 676 km² – bigger than France – which makes Myanmar the second largest Southeast Asian country and the tenth in the whole of Asia. In the 2014 census, the ethnicity statistics polled in enumeration were withheld for political reasons (the explanation was in order not to destabilise the reform and peace process, Callahan, 2017b, so the numbers concerning ethnic groups remain based on a rough estimate. The most popular estimations claim the Bamars, or Burmans – the dominant ethnic group – compromise around 65–68% of the population (although some scholars use estimations from 55% to 68%), while the other seven major groups are: Karen (Kayin), 9–14%; Shan, 8–10%; Rakhine (Arakanese), 3–5%; Mon, 2–8%; Chin, 2–6%; Kaczin, 1.5–3%; Kayah (Karenni), 1%. Besides these, the Chinese comprise around 3%, Indians 2%, while the unrecognised Rohingya are around 2% (Minority Rights Group International, 2020; Selway, 2015: 236–237; Smith, 1999: 29–30). Needless to say, all these numbers are strongly disputed. Without the official data from a reliable census, it remains impossible to give accurate information about the ethnic composition of the country. Nevertheless, these estimations show one dominant feature: Myanmar is an extremely ethnically diverse country, perhaps one of the most ethnically diverse countries in the world. As such, it remains a challenging ground for any state-building projects. The current ethnic composition of the country is a result of at least four major waves of migration, from ancient times to the 20th century, into the current territory of Myanmar by diverse peoples of Australoasiatic (e. g., Mon, Wa), Tibeto-Burman (e. g., Burman, Kachin, Karen), Kra-Dai (e. g., Shan) and IndoEuropean origin. These people have merged, intermarried, and fought with one another; this, coupled with internal migration, trade, proselytisation and waves of conquests, produced an unprecedented ethnic/religious/cultural complexity (ICG, 2020). Geography has historically connected or separated some of these peoples whose cultures and languages either evolved or became isolated from other groups. Historically speaking, the Bamars have dominated in the fertile, nucleus zone which used to be called “Burma proper”: the lowlands along the Irrawaddy (Ayeyarwaddy) river and the Tenasserim (Tanintharyi) peninsula; at the latter they are mixed with Mons, Karens, Karenni and others. The Arakan (Rakhine), the narrow strip of land along the Bay of Bengal and the country’s western border, is inhabited by the Rakhine (Arakanese), Muslim Rohingya (although most of the latter were expelled from the country in 2017) and the Bamars (mostly in the south of the strip). Bamars also live in the northwest (Chin state), the north (Kachin state) and in the northeast (Shan State), although there

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are notably fewer of them. The latter borders are inhabited by a huge amount of major (Shan, Karen, Kachin, Chin) and minor (Naga, Wa, Lisu, Palaung and many, many others) ethnic minorities. The traditional informal division of Myanmar, both ethnopolitically and mentally, has been between the Bamar lowland centre and the hardly accessible, mountainous ethnic peripheries. This division has been given various designations although, perhaps, the “two Burmas” (Callahan, 2003: 95–104) label fits it best. Currently, internal migration has complicated the picture further, as many Bamars migrated into the peripheries while ethnic minorities moved into “Burma proper”. The last, but not the least, problematic aspect here is that the Burmese conception of ethnicity is based on “outdated, deeply engrained essentialist notions of ethnicity”; such understood ethnicity is “deeply embedded in Myanmar’s national psyche and central to its politics, conflict and society”, dominating political, economic and social spheres and being “at the heart of conceptions of citizenship and its legal basis” (ICG, 2020). The above-mentioned list of 135 ethnic groups as well as other official documents (such as the 1982 citizenship law based on similar logic) gave birth to a widely and officially held belief in Myanmar that the country is populated by these “indigenous” (taingyintha) groups, making ethnicity (understood in essentialist terms) the central concept of (non)belonging to a nation (Cheesman, 2017; Ferguson, 2015). The methodological problem with this is that is it based on an outdated, if not racist, colonial classification built upon the notion that ethnicity is determined by essential (fixed, non-malleable, immutable, natural, , etc.) characteristics (both biological. such as physical features, and cultural, such as religion or language) shared by all members of a community and differentiating them from other groups (Yalcinkaya et al., 2017). This essentialism not only had little to do with precolonial categories based on a functional, not ethnical, basis (de Mestan, 2019) but is now universally rejected as ethnicity is currently understood as fluid, relational, impermanent and changeable. In Southeast Asia, this is especially true, as the lines between various ethnic groups are often problematic and blurred. Myanmar, a quintessential plural, multi-ethnic country is a particularly striking example of the cons of ethnical essentialism as official acceptance of these categories led to “an unworkably convoluted classification system” that “has become central not only to identity, but also citizenship, basic rights, politics and armed conflict”; making ethnicity “the core of Myanmar’s politics” and locating it “at the heart of the country’s armed conflict” (ICG, 2020). Given “the absence of any serious attempt to reframe the essentialist and exclusionary narrative surrounding race and identity” (ICG, 2020) in contemporary Myanmar, any power-sharing attempts have been a tall order.

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Two Burmas: The roots of ethnic distrust The three periods of Myanmar’s history: precolonial, colonial and early postcolonial, added other features that complicate power-sharing capabilities within the country, if not make nation-building almost a mission impossible. The precolonial Burmese kingdoms were patrimonial entities based on complex, hierarchical, and personalised patron-client relations (Thant Myint-U, 2001: 24– 85). Power emanated in concentric circles radiating from the centre, the capital, the throne and the monarch (Steinberg, 2000: 37). Authority weakened as the distance from the centre grew. On the margins it met and overlapped with other waves of concentric power emanating from similar centres of power, “creating a patchwork of often overlapping mandalas (circles)” (Walters, 1982: 27), also called “galactic polity” (Tambiah, 1976: 52–132) or as “solar polity” (Lieberman, 2003: 22). The borders of these zones were blurry and flexible. The minor players could switch their loyalties or succumb to two or even three “universal monarchs” while retaining de facto independence, especially if their lands were located remotely from the capital (Thant Myint-U, 2001: 24–26; Walton, 2012: 72; Taylor, 2009: 47; Maung Maung Gyi, 1983: 18–19). In theory, the power of the Burmese king, as a chakkavatti, or universal monarch, was absolute (Lieberman, 1984: 67–68; Aung-Thwin, 1983: 54–55). In practice, he had only tenuous control over his peripheral subjects. His power was limited by objective factors, the main one being geography: the Burmese state only penetrated sections of the claimed territory (Thant Myint-U, 2001: 24). The low population-to-land ratio, particularly in peripheral areas, made the linkage between the centre and the peripheries weak, with no effective communication and little network of local administrative infrastructure bending a king’s authority to be temporary only; the real power remained in the hands of local rulers: tributary chiefs, princesses and other lesser players (Thant Myint-U, 2001: 34–36; Taylor, 2009: 23; Maung Maung Gyi, 1983: 18–19). Usually, the Burmese king just wanted them to accept the status quo: following the non-permanent, non-bureaucratic allegiances such as sending tribute missions, marriage alliances and military forces (Taylor, 2009: 23; HeineGeldern, 1942: 15–30). The Burmese monarch showed little interests in peripheral lands and their interference with the tributary’s domestic affairs was minimal: it was only the Irrawaddy valley that the Burmese kings cared for and really controlled (Silverstein, 1980: 16; Taylor, 2009: 23). Although this was the precolonial period, some aspects of the future “two Burmas” had already emerged. Some scholars see the precolonial period as beneficial for possible powersharing mechanisms in Myanmar as “the roots of decentralized power and a tradition of local rule can be traced back to these monarchical policies” (Smith, 2003). This is not incorrect per se, but the negative perception of precolonial times overshadows any advantageous features. Most non-Burman lands were

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incorporated into Burma by the last Burmese dynasty, Konbaung by (brutal) force: their own political were entities systemically annihilated (most notably Mon Hanthawaddy kingdom and Arakanese Mrauk-U kingdom) which is still very living in the social memories of these peoples. Coupled with Burman patronising attitude, condescension and contempt for the ethnic minorities, especially the (semi)nomadic ones (like Karens or Chins, often treated simply as slaves, San Po, 1928), this solidified the ethnic minorities’ perception of Burmans as inherent predators. Finally, the current official Myanmar narrative that conceals historical facts such as the effective self-government of the minority peoples in the precolonial era as well and the non-belonging of many ethnic parts to precolonial Burman-majority kingdoms, does not help either as it fuels ethnic grievances (ICG, 2020; Steinberg, 2010: 20) Having conquered Burma in the 19th century, the British fundamentally reshaped the country, annihilating the precolonial order. They annexed Burma to India, relocated the capital to Rangoon, pacified the countryside, abolished local political institutions at the central (monarchy, court, and army)and local level (replacement of village chiefs by bureaucracy), introduced a European legal system (combined with eclectically chosen Buddhist dhammathats) and other reforms (Ni Ni Myint, 1983: 42–57; Crosthwaite, 1968: 15–29; Furnivall, 1956: 132– 136; Thant Myint-U, 2001: 207–244; Maung Htin Aung, 1968: 266–278). By constructing railways, roads, steamships, telegraph lines, establishing regular administration, banks, secular schools (and other Western institutions), the colonialists linked Burma with the wider, capitalist world and contributed to its impressive economic and technological development, best symbolised by the export of rice (Furnivall, 1939; Furnivall, 1956: 62–114; Adas, 2011: 41–154; Cheng Siok Hwa, 1965: 67–80). In building modern Burma along commercial lines, the British completely reshaped Burma – they established the first ever modern state here: effective but alien to the Burmese (Furnivall, 1939: Furnivall, 1956: 129–180; Thant Myint-U, 2007: 182–194; Aung-Thwin and Aung-Thwin, 2012: 199–208). For Burmans, the colonial order meant “order without meaning” (Aung-Thwin, 1985: 245). The British built the colonial state with Indian – and to lesser extent – ethnic minorities which placed the Burmans at the very bottom of the “plural society” in their own country (Furnivall, 1956: 118–122, 303–312). This later led to the birth of the Burmese equivalent of OSH (outrage at state humiliation) nationalism (Reid, 2010: 10–13). In building modern Burma, the British introduced for the concept of fixed borders for the first time. They established the external border of the country making British Burma unlike all previous Burmese kingdoms, incorporating lands with little or no relation to Burma (e. g., Kachin) while leaving Assam or Manipur to India (Smith, 1999: 41). Since then, the problem of artificial borders has been haunting the Burmese. Even more importantly, the British admin-

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istratively divided Burma into two parts: 1) “Burma proper” (the Irrawaddy plain and delta; Arakan; Tenasserim) directly controlled by a centralised colonial administration and fundamentally reshaped by capitalist modernisation; and 2) “frontier areas” – mountainous lands compromising around 40% of the territory and 15% of the population, populated mostly by ethnic minorities (Silverstein, 1980: 30–32). The latter territories were ruled indirectly by “light administration” at “the lowest possible cost” (ruling via local chiefs) and mostly ignored – they existed in a state of “sleepy isolation” (Smith, 1999: 42–43). This is how the “two Burmas” were born. For the ethnic minorities, colonial rule was at least acceptable (as the British did not interfere with their lives) and certainly preferable to the previous Burman one: no armies ravaged the frontier territories and taxation was much lighter than previous tribute exaction (Yawnghwe, 1989: 86–87). Christianisation of the elites in some ethnic groups (Kachin, Karen, Chin) coupled with formation of modern national/ethnic self-awareness among many ethnic groups or – in the Burman version – colonial creation of ethnic minorities (Aung-Thwin and Aung-Thwin, 2012: 194–225) led to non-opposition (if not support) to colonial rule by the ethnic minorities. The process was reciprocal as the British in their devide et impera strategy favoured ethnic minorities over Burmans in the colonial administration, police and – most importantly – the army (except for a brief period during WWI, Burmans were excluded from the colonial army), declaring some of the former (e. g., Kachins or Karens) as “martial races” and the latter as “nonmartial races” which caused great anticolonial resentment among Burmans proud of their centuries-long history of military conquests (Callahan, 2003: 35– 36; Silverstein, 1980: 30–40; Smith, 1999: 44; ICG, 2020). The British favouritism of ethnic minorities led to a situation where “there was almost an inverse relationship between the size of the various ethnic groups and their hold on political and economic power” (Taylor, 2009: 128). This entrenched all the ethnic divisions; the seeds of ethnic distrust were planted (Thant Myint-U, 2007: 221). The Burmese anticolonial movement took a distinctively nationalist character by the 1930s, best symbolised by the 1930s Dobama (We Burmans) Association that called for Burma for Burmans and rejected the ethnic minorities as “thudo Bama”, or “them/their Burmese” (Kei Nemoto, 2008: 2–16; Khin Yi, 1988: 17–43; Kyaw Hoe, 2008: 54). From the Dobama emerged the nationalist thakin movement that would later succeed in securing Burma’s independence in 1948. In the meantime, however, interethnic relations were soured further due to the political choices of the Burman and ethnic elites during WWII. The Burmans initially sided with the Japanese whereas the ethnic minorities either remained indifferent (as in the case of the Shans and most hill people like the Wa or Akha and others) (Sai Aung Tun, 2009: 191–207; Smith, 1999: 63) or supported the alliance with anti-Japanese guerrilla warfare (in the case of the Kachins, Karens, Chins and the

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Naga) both in the vague hope of British political gratitude after the war and out of dislike towards the Burmans (Lintner, 1999: 71; Selth, 1986: 489–492; Cruickshank, 1983: 3). The worst, in terms of intercommunal relations, was the case of the Burman-Karen massacres of 1942: if other representatives of ethnic minorities fought with the Japanese but not with Burmans, for the Karen the latter was precisely the case; reciprocal massacres of civilians on both sides led to mutual Burman-Karen hatred (Lintner, 1999: 71). The Burman Japan-trained collaboration army, the Burmese Independence Army and its successor, the Noble Forces (Tatmadaw) were based on do-Bama and other Burman nationalist concepts. As it became the nation-building school based on ethnic Burman nationalism, the Tatmadaw’s influence proved decisive for post-independence Burma (Callahan, 2003: 46–67). The Tatmadaw’s antiJapanese volte-face in 1945 (the Burmese army changed sides at the end of WWII, betraying the Japanese and joining the victorious Allies, hence securing its political position after the war) did not change the essence of the Tatmadaw. Post-war British political engineering within the army (the establishment of “two wings” – one Burman and one ethnic) proved to be short-lived. Burman-Karen communal clashes by the end of 1948 and the start of ethnic civil war at the beginning of 1949 sealed the fate of the army. Ethnic officers left, either retiring or joining rebel forces, whereas Burman officers remained and reintroduced the almost complete Burman monopoly (Callahan, 2003: 95–100; Smith, 1999: 71–74; Charney, 2009: 58–70). From then until now, the Tatmadaw has remained the backbone of Burman nationalism.

The democratic era: The first power-sharing attempt During its early postcolonial period Burma enjoyed a period of genuine, if chaotic, democracy (Thant Myint-U, 2007), rated +8 on a scale from -10 to +10 on Polity Coding IV (Polity IV, 2013) – lasting from 1948 until the second coup d’état in 1962. At that time Burma had some mechanisms of power sharing. Unfortunately, it all ended in failure due to various reasons, the major one (and the only one that will be discussed here) being ethnic discontent. Three intertwined factors contributed to the failure of ethnic power sharing: insurgency, federalism and the existence of multi-ethnic alliances (Selway, 2015: 230). While insurgency was the most important reason, it was the consequence of the other two, so these will be described first.

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Failed federalism Burma regained independence on 4 January 1948, yet politically and legally (and in terms of power sharing) the most formative events had already commenced in 1947. First, in late January-early February, a Burmese delegation headed by Aung San, the Burman paramount leader, the chairman of the Anti-Fascist People’s Freedom League (the umbrella Burmese independence organisation) negotiated Burma’s independence with Atlee’s government in London. This included unification of frontier areas “with the free consent” of their inhabitants to join Burma (Attlee-Aung San Agreement, 1947). The condition was partially (yet sufficiently for the British) met during the second conference in Panglong (Pinlon) on 12 February 1947 between Aung San and the leaders of the (major) ethnic minorities. The Panglong Agreement was hailed as a breakthrough in Burman-ethnic relations and became hopelessly mythologised later in independent Burma (Lubina, 2018). This happened despite the fact that it was only a limited deal: only representatives of the Shan, Kachin, and Chin minorities attended the conference, another key minority – the Karens – only sent observers and later boycotted Panglong; and brokered on the Burman majority’s terms despite some concessions to (some) minorities (Walton, 2008). This fragile compromise – based on personal diplomacy by Aung San – was shaken by Aung San’s assassination on 19 July 1947 and de facto (although not de jure) rejected by his successors, who failed to meet the most important promise of equality, expressed in the catchphrase: “one rupee for ethnics and one for Burmans” (Irrawaddy, 2018). Many of the Panglong inconsistencies were overlooked during the independence euphoria in 1947: if the Burmese were in a hurry for independence (Blum, 2011: 33), then the British were keen to leave the country confident that everything had already been arranged and they could go back home with their task done (for this reason they were indifferent to the Karen demands). Nevertheless, the Panglong Agreement and follow-up deals represent thus far the most important power-sharing attempt in Burmese history. Despite all of its flaws, the vision that emerged from it slightly resembled the Indonesian “unity in diversity” and represented a nation-building project that might have moved beyond ethnicity and could have established a modern, successful nation. Maybe not necessarily Aung San’s “the United States of Indo-China” (Houtman, 1999: 74) but anything better than the post-1962 Burma would be a success. Unfortunately, it was not to be. The terms of Panglong and subsequent minor deals formed the basis of the first Burmese constitution of 24 September 1947 written by the Constituent Assembly, dominated by the The Anti-Fascist People’s Freedom League AFPFL (the party won 173 out of 210 contested seats). The eclectic and hastily written constitution, modelled on the Westminster model

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coupled with socialist ideas derived from Yugoslavia and thus indirectly from USSR as well (Silverstein, 1993: 70; the Burma Constitution, 1948; Smith, 2003) looked promising on paper in terms of power sharing. Despite not using the word federalism, its spirit was precisely federal (Silverstein, 1980: 57, 185–205). The power was shared between Burma proper and the frontier areas. The Union of Burma comprised Burma proper and four autonomous states: the Shan, Kachin, Karenni (Kayah) and Karen states (Constitution, 1947: 1). This division was symbolically mirrored in the state flag where one big white star on the red background was surrounded by five smaller white stars (Maung Maung, 1961: 15–16). Religion was separated from the state. The constitution established a bicameral legislature (Union Parliament) comprising two chambers: the 125-seat Chamber of Nationalities and the 250-seat Chamber of Deputies (Constitution, 1947: 13–24). The Shan and Kayah states – but not the Karen and Kachin states – had the right to secede from the union after ten years (Constitution, 1947: 50–51). This extraordinary provision, unheard of in other decolonising countries, was a consequence of the Panglong compromise: it was a price Aung San paid to keep these territories in Burma. However, it proved to be a broken promise, as the secession right was later revoked by Aung San’s second successor, General Ne Win in 1958. So far, however, the saophas, the traditional Shan rulers, kept their formal power (again, only until 1958): they were granted seats in parliament and elected the Shan State Council from among themselves. The Kachins accepted fewer privileges (parliamentary representation similar to the Shan but no secession right and only 50% of Kachins in the State Council) in return for the large territorial Kachin State with the major cities of Myitkyina and Bhamo and with only around 50% of the Kachin population. The Chins, politically weak and economically dependent on Burma proper, were only granted the Special Division (not even a state) without other concessions. The Mons and Rakhine, as well as the smaller minorities (such as the Wa or Naga), were ignored (Constitution, 1947: 38–50; Smith, 1999; Linter, 1999; Walton, 2008; Callahan, 1998). The most difficult case was that of the Karens (Kayins). The Karen political movement believed independence of a “Karenistan” or “Kawthoolei” was in sight, “just like Pakistan or Laos” (Thant Myint-U, 2007: 253), put their trust in British protection, rejected the Panglong Agreement and boycotted the elections for the Constituent Assembly (Smith, 1999: 140–148; Selway, 2015: 229). This, coupled with the uncompromising Burman attitude, led to civil war in 1949. This also placed the authors of the 1947 constitution in a hopeless position for forging a tolerable settlement. Their task was further complicated by the special disposition of the Karen population (Karens dominated the borderlands with Thailand but were intermixed with the Burmans in the Irrawaddy Delta). What resulted was a self-defeating, futile compromise. The territory and status of the

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Karen state was to be resolved by a Special Commission and “if the Karens desire” to join the Union of Burma, would have the same status as the Shan State (Constitution, 1947: 44). Yet, the outbreak of Burman-Karen civil war soon nullified these plans: the Karens were not given a chance to decide and the borders of the Karen state were finally unilaterally set only in 1952 by the U Nu government when the tide of the war turned in favour of the Burmans which resulted in an unfavourable, small territory of the state compromising less than 25% of all the Karen population of Burma (Silverstein, 1980: 197–198; Smith, 1999: 141–148). As can be seen from this overview, the resulting position of a minority in an independent Burma depended on: the negotiating skills of a community’s leaders (e. g., strong in the case of the Shans, weak in the case of the Chins), on a legacy of discretionary colonial administration boundaries, on a willingness to compromise (e. g., the Karens wanted too much and ended with the very little [Lintner, 1999: 108]) and on the changing political-cum-military landscape in Burma (once the Tatmadaw regained most of strategic territories, the government became less keen to compromise). It was not, however, based on any thought-out power-sharing scheme. It brought more bad outcomes than good: “the patched-together constitutional solutions for the minority-dominated areas aggravated existing ethnic tension by delaying any serious dialogue about how to harmonise never-before integrated portions of this territory into a functional state” (Callahan, 1998: 15). Consequently, the chaotic, fragile ethnic compromise, legalised by the 1947 constitution, was full of inconsistences that satisfied no one and led to contestations and disputes that continued throughout the 1950s (Smith, 1999: 83). On the systemic level the major inconsistency was the contradiction between a de jure federal concept of state and de facto centralisation of power (Taylor, 2009: 229). The administrative units of the minorities had formal autonomy but possessed no legislative rights and had nothing to say in cases of taxation or state finances. In other words, they were financially dependent on the centre which did not distribute the revenues equally (Smith, 2003). In name, the Burman officials praised the constitution and its federal objectives; in reality, they undertook centralisation policies that ran counter to these objectives (Silverstein, 1959: 97). Thus, the emerging political system of Burma was quasi-federal, more resembling the United Kingdom (with its subjugation of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland) than the United States or Switzerland (Taylor, 2009: 229). All these inconsistencies made the constitution a chaotic one, a recipe for disaster (Smith, 1999: 79). In terms of power sharing, the Burmese mechanisms looked inspiring on paper. In the upper house of parliament, the minorities had a disproportionate share of seats guaranteed (the Shans, 25; the Karens, 24; the Kachins, 12; the

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Chins, 8; the Kayahs, 3; the Anglo-Burmans, 4) out of the 125 seats. In the lower house, based on the boundaries of electoral districts, 25 seats were allotted to the Shans, 20 to the Karens, seven to the Kachins, six to the Chins and two to the Kayahs. Moreover, state councils were set up in four ethnic states (Callahan, 1998; Smith, 2003; Reilly, 2017: 69–70; Selway, 2015: 230). Finally, an ethnic representative, a Shan Sao Shwe Thaike was elected as the first president of the Union. These arrangements, however, proved to be only of a symbolic nature. Burma was a cabinet democracy with the power at the hands of the prime minister – always a Burman – making the president a figurehead. The upper house had only limited powers – to review and revise bills – and became politically irrelevant. The lower house was dominated by Burman parties (210 Burman seats out of a total of 250). It did not matter that much anyway as the parliament had only a little bit more power than the president: it met for two months a year and thus remained largely ineffective; the power was exercised by the prime minister (Smith, 2003). Finally, given the fiscal centralisation of power, the regional autonomy of the ethnic states soon proved to be in name only.

Electoral system and party politicking The AFPFL politically dominated the democratic era, winning all elections and making Burma de facto a one-party state (Smith, 2003). The AFPFL was an umbrella party that claimed to be multi-ethnic (it is a good case study for centripetalism) and truly national in nature. In reality, it was a patchwork of personal and group interests along patron-client networks held together by clinging to power and living off state subsides; what kept the AFPFL in power was a combination of the personal popularity of the prime minister, U Nu, the skills of his generals who managed to save the country from near-collapse at the end of 1940s and coercive tactics (e. g., arresting popular political opponents just before elections) employed against political opponents (Trager, 1966: 95–112; Tinker, 1967: 68–72; Smith, 1999: 124; Smith, 2003; Callahan, 1998: 12–13; Thant Myint-U, 2007). It worked as long as the AFPFL remained popular; when it started losing backing, however a devastating split soon commenced followed by two coup d’états (1958, 1962), the latter being final. From a power-sharing perspective, the AFPFL was “merely a short-lived coalition of ethnic groups thrown together at each election rather than a true multi-ethnic party”; most of the ethnic political dynamics commenced within, not outside, the AFPFL: the ethnic factions within the AFPFL and the smaller ethnic parties that the AFPFL co-opted all struggled for resources, built and broke alliances and often at the end deflected disappointed (Selway, 2015: 330–331).

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The AFPFL won all elections until the 1962 coup, albeit with decreasing results: 85% of contested seats in 1951 but only 58% in 1956 (and 63% in 1960, though by that time the AFPFL was already hopelessly split); the waning popularity corresponded with increasing dissatisfaction among ethnic groups/factions/individual MPs: Rakhines, Shans, Kachins, Mons and others (Selway, 2015: 330– 334). Ethnic leaders steadily became more vocal and started demanding more concessions. The AFPFL “increasingly came to depend on individual bargains and agreements, of often labyrinthine complexity, with various political coalitions, particularly of elected minority representatives” (Smith, 1999: 124). These demands concerned three major issues: autonomy, public goods, and religion (Selway, 2015: 333). The Burmans resorted to various tactics in order to manage these demands: postponements, rejections, manipulations or attempts to extract as much in return for conceding. They delayed the establishment of separate Arakan and Mon states, ignored calls for a large Karen state with access to a sea port instead establishing a truncated unit (Karen state). Even earlier, the U Nu government established a separate Kayah (Karenni) state, adding some parts of the Shan state to it; the perfidy of this action was that the Karenni were a subgroup of the Karens: by making de facto two Karen states, both small and weak, the Burman government followed the best tradition of devide et impera (Smith, 1999: 145–146; Cady, 1958: 640; Selway, 2015: 333). It was no more inclusive in terms of development: deteriorating roads, education demands (no new high school had been built in the Chin Division since independence), uneven distribution of subsidies, extraction of resources, state favouritism of Buddhism and other aspects of negligence of ethnic peripheries by the Burman centre fuelled “a growing sense of frustration” expressed by almost all ethnic minorities (Tinker, 1967: 197; Smith, 1999: 192). This frustration escalated with the religious issue of 1961. Prime minister U Nu, the weakening leader of the AFPFL, was forced to resign in the first coup of 1958 but re-emerged in the 1960 elections. Making Buddhism a state religion became his electoral ticket for victory but it came at the price of further alienating the non-Buddhist minorities. The culmination came in 1962 when the Shan Federal Movement demanded amending the constitution: making Burma a real federation with power (and revenues) shared equally between the centre and peripheries. That gave the Burman-dominated army a dream excuse to stage a coup, get rid of U Nu and resolve the ethnic issue on Burman terms. The Burmese democratic experiment was over. In terms of power sharing, the Burmese experience of the 1950s illustrates the perils of an electoral system that created a one-party state (Smith, 2003). Ethnic groups, concentrated in their own areas, voted almost only along ethnic lines; these ethnic divisions were then transferred into the legislature where it produced “explicit ethnic voting, ethnic parties, fragile ethnic coalitions, and politics that revolved around concessions for ethnic groups”; it led, too, to interethnic bar-

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gains and unstable, short-term coalitions “with the goal of extracting as many concessions for their ethnic group as possible until the coalition crumbles” (Selway, 2015: 334). This not only meant a lack of any unified, “national” agenda and made it easier for the Burmans to dominate policymaking and employ devide et impera tactics to politically pacify the minorities. Most importantly, this electoral system, combined with flawed federalism, made governability “the problem that crashed the system” (Callahan, 1998: 15) as ethnic tensions rocked the boat of the U Nu government, making governing next to impossible and eventually provoking the army to move in. In terms of ethnic stability, the minorities, unable to secure their goals, initially dropped out of the AFPFL by forming minor parties in the parliament. When these proved to be politically irrelevant, they increasingly dropped out of parliamentary politics as well and turned to insurgency (Selway, 2015: 335; Silverstein, 1980: 219). This explains the steadily increase of insurgent groups since 1948.

Insurgency The newly born Burma of 1948 faced two major centrifugal tendencies: communist rebellion and Karen insurgency; plus smaller ones simmering under the radar (e. g., mujahid rebellion in Arakan). Although the communist rebellion was a Burman phenomenon, there was always an ethnic dimension to it, especially later on from the 1970s; after the Communist Party of Burma (CPB) dissolution in 1989 “virtually all armed groups have identified with a particular ethnic group” (ICG, 2020). As for the Karen insurgency, it was quintessentially ethnic. By the end of the democratic era, insurgencies had multiplied; the coup of 1962 not only did not reverse this tendency, it enhanced it. Throughout the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s Burma became a playground of a myriad of various armed groups with virtually every ethnic group rebelling against the state and many of them fighting with one another and/or with other ethnic groups simultaneously (e. g., the Wa at one point served in five differed armed groups; the Shans in around 20–30). Hence, such descriptions as “a nation went underground” or “insurgency as a way of life” should not be surprising (Smith, 1999: 89–97). During the period of 1962–1988. Burma had the biggest number in the world (!) of armed groups – over 150 at a point – fighting in a country (Rajah, 1998; 135). Since the mid-1960s, the Tatmadaw has been able to regain control over “Burma proper” due to its brutal, if not genocidal, campaign of four cuts (pyat leit pyat) yet the ethnic peripheries remained a constant battlefield between the Tatmadaw, CPB, ethnic armed organisations (EAOs) and opium gangs. The never-ending civil war became a self-propelled mechanism legitimising the Tatmadaw’s military rule in Burma and its Burmanisation (Smith, 1999: 34–36;

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Steinberg, 2000: 57) campaigns on the peripheries. It was (and still is) a vicious circle: the ethnic minorities turned to insurgency in order to defend themselves against the Tatmadaw, considered a Burman occupying force (Callahan, 2007). Yet, their EAOs legitimised the Tatmadaw’s rule. With the army too strong (and too unwilling) to share power and privileges, and yet too weak to crush the enemies (and reversely: the EAOs too strong to be beaten yet too weak to secure independence or autonomy), the prolonged civil war prolonged became the main reason for Burma’s economic and political plight. By 1987, Burma, once a rice bowl of Asia, degraded into the category of an LDN (Least Developed Nations).

Ceasefire agreements and the disciplined democracy: The second power-sharing attempts The Tatmadaw’s mismanagement led to the outbreak of mass protests in 1988. The “8888” revolution and its spin-off, the major opposition party, the National League for Democracy (NLD) under Aung San Suu Kyi, Aung San’s daughter, have stirred but not shaken the Tatmadaw’s dictatorship. The protests were bloodily pacified while the NLD tried in vain to wrest power by non-violent means from the Tatmadaw for the next 26 years. It finally succeeded in 2015 but the army only tolerated the opposition NLD government for one term; when the NLD won its second election in a row in 2020, the army staged its fourth coup d’état in 2021, arrested Suu Kyi and other leaders and threw the country into turmoil which – at the time of writing – shows no sign of abating. In terms of power sharing, two specific Burmese attempts from the period of 1988–2021 should be described: the ceasefire agreements and the disciplined democracy political system.

Ceasefire agreements Although the Tatmadaw defended its dictatorship against democratic contesters in 1988–1989, the army made two fundamental decisions on the way. First, it switched the economic policy from autarchic socialism into (wild) capitalism. This enabled the Tatmadaw to enrich itself (at the price of selling out Burmese natural resources, degrading the ecology and initiating a dependent development on Chinese terms), to enlarge its size, increase soldiers’ salaries and arm itself better. Consequently, the Tatmadaw’s might vis-à-vis EAOs increased significantly (Selth, 1999: 1; Callahan, 2007: 7; Taylor, 2009: 438). One did not need to wait long for the results. Those few EAOs that did sign ceasefire agreements soon

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found themselves either crushed or pushed into the background, like the Karen KNU: after a devastating defeat in 1994 that included capturing the KNU’s “capital” Manerplaw, this EAO became a shadow of its former self (Smith, 1999: 379–445; Smith, 2007: 42–56; Rajah, 1998: 141; Thant Myint-U, 2007: 322–332). Although not completely and not everywhere, looking at it from the big picture, the Tatmadaw was clearly winning the ethnic civil war. This was also possible thanks to the second (and more important from the perspective of power sharing) major policy change on the part of the Tatmadaw. When in 1989 the CPB was self-annihilated by mutinied ethnic soldiers (mostly the Wa), the Tatmadaw seized the opportunity by starting negotiating with the CPB-breakaway EAOs (Lintner, 1898: 45; Lintner, 1999: 364; Smith, 1999: 376– 379). This policy was enhanced by one calculation. With the existence of the NLD, a mortal enemy inside the Burmese heartland, the Tatmadaw feared that the NLD might join hands with ethnic EAOs and together topple the army’s dictatorship (Charney, 2009: 188). Hence, the Tatmadaw’s commanders decided to prevent such a dreadful perspective by striking a compromise with potentially more mortal enemies: the ones that held arms, the EAOs (Smith, 2007: 40; Thant MyintU, 2007: 326). This is how a sort of Burmese-style power-sharing mechanism, the ceasefire agreements, came into being. The agreements commenced in two waves: the first one, in the 1990s, consisted of 17 deals (Taylor, 2009: 437) while the other one, during the Thein Sein reformist government (see: below) of 15 (MPC, 2017). Although these were only ceasefire agreements, initially nothing more than a break in killing each other, they proved to be surprisingly durable; more durable than many peace treaties (Steinberg, 2001: 190). They ended or suspended civil war on many ethnic areas: for example, Pao (1994), Kachin (1994–2011), Mon (1995), Rakhine (1997) and on other territories, bringing these peoples a situation unknown for half a century: peace (Smith, 2007: 41). The agreements granted minorities neither rights nor political autonomy but allowed the EAOs to keep their arms and control over their territories until things were further settled (Charney, 2009: 188). This turned many EAOs into the Tatmadaw state’s subcontractors; they were allowed to conduct business operations throughout the country. The military state, in turn, promised to invest in the development of the ethnic peripheries; to build schools, hospitals, roads, bridges and dams. In return for relinquishing dreams of secession and recognising the military government, the EAOs were granted de facto (though not de jure) autonomy in their respective lands (Smith, 1999: 441; Taylor, 2009: 433). This allowed the EAOs and their peoples to turn to economic activity which meant joint business ventures with the Tatmadaw for extracting gemstones, cutting down forests (mostly teak) and engaging in other aspects of cross-border trade with richer neighbours (China, Thailand, India) but especially in the drug trade

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(Taylor, 2009: 459; Smith, 2007: 42; Lintner, 1999: 411–423; Mya Maung, 1998: 196). In a way, it was an enlargement of a scheme operating in the Shan State since the 1970s; the EAOs suspended their guerrilla warfare in return for the Tatmadaw turning a blind eye to the opium trade (Lintner, 1999: 365). In all ceasefire agreements the boundary between legal and illegal was blurred (Smith, 2007: 42). Nevertheless, all sides profited from it, with the Tatmadaw and international middlemen (Myanmar was under international sanctions) taking the major share (Steinberg, 2000: 215–219). However, this was the price of peace (unseen there in four decades). The formula of “peace through development” led to the cessation of violence in many territories and a sense of security, even if unstable and incomplete (Thant Myint-U, 2007: 322–332). Granting minorities de facto autonomy led to much greater control of the state than during any previous government (Taylor, 2009: 444). In 1988, the military government fully controlled approximately 40% of the territory of the country, which was inhabited by 90% of population though (Steinberg, 2000; 186). After the ceasefire agreements and the military (re)conquest of the border peripheries, the amount of territory controlled by the central government increased to over 80–90% (Polity IV, 2013). Although much of it was administrated indirectly, via local EOAs proxies (Callahan, 2007), it was still an achievement. Unsurprisingly, the ceasefire agreements were even compared to a nation-building process, consisting of the inclusion of peripheral territories by a mix of cooperation and coercive tactics (Sherman, 2003: 225–255). The ceasefire agreements were acknowledged by Myanmar’s neighbours (Smith, 1999: 441), although not by the West where democratisation hopes dominated the agenda (Thant Myint-U, 2007: 332). Unfortunately, in many places the ceasefire agreements crumbled by the second half of the 2000s/early 2010s. There were two major reasons for this: economic-cum-political conflicts over resources and the Tatmadaw’s tightening of the screw. The former resulted from disagreements over lordship of trade routes, mines, gems and forests: quintessentially, economic, not ideological, conflicts (Duffield, 2001; Smith, 1999: 440) led to the collapse of some ceasefire agreements, the most famous example being the end of the Tatmadaw-Kachin Independence Army ceasefire in 2011. The latter was a consequence of the Tatmadaw’s attempt to keep the EAOs in line; the army tried to force them to relinquish their weapons (in return for food and medicines) and planned to include all EAOs in the Tatmadaw-controlled Border Guard Force, (BGF) (Wai Moe, 2009). The BGF scheme de facto meant surrendering hopes for autonomy without political concessions (BGFS, 2021). Since most of the major EAOs ignored repeated calls to join the BGF – only minor insurgent groups did this (BGFS, 2021; NDF(B), 2010) – the Tatmadaw launched a showcase offensive against the Kokang-based MNDAA rebel army in 2009, capturing its capital and causing an outflow of refugees to China (Storey, 2009; Thant Myint-U, 2011: 117).

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Combined with renewed fighting with other EAOs (e. g., Kachin KIA, Mon NMSP and Shan SSNA), including with the strongest EAO, the United Wa State Army (UWSA), and economic and political repressions against EAOs’ companies and parties (BGFS, 2021), this led to the near-total collapse of the ceasefire agreements by the turn of the 2000s and 2010s. However, the political breakthrough in 2011 – a reformist, quasi-civilian government of former general Thein Sein came to power and introduced sweeping reforms, including liberalisation of political life and mending fences with Aung San Suu Kyi’s NLD – managed to (temporarily) end the deadlock in ethnic relations. Thein Sein appealed to the EOAs to “swap guns into laptops” (NLM, 2012) and rejected the previous preconditions of joining the BGF and laying down weapons (MPM, 2021). The regime set up the (European Union and Norwegian funded)Myanmar Peace Centre and restarted negotiations, headed by the presidential envoy and one of Thein Sein’s closest “lieutenants” – Aung Min. His extraordinary diplomacy secured a series of 15 new ceasefire agreements with ethnic guerrilla groups, temporarily breaking the deadlock in ethnic relations (Thant Myint-U, 2019: 107–110). Although many of these agreements were just renewals of the old ones, and did not lead to a cessation of violence everywhere (Lintner, 2013), they nevertheless reversed the trend and instilled new hope that the end of the civil war was in sight. The ceasefire agreement with the Karen KNU (12. 01. 2012) was breaking news as it ended (or at worst, paused) the Burman-Karen conflict, the longest running (since 1949) among all ethnic insurgencies in Myanmar. It was a real breakthrough. What also differentiated the new agreements from the old ones was that the former were conducted purposely without any references to the political situation; the latter in turn emphasised the political dialogue with the Thein Sein regime officially acknowledging negotiating with ethnic minorities as its priority (Michaels, 2013). It was unprecedented in Burmese conditions. Yet, both these agreements were somehow similar in nature as they were based on the suspension of violence, on the “peace through development” formula without real concessions towards federalism or autonomy; in short, (temporary) acceptance of the Tatmadaw’s (softened) conditions in return for a share of the profits from business deals and NGO projects without genuine autonomy (Saw Yan Naing, 2013). Nevertheless, in Myanmar circumstances, this was not small. This “neither peace nor war” state of affairs (Kramer, 2009, 2021) was not ideal but certainly much better than the never-ending cycles of violence that have been raging the ethnic borderlands since late 1940s. The new ceasefire agreements offered new (even if eventually illusionary) hope that the end of the ethnic civil war was around the corner. Encouraged by this initial success, Thein Sein’s regime wanted to keep up the momentum and sign the National Ceasefire Agreement (NCA)

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with all EAOs in Myanmar by the end of the cabinet’s term in autumn 2015. Unfortunately, geopolitics stood in the NCA’s way. Thein Sein’s reforms went too far in the eyes of China which covertly supports some major EAOs (e. g., the UWSA or KIA). Enraged by Thein Sein’s cancellation of the Myitsone Dam (a Chinese signature project in Myanmar) and by Burmese generals’ political flirts with the USA (Barack Obama visited Myanmar twice), Beijing decided to “punish” Thein Sein by persuading major EAOs not to sign the NCA (Ye Htut, 2019: 154–160; Thant Myint-U, 2019: 146–147). Once the strongest EAOs declined to sign the NCA, the ceremony turned into a symbolic sideshow only. Worse still, soon the good momentum to resolve the ethnic issue was lost. Thein Sein’s Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) lost to Suu Kyi’s NLD in the 2015 elections. The latter pledged to resolve the ethnic Gordian knot by going it alone (she dissolved the Myanmar Peace Centre and dismissed Aung Min’s negotiation team, as well as their contacts and influence, and instead she nominated her trusted physician Tin Myo Win to negotiate with ethnic minority peoples). And by doing it better than Thein Sein’s NCA. Evoking her father’s Panglong, she organised the New Panglong Conference, named the 21th Century Panglong (31. 08. 2016). To her credit, she was able – thanks to travelling to Beijing – to bring (almost) all EAOs representatives to this conference. Unfortunately, to no avail: the conference ended in failure. The Wa left on the second day of the conference citing protocolary issues and the results of negotiations with the rest were inconclusive. Suu Kyi’s Panglong suffered from heavy moral rhetoric and few specifics; Suu Kyi neglected personal diplomacy, while she kept preaching to the EAOs about values, which did not win their hearts and minds (Callahan, 2017a). Most importantly, Suu Kyi was unable to find a way out of the fundamental, structural contradiction between the Tatmadaw’s priority (demanding ethnic armies to disarm and demobilise) and the EAOs’ federal agenda. To save face, the Panglong Conference was rebranded as a cyclical event yet soon new clashes dashed hopes for a reconciliation and sent Suu Kyi’s Panglong idea packing. Since then, the civil war has deteriorated in the Shan, Kachin and Rakhine states. At the end of the day, Suu Kyi achieved less than Thein Sein’s NCA (Lubina, 2020: 106–107). From autumn 2016, the ethnic civil war in Myanmar again intensified, thus cancelling, or at best postponing, any ceasefire agreement-style solutions. As of 2021, this kind of Burmese bottom-to-top power-sharing mechanism, despite important short-term achievements, has ultimately failed to resolve the ethnic issue in Myanmar.

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The Disciplined Democracy The second major power-sharing attempt in contemporary Myanmar – the disciplined democracy (2011–2021) – overshadowed the ceasefire agreements and for a long while seemed successful. Yet, it ultimately failed, too. Since pacifying protesters in 1988 and the NLD in 1990, the Tatmadaw generals had been looking for ways to legitimise their dictatorship. In 1993, they proposed what – depending on the perspective – was later named the “exit plan”, “specific transition” (Thant Myint-U, 2019: 107–110), “bloodless reform” (Ye Htut, 2019: 3), a “sui generis case” (Egreteau, 2016: 3–13) or a Burmese “shibboleth of democracy” (Taylor, 2013: 392). Due to opposition from the NLD and outside pressure (sanctions) it took the generals 18 years to implement it. In 2004, they restarted the process (“the roadmap”), while in 2008 they wrote the (historically third) constitution (later accepted in a rigged referendum; and which came into force in 2011) that enabled rigged elections in 2010 (boycotted by the NLD and won by the army-backed USDP) and paved way for the quasi-civilian government of (former general) Thein Sein to take power in 2011. Once the generals legalised their power, they started reforms, mended fences with the opposition and allowed free and fair elections to take place in 2015; they, too, accepted the defeat of their party, the USDP, and allowed the opposition NLD government to take power. Their reforms were based on giving away enough to provide hope, but not too much such as to lose power. When the NLD tested this formula, the generals lost their patience and staged a final coup on 1 February 2021, thus ending the system they themselves created, the “disciplined democracy” – this euphemistic name is the official term written into the constitution (Constitution, 2008: 3). On paper, the 2008 constitution charters provide some promising powersharing mechanisms. The unitary state is administratively divided into seven Bamar regions in the central part of the country (the former “Burma proper”) and seven ethnic states, mostly in highland peripheries, each named after one major ethnic group (Shan, Karen, Mon, Kayah, Kachin, Chin, Rakhine). Moreover, there are six self-administrated ethnic unites: five zones (Naga, Danu, Pao, Palaung, Kokang) and one division (Wa) (Constitution, 2008: 13–19). Although some researchers claim that recognising the self-administrated zones represents a form of federalism without naming it (Taylor, 2009: 490), in reality it is a quasifederal structure (Reilly, 2019: 16) as the self-administrated units are autonomous within the ethnic states (Shan and Kachin), not within the Bamar regions. In other words, some ethnicities have an autonomy within major ethnic minorities units thus weakening the power of the major non-Bamar ethnic groups vis-à-vis the Bamars. It is, in short, a contemporary equivalent of the divide et impera policy.

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Before the coup, there were other legal provisions for the ethnic minorities in the form of representation. There was a ministry of ethnic affairs and ethnic states had their own ethnic affair ministers elected by ethnic voters; these ministers were allocated to every officially recognised minority group which could claim their population was at minimum of 0.1% of overall population except in their own state (e. g., there was no Shan ethnic affairs minister in the Shan State but there were, e. g., Kachin or Lisu ethnic ministers in the Shan State) or those that comprised a majority of their state or region, or where a state or region already had a self-administered district or self-administered zone dedicated to those ethnic groups (Reilly, 2019: 17). The ethnic affairs ministers were elected in all but one of Myanmar’s administrative units; 14 different ethnics groups were eligible to vote for at least one ethnic affairs minister and there were 29 ethnic affairs ministers in total in the state legislatures, numbering one to seven in each state. They explicitly represented their geographically dispersed ethnic group and were accountable only to them; elections took place via ethnic designation on the electoral roll (Reilly, 2019: 17–18). Unfortunately, these power-sharing provisions provided only a superficial protection due to deeply rooted problems. Ethnic relations based on essentialist concepts of ethnicity, greater rights ascribed to larger ethnic minorities, and the FPTP (first past the post) electoral system mixed with chaotic liberalisation proved to be a fatal combination. It all had “a toxic effect” by reinforcing the “hierarchy of power between different groups”, increasing ethnic divisions “by sending the message that group size matters”; under these circumstances, the emerging “disciplined democracy” system “has reinforced a competitive, zerosum dynamic among minority groups” and led to increased insurgency (ICG, 2020). After the liberalisation of 2011 that included greater freedoms of expressions, many ethnic people of Myanmar took the opportunity to expressed their identity more openly, in a way that was impossible under the military dictatorship. Minority languages returned to schools and newspapers (including online), while “ethnic days” and events were on the state calendar; ethnic organisations popped up and internet and social media, especially Facebook, allowed minorities to communicate in their language without censorship. This translated into political calls to stop the Bamars and/or foreign (Chinese, Thai, etc.) exploitation of the natural resources of ethnic minority areas and to increase financing of ethnic peripheries, but also fuelled a sense that some ethnicities were benefitting more from the reforms. In short, liberalisation enhanced the social capital of the minorities, strengthened their communities yet also increased distrust among ethnic groups, not only between the Bamars and the rest but also between ethnic minorities themselves, for example, between the Kachins and Shans resulting in zero-sum competition between ethnic groups. In short, after 2011, the traditional

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notions of ethnicity as the key determinant of identity became stronger, more central to Burmese politics and armed conflicts (ICG, 2020).Combined with the FPTP electoral system it proved to be a recipe for disaster The FPTP electoral system favoured the major Bamar-dominated parties and smashed ethnic minority parties in every election (2010, 2015, 2020) during the “disciplined democracy”. In 2010, the USDP won 76% of the contested seats, while the NLD secured 79% of the seats in 2015 and 82% in 2020; during these elections only some Shan and Rakhine parties secured noticeable representation (yet too little to matter politically anyway); the rest of the ethnic parties, with only individual seats, became a political plankton. This meant that the leading national (read: Bamar) parties, the NLD and USDP, had “no incentives for reaching out to minority groups” (Selway, 2015: 148) and indeed did not do that. Under these circumstances, ethnic representation took place predominantly within the major national parties (USDP, NLD) rather than via ethnic parties (Reilly, 2019; Breen, 2018). But from the perspective of the ethnic minorities, it was hardly better. The already Bamar-dominated USDP (modelled on the Burmanised structure of the Tatmadaw) in order to win 2015 elections formed an unholy alliance with the ultranationalist, anti-Muslim radical Buddhist monks from the Ma Ba Tha (Protection of Race and Region Organisation) and enacted four “Protection of race and religion” bills (seriously limiting non-Buddhist rights) just before the elections. Aung San Suu Kyi, politically boxed into a corner – accused of being pro-Muslim by the regime – did not field any Muslim candidates in the elections and remained silent on the repressions of the Rohingya Muslim minority, thus receiving an (un)fair dose of criticism from the West yet winning the 2015 elections by a landslide (including in all ethnic areas except Rakhine). Her 2015–2021 governance was accused of being condescending to the ethnic minorities not only with patronising remarks, endorsing Burman-centric historiography or using Burmese Buddhist cultural symbols (Sengupta, 2015: 320–325) but, more importantly, by not listening to ethnic voices, neglecting their feelings and dominating administration cadres – the NLD nominated all chief ministers even in Rakhine and Shan where they did not win; to add insult to injury, in the latter case, the NLD nominated a Bamar, not a Shan (Kyaw Phone Kyaw, 2016). The most glaring example of ethnic disappointment was a protest staged by Mons in 2017 against naming a new bridge in Mawlamaing after Aung San. Most importantly, Suu Kyi sided with the Tatmadaw’s position on ethnic issues (Mathieson, 2020), although it was rather out of necessity as it she needed to placate the army in order to stay in power (she managed this successfully for five years yet was ultimately toppled anyway in 2021). The NLD was not punished electorally for this, as the FPTP system made sure the ethnic votes were split and made no difference in the 2020 elections. While perhaps disappointing, this

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attitude is understandable; electoral logic dictated that the NLD (or USDP) did not need ethnic votes that much to win the elections. This attitude in turn enhanced “the militarisation of ethnicity”. The FPTP electoral system, or “winner-takes-all”, limits ethnic parties’ political importance making their communities more and more frustrated with parliamentary democracy and driving support for EAOs and “many ethnic peoples now view insurgency as the only effective means of achieving political goals such as enhanced autonomy and equitable access to resources” (ICG, 2020). Without an EAO an ethnic community “can be vulnerable to predation from its non-coethnic neighbours; conversely, armed groups are well positioned to profit from the illicit economy that has developed over decades in these areas, which produces the revenues necessary for arming and operating a powerful militia” (ICG, 2020). In other words, given the large number of EAOs (before the last coup there were almost 20), including from rival ethnic groups, and the deficiency of general security, turning to armed struggle became a must, not a choice, for many ethnic communities. The last years before the final coup again saw a backward trend, with increased insurgency, renewed fighting and the loss of hope. The coup of 1 February made the situation much worse. After the Tatmadaw staged its fourth coup, arrested Suu Kyi and bloodily pacified the following protests, the country slid into complete turmoil. An underground National Unity Government (consisting of non-arrested NLD members) emerged, declaring war on the Tatmadaw and setting up (mostly Bamar) arms groups, the People’s Defence Forces (PDFs) throughout the country. At the time of writing, more than 100 PDFs are clashing with the Tatmadaw in northern and central Myanmar. Some major EAOs, especially the Karen KNU and Kachin KIA, support the resistance movement (and fight the Tatmadaw), others (e. g., the Arakan Army, AA) try to use the situation by capturing as much territory as possible while the other EAOs still (e. g., the UWSA) wait and see. The country is steadily sliding into anarchy. Under the circumstances of this Burmese version of the “war of all against all” any powersharing options are now off limits.

