As Syria implodes, some people are looking beyond the disaster to a day when the nation recovers the true meaning of citizenship and national belonging
Since its establishment as an independent, sovereign state, Syria has been marked by structural ethnic and sectarian tensions that cannot be ignored. The country’s myriad, pre-existing cultural groups laid the groundwork for these divisions – but not because diversity condemns societies to division and dismemberment. Rather, the successive governments that ruled the Syrian state failed to manage this diversity adequately, particularly those that came to power after the democratic era (1954–58), which ended with the establishment of the United Arab Republic.1 After the dissolution of the UAR, the Arab Socialist Ba’ath Party took control of Syria, transforming it from a state preparing for a democratic future into one under the control of an oppressive totalitarian regime. The consequences of this transformation are still apparent today.
In the following discussion of Syria’s cultural groups, I use a broad definition of ‘culture’ that goes beyond the typical understanding of this term in the media. Culture, in this context, does not refer to intellectual production or creative work (such as literature, art and music) but rather encompasses a broader array of mental, spiritual, material and emotional activities. In other words, ‘culture’ here refers to all forms of relationships that individuals or sets of individuals united within a group build with the world.
This definition of culture is beneficial for the study of societies because it allows us to look at culture as an active system – that is, as a set of non-material forces and relationships. As a result, it influences individuals and groups and pushes them to move beyond the basic structures of their lives to adopt new positions, embrace new behaviours and engage in creative work. Thus we are able to understand more of the phenomena and dynamics that can be observed in a society.
People, whether as individuals or within homogenous groups, do not move through their lives in accordance with the laws of a single, monolithic culture. Culture is not the product of a god’s or tyrant’s totalising worldview, nor does it single-handedly govern the individual or turn him or her into a clone of a ready-made prototype.
On the contrary, people are influenced by myriad cultures. The rules and forms of these cultures are diverse, and their different levels of influence are apparent in numerous forms. Individuals as well as groups carry within themselves different cultures determined by the specific contexts and circumstances they have encountered in their lives. The very idea of ‘racial purity’ is rendered untenable, both practically and theoretically, by this concept of multifaceted identity. Thus when we consider a young Syrian girl who is Kurdish and Muslim, we find that her identity is, necessarily, arranged according to the four forms of cultural belonging (gender, ethnicity, nationality and religion) that can influence her – in addition to all the other cultures and forms of belonging that she will choose in her life.
These four types of cultural identification are not chosen by the girl. Rather, she finds herself (naturally, to a certain extent) the bearer of the cultures entailed by these forms of belonging. For this reason, we can identify these cultures as ‘natural’, ‘inherited’ or ‘primary’. Nevertheless, nothing theoretically prevents the child in this example from changing some of these cultures: by adopting a nationality other than Syrian, or by changing her religion or renouncing it altogether.
When we describe these cultures as inherited through various affiliations, that is not to say that they are transmitted genetically, permanently imprinted on the child’s DNA. Scientists study memes to identify the mechanisms by which a group’s shared cultural attributes are transmitted across generations. Although some continue to suggest that evidence can be found to support the notion that cultures are inherited naturally, nothing has yet been proven. When we define these cultures as inherited, then, it is with the caveat that they influence the formation of an individual’s identity before he or she attains the threshold of consciousness that, in turn, lays the groundwork for their acceptance or refusal of any given cultural affiliation. Any culture chosen after this stage will be an acquired culture, the formation of which will bear the impact, to a significant extent, of the circumstances and conditions of the individual’s (or the group’s) life.
By examining examples of these two sets of cultures – inherited and acquired – in pre-national cultural affiliations, we can elucidate the difference between them. Here I shall focus on sectarian affiliations in particular.
Individuals acquire through their affiliation with a religious collective – whether understood as sect, denomination or religion – a culture that adds to their knowledge and humanity. These types of belonging presuppose (with rare exceptions) the acquisition of a new culture or new cultures, because each has its own characteristics, standards and modes of dealing with the world. Anyone who has the opportunity to survey these types of affiliation can only gain a sense of the cultural, spiritual and intellectual wealth they represent.
However, feelings of religious affiliation may expand and thereby induce those who identify with a collective to adopt positions, values and behaviours that cause them to view the world exclusively through the lens of their religious identity. The religious collective then becomes a prison, the inmates of which can only see the world through a narrow window. The individual’s perception of truth in the world is held hostage, thereafter, to the angle imposed by his or her perspective: the borders of the window, its position in the world, its specificities. The scene upon which the inmates gaze will inevitably fail to give them a sense of safety, because it is unfamiliar and because they cannot perceive it on its own terms. They will then fear any interaction with this unknown world, and retreat further into the safety of their prison: this is how a culture of religious affiliation transforms into a culture that rejects difference, rejects the Other, and celebrates the superiority of the collective. The culture that the individual receives through his or her sectarian affiliation morphs into a sectarian culture. This is a clear example of a primary (natural, inherited) culture’s transformation into an acquired culture.
