The government attempted to restructure the public sector. It slashed civil service jobs and streamlined salaries and perks. It also introduced new taxes, including a GST and a tourism tax. All this took place against the backdrop of the world food price crisis of and global financial crisis. The government had to contend with rising inflation, depleting foreign exchange and high unemployment. Crucially, the reform program challenged the distribution of power, perks, resources and wealth accumulated over three decades of authoritarianism.
In an already stressful economic situation, the short-term negatives of some of the reform measures fuelled public discontent. Wealthy resort owners, businesses, cadres of the former dictatorship, the judiciary, members of parliament, elements of the security services and other beneficiaries of the old regime responded with anti-government actions.
MPs were bought, the judiciary failed to uphold the rule of law and the police were often implicated in crimes. This culture of corruption and opportunism further enabled elite challenges to the new government.
The government, in turn, failed to cultivate a politics of real dialogue, compromise and coalition-building. This culminated in the arbitrary detention of a criminal court judge. The compact of Medina can be read as both a social contract and a constitution. A social contract, a model developed by English philosophers Thomas Hobbes and John Locke, is an imaginary agreement between people in the state of nature that leads to the establishment of a community or a State. In the state of nature people are free and are not obliged to follow any rules or laws.
They are essentially sovereign individuals. However, through the social contract they surrender their individual sovereignty to a collective one and create a community or a State. The second idea that the compact of Medina manifests is that of a constitution. In many ways, the constitution is the document that enshrines the conditions of the social contract upon which any society is founded. The compact of Medina clearly served a constitutional function, since it was the constitutive document for the first Islamic state.
Thus, we can argue that the compact of Medina serves the dual function of a social contract and a constitution.
Clearly the compact of Medina by itself cannot serve as a modern constitution. It would be quite inadequate, since it is a historically specific document and quite limited in its scope. However, it can serve as a guiding principle to be emulated, rather than a manual to be duplicated. Today, Muslims worldwide can emulate Prophet Muhammad and draw up their own constitutions, historically and temporally specific to their conditions.
An important principle of the Constitution of Medina was that Prophet Muhammad governed the city-state of Medina by virtue of the consent of its citizens. He was invited to govern, and his authority to govern was enshrined in the social contract. The constitution of Medina established the importance of consent and cooperation for governance.
The process of bayah , or the pledging of allegiance, was an important institution that sought to formalise the consent of the governed. This was an Arab custom that predates Islam, but, like many Arab customs, was incorporated within Islamic traditions. Just as Prophet Muhammad had done, the early Caliphs of Islam, too, practiced the process of bayah after rudimentary forms of electoral colleges had nominated the Caliph, in order to legitimise the authority of the Caliph.
Replacing bayah with ballots makes the process of pledging allegiance simple and universal. Elections, therefore, are neither a departure from Islamic principles and traditions, nor inherently un-Islamic in any form. We ought to move to the idea—and it is an Islamic idea—of consensus based politics, rather than counting of votes and dictatorship of majority.
These are some of the areas perhaps where Islamic ideas and institutions can add value. That was until the arrival of colonialism and the onslaught of Western modernity in the Muslim world which disrupted the institutional balance of power between the scholars and rulers, apart from initiating radical socio-political and education reforms which ruptured continuity with some of the traditional practices.
Majorities in all six believe women should have equal rights as men, and more than eight-in-ten hold this view in Lebanon and Turkey. Moreover, while many support the general principle of gender equality, there is less enthusiasm for gender parity in politics, economics, and family life. Solid majorities in Egypt, Tunisia, Jordan and Lebanon said the popular uprising would lead to more democracy in the Middle East.
Turks and Pakistanis, on the other hand, were less hopeful. This report includes a special section on Tunisian public opinion see Part II. Majorities in five of the six nations polled and a plurality of Pakistanis believe democracy is the best form of government.
Moreover, there is a strong desire in these nations for specific democratic rights and institutions, such as competitive multi-party elections and freedom of speech.
Other goals are also clearly important. Many say political stability is a crucial priority, and even more prioritize economic prosperity. When respondents are asked which is more important, a good democracy or a strong economy, Turkey and Lebanon are the only countries where more than half choose democracy.
Egyptians are divided, while most Tunisians, Pakistanis and Jordanians prioritize the economy. Overall, views about the economic situation in these countries are grim, although Turkey is a notable exception. The view that Islam plays a large role in political life has also become more prevalent in Pakistan over the last two years. Meanwhile, more than six-in-ten in Turkey and Lebanon believe Islam is a major part of political life in their countries. The clear exception on this issue is Jordan.
While majorities in all six countries support the principle of gender equality, there are significant differences between men and women on this issue.
Moreover, while there is majority support for the idea of gender equality, this does not necessarily apply to specific aspects of public and private life. For instance, at least half in Tunisia, Pakistan, Turkey and Jordan say men make better political leaders. When it comes to economics, most say women should be able to work outside the home, but most also believe that when jobs are scarce, jobs for men should be the first priority.
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