Conclusion In Myanmar, the starting point for power sharing is very difficult. When applying the nine background factors (Lijphart, 1969: 217–19; Lijphart, 1996: 267–274; Lijphart, 2008: 51–52) to Burmese realities, the scale of the challenge can be seen. In Myanmar there are a lot of segments which makes power sharing difficult from the start. There is no multiple balance of power which increases the want of the Bamars to dominate the rest. Since decolonisation, the decision-making appa-

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ratus of the state has been overloaded and inefficient which hinders the implementation of not only power sharing but any major administrative decisions. There is a lack of tradition of elite accommodation as the Burmans, especially their leading institution, the army, have been reluctant to accommodate minorities. The overarching loyalties are low, if not non-existent; supra-ethnic loyalty is minimal (there is effectively no “Myanmar” loyalty, only Bamar/Burmans and ethnic loyalties). The socio-economic inequality is persistent, with Bamars dominating the political-socio-economic top brass and the ethnic minorities much lower on the informal hierarchies. As for the existence of external threats, the Bamars have a deeply rooted anxiety over threats from two directions: China and Bengal, yet these phobias are not shared by all ethnic minorities and nowadays do not constitute an existential external threat dangerous enough to unite the Bamars and ethnics. Finally, the last two background factors of medium population size and geographical concentration of segments are not disadvantageous yet they pale into insignificance when compared to other plainly negative seven. To these background factors other cultural aspects need to be added: the persistent lack of unity (both within the Bamars and between them and the ethnics) and the long tradition of ethnic distrust. This all deemed the inconsistent and fragile power-sharing attempts – both in 1950s and after 1988 in Myanmar – to failure. The power-sharing literature identifies two major options for conflict management in plural societies such as Myanmar: integration and accommodation (McGarry and O’Leary, 2009: 16–18). If democratisation scholars firmly believe the latter is better (yet they differ on how to achieve that with consociationalism and centripetalism being two major models, (Jarrett, 2018: 38), in Myanmar the choice (consciously or not) was made clearly in favour of (often forceful) integration of ethnic minorities into the Bamar-dominated state. This produced majoritarian Bamar rule, a Burmese version of ethnocracy (Stojanovic´, 2020: 33; Anderson, 2016; Agarin et al., 2018), where the power is in the hands of the main ethnic group (the Bamars) and the citizens who do not belong to it (the ethnic minorities) are politically marginalised and discriminated against. Seeing no chance to change that, they turn to insurgency which produces a never-ending cycle of violence; the rebels are too weak to win (to secure independence or autonomy) yet too strong be beaten, and the reversely, the Bamars too strong (and too unwilling) to share power and privileges, and yet too weak to crush the enemies completely. Therefore, instead of power sharing, Myanmar has a constant power struggle that undermines the state, complicates nation-building process and at times – such as now – leads to anarchy. Theoretically speaking, Myanmar, then, represents a case study of a highly elite-driven nation where the dominant elites from the major segmental group do not believe in power-sharing arrangements, with fatal consequences for the

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country. As the popular saying goes, “where there is a will there is a way”. But in Myanmar there is no will, especially on the side of the most important Bamardominated institution, the Tatmadaw (the recent coup d’état confirmed this logic yet again). As long as it remains so, any power-sharing arrangements for Myanmar will be a pipe dream.

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Antonina Łuszczykiewicz

India as an Anti-Consociational Project under Narendra Modi

From both historical and contemporary perspectives, it is hard to think of any other country as ethnically, religiously, culturally, and linguistically diverse as India. In the precolonial era, before the British took control of the whole subcontinent after the decades-long colonisation process, it had never been fully united – thus, in political terms, the India we know today is, paradoxically, a very young creation. Founded on Gandhism and Nehruvianism, the two dominant political philosophies and social visions that have seemingly complemented each other despite some strikingly contradictory aspects, independent India emerged in 1947 as the largest democracy in the world. With over 1.3 billion inhabitants, it is currently the second most populous country and expected to surpass China by 2027 according to the United Nations (United Nations, 2021). With its internal dynamics and complexities, many theorists of consociationalism have perceived India as an intriguing yet highly challenging case study. Scholars have not even reached a consensus about whether India should be evaluated as a consociational country in the first place. As will be discussed later, most experts concur that the Indian constitution is devoid of explicitly powersharing elements. However, some claim that the very practice of Indian politics is what has transformed India into a de facto consociational state. In his Democracy in Plural Societies, Arendt Lijphart essentially explains that “the primary characteristic of the consociational democracy, where the leaders of all the important segments of the society cooperate”, is the will and practice of sharing power to jointly govern the state (Lijphart, 1977: 25). This model has been applied (not always successfully) in numerous diverse, deeply divided countries which consist of various ethnic, religious, or linguistic groups. Supporters of consociationalism argue that even in deeply divided states – or, to apply consociationalist terminology, countries divided into many segments – democracy can develop and even flourish, as exemplified by the Netherlands, Belgium, and Switzerland (Jelonek, 2007: 137). In pluralist societies, the political elites of the dominant group choose to share power with minorities primarily to avoid in-

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ternal conflicts and violence (Carciumaru, 2018: 34). In consociational systems, decision-making is then based on consensus reached by compromises made by leaders on behalf of groups that participate in power-sharing arrangements. Consociationalists contend that in the case of diverse, deeply divided societies, proportional representation does not guarantee successful management. What is more, it is undemocratic and dangerous, as due to simple election mathematics, minorities are continually denied access to power and they might end up excluded or discriminated (Lijphart, 2012: 32). As a result, the advocates of consociationalism claim that power sharing is the most desired model for heterogenous societies as it allows minorities to influence politics and helps them protect their own “minority” rights. In its ideal form, consociationalism requires representation for each and every minority; however, in countries as sizeable and diverse as India, this is simply impossible (Porter, 2012: 1–3). It must also be stressed that consociationalism in its pure form is very rare – usually, only selected institutions associated with power-sharing arrangements, or some of their variants, are introduced, far from theoretical premises (Trzcin´ski, 2018: 30). Among scholars who conducted research on India and its allegedly powersharing attributions, Arendt Lijphart is probably the most distinguished enthusiast of categorising it as a consociational state. In his famous article “The Puzzle of Indian Democracy” in the American Political Science Review, Lijphard claimed that the Congress-era India exhibited four basic elements of power sharing: the existence of a grand inclusive coalition led by the Congress; cultural autonomy for religious and linguistic groups; proportionality as reflected in the structure of the cabinet and the reservation system; and the minority veto, an example of which was the resistance of the southern states against New Delhi’s imposition of Hindi (Lijphart, 1996: 260–262). Contrarily to Lijphart, Katharine Adeney and Wilfried Swenden argued in their thorough analysis of India’s political environment in the Swiss Political Science Review that even though its political and legal systems do not entirely lack the de facto elements of power sharing, India did not function as a consociational democracy between 1952 and 1989 when its political scene was mostly dominated by the Congress Party (Adeney and Swenden, 2019: 454). According to the scholars, following the demise of the one-party system in 1989–1996, Indian democracy acquired more consociational properties both de facto and de jure in relation to the territorial and caste-related diversity. However, they also noticed that the rise of Hindu nationalism since the 1980s and the restoration of a single party government in 2014 has negatively impacted the accommodation of religious minorities. Observations on the non-consociational nature of Nehruvian India have also been made and staunchly supported by Steven Ian Wilkinson. In “India, Consociational Theory, and Ethnic Violence”, Wilkinson disregarded Lijphart’s ar-

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gument according to which Nehru’s era was supposed to be devoid of serious social conflicts thanks to consociational practices (Wilkinson, 2000: 770). Wilkinson argued exactly the opposite as he claimed that the Nehruvian times were strikingly non-consociational, especially as pre-independence quotas were erased. According to him, consociational tendencies after Nehru’s death led to increased polarisation and the eruption of violence because various religious and caste-based groups – both the lowest-level ones which hoped for more privileges as well as those who were denied access to reserved seats – got involved in politically and socially motivated conflicts. As demonstrated earlier, there is no consensus among the theorists of consociationalism as to how to interpret India’s case. Nevertheless, thanks to its immeasurable diversity and complexity, India seems to be the most ideal candidate for discussing the potential, advantages, and drawbacks of a powersharing system. As a consequence, this chapter draws inspiration from works focusing on the (non)consociational nature of India’s political system and practice. It must be stressed that this chapter’s primary aim is not to determine whether India should be characterised as a consociational or non-consociational state, but rather to observe and analyse the tendencies and dynamics indicating the direction in which contemporary India is heading. Therefore, the chapter presents the evolution of the mainstream vision and practice that occurred in India since the dawn of the Nehruvian era (1947–1964) to the takeover by the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in 2014 and its re-election in 2019. The elections in 2014 are then regarded as a significant caesura which marks the end of the domination of the Indian National Congress (simply referred to as the Congress Party). For the first time, the Modi-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) gained the majority of votes in Lok Sabha which allowed it to rule single-handedly and discount the weak opposition. Ultimately, the aim of this chapter is to examine whether – and if so, to what extent – India under the BJP is being stripped of its allegedly consociational character. Moreover, by analysing the political and ideological agenda of the BJP, the author attempts to explain the reasons and motivations behind the BJP’s actions. Bound by the limitations of a book chapter’s length and scope, the author focuses primarily on the delegitimisation of federalism, the reluctance towards caste-based quotas, the promotion of Hindi as the national language, and the strengthening of Hindu-Muslim antagonism as the most significant exemplifications of the BJP’s ideology, narratives, and practice.

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The diversity of India First and foremost, independent India was designed as a federal republic based on a democratic parliamentary system. Today, it consists of 28 states and eight union territories, five of which are ruled directly by the central government. The relationship between the central government in New Delhi and the states is regulated by federalist rules defined in the constitution. While the Union has the exclusive authority in issues such as defence and foreign policy, the states are given far-reaching autonomy in terms of financial resources, law and order, public health, and education, among others. According to the Indian religion census completed in 2011, nearly 80% of Indian citizens follow Hinduism (Census Organization of India, c. 2011). However, it must be observed that “Hinduism” is very hard to define as persons framed as “Hindus” adhere to different principles and practices depending on their regional as well as caste- or clan-related traditions. Paradoxically, the very term “Hinduism” – which is now commonly used to describe a several-thousandyear-old conglomeration of beliefs and traditions – was coined in colonial times by the British who endeavoured to coherently systemise the overwhelming number of beliefs, gods, myths, and rituals. Nevertheless, despite such a great miscellany of beliefs and practices categorised as Hinduism, some common features of all Hindu traditions might be distinguished. Essentially, Hinduism can be construed as a group of related yet diverse religious branches born in the Indian subcontinent that accept the authority of the Vedas, the belief in reincarnation, the law of karma, and the pursuit of spiritual liberation (Kos´cielniak, 2016: 12, 15). The remaining 20% of Indian society conflates several religious minorities, including Muslims who make up almost 15%. The others are Christians (2.3%), Sikhs (1.72%), Buddhists (0.7%), and Jains (0.37%), to name only the largest groups. Even though some practitioners are concentrated in particular regions of India (for example, Sikhism is the main religion in Punjab, whereas Christianity dominates in several north-eastern states such as Nagaland, Mizoram, and Meghalaya), followers of all the religions indicated above are scattered across the country. As highlighted earlier, labelling Hinduism as the dominant religion of India and perceiving all of its followers as a homogenous group, is – without a doubt – a serious oversimplification. What is then crucial for grasping and comprehending India’s heterogeneity is the existence and complexity of the caste system in which every Hindu is born with a particular set of dharmic privileges and duties. As Lijphart correctly observed, “the majority constituted by [the] Hindu population is in fact deeply divided, to such an extent, that no majority can be distinguished, and a country consist of minorities only” (Lijphart, 1996: 262).

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Finally, India’s linguistic diversity must also be taken into consideration. Paradoxically, it is English, the language of the colonisers, that is used today as the lingua franca by all well-educated Indians. Of the native languages, Hindi is the most widely spoken – it dominates in the Ganges belt in the north and is designated by the constitution as India’s official language along with English. In terms of the largest number of native speakers, it is followed by Bengali, Marathi, Gujarati, and Urdu, among the Indo-European languages, as well as Telugu, Tamil, and Kannada, among the Dravidian languages, to name just a few. Whereas Hindi is widely taught and spoken in northern India, all other languages have a regional character and keep a dominant position in the respective states and regions of the country.

The vision of the Congress Party At the dawn of independence in August 1947, India’s ruling elites faced innumerous political, economic, and social challenges, the most impending of which was to complete the unification process and to prevent and protect common people from communal violence. Indian communalism is based on the construction of religious or ethnic identities and the stimulation of communal violence between people who identify as the members of different groups. Given the ethnic, religious, and linguistic diversity of India, it is the key concept for describing the tension-related clashes and dissonances in Indian society. British India was torn apart into two countries: a secular Indian state meant to be based on the rules of inclusiveness, tolerance, and secularity, and Pakistan, a country designed for Indian Muslims, transformed into the Islamic Republic of Pakistan in 1956. The emergence of two countries led to the largest cross-border migrations of the 20th century which resulted in approximately one million casualties. Nevertheless, the young, fragile Indian democracy survived the postindependence turmoil and was well-grounded in 1950 by the proclamation of the constitution and the metamorphosis of the Dominion of India into the Republic of India. Independent India adopted the motto “Unity in diversity” which, on the one hand, was supposed to mirror its inclusive, tolerant character, and on the other, was believed to strengthen the common respect for political unity. Young independent India was inspired by a vision based on the teachings of Mahatma Gandhi (1869–1948) with their traditional, family- and spiritually-oriented character, and the political philosophy of Jawaharlal Nehru (1889–1964) which, contrarily to Gandhi’s worldview, promoted individualism and secularity. These ideas were to be implemented by federal polity (led by a strong national government and centrally planned economy in Nehru’s vision), secularism, free

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nationwide education, and the existence of an open society based on democratic rules such as the freedom of speech and religion (Mathew, 2015: 63). It should be stressed that Indian “secularism” has always had a specific meaning. As Adeney and Swenden noticed in their analysis, “secularism has to be understood as India’s pledge to apply an equidistant approach to the various religious communities, rather than as a means to separate state and religion” (Adeney and Swenden, 2019: 461). In India’s case, it would be more precise to then classify it as “multi-religiousness” or “religious tolerance” rather than referring to secularism per se, as defined by Western political thought. Even for thinkers like Gandhi, the idea of interreligious tolerance and equality was, in fact, “Hindu-centric”. As observed by Peter van der Veer, Gandhi agitated for the protection of cows (widely regarded in Hindu culture as sacred animals) among all Indians, regardless of their caste and religious background (van der Veer, 1994: 95–96). Although Gandhi sought to convince Muslims to give up consuming beef by persuasion rather than by force, this example proves that his pluralist nationalism was essentially Hindu-oriented. Finally, it should be underlined that the political vision of independent India was not based on religious identity but primarily on territory. After the British left, the Congress Party accepted the territorial legacy of British India and did not intend to make any geographical compromises. This stand motivated the military annexation of Hyderabad in 1948 and New Delhi’s uncompromised stance on Kashmir. In this context, it can also be explained why India – until today – has not wished to negotiate the border it shares with China. New Delhi has stood firm on its axiomatic position to defend the “sacred land of India” as indicated by the resolution issued after China’s attack in 1962 (Government of India, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, 1962: 4; Łuszczykiewicz, 2020a: 91–92; Łuszczykiewicz, 2020b: 147–148). Paradoxically, this “sacred land” had been defined by the British colonisers and its borders had never been confirmed in any bi- or multi-lateral treaty accepted by the authorities of neighbouring Tibet or China. In this regard, it is rather arduous to prove that Gandhi’s ahimsa (non-violence) was indeed considered by New Delhi as a guiding principle.

The political and legal mechanisms of independent India Even though India’s political and legal systems do not explicitly recall the postulates of consociationalism, some of the elements introduced in the Indian constitution of 1950 seem to correspond with and practically implement powersharing ideas. The federalism and constitutionally clear-cut division of competences and prerogatives between the Union and the states aims to maintain the balance

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between the centre and India’s regions as it gives more space for ethnic, religious, and linguistic minorities. However, the privileges of the Union practically allow New Delhi to impose its will on the states and control them to a certain extent. The most striking example of how the balance between central government and the states has been negatively affected is the overuse of the so-called President’s Rule which gives the centre the right to dismiss a state government and replace it with direct rule in the case of an emergency. In practice, the President’s Rule has often been activated by the central authorities if they wished to remove a state government controlled by a different party in order to organise new state elections which would give them a chance to win (Lijphart, 2012: 179). In his book Federal Government, K. C. Wheare concluded that the President’s Rule is what rendered India only “quasi-federal” instead of truly federal (Wheare, 1964: 28). One might then recapitulate that the rules of Indian federalism have been respected and followed only when a central government was satisfied with the outcomes. In terms of lawmaking, the Indian constitution is safeguarded from amendments which would strengthen the majoritarian regime at the cost of the minorities. For instance, some provisions of India’s constitution might be altered by regular majorities in both Lok and Rajya Sabha, whereas others require the absolute majorities of all members of the two houses. Apart from this, some provisions need two-thirds majorities followed by approval by the legislatures of half of the states (Lijphart, 2012: 209–210). In addition, India’s juridical system also bears some of the features of consociationalism as it is expected to protect the rights of minorities. The Supreme Court of India possesses extraordinary powers which reinforce the idea of judicial review and strong non-representative institutions to govern the federal structures. It is believed to guarantee the rights of minorities for the Supreme Court might always play the veto card against “crude” majoritarianism (Fischer, 2015: 7). In terms of the political and social rights of individuals, the constitution of India adopted two methods for defending minorities: first, it protects them from discriminatory treatment; and, second, it grants them positive rights, also known as affirmative actions (Carciumaru, 2018: 71). As a result, the Indian constitution permits positive discrimination in favour of those who are weak and disadvantaged because of their gender, caste, religion, or ethnic identity. By doing so, the constitution of India aims to rectify historical injustice caused by the sociocultural environment. Article 46 under Part IV of the Indian constitution promulgates that “The State shall promote with special care the educational and economic interests of the weaker sections of the people, and, in particular, of the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes, and shall protect them from social injustice and all forms of

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exploitation” (Article 46, Part IV of the Constitution of India, 1950). Since 1950, this mission has been implemented by a quota system, that is, the reservation of a certain number of government positions, college admissions, and elected seats at all levels for Scheduled Castes (SC) and Scheduled Tribes (ST). Initially, the Other Backward Castes (OBCs) which, according to the Mandal Commission, cover 52% of Indian society, were not included (Government of India, 1980: 57). It was not until 1980 and the publication of the research results and recommendations of the Mandal Commission that the need for extending quotas to the OBCs was finally recognised. Apart from caste-based quotas, other reservations can be scheduled based on gender and religion. Establishing the percentage divisions and executing them in practice is the responsibility of the state governments; as a result, the quotarelated rubrics and numbers vary across the country. In this matter, the transition from the British Raj to the Republic of India was least favourable for religious minorities as the separate electorate representation for Muslims, Sikhs, Indian Christians, Anglo-Indians, and Europeans – regardless of their social status – was abolished. However, it must be stressed that this resolve was supported by the Muslim representatives in the final debate of the Constituent Assembly which took place in May 1949 – the reservation of seats based on religious motives was rejected as contradictory to the fundamental principles of secularism (Lal, 2012). Today, some poorly-situated groups within religious minorities are categorised under OBCs, SCs and STs along with the Hindus. The reservation system remains one of the most controversial, divisive issues of India’s internal politics. It is used as a political tool to mobilise and strengthen communalist identities which often leads to protests and increases social antagonisms. Interestingly, it is not only the upper castes who happen to oppose a system in which they are excluded from the quota schemes and affected by other groups’ positive discrimination – there have also been cases when some groups have demanded a lower legal status in order to gain more privileges or have called for the rearrangement of the percentages ascribed (Deutsche Welle, 2016; The Hindu, 2021).

Languages in independent India Linguistic diversity played an important role in shaping postcolonial India, particularly regarding the administrative divisions. For instance, the State of Madras was divided into Tamil Nadu (the Tamil-speaking state) and Andhra Pradesh (the Telugu-speaking state) in 1953. It was followed by the States Reorganization Act, adopted in 1956, which allowed further administrative reforms and the emergence of several linguistically based states. Even though later some

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other administrative transformations followed, the Act of 1956 was the most extensive alteration in state boundaries in the history of postcolonial India. Even today, the unwritten status of Hindi as a “national” language arouses extreme controversies. According to the Report of the University Education Commission prepared in 1948–1949, “Hindi cannot claim superiority over regional languages”, as clearly expressed by the title of one of the report’s subsections (Government of India, Ministry of Education, 1962: 279). As was further explained, Hindi is considered as a language of the minority – “although a large minority” – and does not have any advantages over other modern Indian languages. Nonetheless, as a result of a scrupulous analysis in the search for the most ideal candidate for a federal language, the authors of the report explained that Hindi, the most widely spoken language of India, “has to fulfil this destiny”. Therefore, they recommended that Hindi should adopt both popular and internationally used scientific and technical terms which would make it “grow richer and fuller”. A similar attitude is mirrored in speeches by India’s first prime minister. In a speech delivered on 6 October 1955, Nehru recognised the problems related to the selection of a national language and the imposition of Hindi: “I know that there are enthusiasts for Hindi and for other languages who get so excited and place their claims so high that they naturally irritate others” (Nehru, 1958: 30). Moreover, the prime minister acknowledged the need for conducting all-India services tests and examinations in regional languages. At the same time, he expected the development of teaching Hindi in non-Hindi states and, inversely, introducing some other modern Indian languages in Hindi-dominated regions. However, Nehru insisted that it would be “unbecoming” for Indians to adopt English (a foreign tongue) as an official language and recapitulated that the allIndia language “has to be Hindi”. The Constitution of India of 1950 selected Hindi in Devanagari script as one of the two – apart from English – official languages of the Union (Article 343, Part XVII of the Constitution of India). However, the plans for introducing Hindi as a practically nationwide spoken language were not fulfilled. As a result, the Three Language Formula was enunciated by the government of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi (1917–1984) in 1968 and later reiterated in 1986. It designates Hindi, English, and a modern Indian language (preferably one of the southern languages) to be studied in Hindi-speaking states, and Hindi, English, and a regional language to be taught in non-Hindi-speaking states. However, just like the reservation system, education remains one of the prerogatives of the states. Unsurprisingly, not all of them have followed the centrally-imposed rules in principle. The most striking example is Tamil Nadu which has adopted a twolanguage policy as a result of which only English and Tamil have been taught in schools in this region.

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The vision of the BJP The uninterrupted domination of the Congress Party lasted until 1975 when Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, afraid of the prospects of losing power, introduced a two-year-long state of emergency. Afterwards, as a result of the 1977 elections, the first ever coalition government was formed at the national level. At the same time, it was also the first non-Congress national government, a coalition of several opposition parties. However, the coalition government did not complete the five-year term and had to yield to the Congress Party’s return. The first coalition government in India to successfully complete the whole five-year term was the one led by the BJP from 1999 to 2004. The Congress Party yet again reinstalled its cabinet in 2004 in another coalition that consisted of over a dozen political parties. Finally, in 2014, the BJP secured a majority on its own (even though it was a part of a coalition) and repeated this success in 2019. This paved way for Hindutva to become the mainstream political and sociocultural vision. In parallel with the political philosophy of Mahatma Gandhi, an alternative paradigm in the form of Hindutva had originated and evolved throughout the 20th century. It was popularised in the 1920s by Vinayak Damodar Savarkar (1883–1966). Derived from neo-Hinduism, Hindutva (which might be translated as “Hinduness”) is a concept of a specifically defined Hindu identity, according to which archetypical Hindus are supposed to recognise India (or, more precisely, the entire subcontinent, encompassing Pakistan and Bangladesh) as their sacred homeland.1 Most importantly, Hindutva calls for combating all foreign ideologies – from colonialism, through communism, to Islam. Interestingly, it accepts the so-called Indian religions – Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, and Sikhism – that is, all beliefs and philosophies that were born in the subcontinent (Kos´cielniak, 2013: 203–222; Sharma, 2002: 1–36). As Savarkar observed in his famous essay, “Hindutva. Who is a Hindu?”: (…) Christian and Mohammedan communities who, were but very recently Hindus and in a majority of cases had been at least in their first generation most unwilling denizens of their new fold, claim though they might have a common Fatherland, and an almost pure Hindu blood and parentage with us, cannot be recognized as Hindus; as since their adoption of the new cult they had ceased to own Hindu civilization (Sanskriti) as a whole [original spelling]. (Savarkar, 1969: 100–101)

As a result, in political and cultural terms, Hindutva exposes an anti-Muslim character. In its extreme form, it calls either for driving Muslims out of Indian soil, or for bringing the followers of Allah “back” to Hinduism, their “true” 1 “Akhand Bharat” is often paraphrased as “Greater India”, however, it might be translated literally as “Undivided India”.

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religion from which, as the Hindutva supporters believe, their ancestors had once converted.2 Hindu nationalism stimulated by Hindutva undermined the hegemony of Gandhi’s founding philosophy of the Congress Party in the 1980s and 1990s. Its political and armed wing has been constituted primarily by Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), an organisation established in 1925, deemed to be the mother party of the BJP (Jabbar, 2009: 85). The activities of parties which ground their ideology on Hindutva seem to conform to George Orwell’s (1903–1950) principle, “Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.” In other words, their aim is to gain and strengthen power through a coherent vision of Hinduism and Hindu culture (Udayakumar, 2005: 2). In his book Hindu Nationalism, History and Identity in India, Lars Tore Flåten explains that Hindu nationalism is responsible for promoting a demonised image of Muslims who are depicted as primitive, intolerant, and aggressive (Flåten, 2016: 97). As a result, the history of India since the arrival of Islam has been presented by Hindutva as the history of the Hindu-Muslim dichotomy; in a simplified version, it is believed to be the history of the struggle between good and evil. Having said that, it is hard to find an equally clear-cut, openly anti-Muslim agenda in documents promoting the BJP. Officially, the BJP is inspired by “integral humanism” (BJP, 2022b) based on Indian values and spiritualism, as opposed to Western ideas, represented by communism, individualism, and secularism “distorted beyond recognition” (BJP, 2022d). As one might learn from the BJP’s official website, “Unfortunately in India Secularism has been reduced to minority appeasement, that too at the cost of majority” (BJP, 2022d). According to the BJP, this alleged “appeasement” of minorities and “distorted” secularism were the consequences of India’s non-critical embracement of Western thought which is believed to have emerged as a result of a clash between the state and the church; as we are assured, such a clash has never taken place in Indian culture which has invariably demonstrated “equal respect for all religions” (BJP, 2022d). Furthermore: [the] Bharatiya Janata Party considers India as an ancient and eternal nation. The thought of India’s “cultural nationalism” is older than the West’s thought of “nationstate.” Indian culture has a glorious knowledge tradition, and we have to comprehend our future from this knowledge tradition. (BJP, 2022b)

2 As emphasised by Amalendu Misra, Savarkar began to recognise the impossibility of the coexistence of Hindus and Muslims in the 1930s, when the idea of creating a separate state for the followers of Islam emerged among Muslim politicians and activists. In his early works, Savarkar wrote primarily about the need to take joint actions to overthrow British rule which was to be made possible by an alliance of Indians of all faiths (Misra, 2004: 16–17).

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Even though the territorial legacy is, just like in the case of the Congress Party, one of the primary elements of the BJP’s philosophy, a sense of political unity in the historical perspective does not seem equally relevant. It is the “civilisational ethos of India” and the “civilisational continuity” that serve as a fundament for Modi’s “New India” (BJP, 2022c), or, rather, for “making India great again” (Mendis and Łuszczykiewicz, 2021: 77). Interestingly, however, “Hindutva”, an essence of the BJP worldview, does not appear in any of the informative sections on the organisation’s portal, even though it can easily be found in numerous speeches of the party leaders available in both English and Hindi. Similarly, it is absent in Prime Minister Modi’s political “Manifesto” of 2019 (BJP, 2022c). Although the BJP’s discourse is packed with Sanskrit terms deeply rooted in Hindu philosophy (dharma, artha, kama, moksha, etc.), it is explained that concepts and mottos such as “Ram Rajya” (the rule of Ram) or “Dharma Rajya” (the rule of dharma) should be taken as synonyms for ethical governance based on the rule of law of the Indian constitution, as they are not linked to any faith or way of worship (BJP, 2022d). Antipathy towards non-Indian religions, such as Islam or Christianity, is what the official BJP documents are consistently silent about. Not without relevance is the lack of recognition of the caste system injustice. In the BJP’s narratives, the fight with caste-related inequality is replaced by the concept of antyodaya – “the welfare of the last person in the queue” (BJP, 2022d). Even though the party’s documents invoke terms which point to the existence of a social pyramid, they must be interpreted not in caste- but in class-based categories. The BJP government’s actions under antyodaya are related to “pro-poor, pro-farmer and pro-rural sector policies” (BJP, 2022a). Evidently, antyodaya happens to be one of the key elements of the BJP’s programme: “All its policies are focused on the development of villages, and welfare of the poor, the farmers, the deprived and oppressed sections of the society with special efforts on empowerment of the youth and women” (BJP, 2022a). Together with the Indian – or, rather, the Hindu-centric nature of the ruling party’s agenda – the reorientation from the caste-related reservation system to a class-based social policy is a pivot for understanding the political, economic, and social motivations behind the BJP’s operations.

Political and legal mechanisms under the BJP Controversies related to the BJP’s breaches of secularism and religious equality seem to provide solid arguments for identifying the party’s politics as anticonsociational.

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In December 2019, the Indian parliament passed an amendment to the Citizenship Act which facilitates the granting of citizenship to refugees from Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Bangladesh (The Citizenship [Amendment] Act, 2019, No. 47 of 2019). The controversy is raised by the fact that it applies to Hindu, Sikh, and Buddhist refugees, as well as Jains, Zoroastrians, and Christians who declare that they had experienced religious persecutions in their countries of origin. Therefore, the list does not include Muslims who constitute the majority in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh. Noticeably, contrarily to the BJP’s logic, Islam is not a monolith and the followers of some of its factions and sects do face discrimination back in their home countries. It was the first law in the history of postcolonial India which openly violated the constitutionally guaranteed secularism and religious equality under the law. Even though protests broke out across the country, the authorities remained adamant; hundreds of people were arrested, including well-known social activists and critics of the government. Prime Minister Modi perceived the passing of the law as evidence of an “ethos of compassion and brotherhood” (Regan et al., 2019). However, many experts believe that apart from expanding the community of the party’s supporters by “importing” potential voters from abroad, the legislative action took advantage of anti-Muslim sentiments and effectuated the bolstering of the BJP’s position (Ganguly, 2019). Another good example of the current government’s anti-consociational stand is provided by its policy towards Kashmir. This historic region has been the subject of a territorial dispute involving three countries: India, China, and Pakistan. The Indian-controlled part of Kashmir, previously known as the special autonomous state of Jammu and Kashmir, was divided in August 2019 into two union territories devoid of special status and controlled directly by the government in New Delhi (The Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act, 2019, No. 34 of 2019). Expecting protests from the Muslim majority in Kashmir, the central authorities maintained an information and communication blockade in the region, taking the army out into the streets and cutting Kashmiris off from internet and telephone communication (Bhardwaj, 2019). One of the most striking examples of symbolic violence is the dispute over the north Indian city of Ayodhya. During the reign of the first emperor of the Muslim Mughal dynasty in the 16th century, a mosque was erected on the ruins of a Hindu temple. As many Hindus believe, the pre-existing temple was dedicated to the god Rama who had been born in Ayodhya. On 6 December 1992, incited by right-wing leaders, a crowd rushed towards the mosque and razed the construction to the ground (Gargan, 1992). As a consequence, anti-Muslim riots broke out across the country, resulting in 2,000 casualties. As part of the retaliation, anti-Indian riots erupted in neighbouring Pakistan and Bangladesh – many Hindu and Jain shops and temples were plundered and demolished.

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Although the Ayodhya case had remained in a vacuum for many years, in his manifesto of 2019 Modi promised that the government “will explore all possibilities within the framework of the constitution and all necessary efforts to facilitate the expeditious construction of the Ram Temple in Ayodhya” (BJP, 2022c: 36). On 9 November of the same year, the Supreme Court of India issued a historical verdict according to which the disputed land was to be given to a trust established by the government in order to rebuild the Hindu temple dedicated to Lord Ram. Additionally, five acres of land were to be accommodated in a different area for constructing a new mosque as a replacement for the one that was demolished almost three decades earlier (In the Supreme Court of India, Civil Appellate Jurisdiction, Civil Appeal Nos 10866–10867 of 2010). Following the Supreme Court’s decision, in August 2020 – amidst the COVID-19 pandemic – Prime Minister Modi3 participated in the ceremony re-erecting the temple dedicated to the god Rama (Kidangoor, 2020). Finally, it is worth stressing that the anti-Muslim agenda is implied in the legislation of over 20 Indian states which prohibit the slaughter of cows and enforce high penalties, including years-long imprisonment (Citizens for Justice and Peace, 2018; Government of India, Ministry of Fisheries, Animal Husbandry and Dairying, Department of Animal Husbandry and Dairying, n.d.). Moreover, the BJP crushed the practice of trading cows – in the past, it was common for Hindu farmers to sell unproductive cows to Muslim traders for meat and leather. The BJP’s ban has therefore affected both the Muslims and the poor, low-caste Hindu farmers. Unquestionably, activities affecting the rights and interests of religious minorities – particularly the Muslim community – harmonise with the BJP’s historical agenda. However, the party’s stance on the reservation system which, in general, aims to help low-caste Hindus, seems much more puzzling and not obvious. Indeed, as was earlier explained, based on the BJP’s official promotion documents, the party prioritises the elevation of those who are discriminated and suffer on a class basis, that is, because of their material status. At first glance, the BJP’s purely economic attitude seems justified, especially as over the last few years, India’s wealth disproportions have increased significantly. It is estimated that the top 10% of the Indian population holds 77% of the total national wealth (Oxfam International, n.d.). Moreover, 73% of the wealth generated in 2017 went to the richest 1%, while the poorest 67 million Indians saw 3 It is worth observing that the political experience of Narendra Modi seems to perfectly fit into an anti-Muslim agenda of the ruling party. He became the infamous chief minister of his home state of Gujarat in 2001; one year later, anti-Muslim riots broke out, during which a few thousand people died. The opposition accused Modi and the police of passiveness which was believed to de facto express the authorities’ support for Hindu fundamentalists (Business Standard, 2018).

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only a 1% increase in their wealth. However, an exclusively class-oriented perspective devoid of a broader social context would be incomplete and most misguiding. In comparison to their population share, upper caste groups are overrepresented among the richest, whereas the OBCs, STs, and SCs belong to the middle and bottom of wealth distribution. As encapsulated by the World Inequality Lab report, “The repercussions of past injustice towards lower castes are now becoming more visible with more information coming out in public” (Bharti, 2018: 29). This explains why the BJP government is so reluctant about the idea of a detailed caste census. The last national census that covered caste divisions and whose data has been published was carried out in British India in 1931 (Hutton, 1933). Another census which incorporated the caste issue was conducted 80 years later, in 2011. However, the caste-related data of the Socio-Economic and Caste Census (SECC) (Government of India, Ministry of Rural Development) has never been made public. The government of Prime Minister Modi, which released other census findings in 2015, explained that due to incorrect measurements and the lack of proper preparation, “the caste enumeration in SECC 2011 was fraught with mistakes and inaccuracies” (In The Supreme Court of India (Original Writ Jurisdiction), Writ Petition (Civil) No. 841 of 2021. Reply Affidavit on the Behalf of Respondent-UOI: 9). Consistently, in 2021, Modi’s government refused to collect data on caste identity (apart from SCs and STs) in a census postponed until 2022 because of the pandemic. As the central authorities explained in an affidavit filed in the Supreme Court: It is [sic] may be noted that while the preparation for the 1951 Census, the first after independence were under way, the Government of India had decided on the policy of official discouragement of caste. It was decided that in general, no race/caste/tribe enquiries should be made and such enquiries should be restricted to the Scheduled Castes and Tribes notified by the President of India in pursuance of Articles 341 and 342 of the Constitution.

The BJP’s position appears to be more comprehensible when analysed through the prism of the party’s anti-consociational policy which contests granting reservation seats to historically lower and discriminated parts of the society on a caste basis. Regarding the publication of the 2011 caste data, the affidavit contained a meaningful notice that “the details available in the record of the Census pertaining to castes is not reliable either for the purpose of any reservation, whether in admission, employment or elections to local authorities” (In The Supreme Court of India (Original Writ Jurisdiction), Writ Petition (Civil) No. 841 of 2021. Reply Affidavit on the Behalf of Respondent-UOI: 10). The BJP’s real intentions become even more apparent in a broader legal context. The government’s affidavit was a response to a petition filed by the

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authorities of Maharashtra which pleaded for publishing the 2011 caste census data as it would allow them to modify the reservation numbers for OBCs. Hence, it seems justified to assume that the BJP would not wish the actual numbers of lower caste members to be revealed because it would undermine its upper casteoriented agenda and force it to reconfigure the quota system which would affect the interests of Forward castes.

Languages of India under the BJP Introducing Hindi as a national language has always been one of the top priorities of the RSS-BJP as it mirrored the idea of “Hindi-Hindu-Hindustan”. Ever since Modi became the prime minister, he has been speaking in Hindi at official events, including foreign visits (The Economic Times, 2014).4 Similarly, the followers of Hindutva have used the superiorisation of Hindi as a tool for the country’s uniformisation and a weapon of violence against the cultural “Others”. Imposing a country-wide usage of Hindi as a national language would particularly affect the southern states which do not share the same cultural and linguistic characteristics of the Ganges belt. Noticeably, in the south of India, the BJP has traditionally had significantly lower support than in the north. Despite this, the central government’s actions in the field of education have been more nuanced as, so far, it has refrained from imposing Hindi as a compulsory language. In the draft of the National Education Policy (NEP) published in 2019, Hindi was mentioned 12 times, mainly in the context of the threelanguage formula: The three-language formula will need to be implemented in its spirit throughout the country, promoting multilingual communicative abilities for a multilingual country. However, it must be better implemented in certain States, particularly Hindi-speaking States; for purposes of national integration, schools in Hindi-speaking areas should also offer and teach Indian languages from other parts of India. This would help raise the status of all Indian languages (…). (Government of India, Ministry of Human Resource Development, 2019: 83)

Noticeably, in the final version of NEP released in 2020, Hindi was mentioned only once (Government of India, Ministry of Human Resource Development, 2020: 27). Most importantly, it was declared that neither Hindi nor any other language would be imposed on the states (p. 14). It was also assured that the choice of languages would belong to the states, regions, and students themselves, as long as at least two of the three languages would be native to India. In com4 Moreover, Modi’s government made some efforts to have Hindi recognised as one of the official languages of the United Nations (India Today, 2021).

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parison with the existing educational system, the only significant difference is that in the lower grades more attention should be paid to local and regional languages. Overall, the authors of the education reform trust that the intended development and application of Indian languages reflect the “need to promote multilingualism as well as promote national unity” (Government of India, Ministry of Human Resource Development, 2020: 14). However, it seems that all efforts to practically implement multilingualism at the central level are merely of a tokenistic nature. Examples of Hindi’s privileged position in the public discourse can easily be found: for instance, on the government-owned website where the draft of NEP was published, the “New Education Policy: Educate, Encourage, Enlighten” title is followed by a slogan written in only one Indian language: Hindi (“Make new education policy, knowledge, skills, and employment” (Government of India, Ministry of Education, c. 2020). Moreover, the BJP’s official website is only available in two languages – Hindi and English; so is Modi’s manifesto of 2019. These examples might be perceived as the manifestation of both practically and ideologically motivated dominance of Hindi. Above all, it is a rather clear indicator about the kind of voters the BJP is targeting for its political endgame.

Two different forms of non-consociationalism? In his “The Puzzle of Indian Democracy”, Lijphart (1996) claimed that the structure of the cabinet, which he believed to have comprised of various minorities, was one of the most salient exemplifications of India’s consociationalism. However, a detailed examination of the construction of Indian cabinets throughout the decades reveals a strikingly different picture. Adeney and Swenden (2019) analysed the representation of minorities in the cabinets of independent India until 2019. They found out that even though Hindus comprise 80% of India’s population, they have constituted more than 90% of recent cabinets. In contrast, Muslims have been the most underrepresented group, both under the Congress Party and the BJP. The disturbing trend is that the number of Muslims in high rank offices keeps dropping. One exception is provided by the Presidential Office, as four out of India’s 17 presidents so far have been Muslims. In turn, Sikhs have been over-represented in the army which can be explained by the colonial legacy of designating Sikhs as a “martial race” (Adeney and Swenden, 2019: 457–468). As evidence suggests, Hindus are not a cohesive, homogenous community. Therefore, special attention needs to be paid to the underrepresentation of particular Hindu groups. The OBCs, SCs and STs have been consistently underrepresented in senior executive positions despite the presence of legislative

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reservations. Concurrently, even though Forward castes are demographically a small group, they are greatly over-represented in high office, reflecting their dominant socio-economic position. The same disproportion applies to the office of the prime minister, which has always been occupied by a Forward caste Hindus, except for Manmohan Singh (a Sikh) and Narendra Modi, the first OBC prime minister. Adeney and Swenden argued that those two politicians came to power in the era of coalitions, proving that Indian politics became more inclusive in that period (Adeney and Swenden, 2019: 468). Arguably, the problem of underrepresentation can be observed not only regarding religious minorities and low castes, but also when it comes to representing the particular states of India. The shift from a one-party dominant system to a multiparty system has increased regional representation, particularly for the states in the south and the west of the country. However, some regions, such as the “Seven Sister” states in the north-east, remained highly peripheralised. These observations lead to the conclusion that it is the political or, more precisely, election-motivated pragmatism that has provided more space for consociational practices. However, the marginalisation of the Muslim community motivated by cultural nationalism and upper caste-oriented agenda, which premeditatively denies the role of historical caste injustice by covering it with wealth distribution issues, seems to remove some consociational ideas and practices from the BJP-led India. Nevertheless, it must be observed that it was the Congress Party which strengthened the role of a central government against the state authorities, annihilated the religious-based quota system, and established the reservation mechanisms originally limited to SCs and STs. Yet, the analysis of broadly defined motivations behind both the Congress Party’s and the BJP’s actions presents a distinction between the quintessentially non-consociational character of the vision and practice of the Congress, and the actively anti-consociational programme dictated by cultural nationalism. In other words, in the Congress era neither ethnic and religious minorities, nor a majority comprised of lower, discriminated castes were guaranteed a truly proportional share in state structures, education, and the public jobs market. However, in the BJP epoch, the very same groups have become openly neglected and often deprived of their “minority” rights as a consequence of the Hindutva-motivated agenda.

India’s anti-consociational dynamics Throughout the last 70 years, the religious minorities, low castes, and representatives of less powerful states have been significantly underrepresented in high office, regardless of whether it was the government constructed by the

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Congress Party or the BJP. Yet, it must be stressed that there is a significant difference between the two types of non-consociationalism presented by the Congress and the BJP. The lack of measures which would implement equality and proportional power sharing is what characterised the Congress Party, whereas deliberate, ideologically driven activities which lead to crushing minorities (particularly Muslims) by robbing them of power in the first place, followed by denying social equality and limiting freedom of belief and religious practice, is what has characterised the BJP era. Likewise, the BJP’s vision is based on territorial and cultural unification (as a replacement for the Congress-proposed unity), aimed at blurring the problem of caste inequality by substituting it with economic orientation (from which the less wealthy members of the Forward castes would also benefit). Above all, whereas the removal of religiously-based quotas by the Congress was motivated by the rules of secularism, the BJP’s position clearly stems from the Hindutva framework. Consequently, in most general terms it appears justified to conclude that India was indeed a rather nonconsociational state in the Congress Party’s vision, legal framework, and practice; however, it is becoming an increasingly anti-consociational state under the leadership of Prime Minister Modi.

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Lal, M. (2012, June 12). Reservation Based on Religion is Anti-Constitution. Vivekananda International Foundation, https://www.vifindia.org/article/2012/june/12/reservationbased-on-religion-is-anti-constitution (accessed: 01. 01. 2022). Lijphart, A. (1977). Democracy in Plural Societies: A Comparative Exploration. New Haven and London: Yale University Press. Lijphart, A. (1996). The Puzzle of Indian Democracy: A Consociational Interpretation. American Political Science Review, 90 (2): 258–268. Lijphart, A. (2008). Thinking about Democracy, Power Sharing and Majority Rule in Theory and Practice. London and New York: Routledge. Lijphart, A. (2012). Patterns of Democracy. New Haven and London: Yale University Press. Łuszczykiewicz, A. (2020a). Kulturowe dziedzictwo Indii w Pie˛ciu Zasadach Pokojowego Współistnienia i jego rola w relacjach chin´sko-indyjskich (1954–2014) [Cultural Heritage of India in the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence and Its Role in China-India Relations (1954–2014)]. Kraków: Ksie˛garnia Akademicka. Łuszczykiewicz, A. (2020b). The China-India Border Conflict: Prospects for War and Peace in the 21st Century. In: Olga Barbasiewicz, Marcin Grabowski and Ewa Trojnar (eds.). Security Dilemmas and Challenges in the 21st Century Asia (141–156). Berlin: Peter Lang GmbH. Mathew, G. (2015). Religious pluralism and political accommodation in India. In: Ferran Requejo, and Klaus-Jürgen Nagel (eds.). Politics of Religion and Nationalism: Federalism, Consociationalism and Seccession (50–65). London and New Yok: Routledge. Mendis, P. and Łuszczykiewicz, A. (2021). Biden Administration and Taiwan – Can the Emerging U.S.-India Alliance Counterbalance China in the South China Sea and Southeast Asia? 展望與探索: Prospect and Exploration, 19 (11). Misra, A. (2004). Identity and Religion. Foundations of Anti-Islamism in India. New Delhi: SAGE. Nehru, J. (1958). Emotional Integration, Speech at Bangalore, October 6, 1955. In Jawaharlal Nehru’s Speeches, vol. 3, 1953–1957. Delhi: Publications Division, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting. Oxfam International (n.d.). India: extreme inequality in numbers, https://www.oxfam.org /en/india-extreme-inequality-numbers (accessed: 01. 01. 2022). Porter, J. (2012, March 5). Federalism and Consociationalism in India, https://www.e-ir.i nfo/2012/03/05/federalism-and-consociationalism-in-modern-india/ (accessed: 23. 11. 2021). Regan, H., Gupta, S. and Khan, O. (2019, December 17). India passes controversial citizenship bill that excludes Muslims. CNN, https://www.cnn.com/2019/12/11/asia/india -citizenship-amendment-bill-intl-hnk/index.html (accessed: 25. 11. 2021). Savarkar, V. D. (1969, first edition 1923). Hindutva. Who is a Hindu? https://ia800609.us.a rchive.org/19/items/hindutva-vinayak-damodar-savarkar-pdf/hindutva-vd-savarkar.p df (accessed: 02. 01. 2022). Sharma, A. (2002). On Hindu, Hindusta¯n, Hinduism and Hindutva. Numen, 49 (1). The Hindu (2021, January 30). Protests demanding separate quota for Vanniyar community. The Hindu, https://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Coimbatore/protests-demanding-se parate-quota-for-vanniyar-community/article33699763.ece (accessed: 01. 01. 2022). Trzcin´ski, K. (2018). What Is Power Sharing? Consociationalism, Centripetalism, and Hybrid Power Sharing. Studia Polityczne, 46 (3).