We can apply this example of how ‘cultural affiliation with a sect’ transforms into ‘a culture of sectarian affiliation’ (or sectarianism) to all forms of primary identity and their potential to transform into collective affiliations. Moreover, following similar dynamics, these affiliations can take on the attributes of communautarisme.2 Thus we arrive at chauvinism, nationalist extremism (in cases of national or ethnic affiliation) and misogyny (or its opposite, in cases of gendered affiliations).
Needless to say, such dangers increase with a society’s diversity, notably in those that are home to deep-rooted, primary communities – the cultures that have been part of a society since its founding. Syria is home to many such cultures (Syriac, Assyrian, Kurdish and Armenian) as well as to others that came to Syrian society through waves of immigration that took place long ago. These latter cultures integrated naturally into Syria’s social fabric over time (e.g. Armenians [after 1915], Circassians and Turkmen).
Today, Syria is undergoing a transformation from diverse forms of cultural belonging to a culture of belonging, a transformation from the cultures of sects to a culture of sectarianism. We can identify two main reasons for this transformation: firstly, the policies the Syrian regime deployed to confront the Syrian revolution from its first days, when an uprising broke out calling for dignity and freedom. On Saturday 26 March 2011, only a few days after the events in Deraa, Bouthaina Shaaban, President Bashar al-Assad’s well-known media advisor, spoke of ‘a scheme to create sectarian chaos’ to describe what was happening in Syria. This ‘extremely premature’ gesture toward the sectarian nature of events was a sinister omen, and a signal of the strategy the regime was developing to quash the uprising. Over the following months, it became apparent that this strategy was two-pronged. In its social dimension, the regime would force the uprising out into a sectarian confrontation; on the military front, the regime would drag it into armed confrontation.
The regime began to apply the social side of this strategy by distributing weapons in large quantities to communities that would protect loyal factions of the army. They were expected to unite under the banner of the regime’s army and security forces, at a time when the uprising had not yet lost its peaceful nature. Militias were formed within these communities (first the Shabiha, then popular committees), the vast majority of whom were Alawi, with a small percentage being Christian. As regime violence increased and opposition violence emerged, this sectarian aspect struck deeper roots, particularly after the occurrence of overtly sectarian massacres. Sectarianism became more entrenched after the formation of the ‘National Defence Army’,3 but truly reached its peak when the regime opened up Syrian lands to Lebanese, Iraqi and Iranian armed forces, which espoused an extremist affiliation to Shi‘ism. Their leadership consistently used sectarian rhetoric as justification for their participation in the killing.
The second reason for a transformation to a culture of sectarianism has its origin in the fact that external powers played a role similar to that of the regime in fanning the flames of inter-communal conflict. These powers made no effort to hide their sectarian nature and ambitions. The regime’s violence opened up bitter resentments among Syrians, creating a ready target for these powers, which flooded eager organisations on the ground with money and weapons. They sent their jihadis and deployed their media outlets to promote their sectarian rhetoric overtly (e.g. Al Safa TV) or more indirectly (e.g. Al Arabiya). Moreover, they used modern communications to implant the seeds of sectarianism deeper into the hearts of broad swathes of the Syrian population.
In addition to these two reasons, we cannot ignore the fact that over the course of recent decades, the regime controlled the dynamics that shaped the elite in various fields such as defence. Over time, these dynamics generated different forms of discrimination that benefited the regime’s favoured sect. This phenomenon reached critical levels when the regime began to recruit members of this particular group into its security services in order to absorb surplus labour, instead of creating an infrastructure that would guarantee sufficient employment opportunities to integrate the (marginalised) members of this sect into Syrian society.
Since the earliest days of the uprising, the Syrian revolution adopted the slogan ‘One, one, one: the Syrian people are one’, which announced a clear refutation of sectarianism and division. However, the regime on the one hand and Islamist jihadis on the other, each acting in their own interests, sought to draw the revolution off this path. There is some hope that this strategy has failed: in many areas under jihadi control, demonstrators have once again revived this slogan of unity.
