Big bang or slow motion? Changing state-society relations in MENA

Event Type
Online Launch

Location / Date
Online, 09.10.2024

German Institute of Development and Sustainability (IDOS)

Online launch of the special issue ‘Drivers of change in social contracts in the Middle East and North Africa region’

In many countries, political, economic and socio-political reforms at best take place piecemeal over long periods of time. This also applies to most countries in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). Many governments in this region have invested little in reform processes, offering their citizens even less and less since revolutions took place more than ten years ago. One could say that the ‘social contracts’ of these countries – which stipulate what government and society owe each other – are not being adapted, even though the framework conditions in these countries are changing and thus posing new challenges for politics. However, sometimes large change occurs all at once, often unexpectedly, for example through revolutions (e.g. Tunisia in 2011), comprehensive reform programmes (e.g. Turkey in 2000) or coups d'état (e.g. Sudan in 2021). The question is why there is this split into slow and piecemeal versus quick and drastic changes in MENA, and whether it is possible to channel such change processes into more peaceful renegotiations of social contracts. What should the players in the countries concerned – but also external players – bear in mind?

This 90-minutes online panel will present and discuss research findings we recently published in a special issue of the journal Mediterranean Politics under the title ‘Drivers of change in social contracts in the MENA region’. A first input will take a conceptual perspective and compare the changes in the MENA with those in other regions. The second input deals with the very specific social contract that emerged in Egypt under President Sisi after the 2011 revolution and the 2013 coup. The third input will focus on digitalisation as a potential factor of change to social contracts in MENA. The open debate after the three short presentations will explore these and other drivers of change in state-society relations in the MENA region and discuss policy options and research needs for more inclusive and sustainable development.

Moderator: 

• Mark Furness (IDOS, Bonn)

Presenters: 

• Markus Loewe (IDOS, Bonn): Drivers of change in social contracts: A conceptual framework
• Bruce K. Rutherford (Colgate University, New York): Understanding change in Egypt’s social contract since 2011
• Tina Zintl and Annabelle Houdret (both IDOS, Bonn): Digital transformation as a driver of change in state-society relations in the MENA region

Discussion

The special issue on ‘Drivers of change in social contracts in the Middle East and North Africa region’ has been published by Mediterranean Politics and contains the following articles:

• Markus Loewe, Amirah El-Haddad, Mark Furness, Annabelle Houdret and Tina Zintl: Drivers of change in social contracts: Building a conceptual framework
• Tina Zintl and Annabelle Houdret: Moving towards smarter social contracts? Digital transformation as a driver of change in state–society relations in the MENA region
• Sari Madi: Critical junctures, labour unions, and social dialogue in Tunisia and Lebanon: Implications for the social contract
• Annabelle Houdret and Mark Furness: Intermediary organizations, international cooperation and the changing social contract: Morocco’s new development model
• Bruce Rutherford: Understanding change in Egypt’s social contract since 2011
• Yannick Sudermann & Tina Zintl: Towards an exclusionary social contract: Narratives of a revanchist city in (post)war Syria
• Musallam Abedtalas: The bidirectional relationship between social contracts and entrepreneurship: Syrian refugee entrepreneurs in Kurdistan Region of Iraq

Hinweis

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