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Kamila Junik

Identity narrative and power distribution in Sri Lanka

On 6 January 2022, the leaders of seven Tamil political parties of Sri Lanka issued an official letter to India’s Prime Minister Rajendra Modi,1 seeking help in implementing the provisions ensured by the 13th Amendment to the Constitution. The seven-page letter, dated 29 December 2021, refers to the Government of India’s active engagement in the situation of Tamils for the past 40 years, and indicates difficulties in executing a long-lasting solution “that satisfies the legitimate aspirations of the Tamil speaking peoples to live with dignity, selfrespect, peace and security”. India’s interference to support Tamil minority’s interests in Sri Lanka began in 1983 and resulted in the signing of the Indo-Lanka Accord four years later. It was believed to put an end to the conflict between the two major communities, that is, Sinhalas and Tamils, by the devolution of authority to Provincial Conflicts and enabling the latter to get a just share in sociopolitical life. But, as has also been recounted in the letter in detail, there were several obstacles to fulfilling the promises, which led to escalation of the conflict, despite repeated declarations from Sri Lankan politicians and pushes from international representatives. Moreover, as we read further: … successive Sri Lankan governments have not only failed in full implementation of the provisions in the Constitution with regard to devolution and parity of status to the Tamil language, but have unilaterally reacquired powers and institutions from the provinces, which continues to date. In addition, lands belonging to the Tamil speaking peoples are continuing to be grabbed by the State under various pretexts, with a view to radically alter the demography of the North and East. (Letter to PM Modi, n.d.).

1 The letter addressed to PM Modi was signed by: R. Sampanthan of the Tamil National Alliance, Mavai Senathraja of the Ilankai Tamil Arasu Katchi, Justice C.V. Wigneswaran of the Tamizh Makkal Kootani, A. Adaikalanathan of the Tami Eelam Liberation Organization, Dharmalingam Siththadthan of the Democratic People’s Liberation Front, K. Premchandran of the Eelam People’s Revolutionary Liberation Front, and N. Srikantha of the Tamil National Party. The full text of the letter (without attachments) has been published online (Letter to PM Modi, n.d.).

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India’s prime ministers (both Manmohan Singh and Narendra Modi) have voiced their concern about the situation of Sri Lankan Tamils on many occasions. Especially after 2009, when the civil war ended, there were expectations for constructive dialogue and shared governance, which could be similar to the model of Modi’s “cooperative federalism” (BBC News, 2015). The call for India’s interference by Tamil party leaders aims to draw attention to the fact that there is still no collaboration between the major political agents in Sri Lanka, which leaves the Tamil minority as a victim of majoritarian rule. The rhetoric of victimhood can be found in a large body of scholarship on Sri Lanka’s sociopolitical situation. As pointed out by Nira Wickramasinghe, many works tend to interpret the problem one-sidedly, concentrating on the victimhood of Tamils “without taking into account the transformation of Tamil nationalism from a victim’s voice to a voice of power and force where the Tamil is no longer ‘paraiyah’ Tamil but a ‘Puliththamil’ (Tiger Tamil)” (Wickramasinghe, 2014: 266–267). This idea, however, has been developed in A. J. Wilson’s book, which starts with the author stating that “this nationalism evolved gradually, as a defensive reaction to events” (Wilson, 2000: 1). In the process, two phases may be observed: first – political, second – military, resulting in the civil war. In the first phase, an attempt had been made to address the needs and problems of various groups within the Tamil community, and constructing the idea of “Tamil-ness” as a unifying narrative. Drawn by this idea of unity, Tamils sought their rights to an equal share in governing the state. Yet, after gaining independence from the British in 1948, the Sinhala majority has concentrated political power in their own hands and disregarded other ethnic groups’ demands for equal participation in legislation and administration. In the reaction to this, and amidst anti-Tamil pogroms, there was a shift from political mobilisation to military, which might also be seen as a turn from victim (prone to violence) to power (exercising violence) (DeVotta, 2000: 55–76).

Identity, ethnicity, and power Horowitz, in his seminal book on ethnic conflicts argues, that “in divided societies, ethnic conflict is at the center of politics”. Ethnic division, he continues, poses “challenges to the cohesion of states, (…) strains the bonds that sustain civility and is often at the root of violence (…)” (Horowitz, 2011: 12). Moreover, he explains, borrowing from Lewis Coser, that “conflict is a struggle in which the aim is to gain objectives and simultaneously to neutralize, injure, or eliminate rivals” (Horowitz, 2011: 95). Ashutosh Varshney has taken this idea, claiming that:

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… the decolonized states were new, but ethnic, or communal animosities – sometimes also called national animosities – were old and, therefore, deeply historically rooted. The primordialism of ethnic groups was a stronger bond and a more powerful motivator of human conduct than the pull of civic ties being forged by the new states. (Varshney, 2009: 280)

In this light, Tamil grievances and complaints are not only the result of negligence and reluctance in implementing the 13th Amendment to the Constitution and other legal provisions. They are, from a larger viewpoint, a part of a designed politics, aimed at sustaining social and political division based on discrimination towards minorities. Hence, “Tamil insurgency”, as Nira Wickramasinghe writes, “is a result of the process of political mobilisation and institutional decay in a majoritarian state” (Wickramasinghe, 2014: 267). Here, as Varshney agues, ethnicity is manipulated strategically by the leaders and, in this way, very often (ab)used by the state to gain political power, especially in multi-ethnic societies (Varshney, 2009: 282). The present power distribution paradigm has been inherited from the colonial era, where the British, in accordance with their “divide and rule” philosophy, favoured minorities over the majoritarian Sinhalese community. In the postindependence era, a reverse model gradually took over the old pattern, with the majority ruling over the other groups.2 The current conflict may be approached from the primordialist or modernist point of view, that is, either as present in ancient times and preserved in the cultural memory of the group through language and religion or, as a relatively modern construct which took its shape in the colonial times (Wickramasinghe, 2014: xiii–xiv). Sinhala nationalism, based on inequality and power exercised over the weaker by the privileged, has taken an exclusivist form. Its dominant narration builds around the notion of a “primordial home”, suggesting an ancient claim over the land, “the place ordained by the Buddha for his teaching to flourish” (Rajasingham, 2019: 654). The cultural construction of identity, founded on a mythical image of its own origin and history, as well as on a fixed ground, has left no place for assimilation, integration, interchange, and, as opposed to political identity, proves problematic in organising administration and governing a modern multiethnic society. One of such issues concerned the language of education, which took the form of a Sinhala-only provision, excluding not only Tamil but also English as a link-language. This eventually led to restricted access to schooling and entrance exams to universities and administrative jobs (Rampton, 2011: 259). The linguistic nationalism, which emerged as the aftermath of the one-language 2 Tamils are the largest minority; according to the 2012 Census, they constitute approx. 11%. The current census may be found: http://www.statistics.gov.lk/pophousat/pdf/Population/p9p8% 20Ethnicity.pdf (accessed: 12. 02. 2022).

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policy, had a larger consequence. It helped create an imbalance and disparities within society, with the Sinhalese people being educated, well settled, and having well-paid jobs. This, again, resulted in further self-legitimisation of their claims to Sri Lanka. Soherwordi has described this process by stating that: … in developing as the dominant identity, the Sinhalese have created for the Tamils the opposing identity of a maltreated and rebellious minority which, in turn, has aided in consolidating the position of the Sinhalese as the supreme heirs to Sri Lanka. In short, the roles that the Sinhalese and the Tamils have taken – but not necessarily chosen – within the political sphere have enabled the development of the identity of the opposite. (Soherwordi, 2010: 47)

As we may observe, this imposition of identity is exerted mutually, according to the other’s political aim and the need to validate a populist narrative. The Sinhala majority claim power over the whole of Sri Lanka and legitimise a unitary state, with their own language and religion, with the ambition to ensure that the country remains undivided. Similarly, Sri Lankan Tamils demand their right to sovereignty in their homeland, over which they reigned in the past (Perera, 2001). In this way, the “Tamil nationalist ideology is a mirror image of Sinhala nationalist ideology, seeing the north and east as ‘belonging’ to Tamils, with the other groups there being ‘guests’” (Rajasingham, 2019: 654). Similarly, both strategies of power sharing, as part of a wider debate in Sri Lanka, have been opposed or not fully accepted. In the unitarian model, a unitary state is created, in which the central government grants power to the regional authorities, but nevertheless still controls their activity and is able to regain this power on any occasion. In the federal set up, the competences of the elected central administration as well as the regional government are equal, as they share political power between themselves. The first model was opted for by Sinhalas and rejected by Tamils; the second, quite the opposite as the Tamils welcomed it, yet it was unacceptable to the Sinhalas. Since independence until the present, there have been attempts to shift from a unitarian to federal mode of distribution and exercising of power, “the pursuit, but consistent failure, of attempts at managing these ethnic tensions through forms of consociational ethnic accommodation, power-sharing and devolution frameworks (including discussions of potential federal models)” (Rampton, 2011: 245). For the last six years, several efforts have been made to reformulate the constitution and reframe the model of governance, but achieving a consensus amidst exclusivism, discrimination, and disparity is a difficult task to fulfil.3 The list annexed to the aforementioned letter to PM Modi mentions several unsolved issues named as “matters of urgent 3 Developments of this process have been scrutinised by Rajasingham (2019). Another context to the issue is the changing political views of both Sinhala and Tamil parties, a new alliance, as well as the lack of unity and divisions within the Tamil community.

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serious concerns to the Tamil speaking people in Sri Lanka”. Despite the fact that necessary provisions have been recognised in the form of legal documents, in reality they have not been implemented or sanctioned. Sadly, it proves that “on both sides intraethnic party competition had produced a politics of outbidding on ethnic demands that made reconciliation difficult” (Horowitz, 2011: 357).

Sinhalese nationalism: Towards ethnocracy The Tamil struggle “then and now, has the character of a quest for sovereignty founded on the principle of self-determination” (Wickramasinghe, 2014). They strive for autonomy – cultural, institutional, and territorial – which can be traced in the history of Sri Lanka. During the British era, Sri Lankan Tamils preserved their own individual identity, and – as argued by A. J. Wilson – “maintained a group consciousness as a separate community and civilisation with their own language, culture and territory, and the Hindu Faith as their distinguishing characteristics” (Wilson, 2000: 1). Both conflicting communities, Tamils and Sinhalas, are descendants of immigrants from India, who appeared on the island at about a similar time. But this is where the similarities end. In the common view, Sinhalas are Buddhist and the progenies of Aryans, the superior ethnic group, which should justify their supremacy and leadership in Sri Lanka. The myth of origin (Roberts, 2001: 65–96), no matter how difficult to prove with historical facts, is the basis of Sinhala nationalism and predestined them to rule over the whole country. The conflict resulting from an exclusivist view on their own community and nation could be considered in terms of a clash of two separate civilisations, inhabiting the same island, yet living on distinct territories (north and north-east regions populated by Tamils, southern by Sinhalas).4 The majoritarian Sinhalas claim their sole right to rule Sri Lanka, against the multicultural and multi-ethnic character of the state. In fact, as observed by de Silva (2008: 626), in Sinhalese the words for “nation”, “race”, and “people” are almost synonymic, which means that the very idea of a multiracial or multicommunal nation is difficult to comprehend. This is particularly so when accompanied by a vision of Sri Lanka as a Sinhala-only land with a distinct language and religious symbolism. This is what Horowitz meant when he wrote that “in divided societies, ethnic affiliations are powerful, permeative, passionate, and pervasive” (Horowitz, 2011: 12). Indeed, the identity narrative of the given group is created on the fringes of historical data, popular myth, and cultural symbolism, and emotional attachment, and as such becomes spiritus movens of the group’s in4 Even after migrating to the other parts of Sri Lanka, dominated by Sinhalas, Tamils did not assimilate and have maintained their separate identity (Wilson, 2000: 1).

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terests, in opposition to another group within the same sociopolitical frame. Consequently, Sinhhala nationalism serves an image of Sri Lanka “as a space in which the aspirations of the Sinhala Buddhist people and the unitary state and the integrity of the island territory form a profound nexus” – “with no signs of a political solution based on power-sharing forthcoming” (Rampton, 2011: 261– 267). In his paper, DeVotta has accurately defined the current Sri Lankan political scenario as “control democracy [where the] majority group eschews ethnic compromise with a state’s minorities and instead solely controls the levers of power – in the attempt to create a Sinhalese ethnocracy” (DeVotta, 2000: 57). The Sinhala identity, despite its cultural and territorial roots, is of a weak status and under constant threat by the “Other”. The Tamils in this narration are considered as a “guest” and may be contemporary tolerated within a larger frame by the lawful “host” of the state, who will be reluctant to share its space and devolve power. This threat induces the need for the protection of their identity, directed against the other (guest/hostile) community. In this light, Tambiah (1996) describes Sinhalas as the “majority with minority complex”, which requires the presence of “the Other” – an enemy – to legitimise the violence. The mechanism of the “minoritarian majority” and the fear of losing its predestined position have been justified by the fact that Sinhalas perceive Tamils as part of a larger, global Tamil community, especially since the Tamils repeatedly seek India’s help in solving Sri Lanka’s internal matters.

The Muslim community as the new “Other” The emergence of Sinhala ultra-nationalism is directly related to the fight against the Tamil Tigers. Recently, it also began to target Muslim and Christian communities. For almost a decade we may observe instability in Sinhala-Muslim relations, resulting in riots, violence, and growing reluctance. In 2012, one of the main agents of the radical nationalism of the Sinhalas has been established, namely the Bodu Bala Sena (BBS). The movement, founded by Galagodaaththe Gnanasara (Shirley, 2015: 11–14), comprises Buddhist monks, and is extremely hostile towards the Muslim community. Their ideology and performance are mainly based on the idea that the island’s unity and purity are under threat from foreign powers, thus it needs to be protected and safeguarded by all means. Shirley (2015) argues that the concept of Sinhalese identity is defined in relation to “the other”, or rather against “the other”, who threatens its stability, tradition, heritage, and religion. At its base there is danger, transformed into the necessity to protect the land and its people. Since 2009, when the LTTE (The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam) was defeated and the long-existing threat from the Tamils

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removed, there was an ideological problem in defining their own identity, with no “other” to be against. Thus, the concept of a threat posed by Muslims became the key point of the BBS’s demagogy. As Shirley (2015: 2) writes, “By constructing a new interpretation of the identity narrative that targeted this new threat in place of the LTTE, these nationalists are attempting to remake existing violent Buddhist nationalism into a form suitable for the post-war era.” The BBS was involved in many radical undertakings against religious minorities. For instance, in the year of its conception, the group organised demonstrations against the destruction of a Buddhist temple in Bangladesh, and against an allegedly planned mass conversion of Buddhists to Christianity. At the same time, they were very active on social media, which helped to build a community of supporters and/or audience. However, they came to prominence during the 2014 anti-Muslim demonstrations, which occurred in the aftermath of an assault against a Buddhist monk and his driver. Despite the fact that the police held captive three suspects, the BBS staged rally against Muslims in various places; there have been many victims (murdered, injured, and displaced) on both sides. Rohan Gunaratna (2018: 3) notes that “the growing anti-Muslim sentiment among BBS and other sections of Sinhalese ultra-nationalists, the intermittent attacks and sporadic vigilante violence eventually precipitated into full-blown communal clashes” (Gunaratna, 2018: 3). The 2018 riots resulted from a provocation by Sinhalese youth and were aimed at targeting Muslims, their shops, restaurants, and mosques. Since the police alone could not handle the situation, the Sri Lankan armed forces had to be deployed, followed by the imposition of a state of emergency. A year later, after suicidal bombers attacked in several places during Easter, the government adopted policies which were directed against the Muslim minority. These included a ban on wearing a niqab or abaya (International Crisis Group, 2021). Alan Keenan, the senior consultant for Sri Lanka at the International Crisis Group, explains that for many Sri Lankans, the Easter bombings were a realistic confirmation of the growing threat of “Islamic extremism”, and as such legitimised implementation of more severe terrorism law, justified arresting people for having a Quran at home or any other type of discriminatory behaviour. The leader of the BBS, the militant Buddhist monk Gnanasara, has been accused of staging rallies, spreading communal hatred, and moral responsibility for the attacks and killings. He has been convicted for several accusations and sentenced to six years in prison, but he received a pardon from the president. However, on 28 October 2021, President Rajapaksa appointed him to head a task force on legal reforms (including changing the Muslim Marriage Bill) which caused dismay and protests. Earlier in 2021, the government announced new regulations concerning religious radicalism and violent extremist ideology – “without evidence that any

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significant number of Muslims in Sri Lanka posed a threat to security”, Keenan commented (International Crisis Group, 2021). Gunaratna, concluding his analysis of Sinhala-Muslim riots, suggested that in order to avert communal violence, a three-pronged strategy should be adopted, which comprises of: 1. a legal framework which would criminalise hate speech and agitation to violence; 2. politicians willing to punish extremist groups and their leaders; 3. building and sustaining structures of cooperation and harmony on every level of governance (Gunaratna, 2018: 4). In the light of subsequent events (Gunaratna published his report in April 2018) it is evident that not only that these measures had not been implemented, but also that the current policy of the Rajapaksa government seems to rely on otherism and (ab)uses the feeling of threat as an argument for increased militarisation and further discrimination of the Muslim minority.

Power concentration with no share As discussed above, the “Sinhale nationalist conceptions of their own identity are built around various interpretations of a particular ‘identity narrative’” (Shirley, 2015: i). These interpretations are fluid and contextual, allowing for reinterpretation and incorporation of various aspects of the myth of origin. In the contemporary era, after becoming a republic, Sri Lanka’s politics and administration have been concentrated in the hands of the majority, that is, the Sinhalese. Unequal distribution of power and discrimination of the Sri Lankan Tamil community led to extremism, violence, and eventually, to a civil war. During this time, over and again the Tamils claimed their right to be considered equal, especially after the 13th Amendment to the Constitution was passed in 1987, which guaranteed official status (with Sinhalese, and English as a link-language) to the Tamil language and stated decentralisation of power in favour of the provinces, yet has never been fully implemented. A complaint issued by the Chief Minister of the Northern Province in 2016 only confirms this. Similarly, the peace agreement/ceasefire negotiated in Norway in 2002 was jeopardised soon after Mahinda Rajapaksa won the elections in 2005. The defeat of the LTTE in 2009, which brought an end to a long and draining conflict, left unsolved matters such as responsibility for massacres of Tamil civilians. Furthermore, if we take a look at the political scene before and after 2009, we clearly see two Sinhalese parties dominating the parliamentary and presidential elections: the United National Party and the Sri Lanka Freedom Party. Although Tamils actively participate in today’s political life, they did not succeed in forming a united, firm front, which reflects the divided nature of the community.

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The recent victory in the 2019 elections saw the Rajapaksa family regain power.5 In an analysis for The New York Times, Mujib Mashal calls the new government “a family firm”. Indeed, whereas Gotabaya serves as the country’s president, his three brothers and two nephews hold top positions in the government, including that of prime minister. This demanded some constitutional amendments, which not only legitimised his relatives’ entry into politics, but also strengthened the powers of his office, giving him liberties in legal doings without taking an opinion from the government (Mashal, 2021). According to Alan Keenan, the only recipient of benefits – symbolic or tangible – is the Rajapaksa family; they are not only reluctant to apologise, but recurrently attempt to silence opposing voices, harass dissidents, and block investigation into war crimes. Repeated demonstrations in 2021 have all been suppressed (using the pandemic as an official excuse) – more proof that freedom of speech is under serious threat (Jayasundara-Smits, 2022). The UN Human Rights Council has intervened several times already; it is worth noting that one of the reasons was enforced cremation of deceased Muslims because of COVID-19. The economic condition of Sri Lanka has been deteriorating and rigorous restrictions imposed on movement and tourism during COVID-19 have just made it worse. A few years before the Rajapaksa family regained power, Sri Lanka entered another phase of Sinhala nationalism and dominance. As already mentioned, a change was made in the content and context of the Sinhala identity narrative, although the mechanism remained the same: the majoritarian group feels threatened – demographically, culturally, economically, and politically – by a minority and feels compelled to protect its identity and heritage from impurity and loss. Scrutinising the concept of “societal security”, Bush and Keyman write that: … complete security – that is, the complete absence of threat or danger – even if it were possible, would destroy a necessary precondition for politicised group identity. If the absence of threat challenges a group’s sense of identity… the construction of threat may also consolidate identity. (Bush and Keyman, 1997: 312–313)

In this way it seems essential for the Sinhala identity to produce a valid threat and induce the danger-driven condition. As the last elections showed, the bombings during Easter 2019, launched by militants linked with ISIS, have been skilfully framed into a constant threat posed by the Muslim community in general. This demagogy helped Gotabaya Rajapaksa win the presidential election a few months later, but has also sewn a seed of doubt towards the community, whose demands for things as simple as labelling halal food has been received as exclusivist. In this 5 Rajapaksa’s Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna, or SLPP, won 145 seats in the 225-member parliament to hand Mahinda the prime ministership.

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scenario – with Muslims depicted as “the dangerous Other”, and fractioned Tamils searching for support outside their own country – it is very unlikely that the Sinhala majority would share its political power in the coming years.

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Rajasingham, S. (2019). Federal or Unitary? The Power-sharing Debate in Sri Lanka. The Round Table, 108 (6): 653–665. Rameez, A. (2019). Second minority in Sri Lanka: Genesis and current crisis. International Journal of Advanced and Applied Sciences, 6 (4): 53–58. Rampton, D. (2011). “Deeper hegemony”: The politics of Sinhala nationalist authenticity and the failures of power-sharing in Sri Lanka. Commonwealth & Comparative Politics, 49 (2), 245–273. Roberts, M. (2001). The burden of history: Obstacles to power sharing in Sri Lanka. Contributions to Indian Sociology, 35 (1): 65–96. Rogers, J. D. (1994). Post-Orientalism and the Interpretation of Premodern and Modern Political Identities: The Case of Sri Lanka. The Journal of Asian Studies, 53 (1): 10–23. Shirley, B. M. (2015). Violence, Identity, and Alterity. Post-War Rhetoric of Sri Lanka’s Bodu Bala Sena. Unpublished thesis defended at Victoria University of Wellington. Smith, A. D. (1996). Culture, Community and Territory: The Politics of Ethnicity and Nationalism. International Affairs (Royal Institute of International Affairs 1944-), 72(3): 445–458. Soherwordi, S. H. S. (2010). Construction of Tamil and Sinhalese Identities in Contemporary Sri Lanka. Pakistan Horizon, July, 63 (3): 29–49. Sreenivasan, M. (2018). The abaya and the tensions in Sri Lanka’s east. The Hindu. https:// www.thehindu.com/news/international/fear-of-the-abaya/article24116604.ece (accessed: 15. 04. 2022). Suryanarayana, P. S. (2013). A ‘Power-Sharing’ Moment in Sri Lanka. ISAS Insight, No. 228/ 30, September 2013. Tambiah, S. J. (1996). Leveling Crowds: Ethnonationalist Conflicts and Collective Violence in South Asia. Berkeley: University of California Press. Thowfeek, M. I. M. (2019). Negotiating the Sri Lankan Muslim Identity through Choice of Clothing: Emerging Trends and Tensions. Sri Lanka Journal of Sociology, 1 (1): 151–168. Varshney, A. (2009). Ethnicity and Ethnic Conflict. The Oxford Handbook of Comparative Politics. New York: Oxford University Press. Wickramasinghe, N. (2014). Sri Lanka in the Modern Age: A History. New York: Oxford University Press. Wilson, A. J. (2000). Sri Lankan Tamil nationalism: Its origins and development in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. London: Hurst. Wolff, S. (2010, November). Approaches to Conflict Resolution in Divided Societies. Ethnopolitics Papers (Online), No. 5 https://www.psa.ac.uk/sites/default/files/page-files/E PP005_0.pdf (accessed: 22. 02. 2022). Yusoff, M. A., Sarjoon, A. and Abdul Wahab, A. R. (2016). State-Building, Power-Sharing Discourse, and Political Autonomy of Minorities within Ethno-Nationalist Gloom in Sri Lanka. Journal of Politics and Law, 9 (1): 88.

Agnieszka Kuszewska-Bohnert

Consociationalism as a power-sharing solution in Pakistan. Obstacles and prospects for a democratic transformation

With a population estimated at approximately 227–238 million1 in 2021, the Islamic Republic of Pakistan (IRP), a strategically located South Asian nuclear state, is characterised by a fragmented, violence-prone political culture, a deeply divided society, and incessant (and often intentionally escalated) ethnonational, communal and sectarian tensions that were never properly addressed by either civilian or military decisionmakers. Pakistan is a postcolonial federation, dealing with long-standing problems of nation-building and incessant efforts to achieve national integration. In its multisegmented, diverse society, various identities should be regarded as decisive in shaping the political narratives at local, provincial, and federal levels. Among these, the ethnonational and religious (communal, sectarian) discourses seem to be the most important, and this analysis will focus on them. It is mainly along these lines that power structures are established and used as leverage in political tussles and the materialising of self-perceived interests by different groups. Ethnic identities are related mainly to the local/ provincial discourses of marginalisation and often materialise in grievances against the federal authorities and the sociopolitical and economic domination of the Punjab province. Religious narratives are of more of a federal character, as they often go beyond the provincial level; these include communal/sectarian tensions with the perceived exclusion and persecution of Pakistani minorities, including the Hindu, Christian, Shia, and Ahmadiyya communities. Markedly, even if these grievances have mostly regional specificity, for example, the SunniShia sectarian tensions in Gilgit-Baltistan, they are exacerbated by the centre (demographic engineering allowing Punjabi Sunnis to settle there). Pakistan’s ethnic groups include: 44.7% Punjabis, 15.4% Pashtuns (referred to in Pakistan as Pathans or Pakhtuns), 14.1% Sindhi, 8.4% Saraiki, 7.6% Muhajirs, 3.6% Balochi, and 6.3% others. Officially, the country is inhabited by 96.5% Muslims, including 1 The numbers vary depending on the source. See: Pakistan Population (2021), CIA World Factbook (2021). As of December 2021, Pakistan is the fifth most populated country in the world. Pakistan Population (2021).

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85–90% Sunnis and 10–15% Shias2). Religious minorities (mainly Christians and Hindus3) comprise approximately 3.5% of Pakistani society (CIA World Factbook, 2021). Since 2018, the IRP has had a civilian government, led by Imran Khan representing the ruling party, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI). The genuine power in constructing the prerogatives of foreign and, to a large extent, domestic policies, rests primarily with the military establishment, referred to as a “Deep State” (involving the military/intelligence establishment). Notwithstanding some reforms, at the time of writing (late 2021), more just power-sharing arrangements are still highly insufficient. They face overwhelming challenges, originating in Pakistan’s ideological and sociocultural specificity, where key decision makers, domestically and internationally, project the ideological characteristics of the state, intermingling them with defence objectives (politicised, increasingly radical Islam as the ideological framework for statehood and sovereignty, which must be enduringly confronted with asymmetrical relations with India). Such circumstances, combined with tumultuous interactions between the centre and the provinces, have a profound, multidimensional impact on the country’s political system and the domestic decision-making process. Political instability is historically inherited and can be termed endemic; yet during the 75-year history of Pakistan, it has been exacerbated by various factors. It is against this backdrop that Pakistan’s policies must be investigated: upholding the unequal power structures with their highly hierarchical features and engaging in polarising campaigns rather than reforming the system into a more stable, inclusive and effective one from the perspective of the average Pakistani citizen. The IRP is therefore a sui generis example of a multisegmented society, diversified inter alia in terms of religious, ethnic or linguistic affiliations. Pakistan’s provinces and regions, deprived of this status (vide infra), are inhabited by people with diverse or overlapping identities, with a strong religious and ethnonationalist component. Moreover, Pakistanis constitute a class society, highly 2 Although Muhamamd Ali Jinnah was a Shia Muslim, this minority is regularly subjected to sectarian violence. For example, the anti-Shi’a armed group Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ) has many times Shia Hazaras (religious and ethnic minority) who live in Quetta, the capital of Balochistan. Also Pakistani Taliban (Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan) claims responsibility for killing Pakistani Shia Muslims. 3 According to the last national census, conducted in 2017, Pakistan is inhabited by 1.27% Christians, 1.73% Hindus, 0.09% Ahmadis (Ahmadi Muslims are legally and constitutionally regarded as non-Muslims in Pakistan and subjected to multi-dimensional persecution), 0.41% scheduled caste and 0.02% others. Sindh province has 7% Hindu minority. Citing the ‘special statis’ of Pakistani-administered Kashmir, the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics did not provide the information about Gilgit-Baltistan and Azad Jammu and Kashmir. See: Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (2017). PaJK’s population is estimated at approximately 6.5 million people (4.5 million in AJK, 2 million in GB).

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hierarchical, where belonging to the social class determines the status, economic interests and position, and political choices. Establishing a durable political organisation that would bring benefits to diverse groups in political circumstances where cleavages were institutionally exacerbated and politicised is particularly challenging. Consequently, Pakistan constantly struggles with persistent political turmoil and power-sharing patterns that lack adequate representation, nurture the interests and privileges of the narrow ruling elites, and legalise (or neglect) systemic inequalities.

Consociationalism and Pakistan Analysing and developing the theoretical approaches and empirical references to studying the power-sharing models in the rapidly evolving world is a vital contribution to a general debate on the prospects for democratic transitions in multisegmented societies which are characterised by persistent instabilities and conflict-prone narratives. In his famous theory, which substantially inspired the comparative studies on political systems, Arend Lijphart refers to consociationalism as a method for providing basic political stability in multisegmented societies, torn by internal cleavages and conflict-prone narratives. The term “consociational democracy”, was introduced and developed by him in the research articles published in 1968 (Lijphart, 1968) and 1969 (Lijphart, 1969), and many subsequent publications discussing power-sharing problems in comparative terms. Initially, it mainly referred to the Western European consociations but later served as a useful framework to discuss power sharing in non-European states, such as Lebanon, Malaysia, Iraq,4 South Sudan, etc. Lijphart contends that political culture and social structure are two factors empirically related to political stability, but he emphasises the third important criterion, particularly crucial for such states, the behaviour of the political elites. The leadership should be ready to work on the political consensus and capable of mustering a certain degree of social support, which enables them to introduce the earlier established political arrangements; elite cooperation could therefore deliver political stability. Lijphart argues that leaders can engage in competitive narratives that reinforce tensions, or try to achieve internal stability by “making deliberate efforts to counteract the immobilizing and unstabilizing effects of cultural fragmentation”. The underlying philosophy of Lijphart and other consociationalists is anchored in proportionality and based on the key pillars of inclusion, representation, and power sharing. 4 See for example the analysis of Iraq’s consociational arrangements: McGarry–O’Leary (2007: 1–29).

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Gabriel A. Almond and Sidney Verba (1963) refer to belligerent leaderships with very limited preparedness to communicate and compromise, such behaviour of state actors resulting in permanent instabilities and political turmoil; the success of consociationalism as a method of solving conflicts largely depends on the ability of the representatives of a multisegmented society to cooperate. In other words, in a successful consociational democracy, the elites are capable of accommodating divergent interests, participating in concerted initiatives with “subculture elites” aimed at improving the stability and cohesion of the system and avoiding the risks of political fragmentation (Lijphart, 1969: 211–212, 216). In societies deeply divided along religious, ideological, linguistic, cultural, ethnic, or racial lines, majority rule can turn undemocratic and even violent because certain communities (ethnic, religious) are systemically excluded from the political process and denied access to power. Consequently, they may lose their allegiance to the regime or, as in the case of some groups in Pakistan (for example, some Balochi or Pashto nationalists), repeatedly put such adherence into question. The system which rejects or institutionally curtails pluralist features, in which certain minorities/groups feel marginalised, persecuted, or discriminated against, is particularly prone to disintegration and remains besieged by an endless cycle of domestic instabilities. In terms of political arrangements, such fragmented systems require more than a simple majority rule as it does not suffice in times of severe crises, which regularly re-escalate in societies with limited political stability, multidimensional divisions, fragile and unresolved issues. While analysing majoritarian democracies, Arend Lijphart (2008: 112) argues that majority rule as a component of genuine democracy works better in relatively homogeneous societies where major parties do not differ much in their policy outlooks. He rejects the majoritarian model of democracy as potentially unsuccessful in deeply divided societies, as it concentrates political power in the hands of the majority. Instead, he endorses the consensus model, that “tries to share, disperse, restrain, and limit power in a variety of ways”. Pakistan’s specificity with its security dilemmas and India-centric obsessions requires a deeper investigation of power-sharing-related configurations, going beyond domestic dynamics. For this purpose, Lijphart’s classical consociational theory is supplemented by the approach of John McGarry (2019: 551), highlighting that “the external actors have played a much broader role in both the underwriting and the undermining of consociations” and “consociational performance is often intricately linked to the external regional and geopolitical arenas in ways that classical consociational theory did not conceive of, and this has crucial relevance for understanding the performance of recent consociations and the prospects for future ones”. Consequently, studies on current consociational arrangements should be expanded by adding the external dimension,

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security and self-determination, and it undoubtedly refers to Pakistan, which is engaged in unresolved conflicts with its direct neighbours, pursuing its territorial quests vis-à-vis India-administered Jammu and Kashmir, engaging in multidimensional patron-client relations with China. These external factors directly impact power configurations and political management within Pakistan. Consequently, its political processes must be contextualised within the framework of the persistent domestic and international challenges of the state.

Historically inherited narratives and the political culture of Pakistan There is a direct causal link between Pakistan’s turbulent past and its current power-related configurations. Therefore, it is impossible to understand the patterns of permanent political instabilities and democratic setbacks without a brief reference to the essential role of the founding ideology of Pakistan and the political circumstances that accompanied its development, shaping political discourses during the 75 years of its existence. The underlying sociopolitical dimensions, pertaining to the geostrategic specificity and political ambitions of the leadership on the eve of the end of the colonial era in India, led to the bifurcation of British India and materialisation of a separate state project. As a consequence, specific correlations between social structure and political culture were inherited from British India (divide and rule policy, with its deliberate politisation of communal hatred), which was later further moulded by the partition of the subcontinent and politics in the formative years of sovereign Pakistan. Pakistan was created after India’s partition along Hindu-Muslim lines to address the grievances of certain milieus among Indian Muslims who led the campaign “Islam in danger” about the alleged marginalisation and persecution of Muslims if they were to live in a Hindu-dominated India. Muhammad Ali Jinnah, who popularised a two-nation theory, which argued that Muslims and Hindus are fundamentally different nations, became a leader, symbol and chief maker of Pakistan and its nation-building efforts at the time of the state’s inception. The establishment of a new state brought, as it turned out, a very specific outcome – on the one hand, a seemingly largely homogeneous state, carved out especially for Muslims (albeit still with significant minorities after the partition), which was expected to bring stability and peace; on the other hand, Pakistan was immediately besieged with a political tussle, which included the clash between Islamic radicals and the proponents of a moderate Muslim state, centre-province rivalry, escalation-prone sectarian tensions, and, last but not least, a gradual encroachment of the military establishment into political affairs.

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Jinnah, referred to as Quaid-e-Azam (“Great Leader”), became the first Governor General. His short rule (until his death on 11 September 1948), with his dominant position in all political decisions, presiding over cabinet meetings (and not giving this task to the prime minister), uncompromising attitude towards all who dared to question the official narrative in the name of imposing the “one nation spirit”, heralded the undemocratic patterns of power distribution. In the speech delivered during a rally in Dhaka on 21 March 1948, confirming Urdu as a national language (although he barely spoke it), in negligence of the separate Bengali cultural and linguistic identity, Jinnah emphasised: “anyone who tries to mislead you is really the enemy of Pakistan”. Although the declared aim was to establish an inclusive system with a high degree of provincial autonomy, the political realities turned out to be far from these pledges. Furthermore, the problem of military intervention in politics through coups d’état has plagued Pakistan since its early decades with the first army rule imposed in 1958. Pakistan’s persistent struggle to establish a stable democracy must be viewed as an intrinsic feature of its 75-year-old political culture, deeply embedded in the formative ideology of the state and its emergence as what could be called a “splinter state”, which defected from British India and faced the challenge of conceptualising and implementing its political arrangements. Pakistan’s unique political characteristics were related to the fact that its central ruling elites consisted overwhelmingly of migrants from India (referred to as muhajirs5), who were connected to indigenous inhabitants mainly by one factor: Islam. The newcomers, mostly Urdu speakers, settled in regions culturally, linguistically, and ethnically unfamiliar to them. Their political domination resulted in divisive discourses and rivalries between the migrant-controlled centre and the provinces dominated by locals, and became a major structural hurdle for successful devolution of power through federalism or decentralisation. The inequitable distribution of resources has exacerbated tensions between the provinces and the centre since the inception of Pakistan (Adeney, 2012: 539). Migrant-led political structures (with the then central government in Karachi) shaped the country’s domestic dynamics and political power sharing along non-representative lines, with the leading role of the executive; the interests of those in power were projected as tantamount to the interests of the state. The centralisation tendencies with the rejection of provincial autonomy were materialised by the One Unit policy in the western wing of Pakistan (the two parts of Pakistan, geographically separated from each other by India, were often referred to as “wings”; the eastern wing comprised the province of East Bengal). In 1955, the Pakistani government merged the West Pakistan provinces into one united province to counterbalance the position of the eastern wing, which made 5 It is an Arabic word meaning migrant.

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up more than half of Pakistan’s population, in the National Assembly. This decision stood in profound contradiction to the idea of provincial autonomy and was vociferously contested (for example, in Sindh) as aggressive centralisation and an attempt to erase local cultures, identities, languages, etc. The One Unit scheme, which was finally dissolved in 1970, severely damaged interstate interactions by alienating the provinces and at the same time bolstering the discourses of disenfranchisement at the subnational level. Another key problem was the growing power of the Punjab province. The capital city shifted first to Rawalpindi in the early 1960s, then to Islamabad, after its construction was finalised in 1966. Mohammad Waseem appositely contended that local political ambitions and sociocultural identities were thwarted by what could be referred to as “Punjabi imperialism” or the “Punjabisation” of the state, the “identification of the state in Pakistan with the Punjabis”. This process contributed to the exclusion of the ethnic groups inhabiting other provinces (especially Sindhis, Balochis, and Pakhtuns), led to the emergence of politics of ethnic identity in all non-Punjabi communities, intensified and even militarised the ethnic conflicts in the country (Waseem, 2002: 4536–4537). For example, Balochistan, the most marginalised province, was regarded as a peripheral area by successive Pakistani governments which resorted to using force (including military operations) against the locals rather than negotiating political solutions for the persistent socio-economic problems (Khan, 2007: 126). The years of the military rule (the mostly Punjabibased army) further upgraded the role of the privileged structures within the army and the bureaucracy. To some extent, the Pakistani system bears the characteristics of centralistic authoritarianism with a lack of adequate representation and systemic support for the already marginalised groups and regions. Ethnic and religiously motivated tensions and protracted power rivalries at different levels undermined political cohesion (Markusse, 1997: 77), exacerbating political turmoil and distrust among different segments of Pakistani society. Regional separatism rooted in the sense of systemic injustice became an inseparable element of the Pakistani sociopolitical landscape, which decisively contributed to the escalation of tensions and ultimately resulted in the civil war, which ended with Pakistan’s territorial disintegration in 1971. Confronted with genuine sociopolitical and economic grievances, the two-nation theory failed to sustain territorial integrity. Political cleavages and power struggles related to ethnic identities became an incessant characteristic feature of Pakistan’s political reality. After the 1971 disintegration, the province of Punjab, already enjoying privileged status since the rise of the Punjabi-based army to power in Pakistan in 1958, further bolstered its position in Pakistan’s domestic affairs. In Pakistan, the narratives of exclusion are multilayered and refer to the grievances of minorities and to centre-provinces asymmetries in the distribution of power and resources. The systemic inequalities are related to the political,

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legal, and administrative differences in the way its territories are governed. Markedly, the Constitution of the IRP (passed in 1973 and since then many times amended) in Article 1 stipulates that the territories of Pakistan comprise: a) the provinces: Punjab, Sindh, Balochistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa; b) the Islamabad Capital Territory; and c) “such States and territories as are or may be included in Pakistan, whether by accession or otherwise” (The Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan). The provinces are incorporated in the constitutional system and their inhabitants are represented at a federal level. The territories mentioned in paragraph c comprise Pakistani-administered Jammu and Kashmir (PaJK): Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) and Gilgit-Baltistan (GB). Through the Ministry of Kashmir Affairs and Gilgit-Baltistan, Pakistan exercises complete control over the territories that are treated for all practical purposes and interests by Islamabad as an integral part of Pakistan’s territory, but are held suspended in a legal limbo (no seats are allocated to the representatives of AJK or GB in the National Assembly6) when it comes to the rights of PaJK residents. According to Pakistan’s official narrative, this state of affairs is caused by the unresolved Kashmir dispute with India and Pakistan’s persistent territorial claims vis-à-vis Indian-administered Jammu and Kashmir. Therefore, geostrategic objectives and historically inherited claims determine the Pakistani domestic power-sharing model, with concrete political rights that are provided or not to its citizens, depending on the region they live in. Although certain elements of power-sharing solutions, based on consociationalism, were implemented in Pakistan during the 74 years of its existence, the challenges related to ethnonational, sectarian tensions, bolstered by inequalities and segmentation of the society, were never properly addressed. Power shifted recurringly between the army and civilians. Interestingly, although it has become a characteristic feature of Pakistan’s domestic politics that key political leaders are elevated to power with the support of the army, civilian-military interactions are characterised by permanent distrust and rivalry. This was particularly reinforced after 1979, when the civilian leader Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto was executed on the order of the then military dictator, General Zia ul-Haq. State-supported Islamic radicalisation, which was exponentially exacerbated by Zia’s regime, led to structural radicalisation that was implemented in state institutions, strengthening discriminatory laws (the infamous blasphemy laws), and targeting the persecution of minorities. It greatly reduced the chances of a successful power-sharing transformation. Additionally, the mullah-military (Haqqani, 2016) nexus has gained profound influence over domestic affairs, political culture, and social order.

6 See: Articles 51 and 59 of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan.

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Pakistan’s political elites and post-2008 power-sharing configurations: Systemic injustice or inclusive federalism? The sociopolitical cohesion of Pakistan remains to a large extent forced rather than negotiated; certain specific correlations between social structure and political culture have been inherited from the rough colonial past, with systematic sociopolitical and economic deprivation of the marginalised segments of society. Despite some reforms, the power-sharing model in Pakistan remains highly exclusivist and successful transformation faces profound challenges with the gradual erosion of democratic norms and enhanced authoritarian leanings, combined with politicised religious radicalism. This dynamic originates in the security-related objectives defined by the key decision makers, who project the ideological features of the state domestically and internationally. Islamic nationalism is intentionally bolstered as a non-negotiable framework of statehood and the guardian of sovereignty, which have to be enduringly confronted with the asymmetrical fragility vis-à-vis India. It is against this backdrop that Pakistani decision-making patterns and structural divisions must be investigated: as the pillars upholding the hierarchical power structures with the intentional polarisation and deprivation are aimed at controlling fragile areas. The IRP’s parliament consists of a 342-member National Assembly and a 104member Senate. Of the 342 seats, 272 are filled through direct elections in singlemember districts, 60 are reserved for women, and ten are provided for nonMuslim minorities. In the Senate, each provincial assembly elects 23 members. Pakistan has a multiparty system, which, at least theoretically, provides a potential framework for a consociationalist power-sharing system. The political scene was traditionally dominated by the two major parties: The Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N). This feature was particularly noticeable in the 1990s, when both parties exchanged power following short tenures. They have never established a ruling coalition, their interactions are largely based on staunch political rivalry and cooperation with the army, when it was politically (albeit for a short term) beneficial. Certain elements of the institutional decentralisation of power are present at provincial levels, which have local governments. Many smaller parties participate in the elections and are represented in the parliament and provincial legislatures, yet the most important political leaders, at particular times holding power, typically enjoy the support of the unelected participants of the domestic political process (the military establishment). Since 2008, the IRP has experienced two major power transitions. First, from the General Pervez Musharraf ’s army rule to civilian control under Nawaz Sharif from the PML-N in 2008. Since then, the army has not directly ruled in Pakistan.

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In a bid to strengthen the federation-based character of the state, the constitution (18th Amendment) of 2010, introduced some vital changes to the system. By changing the name of the North West Frontier Province to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, the amendment paved the way for the reorganisation of the provinces along ethnolinguistic lines, yet it did not provide sufficient empowerment and representation to certain systemically disenfranchised groups. H. Bhattacharyya (2021: 1) refers to these changes as a quasi-revolutionary devolution for the provinces. Second, in 2018, what could be termed as a thirdparty civilian transition took place, which elevated to the power at the federal level another political player, the PTI. The rise of the PTI led to partial deescalation of the PPP-PML-N antagonism; these two actors of Pakistan’s political scene became seemingly more cooperative after Imran Khan was elevated to power. Time will show if they are capable of burying the political hatchet and coming up with more power-sharing initiatives; the history of political compromising in a bid to uphold privileges provides limited hope for such chances. The democratic transition in Pakistan faces another challenge: the lack of trust in state institutions and a purported lack of understanding among the common people of how democracy should function. Furthermore, the authorities and the Islamic clergy regularly project Western values as inconsistent with Pakistan’s social and ethical values. The “liberals” are vilified and projected as “anti-national”. As a result, a combination of autocratic leanings with a positive approach towards dominating leadership and religious conservatism seems to be the driving force in the political thinking of the majority of Pakistanis, yet, with a substantial minority endorsing a more pro-democratic approach. According to a 2013 Pew Research poll, 29% of Pakistanis unconditionally accept a democratic government, while 56% would prefer a strong leader instead. Sharia should be an official law of the state according to 84% of Pakistanis; 84% claim that religious judges should decide in family and property disputes, and 76% say that apostates should be executed, but concern about religious conflict is high among Pakistanis; 58% consider it a big national problem. Sunni-Shia tensions are considered a very big problem by 34% of Pakistanis (Pew Research Center, 2013: 114, 117).

International ramifications and power sharing There is a substantial correlation between Pakistan’s power-sharing setbacks and the international ramifications of their persistent security-related challenges. Throughout the decades, domestic vulnerabilities were augmented by Pakistan’s permanent security dilemmas with India and its largely asymmetric relations with its main allies. The unresolved conflict with India, projected by Pakistan as

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its arch enemy, manifests itself inter alia in belligerent, communalised narratives with religiously motivated nationalism being the key pillar of state-led mass mobilisation. It also impacts intergroup hostility and persecution of religious minorities residing in Pakistan, which experience direct violence by mob lynching, destruction of property or temples, forced conversions, hate speech, etc. The anti-minority rhetoric, which rose significantly in India under the nationalist administration of Narendra Modi, supported by far-right Hindu organisations, provides an excuse for the increased intimidation of minorities in Pakistan. India-centrism remains a key component of its policies. Pakistan has never abandoned its revisionist posture and its image has been tarnished by long-term support for Islamic proxies, waging jihad in Indianadministered Jammu and Kashmir (IaJK), particularly in the Muslim-majority Kashmir Valley, and pursuing its “strategic depth” agenda in Afghanistan. To materialise its goals, Pakistan has always sought powerful allies; during the Cold War, it was primarily the United States, then the role of China exponentially rose. Currently, Pakistan continues to be placed on the “increased monitoring list” (the so-called Grey List) of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), a Paris-based UN watchdog that deals with terror financing, for not doing enough to clamp down on the activities of UN-designated terrorist groups and to stop money laundering. Pakistan’s current political dynamics are intensely influenced by its Chinese ally, with whom relations are propagandistically projected as “deeper than oceans, higher than Himalayas”. Their multidimensional cooperation, which includes the China–Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), the expected flagship project of the Belt and Road Initiative, may have a profound impact on Pakistan’s power-sharing system. There is a risk that the CPEC may bolster the imbalance between civil and military establishments in Pakistan, as China, investing in fragile and marginalised regions, recognises the Pakistani Army’s multidimensional engagement as an essential condition for the project to succeed (Kuszewska and Nitza-Makowska, 2021: 232–233). The increased presence of the security apparatus in restive areas fuels the hostility of residents against both the central establishment and the Chinese and bolsters disenchantment narratives. For example, in the port city of Gwadar7 in Balochistan, the poorest province of Pakistan, which at the same time has most of the resources, protests erupt regularly against what locals consider persistent sociopolitical and economic exploitation and disenfranchisement imposed by the Punjabis; they complain 7 The deep-sea port and its adjacent special economic zone in Gwadar are under 43-lease management to a Chinese state-owned China Overseas Port Holding Company, which benefits from huge tax exemptions that Pakistan offers to Chinese firms that participate in the CPEC projects. Kuszewska–Nitza-Makowska (2021: 232).