As discussed, it is not a preordained or unavoidable outcome that cultural affiliations will transform into collectivism. There are many examples in the world of states containing societies that have managed to embrace the diverse ghosts of primary identity without it leading to the appearance of fissures or tensions that weaken social unity – attributable to the fact that these states have managed to build, to varying extents, societies based on citizenship, and to reinforce a culture of citizenship in the daily lives of their individual citizens. These citizenship-based states obviated the need for anyone to seek refuge in their primary communities, whether from fear of state oppression or of their co-citizens.
The culture of citizenship is the impenetrable bedrock that holds together diverse societies, whether national or religious. It is a vital necessity for our societies, which are characterised by deep-rooted, mosaic structures. So what, then, are the particularities of this culture?
It must be noted first that there is a significant difference between two terms, often conflated in Arabic, which refer to distinct concepts: nationalism (al-wataniyya) and citizenship (al-muwatina). Nationalism (or patriotism) relates to the positive feelings people naturally acquire from the affection that binds them to the place they live in, and from the close relationships that tie them to those who share that place with them. These feelings increase through a person’s upbringing and education, as well as through the relations he or she has with relatives and friends. Such emotions are apparent at their strongest and most vibrant when a nation faces danger such as external aggression or natural disaster. In such cases, the individual rises to the defence of his or her nation, and volunteers to assist those afflicted by the threat. Nationalism can be characterised as just such a strong feeling of organic belonging to the nation.
Citizenship, however, is not nationalism or national feeling, despite the importance of the latter. It is a political, legal and cultural framework established by a constitution, organised by laws and fostered by public values. Citizenship requires three essential elements: the right to acquire it; the rights and responsibilities it entails; and participation in public life.
If one of these three elements is not fully available to the citizens of a state, then citizenship cannot be fully realised. Moreover, a state where citizens are deprived of nationality has not successfully implemented citizenship, as is the case when the principles of equality in law and before the law are not respected, and when social participation is rendered impossible.
Citizenship does not just require nationalism. A traitor who loses his feelings of nationalism, for example, is still considered a citizen, and it is precisely because he remains one that he can be tried as a traitorous citizen before the law. Likewise, nationalism does not entail citizenship. Fascist parties and oppressive regimes base their political ideas on the principle that the nation is sacred, and embrace nationalist extremism in their speeches. Nevertheless, such organisations are far from the practice of citizenship because they are founded on ideas of discrimination, whether racist (e.g. national or ethnic discrimination against other national or ethnic groups), sectarian (one sect discriminating against other sects) or despotic (a single party, ideology or organisation discriminating against other parties, ideologies or organisations).
Practical reality demonstrates that true citizens can only be nationalist in the performance of their national and social duties, and in their attitudes to other citizens and to the common spaces that they share.
The framework of citizenship presupposes the existence of certain relationships that can be categorised into the following levels: the citizen and other citizens; the citizen and the state; and the citizen and common space.
When we discuss the culture of citizenship, we are referring to a cluster of knowledge, experience and attitudes. The individual embodies these across these three levels as a social being who lives with other, similar social beings in a common space that is governed by a defined power. As long as the individual must live with other people, he or she must submit to the rules that govern interaction in shared areas of life. In other words, he or she must transform from a ‘living/natural being’ into a ‘social being’. The essential value that governs this participatory state of existence is freedom – not a freedom that is naturally given to the individual, but rather a social freedom, which ends where the borders of the Other’s freedom begin. Ideally, the law should regulate this freedom and defend it by relying on the same foundations that form the basis of the social contract. Freedom, in this sense, is the first and most significant element in the culture of citizenship.
This concept of freedom changes ‘latent citizens’, who are satisfied with what the state allots to them, into ‘active citizens’ who exercise their civil, political and cultural rights, participate in the enactment of legislation (via referendums) and engage in the politics that regulate the affairs of their state and society, through legislative and municipal elections. This freedom is what liberates the citizen from the culture of fear, which oppressive powers seek to reinforce in a society in order to subjugate it to their will.
The Syrian revolution, from its beginnings, was a quintessentially free uprising. Activists demanded the restoration of their freedom, which was formally protected in the constitution but violated in practice at the hands of an oppressive regime. Moreover, the revolution called for the need to establish a new social contract from the outset, which would restore people’s freedom and ensure their rights.
The revolution was, therefore, an exceptional act of citizenship that began by breaking the chains that had reproduced the culture of fear. It continued with protest movements and demonstrations, sit-ins in public squares and universities, and strikes (such as the Karamah strike in Deraa in late 2011). These were, practically speaking, the first steps in the process of reclaiming the bonds of citizenship, but the militarisation of the revolution and the accompanying encroachment of exclusionary, jihadi and extremist ideas began to threaten this act of reclamation and to replace the violent, well-established tyranny that the revolution set out to overthrow with a new savage tyranny that has broken loose from all control.
