Page 19 - Issue 68

ELITE VOL 1, ISSUE 68
ELITE

form depends largely on the availability rewards in stability.
of peaceful channels through which Syria and Sudan serve as a lesson:

various groups can voice their demands freedom and the peaceful transfer of power
—a factor that was utterly absent in are the cornerstone of long-term stability.
Syria. When the Syrian people, The devastation brought by revolutions,
overwhelmed by repression, saw no hope even peaceful ones, can be avoided if the

for change on the horizon, they rose up demands of the people are heeded. Justice
in 2011. Bashar al-Assad's response was and equality significantly reduce the
bullets, and the people’s response to his likelihood of violent power struggles. Empty
violence came in the form of militias. slogans drilled into youth and echoed in the

I do not advocate for violent change, media whenever there is a hint of public
given the destruction, bloodshed, and dissent—such as "rallying around the
division it leaves in its wake. Nor am I in political leadership"—and the vilification of
a position to theorize about a people who anyone exercising their right to free

have suffered immensely under a brutal expression will be of no use. The region’s
and bloodthirsty regime. This is not a nations are in dire need of a new social
justification for the fighting in Syria, but contract that ensures justice, equality, and
rather an explanation of the causes and freedom. Without such a framework, states

an organization of the facts. Bashar’s will continue to collapse one after another,
tyranny drove the people to peaceful leaving occupation as the sole beneficiary.
revolution, and his violent response to What is required is not the people rallying
that revolution paved the way for the rise around political leadership but rather

of militias. His persecution of Sunnis political leadership representing the will of
facilitated the spread of al-Qaeda and the people and adhering to it.
ISIS. Systems fail when their foundation
is built on oppression and exclusion.

Another important point highlighted
in the book, and evident in the case of
Sudan, is how the nature of institutions
that limit economic growth to certain

groups creates violent power struggles
over the spoils of governance. The war in
Sudan is neither a conflict between
opposition and regime, nor a sectarian

war. Rather, it is a war between two of
al-Bashir’s men, Hemeti and Burhan—a
war in which the Sudanese people have
no stake. This is a battle for control over

Sudan's wealth and monopolizing its
resources. If not for institutions that
make the fight for power so tempting, the
two factions might not have resorted to

violence and could have found greater