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about the shortage of water and electricity, tight security measures that affect their daily lives. Local fishermen accuse Chinese trawlers of illegally fishing in the area. Balochi separatist groups, such as the Balochistan Liberation Army, accuse Chinese of exploiting Balochistan’s mineral resources; they attack Chinese nationals and institutions (for example, the consulate in Karachi) (Baloch, 2021). Popular protests in November and December 2021 (against Chinese wine factories in the area and coastal real estate development projects) led by the Islamic cleric Hidayat-ur-Rehman, the Balochistan secretary general of the Jamaat-eIslami party, ended by signing a deal with the government on 16 December, which promised, among others, to ban illegal trawling in territorial waters and reduce the number of security check posts.8 Under Chinese influence, connected with the CPEC traversing strategically fragile regions, the Pakistani authorities debate about granting provincial status to Gilgit-Baltistan, which remains in protracted legal limbo, and at the same time is rigidly politically and economically controlled by the central authorities. It would signify a major departure from Pakistan’s long-term stance on the Kashmir issue, according to which the legal status of the Pakistani-administered part of Kashmir is temporary until the settlement of the conflict with India (which Pakistan interprets as the wresting of Kashmir from India). It can be argued that authoritarian characteristics and disregard for equality and human rights are likely to be reinforced in Pakistan under increasing Chinese influence.

Conclusion The power-sharing transition in Pakistan remains an unmet challenge, and the country faces the risk of sliding into radicalisation and autocratisation. Political appeasement towards the hawkish elements of the domestic political scene has led to the situation where the state is beset with sectarian conflicts, increasing Talibalisation, and remains at loggerheads with India. Cooperation with China and projects related to the CPEC in marginalised regions evoke protests among the local population and accusations of being non-transparent and serving 8 Ayesha Siddiqa, a renowned Pakistani researcher, appositely expressed doubts that the decisionmakers will indeed implement the pledges. She emphasized that they were mostly interested in ending the long protests and Abdul Quddus Bizenjo, the Balochistan Chief Minister, was caught on camera distributing money among the protesters to bribe them. ‘Like the British East India Company of the past, the Chinese companies and real estate developers have little interest in the local fisherfolk, who, in any case, are viewed as a menace for development of large real estate projects for rich investors in Pakistan and abroad’, she argued. Siddiqa (2021). This case serves as a perfect exemplification of complex power related abuses and various interests of domestic and foreign character that directly influence the narratives of exclusion.

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mainly the interests of the Punjabi leadership. It enhances the sense of disenfranchisement and nourishes fragmented group identities and local narratives that highlight the exclusion. Furthermore, the role and credibility of civilian authorities in providing good governance is largely limited due to the army’s unabated incursions into politics. The alleviation of security dilemmas by renouncing territorial claims and resolving the conflict with India is highly unlikely in the foreseeable future. Power-sharing arrangements should involve decentralisation combined with more sociopolitical recognition of regional identities and guarantee that the institutions protect the minorities against sociopolitical disenfranchisement and safeguard their political participation. With its prolonged setbacks in power sharing, the IRP is yet another example that confirms the enduring relevance of consociationalism in multisegmented societies, with its key prerogative being the systemic inclusion of communities and individuals.9 Conversely, Pakistan’s post2008 democratic transition and three consecutive direct elections (2008, 2013 and 2018), which provided the transfer of power between civilian governments, did not facilitate democratic change by integrating diverse groups and introducing a more inclusive policies which would better recognise the interests of minority/ marginalised groups. Both the PML-N-led administrations led by Nawaz Sharif and the PTI-led government of Imran Khan failed to transform Pakistan’s Indiacentred revisionist policies, and did not manage to sufficiently curb the activities of Islamic radicals. In October 2020, the PML-N and PPP, the two major political parties, which constitute the opposition to the PTI-led government, formed the Pakistan Democratic Movement against Imran Khan, whom they consider to be an army-appointed leader. Time will show whether these key political forces will be able to engage in long-term cooperation with the prospect of participating in a grand coalition and managing the consensus-oriented system with maximum support from different segments of society. The persistent lack of adequate proportional distribution of privileges and resources among different segments of the society, with structural marginalisation and rigid centralised control over the regions regarded as strategically crucial, are the key hurdles to a consociational, power-sharing system. The lack of the ability of key decision makers to compromise further delays the introduction of pro-democratic settlements; otherwise, consociational arrangements simply do not work. Therefore, it will be challenging to introduce a successful transition as long as the key decision makers in Pakistan’s politics are unwilling to compromise and pursue a more inclusive position oriented towards power sharing. Currently, Pakistan, with its weak civilian government in political turmoil, is facing the risk of sliding into authoritarianism rather than transforming its po9 See the conclusive remarks of McGarry (2019: 552).

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litical system into a stable democracy. Political uncertainty about its future prevails, while the scenario of more direct army rule cannot be excluded. To avoid further fragmentation and chronic instability, political consent based on a decentralist paradigm with a systemic, more inclusive diffusion of power has to be worked out. Consociational solutions in Pakistan pose a serious challenge, but it is necessary to introduce them in order to improve the internal situation. They should be introduced simultaneously at two levels: cross-national (with reference to religious, ethnic minorities inhabiting different parts of the state) and provincial (with reference to diverse groups inhabiting particular regions), and should be accompanied by de-escalation of regional conflicts and management of the relations with key external allies and rivals. In the case of Pakistan, as in societies torn by cleavages, the major challenge is to avoid the situation where the potential transition is short-lasting; consequently, there is a need to consolidate powersharing-oriented political processes in order to maintain peace in the longer run. The rejection of majoritarian one-party governments with centralised power and implementation of the consociationalist approach instead, may bring an effective power-sharing model in deeply divided societies provided that the system is based on certain pillars of consociational democracy. If we adjust these prerogatives, enumerated by Lijphart (2008: 42–43) to Pakistan’s specificity, they could include: (1) a grand coalition administration that comprises representatives of all the major ethnic and religious groups from all regions of Pakistan, including PaJK; (2) genuine reforms aimed at the development of restive, impoverished regions, providing sociocultural autonomy for them with legal and institutional guarantees; (3) the decentralist paradigm as a key pillar of the power-sharing political culture that takes into account Pakistan’s specificity and all its social vulnerabilities; (4) proportionality and transparency in political representation and civil service appointments to avoid corruption and discrimination; (4) a minority veto with respect to vital minority rights and autonomy; (5) a new political forum engaging the key stakeholders, who reconceptualise the patterns of mitigating intra-Pakistani hostilities; (6) a realistic plan which would include the constitutional protection of the multisegmented society against the state’s discriminative legislation and institutional cooperation at the federal and provincial level to alleviate divisions; (7) promotion of constructive interactions between the groups which will mobilise them to reduce the existing divisions; and (8) robust confrontation and curbing of the activities of violent groups and divisive religious leaders, who attack minorities and promote radical narratives. Political cooperation between the largest parties in Pakistan poses a major challenge as, historically and currently, the rivalry between key civilian leaders (in recent years, Nawaz Sharif and Imran Khan, previously also the Bhutto

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family) has been regularly used by the powerful “Deep State” to reshuffle the political cards according to its own interests. Self-interest and the corruptionprone attitudes of the leadership have also adversely affected the development of democratic structures and people’s trust vis-à-vis the institutions. A consociational democracy in Pakistan could solve many of its problems, but its genuine implementation is likely to be confronted with a plethora of obstacles. One of these is the necessary deradicalisation of political narratives, school curricula, and certain legal arrangements which have contributed to the persecution of minorities, such as the blasphemy laws. The effectiveness of the federal system should be reflected at the provincial level with legal, political, and socio-economic arrangements that result in a situation where the multilayered benefits of staying within the federal structures outweigh the risks connected with separatism and belligerence. The orientation towards a decentralist paradigm with its federal prerogatives should be pursued in a manner which does not pose a threat to the territorial integrity of the state.

Bibliography Adeney, K. (2012). A Step Towards Inclusive Federalism in Pakistan? The Politics of the 18th Amendment. Publius, 42 (4): 539–565. Almond, G. A, Verba, S. (1963) The Civic Culture. Political Attitudes and Democracy in Five Nations. Princeton–New Yersey: Princeton University Press. Ayres, A. (2003). The Politics of Language Policy in Pakistan. In: M. E. Brown and Sˇ. Ganguly (Eds.). Fighting Words Language Policy and Ethnic Relations in Asia. Cambridge– London: The MIT Press, pp. 51–80. Baloch, S. M. (2021). Protests in Pakistan Erupt Against China’s Belt and Road Plan. The Guardian, 20. 08. 2021. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/aug/20/water -protests-in-pakistan-erupt-against-chinas-belt-and-road-plan (accessed: 29. 12. 2021). Bhattacharya, H. (2021). Federalism in Asia. India, Pakistan, Malaysia, Nepal and Myanmar. Second edition. Oxon–New York: Routledge. Bogaards, M. (2019). Consociationalism and Centripetalism: Friends or Foes? Swiss Political Science Review, 25 (4): 519–537. CIA World Factbook (2021) Pakistan. People and Society. https://www.cia.gov/the-world -factbook/countries/pakistan/#people-and-society (accessed: 28. 12. 2021). The Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, http://www.pakistani.org/pakistan /constitution/ (accessed: 30. 11. 2021). Financial Action Task Force (2021). Jurisdictions under Increased Monitoring – October 2021, https://bit.ly/3cVYhHK (accessed: 30. 10. 2021). Haqqani, H. (2016). Pakistan. Between Mosque and Military. London: Penguin Books [updated; first edition 2005]. Khan, A. (2007). Pakistan in 2006: Safe Center, Dangerous Peripheries. Asian Survey, January/February, 47 (1): 125–132.

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Kuszewska, A. and Nitza-Makowska, A. (2021). Multifaceted Aspects of Economic Corridors in the Context of Regional Security: The China–Pakistan Economic Corridor as a Stabilising and Destabilising Factor. Journal of Asian Security and International Affairs, 8 (2): 218–248. Lijphart, A. (1969, January). Consociational Democracy. World Politics, 21 (2): 207–225. Lijphart, A. (2012). Patterns of Democracy. Government Forms and Performance in ThirtySix Countries. New Haven–London: Yale University Press [updated; first edition 1999]. Lijphart, A. (2008). Thinking about Democracy. Power Sharing and Majority Rule in Theory and Practice. London–New York: Routledge. Lijphart, A. (1968, April). Typologies of Democratic Systems. Comparative Political Studies, 1 (1): 3–44. Markusse, J. (1997). Power-sharing and “Consociational Democracy” in South Tyrol. GeoJournal, 43 (1): 77–89. McGarry, J. (2019). Classical Consociational Theory and Recent Consociational Performance. Swiss Political Science Review, 25 (4): 538–555. McGarry, J. and O’Leary, B. (2007). Iraq’s Constitution of 2005: Liberal Consociation as Political Prescription. International Journal of Constitutional Law, 5 (4): 1–29. Pakistan Bureau of Statistics, Government of Pakistan (2017). Final Results (Census-2017), https://www.pbs.gov.pk/content/final-results-census-2017 (accessed: 28. 12. 2021). Pakistan Population (2021). World Population Review https://worldpopulationreview.com /countries/pakistan-population (accessed: 29. 12. 2021). Pew Research Center (2013). The World’s Muslims: Religion, Politics and Society, Washington DC, 30. 04. 2013. https://pewrsr.ch/2T1snAN (accessed: 26. 11. 2021). Siddiqa, A. (2021). In Gwadar Protest Success, You Are Missing out this War Within Pakistani Establishment, The Print, 29. 12. 2021. https://theprint.in/opinion/in-gwada r-protest-you-are-missing-out-war-within-pakistani-establishment/789574/ (accessed: 30. 12. 2021). Waseem, M. (2002). Causes of Democratic Downslide. Economic and Political Weekly, November 2–15, 37 (44/45): 4532–4538.

Michał Lipa

The potential for power sharing in Bahrain: Opportunities and limitations

Bahrain is an island micro-state located in the eastern part of the Arabian Peninsula, ruled by the non-native Sunni Al-Khalifa family. The predecessors of the current rulers arrived in Bahrain in the 18th century, where they found a thriving population of Shiite farmers. Over time, however, members of the Al-Khalifa family began to take control of the fertile land. In doing so, they had the support of the British, with whom they had previously allied. However, before Bahrain declared independence in 1971, Shiites enjoyed legal protection regarding personal security and property, and their religious and judicial practices were commonly respected. When the Al-Khalifa family headed the independent state in 1971, discrimination against Shiites in favour of Sunnis began – with occasional physical attacks on representatives of the Shiite community (Rabi and Kostiner, 1999: 171–190). Shiites in Bahrain do not constitute a cohesive sociopolitical community with a unified political worldview. This is because the few upper-class Shia families were not discriminated against as much as the poorer majority, meaning that discrimination mainly affected the lower classes. It is true, however, that Shiites dominate the lower classes, including local farmers and fishers. Consequently, they have suffered far more than the upper classes from land dispossession by the Al-Khalifas, who turned them into tenants. Pushed to the margins of political and economic life, they began to take opposing stances towards the ruling regime, sometimes resorting to violence. Their motivation was usually not to overthrow the government but rather to seek political reforms that would improve their status in the state. In doing so, they were constrained not only by the actions of the central authorities but also by internal divisions, which to some extent prevented them from taking extremist positions. Some Shiite activists, mainly young and relatively well-educated people, often held dissident views extending beyond their religious identity and even collaborated against the authoritarian rule (Rabi and Kostiner 1999: 171–190). This chapter aims to explain why, despite the potential for a power-sharing political system in Bahrain, the long-running political conflict, which became

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even more confrontational in 2011, has neither led to the collapse of the regime nor forced the rulers to implement significant political reforms. The hypothesis that was the matter of verification says that Bahrain’s political system has the nature of a primordial authoritarian regime with some rentier elements, which – combined with the external factor strengthening the regime, that is, external (mainly Saudi) patronage – hinders the introduction of power-sharing institutions. We believe that the combination of these two factors turned out to be sufficient to counter the pressure from the Shiite majority to reform the political system. The assumption underlying this chapter is that Bahrain, due to its social heterogeneity, meets the criteria of the state in which it is at least reasonable to apply power-sharing institutional solutions, which would reduce sociopolitical conflicts. As conceptualised by Arend Lijphart, potentially antagonistic segments of the population can coexist peacefully if governed by a system that preserves cultural diversity and secures political influence, which is accomplished through a separate, but fair representation of these groups (Lijphart, 2008: 3–22). Following Lijphart’s logic, Ian O’Flynn and David Russell state that: … power-sharing enables conflicting groups to remedy longstanding patterns of antagonism and discrimination and build a more just and stable society for all. Institutionally, there is an indeterminate number of ways in which democratic power-sharing can be realized. For example, the choice of institutions and procedures may include provisions for the coalition government, guaranteed representation, legislative vetoes, territorial devolution and federalism, functional autonomy, and even trans-national structures agreed by treaty between sovereign states. (O’Flynn and Russell, 2005: 1)

However, what about a state in which the potential for power-sharing institutions exists but cannot be introduced since the ruling minority is afraid of losing power and has sufficient resources to neutralise the political pressure expressed by dissidents? It is a situation in which the factors strengthening the authoritarian rule (of the Sunni minority) are more robust than the opposition pressure, which is a reminder of the situation in Iraq before 2003. It turns out that none of the major approaches dealing with power-sharing political systems undertake to answer such a question. Most of the focus is only on cases where a non-powersharing regime has already collapsed (such as in Iraq in 2003), and the challenge of building a new political system – that would mitigate sociopolitical cleavages – has emerged. However, this is not the case in Bahrain, where – unlike, for example, in the Balkans (or the aforementioned Iraq) – there are no external incentives to build such a system. As Florian Bieber (2013: 313) states: “The success of power-sharing systems in former Yugoslavia has been modest: power-sharing mostly continues to rely on strong external intervention, and the political systems and countries

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remain profoundly contested.” In Bahrain’s case, there are no external interventions that could keep power-sharing institutions alive, but external factors work against non-authoritarian solutions, thus securing the rule of the Sunni minority represented by the Al-Khalifa family. Saudi Arabia’s overtly antidemocratic, hard-line policy towards Bahrain is not countered by the vaguely pro-democracy rhetoric of the United States nor by Iran’s instrumentally prodemocracy policy towards Bahraini Shiites. It also seems that introducing a political system based on power-sharing institutions is much more difficult when the authoritarian state is ruled not by the majority (violating the rights of the minority) but by the minority afraid of losing power, which would happen due to democratisation. The opposition itself does not seek to introduce power-sharing institutions when democratic elections would potentially give it full legislative and executive powers. Such a case is Bahrain, whose political system can be described as a primordial regime, as Łukasz Fyderek has written about concerning Syria and Saudi Arabia. According to Fyderek: … regimes defined as primordial are regimes in which the formal, organizational institutions of the state have been staffed to a large extent by members of a particular identity group: family (Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, UAE), family and tribe (Libya, Yemen) or family and religious group (Syria, Iraq before 2003). It should be emphasized that by the primordial regime, we mean not so much a regime lacking modern political organizations (army, bureaucratic security services or political parties) but a regime in which members of a particular identity group have dominated these institutions. Political interactions in such regimes presuppose the reconciliation of social roles imposed by these two levels of institutions: political organizations and primordial groups. (Fyderek, 2016: 34)

The potential for power sharing in Bahrain Social cleavages With a current population of about 1.8 million (including a large group of economic immigrants), the population of Bahrain is deeply divided along religious lines (Worldometers, n.d.). The number of Bahrainis themselves is much smaller – less than 50% of the total population (CIA World Factbook, n.d.). The rest are residents (economic immigrants), mostly from other Asian countries, including non-Muslim countries (such as the Philippines). It is estimated that about 70% of the indigenous inhabitants of Bahrain are Shiites, which means that most nonSunni citizens must submit to the authoritarian Sunni ruling elite, represented by the Al-Khalifa family. The proportion between Shiites and Sunnis is only esti-

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mated, as evidenced by Pew Research Center reporting that the Shiite population in Bahrain (as a percentage of Bahrainis) is between 65 and 75% (Pew Research Center, n.d.). The vast majority of Shiites in Bahrain are Imamites (Muslims recognising 12 Shiite imams), mainly from Iran and Iraq. Many of them sympathised with the Islamic revolution in Iran, and thus the Sunni political elites viewed them as a threat to their dominance and power. This is especially so since the Iranian revolution, which emboldened Shiites living in Arab countries to become politically active. Bahrain’s Shiites represent mainly the middle and lower classes, living primarily in rural areas or poorer urban neighbourhoods. On the other hand, Sunnis predominate in urban areas and are economically better situated. Moreover, Sunnis predominate in Bahrain’s state institutions, not excluding the internal security services and the armed forces, where there is no place for Shiites who pose a potential threat to the Al-Khalifa regime (Khuri, 1980: 1–12; Rabi and Kostiner, 1999: 171–190). Although the hardships they have experienced over decades have united them to some extent, Bahrain’s Shiites are still internally divided. Ethnically, Shiites of Persian origin, known as Al-Baharna, make up the most significant portion of the island’s original population. Economically, few Shiites belong to the social elite. They occasionally form some part of the bureaucracy, but only in the middle rank and file. Instead, most are farmers, small merchants and artisans (Rabi and Kostiner, 1999: 171–190). Economic discrimination is reflected in higher unemployment among Shiites, but despite attempts to exert pressure on those in power, the government has not made significant moves to address this issue (Pradhan, 2017: 33). The Shiite political and economic domination of the Sunnis was also reflected in the state’s naturalisation policy. The Shiite opposition has been accusing the government of encouraging Sunni immigration from other Arab countries (such as Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Jordan, and Syria) with easy procedures for acquiring citizenship. Representatives of the Shiite opposition refer to these new Bahraini citizens as “politically naturalised”. In this regard, estimates range from 50,000 to 200,000 people who could thus acquire Bahraini citizenship, which – according to the leaders of the Al-Wefak National Islamic Society – is expected to change the demographic structure of Bahrain. They are subsequently employed in state institutions such as the army and internal security forces – institutions whose primary purpose is to protect the regime from external and internal threats. Since externally Bahrain is not threatened by anyone, especially as it enjoys American and Saudi protection, the armed forces can always support the police in their struggle against the opposition and demonstrators, as exemplified by the Arab Spring in early 2011 (Pradhan, 2017: 32–33).

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Shiite opposition Since the Shiite majority feels politically and economically disadvantaged, there have been repeated fierce protests in previous decades, over which the regime has responded with a mixture of repression and co-optation (Pradhan, 2017: 31). In 1979, revolutionary Iran began to assault the Bahraini regime with harsh rhetoric and hostile actions, sparking a wave of demonstrations involving Shiites demanding better treatment. Among the more radical groups promoting an Islamic revival in the Gulf was the Islamic Front for the Liberation of Bahrain (IFLB), which collaborated with the Iraqi Shia underground, the Islamic Call. An organisation led by Shiite cleric Hadi al-Mudarrisi, an Iranian who fled the country during the Shah’s rule, it organised public demonstrations broken up by police in August 1979. Although their ideas were derived from socio-economic concerns, Bahrain’s Shiite clerics were open to Iranian ideology and religious symbolism, which came to dominate class rhetoric (Rabi and Kostiner, 1999: 171–190). In the 1980s, opposition activity primarily involved large-scale sabotage acts by small but well-trained groups. The individuals behind them were frustrated by the failure of the first large wave of social protests and believed that only through brutal methods could they achieve their goals. The regime’s response was immediate. In December 1981, security forces arrested dozens of people accused of seeking to overthrow the regime and proclaiming an Islamic republic. The plot was organised by the IFLB, with Mudarrisi designated as the new state leader if the revolution was successful. Iranian-trained members of this group infiltrated Bahrain, where they were to take over strategic facilities. There were more similar attempts later on. The most notable was an attempted coup d’état in late 1987, which Iran was again alleged to be behind. However, the radicals’ strategy, focusing, among other things, on acts of terror against the Al-Khalifa family, did not enjoy broad popular support and failed to attract a majority of Shiites (Rabi and Kostiner, 1999: 171–190). A new phase of Shia-dominated opposition activity began against the backdrop of the Second Gulf War (Iraq-Kuwait), amplified by the deteriorating economic situation in Bahrain. In the post-war period, the frustration of a new generation of young Bahrainis was exacerbated by poor economic conditions, manifested by rapidly rising unemployment. Bahrain had depleted much of its meagre oil reserves and had become dependent on its wealthier neighbours for assistance in modernising its economy. The government was particularly criticised for allowing “cheap” foreign labour to flow in rather than providing jobs for Bahraini citizens. Consequently, in July 1994, over a thousand unemployed people signed a petition requesting the government address this issue, to which the regime responded with violence (Rabi and Kostiner, 1999: 171–190).

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The petition movement in Bahrain had been sprouting for some time. However, this was the first petition brought by Shiites. They were preceded by an appeal by a Sunni theologian, Abd al-Latif al-Mahmud, who was arrested in 1991 after delivering a speech critical of the Gulf regimes. He argued that progress in the region could only come through deep political reform, leading to the establishment of elected parliaments, the rule of law, and the implementation of freedom of speech guarantees. Al-Mahmud’s ideas were summarised in a petition calling for the restoration of an elected National Assembly (parliament). The petition, which was submitted to the monarch, was signed by more than 150 public figures representing the majority of Sunni and Shiite ideological movements in Bahrain. This was a significant move since it was the first joint action in Bahrain. Three hundred signatures followed this on a second petition addressed to the emir, calling for greater political freedom under the new Basic Law. In response, the emir threatened these people with imprisonment or exile (Rabi and Kostiner 1999: 171–190). The Al-Khalifa family resisted demands for reforms. After a short-lived experiment by the National Assembly (1973–1975), the ruling regime was afraid of setting up a body that could be used to attack the royal family. As a result, in late 1992, the political struggle escalated again. However, this time, the government responded with some cosmetic concessions. At the end of 1992, the emir announced the establishment of a 30-member consultative council to be appointed, not elected. This council was limited to an advisory role, and its deliberations were not made public. However, to lessen negative perceptions about the council, the government announced new social benefits to alleviate the hardships faced by poorer individuals, lowering the cost of their living and subsidising the lower strata in general (Rabi and Kostiner 1999: 171–190). In this context, Shiite opposition activities radicalised in late 1994, and leading figures in the Shiite resistance movement came to the forefront of the struggle against the regime. The arrest in December 1994 of a popular young Shiite cleric, Ali Salman, triggered riots sparked by the agitational activities of several Shiite clerics. Salman, along with Hamza al-Dayri and Haydar al-Sitri, were the leading figures in the campaign to collect signatures for another petition calling for the restoration of the National Assembly. Thousands of Bahrainis, mostly Shiites, signed the petition, becoming targets of government persecution. In the week preceding Salman’s arrest, protests spread from mosques in the capital to Shiite villages and towns surrounding Manama, prompting further police raids and mass arrests. These places were at the centre of an uprising in March 1995 with attacks on the state infrastructure and institutions in what the perpetrators themselves referred to as the “intifada”. There was also a growing cross-class collaboration between intellectuals, who demanded the restoration of constitutional rule, and the unemployed in non-urban areas, which Shiite clerics co-

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ordinated. The Bahraini security forces responded brutally, isolating entire neighbourhoods, raiding residential homes, and using tear gas and live ammunition. It was not until late May 1995 that the revolt began to decline after more than a dozen civilians and several police officers had been killed (Rabi and Kostiner, 1999: 171–190). In order to gain broader support, the leaders of the radical movement sought to formulate their views in a universal language that would convince more moderate groups, and such groups were numerous in the Shiite community. Shiite opposition publications further emphasised that their movement was not religiously exclusive, thus indicating that it included both Sunnis and Shiites. They all focused on a common goal: the restoration of parliament and limiting the authoritarian rule of the Al-Khalifa family. Moreover, they openly claimed that the intelligence services were deliberately trying to provoke Sunni-Shia antagonism. To alleviate the increasingly tense mood, the government once again decided to use a clientelistic “carrot” by declaring its willingness to find jobs for several thousand Bahrainis a year. The idea was to eliminate one of the leading causes of unrest: unemployment. Some of the new jobs were to be created due to “Bahrainization”, that is, the replacement of foreign workers with Bahraini citizens, most of whom were Shiites. Of course, this entailed forcing the departure of many labour migrants, particularly low-skilled workers from the Indian subcontinent (Rabi and Kostiner, 1999: 171–190). In November 1995, after a six-month pause, disturbances broke out again, with a wave of bombings, acts of arson, and other violence bearing the hallmarks of terrorism. Two homemade bombs exploded in two luxury hotels, injuring three people. A third exploded in a shopping complex, causing no injuries. Another exploded prematurely in a car parked in a shopping plaza. Many people, mainly from the Shia community, were arrested in the government crackdown. Bahraini newspapers and other Arab media that followed the government’s official line emphasised that some of those detained confessed they had been trained to prepare explosives in Iran or in Hezbollah camps in Lebanon. The Shiite leaders also pursued extremist propaganda while attempting to move beyond sectarian affiliations and appeal to other groups to join the resistance. They also pressured the government to release those detained for political reasons, which led to an agreement and the subsequent release of some detainees. They also called for an end to trials of dissidents, the return of those deported, and the beginning of talks on political reform – particularly the restoration of the constitution suspended in 1975 and the parliament. Shiite religious institutions have long provided a political platform for Shiite clerics who have continued to fuel unrest. Abd al-Amir al-Jamri, a member of the dissolved parliament who has become the leader of the opposition, speaking to worshippers during Friday prayers in the village of Diraz, warned that the dangerous situation could become

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even more complicated if the Supreme Court of Appeals upheld the death sentence imposed on one Shiite. Concerning the democratic reforms advocated, AlJamri stressed that any solution lacking constitutional legitimacy would be incomplete (Rabi and Kostiner, 1999: 171–190). In response to Al-Jamri’s activities, the Bahraini security forces conducted raids on mosques, and the regime banned Friday prayers in several of them. In January 1996, several prominent leaders of the opposition movement – including the Shiite cleric ‘Abd al-Amir al-Jamri and Sunni lawyer Ahmad Shamlan – were arrested again, which led to another wave of fighting against the opposition. However, this did not calm the public mood. On the contrary, government repression resulted in the radicalisation of the opposition (not only Shiites). This was evidenced by such acts of violence as the setting on fire of a restaurant in 1996, which resulted in the deaths of seven Bengalis. This action was intended to threaten the immigrant community. On the other hand, the execution of a Shiite convicted of killing a policeman triggered another wave of protests among Shiites in and around the capital, to which the authorities generally responded with repression (Rabi and Kostiner, 1999: 171–190). In 1999, Hamad took power and kept in mind the social unrest that had broken out in 1994–1999, which dissidents described as an “uprising of dignity”. The new leaders of authoritarian Arab states usually try to appear more “liberal” than their predecessors, so the new ruler of Bahrain also tried to show himself in a good light. He thus lifted the state of emergency (in effect since the mid-1970s) and released political prisoners. The political liberalisation meant that many oppositionists who had previously had to flee the country decided to return to their homeland. The wave of reforms also saw the introduction of the National Action Charter of Bahrain, which came into force in 2001, preceding the adoption of a new constitution in 2002. However, it soon became apparent that political liberalisation could threaten the regime, which allowed most parliamentary seats to be filled through elections. Therefore, the first decade of the 21st century saw a retreat towards political deliberation. In response, the Shiite organisation AlWefak began to boycott subsequent elections; however, it remained a platform for mobilising Shiites and articulating their interests (Pradhan, 2017: 33–34).

Arab Spring of 2011 The outbreak of the Arab Spring in Tunisia and Egypt inspired Bahrainis to launch mass protests in February 2011. The protesters who gathered at the Pearl Roundabout in Manama demanded political reform, equality, and economic improvement. Pro-government groups, mainly Sunni loyalists, demonstrated against the protesters. For the Sunnis, demands for political reform were con-

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sidered a direct attack on the kingdom’s Sunni identity. They also believed that showing more leniency to Shiites during protests could be seen as a “sign of weakness” by the government and that maintaining the status quo was more important than granting political freedoms to Shiites (Pradhan, 2017: 34–35). During the Arab Spring, Al-Wefaq played an essential role in uniting the people. The organisation demanded a fundamental political transition to democracy that would limit the monarch’s powers. In early July 2011, the government proposed a national reconciliation process involving opposition groups, which even appointed their delegates to alleviate the growing crisis. However, two weeks later, Al-Wefaq withdrew from the unproductive talks. In order to calm the civil unrest, which escalated (especially among the Shiites), an attempt was made to hold another national dialogue, inviting all significant parties to the conflict to participate. The king then appointed the speaker of parliament, Khalifa bin Ahmed Al-Dhahran, as the head of the national dialogue. About 300 representatives representing the government, opposition groups, civil society and the media were invited. To encourage the opposition to participate in the talks, King Hamad assured the opposition that (this time) it would be a genuine dialogue and no part of Bahrain’s diverse population would be neglected. However, the opposition remained distrustful, with the main reason for their concern being the number of seats allocated to them, much less than they had expected. Of the approximately 300 seats, only 35 were allocated to opposition groups. The main opposition “party”, Al-Wefaq, initially refused to participate in the negotiations, but its leadership changed their minds. However, later they definitively left the talks. Al-Wefaq leaders complained, among other things, that although their organisation had won 64% of the vote in previous elections, only five representatives of the group were allowed to participate in the talks (Pradhan, 2017: 35–41). In response to the ongoing protests, the regime used massive force against protesters and attempted to disperse them from the Pearl Roundabout, which to Bahrainis has become what Tahrir Square was for Egyptians. Security forces were deployed after protesters called for a nationwide Day of Rage on 14 February. There were reports of heavily armed police units using tear gas, rubber bullets and even live ammunition, resulting in several protesters being killed. The use of force to control the protests drew harsh criticism from the domestic opposition and the international community. As the protests gained momentum, security forces took control of the Pearl Roundabout on 17 February. Excessive use of force was evident in Manama, where the regime used tanks and helicopters. In addition, in mid-March, the government in Bahrain requested military assistance from the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), and the military command gained broader powers, allowing the army to crack down on protesters, which the police could not cope with. Finally, on 14 March, GCC forces under the name of the

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Peninsula Shield Force entered Bahrain at the request of King Hamad, which virtually spelled the end of dreams of a successful uprising (Pradhan, 2017: 35– 38). Subsequently, in a move that marked some concessions, on 19 February, the government declared national mourning for those killed during the protests, referring to them as “the sons we lost”. King Hamad proposed releasing prisoners, including 25 Shiites, and then dismissed several ministers three days later. The government then suggested starting a negotiation process with the protesters and invited various political associations, business leaders and social activists for consultation. This was followed by a statement issued in mid-March that set out seven principles, essentially a call for democratisation, on which the national dialogue should focus (including a parliament with full legislative powers; a government that presented the will of the entire people; a solution to the counterinsurgency issue of neutralisation; fair electoral districts; and eliminating the causes of tension between religious communities). However, in a fast-changing situation, the opposition also voiced further demands, such as establishing a Constituent Assembly to draft a new constitution. The National Dialogue was temporarily suspended in July 2011. It was then resumed in February 2013. However, it had to be suspended again because Al-Wefaq pulled out of the dialogue after one of its party leaders, Khalil Marzook, was arrested in September 2013 for inciting violence and terrorism. This led to a sharp reaction from AlWefaq, which claimed that the government was taking aim at the political opposition and escalating further tensions. This time, not only Al-Wefaq but also the opposition coalition called the National Democratic Opposition Parties withdrew from the dialogue. The government and the opposition remained inflexible, so the national dialogue was suspended in January 2014. Then, in October 2014, a Bahraini court banned Al-Wefaq for three months due to a lawsuit filed by the Ministry of Justice, which accused the group of breaking the law. In the meantime, the security apparatus continued its repression, as evidenced by several opposition leaders and activists being arrested. Even after a temporary protest pause, more than 1,700 people were arrested in 2015 alone. Between 2012 and 2015, the government also revoked the Bahraini citizenship of 260 people, most of whom were political activists, human rights defenders, and journalists (Pradhan, 2017: 36–42). This was followed by the final dissolution of Al-Wefaq in 2016, preceded by the stripping the citizenship of a prominent Shiite cleric, Isa Qassim (Reuters Staff, 2016). The move should be seen as the ultimate suppression of Bahrain’s most vital Shiite organisation.

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Factors impeding the introduction of power-sharing institutions Authoritarianism and co-optation The Al-Khalifa family, which has several thousand members and originated in what is now Qatar, is still regarded by Bahraini Shiites as a coloniser because the indigenous inhabitants of the archipelago were Shiite farmers and fishermen. It maintained its hold on power through a mixture of repression and co-optation, further aided by oil production and external patronage – first by the British and then by the Americans and Saudis (Jones, 2020: 5). This is why Ala’a Shehabi and Marc Owen Jones have described the Bahraini political system as: … [a] kleptocratic ethnocracy, where one ethnic group, the Sunni Al-Khalifa, has captured the instruments of the state in order to protect their position of material and political privilege. As the result of this, a system of domination is reproduced through social, political, and legal institutions that reflect the norms, values and interests of the dominant ethnic group, the Al-Khalifa tribe. Despite representing under 5,000 members, the ruling family has historically appropriated a third of economic wealth, a third of all key political positions, and over a third of the landmass of Bahrain. In this unwritten consociational distribution, loyalists, mostly Sunni, would get another 30–40 per cent and the Shia would get the remainder. (Shehabi and Jones, 2015: 24)

As already mentioned, the core of the Bahraini regime is the Al-Khalifa family, represented by King Hamad bin Isa bin Salman Al-Khalifa, son of the first ruler of Bahrain – Emir Isa bin Salman Al-Khalifa (he held the position of emir even before the declaration of independence, that is since 1961). Al-Khalifa family members do not particularly care about assimilating with the rest of society, strengthening their identity as “settler-rulers”, as Fuad I. Khuri pointed out, emphasising the “non-assimilative character of the group” (Khuri, 1980: 237). The 2001 reforms, intended as a step towards a more representative political system, can also be described as a constitutional “coup” since they were accompanied by the fear of granting too much power to the Shiites. In addition, the government issued several decree-laws prior to the election of a new parliament, which was the main result of the political reforms. As with all decrees issued before the first session of Bahrain’s new National Assembly, none could be amended unless both chambers voted to repeal them. These included a restrictive press law enforced at the regime’s discretion. It became virtually impossible to repeal any laws passed before the election of the National Assembly in 2002 (Jones, 2020: 130–131). It is worth mentioning that under the 2002 Constitution (amended in 2017), Bahrain became a constitutional monarchy, and the ruler was no longer referred to as an emir – he became a king. The introduced parliament (National Assembly) became bicameral and consisted of a lower house (the Council of

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Representatives) and an upper house (the Consultative Council). Since political parties are banned, only independent candidates can run in elections for the upper house. However, political organisations in Bahrain function in much the same way as political parties and are referred to as “political societies”. The various political groups field their “independent” candidates in this way. In addition to Al-Wefak, these include organisations such as the National Democratic Action Society, the Nationalist Democratic Rally Society, the Islamic Action Society, which is also a Shiite organisation, as well as Sunni political organisations such as the Salafist Al-Asalah Islamic Society and the Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated Al-Menbar National Islamic Society (Election Guide, n.d.). On the other hand, the upper house comes entirely from royal nominations. It is interesting to note that a member of parliament: … must be a citizen of Bahrain, and for naturalised citizens, at least ten years must have elapsed since acquiring their citizenship. He must not be a citizen of another country, with the exception of citizens of the member states of the Cooperation Council of the Arab States of the Gulf, on the condition that his Bahraini citizenship be the original citizenship. (Bahrain’s Constitution of 2002)

This confirms the allegations as mentioned above by Shiite opposition representatives regarding “politically naturalised” Bahrainis, of whom Sunni Arabs – from other GCC countries – are politically privileged. To minimise the impact of non-Sunni votes, constituency boundaries in Bahrain were drawn to limit the possibility of Shiites winning seats. That meant that Sunni constituencies of only a few hundred people had the same voting power as Shia-dominated areas with thousands of citizens. In some cases, one Sunni vote was equal to 21 Shia votes. After the War on Terror had begun, combating Sunni Islamism became a strategic concern for the United States, which harmed all Islamist groups – both Sunni and Shia. For example, in 2014, the Bahraini government reformulated electoral districts to address the problem of the gerrymandering that weakened the Shia vote. However, the leaders of AlWefaq complained that this action weakened not only the Sunni Islamists but also their organisation (Jones, 2020: 131–132). Although most of Bahrain’s population is Shiite, security institutions are dominated by Sunnis, a coup-prevention strategy employed by a regime that views Shiites as distrustful. Bahrain’s armed forces are also derived from tribal ties and are overwhelmingly controlled by the Khalifa family. In this patrimonial system, foreigners serving in the army are disconnected from the local population. The fact that there are many foreigners in the security forces has led some scholars to criticise it, claiming that the Bahraini army is not a national army; instead, it can be described as a militant force of Sunnis tasked with protecting

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the Sunni ruling family and the Sunni political and business elites (Pradhan, 2017: 39). Unrest in the 1990s led to measures aimed at “solving” the Shia problem. Human Rights Watch has noted numerous allegations of new hiring rules to reduce the number of Shiites in ministries and state companies (Human Rights Watch 1997). During the 2011 uprising, mass dismissals were used on an unprecedented scale to punish those who engaged in strikes. Additionally, to intimidate students involved in the protests, the government ordered the expulsion of hundreds of students from universities across the country. Between March and June 2011, more than 400 students were expelled from the University of Bahrain and another 54 from the Bahrain University of Technology. The regime also tried to limit the growth of the political opposition by imposing strict control over civil society. This became an issue after the 2001 reforms, which enabled the establishment of new civil society organisations controlled by the regime. By controlling this sector, the government sought to limit the effectiveness of independent NGOs, especially those concerned with human rights in Bahrain. In addition to sophisticated methods, the Bahraini regime also used hard instruments against dissidents, such as implementing harsh laws, arresting political opponents, and even torture carried out by internal security personnel. On the other hand, the arbitrary use of co-optation within the authoritarian political system also played an important role. Bahrain has remained, to some extent, a rentier state (or rather post-rentier) and has served this purpose, although reliance on oil has diminished considerably in recent decades, which could pose a threat to the undemocratic regime led by the Al-Khalifa family (Jones, 2020: 76– 112). Oil was discovered off the coast of Bahrain in 1932, the first such discovery on the Arabian Peninsula. The main task of the government thus became the management and distribution of oil wealth. Under the authoritarian rule, this distribution was unequal, contributing to increased economic inequality that coincided with religious divisions. Parallel co-optation measures accompanied the political repression described above, and the opposition was sometimes able to influence the ruler through various types of pressure. Co-optation was thus accompanied by political bargaining. The opposition’s main demands concerned the unequal distribution of wealth (to the detriment of the Shiites), the state’s overdependence on energy resources, and the desire to participate in the decision-making processes (Pradhan, 2017: 32). Although oil resources have been diminishing over the years, prompting the need for economic diversification and a gradual shift away from dependence on energy resources, Bahraini authorities, to some extent, continue to use oil revenues to develop both business opportunities for the elite families and a welfare system for the lower classes. They have also introduced a policy of appointing

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Shiites, but only those from families of Shiite notables, to secondary ministries while excluding them from senior positions. Similarly, Shiites were given opportunities to work in public administration, the private sector, and the Bahrain Petroleum Company, mainly in mid-level positions, with those who protested against the central government often losing their jobs. Those loyal to the regime were rewarded, and rebels were punished (Rabi and Kostiner 1999: 171–190). Loyalty politics in exchange for privileges, as a method of retaliation against those perceived as trying to tarnish Bahrain’s reputation, was evident. Only those who could prove they had voted were entitled to certain privileges and jobs. As a result, some people felt compelled to vote, which was seen as an act of supporting a government trying to bolster its democratic legitimacy by inflating voter turnout. The punishment for disobedience was, for example, revocation of citizenship or deprivation of employment. In this way, the regime left no doubt about who had ultimate power over people’s lives (Pradhan, 2017: 82–107).

External patronage The external patronage or support given to the Al-Khalifa regime is as old as the domination of this family in Bahrain. The first to provide this support in the 19th century were the British, who still enjoyed special favours at the royal house in Manama. The agreement between the British and the Al-Khalifa leaders dates back to colonial times when, in return for agreeing to deal with Bahrain’s foreign policy, London pledged to protect the local government from outside aggression. After discovering oil, it became clear that the close relationship between the AlKhalifa family and London could pay off even more for the British. By providing security for the ruling family in Bahrain, the British looked out for their own interests, but this benefited both sides (Jones, 2020: 7). Later, the United States (together with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia), having its famous Fifth Fleet in Bahrain through which Washington controls the Persian Gulf (Jones, 2011; Schneller, 2013: 38–53), joined the patrons of the Al-Khalifa regime. In 2002, the United States recognised Bahrain as a major non-NATO ally. Previously, in 1991, the two countries signed a defence cooperation agreement due to which more than 8,000 US military personnel were stationed in Bahrain. When protests broke out in Bahrain in 2011, the United States halted arms sales to Bahrain on suspicion that the regime could use them for internal security purposes. In July 2015, the United States concluded that, while the human rights situation in Bahrain was not satisfactory, there had been significant progress in human rights reforms, allowing the administration to lift the arms embargo (Pradhan, 2017: 53).

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The kingdoms of Saudi Arabia and Bahrain enjoy close strategic relations. The Al-Khalifa family came to power in the 18th century, defeating the Persians with the help of the rulers of the Arabian Peninsula. Today, both the Saudi and Bahraini kingdoms are members of the GCC and share similar views on many regional political, economic, and security issues. Bahrain’s geographic location is vital to Saudi Arabia from a geostrategic standpoint, and the only land link between the two countries is the King Fahd Causeway, which connects the two countries. In addition to facilitating trade, the border crossing is a valuable tool for Saudi Arabia to control any security threats coming from Bahrain. Beyond the proximity of the two kingdoms, the geopolitical aspects of Iranian influence in Bahrain are also crucial for both Bahrain and Saudi Arabia. Thus, for Riyadh, the regime’s stability in Manama is essential to prevent Iran’s growing involvement in the Arabian Peninsula. Accordingly, Saudi Arabia considers Bahrain to be in Tehran’s sphere of influence and fears that some Bahraini Shia groups have close ties to Iran. Riyadh also believes that Iran intends to use these ties to advance its strategic interests by establishing pro-Iranian political groups throughout the region and supporting the opposition to overthrow Sunni royal families (Pradhan, 2017: 44–52). When political protests erupted in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia feared they could spread to its territory, especially among the Shiite majority in the Eastern Province. Like the tribal ties linking the two royal families, Bahrain’s Shiites also have strong ties to Saudi Arabia’s Shiites. Saudi Shiites are also religiously linked to Iranian Shiites and are often seen as an Iranian fifth column. In the past, Saudi Arabia has seen protests by the Shia minority, which makes up about 10–15% of the population, demanding political reform, religious freedom, and economic equality. The Saudi regime discriminates against the Eastern Province, where Shiites face political discrimination. The Saudi regime does not support any democratic reforms, such as those demanded by protesters in Bahrain, knowing that an elected parliament would lead to a Shia victory (Pradhan, 2017: 44–49). The American military presence is essential for Saudi Arabia to ensure the oil flows smoothly in the waters of the Persian Gulf. Saudi rulers believe that any disruption in the international oil market could harm oil buyers, so it is essential to maintain peace and stability in the region. As a result, the protests in Bahrain became a challenge to the Saudi economy and a potential threat to the Saudi regime, which was the direct driver for Saudi Arabia intervening militarily in Bahrain in 2011. The GCC leaders believed that Iran could use the revolt of 2011 to its advantage by exploiting its Shiite connections, and it was seen as an Iranian attempt to turn the protests in Bahrain into another Iranian revolution. It is believed that the political support the Bahraini regime received, which later manifested as military support from the GCC Peninsula Shield Force, was crucial to the survival of the Al-Khalifa regime (Pradhan, 2017: 46–49).

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Conclusions There is potential for power-sharing arrangements in Bahrain. Still, they were not introduced even in the years preceding the Arab Spring (2011–2015), which was an example of the escalation of the Sunni-Shia conflict that had been growing for years. The analysis verified the following hypothesis: Bahrain’s political system has the nature of a primordial authoritarian regime with some rentier elements, which – combined with the external factor strengthening the regime, that is, external (mainly Saudi) patronage – hinders the introduction of power-sharing institutions. It turned out that, in fact, the combination of these factors (authoritarian repression combined with occasional co-optation and remnants of rentierism), as well as the significant external support (including military) provided mainly by Saudi Arabia, was enough to prevent the collapse of the regime and the introduction of any essential reforms. Reforms that allowed the Shiite majority to participate in governance. Another point is that the Shiite opposition, rather than demanding the introduction of a power-sharing political system, advocated a democratic transition. The introduction of a democratic system would be most beneficial for Shiites since it would allow them to gain total power, not having to share it. Bahrain’s primordial regime saw this as an existential threat, so – when the regime’s security became threatened – it did not hesitate to “invite” Saudi troops to defend the rule of the Al-Khalifa family. On the other hand, on the rhetorical level, the regime is favoured by the securitisation of the “Iranian threat”, which allows the fight against the Shiite opposition to be presented as a fight against this threat – that is, the growth of Iranian influence in the Arabian Peninsula.

Bibliography Bahrain’s Constitution of 2002 (with amendments through 2017). https://www.constitutep roject.org/constitution/Bahrain_2017.pdf ?lang=en (accessed: 23. 01. 2022). Bieber, F. (2013). The Balkans: The promotion of power sharing by outsiders. In by Joanne McEvoy and Brendan O’Leary (eds), Power Sharing in Deeply Divided Places. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. CIA World Factbook (n.d.). Bahrain: https://www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/countries/ bahrain (accessed: 16. 01. 2022). Election Guide (n.d.). Kingdom of Bahrain: https://www.electionguide.org/election.php? ID=1511 (accessed: 23. 01. 2022). Human Rights Watch (1997). Routine Abuse, Routine Denial Civil Rights and the Political Crisis in Bahrain, July 1: https://www.hrw.org/legacy/reports/1997/bahrain/ (accessed: 30. 01. 2022).

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Jones, M. O. (2020). Political Repression in Bahrain. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Jones, T. C. (2011). Time to Disband the Bahrain-based U.S. Fifth Fleet. The Atlantic, June 10: https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2011/06/time-to-disband-the-b ahrain-based-us-fifth-fleet/240243/ (accessed: 30. 01. 2022). Khuri, F. I. (1980). Tribe and State in Bahrain: The Transformation of Social and Political Authority in an Arab State. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Lijphart, A. (2008). Thinking about Democracy Power Sharing and Majority Rule in Theory and Practice. London-New York: Routledge. O’Flynn, I. and Russell, D. (2005). Introduction: New Challenges for Power Sharing. In Ian O’Flynn and David Russel (eds), Power Sharing: New Challenges For Divided Societies. London-Ann Arbor: Pluto Press. Pew Research Center (n.d.). Estimated Percentage Range of Shia by Country: https:// www.pewresearch.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/7/2009/10/Shiarange.pdf (accessed: 16. 01. 2022). Pradhan, P. K. (2017). Arab Spring and Sectarian Faultlines in West Asia: Bahrain, Yemen and Syria. New Dehli: Pentagon Press. Rabi, U. and Kostiner, J. (1999). The Shi’is in Bahrain: Class and Religious Protest. In: Ofra Bengio and Gabriel Ben-Dor (eds.), Minorities and the State in the Arab World. Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers. Reuters Staff (2016). Bahrain court dissolves main Shi’ite opposition. Reuters, July 17, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-bahrain-court-wefaq-idUSKCN0ZX05J (accessed: 30. 01. 2022). Schneller, R. J. (2013). Anchor of Resolve: A History of U.S. Naval Forces Central Command/ Fifth Fleet. Washington: Naval Historical Center. Shehabi, A. and Jones, M. A. (2015). Introduction: Bahrain’s uprising: The struggle for democracy in the Gulf. In Ala’a Shehabi and Marc Owen Jones (eds.), Bahrain’s Uprising: Resistance and Repression in the Gulf. London: Zed Books. Worldometers (n.d.). Bahrain Population. https://www.worldometers.info/world-popula tion/bahrain-population/ (accessed: 16. 01. 2022).