The culture of citizenship can only live in spaces of freedom, and these are the spaces that began to take shape in the beginning of the revolution. We must defend them and develop them to make Syria a state founded on true citizenship.
A culture of citizenship also presupposes that citizens will feel social responsibility, do what the law requires of them in terms of protecting the nation from dangers and disasters and participate in the necessary social services that contribute to the life of society as a whole. However, a culture of citizenship is distinguished above all by citizens’ respect for the law; by political participation and citizens’ exercise of their rights through voting and being elected; by the performance of military or civil service (rather than avoiding this responsibility); and by the payment of taxes.
This culture is already prominent in the revolution today, in the work of thousands of Syrians who have performed relief work and provided medical, nutritional, educational and other forms of assistance to millions of displaced Syrians, both inside and outside the country.
In this context, we must also ask whether or not the Syrian soldiers who have fled the army to join the revolution are deserters, abandoning a sacred duty of citizenship. Yet to answer this question, we must remember that these deserters did not leave their posts in a confrontation with an enemy or abandon their duty to defend the nation; rather, they refused orders to kill unarmed civilians who were merely practising their right to free expression and protest. Therefore, these deserters are citizens of the highest rank.
However, this distinction does not apply to anyone who took up arms afterward, whether for the aim of building a new state of tyranny or as a tool to gain power or money in the shadows of war economics and its emerging networks. One of the greatest challenges Syria will face as a citizenship-based state, after this crisis, will be to cleanse society of the arms that have accumulated since the violence began. This task cannot be achieved without holding to account those who participated in killing for goals that strayed far from those of the revolution.
On a different level, a culture of citizenship requires values that allow citizenship to develop along its proper course. These values are to be found in the realm of ethics and etiquette: first, in interactions between citizens; second, in interactions between citizens and the shared spaces they inhabit. In the first case, the concept of civility, which revolves around the issue of mutual respect, is of primary importance. This concept is manifest in a number of principles such as tolerance and respect for the right to disagree over beliefs and opinions; avoidance of prejudice; the renunciation of racism; and respectful interaction between generations.
In terms of interaction with common spaces, the principle of civility can be identified in the way a citizen deals with public facilities and spaces: its criteria are care and respect for these sites, which includes respect for the environment; protecting it from all forms of pollution; conservation of vital natural resources; minimising waste; care for historical sites and public institutions; maintenance of public cleanliness; and ongoing maintenance of objects and equipment for public use.
Since the beginning of the revolution in Syria, these values have seen a steep decline in a number of areas of public life. Killing, destruction, massacres and other forms of violence have unleashed in Syrian society a choking desire for revenge, which represents a true murder of tolerance. New powers rely on weapons for legitimacy and enforce their particular laws in the areas they control. Archaeological wonders have been destroyed, ancient manuscripts stolen, natural resources incinerated, annihilating the principles of civility and respectful interaction between people and between them and their social spaces.
A culture of citizenship is not inheritable, but acquired through upbringing, education and practical life experience. It requires, primarily, respect for the powers that determine a country’s policies and direct its affairs according to the principles of citizenship. This respect is established first through the state’s commitment to the legitimacy of human rights and everything this entails in terms of treaties and agreements. Likewise, it is established through the presence of a system that considers people as citizens in the legal sense of the term, and not subjects to be herded like cattle. Any system that does not base its politics on the principles of citizenship and human rights will inevitably slide into tyranny and dictatorship, frightening its citizens, weakening their interest in public affairs and causing them to retreat into their primary cultural affiliations and identities – which, in turn, constitutes a fertile ground for separatist tendencies and sectarian and regional animosity.
A state founded on citizenship is the only way to ensure the establishment of a culture of citizenship, and a culture of citizenship is the only sure defence against sectarianism and extremism. Today in Syria, more than ever, we are witnessing the necessity of holding onto citizenship culture and its values – not only to rid ourselves of tyranny, but to build a new Syria that will survive us.
Translated from the Arabic by Anne-Marie McManus and Leen Zyiad
1 The union between Syria and Egypt that lasted from 1958–61.
2 Translators’ note: This term denotes an effort by minority groups or communities to differentiate themselves (ethnically, religiously, etc.) within a nation and, while the subject of debate, it typically evokes a negative image of separatism.
3 Translators’ note: Also known as the National Defence Forces, formed in late 2012 by the Syrian regime.