2011, 1989, 1848 . . .
posted by Gerard Magliocca
With President Mubarak’s resignation, we now have two longtime dictators that have been swept out in a month. Who will be next? You would think, though I don’t know enough about Libya to venture an intelligent opinion, that forty years of Qaddafi is enough.
February 11, 2011 at 11:26 am
Posted in: Current Events
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Responses (5)
Patrick S. O'Donnell - February 11, 2011 at 1:05 pm
Less speculatively, i.e., instead of asking “who will be next?” we might rather ask “what will be next?”—and in the case of Egypt at least, I proffer some reading material toward understanding the sort of things Egyptians will be dealing with in the coming months in making the “transition from Tahrir Square to democracy.”
See: http://ratiojuris.blogspot.com/2011/02/hosni-mubarak-is-no-longer-president-of.html
Logan - February 11, 2011 at 2:16 pm
Ah a post on something I’ve actually studied (Middle East for my MA degree)! First off, Mubarak might be gone but with the Army in power now so nothing much may have changed. The big difference between the two is that the Army is well respected among the people.
In regard to who might be next, I wouldn’t put my money on Libya because Qaddafi has a much better strangle hold over his country. Yemen is the most likely but Ali Abdullah Saleh has already said he won’t run for re-election and only has effective control over the capital, Sana’a. So I’m not sure he would count. Outside of that, there aren’t any great prospects. Jordan would be likely but most Jordians don’t hate King Abdullah II like Egyptians hated Mubarak. Bashar al-Assad also has decent control over his population. Sudan is a possibility though. al-Bashir is a little shaky now that South Sedan has voted for succession. The Gulf states are off limits because of their oil money and fairly high standards of living.
If I had to pick a “country”, I would pick the Palestinian terrorities. With the peace process stalled, Palestinians might start another intifada but this time against the Palestinian Authority and maybe even Hamas in the Gaza Strip. There is also a lot of pressure on Netanyahu now (more so than before) because of the instability in Egypt and what it means for one of their few “friends” in the area. However, you were probably thinking more along the lines of a revolution than a democratic change in government in Israel.
ForeignPolicy.com and Al Jazeera English have a lot of great op-eds about the situation if you want to learn more.
Logan - February 11, 2011 at 2:22 pm
Oh and The Economist also has some good stuff. The Lexington article this week does a good job of explaining our relationship with Israel and it’s broader implications for us in the Middle East.
Ken Rhodes - February 11, 2011 at 4:43 pm
I’d like to nominate a country outside the Middle East — Myanmar. Whoever is the top general in the military junta is on shaky ground.
Tuan - February 14, 2011 at 7:48 pm
Qaddafi’s sabre rattling against Israel may be to distract Libyans from the obvious — that it is his turn to fall.
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