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Iraq: Paradoxes of post-conflict power sharing

Power sharing has been widely recognised as a vital conflict-resolution mechanism. Power-sharing arrangements promote political moderation, limit the ability of stronger groups to abuse the power, thus minimising the risk of civil conflict. Even if the notion of power sharing was originally adopted by Arend Lijphart for the political institutions of stable democracies, the concept has since been analytically tested and applied to a range of post-conflict cases, from Burundi (Curtis, 2013: 72–91) to Syria (Salamey and Rizk, 2018: 149). The process of post-conflict state building is almost always determined by a variety of factors. In practice, any political project that has a constitution at its core is the expression of numerous compromises made by the major political forces operating at a particular time and place. Political power sharing is understood as a fundamental agreement that enables a broad set of actors to exercise power through participation in political decision-making (Strøm et al., 2017). This fundamental agreement forms the backbone of power-sharing institutions. As such, the process of reaching this fundamental agreement (usually institutionalised in a constitution) accommodates such divergent objectives as: representation versus governability, efficiency of power versus balance among the organs of state, and dispersion versus concentration of power. Besides the major considerations related to the power-sharing institutional design, practitioners note that the process is marked not only by the discussions and serious deliberation inherent in such a serious task, but also, and less inspiringly, by armtwisting, pressure, and “behind-the-scenes horse-trading” (Dobbins et al., 2007: 191). Such multiple variables affecting regime design mean that in any case of state building, the institutional design is highly dependent on the local context. The processes of post-conflict power sharing are thus multifactorially conditioned and highly specific to each country. Nevertheless, three subprocesses can be analytically distinguished here: 1) ensuring security, 2) developing powersharing institutions, and 3) ensuring legitimacy via power sharing. These usually take place simultaneously, conditioning each other. Their mutual temporal and causal relationships shape the security, institutional and normative environment

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in which politicians act. Associated with each of these processes are specific political dilemmas that must be resolved by the ruling elite – and in case of Iraq, also by the occupying forces. Thus, while there is usually a broad consensus that the provision of security is a fundamental condition for the success of a statebuilding project, there is a dilemma not only how to structure the power-sharing institutions but also about when to proceed with the transfer of power from foreign occupation forces to local politicians and structures. Of particular importance in the post-conflict environment are the power-sharing arrangements related to military disarmament and control over the security apparatus and the military. One of the main objectives of a power-sharing arrangement is to contain or thwart political violence. A similar choice in which values are entangled is the question of balancing the effectiveness of central government institutions and ensuring their legitimacy, which is fundamental to the success of state reconstruction. At stake here are the effectiveness of the government or interim government in regaining control of the country on the one hand, and its impartiality and ability to share power among the relevant segments of society. This issue is linked to political dilemmas such as when to hold elections, whether they can take place in areas outside of full government control, and how much veto power should be allocated to lesser actors in relation to the military and security services operating in a conflict situation. Power-sharing structures in a post-conflict environment may be also approached from a functional perspective. Some researchers disaggregate power sharing between political, territorial, military and economic arrangements (Hartzell and Hoddie, 2007). Different power-sharing provisions create different levels of costs for the dominant group or the power centre. The costliest form of power sharing is political. Territorial power sharing is less costly, and military power sharing is the least costly form of arrangement. The authors suggest – in line with the Lijphartian tradition – that the different dimensions of power sharing reinforce each another (Lijphart, 1977). A different functional approach to power sharing was presented in a large comparative study of power sharing in the world’s states in 1975–2010. The authors distinguished three separate forms of power sharing: inclusive, dispersive, and constraining. Inclusive power sharing is defined as agreements that mandate the participation of several parties or groups in particular offices or decision-making processes. Dispersive power sharing relates to agreements that divide authority among many actors in a well-defined or institutionalised pattern. The most common form of such an agreement may be territorial decentralisation. Finally, constraining arrangements limit the power of any party or social group and thus protect ordinary citizens and vulnerable groups against encroachment and abuse (Strøm et al., 2017). The authors understand that

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dispersive and constraining power sharing correlate with electoral democracy with a proportional rather than a majoritarian electoral system. They assert that these two forms of power sharing reflect the greater likelihood of empowerment not only of the political elites, but also ordinary citizens. In contrast, inclusive power sharing is thus primarily a device to resolve uncertainty and conflict at the elite level (Strøm et al., 2017). In order to understand better the utility of this functional approach to power sharing, this chapter proceeds with testing the functional conceptualisation of power sharing against the single case of Iraq. The chapter thus presents a theoryevaluating case study, aimed at assessing how hypotheses related to inclusive, dispersive, and constraining power sharing account for the processes and outcomes of the selected case (Vennesson, 2008: 228). The chapter proceeds with the analysis of the Iraqi post-2003 power-sharing process, institutions, and behaviour. It is structured in this way to trace how observable variables, that is, specific practices and institutions, relate to unobservable variables (i. e., factors such as the composition of the ruling elite, the previously existing authoritarian regime, foreign intervention and the three forms of inclusive, dispersive, and constraining power sharing).

Establishing power-sharing institutions in Iraq 2003–2005 After the US-led coalition forces toppled Saddam Hussein’s regime and occupied Baghdad on 9 April 2003, the process of building an interim administration began. The first civilian institution of the occupation authorities was the Coalition Provisional Authority, headed by Paul Bremmer. In July 2003, an indigenous Iraqi structure was created, the Iraqi Governing Council (IGC), which began to perform some of the functions of the Iraqi government during the occupation. The 25-member body presented the first case of power sharing in post-Saddam Iraq: it consisted of representatives of all the major ethno-religious groups living in the country (13 Shias, six Sunnis, five Kurds and one Christian), with most of the politicians coming from the anti-Saddam opposition. However, the IGC’s powers were very limited, and the body with supreme authority over Iraq was the Coalition Provisional Authority, led and staffed by the US and coalitional administrators. Despite its shortcomings, the appointment of the IGC marked the beginning of power-sharing institutions in post-Saddam Iraq. The system known as the Muhasasa Tai’fiya – sectarian apportionment – became one of the organising principles of the political transformation of the country. The origins of the Muhasasa Tai’fiya may be traced back to the attempts to create an umbrella organisation for various groups of Iraqi opposition in the nineties. The organisation Iraq National Congress (INC) convened in October

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1992 in Salahuddin, in Northern Iraq, and established its organs based on the socalled “Salahuddin quotas” or along the ethno-sectarian lines. According to the Salahuddin quotas, positions within the INC were allocated according to the size of ethnic and religious groups within Iraqi society, with those from the Shia section of society taking 50% of the jobs, Sunni Arabs 20% and the Kurds 20%, with the rest of the posts distributed among smaller minorities. This was the consociational bargain of oppositionists in exile, which formed the basis for the power-sharing practice in post-Saddam Iraq (Dodge, 2021: 464). Among the most influential political actors in Baghdad after the fall of the Baathist regime were two Kurdish parties, the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), two parties claiming to represent the Shia population, the Dawa Islamic Party and the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq as well as the mostly secular Iraqi National Accord. Willingness to end foreign rule over the country became a major unifying factor for virtually all actors of the emerging Iraqi political scene. In order to achieve this, a transition plan was prepared that called for the adoption of a provisional constitution by the IGC before March 2004 and parliamentary elections and the transfer of power by the occupation administration before June 2004. Only then was the final constitution to be drafted. Meeting the above timetable became an important motivating factor for members of the IGC to restrict their ambitions and agree on difficult compromises. After months of heated discussions, the provisional constitution was finally adopted unanimously on the morning of 1 March 2004. In order to underline the interim character of the new constitution, the new supreme legal act was called the Transitional Administrative Law. The Transitional Administrative Law (TAL) proved to be a regulation of momentous importance for the reconstruction of Iraq. The document expressed the vision of Iraq as a democratic state that protects human rights and respects Islamic legal principles. The interim constitution provided for a government and regulated electoral procedures. The document also contained some preliminary references to a federal system, although it did not regulate this issue precisely. It merely sanctioned the status quo, ensuring that Iraqi Kurds would retain their autonomy. Matters of state finance, foreign and defence policy, and natural resources were to remain the sole responsibility of the central government. Despite several objections raised about the TAL by various actors on the Iraqi political scene, this document throughout 2004 and 2005 was the supreme legal act and a governance framework. The stipulations of the TAL structured the process of the political transformation of Iraq. The TAL standardised the deadlines for elections to the interim parliament, the enactment of the constitution, and its adoption by referendum. The final transition point regulated by the TAL calendar was the election of a permanent, non-transitional parliament, which was to be held before 15 December 2005. The “road map” of Iraq’s tran-

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sition enshrined in the TAL became one of the few permanent points in the turmoil of Iraqi politics and significantly facilitated the constitutional process and the emergence of the country’s permanent government in the following months (Arato, 2008: 162). Under the provisions of the TAL, an interim government was formed on 1 June 2004, with Iyad Alawi as its head. On 28 June 2004, Paul Bremer officially transferred all powers to the interim government, and the Coalition Provisional Authority was dissolved. Prime Minister Alawi’s interim government was recognised by the UN Security Council as the sovereign and legitimate authority in Iraq. The formation of Allawi’s cabinet reflected the complex political conditions of Iraq. With the authoritarian regime ousted, the US-led occupation authorities faced rising tensions around the country, and the beginnings of armed insurgency in Fallujah and Najaf. Hence, the first Iraqi government had to be accepted by all the relevant players in Iraqi politics of the day – the US military and civil administration, the UN Special Envoy for Iraq, the influential Shia religious hierarchy centred around Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, as well as the leaders of the two major Kurdish parties. Allawi’s candidature – a secular Shia political activist, who came back to Iraq after long exile – proved to be acceptable to all parties involved. The political composition of the interim cabinet was similar to the earlier proto-government IGC, which ceased to exist by the end of May 2004 (Allawi, 2008: 286). Much bigger controversies arouse around the post of interim president, which was to be offered to a Sunni Arab. This created a lot of tension, with the Kurdish parties in particular voicing strong objections. Eventually, after prolonged discussions, the IGC selected a Sunni politician Ghazi al-Yawer as the interim president. The main task, as defined in the TAL, was to prepare for the first democratic parliamentary elections. These were held on 30 January 2005, and voters elected 275 deputies in universal, equal, secret, and proportional elections. The first formal power-sharing institution, the interim parliament known as the Transitional National Assembly (TNA), was formed. In the elections, 58% of the eligible citizens voted, which was considered a success, especially in the volatile security situation in a country plagued by terrorist attacks. Most seats in the parliament were won by the United Iraqi Alliance, a loose coalition of Shiite parties under the patronage of Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani. An alliance of Kurdish parties (the Kurdistan Democratic Party – KDP and the PUK) also became a major force in parliament, with 75 seats. Another grouping, with 40 seats, was the “Iraqiya” list created by former Prime Minister Iyad Alawi, grouping secular nationalists and liberals from both Muslim communities. A particular feature of the parliament was the limited representation of Sunnis, due to the boycott of the elections by the main parties of this

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community. This limited the legitimacy of the interim parliament and, by extension, the whole state-building project, among the Sunni citizens of Iraq. The elections of 30 January 2005 to the TNA were the first free Iraqi elections in more than half a century. They were also a unique event in a region where almost all states remained autocracies. Conducting elections in a situation of omnipresent threats, with a lack of experienced administrative cadres and the weakness of the security forces posed a particular challenge. Moreover, the fact that the country was occupied by coalition forces was not conducive to the perception of the electoral process as free and independent from external influence. However, the political freedom brought by the overthrow of Saddam Hussein’s authoritarian political system resulted in political ferment and great interest in the elections. A measurable indicator of this was the number of registered candidates and political groups. Before the elections, 223 political groups seeking election and 34 coalition election lists were registered. The Electoral Commission registered 7,785 candidates running for 275 seats (Inter-Parliamentary Union, c. 2005). The TNA began with the formation of a new government. After several weeks of negotiations, a coalition cabinet led by Ibrahim al-Jafari was formed on 6 April 2005. In accordance with the provisions of the TAL, the assembly also elected the president of the country – Jalal Talabani, a Kurdish politician and the chairman of the Democratic Party of Kurdistan. The TAL then set to work on drafting a constitution. A constitutional committee (layna dusturiia) of 55 deputies was appointed to draft it, headed by Shiite cleric and long-time oppositionist Humam al-Hammudi. The composition of the committee roughly reflected the balance of power in parliament. Thus, the constitutional committee reproduced the pattern of power sharing. The main motivation behind the inclusive character of the committee was not only the general desire to include minority representatives in constitutional work, but rather the drive towards securing legitimacy of the whole process. Despite those efforts, the legitimacy of the nation-building process was undermined by widespread violence in the predominantly Sunni areas of Iraq. Security problems made it difficult to initiate a political process. However, an important distinguishing feature of events in Iraq has been the ability to reach a consensus and reduce the level of conflict within two of the country’s three main ethno-religious groups: the Kurds and Arab Shiites. These two communities were able to emerge political leadership between 2003 and 2005 and saw the benefits of building a democratic political order based on power-sharing principles. Unfortunately, disputes with representatives of the Sunni minority and divisions within this formerly privileged group were the main cause of large-scale political violence in 2004–2008. At this moment in Iraqi history, the power-sharing mechanisms were used as a tool of conflict-prevention or conflict-resolution

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measures. It was only half successful since some prominent Sunni elites refused to engage in the political process and preferred to use guerrilla tactics to secure the interests of their community. The differentiation into winners and losers of the political transition was also reflected in restrictions on the legitimacy of electoral procedures and the subsequent paralysis of parliamentary work. In order to address this deficiency, the US administration pressed for the expansion of the membership of the committee to include nonparliamentary members. In the absence of wider Sunni political representation in the Shiiteand Kurdish-dominated assembly, US diplomacy began to press the TNA for representatives of the Sunni community to be included in the process of drafting the constitution. Initially, there were only two Sunni members of the 55-member constitutional committee (al-Ali, 2014: 85). These efforts were successful and on 16 June 2005, the composition of the constitutional committee was expanded to include 15 representatives of the Sunni community, who were not members of the Parliament but had full voting rights on the committee (Feldman and Martinez, 2006: 898). In an attempt to broaden Sunni representation, ten additional Sunni members were assigned advisory, non-voting status. Radical Sunni factions perceived the constitution drafting process as illegitimate and sought to undermine the process by using political violence. Four Sunni members of the constitutional committee were killed by their coreligionists in terrorist attacks (Jawad and al-Assaf, 2012: 11). Hence, Sunni representatives had to deal with a double challenge – distrust from their Shia and Kurdish colleagues and accusations of treason by part of their own community. In these circumstances, their ability to influence the shape of the draft Iraqi constitution was highly diminished. The actual process of negotiating the text of the new constitution took place in July and August 2005. As with the interim constitution, disputes over the shape of federalism in the new Iraqi state came to the fore. The issues of the role of the Muslim religion, civil rights, and cultural pluralism were discussed, although less controversially. Representatives of Shiite groups sought to emphasise the role of Islam in the politics of the new Iraqi state and to formally refer to Shiite religious leaders and places of worship in the text of the constitution. These efforts met with opposition from Kurds and secular liberals. Representatives of Kurdish groups sought to federalise the state as far as possible and to limit the power of the central government over the policies pursued by the autonomous government of the Kurdish provinces. In this case, the Shiites did not pose as many obstacles as during the work on the interim constitution. However, they sought to extend the federation provisions to other regions of the country as well, leaving open the possibility for the creation of an autonomous Shiite region in the south of the country. This provoked opposition from Sunnis and liberal nationalists, led by Iyad Alawi, who feared the disintegration of the country.

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The text of the draft constitution was made public on 28 August 2005. It reflected most of the issues the compromise reached between the main political actors: the Shiite coalition and the Kurdish bloc. Sunni demands for reduced federalism were only marginally addressed. In the face of this, Sunni leaders launched a campaign to encourage people to vote against the draft constitution in the upcoming referendum. Faced with this threat, the various actors in Iraqi politics, with the significant involvement of the US ambassador, began negotiations of last resort, modifying the text of the draft somewhat. It was also decided that the new parliament would appoint a constitutional review commission with the power to prepare amendments to the constitution, which would then be ratified in a simplified procedure. These compromise solutions caused secular liberals and some Sunni representatives to withdraw their opposition to the draft constitution, which was finally approved in a referendum on 15 October 2005. The constitution was supported by 78.5% of voters, with a 63% turnout. Despite the democratic acceptance of the constitutional text, some observers of the Iraqi political scene have pointed out that the accelerated constitutional negotiations contributed to an unprecedented political polarisation, which was one factor in the long-term destabilisation of the country (International Crisis Group, 2006). Seen from a power-sharing perspective, the Iraqi constitutional process was shaped by three major factors. First, there was the strong political will of the leaders of the Shiite community for the new constitution to be passed by the democratically elected representatives of the people. The realisation of this demand seems to have had a positive effect in terms of the greater legitimacy enjoyed by the Basic Law. The second factor significantly influencing the constitutional process was the desire for its speedy completion. The majority of actors were interested in the swift emergence of a permanent parliament and a legitimate government capable of taking over responsibility of the country. The intention itself, while legitimate and reflecting the goals of both the occupation administration and most Iraqi politicians, nevertheless resulted in an over-acceleration of the constitution-making process. The TAL gave only a seven-month deadline for the preparation of a constitution for the transitional parliament. However, the coalition formation process in the TNA extended to three months, and this in turn led to delays in the selection of the members of the constitutional committee. Once the committee was selected, its work was affected by the lack of Sunni MPs and attempts to co-opt representatives of that community. As a result, very little time was left for the constitutional negotiations themselves. The haste in working on the constitution, which seems to have been the result of setting unrealistic deadlines, has resulted in some defects in the Iraqi constitution. This is particularly evident in the number of systemic issues not regulated by the constitution and left to ordinary laws. The third factor affecting the constitution

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drafting process has been its limited legitimacy among the Sunni community. A situation when one of the ethno-sectarian groups had a considerably lower level of support for the power-sharing deal resulted in an imbalanced power-sharing institutional order (McEvoy and Aboulatif, 2021: 245). Discussing the constitutional process in Iraq, Andrew Arato highlights three elements of it: the imposition of will by external forces, exclusionary (exclusive) bargaining, and the paradoxical effort to simultaneously emphasise and limit the sovereignty of the electoral power of the Iraqi people (Arato, 2008: 164). The author notes that any process of creating a basic law, usually carried out by the people’s representatives, is accompanied by some limitation on the freedom of popular choice. However, in the Iraqi case, the accompanying phenomena of interference by external forces and negotiation within a closed circle of political actors excessively limited the sovereignty of the people. The external forces mentioned by Arato are, of course, the US occupation administration in its broadest sense. Negotiations over the shape of the regime took place among the four main actors: The US, the two main Kurdish parties, and the Shiite clergy, initially following the leadership of Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani. The particular balance between the desire to guarantee majority rule on the one hand and the desire to ensure the most proportional parliamentary representation possible on the other, were the result of a constitutional compromise between Shiite and Kurdish politicians. A slightly different assessment is made by Noah Feldman and Roman Martinez. They stress that despite the presence of occupying forces on the territory of the country, the circumstances of the adoption of the Iraqi constitution were close to democratic principles (Feldman and Martinez, 2006: 899). The draft constitution was adopted by a democratically elected representative body, the transitional parliament, and was subsequently approved by a popular referendum. The democratic process of writing and ratifying the constitution had a key influence on its content, reflecting the Islamic values strongly present in the political culture of the Iraqi political class and broader society. In concluding the political process which led to the establishment of powersharing institutions, it is important to note the context. Iraq’s parliamentary system of government with the exceptionally strong position of the Assembly of Representatives, normalised in the Basic Law, was the result of the influence of two major political forces during the 2005 constitutional negotiations in the Transitional National Assembly. Religious Shiite parties, with a majority in that body, were able to push through provisions placing a very wide range of powers in the hands of the largest parliamentary grouping. Their promotion of a majoritarian system of government was based on a calculation of the demographic potential of the country, where the majority of the population consists of Shiites who have been politically marginalised for decades. Shiite politicians expected

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that consistent support for the principle of majority rule and limiting the powers of the executive (especially the president) would enable them to govern Iraq with confidence over the long term. Thus, while parliamentarism was a priority for the Shiites during the constitutional negotiations, federalism was crucial for the other major political force in the TNA, the alliance of Kurdish parties. Of particular importance for both the KDP and PUK was guaranteeing the effective autonomy of the Iraqi Kurdistan Region. Both Shiites and Kurds managed, while respecting each other’s political expectations, to agree on the most important issues of the constitutional process, with marginal participation of Sunni representatives – the third of the large Iraqi communities. As a result of this compromise, the framework of the federal system of the Republic of Iraq and the parliamentary-cabinet system of government was formed. Inclusive and constraining power-sharing arrangements at the central level were complemented by the adoption of a federal system with its provisions for dispersive power sharing.

Power-sharing institutions in Iraq The result of an accelerated state-building process, the Constitution of the Republic of Iraq, is a comprehensive document, containing a preamble and 144 articles arranged in six sections. Its general systematics is based on both subject and object criteria. The first sections contain the supreme constitutional principles and the regulation of the status of the individual in the state (Section I. Fundamental Principles; Section II. Rights and Freedoms). The next three sections contain provisions on the system of state bodies, their mutual relations, structure and competences (Section III. Federal Power; Section IV. Power of the Federal Government; and Section V. Authorities of the Regions). The last section regulates issues concerning the transitional period, as well as the procedure and rules for amending the constitution (Section VI. Final and Provisional Provisions). With respect to the federal organs of power, Article 47 divides power into legislative, executive and judicial. Legislative power rests in the hands of the unicameral parliament – the Assembly of Representatives. Executive power is exercised by the government and the president, and judicial power is exercised by the courts and the Federal Supreme Court, which acts as a constitutional court. The supreme bodies of state power are independent of each other, which is an expression of the implementation of the principle of the tripartite division of power. Judging from both the general scheme of the constitution and its detailed provisions, the National Assembly has the strongest political position. The strong position of parliament under the provisions of the constitution stems from the consistently understood principle that the source of all state

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power is the people. The constitution in article one already unambiguously indicates the subject of power in the state. This article states that: “The Republic of Iraq is a federal, independent, and fully sovereign state with a republican, representative, parliamentary and democratic system.”1 This issue is further clarified in Article 5, which normalises the principle of representation: “The people shall be the sole source of power and of its legitimacy, which the people shall exercise through direct and secret elections and through constitutional bodies.” It should be noted that although the above article contains references only to the indirect realisation of the attributes of power by the people – through the election of a representative body – in the later part of the Basic Law there are also provisions normalising the institution of referendum. Such systematics indicate that the principle of direct democracy, although it is guaranteed by the constitution, has a subsidiary character. In addition to the basic power-sharing principles of republicanism, federalism and democracy, the provisions in the catalogue of basic constitutional principles also indicate the supreme role of the Muslim religion, stating in Article 2 that “Islam is the state religion and the primary source of legislation.” The constitution also emphasises the Islamic identity of the majority of Iraqis, while guaranteeing the right to freedom of religion and religious practice for all citizens. The detailed wording of the role of Islam as the state religion was hotly debated during the drafting of the Basic Law. Simply making the Muslim religion the state religion was not controversial – such provisions appear in almost all Arab constitutions and were also present in Iraq’s previous Basic Laws (of 1925, 1958, and 1970). However, secular liberals and US diplomats had concerns that it opened the way for the state to apply Muslim religious law, Sharia, which could lead to restrictions on human rights and even undermine the democratic character of the state. Particularly significant in this context is the phrase that Islam is the “primary source of legislation”. It is stronger than the TAL’s formulation that “Islam is the source of legislation”. On the other hand, the Shiite members of the constitutional committee sought a clause stating that “Islam is the only source of legislation”. Thus, the final provisions were sort of a compromise. To limit the possibility of making laws contrary to constitutional principles, two clauses were included in Article 2 stating that no law could be contrary to democratic principles and that no law could be contrary to the fundamental rights and freedoms guaranteed by the constitution. References to the role of Islam in the Iraqi state also appear in many other articles of the constitution. A certain peculiarity, probably resulting from the sad experience of the period of the Baathist regime, is 1 The English translation of the Iraqi Constitution has been published on the official database of the International Committee of the Red Cross Iraqi Constitution Final https://ihl-databases.ic rc.org/ihl/Constitution_en (accessed: 15. 04. 2022).

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the guarantee in Article 10 of the special character of the holy places lying within the territory of the republic and the emphasis on the obligation of the state to protect them. As mentioned above, the constitution creates a unicameral parliament. Its unique feature, however, is that the legislator left open the possibility of creating a second chamber of parliament under the name of the Federation Council. Given the federal nature of the Iraqi state, the creation of such a chamber, grouping representatives of the provinces or autonomous regions of the country, would be natural. Thus, the Iraqi constitution in the regulation of the legislature creates an unusual situation, in which it provides in Article 65 for the creation of a bicameral parliament, but in the remaining provisions normalises the functioning of the state with a unicameral parliament, where only the existence of the Assembly of Representatives has been acknowledged. It should be noted that leaving such an important issue unresolved was due to the inability to reach a consensus in 2005 among Iraqi politicians on the shape of Iraqi federalism. The constitutionally signalled law establishing the Federation Council did not come into being. Regardless of the further fate of the legislation on this issue, it can be concluded that even if the Federation Council is established, there will be a significant asymmetry between the two chambers of the Iraqi parliament, one of which, the Assembly of Representatives, was created by the constitution and the other, the Federation Council, only by an ordinary law. The Assembly of Representatives is a chamber with a non-permanent number of members. Article 49 of the constitution defines the ratio of the number of deputies to the size of the population; there should be approximately 100,000 citizens per deputy. Deputies are elected in direct and secret elections. The constitution does not regulate the electoral system, leaving the type (proportional or majority) and the number of constituencies to be decided by law. For some researchers (McGarry and O’Leary, 2007: 693), the wording of Article 49 suggests a proportional representation system, however, it has not been explicitly stated in the document. The constitution also does not specify the conditions to be met by candidates for members of parliament, leaving this issue to statutory regulation. The aforementioned article states that parliamentary duties may not be combined with any state position. As a condition for assuming the duties of a newly elected deputy, the candidate must take an oath of allegiance to the Republic of Iraq. The text of the oath, contained in Article 50, begins with an invocation of God Almighty and includes a pledge to work for the sovereignty and integrity of the country, to look after the interests of its people and to preserve the democratic and federal system. An oath with the same content is taken by both ministers and the president of the republic.

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The Iraqi constitution introduces in Article 56 the principle of the limited tenure of the Assembly of Representatives. The legislator has set the duration of the term of the House of Representatives at four years, counted from the moment of convening the first meeting. Parliamentary sessions are held in public, although the constitution provides for the possibility of holding a meeting in camera in exceptional cases. The Assembly of Representatives sits in session. The constitution stipulates that there must be two ordinary sessions per year, lasting a total of at least eight months. In addition, the president of the republic, the prime minister, the speaker of parliament or 50 deputies may convene parliament to hold an extraordinary session. Extraordinary sessions must have a specific theme, which may not be exceeded. The president and the Council of Ministers can initiate legislation. The legislative initiative is also held by ten members of parliament or a parliamentary committee. In order for a bill to be passed by the Assembly of Representatives, it must be passed by a simple majority of MPs and a quorum equal to an absolute majority of MPs. Laws passed by parliament come into force after being signed by the president and published in the official gazette. In the absence of the president’s signature, a law comes into force automatically 15 days after being sent to the president. As an expression of respect for the autonomy of parliament, the constitution leaves it the right to enact the rules of procedure of the chamber. The internal organs of the Assembly of Representatives are the speaker of the chamber and his two deputies. The constitution does not contain provisions regulating the formation of parliamentary committees, although in Article 60 it provides for their functioning, granting them legislative initiative. As mentioned earlier, the powers of parliament have been drawn very broadly. The Assembly of Representatives is the only supreme authority of Iraq with legislative competence. It is also the only organ of state power that is a representative body. In addition to its legislative function, the parliament also performs creative and control functions in relation to the executive. Article 61 of the constitution enumerates the powers of the Assembly of Representatives. These include: the adoption of laws, control over the government, election and impeachment of the president, ratification by law of international agreements and approval of judicial, ambassadorial and general appointments above the rank of major general. The parliamentary control function over the executive branch is exercised both over the president and the government. In the latter case, the parliament can granting a vote of confidence or a vote of no confidence. The constitutional procedure for appointing the government stipulates that the government appointed by the president must receive parliamentary approval. It is granted when the candidate for prime minister presents a programme that receives the approval

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of an absolute majority of the members of the Assembly of Representatives. The constitutional provisions governing the vote of no confidence indicate that both the individual political responsibility of individual ministers and the joint and several responsibilities of the government can be exercised in this mode. In the latter case, the censure motion is filed against the person of the prime minister. The resolution on the motion of censure is passed by an absolute majority of votes of the Assembly of Representatives. A vote of no confidence results in the resignation of the government or the minister concerned. Procedures for government creation and parliamentary control show the features of constraining power sharing. The relationship between parliament and the president of the republic also indicates the predominance of the former above the latter. The constitution defines the office of the president as the head of state, a symbol of its unity and sovereignty. The Iraqi head of state comes from indirect elections; hence, his legitimacy is comparatively lower than the parliament. The president is elected by the Assembly of Representatives by a two-thirds majority of all members of the chamber. The lack of legitimacy to hold office coming directly from the people significantly weakens the constitutional position of the president. The term of office lasts four years and the president can be re-elected once. The president is elected by the parliament within 30 days of its first session. The constitution provides for the office of vice president or vice presidents, leaving this matter to statutory regulation. The powers of the president are very limited. The president has no legislative veto or power to dissolve parliament. His most important prerogative is to entrust the prime ministerial candidate with the mission of forming a cabinet. However, here he is limited by Article 76 of the constitution, which obliges him to entrust the mission of forming the cabinet to a person indicated by the largest parliamentary grouping. The constitution leaves the president the possibility of opposing such a nomination only in the case of persons accused of crimes. This provision, which favours the position of the largest political groups, reduces the president’s role in the process of forming the government to almost a mere formality. It should be added that this regulation has contributed to the prolonged process of government formation, as demonstrated by the long-term inability to form a cabinet after all four national elections in 2005, 2010, 2014, and 2018 respectively. The main weakness of this regulation is that it does not provide alternative ways of forming a government in the event of the failure of the procedure indicated above. The absolute parliamentary supremacy over the president became a fact only since the second term of parliament. Until 2010, transitional provisions were in place, regulated by Article 138 of the constitution. This provision states that during the transitional period the collective head of state was a three-member presidential council with broader powers. The presidential council was elected by

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the Assembly of Representatives and consisted of the president and two vice presidents. Unlike the post-2010 presidential institution, the presidential council had the power to veto legislation. The creation of a presidency with broader powers for the transitional period was the result of a unique compromise made during the constitutional negotiations.

Power-sharing behaviour in Iraq 2005–2014 Iraqi politicians, operating in an emerging institutional order and under conditions of external interference, made political decisions with long-term consequences during the first decade of the functioning of the political system. This section identifies the factors that condition the political calculations of the main actors of the Iraqi political scene. The consensus of the main actors on the democratic nature of the political system and the resulting establishment of the parliament – the body of political representation – were milestones in the process of reconstruction of the state, and at the same time important incentives for further political activities: the formation of parties, building coalitions and parliamentary alliances, and finally the formation of governments. At the same time, the imperfect power sharing, confined mostly to intra-elite bargains, led to the sectarian violence and civil war. The Iraqi political transition process, structured by the TAL, culminated in parliamentary elections, which were held on 15 December 2005. Approximately 78.6% of those eligible voted in the elections to the new Assembly of Representatives (Majlis al-nuwwab). Such a high turnout was a surprise in a country ravaged by decades of dictatorship, war, and the widespread acts of terrorism in recent months. The elections of 15 December 2005 took place in a similarly difficult security situation as the January elections. However, their political context was decidedly different. The constitution, adopted in a nationwide referendum on 15 October, had already entered into force. It was accepted by 79% of voters with a 63% turnout. The acceptance of the constitution was an expression of the will of the Iraqi people to continue their political transformation. This was how it was interpreted by Sunni groups, who stopped calling for a boycott of Iraq’s political institutions and joined the political process. The campaign for the December elections was relatively short. Some observers feared that Iraqi voters, called to the polls for the third time in 2005, would not vote in large numbers. However, it turned out that voter turnout was exceptionally high at nearly 80%. The most significant change from previous elections was the end of the boycott in Sunni-populated provinces, which saw a significant turnout. Numerous supporters of the radical Shiite cleric Muktada al-Sadr also

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participated in the election. The relatively low level of political violence on election day was also an encouraging sign. The high turnout was seen by Iraqi politicians as a refusal to allow the armed settlement of political disputes and as an expression of a longing for peace and stability (Allawi, 2008: 441). From this point of view, regardless of the outcome, the power-sharing mechanism of elections proved to be crucial in avoiding civil war. The newly elected Assembly of Representatives began its work, enjoying a strong mandate given by the people. The higher turnout than in the referendum and the elections to the Transitional National Assembly was mainly due to the increased participation of Sunnis, whose representatives took almost 60 of the 275 seats. It may be argued that the adoption of the constitution and lessons learned from the weak Sunni involvement in the drafting process were a milestone for the Sunni community. Since then, most leaders of this community have accepted the political institutions of the new Iraq and decided to engage in a democratic political process. However, the winner of the elections, as expected, was again the United Iraqi Alliance – a coalition of Shia groups. The biggest loser was Iyad Alawi’s mixed Shia-Sunni secular coalition “Iraqiya”, which has lost as much as 40% of its seats in parliament. The electoral process also proved that the major political parties have become representatives of the interests of the main religious and ethnic groups in the power-sharing setting. The only outlier – a secular coalition “Iraqiya”, which included both Arab Shiites and Sunnis and has been led by former Prime Minister Iyad Alawi, was the weakest among the main groups, with only 8% of voters supporting it. The elections showed that when there is a permanent threat of violence, voters turned towards their basic, primordial identities and supported the groups referring to them. The distribution of seats in the parliament – the main power-sharing institution – reflected not so much the political preferences of the voters as their ethnic and religious divisions. After the result of the 2005 elections, the negotiations over the government started. As after previous elections, the process of selecting a government was rather lengthy. After six months of tedious negotiations, a Government of National Accord was formed with Nuri al-Maliki as prime minister. The five years of his government came at an extremely difficult time for Iraq. The country was gripped by civil war between the followers of the two main strands of Islam. In 2006, the government did not control large parts of the country, or even many districts of Baghdad, and the number of civilian casualties exceeded 30,000. Effectively the country was marred by the sectarian, Sunni-Shia civil war. However, in the following two years, US forces together with the government managed to bring some Sunni militias back into the political process, and a counterinsurgency offensive by coalition troops helped restore central government control over many areas.

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The issue of the federal state system, introduced by the new Basic Law, has been a particularly divisive factor in Iraqi society and the political class. Legislative work on the law on the regions began as early as 2006. It encountered major problems and once again revealed major divisions along ethnic, religious and regional lines among Iraqi parliamentarians. In the end, this law, which is particularly important for the Kurds, was adopted by a very narrow majority. The provisions of the constitution not only created an autonomous region of Kurdistan within the Republic of Iraq, but also left open the possibility of creating further autonomous regions. The Basic Law, passed by Shiite and Kurdish votes, thus allowed for the creation of a Shiite “super-region” grouping the country’s nine southern provinces. This prospect antagonised the Sunnis, who saw a possible Shiite region as jeopardising the existence of the Iraqi state and an existential threat to their community. Therefore, in the negotiations on the formation of a national unity government, the condition of the Sunni politicians was the establishment of a parliamentary committee for the amendment of the constitution. It began work at the end of September 2006 with 27 members, with the task of preparing a draft amendment to the Basic Law within six months. It should be added that due to the impossibility of reaching a consensus in the following months, the deadline was not met. An issue related to the federation system of the state was the problem of internal borders between the provinces and the autonomous region of the country. Particularly pressing was the issue of Kirkuk, a city and its adjoining area inhabited by Kurds, Arabs and Turkmen in the north of the country, just outside the jurisdiction of the Kurdistan Regional Government. The ownership of this area, which contains vast oil reserves, was to be determined in the course of a procedure regulated by Article 140 of the Iraqi Constitution. This article envisaged a three-stage process involving the normalisation of the issue of residency (i. e., a return to the state prior to the ethnic cleansing perpetrated against the Kurds by Saddam Hussein’s regime), followed by a census and, finally, a referendum, the result of which would determine whether the city would belong to Kurdish autonomy or to federal control in Baghdad. In the autumn of 2006, both the government and the House of Representatives appointed the relevant committees to implement and oversee the arrangements of Article 140 of the constitution. The unresolved issue of Kirkuk was vitally important to Kurdish groups, often becoming the main subject of dispute between Kurdish and Arab representatives in subsequent years. In the first half of 2007, a government bill on hydrocarbons was debated in parliament and referred to the parliamentary committee on oil and gas. The draft law, apart from a number of technical norms regulating the operation of the oil and gas sector, also contained provisions on the division of profits from the sale of these resources between the federal government and the authorities of the

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autonomous region. Other contentious issues included the proposed structure of the national oil company and the scope of its powers, policy towards foreign extraction companies and the nature of contracts signed with them. Sunni groups and the vice president, Tarik al-Hashemi, called for work on this law to be postponed until the constitutional amendment committee had completed its work. On the other hand, the need to base the work of Iraq’s main industry, the oil industry, on up-to-date legal standards created considerable pressure to complete the legislation quickly. By mid-2008, most of the contentious issues had been resolved, with the biggest problem remaining the question of the powers of the federal and Kurdish regional governments to sign oil exploration and production contracts. Intra-elite bargains and parliamentary politics were overshadowed by sectarian violence and the civil war. At the height of the sectarian violence, in 2008, Prime Minister al-Maliki sent Iraqi troops into the streets of the southern city of Basra, where they fought a victorious battle against the militias of the powerful Shiite cleric Muktada al-Sadr. The central government’s war against the rebels also had its dimensions in parliamentary politics. Parallel to the ongoing military struggle, individual parties in conflict with the government boycotted the parliament: the eight-month boycott of the Assembly of Representatives by Sunni parties was followed by the boycott by supporters of Muktada al-Sadr and members of the “Iraqiya” coalition. Despite these enormous political tensions, the government managed to survive the entire term, hold local elections in 2009 and prepare for the 2010 parliamentary elections. In the summer of 2009, prior to the elections, the need for changes to the current electoral law became clear to Iraqi parliamentarians. A draft law on electoral law was prepared by the Council of Ministers in September 2009. The starting point for works on the amendment was the judgement of the Federal Supreme Court on the need to create constituencies with the number of seats corresponding to the number of citizens living in them. This was a consequence of Article 49 of the constitution, which stipulates that there should be 100,000 citizens per deputy. In the December 2005 elections, the number of 275 seats was adopted, which – formally speaking – was contrary to the constitution (International Crisis Group, 2010). When works on amendments to the electoral law were initiated, various political groups started to seek further changes modifying the electoral system according to their preferences. The first issue discussed was the possibility of introducing open list voting, instead of the closed list voting system that had been in place until then. This issue divided Shiite parliamentarians, among others, with Ayatollah al-Sistani’s supporters being the biggest proponents of an open list system. Parliamentarians associated with the charismatic Muktada al-Sadr expected that it would be more beneficial for them to keep the current system of

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closed lists, but publicly tried not to oppose the position taken by the spiritual leader of the Shiite community. Eventually an open list regulation was passed (Davisha, 2010: 31). The national elections that took place on 7 March 2010 were held in a very different atmosphere from the two elections five years previously. Although security conditions in the country were still very difficult, there were improvements in almost every dimension compared to previous years. Before the elections themselves, considerable controversy arose over the High Independent Election Commission’s decision to exclude as many as 499 candidates on the grounds that they had a history of association with the Al-Baas regime. Among the excluded candidates were politicians from all lists, but Sunni and secular candidates were the most numerous. After considering the appeals, 43 candidates were reinstated to run in the elections. The issue of the exclusion of such a large number of candidates and the subsequent non-transparent restoration of the opportunity to run for some of them seriously undermined the authority of the High Independent Election Commission. Eventually, 6,292 candidates were eligible to participate in the election, most of whom belonged to one of 89 political groups. Twelve electoral coalitions were also registered. The voting itself took place in a relatively calm atmosphere. Almost 12 million voters took part – more than 62% of those eligible to vote. The voting took place in 52,000 district election commissions, where over 300,000 commissioners and observers worked. After the vote, the contents of ballot boxes were counted in special election centres and the entire process was supervised by observers from individual political parties, international observers, and the media. Despite these procedures, after the elections some Iraqi political parties made accusations of electoral fraud and unlawful influence on voters. This was the reason why the Special Electoral Court ordered a recount in the Baghdad province. It confirmed the original election result. International observers tended to agree that the irregularities during the election were minor and did not materially affect the outcome of the vote. The final results were announced on 29 March. The secular coalition “Iraqiya”, under the new name of the Iraqi National Movement, won the elections with 91 seats. It was narrowly ahead of the second-ranked party, the Shiite State of Law Coalition, which won 89 seats. It was followed by the Iraqi National Alliance with 70 seats and the Kurdish Alliance with 43 seats. A significant change compared to the composition of the first term parliament was that seats were taken by genuinely popular politicians. Thanks to the open list system, voters in many cases voted for politicians they knew and who were popular locally but whose names were relatively low on the electoral lists. This resulted in the defeat of many party nominees and the introduction of numerous new deputies to the Assembly of Representatives, accounting for more than 80% of the membership. The announcement of the final election results

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opened a lengthy process of forming a governing coalition that culminated in the formation of a government led by Nuri al-Maliki of the State of Law Coalition on 11 November 2010. This long and turbulent process of government formation exposed many weaknesses of the electoral system adopted before the elections. The difficulties in forming a government following the 2010 elections were an indication that the existing structure of inclusive power-sharing institutions in Iraq did not fully reflect the deep political divisions affecting society.

Conclusions During the first decade of power-sharing practices in Iraq the main conflicts were focused on four major themes: 1) the degree of centralisation of state power and the associated extent of the devolution of powers and resources to regional and local government bodies; 2) the management and distribution of oil and gas production revenues; 3) the course of internal borders between the Kurdistan Region and the rest of the country; and 4) settlements with members of Saddam Hussein’s regime (the politics of de-Baathification). The first three issues revolved around particular Iraqi form of distributive power sharing – issues relating to the autonomy of the single federal region, the Kurdish region. They touched on the disputed areas of Kirkuk. One of the first issues facing Iraqi parliamentarians after the formation of the cabinet in 2006 was the call for a revision of the constitution and increased powers for the central government. This view was held mainly by Sunni politicians, who feared the disintegration of the country (Kirmanj 2013: 215). On the other hand, politicians from the Kurdish Alliance were opposed to the changes, arguing that any amendments to the constitution should only be made after it had been fully implemented. They pointed to the lack of progress in the implementation of Article 140 of the constitution, which regulates how to deal with disputed land around the city of Kirkuk, claimed by both Kurds and Arab Sunnis, as well as the Turkmen minority. The strategy adopted by the Kurdish Alliance was to agree to any possible adjustments to the powers of the federal government on the condition of the acceptance of the other parties to hold a referendum in Kirkuk province, as provided for in Article 140. This position caused resistance by Arab groups fearing the loss of control over an oil-rich area, a further consequence of which was the inability to find a new compromise on the powers of the central, regional and local governments. Throughout the period in question, it was not possible to reach a compromise solution to the problem of the regional membership of Kirkuk and its environs. In the process of building the institutional capacity of political representation in the period under discussion in Iraq, not only the interactions between political

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actors and the institutional structure they created played an important role. Specific external circumstances also had a significant impact, the most significant of which were: (1) the context of a postcolonial state with arbitrarily drawn borders that included different communities with distinct collective identities; (2) the situation of the end of a long-standing dictatorship; and (3) the fact of the intervention and long-term military presence of external powers. The above factors, relating to the sociostructural and international situation, constituted foundational conditions which, from an analytical point of view, should be treated as variables independent of the political processes taking place in Iraq. The degree of acceptance of the new state by citizens should be considered as a variable dependent on the process of building parliamentarism and state capacity. A measure of this acceptance is the spread of terrorism and other acts of political violence. The scale of this phenomenon has varied over the years 2004– 2010. During this period, in the areas inhabited by the Arab population of Iraq, isolated armed clashes against foreign troops transformed into a regular civil war of a sectarian nature. It reached its peak in 2007–2008, and by the end of the first decade of the 21st century was limited to acts of terror organised by groups challenging the constitutional order of the country. The intensity of political violence can also be treated as an indicator of the success of building representative power and effective state institutions, although it should be remembered that in the Iraqi context this phenomenon (political violence) was also influenced by the presence of the US military and its allies. From this point of view, the military presence of foreign external states can be treated as an intervening variable in the process of state building and its acquisition of democratic legitimacy.

Bibliography Al-Ali, Z. (2014). The Struggle for Iraq’s Future: How Corruption, Incompetence and Sectarianism Have Undermined Democracy, Yale University Press, New Haven. Allawi, A. A. (2008). The Occupation of Iraq. Winning the War, Losing the Peace. Yale University Press, New Haven. Arato, A. (2008). From Interim to “Permanent” Constitution in Iraq. In: S. A. Arjomand (ed.). Constitutional Politics in the Middle East. With Special Reference to Turkey, Iraq, Iran, and Afghanistan. Hart Publishing, Oxford–Portland. Curtis, D. (2013). The international peacebuilding paradox: Power sharing and post-conflict governance in Burundi. African Affairs, 112 (446):, 72–91. Davisha, A. (2010). Iraq. A Vote Against Sectarianism. Journal of Democracy, 21 No. 3, July 2010:, 26–40. Dobbins, J., Jones, S., Crane, K. and DeGrasse, B. C. (2017). The Beginner’s Guide to NationBuilding. RAND, Santa Monica, CA.

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Dodge, T. (2021). The Failure of Peacebuilding in Iraq: The Role of Consociationalism and Political Settlements. Journal of Intervention and Statebuilding, 15 (4): 459–475. Feldman, N. and Martinez, R. (2006). Constitutional Politics and Text in the New Iraq. An Experiment in Islamic Democracy. Fordham Law Review, 75 (2):, 883–920. Hartzell, C. A. and Hoddie, M. (2007). Crafting Peace. Power-Sharing Institutions and the Negotiated Settlement of Civil Wars. Penn State University Press, University Park, PA. International Crisis Group (2006). After Baker-Hamilton. What to Do in Iraq. International Crisis Group Middle East Report No. 60, https://www.crisisgroup.org/middle-east-north -africa/gulf-and-arabian-peninsula/iraq/after-baker-hamilton-what-do-iraq (accessed: 04. 03. 2022). International Crisis Group (2010). Iraq’s Uncertain Future: Elections and Beyond. Crisis Group Middle East Report No. 94. https://www.crisisgroup.org/middle-east-north-af rica/gulf-and-arabian-peninsula/iraq/iraq-s-uncertain-future-elections-and-beyond (accessed: 24. 03. 2022). Inter-Parliamentary Union (c. 2005). Iraq, Council of Representatives of Iraq, Elections In December 2005. http://archive.ipu.org/parline-e/reports/arc/2151bis_05.htm (accessed: 02. 03. 2022). Jawad, S. N. and al-Assaf, S. I. (2012). Iraqi Federalism. Empowering the Governorates at the Expense of the State. Al Jazeera Center for Studies, http://studies.aljazeera.net/Resource Gallery/media/Documents/2012/6/27/201262772047220734Iraqi%20 federalism.pdf (accessed: 27. 06. 2018). Kirmanj, S. (2013). Identity and nation in Iraq. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner. Lijphart, A. (1977). Democracy in Plural Societies: A Comparative Exploration. Yale University Press, New Haven. McEvoy, J. and Aboultaif, E. W. (2022) “Power-Sharing Challenges: From Weak Adoptability to Dysfunction in Iraq”, Ethnopolitics, 21:3, 238–257. McGarry, J, and O’Leary, B. (2007). “Iraq’s Constitution of 2005: Liberal consociation as political prescription”, International Journal of Constitutional Law, Volume 5, Issue 4, October 2007, Pages 670–698, Salamey, I. and Rizk, S. (2018). Ways Forward for Syria. In: Imad Salamey, Mohammed Abu-Nimer, Elie Abouaoun (eds.). Springer International Publishing, Cham, Switzerland, 149–164. Strøm, K., Scott, G., Benjamin, A.T.G. and Harvard, S. (2017). Inclusion, Dispersion, and Constraint: Powersharing in the World’s States, 1975–2010. British Journal of Political Science 47 (1): 165–185. Vennesson, P. (2018). Case studies and process tracing: theories and practices. In: Donatella della Porta and Michael Keating (eds.). Approaches and Methodologies in the Social Sciences. A Pluralist Perspective. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, England, 223–239.

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The elite interactions. Elements of consociationalism and the intra-organisational factors in Syria in the pre- and post-Arab uprising periods

Focusing on the theoretical dimension of consociationalism, it would be necessary to clarify in what sense Syria can be considered as a country in which deeply divided societies experience power sharing between elites from different social groups. It is true that when simplifying the perspective of consociationalism to only consociational democracy some difficulties arise. Syria does not have a “a stable democratic system” in a pluralistic society. To apply the term “democratic” to the Syrian government would be a highly controversial characteristic. Although officially Syria is classified as a parliamentary republic in which decision-making power is shared between the president and parliament, however, it is, in fact, considered by many political scientists as a state with an authoritarian government (Heydemann, 2013: 59; Hinnebusch, 2014: 21; Sottimano, 2016: 450). Many authors found confirmation of this statement, inter alia, in the 1973 constitution (which was in force until 2012) which stated that “the Arab Socialist Baath Party leads society and the state” (The Syrian Constitution – 1973: Art. 8). Consequently, at least 167 seats of the 250-member parliament were guaranteed to the National Progressive Front, a coalition of ten mostly Baathist parities (Turner, 1999: 1503). However, it is not obvious that this was the reason there was always limited power sharing between the elites from different social groups. Research shows that consociationalism has a broader scope, going well beyond a purely democratic system, which is why some elements of consociationalism are also found in Syria (Karabibar, 2014; Rosiny, 2013). Such an approach is possible because the “sharing of power” is a constantly discussed concept that emphasises both the concrete sharing of power in society and the sharing of power in general. The “quantitative” and “qualitative” dimensions of the separation of powers are also considered, taking into account formal and informal institutions (Guelke, 2020: 92–95; Strøm et al., 2017: 165–185). For this reason, when analysing the case of Syria, it is necessary to include not only the implementation of de jure consociational principles, but also non-formalised consociational elements, which are also of great importance. In order to understand the elements of the consociationalism in the Syrian case, it is also useful

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to distinguish between inter-party and intra-party consociationalism (Bogaards, 2014: 19). For example, in Syria the Baath party favoured the representation and accommodation of sociocultural groups within the dominant party. It seems that the Lebanese experiences with “corporate consociationalism” and the Iraqi implementation attempts of “liberal consociationalism” inspired Syria’s elites to also adopt a form of consensus deal. It is worth recalling that many researchers avoid presenting the current conflict in Syria solely in terms of sectarianism (Majed, 2017). Hafez and Bashar Assad tried to gain broader support not only from minorities but also from Sunni elites to stabilise their power. The new constitution of 2012 (Syrian Arab Republic’s Constitution, 2012) replaced the content of the eighth article of the constitution on the leading role of the Baath party with a more consociational one, which emphasises that “the political system of the state shall be based on the principle of political pluralism, and exercising power democratically through the ballot box” (Article 8.1). On the legal level, the constitution guarantees protection of the cultural diversity of Syrian society (Article 9), stressing that the pluralism of Syrian society is based on solidarity, symbiosis and respect for the principles of social justice, freedom, equality and the maintenance of human dignity of every individual (Article 19).

The vertical “segmental cleavages” of Syria Analysing the Syrian social division, often simplified to the dimension of “sectarianism”, it is worth remembering that one cannot indiscriminately assume the internal political homogeneity of identity groups (Majed, 2017). Although political groups cannot be mixed with religious or ethnic communities in a simplified way, in the case of Syria, political and religious affiliation shows certain regularities. For example, it is true that most Alawites and Christians cooperated with Bashar al-Assad and that most Sunnis supported the rebels in the recent war. It is obvious that larger groups are never 100% homogeneous. This fact, among other things, was conducive to some consociational interactions between Alawites and Sunni Muslims. For this reason, before we move on to discussing the elements of Syrian consociationalism, it is worth presenting the segmentation of Syria’s society against the background of the internal dynamics of the political system. All of this is to establish the causes of the radicalisation of some Sunnis and why many minority representatives joined the Baath party government. At the same time, this analysis will reveal the conflict-generating spaces that the rulers tried to neutralise in order to maintain power. At this point it is also worth emphasising that the Syrian civil war cannot be solely and exclusively defined by the rebellion and conflict of those who took to the streets in 2011. It is true that the crisis erupted thanks to civil society activism against the Alawite families who

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monopolised power, however, there were many reasons besides minority rule which created the unrest. There were long- and short-term causes, such as the discredited ideology of Arab socialism, the uneven economy, drought (2006– 2011), population surge, social media (the proliferation of satellite TV, mobile phones, and the internet), corruption, and the activity of Syria’s powerful intelligence agency (Khattab, 2017: 157–86; Mazur, 2019: 995–1027; Salih, 2013: 184–206). Notwithstanding all of the above reservations, however, Syria’s social fragmentation has become one of the most important factors in the ongoing conflict. Sunni Muslims have always constituted the majority in recent Syria, and the remainder is divided into Christians, Alawites, Druze, and Ismailis. In line with Baath party ideology, Syria’s official censuses do not include religion or ethnicity, making it difficult to achieve an accurate breakdown of society (Samman, 1978: 9). For these considerations, it is extremely useful to try to establish the number of followers of particular religious denominations in 2011. The heritage, contribution and place of individual groups in the social composition of this state are also important for understanding the conflicting spaces. At the same time, ethnic diversity complicates religious affiliation. Western researchers have usually provided estimates for 2011, which are, in any case, questionable. Nevertheless, taking into account the inconvenience of religious statistics in the Middle East, the US estimates from 2011 can be roughly adopted (slightly corrected by the author of this text). According to these data, the population of Syria in 2011 consists of the following groups: 68.7% Sunni (including 60% Sunni Arabs and 8.7% Sunni Kurds and Turkmen), 12% Alawites (Arabs), 9% Orthodox Christians and Catholics (Melkites-Orthodox, MelkitesCatholics, Maronites, Syrian-Orthodox, Syrian-Catholics, Chaldeans), 4% Armenian Christians (Armenians from the Apostolic Church of Armenia and the Catholic-Armenian Church), 3% Druze, 2% Shiites (mainly Ismailis), approx. 0.3% of Yezidis (mainly Kurds), and approx. 1% of other religions (Glioti, 2013; Holliday, 2011: 10). There are various estimates that more or less significantly change the percentage share of particular religious groups in Syria. Obviously, the above-mentioned data significantly changes the picture of other religious groups, which in their entirety must be automatically reduced by more than 5% in relation to the US estimates from 2011. For example, according to the World Directory of Minorities and Indigenous Peoples, the numbers of followers of particular religions and denominations in Syria in October 2011 were as follows: Sunni Islam (74%), Alawite Islam (11%), other Muslims including Ismaili and Ithna’ashari or Twelver Shia (2%), Christianity including Greek Orthodox, Syriac Orthodox, Maronite, Syrian Catholic, Roman Catholic and Greek Catholic (10%), Druze (3%). This meant in numbers that the Alawi Muslims were 2.1 million (11%), Christians of various denominations 1.9 million (10%), Iraqi refugees 1.5–

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2 million (7.8–10.4%), Kurds 2–2.5 million (10–15%), Druze 580,000 (3%), Palestinians 442,000 (2.3%), Ismailis and Ithna’ashari or Twelver Shia 386,000 (2%), Armenians 323,000 (1.7%). However, the discussed source honestly emphasises that the specific demographic data for Syria are unreliable. This is because some minority groups were defined primarily by religion, others by ethnicity, and some were new and transitional immigrant communities. This complex physical and human geography was the main determinant of Syria’s social fabric. In addition, there were profound social divisions between the inhabitants of towns and villages. Tensions between the two communities were almost as important as religious differences (Minority Rights Group International, 2011). Another issue – which, due to the limited possibilities of the study can only be mentioned – is the production of statistics for the purposes of confession. For example, there were times when Christians or Alawites overestimated the numbers of their followers, while Sunni authors clearly understated them. Often one can get the impression that there was a specific form of a “fight for statistics”, which is expressed in the numerical minimisation of the competitive position of a religion (or a religion recognised as the “opponent”), because the higher the number of followers of a given group means it is translated into greater political and strategic importance (Kos´cielniak, 2003: 187–191; Kos´cielniak, 2006: 71–84). Key actors on the Syrian political scene for several decades have been the Alawites, who are associated with the Baath party. In 2011, they – depending on various, difficult to verify sources – constituted somewhere between 10% and 15% of the population, or about 2–2.5 million out of a population of around 23 million. The scary slogan: “Alawi to the tomb and Christians to Beirut!” which appeared during the first demonstrations against President Assad’s rule as early as spring 2011 marks the first major vertical line of social division. There is still some uncertainty as to who was behind such slogans. Some of the Syrian opposition considered it as provocation by members of the government’s secret services who managed to infiltrate the ranks of the demonstrators. In other words, according to this explication, Syrian government agents were trying to portray the opposition as dominated by Islamic radicals (Balanche, 2015). All this was intended to discredit the opposition in the eyes of the religious minorities who wanted to live in a secular Syria. At this point, we touch upon the second fundamental vertical line of social division: the power of a religious minority propagating of separating religion from the state. Therefore, the first vertical line of social division is connected with the clanliness, secrecy and persistence of the Alawites – the Syrian ruling elite around President Bashar al-Assad. These are the hallmarks of the ever-enigmatic Alawite faith that unites its members and has aroused suspicion among most Sunnis for centuries. Alawism or “Nusayrizm” (from the name of its founder Muhammad Ibn Nusayr) arose in today’s Iraq in the 11th century. Like all currents of Shiism,

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the Alawites have great reverence for Ali. Added to this is the belief in reincarnation. How the persecuted group created quite hermetic methods of defence, intensified the mystery of this community. The most visible manifestations in society, such as their non-use of mosques, the lack of a ban on drinking alcohol and the fairly loose manner of women’s clothing, increased aversion to them in Sunni circles. Pejorative legends about them have spread. In the past, the Alawi have been condemned by Sunni authorities such as Ibn Taimı¯yya (1263– 1328), who in his famous fatwa declared the Nusayris to be even more unfaithful than idolaters and declared jihad against them (Friedman, 2005: 349–363; Talhamy, 2010: 175–194). Radical modern Sunni supporters of Ibn Taimı¯yya’s thinking still consider the Alawites not only “religious bankrupts” and “the most immoral” but also “the source of all misfortunes in the Islamic world” (Ibn Taimı¯yya, 1976: 361). The identity of the Alawites and their ideological preferences in the 20th century (secularism) were shaped by a cycle of uncertainty related to the decades-long non-acceptance and persecution by many Sunnis (Goldsmith, 2015a). Alawite Arabs showed a certain solidarity and ideological and political unity, although this group cannot be viewed as a monolith. According to researchers, they are even a kind of contradiction because they constitute an extremely diverse and fragmented community. Being an Alawite means many things, different identities, all overlapping with different geographic and ethnic contexts. Their existence also differs in Arab or Turkish environments, in state contexts (Syrian, Turkish, Lebanese) or in urban or rural, workers and elite contexts. Hence, it is quite difficult to present a comprehensive analysis of this religious community. Generally, in Syria there are two groups of Alawites: those from the coast (Latakia, Tartus) and the interior of the country from cities like Homs, Hama, Damascus and Aleppo. In fact, the complex politics and identity of the Alawites in Syria should be viewed in large part as a product of modernity, dating to at least the French mandate era. The policy of Paris promoted separate identities and autonomous zones along ethnic and sectarian lines. France used minority groups such as the Alawites, Druze, Ismailis, Christians, Kurds and Circassians to serve in its local forces Les Troupes Speciales du Levant. This policy not only created tensions with the Sunni Arab majority, but also paved the way for subsequent minority control over Syria. Military service offered a chance for social and political advancement, but was not particularly popular with Sunnis. Since Syria gained independence in 1946, successive governments have relied heavily on minority or local resources of support (Bolat, 2020: 143–162; Khoury, 1987: 515–534). The seizure of power by the Alawites of the Baathist party in the mid-1960s was undoubtedly the most significant point in Syria’s modern political history. Minority rule caused distrust among many Sunnis who regarded the government as illegal, oppressive and anti-Islamic. The rhetoric of the Sunni opposition, centred around the Muslim Brothers, emphasised that the Alawite

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minority had seized power by armed force, limited religious education and the importance of ulema (Fildis, 2012: 148–156). Alawites are often associated with the interests and fate of Al-Assad’s rule in Syria on an ad hoc basis. However, an analysis of the politics of this community in 1832–1973 paradoxically indicates that pluralism and diversity are the foundations of the political preferences of the Alawites (according to the Alawite perspective, this is what God intended!). For this reason, in recent history, the Alawites have made gradual progress towards true integration into Syrian society. The problem, however, always arose in opposition to them on the part of some Sunnis, and thus the in-depth mobilisation of the Alawites by Al-Assad. Paradoxically, however, the long-standing political aspirations of the Alawites are no different from those demanded in the antiregime protests that began in Syria in early 2011 (Goldsmith, 2013: 392–409). In this way, one also touches on certain spaces close to consociationalism (some, more or less clear manifestations of which will be discussed in the next point). The second line of social division in Syria is revealed in the tension between the religious and secular visions of Syrian society. “There must be feelings of worry about the Middle East because we are the last stronghold for secularism in the region” President Bashar al-Asad said during his interview with the British newspaper The Sunday Times (Rashed, 2013). The concept that the idea of citizenship should replace tribal and religious identity has consequently been built by the ruling secular Baath party. Syrian secularism, both internally and externally, was part of the political agenda of the governments of both Hafiz and Bashar Assad. Nevertheless, the secular nature of the state was not consistently implemented. This inconsistency is explained by the fact that secularism was to some extent an instrument for gaining and maintaining power (Gatta, 2016: 1). Immediately before the Arab Spring in 2011, Syria was described as a country with “moderate separation” between religion and the state. The Syrian degree of restrictions on religious freedom compared to other Middle Eastern countries was one of the lowest, and in most cases, religious minorities were free to practice their religion (Fox, 2008 p. 246). Nevertheless, in Syria there was considerable scope for state intervention in religious matters. Syria was also the country that had the highest level of government regulation in these areas (Fox, 2008: 221, 246). Nevertheless, the Syrian system was “problematically secular”. In the light of the ethnopolitical theories of Pierre L. van den Berghe (1933–2019), the case of Syria could be an example of the “hidden use” of religious identity in political matters (van den Berghe, 1981). It was characterised by reducing the presence of religious and ethnic topics in Syrian politics and the mass media. Thus, attention was drawn away from minority rule. In reality, however, there was an informal favoritism towards certain minority groups. (Gatta, 2016: 2). In principle, Syrian secularism has propagated religious freedom. The key element of the normative concepts of Baath ideology has been the equality of

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various classes of people. In reality, in order to overcome the religious Sunni vision of the state, civil institutions of authoritarian government have been established. It is well known that secularism as a principle of separation between the state and religious institutions and of the equality of people of different religions before the law has many faces. Typologies of the whole spectrum of secularism may oversimplify social reality (Warner et al., 2010). In Syria, a mixed form of secularism with special forms of its institutionalisation has existed for several decades. It has indicated less democratic features, being rather one of the means to create a homogenous and powerful nation-state. There are many indications that secularism was used instrumentally by the authoritarian government of Hafiz al-Assad. It was an ambivalent but significant tool for legitimising power. During the nearly 30-year rule of Hafiz al-Assad, there was a clear pattern of authoritarian rule that placed the holding of power before any specific ideological goals, such as the establishment or institutionalisation of secularism in the country. It is significant how the Islamists’ rebellion in Hama of 1982 allowed for the promotion and strengthening of national unity and secularity of the state around “us”, that is, ruling against “them”, that is, radical Islamists (Khatib, 2018: 98). In this way, he not only gathered religious minorities around him but also increasingly labelled many of the opposing Sunnis as radicalists without taking into account important ideological distinctions. In this way, the second social gap began to form. It is true that for the supporters of some radical groups such as the Syrian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, which was established in 1942, Syria was to become a religious state according to the principle of the organisation: “Allah is our objective; the Prophet is our leader; the Quran is our law; Jihad is our way; dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope” (Servold 2005: 41). This vision, of course, reverted to the classical model of the Islamic state, in which religious minorities were second-class citizens. For the ruling camp dominated by the Alawites and supporters of the Baath party, the rejection of the idea of a nationstate built on a secular ideology of citizenship was unacceptable. The secular nature of the state was naturally supported by various Christian churches and non-Sunni Muslim minorities, seeing it as an opportunity for equality and greater participation in political and social life, although, as in any pluralist society, there were exceptions to this rule. Of course, the division presented above does not exhaust all the ideological complexity of Syria because over time groups appeared that did not support any of the above-mentioned sides. Above all, the demonstrations by many thousands in various Syrian cities in 2011 did not represent the religious and political postulates of Muslim fundamentalists. Nevertheless, in line with the rhetoric of Bashar al-Assad’s supporters, the opposition was reduced to the level of fundamentalists, Salafists, Wahhabis or even Islamic terrorists seeking to murder non-Sunnis and establish a new caliphate.

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The progressive radicalisation of the Sunnis resulted from the fact that the demonstrators were quickly replaced by radical Sunni fighters from the Gulf and North African countries. And the attacks and humiliation that Sunnis faced in their struggle with pro-government forces increasingly radicalised this group, pushing it to extremism. In this way a kind of “macabre perpetuum mobile”, a mechanism that, once trained, began to operate indefinitely during the Syrian civil war. Although not all Sunnis stood against Bashar al-Assad, there is no doubt that they formed the core of the opposition. In turn, although a relatively small number of Alawites and Christians appeared in the anti-Assad camp, the vast majority of the members of these denominations supported the president. Basically, at the end of 2011, the vast majority of Alawites and other minority groups feel an increasing fear of increasingly desperate Sunnis. The rapidly advancing radicalization of Sunnis led to the consolidation of Alawite, Shiite and Christian militias. All this generated more and more resolute opposition and brutality among the rebels, and in the end all sides aggressively attacked their opponents for fear of suffering the consequences, that is, fear of the honour vengeance still alive in the Middle East. In this way, the political and religious prejudices that had arisen earlier were incorporated into the unequivocal polarization of the actors in the conflict, which seriously strained the local mediation mechanisms in this conflict.

Elements of consociationalism before 2011: “creative compromise” with religious minorities and Sunni majorities The most important social change after the independence of Syria was the collapse of the socio-economic influence of leading families in any “agro-city”. With the disappearance of the old structure of power and influence, a new political elite was dominated by a minority representing specific religious, regional, socioeconomic and political groups. The profound changes in the elite structure of the state influenced the formation of new relations between Sunnis and non-Sunni Muslims, between city dwellers and peasants, a new class of rich and poor, conservative and progressive politicians. The culmination of this process was the eventual gaining of political supremacy by the Alawites (Faksh, 1984: 133). Their policies led to a completely different recruitment of the elite and the elimination of threats to their position. Thus, the new allocation and distribution of political power demanded at least partial social affirmation, which in turn implied “some elements of consociationalism”. It has already been mentioned that historically the relationship between the Alawites and Sunnis has been strained. These relations were usually charac-

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terised by conflict, discrimination and economic exploitation by the Sunnis. A number of factors also contributed to the development of a strong community identity of the Alawites. It was an identity distinct from the majority national identity prior to Syria’s independence. The separatist tendencies of the Alawites were strengthened by the period of the French mandate (1920–1946). The mandate authorities deliberately stoked religious and ethnic divisions in order to suppress or weaken Arab nationalism and halt the development of the national independence movement. The separatism and particularism of religious and ethnic minorities became the basis of the so-called politique minoritaire, that is, granting autonomous status to areas where these minorities constituted the majority (Fildis, 2012: 148). After 1946, the separatist attitude of the Alawites evolved towards Arab nationalism. Thus, the new realities called for practical changes to the past to which the Arab nationalist movement was always closely bound and controlled by Sunni Islamism. If it was attended by “heterodox” (from the Sunni point of view!), Muslims and other religious groups were given a secondary place (Faksh, 1984: 139). A key role of the coming to power by the Alawites and ultimate control of political life in Syria were two organisations: the Baath party and the military. Socialist ideas especially strongly influenced the modification of the Alawite identity and its adaptation to the new reality. The integration process undertaken included both “strong power” as well as some consociational “soft power” measures. In other words, besides the use of force, the ambitious plans for the improvement and modernisation of socio-economic institutions were implemented. Another political manoeuvre was shifting the focus from divisions to general social mobilisation. The idea of a secular, socialist political system as advocated by the Baath party was extremely attractive to minorities. On an ideological level, it was a promoted system which undermined the hegemony of the traditional Sunni establishment in Syria with some consociational elements. It eliminated the political and socioeconomic discrimination of minorities. The Baathist secular national ideology regarded everyone as fully Arab Syrian people. Thus, at least theoretically, the Baath party in its programme followed one of the basic tenets of consociationalism that the government through a grand coalition was “an institutional environment in which representatives of all significant segments participate in joint decision-making on common problems” (Saurugger, 2021). Therefore, regardless of religion, citizens were granted unrestricted party membership. They were allowed to take part in party politics and compete with Sunni organisations on an equal footing, both at the regional and national levels. The socialist ideals of the Baath party found the greatest support in the countryside and poor cities, not in large centres dominated by the traditional bourgeoisie. Geography paradoxically contributed to new divisions: usually, compact

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religious minorities inhabited the rural interior of Syria, and the cities were dominated by Sunnis. On the other hand, “collaborative decision-making” could only take place within the Baath party uniting numerous groups which made a monolithic system with, at most, internal diversity within one organisation. It was also difficult to talk in Syria about decision-making by entities autonomous from the Baath party on local issues that did not refer to “common problems”). Nevertheless, it is worth looking at those areas in which the Baathist rule of Assad used at least elements of the division of power between elites from various social groups. Due to fundamental ideological tensions, it was not only about the physical transfer of power, but above all about mitigating or deviating from the two above-mentioned vertical conflict zones: minority rule and secularism. Elements of consociationalism also appear in the draft constitution of Syria of 1973, which had no reference to Islam which contrasted vividly with the pragmatics of other Muslim countries. Ultimately, the constitution states that Syria is a secular state, but “Islam is religion of the head of state”. This clause was inserted as a compromise after numerous Sunni protests. In its structure, the Syrian Constitution is unique among the constitutions of Arab states. Apart from the case of Lebanon (where the percentage of Muslims is smaller than in Syria), it is the second constitution of a country with a vast majority of Muslims (approx. 75%), which does not recognise Islam as a religion of state (Schaebler, 2013: 71). Since the document was propagated, both presidents of Syria have made more and more concessions to the appreciation of Sunni Islam, for example, by participating in public prayers at the Umayyad Mosque. Syrian TV for many years transmitted the religious broadcasts of the notable Sunni Muslim scholar Muhammad Saʿı¯d Ramadan al-Bu¯t¯ı (1929–2013) who also prayed at the open tomb ˙ of Hafiz al-Assad. It is all the more peculiar as al-Bu¯t¯ı criticised in his sermons ˙ and writings not only the ideas of secularism but also other Western ideologies such as Marxism and nationalism (Christmann, 1998: 154). Secularism – the flagship postulate of the Baath party – was also subject to a negotiation process as part of a kind of consociationalism. Systematically, during the rule of both Hafiz and Bashar Assad, the Damascus authorities consented to the growing importance of moderate Sunnitism, thus agreeing to creeping Islamisation. Of course, the support of moderate Islam was intended to maintain power, but it also increased the influence of religious leaders in the Sunni majority of Syria. While this weakened secularism, it was intended to be a counterweight to Sunni radicalists. The cure for radicalism, however, has not borne fruit. The strengthened Islam not only corroded the idea of secularism, but above all caused the Islamisation of the anti-government Sunni opposition after the outbreak of the Syrian uprising in 2011. Paradoxically, the erosion of Baathist secularism in the decade leading up to the civil war was the price to pay for state

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stabilisation under many agreements with Muslim groups of varying degrees of radicalisation (Khatib, 2011: 51–224; Kos´cielniak 2017). Television series produced in Syria in 2000–2010, among others, played a major role in this process of “consociational” Islamisation. They reached a huge audience in the Arab world. Since pan-Arab satellite stations were financed by wealthy but religiously conservative Gulf states, filmmakers had to consider both the audience’s markets and numerous sponsors – censors. All of this was done with the consent of the Syrian authorities and reflected the wider consociational social and political context. There has been a phenomenon which Christina Salamandra describes as a “creative compromise”. In this way, the television drama industry both embraced and resisted Islamist currents (Salamandra, 2008: 177–189). This shows the problems of filling the “void” after discredited nationalist and socialist projects in the first decade of the 21st century. In fact, the collapse of Baath party socialism, and the erosion of Arabism with strong Islamic influence already occurred a decade before the outbreak of the civil war in Syria, at least with the partial consent of the Damascus authorities. The Islamisation, or rather Sunnitisation, of Syria as part of a kind of consensus between the Alawite dominated government and the Sunni authorities was very visible in the field of education. It is debatable whether the quite radical approach of Joshua M. Landis to this problem that “the Asads have struggled to be good Sunnis, not to make Sunnis into good liberals” is really the truth (Landis, 2003: 2). Certainly, the author is right in his more balanced statements that, in order to preserve the rule of the Alawite minority, the government in Damascus did not want to interfere with the Sunni curriculum of religion in schools. The rulers worked out a consensus that the Sunni Ulema received great influence in public life with limited political influence. This was due to the fact that although the Alawites emphasised their allegiance to Islam, many Sunnis did not consider them “fully” Muslim. This socially controversial identity generated caution in interactions with Sunnites. The paradox was that because of the complicated relations in which the government attempted to cooperate with the ulema, the Alawites were forced to accept some elements of Sunni conservatism, sacrificing the ideas of secularism (Landis, 2003: 31). At the same time, the government, dominated by the Alawite minority, proclaimed to the audience of religious minorities that it was committed to respecting the separation of religion from the state.

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Elements of Assad’s consociationalist pragmatics during the civil war 2011–2021 Judged superficially, the internal armed conflict in Syria does not seem to be in favour of consociationalism. Hostility, hatred, and a driving spirit of retaliation are factors that do not seem to favour consociational solutions. On the other hand, the concern about gaining allies or the will to at least partially neutralise the social hostilities towards Bashar forced the government of Syria to develop something that could be called peculiar “consociational strategies”. Assad’s rule has always had the inconvenience of partial legitimacy (Spyer, 2012: 1–9). Moreover, the result of the armed confrontation in Syria gradually tilted in favour of the Bashar al-Asad camp. In the new reality, both sides began to perceive the necessity for developing new solutions more and more realistically. Years of devastating civil war have locally destroyed or strained the administrative structures of the state. In order to maintain control of its territories and regain lost territories, the Assad government has focused on maintaining, reviving or renewing its network of local intermediaries. However, the civil war changed the politics and the local balance of power in Syria in a profound and irreversible way. In fact, returning to the status quo from before 2011 is impossible. In order for any negotiated agreement to be permanent, there must be a kind of consociational arrangement. Irreversible changes will have to be incorporated into the new decentralised power-sharing agreement. This system will shape the economic and physical reconstruction of Syria and the post-conflict reconstruction. In the course of the war, as the government forces remain victorious, Damascus seems to understand more and more the necessity of implementing consensus politics (Khaddour, 2017). The complexity of the ongoing Syrian conflict raises questions about its nature and definition. Despite their roots in national disputes, many outside actors have been involved in the conflict from the outset. This resulted not only from the regional and global interests of many states, but also from a certain tradition of external support for particular groups in Syria’s fragmented society. It was these realities that generated some consensus proposals on the part of the Bashar government. These generated changes in the country that were unfavourable for the ruling camp. It quickly turned out that the tactics of violence by the Syrian army, strongly allied with the Assad family, and the Alawite religious denomination, were not working. The situation began to become extremely complicated when not only the Free Syrian Army was established as the main core of the opposition against the government in Damascus, but when dozens of radical Islamic groups began to operate in 2012. Islamist movements that were not essentially the instigators of the uprising began to take more and more profit

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from the national rebellion (Dalacoura, 2012: 63–79). However, in September 2013 it was already estimated that 100,000 people had fought in the civil war in Syria. rebels associated with approximately 1,000 military organisations as part of several dozen larger alliances (Lister, 2013). The contexts of the first decades of the uprising forcefully revealed the elements of rejection of the ruling elite by a large part of the society. The irreversible changes concerned the replacement of the state administration in territories occupied by a fragmented opposition. Each opposition town quickly became its own, new and independent centre of power. Each of these independent entities used a different model of self-governance and differently determined the relations between armed groups and civil authorities, if there were some forms of it (Khaddour, 2017). This automatically resulted in attempts by the Assad government to gain or strengthen ties to Damascus with at least some of the elites. Some in this case had even started to trace some parallels between authoritarianism and neoliberalism. On the economic level, the government’s response in Damascus was economically unsustainable.he proposed 30 percent wage increase in March 2012 for some two 2 million civil servants and retirees, combined with an overall income tax cut, proved to be impracticable. As a consequence, wage increases were more modest than planned and did not exceed inflation. This, in turn, made society more impoverished. However, the declared assistance for families in a difficult financial situation would have to exceed USD 1 billion, that is, more or less 6% of the total Syrian budget in 2012. This attempt to de-escalate the conflict, however, could not be effective due to the economic losses generated by the uprising, as well as the need for increased funding for the army, which was the guarantor of Bashar’s maintaining rule (Dahi and Munif, 2012: 323–332). Attempts were also made to pursue a politically and socially consociational policy in the field of law reform. Al-Assad initiated activities aimed at the enactment of new party laws and a new constitution replacing The Syrian Constitution of 1973. Admittedly, for the first time the Syrian president mentioned the need to change party regulations in a speech on 16 April 2011, but both reforms were only introduced the following year in the face of the aforementioned escalation of the conflict. The new constitution became the most significant result of the declared political reforms. The new constitution removed the old Article 8, which referred to the Baath party as “the leading force in society and the state” (Art. 8) and replaced it with an acceptance of political pluralism. Thus, more importance was given to the democratisation processes through encouraging the building of a multiparty system. Parliament’s powers had been increased during the election of the president. Under the new procedure, a candidate must obtain at least 35 votes from members of parliament, and an individual parliamentarian may nominate only one candidate. Article 3 of the constitution of 1973 saying that the president must be a Muslim was retained.

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This can also be seen as consociational gestures in relation to most of Sunni Syria. In a similar vein of consociationalism, Article 7 of the previous constitution was amended, resigning from the reference to “unity, freedom, and socialism”, foreign to traditional Sunni circles (Dostal, 2014: 50–51; Syrian Arab Republic’s Constitution, 2012; The Syrian Constitution, 1973–2012; Tanvi, 2021: 55–56). Although the constitution of 2012 changed Article 8, about the leading role of the Baath party, the broad and far-reaching powers of the president remained unchanged. There are also some critics who believe that Syria’s new constitutional framework is designed to keep Assad in office until 2028 (essentially “forever”). In fact, the aforementioned revised constitutional provisions alone did not change the essential position of Assad and the Baath party, who continue to control state policy, society and the military (Fares, 2014; Ziadeh, 2017). Regardless of critical opinions, the excellent analyses of Karim Atassi indicate a novelty and, at the same time, a continuation of certain political traditions in Syria, which arose as a result of certain consociational solutions. The author has thoroughly researched Syria’s 25 constitutions and constitutional texts, and presented an original classification of the various political regimes that have shaped Syria over the past century. The recent history of Syria shows a peculiar durability of the Syrian model defined by the Founding Fathers. It is possible that after the end of this conflict, provided Syria maintains its territorial integrity, the country will see further solutions towards a democratic regime that reflects society. Either way, this is where the concept of Syria can find new life (Atassi, 2018: 462–469). The latest constitution is such an important stage in the evolution of the Syrian political system that the period after 2012 is sometimes referred to the Fifth Syrian Republic (Atassi, 2018: 354–4330). It is difficult to say how long the constitution of 2012 will be in force. Already during the negotiations in Geneva in 2016, the Syrian opposition called for the immediate suspension of the 2012 constitution and the reinstatement of the 1950 constitution, which they believed best met democratic standards and which had been drafted by an equitably elected legislative assembly. Of course, the 1950 Constitution is nearly 72 years old, and since then Syria has undergone many political and social changes that do not reflect the situation of the middle of the last century. There is probably a long way to go before a new Syrian constitution is drawn up. It seems that Syria will need a new constitution as the “Sixth Republic”, that is, after the fighting has completely ceased, that is, during the effective implementation of the peace process (Atassi, 2018: 434–461; Ziadeh, 2017). In any case, it seems that consociationalism will emerge as a proposal to solve the confusing Syrian identity and problems of responding to religious and ethnic conflicts through powersharing institutions (Sisk, 2013: 7–20). In identifying the elements of consociationalism in the context of religious divisions in Syrian society during the civil war, there is a controversy over un-

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derstanding of the sectarian identity. This then becomes a political player when leaders use sectarian solidarity to compete for power. It is also the politicisation of differences between sects within religion, often leading to discrimination, hatred or tension (Balanche, 2018; Haddad, 2017: 363–382; Phillips, 2015: 359). However, despite the strong religious polarisation of Syrian society, the Bashar Assad government tried in various ways to neutralise the radicalisation of Sunnitism. The Sunni majority has become an important factor in achieving stability in the country. In this context, certain reservations should also be raised about the so-called sectarian identity. It turns out that a very complex problem is the causality of sectarian mobilisations (Dodge, 2018). The dispute among scholars basically led to the formation of “two camps”, that is, a conflict between supporters of a slightly outdated primordialist approach and supporters of instrumentalist explanations. The former attribute the sectarian conflict to the continuation of old hatreds or manipulation by the elite. Sometimes the view that Syrians have been rooted in sectarian differences for centuries results in the opinion that they are doomed to fight as they have no choice but to “let them fight” in the Middle East. Primordialism, however, does not approach the problem positively because it does not explain why these sectarian ones coexist peacefully at certain points in history. Therefore, the indiscriminate construction of an exclusively one-dimensional “Sunni versus Shiite” narrative has simplistic implications. The simplifications concern the very perception of the official “secularism of the Syrian state”. Religion – including Sunni Islam – has always been a real instrument used by the Assad rule. The boundaries between religion and the state became more blurred during the civil war, and official political rhetoric has become clearly religious and anti-secular. This phenomenon can be observed in the presidential discourse, which is strongly and clearly saturated with religious language. An analysis of Bashar al-Assad’s speeches to Sunni leaders and other public ministerial statements reveals how much religious language has been used to strategically co-opt Sunni religious institutions (Aldoughli, 2020). The relatively successful attempts to link the Sunni elite with the ruling camp took place in the first period of Bashar al-Assad’s rule, that is, 2003–2010. The oil boom and economic liberalisation contributed to a sharp increase in donations to Sunni communities. For example, Muhammad Hamsho, brother-in-law of Bashar al-Assad Mahir’s brother and at the same time an “independent” member of parliament has spent millions of pounds supporting Sunni organisations while gaining political support from the ulema. Economic liberalisation also resulted in very tangible, steady incomes for many Sunni ulema, as they played a great role in the emerging Islamic banks. These prestigious Sunni figures were hired as Sharia experts on the management boards of these banks. Thus, during the neoliberal turn in the economy, paradoxically, there was already a certain strengthening of

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relations – at least for some of the Sunni elites – with the government (Pierret, 2014: 6; Pierret and Kjetil, 2009: 595–614). For the above reasons, when the protests broke out in 2011, the Sunni elite did not respond to the crisis in a uniform manner. The Muslim Brotherhood and other supporters of political Islam gave their full support for any activities in opposition to the rule of Bashar al-Assad. The ulema, in turn, were divided. The government’s long-time allies in Damascus, such as the Grand Mufti Ahmad Hassun, called for an end to violence (Pierret, 2014: 6). The Sunni scholar Muhammad Sa’id Ramadan al-Bouti (1929–2013) appeared to be the strongest on Assad’s side. In March 2011, Bouti criticised anti-government protests and urged demonstrators not to follow the “calls of unknown sources that want to exploit mosques to incite seditions and chaos in Syria”. Bouti did not consider the protesters to be representatives of the Sunni believers, stating that “most protesters do not pray”. He also sharply criticised the Egyptian Sunni scholar Yusuf al-Qaradawi for promoting “a demagogy that opens the door to rebellion” (AlArabiya, 2013). Despite his open support for Assad, Bouti was said to have issued a fatwa prohibiting the killing of protesters. But Bouti should not be classified as a marginal scholar who had a local “servile” significance as a supporter of the Damascus government. In one study of the 500 most influential Muslim scholars in 2010, Bouti was ranked 17th (in the most prestigious category of the “top 50”), which means that his teachings echoed throughout the Sunni world (Lumbard and Nayed, 2010: 60). Bouti was killed during a lecture at one of the Damascus mosques. Apart from him, his grandson and about 50 students were killed and 90 others were injured. Muhammad al-Bouti was buried in the Umayyad Mosque. Thousands of people of various religious denominations attended the funeral (National Post, 2013). The event revealed some levels of the interfaith platform are still alive around the ruling camp. The 2011 protests were supported, among others, by groups of the impoverished, such as peasants, who felt abandoned by the once socialist government. The Ulema Sunnis did not belong to this class, but rather benefited from liberalisation. Similarly (at least passively) loyalty to the regime was shown by the Sunni bourgeoisie in Damascus and Aleppo. However, during the civil war, the importance and activities of these people were sometimes visible but never decisive. These elites were not the driving force behind the largely peripheral rise of the lower classes. On the other hand, there were Muslim scholars who were more or less connected with the government and along with most of the business class helped to hamper the spread of protests in Damascus and Aleppo. Nevertheless, further complicating the conflict in 2013–2021, deep divisions among the Sunni majority have made the support of the ulema without political backing on the battlefields a negligible factor in the survival of the Bashar al-Assad government. The war simply entered a new phase, that is, between the government in Dam-

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ascus and the new Sunni elites of a completely different kind. They were often more or less radical Islamic leaders of rural and suburban or foreign origin (Pierret, 2014: 6–7). During the war, the government in Damascus tried to play the “Sunni card” in various ways. In 2021, Bashar al-Assad abolished the office of the Grand Mufti of Syria, a symbolic but ineffective institution. The reason was quite prosaic – the compromising statements of Mufti Hassoun, in which he incorporated breakneck Koranic exegesis in the context of the migration of Syrians. Nevertheless, the very easy liquidation of this office ten years after the outbreak of the war testifies to the great weakness of the Sunni community in Syria after Assad’s victory over the opposition. This weakness is also illustrated by the fact that the presidential decision was not intended to quell any threat, but simply to settle a conflict between two figures – Hassoun and Sayyid – equally loyal to the Damascus government (Young, 2021). With the decree overthrowing the office of the Grand Mufti, Assad hoped to control the weakened Sunni community of Syria by promoting loyalist ulema and making them dependent on the government in Damascus (Hamad, 2021).

Conclusion The excessively strengthening of confessionalism is the opposite of consociational democracy. Syrian disputes had become too complex to be quickly resolved, and religious affiliation led subgroups to resort to alliances with outside actors. These facts seem to be in contrast to Lijphart’s theory. However, the analyses presented in this study lead to the conclusion that, after ten years of war, there are grounds for attempting to implement some form of consociationalism other than consociational democracy. There is a possibility that deep religious and ethnic divisions and the notorious recourse to foreign actors will fail and eventually drive domestic actors in Syria to seek some form of consociationalism. Moreover, in the case of Syria, demographics only appear to seemingly fall short of the pattern of proportional population division. The overwhelming Sunni majority, about 75%, have never acted as a homogeneous group. In fact, the Sunnis formed many parties, which means that on the plan of the political religious affiliation this 75% should be divided into parts. It has been shown that some of the Sunni groups had fairly important ties to the rule of Bashar al-Assad, others showed democratisation tendencies, and still others opted for more or less radical forms of Islamism. Ethnic composition, territorial fragmentation, socioeconomic divisions and multiple belief practices generate different (and sometimes contradictory) collective Sunni identities. Thus, Syria has a more complex

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social structure than is commonly believed. Therefore, Syria appears to be pushed towards some form of consociationalism for several reasons. Firstly, the government of Bashar al-Assad was already implementing certain movements in this direction before the outbreak of the war, for example, increasing the value of Sunnitism in the public space, engaging and supporting a group of ulema and Sunni religious institutions. The new constitution of 2012 is also an important step in this direction and a new one is expected after the end of the war establishing the “sixth republic” (it is difficult to predict to what extent as it is only a wish). Secondly, the direction of consociationalism seemed more real as the Syrian civil war disintegrated or damaged the position of traditional state actors. Numerous militias and fighters arose with the strong involvement of foreign groups. The years preceding the conflict, as well as the period of the civil war, made the elites realise that it was impossible to return to only the declared ethnic pluralism, which was allegedly guaranteed by the nationalist secular state. The reawakened group identities raise the question of whether there is still what could be called a single Syrian national identity. This question is crucial, because even in the period of propaganda of this type of identity, it was not in fact the Syrian way of life for many representatives of society. Resistance to this ideology was masked by fear of reprisals and has always been a ticking bomb. The victorious Bashar alAssad seems to be aware of the fact that his victory is pyrrhic and perhaps even realises that this is a result of a confrontation that would have shamed King Pyrrhus of Epirus himself. There is no doubt that the bloody conflict in Syria generated a great deal of resentment, suspicion and animosity between different groups. This baggage of war will be extremely difficult to erase from the collective memory. For this reason, each model of Syria of the future will face many challenges and opposition from many sides. However, despite all its social wounds, future Syria faces one option: some form of power sharing despite the victory of Bashar al-Assad. Otherwise, a new conflict round will be generated sooner or later. The form of Lebanese consociationalism is sometimes compared with the potential Syrian consociational model. It is debatable as to what extent the experiment of consociationalism in Lebanon has failed. One can also endlessly discuss the lack of sufficient support for this project from internal and external actors. Nevertheless, some form of social compromise prevented the state from collapsing. It seems that only a similar model can not only save the territorial integrity of Syria, but also ensure the slow healing of wounds and the peaceful coexistence of many groups. Creating some form of consociationalism is still a viable proposition for postconflict Syria. Moreover, it is about some form derived from the classical form of consociationalism, that is, such a separation of powers that will ease tensions in a

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deeply divided society. Of course, at the present stage of development of the very dynamic situation in the region, it is not known whether the elite cartel, in which the conflicting groups will be represented by their leaders, will actually work. In any case, political rule in Syria seems to be becoming, as never before, a matter of coalition building and negotiation between community representatives. Anyway, when designing scenarios for post-conflict Syria, more and more authors understand that this country’s rulers – whoever they are – will have to deal with issues such as national reconciliation, minority protection, security sector reform, and reconstruction and development. The war in Syria appears to have entered its final stage, where diplomacy and consociationalism should dominate military action.

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Przemysław Turek

Lebanon – an exemplary consociational democracy state and its eventual failure

The political history of the autonomous area that formed part of the modern Lebanese republic began in the late 16th century when the local administration of Druze emirs from the endowment of the Ottoman authorities gradually evolved into the core of a political entity, integrating more or less freely the multisectarian elite of Mount Lebanon (Harris, 2012: 5; Hitti, 1958: 729–731; Traboulsi, 2007: 5– 8). The specificity of this area, unlike other areas of the Levant, was the dominant percentage of Maronite Christians who had to remain in a more or less lasting symbiosis with the Druze families (Hitti, 1958: 729). However, breakdown between those two major communities in the in the early 1840s, as well as the sectarian explosion of 1860, ultimately led to the end of Druze political supremacy in Mount Lebanon and the institutionalization of a sectarian system of political representation (Farha, 2019: 85–88; Winslow, 2005: 27–49). The autonomous province of Mount Lebanon, created under the pressure of European intervention, had boundaries equivalent to the former Druze emirate, a Catholic Christian imperial governor coming from outside of Lebanon, and an elected multicommunal advisory council (Harris, 2012: 147–148; Traboulsi, 2007: 24– 49). In this political entity the Christians of all denominations were a majority of 80%, and the Maronites formed the largest community of 58% within the mentioned Christian society (Harris, 2012: 148). When the French took over the territory as part of their mandate after World War I, they enlarged the former Mount Lebanon, setting boundaries for a Greater Lebanon. Lebanon, in the frontiers defined on 1 September 1920, had never existed before in history. It was a product of the Franco-British colonial partition of the Middle East. Therefore, the entity that has survived to this day has only a simple Christian majority of 55% in Lebanese society (with 33% of Maronites) beside Sunni and Shia Muslims, and Druze. On the basis of the 1921 census, Christians would have the majority in representative institutions, and the Maronites would have the leading role (Harris, 2012: 150, 179; Traboulsi, 2007: 75–87). An unwritten arrangement, known as Lebanese National Pact, was established in 1943 between the Lebanese Christians and Muslims by two of the most im-

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portant personalities in Lebanon’s history of the struggle for independence: the Lebanese president, Bishara al-Khuri, and the Lebanese prime minister, Riyad alSulh. The National Pact leaned on the1932 census results, although differential growth meant that Christians had parity at best by the 1940s (Harris, 2012: 194; Traboulsi, 2007: 109–111). The mentioned agreement created a system of power sharing in the Republic of Lebanon that relied and continues to be dependent on confessional proportionality based on the 1932 census, rather inadequate for the demographic reality of the state ten years later (Traboulsi, 2007: 106). According to the pact, the president is always a Maronite Christian and the prime minister a Sunni Muslim, while the speaker of the National Assembly must be a Shi’a Muslim (Traboulsi, 2007: 110).

Arendt Lijphart’s consociational democracy model for Lebanon The peculiarity of the Lebanese model of power sharing lies in its criteria. The basic segmental units are in this case not the ethnic but the religious communities (cf. Trzcin´ski, 2018: 17). Thus, Lebanon was a good candidate for adopting the consociational model. Lebanese society is almost homogenous (95% Arabs, 4% Armenians, and 1% others), therefore its division into segments is based on religious affiliation, not on an ethnic one. Nevertheless, the confessional segmentation goes deeper, because the government officially recognizes 18 bigger or smaller different religious groups in the country (International Religious Freedom Report. Lebanon 2019: 3; Makdisi and Marktanner, 2009: 2). Still, the political and social influence of those groups varies according to the size of the group and its traditional contacts with influential countries in the region and/or former colonial powers, for example, France. Lebanon is presented as an exemplary consociational democracy state, according to Arend Lijphart’s definition (Lijphart 2008: 33–34), and as such will be the subject of these considerations. The four basic principles of consociational democracy, presented by Lijphart in his book Democracy in Plural Societies, were characteristic of his opinion for the Lebanese model as well: (a) power-sharing executives in which all important groups are represented; (b) cultural autonomy for these groups; (c) proportionality in political representation, civil service appointments, and government subsidies; and (d) a minority veto power with regard to the most vital issues such as minority rights and autonomy (Lijphart, 1977: 25).

All these rules were formally applied under the Lebanese National Pact: all important religious segments were represented; 18 religious groups were officially recognized; there was proportionality in the political representation of Mar-

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onites, Sunni and Shi’a Muslims, as well as Druze; the minorities had the right to veto on key issues. It should be remembered, however, that Lijphart’s book was published at a time when the civil war had raged in Lebanon for two years. Therefore, some researchers applied Lijphart’s understanding of consociationalism to the period 1943–1975, the so-called pre-war period (Aboultaif, 2020: 109). Scholars pointed at an incongruity between the consociational model as a normative paradigm and Lebanon’s political realities (Fakhoury, 2014: 231). Especially, the pre-war Lebanon could be treated as a semi-consociational system characterized by the concentration of executive powers in the president or prime minister allowing the community which holds such positions to dominate the system and to subordinate the other groups due to their lack of veto rights. Hence, this domination is shifting to the military sector (Aboultaif, 2020: 120). Lijphart himself stressed that power sharing worked reasonably well for more than 30 years in Lebanon, but ended in civil war. Still, for him it was not a failure of consociational democracy as such, but rather it was caused by the rigid Lebanese election system that was only partly proportional and continued to give the Christian sects a legislative majority although Muslims had become the popular majority (Lijphart, 2008: 275–276). Because the religious segments in Lebanon have to be represented by their elites, Lijphart’s general description of a successful consociational democracy applies to the Lebanese model as well. It should be noted, however, that the following idealistic assumptions of consociational democracy concerning the elites, in the case of Lebanon, were verified by the political and social realities of the period. Thus, firstly, the elites have the ability to accommodate the divergent interests and demands of the subcultures. Secondly, this requires that they have the ability to transcend cleavages and to join in a common effort with the elites of rival subcultures. Thirdly, this in turn depends on their commitment to the maintenance of the system and to the improvement of its cohesion and stability. Fourthly and finally, all of the above requirements are based on the assumption that the elites understand the perils of political fragmentation. (Lijphart, 2008: 32). In the case of Lebanon, the elites played a constructive, but, in terms of their own interests, a destructive role as well. The National Pact did not include any adjustment mechanisms to accommodate demographic shifts. Therefore, the Christian advantage in the executive branch and legislature with a Maronite as president and a parliamentary advantage in the distribution of the seats made valid the allegations that the Christians relied on fictitious demographics. NonChristians had to accept a leading Maronite role in a Lebanon open to the West; Christians had to accept that the new state was a partnership and that Lebanon was part of the Arab world. The concern was the ability to accommodate the

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divergent interests and demands of the subcultures, as income from services went overwhelmingly to the already well-off, whose conspicuous consumption dramatized the income disparities. Thus, much of the Sunni community, mostly Druze and Shia, and many rural Maronites shared only some of the benefits achieved by the merchant republic. The disparities and political divisions caused sectarian violence between Christians and non-Christians in May 1958, involving challenges to the internal and external balances of the National Pact, eventually pacified by American intervention (Harris, 2012: 193–196). In multi-segmented societies, each subculture has an additional level of mediating institutions. The functioning of the system in relation to the permanent isolation of subcultures at the level of the masses depends on the effective cooperation of the elite. It functions as a substitute for the lack of political consensus at the level of the masses. The elite is thus entrusted with the management of the intersegmental conflict, which provides the basis for limited political unity. Unlike divided subculture communities, the elite are, according to Lijphart, able to negotiate and reach a compromise and to find a pragmatic solution (Jelonek, 2005: 96). The above-mentioned issues concerning power sharing in the Lebanese reality will be a reference point for further considerations on the erosion of the consociational system in that country.

Lebanon’s consociational system The Lebanese system of power sharing in the period 1943–1975 is considered by Lijphart and other scholars to be fairly well-functioning. Nevertheless, the 1943 National Pact assured that strong presidential powers would be given to the Maronite community thus barely conceiving its political as well as economical supremacy. The president had the right to negotiate and ratify international treaties alone, only informing the parliament about them and kept control of the army. So, the system only partially included the Muslim community (Aboultaif, 2020: 114–115; Traboulsi, 2007: 109, 115). The first period of consociational democracy in Lebanon is known as the merchant republic 1943–1952 (Traboulsi, 2007: 109–127). This was the phase of implementing the power-sharing formula among the sects in a newly functioning state with clear distribution of the three major posts of government already mentioned earlier. The National Pact also implied better participation of the Muslims in power, decision-making and state functions. The effectiveness of the system was manifested in the fact that Lebanon managed to make French troops withdraw from the territory of the former mandate, survive the first Arab-Israeli war without major perturbations, and hold new presidential elections, although

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President Al-Khuri tried to retain power against an unwilling political class and wider public (Harris, 2012: 199–205; Traboulsi, 2007: 112–114, 123–127). During Kamil Sham’un’s presidency (1952–1958), the system of power sharing was put to the test. The president, using his constitutional powers, applied all the regulations to strengthen his position in an authoritarian manner; his policies not only alienated Muslim elites and the Muslim ‘street’ but divided Christian ranks. Eventually, the already mentioned armed insurrection in 1958 led to American intervention, but Sham’un had to step down. Despite the authoritarian tendencies of the president and the corruption surrounding him and his coterie, the system worked, although the political atmosphere around Lebanon was tense: Nasser came to power in Egypt, and the monarchy was overthrown in Iraq, which affected the pro-Western president (Farha, 2019: 184; Harris, 2012: 205–212; Smith, 2017: 261–264; Traboulsi, 2007: 128–137). President Fuad Shihab (1958–1964) and his successor, Charles Hilu (1964– 1970) operated under a still fairly well-functioning system of power sharing. Shihab intended moderate social welfare to incorporate deprived people and regions, principally Muslims, more adequately into a Lebanese nation. Since we are mainly interested in the functioning of the consociational system in Lebanon, we will not delve into political and social issues, but it should be mentioned that until the Six-Day War, Shihab and his successor did not face any external problems, except for the unsuccessful coup d’état during Shihab’s rule. The sectarian division typical of Lebanon was not subject to deep reforms, only the balance of power changed slightly, which is also visible today. However, the subsequent Arab-Israeli war weakened the consociational system and eventually led to its first demolition (Harris, 2012: 212–219; Traboulsi, 2007: 138–145). If we add to Lebanon’s shaky political and socio-economic situation the two Arab crises of the 1967 Six-Day War and Black September 1970, which resulted in an influx of Palestinian militants into the country and growing tensions between Christian and Muslim-Druze militias, the weakness of the consociational system will be evident (Traboulsi, 2007: 152–153, 161). The scholars specializing in economics as well as in the history of Lebanon paid attention to the political as well as the economic shock created by the 1967 Arab-Israeli war and the problem of the second wave of Palestinian refugees and Palestinian militant groups. After 1970, property speculation surged with rising Arab oil revenues. Many Lebanese, especially Muslims, simply experienced higher inflation on stagnant real incomes. An overheated, socially unbalanced economy stirred animated street protests. This was a shock Lebanon could not absorb nor accommodate peacefully, especially as it was combined with harsh reactions and strikes of workers and employees, which, combined with its religious divisions, eventually paved the way for the outbreak of the Lebanese civil war in 1975 (Harris, 2012: 221–222, 224; Makdisi and Marktanner, 2009: 3).

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On one hand, we could argue, if we had to, that semi-consociationalism remained during that period of Lebanon’s history, on the other hand, we could agree with Lijphart’s argument that the failure of power-sharing in the 1970s in Lebanon was due not just to domestic factors but also with international influences on the local ethnic conflict (Aboultaif, 2020: 109; Lijphart, 2002: 42): The Israeli defeat of the Arabs led to Palestinian militarization in Lebanon, and eventually the Lebanese state broke down as Maronites fought Palestinians and the Leftist/Muslim National Front in 1975. The war in Lebanon in 1975–1990, with its Christian-Palestinian clashes, Syrian intervention from 1976, two Israeli invasions in 1978 and 1982, assassination of President-elect Bashir Jumayyil and sectarian cleansings conducted by Christian and Muslim militias, resulted in the collapse of the (semi-)consociational system in the country (Smith, 2017: 347, 367–372; Traboulsi, 2007: 187–239; Winslow, 2005: 212–225). Although some scholars say that Lebanon ceased to be an independent state in 1975 (Harris, 2012: 232), the situation in this country was more complex. In 1975– 1990, Lebanon represented a form of a failed state. The legitimate authority was unable to make collective decisions, as some Christian ministers resigned, and President Sulayman Faranjiya with super-minister Kamil Sham’un managed the state and at the same time took part in the conflict as a leader of one of the parties (Harris, 2012: 235–236). Public services were gradually replaced by the ad hoc actions of the militias or non-governmental groups, as long as they could function in a given area. The state lost control of its territory, and the monopoly on the legitimate use of physical force, as the Lebanese army had been disbanded and joined the militias. Lebanon was unable to interact with other states as a full member of the international community because part of society and sectarian groups did not recognize its authority. Besides, its territory was partially occupied by the Syrian and Israeli armies (Harris, 2012: 239–247; Traboulsi, 2007: 194–198). The collapse of the multicommunal government, and the intervention of Palestinians, Israelis, Syrians and others, had contradictory implications. As the Maronites lost their hold on Lebanon, the Christian disempowered factions gathered around mostly Maronite politicians and the Maronite patriarch as their senior spiritual leader. In parallel, the Sunnis discovered the benefits of a multicommunal Lebanese state through its absence during the war years. By the mid1980s, their powerlessness vis-à-vis Palestinian guerrillas, the military leaders of the mountain communities, and the Syrian army that entered Lebanon in 1976 made the re-establishment of a new Lebanese republic the Sunni priority. Most Sunnis became committed Lebanese as never before. As for the Druze, the war years restored the strategic valor they lost a century ago, but they also felt vulnerable, first to the Maronites and later to the Shia. Therefore, in the 1990s, most

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Druze favored Sunni power under Prime Minister Rafiq al-Hariri, for survival reasons (Harris, 2012: 233). Fifteen years later, the 1989 Ta’if Accord restored power sharing, although the final results of the peace agreement are ambiguous. One could argue “that the civil war that destroyed the Lebanese model was put to an end by the Ta’if Accord that transformed the political system into a full consociation” (Aboultaif, 2020: 109), at the same time one could try to convince us that “even though Lebanon’s consociational arrangements survived the violent civil war, post war political sectarianism deviates from the consociational democracy model” (Fakhoury, 2014: 241). If not for an indefinite Syrian military presence, one could see the accord as an improvement of the National Pact, adequate for the demographic reality: the executive authority would shift from the Maronite president to the council of ministers, selected proportionally – half Christian and half Muslim and Druze – chaired by the Sunni prime minister as before, although the president would retain prerogatives. Parliament would become more independent, with a longer term for the Shia speaker. Membership of parliament would be divided equally between Christians and non-Christians, with Sunnis and Shia also equal, thus giving Maronites the largest communal allocation. The sectarian quotas would end in some vague future. The Muslims gained, without much cost to Christians. Sunnis, with a stronger prime minister, gained more than the Shia, because of Saudi influence. The accord also included Syrian military interventions to help the government, thus approving the Syrian occupation of Lebanon in the form of a Syrian protectorate (Farha, 2019: 164–172; Harris, 2012: 255–256; Winslow, 2005: 264–266). The implementation of the sectarian power-sharing model following the 1990 signing of the Ta’if Accord formally ended the Lebanese civil war. Nevertheless, the agreement is firstly criticized for avoiding the judicial and societal measures necessary for restoring accountability and trust among its communities after the war ended. Secondly, Lebanon became incorporated into the neoliberal regional and global economy, giving way to mass privatizations and foreign direct investment flowing in primarily from the Gulf region. Participating in rent seeking activities was out of reach for most citizens in the country, which resulted in their increasing dependence on their communal elites who became their primary providers for services such as education and health-care. Thirdly, the parliament was not able to reach cross-confessional compromises on vital issues such as how elections should be organized (Vértes et al., 2021: 260–261). The supposed full consociation, although based on the balancing of the presidential and prime ministerial powers, deviated from the democratic model mainly because of the Syrian political and military presence in Lebanon in the years 1976–2005. Therefore, Syria played the role of foreign arbiter and had a direct influence on the domestic policy of the country. Even after Syria’s with-

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drawal in 2005 there are several factors obstructing consociational democracy in post-war Lebanon: – There is a different approach to the possible domestic and external threats (they are not shared by all communities and political groupings, and easily polarize people along sectarian lines); – The communal elites seek external support to reinforce their power and are divided over Lebanon’s foreign alignments inviting regional intervention; – The static and quota-related political arrangements are threatened by demographic shifts, post-war emigration flows, a weak culture of accommodation, and distrust of power-sharing institutions; – The lack of institutionalized arbitration mechanisms makes negotiation over loaded political issues depend on consensus or on an external mediator who can provide arbitration mechanisms (Fakhoury, 2014: 242). The assassination of the former Lebanese prime minister, Rafiq al-Hariri, on 14 February 2005 ultimately led to the complete withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon on 26 April 2005, after 30 years of their presence (Arsan, 2018: 27–28; Harris, 2012: 269; Salloukh et al., 2015: 96). The state regained sovereignty, so one might expect that the principles of power sharing established in Ta’if would function similarly. Nevertheless, each of the Lebanese political blocs that emerged in 2005–2006 was cross-sectarian. March 14 Alliance looked to the West and conservative Arabs, emphasized freedoms, and wanted private armies disbanded (including Hezbollah) but offered no social development policy. March 8 Alliance looked to the Syrian ruling coterie and Iran and consented to Hezbollah’s agenda: primacy of “opposition” to Israel over all else and condemnation of international justice (Harris, 2012: 276). In February 2006, Michel Aoun met Hezbollah chief Hasan Nasrallah, signed a memorandum of understanding, and Aoun’s Free Patriotic Movement started a major alliance with the March 8 Alliance that has remained ever since, thus handing Syria’s allies cross-communal credibility (Harris, 2012: 270; Salloukh et al., 2015: 96–98; Turek, 2008: 89–98). Aoun has served as the President of Lebanon since 31 October 2016. However, former divisions over religious denominations have partially blurred; at a higher level, Christians and Sunni Muslims support the unity of the state, especially the unity of the Lebanese armed forces. The Shiites, especially those represented by Hezbollah, are rather distrustful of state institutions, and they exclude self-disarming and joining the structures of the state’s armed forces. This is one of the factors breaking down the former power sharing.

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Conclusion The consociational paradigm of power sharing, which was developed in parts of modern Lebanon (Mount Lebanon) in the late 16th century, is characterized not only by the presence of many religious denominations, which is not unique in the Middle East. The exceptions are the proportions of minorities sharing power. Over the centuries, and especially from the second half of the 19th century, the Christian Maronite community played a dominant role in Mount Lebanon, and together with other Christian denominations formed the vast majority in the area in question. The model of power sharing developed on this basis, promoted by Lijphart, functioned for Lebanon relatively effectively until 1967, despite external and internal obstacles and problems in the functioning of the multi-denominational state. The end of the 1960s and the first half of the 1970s brought about the erosion of this system, and from 1975 it could not be implemented due to the fact that Lebanon essentially became a failed state for the next 15 years, and then a state dependent not only on the occupying Syria, but also on armed groups forming a state within the state and exposing Lebanon to retaliation by Israel. After the withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon and the country gaining sovereignty, consociational democracy in post-war Lebanon became a pattern which is to be distrusted because of several reasons: emigration flows, weak culture of accommodation, especially after the hefty protests in neighboring Syria and dealing with waves of immigrants, demographic shifts and the appearance of the young generation which treats sectarian divisions as an anachronism and takes part in anti-sectarian protests. On the other hand, this pattern is still attractive to the more conservative elites of the country regardless of religious denomination because it allows them to keep the status quo.

Bibliography Aboultaif, Eduardo Wassim (2020). Revisiting the semi-consociational model: Democratic failure in pre-war Lebanon and post-invasion Iraq. International Political Science Review, 41 (1): 108–123. Arsan, Andrew (2018). Lebanon: A Country in Fragments. London: C. Hurst & Co. Publishers Ltd. Fakhoury, Tamirace (2014). Debating Lebanon’s Power-Sharing Model: An opportunity or an impasse for democratization studies in the Middle East? The Arab Studies Journal, 22 (1): 230–255. Farha, Mark (2019). Lebanon: The Rise and Fall of a Secular State under Siege. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Harris, William (2012). Lebanon: A History, 600–2011. New York: Oxford University Press.

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Hitti, Philip K. (1958). History of the Arabs: From the Earliest Times to the Present. London: Macmillan & Co Ltd – New York: St Martin’s Press. International Religious Freedom Report. Lebanon 2019. https://www.state.gov/report s/2019-report-on-international-religious-freedom/lebanon/. Jelonek, Adam (2005). Kryzys konsocjonalnej demokracji. Studium przypadku [Crisis of the Consociational Democracy. The Case Study]. Studia Socjologiczne, 1 (176), 93–116. Lijphart, Arend (1977). Democracy in Plural Societies: A Comparative Exploration. New Haven: Yale University Press. Lijphart, Arend (2002). The Wave of Power-Sharing Democracy. In: A. Reynolds (Ed.). The Architecture of Democracy: Constitutional Design, Conflict Management, and Democracy. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 37–54. Lijphart, Arend (2008). Thinking about Democracy: Power sharing and majority rule in theory and practice. London and New York: Routledge Taylor & Francis Group. Makdisi, Samir and Marktanner, Marcus (2009). Trapped by Consociationalism: The Case of Lebanon. Topics in Middle Eastern and African Economies, 11, 1–15. Salloukh, Bassel F., Barakat, Rabie, Al-Habbal, Jinan S., Khattab, Lara W. and Mikaelian, Shoghig (2015). The Politics of Sectarianism in Postwar Lebanon. London: Pluto Press. Smith, Charles D. (2017). Palestine and the Arab-Israeli Conflict. Boston–New York: Bedford/St. Martins, Macmillan Learning. Traboulsi, Fawwaz (2007). A History of Modern Lebanon. London–Ann Arbor, MI: Pluto Press. Trzcin´ski, Krzysztof (2018). What is Power Sharing? Consociationalism, Centripetalism, and Hybrid Power Sharing. Studia Polityczne, 46 (3): 9–30. Turek, Przemysław (2008. Dziwny sojusz Michela ‘Auna z Hezbollahem i Amalem [A strange alliance between Michel ‘Aun and Hezbollah and Amal]. In: Marek M. Dziekan and Izabela Kon´czak (eds.). Mie˛dzy Wschodem a Zachodem [Between East and West]. Łódzkie Studia. Tom I, Katedra Bliskiego Wschodu i Północnej Afryki Uniwersytetu Łódzkiego, Łódz´, 89–98. Vértes, Sára, van der Borgh, Chris and Buyse, Antoine (2021). Negotiating civic space in Lebanon: The potential of non-sectarian movements. Journal of Civil Society, 17: 3–4. Winslow, Charles (2005). Lebanon: War and Politics in a Fragmented Society. London and New York: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group.

Joanna Dyduch

Israel’s democracy at the crossroads: What is left of power-sharing

Israel serves as one of the most prominent examples of a democratic regime operating in a deeply divided society. Yet, as noted by A. Dowty, “ethnic and religious cleavages make the achievement of democracy more difficult” (Dowty, 1998). This chapter argues that the direction of the changes occurring in Israel over recent years has both reinforced existing sociopolitical cleavages and created new dimensions of divisions. The aim of the chapter is twofold. First of all, it takes a closer look at the legal steps and political actions initiated and implemented by the Israeli ruling elites in the past years. Secondly, it aims to examine the causalities between societal changes, political evolution, legal-institutional reforms, and the efficiency of Israel’s political system. The analysis presented here focuses mainly on the period of Benjamin Netanyahu’s most recent premiership (2009– 2021) which was a time of a significant shift towards the majoritarian variant of democracy (Lintl and Wolfrum, 2018) and the contestation of liberal democracy principles. The overarching objective of the analysis is to assess to what extent the “power-sharing” concept is still applicable to investigating the Israeli political system nowadays, and how Israelis adjust “power-sharing” to serve their nationalist, Zionist, state-oriented ideology. Against this backdrop, the chapter addresses the current shape of the socio-political divisions in order to better understand “among whom the power is shared” – in other words, which key segments of Israeli society effectively take part in power sharing and why. In addition to this, the chapter aims to provide some understanding of how the constellations of divisions and the distribution of power have evolved throughout the period under investigation. In light of the above considerations, the main argument of this chapter is that although Israel remains a country with a deeply divided society and a great degree of polarisation among the societal segments, its political system actually departed from the consociational democracy patterns some time ago, moving first towards consensual democracy and later towards majoritarianism. Moreover, the case study of Israel reveals some interesting phenomena, whereby the

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intensity and prevalence of certain divisions have ebbed and flowed, as the nationality-based division is somewhat isolated, and other sociopolitical divisions have prevailed. This leads to a situation in which the power is indeed shared, but mostly among the Jewish-Zionist citizens of Israel, whereas the Arabs have been marginalised. The chapter proceeds as follows: first, it reviews the ongoing academic debates on consociationalism and power sharing, with a special focus on Israel and its political system. This provides a picture of the current research, both at the theoretical and the empirical levels of academic disputes. It also points to gaps in the existing literature and the utility of two major explanatory concepts – consociationalism and power sharing – for analysing current Israeli democracy trends. Bridging the power-sharing concept with reflection on illiberal tendencies and drifts towards majoritarianism offers a chance to gain better insights into the Israeli case. This will allow us to reflect on the achievements, failures, and challenges of Israeli democracy. The chapter ends with comprehensive conclusions.

Consociationalism, power sharing, and the Israeli case study: General overview of the scholarly, theoretical debate Following Arend Lijphart’s distinction between two opposite models of democracy – majoritarian and consociational – and his further observation on their interplay with the sociopolitical structure of studied societies, this section serves to map the state of research on the development of democracy in divided societies (Lijphart, 1989), with a special focus on the Israeli case. Although the point of departure for the literature review is D. L. Horowitz’s (Horowitz, 2014) contribution to studying democracy in divided societies and Lijphart’s powersharing concept (Lijphart, 2007), this section focuses on the most recent scholarship elaborating on the ongoing changes in the Israeli democracy model. As Horowitz states, democracy is essentially “about inclusion and exclusion, about access to power, about the privileges that go with inclusion and the penalties that accompany exclusion. In severely divided societies, ethnic identity provides clear lines to determine who will be included and who will be excluded” (Horowitz, 1993: 18). Moreover, it seems as if his later and somewhat obvious observation that “in societies severely divided by ethnicity, race, religion, language (…) ethnic divisions make democracy difficult” (Horowitz, 1993: 18) remains valid. The systemic and gradually developing scholarship on politics and political systems in divided societies has also made it clear that the implementation of the ordinary majority rule results in domination (Horowitz,

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2014). Therefore, one of the methods proposed to soften the consequences of domination is power sharing, which assumes proportional representation in government and minority vetoes on particularly sensitive policies. This, in turn, provides the necessary foundations for building consociational democracy. Meanwhile, A. Lijphart (2007) suggests that for deeply divided societies consociationalism was a better solution than liberal democracy, as the former required power sharing. He also prescribes that all significant societal segments should be included in the political process by demanding group autonomy (Lijphart, 2007: 8). In consociational democracy, ethnic groups are recognised by the state and allowed all the necessary prerequisites, such as separate communities, language rights, schools, and mass media, to preserve their separate existence and identity. Consociational democracy operates through the mechanisms of group autonomy, proportional representation, the politics of compromise and consensus, a coalition government (elite cartel) permanently engaged in negotiations, and veto power on decisions vital to group interests. The state takes a neutral stance towards the conflict between the groups and impartially implements the compromises reached by group elites (Smooha, 2001). In his book entitled Democracy in Plural Societies, Lijphart (1977) identifies Israel as a semi-consociational system. Critically building on Lijphart’s proposal, Ian Lustick developed a model of a political system that he called “control”, which he argues was more appropriate for studying the Israeli case. Control is presented as a general framework, designed to ensure political stability in deeply divided societies, that constitutes an alternative to liberal and consociational democracy (Lustick, 1979). Obviously, over time, Israeli society has changed and its evolution has affected the nature of the country’s democracy. These changes and their consequences are also reflected in the scholarly debates (Jakala et al., 2018; Kremnitzer and Shany, 2020). Considering the key social and political turning points in Israel over the past decades, Reuven Y. Hazan identifies three consecutive stages in the development of the Israeli party system – a core element of the democratic governance framework (Hazan 1999). In Hazan’s view, the party system constitutes a key element of a democratic political system and is of great importance in managing social and political divisions.

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Table 1. The process of change in the Israeli political system STAGE OF EVOLUTION CONSOCIATIONALISM pre- and immediate post-independence period

BASIC CHARACTERISTIC Both the formal governmental institutions and the party system have been structured to acknowledge and reinforce the ideological or religious cleavages, in addition to the socio-economic ones. The result has been a combination of social segmentation and political stability.

CONSENSUALISM weaker version of consociationalism where there remains an emphasis on the dispersion and limitation of concentrated political power (Sussman, 2016) 1950s–late 1960 s

The transition was sparked by the establishment of legitimate state authorities, which were based on the agencies of the dominant subculture, and the continued opening up of the system over time. Two extremely divergent, mutually exclusive subcultures in Israel (Jews and Arabs) were able to cooperate and overcome their segmentation due to elite accommodation and the utilisation of characteristically accommodationist mechanisms. Starting in the 1980s, the executive power in Israel has become more concentrated. This was particularly reinforced by the electoral reform of 1992 (Dyduch, 2021a), as well as further formal and legal changes and informal practices.

A gradual shift towards MAJORITARIANISM 1967–late 1990s and 2000 s

Source: own compilation based on Hazan (1999).

Changing sociopolitical cleavages in Israel The literature elaborating on sociopolitical cleavages in Israel identifies four major lines of divisions: (1) national/ethnic; (2) religious; (3) socio-economic; and (4) ideological. However, the specificity of the Israeli case lies in the great complexity across the above-mentioned lines. For instance, although nationality/ ethnicity explains the distinction of the Arab and Jewish segments, both groups are further divided in ways that are also significant for the political system. Within the Jewish population, one needs to mention two major (but not the only) subgroups: Ashkenazi1 and Mizrahi2 (Sephardi). Moreover, it is this division (rather than Arab vs. Jewish) that seems to play a greater role in the actual process of power sharing and institutionalised political decision-making in Israel. 1 Ashkenazim are those whose origin is in Europe or America (as well as Oceania). 2 Mizrahim are those who emigrated from Arab and Muslim countries in the Middle East and North Africa.

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Table 2. Comprehensive mapping of cleavages in Israel Cleavages Nationality/ethnicity

Israel case study Arabs

Jews

Ashkenazi

Sephardi/

“Westerners”

Mizrahi “Orientals”

Religion

Muslims

Druze Christians

Jews secular

religious (inc. ultraOrthodox)

Ideological

left

centre

right

preferences

Economic status/

upper– rich

middle class

poor

CLASS

Source: (Berman, 2020; Ram, 2018).

When one takes a closer look at the shape of contemporary Israeli society and its internal segmentation, it appears that two (among many others) divisions are primarily responsible for political polarisation. These are religion and class, but surprisingly not ethnicity. A high level of income inequality, as well as the dividing role of religion and Jewish heritage in Israeli politics are translated into deep and profound cleavages. As far as the fault lines of religion and religiosity are concerned in Israel as the Jewish State, according to the Central Bureau of Statistics in 2020 non-Jews constitute one-quarter of the Israeli population. Most were Muslims (18% of Israelis), Christians (2%), or Druze (1.6%) (Skorek, 2021b; Even, 2021). Nevertheless, religion as a divisive factor in Israel refers mainly to Judaism. Therefore, its impact is primarily visible in the intra-Jewish dimension. The special status of Judaism, which is the source of not only spiritual but also historical and cultural references in contemporary Israel, is reinforced by several legal provisions that affect the followers of other faiths as well as the secular mainstream of the Israeli society. Those provisions – for instance, the Orthodox Chief Rabbinate’s monopoly over marriages and divorces, conversion processes, or exemption from

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mandatory army service for ultra-Orthodox Jews – put the most observant Jews in a privileged position vis-à-vis the rest of the society. The fact Judaism is given greater attention than any other religion may be explained by the size of this particular group (ca. 74%) which, although internally heavily divided, still shares a common, Jewish identity. At the same time, it should be noted that Israeli civic legislation blurs the distinction between religion and nationality – a feature which influences individual self-identification (Skorek, 2021b: 2). Hence, the lack of clear separation between the state and religion may be attributed to the latter’s utility as a powerful element cementing the Jewish identity. At the same time, religion-based divisions within the Jewish majority segment remain an important driver of the political dynamics in the country and are, to a great extent, responsible for the politicisation and polarisation of public policies (e. g., education, housing, health, and others). Moreover, religious (Datim) and/or ultrareligious Jews (Heredim), who are considered to be a minority, are actually included in the power-sharing mechanism. As practice shows, it is this cleavage that tends to overshadow all others. As for the economic stratification of contemporary Israel, it is classified as one of the top ten among OECD countries in terms of inequality, with income polarisation gradually increasing (OECD, 2022a). Israel also remains in the OECD’s top five when it comes to poverty rate, as over 20% of its population has to make do with income below the poverty line (OECD, 2022b). Ultra-Orthodox Jews (Haredi) and Israeli Arabs are among the most economically disadvantaged social groups in Israel. Both are characterised by low participation in the job market and low wages as a direct result of low levels of education. On the opposite side of the socio-economic spectrum, we have the upper class – the mostly secular Ashkenazim Jewish population – and a slightly more diverse (religiously and ethnically) middle class. It is worth mentioning that in the past years the country’s middle class has been gradually and steadily shrinking, down to 15.5% in 2021 (Margit, 2021), while the upper-class share is estimated at ca. 10%. Although the Israeli model of economic growth is advertised as being based on high-tech industry, it has brought an unsustainable, dual structure to the labour market. On the one hand, there is a group of well-educated and very well-paid workers who are concentrated in the main metropolitan area (in and around Tel Aviv) and employed in innovative technological sectors. On the other hand, there is a poorly paid labour force living mostly on the peripheries (Dyduch and Olszewska, 2018). The class division overlaps with the “centre vs. periphery” cleavage, which in Israel is often connected to the problem of the so-called “development towns”, described in the literature as “Mizrahi enclaves” (Kalman, 2021). Development towns were created in the early 1950s to absorb a mass wave of immigration of Mizrahi Jews coming to Israel from the Arab countries and, additionally, to counterbalance the Arab populations in the country’s peripheries

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(Galilee and Negev). The social and ethical structure of those towns was a result of strict segregation. In geographical terms, these cities were isolated and lacking connections with other urban centres, with limited employment opportunities. Therefore, it is not surprising that most development towns were for decades among the poorest Jewish areas in the country. The widening economic gap between the inhabitants of these towns and those living in well-developed metropolitan spaces (such as Tel Aviv) has exacerbated ethnic divisions by strengthening the “Mizrahim vs. Ashkenazim” and “rich vs. poor” contrasts (Heumann, 2015). The ethnic division within the Jewish population, which led to the separation of two distinct groups – “Mizrahim” and “Ashkenazim” – is commonly viewed as Jewish society’s failure to accommodate for cultural characteristic and socioeconomic attributes that differentiate Jews who emigrated from different geographical directions. This specific ethnic cleavage has over the years been sustained by inequality in terms of resources and socio-economic attainment, and found its expression in Israel’s political arena where the Mizrahi Jews tend to vote for right-wing nationalist parties, while the Ashkenazi Jews are more likely to vote for centre-left parties. It is estimated that the Mizrahi Jews constitute 44.9% of the Jewish population in Israel, while the Ashkenazim account for 31.8% (LewinEpstein and Cohen, 2019: 8). As already mentioned, one reason for the increasing ethnic and cultural diversification of the Israeli society (within the Jewish national segment) was the immigration of Jews from the diaspora to the Jewish State, established in 1948. Consecutive waves of immigrations (Aliyahot) continued over the decades. Obviously, the influx of a huge wave of immigrants from the former Soviet Union (ca. 1 million people) who arrived in the 1990s, as well as approximately 80,000 immigrants from Ethiopia, had its impact on Israel’s ethnic diversity within the Jewish segment. Moreover, ethnicity as a dividing factor gained in importance, since many newcomers (Olim Chadashim) were non-religious or even nonJewish according to Jewish religious law (Halacha), but were granted entry into Israel as family members or descendants of Jewish parents. Recent studies indicate that Russian-speaking Israelis make up as much as 12.4% of society, while those coming from Ethiopia constitute only 3% (Lewin-Epstein and Cohen, 2019). As argued by Hazan: … the ethnic divisions were addressed in a manner that can be better described as a combination of clientelism and patronage, of the politically established Ashkenazi group toward the Sephardic, while the national divisions (Arabs – Jews) were treated by a pattern of exclusion and control, by the Jewish political establishment toward the Arabs – a model quite contradictory to that of accommodation. (Hazan, 1999: 111)

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This makes Israel far from a perfect case of consociational democracy. Public declarations of the country’s Jewish character make it a particularly problematic case, as they reinforce the Jewish majority’s institutionalised control over the state. Moreover, the first two decades of the 2000s were a time of substantial reconfiguration of the social segments most relevant from the perspective of power-sharing operationalisation. When evaluating those changes, Uri Ram recalls President R. Rivlin’s diagnosis of the Israeli society, according to which: … the old Israeli order has reached its limits and “a new order” is emerging. During the 1990s Israeli society was composed of a clear and solid majority, with minority groups alongside it; a great mainstream Zionist majority, and alongside it three minorities: a religious-national minority, an Arab minority, and an ultra-Orthodox minority. (…) But reality meanwhile has changed essentially. (…) In this new order, Israeli society is composed of four major sectors (…) essentially different from each other, which are becoming roughly of the same size. (Ram, 2018: 3)

Following this argument, Ram lists and categorises four major societal divisions in contemporary Israel: (1) the national cleavage, Israeli Jews versus Palestinian Arabs (53% of the public consider it the “strongest” cleavage); (2) the cultural cleavage, secular Jews versus religious ones (10.5%); (3) the socio-economic (or class) cleavage, rich versus poor (or canter versus periphery) (8%); (4) the ethnic cleavage, Ashkenazi Jews versus Mizrahi Jews (“Westerners” versus “Orientals”) (4%)’ (Ram, 2018: 4).

Public opinions and attitudes, proposed by Ram as a criterion for separation and hierarchisation (Ram, 2018), may additionally be accompanied by information about the actual size of a particular group and how these cleavages translate into the structure and scheme of the party system, as indicated in Table 3.

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Table 3. Segmentation of contemporary Israeli society sociopolitical cleavages * the national cleavage** Israeli Jews versus Palestinian Arabs Total population: 9,215 m people

The actual size of the groups

the cultural cleavage secular versus religious Jews

the socio-economic or class cleavage rich versus poor associated with centre versus periphery

Jews:

Arabs (including those living in East Jerusalem):

6,870.9 m à 73.9%

1,957.6 m à 21.1%

Jews:

Others: **Muslims: 18% of the total Israeli population Christians: 2% Druze: 1.6%

Israeli parties and their electoral relevance (considering the Knesset elections held on 23 March 2021) Jewish mainstream Arab parties parties with a general appeal Likud (30 seats) Joint List – Blue and White (8) political alliLabour (7) ance of four Arab political parties in Israel: Balad, Hadash, Ta’al, and the Arab Democratic Party (6 seats) Jewish parties Other

Secular: Yesh The United Atid (17 seats)/ Arab List Meretz (6 seats) (Ra’am), a reTraditional: New ligious Arab Muslim party Hope (6 seats) Religious/very reli- (6 seats) gious: Yamina (7 seats); Religious + parties from the Joint List – Zionism (6 seats) Mizrahi Ultra-Or- see above thodox: Shas (9 seats) Ashkenazi UltraOrthodox: United Torah Judaism (6 seats). **** upper class: 12% This cleavage is less reflected in the middle class: 54% (upper- programmes of relevant parties middle class à15.5%) lower middle class: 16% very poor/poverty: 19%

**, *** Secular (Hiloni): 45% of Jewish population Traditional: (Masorti) 25% Very religious (Dati): 16% Ultra-Orthodox (Heredi): 14%

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Table 3 (Continued) sociopolitical cleavages * the ethnic cleavage Ashkenazi versus Mizrahi Jews

The actual size of the groups

Israeli parties and their electoral relevance (considering the Knesset elections held on 23 March 2021) Likud, Shas Labour, Yesh Atid, Mertz, United Torah Judaism Israel Beytenu (7 seats)

Mizrahi: 44.9% (*of the Jewish population) Ashkenazim: 31.8%* Israelis from the former Soviet Union: *12.4% Israelis from Ethiopia: *3% Source: (*Ram, 2018; **Central Bureau of Statistics, 2021; ***Even, 2021; ****OECD, 2019; *****Lewin-Epstein and Cohen, 2019).

Where does Israeli democracy go? Consolidation of majoritarianism under B. Netanyahu’s premiership (2009–2021) There is a common understanding among researchers that despite deep and significant ethnic, religious, and cultural divisions, Israel has successfully remained a stable democracy. Freedom House’s 2021 annual study of political rights and civil liberties worldwide ranks Israel relatively high, as a “free” country (with a total score of 76 points). In its most recent report, the organisation recognises Israel as “a multiparty democracy with strong and independent institutions that guarantee political rights and civil liberties for most of the population”, but it also acknowledges that while “the judiciary is comparatively active in protecting minority rights, the political leadership and many in society have discriminated against Arab and other ethnic or religious minority populations, resulting in systemic disparities in areas including political representation, criminal justice, education, and economic opportunity” (Freedom House, 2021). Bearing that in mind, it should be said that although Israel is a democracy, it is far from being perfect in terms of inclusiveness, sustainable development, and social coherence (Diskin, 2003). The last decade was particularly crucial when it comes to the consolidation of democratic principles and procedures. The system was challenged by illiberal tendencies driving it towards solutions that further privileged the majority and introduced a specific variant of power sharing, which actually undermined its original conscionable sense. While in theory all Israeli citizens enjoy equal rights, in practice citizenship does not guarantee equal group recognition – neither for Jews, nor for Arabs. As diagnosed by Freedom House:

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Jewish citizens, particularly those of Ashkenazi descent, typically enjoy practical advantages relative to the rest of the population on matters including legal treatment and socioeconomic conditions. (…) Arab citizens of Israel face de facto discrimination in education, social services, and access to housing and related permits. Aside from the Druze minority, they are exempted from military conscription, though they may volunteer. Those who do not serve are ineligible for the associated benefits, including scholarships and housing loans. (Freedom House, 2021)

If one considers the subject from a different perspective, it must be said that recent developments in Israel have strengthened the nationalist narrative. Categories such as nation, nationhood, and the nation-state have been reinvigorated and become key points of reference in political and public debates. The state has evidently been defined in ethnocultural terms, while the national community and its supremacy over minorities has been highlighted. The survival, security, and wellbeing of the national community have been placed above the wellbeing of individual citizens. Therefore, if individual human rights and civil liberties clash with the community’s interest, the latter must take precedence. Moreover, upon a closer look at the dynamics of the political processes in Israel, one may conclude that the ruling elites were not only in favour of strengthening the majority rights but were also highly critical of the principles of liberal democracy. This scepticism has translated into several political, legal, and economic initiatives, including the adoption of controversial legislation limiting the leeway of civil society actors (this will be elaborated on later in the chapter) and political campaigns. Legal initiatives and regularly repeated political gestures reflected a broader and more significant shift towards the “majoritarian” version of the democratic model (Lintl and Wolfrum, 2018; Kremnitzer and Shany, 2020). Controversial legislation adopted in recent years in Israel resulted in the strengthening of collective rights at the expense of individual rights and freedoms, the consolidation and centralisation of power, the diminution of pluralism, and a decrease in the leeway for the civil society to act on its own behalf (Dyduch, 2021b).

Legal developments: 2018 Nation State Law and beyond On 19 July 2018, the Israeli parliament – the Knesset – passed legislation entitled “Israel – The Nation State of the Jewish People”, which became Israel’s 14th Basic Law (comprising Israel’s constitutional law). The new Basic Law, known as the “Nation State Law”, was not a novel idea. In fact, it had been discussed for some years, the first drafts coming as early as 2011. When naming key motivations behind the proposal, historians recall: (1) stagnation in the negotiations with the Palestinians which led many Israelis to the

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conclusion that the peace agreement lost its importance and relevance as a key social goal; consequently, the social perception of the need to preserve the Jewish character of the state has been reinforced; (2) the majority society’s growing resistance to the demands of post-Zionists and the Arab minority seeking to define Israel as a “neutral” rather than a “Jewish” state; (3) increasing contestation of “legal activism” and a growing conviction that the law was supposed to serve as a proactive statement against any attempts to de-legitimise Israel (see also: Lintl and Wolfrum, 2018; Navon, 2021). Authors and protagonists of the new bill argued that it was explicitly derived from Israel’s Declaration of Independence of 14 May 1948, which indeed highlights “the natural right of the Jewish people to be masters of their own fate, like all other nations, in their own sovereign State”. However, it also announces that the State of Israel “will be based on freedom, justice and peace (…); it will ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex; it will guarantee freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture”. Finally, the Declaration appeals “to the Arab inhabitants of the State of Israel to preserve peace and participate in the upbuilding of the State on the basis of full and equal citizenship and due representation in all its provisional and permanent institutions” (The Knesset, 1948). As noted by Waxman and Peleg, “the explicit commitment in the ‘Declaration of Independence’ to potentially conflicting values – universalistic liberal values and particularistic Jewish – resulted in a long-lasting political struggle to reconcile the country’s Jewish character with the liberal democratic principle of equal citizenship” (Waxman and Peleg, 2020). This struggle was mainly (but not only) reflected in the state’s approach to its Arab citizens. Although the Basic Law contains mainly symbolic provisions – for instance, those on state symbols such as the flag, emblem and anthem – it mentions a united Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and declares Hebrew as the official language (The Knesset, 2018); it also emphasises Israel’s Jewish character as its fundamental value (Skorek, 2021a: 12). Some scholars have interpreted the new law as an attempt to return control over the constitution from the Supreme Court to the Knesset and as a challenge to the Supreme Court which, through judiciary activism, typically leaned towards protecting individual human rights essential to liberal democracy, at the expense of collective national rights and principles, (see more: Navon, 2021: 2–6). For some, however, the adoption of the new legislation changed the nature of Israeli democracy, illustrating the shift towards illiberal tendencies. They recalled the arguments of the Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked (Jewish Home), who said the law should “protect the Jewish character of the state, even if that means sacrificing human rights” (Lintl and Wolfrum, 2018). The new Basic Law, as well as the preceding and following disputes, highlighted the division between the Israeli Jews and the Palestinian Arabs. For

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obvious reasons, it reinforced a political model based on tense majority-minority relations, whereby the majority strengthened its dominant position. According to the new provisions, the character of the state was to be determined by the national majority – a solution that confirmed the secondary status of non-Jewish minorities. What is more, the adopted bill did not address the issues of how its provisions might be reconciled with democratic principles, primarily the equality of all citizens. Furthermore, the relevance and impact of the new Basic Law should be considered in the wider context of legal changes introduced prior to its adoption. A common denominator of all these acts was that they sought to limit civil liberties and broaden the competences and powers of the central government. Moreover, as will be demonstrated below, some of them directly addressed the tensions and issues resulting from the divisions. For instance, in 2011 the Knesset passed the so-called “Nakba Law” that required the state to fine local authorities and other state-funded bodies (including educational institutions) for holding events marking Israeli Independence Day as the “Nakba” (or “catastrophe”, in Arabic), as well as for supporting armed resistance or racism against Israel. It also banned desecration of the state flag or national symbols. Its provisions also enabled the Ministry of Finance to cut funding for any public institution (including schools) that commemorated the Nakba. For Israeli Arabs, the legislation was discriminatory and anti-democratic. An Israeli-Arab member of the Knesset, Hanna Suweid (Hadash), called the bill “one more ingredient in the bubble of laws that are anti-democratic, anti-minority, anti-free thought” (Hartman, 2011). The same year saw the adoption of another highly controversial act, known as the “Boycott Law”.3 The bill prohibited Israeli citizens and organisations from inciting a boycott of not only Israel, but also of the settlements in the Occupied Territories. It also allowed for a variety of actions to be taken against those who called for boycotts (Hennessey, 2022). In 2016, the Knesset adopted the so-called “NGO Transparency Law” that required Israeli NGOs receiving more than half of their funding from foreign donors to publicly disclose that information, labelling them as foreign agents. The entities affected by the legislation include wellknown human- and minority-rights organisations such as: Breaking the Silence, B’Tselem, Peace Now and Yesh Din. The adoption of the new law sponsored by the right-wing governmental coalition sparked criticism both from the opposition in the country and internationally. In her scathing comment on the legislation, Sari Bashi from Human Rights Watch said that it: … targets and burdens human rights and left-wing groups by imposing onerous reporting requirements and hefty fines for noncompliance. If the Israeli government were

3 Law Preventing Harm to the State of Israel by Means of Boycott.

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truly concerned about transparency, it would require all NGOs to actively alert the public to their sources of funding – not just those that criticize the government’s policies. (Beaumont, 2016)

Finally, in 2017 the Knesset adopted the “Entry Law” that barred people who publicly advocated boycotting Israel or “any of the territories under its control” (thereby including targeted boycotts of products from Israeli settlements) from entering the country. Despite the establishment of democratic institutions and practices, Israel has never evolved into a Western-style democracy rigorously following liberal principles. Instead, academia has by and large concluded that the country has been drifting from the consociational democracy model towards a more consensual solution and, subsequently, a specific variant of majoritarian democracy, labelled in the literature as “ethnic democracy” or “ethnocracy” (Smooha, 2002; Yiftachel, 2006). There is also a consensus among scholars that the Nation-State Law reinforces the ethnocratic character of Israel’s political system (Waxman and Peleg, 2020: 192).

Party system Israel’s highly fragmented, multiparty system serves as an important instrument for managing public affairs in a deeply divided society, as it links the dominant subcultures and their elites (Hazan, 1999: 109–110). Although all relevant segments of society are represented in the landscape of the Israeli political scene, not all of them enjoy influence or participate in the redistribution of the costs and benefits of coexistence proportionately to their size. While formally Arab citizens are present in the parliamentary arena, Arab parties were effectively not considered suitable coalition partners (until 2021). Their almost systemic governmental irrelevance deeply influenced the operationalisation of power sharing. Power was indeed shared, but only among the Jewish Israelis. When describing the isolation of the Arab minority, Dowty wrote there was “no meaningful powersharing with the Arab community” (Dowty, 1998: 172). On top of that, voter turnout among Arab citizens has significantly decreased in recent years and dropped well below the overall national statistic. In the 1999 Knesset elections, 75% of the Arab population cast their votes (the national turnout stood at 78.7%). In 2021, the turnout in predominantly Arab localities was as low as 44.6% (while nationally it stood at 64%) (Rudnitzky, 2021).

Jewish

Jewish Jewish Jewish

United Torah Judaism

Habayit Hayehudi (Jewish Home) – New National Religious Party

National Union

HaBayit HaYehudi – National Union

Shas

National/ ethnical character Jewish

Political party

Religious atim to heredim

Religious Ultra-Orthodox Ashkenazi

Religious Ultra-Orthodox Mizrahi party

Religiosity

Right-wing to farright Zionism – religious nationalism Religious conservatism Modern Orthodox and settlers’ interests

Right-wing Religious conservatism Social conservatism Haredi non-Zionism

Zionism Religious social conservatism Economic egalitarianism

Ideological appeal

Table 4. Landscape of the Israeli party system with regard to sociopolitical cleavages

2013: 9.12%/12 seats 2015: 6.74%/8 seats 04/2019: 3.7%/5 seats

2009: 3.3%/4 seats

2009: 2.9%/3 seats

Knesset election year/ vote percentage/number of seats in the Knesset 2009: 8.5%/11 seats 2019: 8.75%/11 seats 2015: 5.74%/7 seats 04/2019: 5.99%/8 seats 09/2019: 7.44%/9 seats 2020: 7.69%/9 seats 2021: 7.17%/9 seats 2009: 4.4%/5 seats 2013: 5.16%/7 seats 2015: 4.99%/6 seats 04/2019: 5.78%/8 seats 09/2019: 6.06%/7 seats 2020: 5.98%/7 seats 2021: 5.63%/7 seats

YES – coalition partner (after elections in 2009, 2013, 2015, 2020)

YES – coalition partner (after elections in 2009, 2015, 2020)

YES – coalition partner (after elections in 2009, 2015, 2020)

Governmental relevance (2009–2021)

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Jewish Jewish

Likud – Yisrael Beitenu Likud

Secular Secular

with antiultra-Orthodox agenda

Secular

Jewish

Yisrael Beitenu

Religious Dati

Religiosity

Religious Dati

National/ ethnical character Jewish

Religious Zionism Jewish previously in alliance with National Union (2009), HaBayit HaYehudi (2013, 2015), Yamina (2019, 2020)

Yamina political alliance of right-wing parties founded in 2019

Political party

Table 4 (Continued)

conservatism national liberalism

centre-right to right-wing Zionism

right-wing Zionism National conservatism Economic liberalism Right-wing Zionist nationalism Religious conservatism Social conservatism right-wing Zionist nationalism originally appealing to Russian-speaking Israelis

Ideological appeal

2013: 23.34%/31 seats 2009: 21.6%/27 seats 2015: 23.4%/30 seats 04/2019: 26.46%/35 seats 09/2019: 25.1%/32 seats 2020: 29.46%/36 seats 2021: 24.19%/30 seats

2009: 11.7%/15 seats 2015: 5.1%/6 seats 04/2019: 4.01%/5 seats 09/2019: 6.99%/8 seats 2020: 5.74%/7 seats 2021: 5.63%/7 seats

2021: 5.12%/6 seats

Knesset election year/ vote percentage/number of seats in the Knesset 09/2019: 5.87%/7 seats 2020: 5.24%/6 seats 2021: 6.21%/7 seats

YES – coalition initiator YES – coalition initiator (2000–2020)

YES – coalition partner (after elections in 2009, 2013, 2015a))

YES – coalition partner (after elections in 2009, 2013, 2015, 2020)

YES – coalition co-initiator (2021)

Governmental relevance (2009–2021)

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Secular

Blue and White political alliance founded in 2019

Jewish

Secular

Yesh Atid Jewish In elections in 2019 and 2020 in electoral alliance with Blue and White

Secular

Religiosity

Secular

National/ ethnical character Jewish

Jewish

Kadima

Tikva Hadasha (New Hope)

Political party

Table 4 (Continued)

Centre Liberal Zionism Social liberalism Catch-all alliance

Zionism Centre-right to right-wing Nationalism Conservative liberalism Economic liberalism Centre Liberal Zionism Two-state solution Centre Liberal Zionism Secularism/anticlericalism

Ideological appeal

04/2019: 26.13%/35 seats 09/2019: 25.95%/33 seats 2020: 26.59%/33 seats 2021: 6.63%/8 seats

2013: 14.33%/19 seats 2015: 8.82%/11 seats 2021: 13.93%/17 seats

2009: 22.5%/28 seats 2013: 2.08%/2 seats

Knesset election year/ vote percentage/number of seats in the Knesset 2021: 4.74%/6 seats

YES – coalition partner (2020, 2021)

YES – coalition partner (2013), coalition co-initiator (2021)

NO

YES – coalition partner (after elections in 2020)

Governmental relevance (2009–2021)

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Jewish

National/ ethnical character Jewish

Democratic Campc) Jewish political alliance (Meretz, Israel Democratic Party, Labour) Hatnuah Jewish

Labour-Gesher-Meretz

Labour-Gesher

Labour

Kulanu

Political party

Table 4 (Continued)

Liberal Zionism 2013: 4.99%/6 seats Secularism Two-state solution Environmentalism Centre to centre-left

Secular

09/2019: 4.34%/5 seats

2020: 5.83%/7 seats

2009: 9.9%/13 seats 2013: 11.39%/15 seats 04/2019: 4.43%/6 seats 2021: 6.09%/7 seats 09/2019: 4.8%/6 seats

Knesset election year/ vote percentage/number of seats in the Knesset 2015: 7.49%/10 seats 04/2019: 3.54%/4 seats

liberal-left-wing

Centre to centreright Zionism Economic egalitarianism Consumer protection and social liberalism Centre-left Labour Zionism Social democracy Two-state solution Centre-left to left Labour Zionism Social democracy Two-state solution

Ideological appeal

Secular

Secular

Secular

Religiosity

YES – coalition partner (2013)

NO

YES – coalition partner (2020)

NO

YES – coalition partner (2009,b) 2021)

YES – coalition partner (2015)

Governmental relevance (2009–2021)

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Jewish

Democratic Union (or Democratic Camp) political alliance of Meretz, Israel Democratic Party, Labour

Balad (National Democratic Assembly) Arab

Jewish

National/ ethnical character Jewish

Meretz

Labour-Zionist Union (established in 2014 as three party alliances: Labour, Hatnuah and Green Movement)

Political party

Table 4 (Continued)

Secular

Secular

Secular

Secular

Religiosity

Left-wing Arab nationalism Social democracy Secularism, PanArabism Non-Zionism

Centre-left Zionism Social democracy, Progressivism, Green politics Two-state solution Left-wing Labour Zionism Social democracy, Green politics Two-state solution Liberal left-wing Labour Zionism Social democracy Green politics Two-state solution

Ideological appeal

2009: 2.5%/3 seats 2013: 2.56%/3 seats

2009: 3%/3 seats 2013: 4.55%/6 seats 2015: 3.93%/5 seats 04/2019: 3.63%/4 seats 2021: 4.59%/6 seats 09/2019: 4.34%/5 seats

Knesset election year/ vote percentage/number of seats in the Knesset 2015: 18.67%/24 seats

NO

NO

YES – coalition partner (2021)

NO – in opposition

Governmental relevance (2009–2021)

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National/ ethnical character Arab and other far leftwing groups Arab

Arab

Hadash coalition of parties

Hadash-Ta’al

Joint List (Hadash, Ta’al, Balad)

Political party

Table 4 (Continued)

Secular

Secular

Secular

Religiosity

Knesset election year/ vote percentage/number of seats in the Knesset left to far-left 2009: 3.3%/4 seats Non-Zionism Com- 2013: 2.99%/4 seats munism/socialism Israeli-Arab interests Two-state solution Centre-left to left04/2019: 4.49%/6 seats wing Arab nationalism, secularism Israeli-Arab interests Two-state solution Left-wing non2015: 10.61%/13 seats Zionism/Arab na09/2019: 10.6%/13 seats tionalism 2020: 12.67%/15 seats Socialism, secular- 2021: 4.82%/6 seats ism Israeli-Arab interests Two-state solution

Ideological appeal

NO – in opposition

NO

NO

Governmental relevance (2009–2021)

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National/ ethnical character Arab Religious

Religiosity Islamic democracy Social conservatism Israeli-Arab interests Two-state solution

Ideological appeal

Knesset election year/ vote percentage/number of seats in the Knesset 2009: 3.4%/4 seats 2013: 3.65%/4 seats 04/ 2019: 3.33%/4 seats 2021: 3.79%/4 seats

YES – coalition partner (after elections in 2021)

Governmental relevance (2009–2021)

Source: Knesset, 2022, https://m.knesset.gov.il/en/mk/pages/elections.aspx a) Yisrael Beiteinu joined the coalition in 2016 and withdrew in November 2018 when Netanyahu agreed to a cease-fire with Hamas. b) Labour withdrew from the coalition in 2011. c) The party was founded in 2019 and dissolved in 2020.

United Arab List 2009: Ra’am–Ta’al alliance 04/2019: Ra’am–Balad alliance

Political party

Table 4 (Continued)

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Table 4 is quite revealing in several ways. First of all, over the past decade the Israeli political system has suffered from increasing instability. One element that illustrates this trend is the very high number of parties with parliamentary relevance. Secondly, it shows recurring problems with building and maintaining a parliamentary majority capable of running a government – the failure of several desperate attempts has led to earlier elections. Thirdly, the data in the table suggests that the party system exhibited impressive dynamics when it comes to the construction and reconstruction of political alliances as well as the creation of new parties. Surprisingly, the “party blocs”, that is, Jewish religious, Jewish secular (rightwing, centrist and left-wing) and Arab, remained relatively stable. Interestingly, none of the major blocs enjoyed a clear majority – a fact which actually enforced greater cooperation among the parties, and also across the significant division lines. Likud and Labour, the two parties which for decades were the main actors and rivals, lost their predominant position and were on several occasions forced by circumstances to create broad coalitions, or even national unity governments. After several recent elections, building a majority required including both some of the more extreme parties and those in the new, volatile centre (Hazan, 2018: 18). While the religious Jewish parties gained power and blackmail potential disproportionate to their size and parliamentary representation as early as the 1990s (they participated in every coalition formed in the period examined here), their Arab rivals, although present in the Knesset, were intentionally marginalised, irrelevant in cabinet-forming negotiations and, until 2021, had never been invited to co-govern. Such a state of affairs pushed them to change their strategy. As a result, in the most recent elections they consolidated their fragmented appeal and formed alliances which made them the third largest parliamentary group. Despite all this, the developments regarding Israel’s 36th Cabinet cannot be considered as a definitive systemic move towards consensual or even conditional democracy. First of all, the above-mentioned legal and institutional framework of the Israeli political and social system still favours Jewishness, rather than any other, more universalist national identity. Secondly, one cannot ignore the country’s political culture, constructed over several decades in a complex, multidimensional process. Therefore, at this stage it can only be concluded that the breaking of the Arab parties’ isolation as potential coalition partners is merely the first signal of change. It is, indeed, a promising turn of events, but it falls short of constituting a definite move towards a more effective power sharing. In a more long-term perspective, the lack of observable, considerable mutual accommodation between Jews and Arabs may be seen as conducive to the majoritarian direction the Israeli government has taken in recent years (Sussman, 2016: 48). Over the past decades, formal and informal practices and procedures associated with majoritarian democracy were solidly inserted into the Israeli

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political culture with the engagement of various public actors and the use of different instruments. For instance, when it was headed by Naftali Bennett, the Ministry of Education banned a novel entitled “Border life” penned by an Israeli author, Dorit Rabinyan, from being taught in high schools because it involved a love story between an Israeli woman and a Palestinian man. Similarly, when serving as the Defence Minister, Avigdor Lieberman demanded that poems by Mahmoud Darwish, a Palestinian national poet, be banned from Army Radio (Waxman and Peleg, 2020: 195). Bearing in mind the arguments listed and elaborated in the above sections, it must be said that over the past decade Israeli democracy has definitely shifted towards majoritarianism. Paradoxically, this has been accompanied by a progressing, deep, and comprehensive fragmentation of the party system, the weakening of electoral preference and loyalties, and a continuing problem with sustaining parliamentary coalitions capable of effectively supporting the government. What has also changed and been clearly reflected in the structure and dynamics of the party system is the intensity and character of the cleavages existing in Israel. Until the late 1960s, the “left” and the “right” in Israel were defined based on a socio-economic division. The Six-Day War of 1967 fuelled a shift in focus on security issues. Later, in the 1980s and 1990s, the attitude towards Palestinian claims to self-determination and Israel’s handling of the Occupied Territories emerged as yet another relevant factor driving divisions within society. The hawkish right-wing parties supported the settlement policy and contested the two-state solution. Meanwhile, the dovish left-wing advocated a livelier pursuit of the Middle East Peace Process and a far-reaching compromise when it comes to peace negotiation with the Palestinians (Hazan, 2018: 3).

Conclusions: The failures and challenges of Israeli democracy in light of the power-sharing concept – assessment of recent developments and future prospects Although in public (and sometimes even academic) debates Israel has been considered a liberal democracy, the actual systemic solutions and the character of its political culture position it far from this particular model, even if many would wish to see it differently. One of the preconditions for the transformation of the political system from a consociational regime towards a liberal democracy is the development of a sufficiently strong sense of common political identity among the various segments of a divided society. A well-established and solid

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common political identity enables the creation of circumstances where consociational institutions are no longer required (Stojanovic´, 2020: 32). Meanwhile, Israel is more a case of a “government or rule by a particular ethnic group” (Horowitz, 1985: 499–505). In this sense, the country’s political system can be identified as being closer to ethnocracy, whereby the citizens who are not identified with the dominant ethnic group are de jure and/or de facto marginalised. Moreover, scholarly analysis points out that Israel is not only far from being a liberal democracy, but also that this particular model of governance has been widely and openly contested and criticised in Israel in recent years. Furthermore, many observers believe that the events witnessed during Prime Minister B. Netanyahu’s period in power amounted to a crisis of democracy as such. This chapter has argued that since Israel remains a country with a deeply divided and polarised society, its political system requires special solutions, for example, a redesigned model of consociationalism, tailored to this particular set of circumstances, conditioned by an internal and external process. This assumes that one of the core elements of Israel’s democratic architecture is its party system, often criticised for its highly fragmented character hindering governance efficiency. However, this analysis suggests that the fragmentation of the political scene and the long (for some Israelis, too long) leadership by a single political group pushed voters and politicians to search for new, potentially groundbreaking solutions (such as a coalition government that includes Arab parties). One important conclusion which can be drawn from this study is that although over the past decade Israel proved itself as a democracy, the apparent power sharing, somewhat forced by multiple divisions within society and the fragmentation of the party system, does not promote and contribute to the consociational solutions and mechanism highlighted by Lijphart. The exclusion of the Arab segment from effective participation in public and state affairs remains the key obstacle to the consolidation of a consociational to consensual democracy mechanism. Finally, when discussing Israeli democracy and the management of the societal and political cleavages, one may need to address the question of identification among the Arab-Palestinian population which has remained under Israeli control since 1967, specifically in the West Bank. Additionally, further research might explore the willingness and ability of the Arab minority in Israel to be an effective, long-term, constructive partner in governance – one prepared to contribute constructively to the system, accept its rules and seek compromise.

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Bibliography Beaumont, Peter (2016). Israel Passes Law to Force NGOs to Reveal Foreign Funding. The Guardian. 12 Jul 2016. Berman, Yonatan (2020). Inequality, Identity, and the Long-Run Evolution of Political Cleavages in Israel 1949–2019. https://halshs.archives-ouvertes.fr/halshs-03022224 (accessed: 15. 04. 2022). Central Bureau of Statistics (2021). Population, by Population Group, Published: 31. 08. 2021. Diskin, Abraham (2003). The Last Days in Israel. London: Frank Cass Publishers. Dowty, Alan (1998). Consociationalism and Ethnic Democracy: Israeli Arabs in Comparative Perspective. Israel Affairs, 5 (2–3): 169–82. Dyduch, Joanna (2021a). Electoral Reforms in Israel. In: The Palgrave International Handbook of Israel, Singapore: Springer Singapore, 1–20. https://link.springer.com/10 .1007/978–981–16–2717–0_33–1 (accessed: 15. 04. 2022). Dyduch, Joanna (2021b). Israel and East-Central Europe Case Studies of Israel’s Relations with Poland and Hungary. Israel Studies Review, 36 (1): 7–25. Dyduch, Joanna and Olszewska, Karolina (2018). Israeli Innovation Policy: An Important Instrument of Perusing Political Interest at the Global Stage. Polish Political Science Yearbookcience Yearbook, 47 (2): 265–83. Even, Shmuel (2021). The National Significance of Israeli Demographics at the Outset of a New Decade. Strategic Assessment. A Multidisciplinary Journal on National Security, 24 (3): 33–49. Freedom House (2021). Freedom House: Freedom in the World 2021 Country Report. https://freedomhouse.org/country/portugal/freedom-world/2020%0D%0A (accessed: 15. 04. 2022). Heumann, Gerard (2015). Revitalizing Our “Development Towns” Jerusalem Post, 12 July 2015. https://www.jpost.com/opinion/revitalizing-our-development-towns-408415 (accessed: 15. 04. 2022). Hartman, Ben (2011). “Nakba Law” Passes Vote in Knesset Committee. The Jerusalem Post. 15 March, 2011. https://www.jpost.com/diplomacy-and-politics/nakba-law-passes-vote -in-knesset-committee (accessed: 15. 04. 2022). Hazan, Reuven Y. (1999). Religion and Politics in Israel: The Rise and Fall of the Consociational Model. Israel Affairs, 6 (2): 109–37. Hazan, Reuven Y. (2018). Parties and the Party System of Israel. In: Gideon Rahat, Reuven Y. Hazan, Alan Dowty and Menachem Hofnung (eds.). The Oxford Handbook of Israeli Politics and Society. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 351–66. Hennessey, Zachy (2022). Why Isn’t Everyone in Favor of Israel’s Boycott Law? – Analysis. The Jerusalem Post, 6 February 2022. https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/politics-and -diplomacy/article-695656 (accessed: 15. 04. 2022). Horowitz, Donald L. (1993). Democracy in Divided Societies. Journal of Democracy, 4 (4): 18–38. Horowitz, Donald L. (2014). Ethnic Power Sharing: Three Big Problems. Journal of Democracy, 25 (2): 5–20.

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Agata M. Karbowska

The failure of consociational democracy in Cyprus

This chapter uses a narrow understanding of the concept of power sharing, which in a specific and conceptualised way refers in political science to the phenomenon of the systemic sharing of state power by various segments – in the Cyprus case – ethnic and religious communities, with plural (divided, fragmented) societies, including especially the multi-ethnic and/or multireligious ones of Greeks and Turks (Jelonek, 2005: 93–96; Trzcin´ski, 2016: 26). This Cypriot case in particular applies to the concept of ethno-religious power sharing (Berman, 2009: 52). In addition, the concept of power sharing should be defined here with the understanding that it refers to the arrangements and established relations between the political elites representing different parts of plural societies, that is, consisting of different social groups, especially of an ethnic, national, religious or religious nature which are often referred to as segments or subcultures. The meaning of power sharing in the specific conditions of multi-ethnic society of Cyprus is presented as a kind of political system (Sisk, 1996: 4) that goes beyond the system of government, form of government or political regime. It includes, within a given political community, the structures, institutions and organisations that are characteristic of it, as well as its consciousness, culture, relations, values and norms (Trzcin´ski, 2016: 29). However, before these features were developed in the Republic of Cyprus, power sharing was introduced mechanically – as a result of an ad hoc peace agreement crowning the conflict (1950– 1955) between segments hostile (Greeks and Turks) to each other – and may simply be considered a set of structural (decentralisation) and institutional solutions (the rule of a large coalition) and organisations (ethnic parties) constituting a significant part of a given political system. The implementation and functioning of power sharing was to build political stability in this plural society island where there was risk of conflicts in the relationships between the segments. Power-sharing solutions are intended to meet existing differences and help to reconcile conflicting interests and reduce ethnic, religious and communal conflicts. By allowing various segments of the political elite to participate in the decision-making processes, power sharing also limits the concentration of power

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by the majority and, as a result, reduces the arbitrariness of power. Power sharing may include political solutions that are formal, institutionalised, but also informal. This system can exist in a democratic as well as an authoritarian regime; this system concern both the actual state and constitute an empirical one or can be a normative theory that proposes institutional solutions for plural societies (O’Leary, 2005: 3–36). The most famous model of power sharing – consociationalism in Cyprus – has been conceptualised and is still being developed by Arend Lijphart (1968a, 1977 2008) and his students. Arend Lijphart identified four structural features shared by consociational systems – a grand coalition government, segmental autonomy, proportionality in the voting system and in public sector employment, and minority veto (Lijphart, 1977: 25–52). The classic example of consociationalism is Cyprus, but there are still many supporters of the centripetal approach for the island, such as the left-wing parties in each bloc, the Greek-Cypriot AKEL and the Turkish Cypriot CTP; in addition, the prominent London-based think tank “Friends of Cyprus”, academics and a large proportion of the Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot communities, are all fearful of allowing hardliners from other communities to join the government (McGarry and Loizides, 2016). Centripetalism (integrationism) is another form of democratic power sharing for divided societies which could work for Cyprus. Its aim is to encourage the party to adopt moderate and compromise policies and to strengthen the centre of the divided political spectrum. In opposition to consociationalism, it aims to “depoliticise ethnicity by putting in place institutional incentives for cross-ethnic voting to encourage a degree of accommodation between rival groups” (Reilly, 2012: 263). The theory of centripetalism, created by Donald L. Horowitz, a critic of consociationalism (Horowitz, 1985), might have worked before the huge migration from Turkey to the northern part of the island. However, it would be wrong to conclude that consociationalism and centripetalism are incompatible, because there are consociational regimes around the world with centripetal elements. The choice between consociationalism and centripetalism cannot be reduced to a choice between the list of proportional representation and the alternative vote (Bogaards, 2019: 521). “An electoral system in (…) should provide every inducement to candidates and to political parties to reach out across racial and ethnic lines for support” (Horowitz, 1991: 106).

History of the division in Cyprus Cyprus is a small island in the eastern Mediterranean, approximately 70 km south of the Turkish coast, west of the coasts of Syria and Lebanon, and more than 260 km east of the easternmost part of Greece. There are two British military

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bases in Cyprus, Akrotiri and Dhekelia. The island is crossed by a 180 km long green line, which forms the border between the Republic of Cyprus in the south and the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. The affiliation of Cyprus has changed over the centuries; from the middle of the 1st century BC it was part of the Roman Empire, from the end of the 4th century CE – Byzantine, then the subject of Byzantine-Arab wars, conquered by the crusaders who created the Kingdom of Cyprus and ruled successively by the Lusignan and Antioch-Lusignan dynasties.(Mallinson, 2005, pp. 63, 105–6; Coureas. 2019, pp.391–418). In the 13th and 14th centuries, Cyprus was an important point of resistance and support for the Christian principalities of Syria in the fight against the Egyptian Mamluks. In the 14th century, its importance in the Levantine trade increased, which resulted in the occupation of Venice in 1489 by Cyprus as a result of the trade rivalry with Genoa (Kazamias et al., 2013). The Turks captured the island around 1570. Increasingly higher taxes imposed on the people of Cyprus resulted in repeated revolts. In 1821, when the Greek uprising broke out (1821–1829), the Turks accused the Orthodox clergy of supporting the insurgents and organised a massacre of Christians in Nicosia (Faroqhi, 2004).1 Although anti-British riots broke out in Cyprus in the 1930s (Morgan, 2010), local government was demanded, but the idea of unification (Enosis) with Greece was more popular. In 1950, Archbishop Makarios III became head of the Cypriot Orthodox Church and headed the Enosis movement. The armed struggle for the liberation of Cyprus from British rule and annexation to Greece was continued by the National Organization of Cypriot Fighters (Ethniki Organosis Kyprion Agoniston, EOKA) established in 1955 (Karyos, 2009; Papadakis, 1998: 149–165). EOKA used terrorist methods, and attacked British administration facilities, which resulted in the introduction of a state of emergency. At that time, the conflict between the Greek and Turkish populations of the island escalated, in which Greece and Turkey actively participated. After a series of long-lasting Greek-Turkish-British talks (1960), the Republic of Cyprus gained independence with Greece, Turkey and the United Kingdom (UK) as its guarantors (including the right to maintain military contingents on the island). Archbishop Makarios III became the president of the Republic of Cyprus and the representative of the Turkish population Fazıl Küçük the vice president. The constitution of 16 August 1960 defined the rules of coexistence for the residents of both nationalities. At the same time, the treaty of guarantee signed by the UK, Greece and Turkey ensured the territorial integrity of the new republic, and the alliance treaty between Cyprus, Greece and Turkey provided soldiers for the defence of the island. However, the two major communities aspired to a different future for Cyprus: most Greek Cypriots opted for the union 1 Treaty of Lausanne – English (1923), https://ecf.org.il/media_items/1096.

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of the whole island with Greece (enosis), while Turkish Cypriots preferred to divide the island (tur. taksim) and perhaps unite the Turkish Cypriot zone with Turkey. The consociational system lasted from 1960 to 1963. Unfortunately, the disastrous constitution paralysed the state because it artificially divided power between the uncooperative Greeks and Turks. The efforts of President Makarios III to amend the constitution modifications that favoured the majority Greek Cypriot community sparked conflicts between the communities in 1963 causing open fights between them. Turkish Cypriots increasingly consolidated into enclaves in the larger cities, mainly in the north of the island, for safety. On 4 March 1964, the United Nations Security Council authorised the creation of a United Nations Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus (UNFICYP) to control the violence and act as a buffer between the two communities. UNFICYP was launched on 27 March 1964 and continues its mission to this day. The UN sent its army to Cyprus2 and the negotiations between representatives of both nationalities lasted for years and did not bring any visible results. The consociational structures ultimately did not go beyond antagonism and instead collapsed in the 1970s when General J. Grivas, the leader of EOKA, returned to the island and increased the political pressure of the Greek government to join Cyprus under Enosis to Greece. In the following year, the chief of the Military Police, Dimitrios Ioannidis inspired a coup d’état against the policy of the president of the country, Archbishop Makarios III, and advocated an immediate union between Cyprus and Greece (Mallinson, 2005: 10, 70, 75). The Turkish government responded with the landing of Turkish troops and occupied the northern part of Cyprus. The UN intervention and negotiations were unsuccessful (Mallinson, 2005). In 1975, in the Turkish-occupied part of Cyprus, the Turkish Federated State of Cyprus (Kıbrıs Türk Federe Devleti) was proclaimed. In the 1980s, UN troops supervised the exchange of refugees, and the UN organised numerous conferences and negotiations, In 1983, the UN called on Turkey to withdraw its troops from Cyprus, to which the Turkish side responded with the creation of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus with President Rauf Denktas¸ and the provisional government. The founding parliament of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) by acclamation passed the Declaration of Independence, which emphasised that the Turkish Cypriot side “firmly adhered to the view that the two peoples of Cyprus were destined to coexist side by side and could and should find a peaceful, just and durable solution through negotiations on the basis of equality” (MFA TR 2, 2021). The parliament also confirmed that the proclamation of the TRNC was intended to facilitate the restoration of a new partnership on the island between Turkish 2 Cyprus has been a member of the United Nations since 1960, and the British Commonwealth of Nations since 1961.

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Cypriots and Greek Cypriots and to resolve the Cyprus problem through comprehensive negotiations. The UN Security Council condemned the proclamation of the separatist Turkish Cypriot independent state,3 which was recognised only by Turkey. In the following years, reunification dominated the affairs of the island. On 11 November 2002 the then UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan presented a draft “Grounds for Agreement on a Comprehensive Solution to the Cyprus Problem”, commonly known as the Annan Plan. The plan assumed, inter alia, the establishment of a government of a “common state” with one international legal personality to participate in foreign relations and the European Union (EU). When the EU and Cyprus announced the political dialogue in 1989 and started the negotiations which turned in 2000 to the acceptance of the entire island of Cyprus as a member, it was believed that Cyprus’s planned accession by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan would result with agreement between both sets of citizens (Europarl, 2000). On 1 May 2004 the whole island became a full EU member state (Cyprus and the European Union) but actually, Northern Cyprus is not part of the deal. Turkey treats North Cyprus as yavrum vatan.4 The official currency of Northern Cyprus is the new Turkish lira. The president of the Republic of Cyprus, Tassos Papadopoulos said that, for Greek Cypriots, accession to the EU is an expression of acceptance by the family to which it belongs geographically, historically, culturally, economically and politically: This historic achievement acquires even greater significance if seen in the light of the special conditions of Cyprus, the tragedy of the invasion and the continued Turkish occupation of part of our country and its grave consequences (…) From now on Cyprus has the possibility to offer to all its citizens, including the Turkish Cypriots, not only conditions of peace, greater security and respect of the rights of all, but also its vision, aspirations and immense prospects which the accession to the European Union opens up. (MFA CY, 2021)

On the way to finding a solution Unity talks aimed at ending the division of Cyprus after 55 years as a politically separated and 45 years as a physically divided country have been suspended since July 2017. UN attempts to find common ground between the two Cypriot communities to resume negotiations have failed. The talks faced the reality of 50 years 3 Resolution 541(1983) / adopted by the Security Council at its 2500th meeting, on 18 November 1983, https://digitallibrary.un.org/record/58970 (accessed: 15. 09. 2022). 4 Tur. yavru – baby (young animal), a child; yavrum – my baby; vatan – homeland, nation.

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of separation and the inability of both sides to make the concessions necessary to reach a final agreement. The bizonal, bicommunal, federal solution for the island has remained elusive and may no longer be attainable (Morelli, 2019). The negotiations in Cyprus tend to show periodic levels of optimism, quickly tempered by the political reality between Greek and Turkish Cypriots. In June 2018, in an attempt to advance the talks, Jane Holl Lute was appointed by UN SecretaryGeneral Antonio Guterres as his new adviser for Cyprus. She was asked to consult with Nicos Anastasiades and Mustafa Akıncı (the Cypriot leaders) and the three parties of the guarantors (Greece, Turkey and the UK) to determine if there were sufficient conditions to resume UN-led negotiations and, if so, to prepare a comprehensive document of the “terms of reference” by the end of 2018. Lute carried out consultations in September and October 2018 and returned to the island in January 2019 without having made any progress. Then, when meeting the Cypriot leaders she realised that besides years of dispute over security guarantees, a major point of contention was Akıncı’s insistence that Turkish Cypriots should gain political equality, manifested in a necessarily positive Turkish Cypriot vote for any new law at a federal level. Although Anastasiades expressed enthusiasm to discuss Akıncı’s proposal on some issues, he rejected the request, arguing that it would give Turkish Cypriots an absolute veto on all political issues, potentially resulting in stalemate. He revived the old proposal that the new government should be something between a presidential system – the president would be a Greek Cypriot – and a parliamentary system with the prime minister alternating between the two communities. Akıncı rejected the proposal, saying, as previously claimed by Tahsin Ertug˘rulog˘lu, the Turkish Cypriot foreign minister, that it reinforced his view that Greek Cypriots would always see Turkish Cypriots as a minority and not as an equal partner (Arslan, 2020). This was the case in November 1963, when Greek Cypriots demanded the abolition of eight articles of the 1960 Agreement for the Protection of Turkish Cypriots, the purpose of which was to reduce Turkish Cypriots to a mere minority, completely under Greek Cypriot control, until their final destruction or expulsion from the island (MFA CY, 2021) Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavus¸og˘lu on 1 July 2021, during a joint press conference with Turkish Cypriot President Ersin Tatar, said that Turkey and the TRNC ignored a mentality that viewed Turkish Cypriots as a minority. President Recep Tayyip Erdog˘an’s proposal from the Eastern Mediterranean regional conference is still on the table. He also added that the TRNC’s proposals for equitable distribution of income are also on the table, and urged the EU and the UN to take the necessary step towards an equitable distribution of resources. Çavus¸og˘lu said: “Otherwise we have taken and will take the necessary steps” (Daily Sabah, 2021). The failure of the talks between Akıncı and Anastasiadis in 2017 sparked discontent among Turkish Cypriots. Part of the public accused the president of

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the TRCP of a lack of political sense, which was to be manifested in antagonising Turkey despite the lack of certainty that the negotiations would bring a positive result. In the presidential election in 2020, Akıncı, a social democrat, supported the reunification of Cyprus and the federal model (Kucukgocmen, 2020) as the last chance for unification. He believed that he is the last of the generation that wants unification, and he understands how important it is that another generation will decide, and this generation does not have as good memories of a reunified Cyprus as he does. Ersin Tatar has consistently built his position, among others, on the wave of this discontent. This was not enough to ensure an immediate victory for the prime minister, but it did help to mobilise the electorate before the second round (according to local media, the personal involvement of Turkish politicians, who were to campaign for the head of government on the island, also played an important role). As a result, in that (2020) year’s pesidential campaign, Turkey clearly supported Tatar. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdog˘an, at a joint conference with Tatar a few days before the first round of the presidential elections in the TRCP, announced that he supported the government’s project of the TRNC, to reopen and eventually populate the seaside resort of Varosha,5 which became a ghost town after the Turkish invasion in 1974. When the president of Turkey visited Northern Cyprus on 8 October 2020, a small area of Varosha was opened (Kambas, 2021). On the Greek side of the island, this was taken as an attempt to take property away from Greek refugees, some 15,000 of whom had fled Varosha (in total a quarter of a million fled from the north before the invading Turkish army) (DW, 2021). However, for Turkish nationalists in North Cyprus, especially those who emigrated there from Turkey after 1974, the image of Erdog˘an and Tatar standing side by side was enough to confirm their belief in who is the right man to lead the TRNC. As for the more hesitant voters, many of whom abstained in the first round of voting on 11 October, they were given a nudge towards the Tatars when a group of Greek Cypriot extremists protested against the opening of Varosha on the same night as the elections. They launched an attack on the Derinya crossing on the opposite side of the buffer zone. Incidents like this naturally push Turkish Cypriots more towards secession than reunification, rendering the rhetoric of pro-federalist politicians like Akıncı obsolete. As a result, Tatar beat Akıncı by 52% to 48% (DW, 2021). Since becoming Prime Minister in May 2019, he has spoken repeatedly about the need to maintain strong ties between the TRCP and Turkey. He also argued that since the attempts to solve the Cyprus problem under the federal model had once again failed, it was 5 tur. Maras¸; an abandoned, inaccessible to civilians, southern quarter of the Cypriot city of Famagusta, previously a bustling tourist city, which until 1974 was famous for its beaches. Now it is a symbol of the conflict between Turks and Greeks, a para-state.

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time to create two independent states on the island. This was in line with the demands of the Turkish authorities, which were increasingly dissatisfied with the deadlock in the negotiations on Cyprus. Tatar immediately began to pursue politics in line with those of Erdog˘an. Tatar’s victory was received with dissatisfaction in the Republic of Cyprus. Opinions appeared in the local press that the lack of decisive efforts to reach an agreement with Turkish Cypriots in 2015–2017 was a mistake. This public perception of the new TRCP president may make Greek Cypriots’ negotiating position more flexible in the event of the resumption of unification talks. Two other considerations can contribute to this as well. First, Anastasiadis cannot run for another term, which should make him less susceptible to the reactions of the electorate. Secondly, there are strong fears in the Republic of Cyprus that an alternative to reunification is the annexation of the TRCP by Turkey, and consequently a further strengthening of its influence on the island, which Greek Cypriots perceive as a threat. President Anastasiades said: “I want to send the strongest message to Mr Erdog˘an and his local proxies that the unacceptable actions and demands of Turkey will not be accepted” (Kambas, 2021). Moreover, Tatar’s victory strengthens the Turkish influence on the island. Tatar believes that since unification has not been achieved so far, another option should be chosen. Tatar is a supporter of the two-state solution, but will most likely return to the unification talks. However, his negotiating position will be closely coordinated with Turkey, so it will be more difficult for the parties to reach a compromise on key issues: the distribution of funds from the extraction of raw materials or security (around 30,000 Turkish soldiers are stationed in the north of the island (Global Security, 2021) – the Greek Cypriots want their total withdrawal, the Turkish Cypriots are inclined to reduce the contingent). Tatar will also be more prone to increasing Republic of Cyprus costs due to no agreement. This can happen, for example, by investments in the north of the island being implemented jointly with Turkey, which will inflate real estate prices, complicating negotiations in another important element, which is the exchange of land between communities. It is also certain that until an agreement is reached on the allocation of funds from the production of hydrocarbons, Turkey most probably will hinder their exploration and production. In the case of misunderstandings in the negotiations, Tatar will use the postulates of a two-state solution even more often, and Turkey suggests that it will take care of expanding the group of countries that recognise the TRCP, starting, for example, with Azerbaijan. On the island, at least half of the Turks are reluctant to the Turkish leader, have antipathy to him, fearing that he will eventually lead North Cyprus to join Turkey. Many of Erdog˘an and Tatar’s opponents have acquired citizenship of the Greek Republic of Cyprus in the last six months and have left its Turkish part. However, they are

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replaced by settlers from the depths of Turkey, changing the demographics of this part of the island and its political preferences. The importation of settlers from Turkey is changing the demographic proportions between the Greek and Turkish populations of Cyprus. When the Republic of Cyprus gained independence from Great Britain in 1960, the island’s population was approximately 77% of Greek ethnicity and approximately 18% of Turkish (Kaufmann, 2007: 206). This changed over the years as mainland Turks settled in the north. Many Turkish Cypriots went to Great Britain and Australia, which offered better employment opportunities, and those who stayed behind in North Cyprus became completely dependent on Turkey’s generosity, mostly trapped on a third of a small island on which international embargoes had been imposed. Initially, they found a way to survive, but over time, they began to notice a change in the demographics of their society. Waves of immigrants started pouring in from the less privileged areas of Turkey. A large proportion of the new arrivals came from Hatay (a coastal province on Turkey’s southern border with Syria), Mersin and Adana (Kibris Postaci, 2012). Hatay is unique because it was not originally incorporated into Turkey when the country was founded in 1923, but following a referendum in 1939. Traditionally a melting pot of languages and religion, Hatay witnessed a sudden surge in the Turkish Sunni population at this time as migrants came from central Anatolia, apparently in an effort to strengthen the province’s ties with the rest of Turkey. Today, some say that the reason the new arrivals in North Cyprus are mostly from Hatay is that these people had already voted to join Turkey once, so when the time comes, they will vote to rejoin Turkey. In 2019, significant gas deposits were found south of Cyprus, which began to be exploited by companies: Italian Eni and French Total. Ankara demanded to be allowed to participate in the Northern Cyprus project, but this was of course rejected. Turkish Cypriots could benefit from the profits if they agreed to some form of union with the Republic of Cyprus (and detachment from Ankara). Erdog˘an then reached an agreement with the Libyan authorities, recognised by the UN, on the delimitation of the sea border, trying to prevent the construction of a gas pipeline to Greece and further into Europe (according to estimates, the new gas fields would cover 4% of European demand – Uslu, 2021: 37). Turkish research vessels escorted by warships began to flow into the waters near the island, which led to a conflict with Greece. But Ankara is determined to look for more deposits that would make it independent of supplies from Russia, Azerbaijan and Iran. The leaders of the Cypriot communities returned to the unification talks on 27–29 April 2021 in Geneva, at an informal meeting devoted to the conflict in Cyprus held under the auspices of UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. The purpose was to pave the way for a return to official negotiations. Officials from

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Turkey and the TRNC shared their positions, even before arriving in Geneva, in various forums on the need for a paradigm shift to end the conflict. They noted that the negotiations had ended in stalemate, so they called for a new approach. Guterres said, “The truth is that at the end of our efforts, we have not yet found enough common ground to allow for the resumption of formal negotiations” (Paul, 2022). The representatives of the Turkey and Turkish communities blamed the Greek side in the Crans (DS, 2021), and argued that future discussions should focus on a two-state solution or a confederation and Ersin Tatar made a proposal for the first time (KKTBC, 2021). He presented a six-point proposal and asked the Secretary-General to submit a new UN Security Council Resolution which would recognise equally the international status and sovereign equality of the two sides in Cyprus. Then they start the time limited, new results-oriented negotiations and EU was an observer to them. The next step if the resolution will be found – the agreed plan would be put to a referendum held concomitantly in the northern and southern parts of the island. The Greek Cypriots are willing to negotiate mainly for fear of an alternative in the form of the annexation of the TRCP by Turkey. In the case of the Turkish Cypriots, the resumption of talks was due to Tatar’s weak political mandate – he won with only a small majority of votes, with unprecedented interference from Turkey. This indicated that the two-state solution is not strongly enough supported by TRCP residents for the president to push through it without trying to reach an agreement with the Republic of Cyprus. Once again, the unification talks ended in failure. It required a very flexible negotiating position by the Greek Cypriot leader, and maintaining it was difficult in the light of stronger pressure from Tatar and Turkey. Greek Cypriots also regret that they did not make more resolute attempts at unification in 2015– 2017. The failure of the negotiations led to a further strengthening of Turkey’s influence in the TRCP, which may make the annexation real in the longer term. Turkish Cyprus is not able to exist without Turkey which provides 15–20% of budget revenues annually (World Bank, 2020). The contraction of the manufacturing sector is the result of the lira depreciation shock, structural issues in the livestock sector, and declining financial support from Turkey (World Bank, 2020: 2.) which is comprised of grants (investment, defence and support to the private sector) and budget support to the central administration for deficit financing. In recent years, the budget support from Turkey has been dramatically declining – previously in 2013 it was 6.5% of GDP and in 2018 only 0.22% (World Bank, 2020). As a result, the Turkish Cypriot administration has embarked on a dramatic fiscal consolidation programme, cutting total expenditure from about 43% of GDP in 2013 to about 30% in 2018 (World Bank, 2020).The decline in financial support from Turkey triggered unprecedented fiscal consolidation and significantly reduced the current account surplus. Investments resulted in higher land prices, and land exchange is one of the problems in the negotiations between the two

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communities. Tatar has tools that could lead to the position of the Greeks becoming harsher. Turkish President Erdog˘an visited Northern Cyprus on 20 July 2021 to celebrate the 47th anniversary of the Turkish army landing in Cyprus. Soldiers were to oppose a coup inspired by Athens’ black colonels to join the island to Greece, and they remained for nearly half a century. Currently, over 30,000 Turkish soldiers are stationed in Cyprus. Erdog˘an spoke in favour of a two-state solution to the conflict on the island. He highlighted the endeavours of Turkey and the TRNC who have made “all kinds of sincere efforts since the beginning to reach a just and lasting solution in the island” (Iletisim, 2021). Moreover, he added: The Greek side is insistent to maintain its unreal, maximalist, insincere and spoilt approach. In addition, they have no intention of changing their approaches, questioning themselves or exerting sincere efforts for a just resolution. Whatever intentions they had in the past, they look at the issue in the same perspective today. (Iletisim, 2021)

President Erdog˘an also recalled talks in Bürgenstock regarding Annan’s plan, stressing that the EU had not yet fulfilled its promises, and that one day they called him asking for his speech at the TRNC on 20 July, hoping it would not be disturbing, to which the president indignantly commented that they would not ask for permission to do so. Reopening the city was kind of shenanigan which president appreciated and supported, he also showed it by saying: “the Maras¸ region, which has for years been inactive, will be the symbol of the peaceful and prosperous future of the Cyprus island, not of the deadlock” (Iletisim, 2021) Erdog˘an added: and to this regard, first of all, the sovereign equality and equal status of the Turkish Cypriots must be acknowledged. This is the key to the solution. Saying that, “There is no two-state solution”, means ignoring the sovereignty, equality, independence, state and gains of the Turkish Cypriot people. No one should ever expect the Turkish Cypriots to give up their vested rights, equal status or sovereignty, and to live as a minority under the will and control of the Greek side. (Bayar and Aliyev, 2021)

At the same time, Erdog˘an attended the mass opening and groundbreaking ceremonies of a new campus of Anadolu University6 in Lefkosa and said: Turkish Cypriots, who are equal co-owners of the island, have been condemned to the illegal and inhumane embargo of the Greek Cypriots for decades. On the other hand, we’re implementing projects that will increase the welfare level of Turkish Cypriots every day. (Bayar and Aliyev, 221)

Tatar said that the reopening of Varosha for settlement was in line with international law and the north’s position on a two-state solution, and it also had 6 Based in Turkey’s central Eskisehir province.

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brought many benefits for the Turkish Cypriots: for tourism, the economy and politically (Cyprus Mail, 2021). The locals in the TRNC’s Gazimag˘usa (Famagusta) share this enthusiasm of its benefits and stated that many people could be provided with job opportunities by integrating the region into the economy (Cyprus Mail, 2021). In response to these actions, the Cypriot authorities decided to deprive the passports of people who sit in the cabinet of the TRCR or are associated with attempts to change the situation in Varosha, said Marios Pelekanos. He added that there were 14 people, including ten ministers of the TRCP government, but he did not mention their names. Their hostile actions against the Republic of Cyprus are conducive to the implementation of Turkey’s plans to change the status of Varosha in a manner inconsistent with UN resolutions. These actions undermine the sovereignty, independence, territorial integrity and security of our country, emphasised Pelekanos (Cyprus Mail, 2021). Cyprus is heading inexorably for partition as Turkish patience with Greek Cypriot dilatoriness has run out. Following the failure to reach a resolution in 2017, Ankara, together with officials in Northern Cyprus, now proposes a twostate solution or a loose confederation in Cyprus. This dramatic shift shows that the gap between Greeks and Turks has widened ever more. If the talks still do not bring a solution, Turkey is considering trying to get other countries to recognise Northern Cyprus. The officials invoked Nagorny Karabakh and suggest that maybe Azerbaijan will recognise it and then other countries as well. Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavus¸og˘lu, during his visit to the north on 17 April 2021, said that: “the Greek Cypriot side wants to impose a federal solution in Cyprus but when this form of solution was on the table, they rejected it” (Andreou, 2021). Turkey and Turkish Cypriot leaders are now pressing the island for two sovereign states instead of a federation, arguing that it would be a win-win situation, because talks about a federal solution are getting nowhere (Andreou, 2021). Ali Murat Bas¸çeri, Turkey’s Ambassador to the TRNC, said already in 2019 that Turkey was open to alternative models for a resolution of the Cyprus issue (Mehmet and Yilmaz, 2019). At the 38th anniversary of the proclamation of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus on 15 November 2021, Tatar said that one of the happiest days of the Turkish Cypriot people was the proclamation of the TRNC, which took place after an “honourable struggle for existence and sacrifices” (KKTBC, 2021) and was celebrated with great excitement and deep feeling of patriotism for the homeland. The president also mentioned that: … in order to be able to walk to the future with confident steps, there is a need to assess the past correctly and to take the appropriate lessons. This is necessary to continue to progress in our national and sacred struggle for existence as one of the two co-owners of Cyprus. (KKTBC, 2021)

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Moreover, he commented on the Greek Cypriots’ position and criticised it strongly: Because of this illusion, they [Greek Cypriots] rejected all proposals in the negotiations that have been going on for decades, and they also rejected the Annan Plan, which was put to a simultaneous and separate referenda for the first time in the history of the Cyprus negotiations. As the process that started in 2008 collapsed in Crans Montana in July 2017, the Greek Cypriot side rejected our equality and continued to make demands for a solution that would pave the way for a Cyprus that will become a Greek-dominated state with zero soldiers, zero guarantees. (KKTBC, 2021)

Foreign Minister Ioannis Kasoulides said that the current political climate is characterised by a multitude of geopolitical changes in international relations, and it is time to solve issues that the international community considers of minor importance; a solution to the Cyprus problem is needed now. He pointed out that Turkey should accept a solution to the Cyprus problem which will not be achieved on their terms. While President Nicos Anastasiades will not stand in the 2023 presidential elections, he will be ready to take on a new role in an attempt to find a solution to the Cyprus problem. Focusing on confidence-building measure will be their way to restart meaningful negotiations, which they have had conveyed to Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdog˘an by the European Council President Charles Michel (Shkurko, 2022). Kasoulides welcomed the US Under Secretary for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland during her visit to the island to meet with government officials and civil society for discussions on regional security, economic issues and bilateral priorities. Nuland referred to the Turkish Cypriot leader as “President” Tatar. The faux pas was said to reporters at the Presidential Palace after she met Cyprus President Nicos Anastasiades and before meeting Tatar. As language is a strong weapon in Cyprus politics, Tatar assumed that Nuland’s reference showed a tacit acceptance of the breakaway state, whether a mistake or not.

Conclusion The current situation on the island is unsustainable, because Cypriots, Greek and Turks have a lot to lose by not finding a solution. The fear of reunification for many Greek Cypriots is that it would result in the projection of Ankara into their island. But failing to support a deal would be the worst outcome. The failure of consociational democracy in 1963 and not reaching a resolution in 2017 has resulted in the government in Ankara and officials in Northern Cyprus proposing a two-state solution or a loose confederation in Cyprus. This shows that the

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distance between the Greeks and Turks has widened ever more. Going back to a system of consociational democracy is not an option anymore. The Cyprus problem has fallen off the political map during the war in Europe, the COVID-19 pandemic and the economic crisis. The deepening divisions on the island appeared only when Turkey decided to do something hostile, such as reopening Varosha, sending warships into Cyprus waters or wheeling out of other form of partition. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has shown that Turkey is back as a globally important player – The Turkish Armed Forces is the second largest standing military force in NATO. The Republic of Cyprus has become important to the US and its allies as another possible sanction for Russia – Cyprus was a common holiday destination for many Russians. The Cypriot government believes its energy diplomacy and pro-US détente will secure the future. At the same time, the island has contributed more humanitarian aid to Ukraine than it has to any other country, because they still remember the war which made one-third of its population refugees and buried loved ones. While foreign troops remain in Cyprus, Greek and Turkish Cypriots are distrustful of and blame each other which is easier than the remedy and makes reunification harder.

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Authors

Adam W. Jelonek Professor at the Jagiellonian University in Krakow. Sociologist and political scientist. Former Polish Ambassador to Malaysia, Brunei and the Philippines. Director of the Institute of Middle and Far East. Author of a number of books and papers on the theory of social change and political anthropology. Joanna Dyduch Assistant professor at the Institute of Middle and Far East, Jagiellonian University, Poland. Specialises in Israeli and European studies. Most recently visiting professor at the University of Potsdam (2020), Matej Bell University (2019), visiting fellow at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs (2018). Chair of the European Association of Israel Studies and board member of the Association of Israel Studies. Krzysztof Kos´cielniak Professor at the Institute of Middle and Far East, Jagiellonian University, Poland. The scholarship holder at Ruprecht Karls Universität Heidelberg, Pontificio Istituto di Studi Arabi e d’Islamistica – Arabic Study Centre Cairo and Institut Français d’Etudes Arabes de Damas. A lecturer at Fu Jen Catholic University and Tamkang University, Taipei (2016–2017), Caucasus International University in Tbilisi (2018), visiting professor at Imam Khomeini International University in Qazvin (2019). Agnieszka Kuszewska-Bohnert Associate professor at the Institute of Middle and Far East, Jagiellonian University, Poland. Her research and teaching focuses on international relations, conflicts, sociopolitical and security-related problems of contemporary South Asia, particularly India and Pakistan. Visiting scholar at many universities, including: University of the Punjab in Lahore, Quaid-eAzam University in Islamabad, Peshawar University and many others in Pakistan, Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi, University of Calcutta, Rostock University (Germany), University of Tartu (Estonia), Tashkent State University of Economics (Uzbekistan).

270

Authors

Krzysztof Trzcin´ski Associate professor at the Institute of Middle and Far East, Jagiellonian University, Poland. Tutor at the Collegium Invisible and a Life Member of Clare Hall, University of Cambridge. He has studied international economic and political relations, political science, and European law. He currently researches various formal and informal concepts – including consociational, centripetal, and hybrid forms of power sharing – that may contribute to the emergence of an optimal political organisation in multi-ethnic societies. Other areas of interest include political philosophy, citizenship theory, separatism, and conceptual analysis. He is a regular visitor to African and Asian countries, where he conducts field research projects, including discussions with local intellectuals and public officials. Przemysław Turek Arabist. Associate professor at the Jagiellonian University, Head of the Department of Israel and the Levant at the Institute of Middle and Far East. A visiting lecturer at Stanford and Rutgers Universities, a member of the American Oriental Society and the Royal Asiatic Society, his main fields of interest are: religious and ethnic minorities of the Near East and Northern Africa, Arab-Israeli relations and the culture and politics of the MENA countries. Łukasz Fyderek Associate professor at the Institute of Middle and Far East, Jagiellonian University, Poland. A political scientist, his research has been focused on non-democratic governance and post-conflict reconstruction of the Middle Eastern states. Author of five books and frequent media commentary on MENA politics. Michał Lubina Associate professor at the Institute of Middle and Far East, Jagiellonian University, Poland. He is the author of eight books (six on Myanmar), including A Political Biography of Aung San Suu Kyi: A Hybrid Politician (Routledge, 2020), and The Moral Democracy (2019), translated into Burmese and published in Myanmar. Michał Lipa Assistant professor at the Institute of Middle and Far East, Jagiellonian University, Poland. A political scientist specialising in the political systems of Arab states. He has conducted research in Egypt, Tunisia and Algeria and lectured at Cairo University and Ankara University. Antonina Łuszczykiewicz Assistant professor at the Institute of Middle and Far East, Jagiellonian University, Poland. Specialist in political and cultural history of China and India. She has published three books and several articles focusing on China-India relations, the image of Indians and Chinese in literature and film, and Cold War discourses and narratives in the Asian context.

Authors

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Agata Karbowska Assistant professor at the Institute of Middle and Far East, Jagiellonian University, Poland. Political scientist. She has been granted scholarship by the Türkiye Scholarships Evaluation Committee and lectured at the University of I˙stanbul S¸ehir (Center for Modern Turkish Studies). She is the author of a number of books and papers on Sufism, political Islam and Turkey. Kamila Junik, PhD, Assistant Professor at the Institute of the Middle and Far East, Jagiellonian University in Kraków, with research interests focused on sociopolitical, religious and cultural problems in South Asia (with a reference to communal conflicts in India and its neighbour countries). Head of the Centre of Studies on Bangladesh at Jagiellonian University. Conducted research at various institiutions in India and Pakistan, including: Jawaharlal Nehru University (New Delhi), Punjab University (Lahore), Habib University (Karachi).