In the history of the Middle East, Syria’s current transition to a new form of government is in a category of its own. Desperate the avoid the mistakes that their counterparts in other Arab countries have made in recent decades, the new interim authorities under President Ahmed al-Sharaa have achieved impressive progress in their effort to transition to a stable political environment. For all their attempts to build something new, however, the leadership has remained incapable of thinking past Syria’s old, discredited system of centralized, highly concentrated presidential governance.
That approach, coupled with the huge economic and social threats that Syrians face after more than a decade of war, could cause the whole transition to fail.
Of all the recent political transitions in the region, Syria’s is the only one in which a single domestic armed group defeated the former regime. When Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the Sunni Islamist military group led by Sharaa, took control of the major population centers in western Syria last November, the old regime and the ruling Baath Party dissolved completely. In all other countries where transitions occurred or were attempted, either the regime was replaced by something very similar (such as in Egypt and Tunisia) or violent conflict continues to this day (Libya, Sudan, and Yemen).
Syria appears to be the only exception. And in keeping with that exceptional status, Sharaa and his ministers appear to be determined not to repeat other countries’ mistakes. Thus, HTS has stated that it seeks to be inclusive of Syria’s diverse religious and ethnic groups without adopting a formal quota system, deliberately avoiding the examples of Iraq and Lebanon. HTS is also pressing ahead as fast as possible in hopes of achieving stability—unlike Libya (where a transition has been ongoing for 14 years), Yemen (where a national dialogue process took two years amid an unabated economic crisis), and Sudan (where a transition failed to bring economic relief to an already battered population).
Syria’s transition is only four months old, but the country has already completed a national dialogue process. HTS has already signed agreements with the Syrian Defense Forces—the old regime’s military and once the chief enemy of HTS—and the Suwayda Military Council, which defends the majority Druze areas in the country’s south. These arrangements demonstrate that HTS is more flexible than the group originally signaled. Sharaa has also formed a technocratic government, something that no other Middle Eastern transition country has achieved. Most importantly, perhaps, on March 13 Sharaa issued a “constitutional declaration”—an interim constitution by decree that can be amended at any moment.
The fact that HTS has managed to complete all these steps in such short order is impressive. But many of them are trending in the same direction of highly concentrated presidential power, which has had a dismal record in Syria and the wider region. Crucially, the constitutional declaration concentrates huge authority in the hands of Sharaa—who is not elected and who cannot be removed from office—and any of his potential successors, unless a substantially altered constitution emerges from the transition process. The president appoints one-third of parliament and the entire Constitutional Court. He has full control over the composition of the cabinet. And he can declare a state of emergency virtually at will. Many of the constitutional declaration’s defenders have argued that it does not give as much power to Sharaa as the 2012 Baathist constitution gave to the Assads. That may be true, but the difference is not very significant.
The upshot is that Syria’s transition—and the country’s future—is now inextricably tied to the ability of a single person to govern effectively and to his commitment to good faith. If Sharaa decides to concentrate more authority in his hands or renege on his commitments to diversity, there is very little, if anything, that can be done to stop him. The technocratic government formed in March will not change that, given that he can remove ministers at will. The courts will also not be able to control him. The Syrian judiciary is a weak institution, and the interim president has full control over its most important body, the Constitutional Court.
All this makes the transition highly vulnerable, which brings us to its current biggest failing: the interim authorities’ inability, at least thus far, to think creatively about future governance models. Like their predecessors or counterparts in neighboring countries, their approach to governance is to either tinker with the existing system or do the opposite of what was done in the past.
The inability to develop alternatives to this all-or-nothing approach means that, despite a 14-year war against a hyperpresidential dictatorship, Syria’s new masters have essentially adopted the same system with only minor differences.
Syria’s transitional authorities should not seek to reestablish a defunct and discredited model based on the idea that all that it needs to function properly is a more benign leader. The country deserves a leap in its thinking that allows for a new constitutional model to be adopted that caters to Syria’s complexity, addresses its many challenges, and preserves its unity.
There aren’t any existing models that Syria can simply copy, but many other countries around the world—particularly in Latin America and Africa—have experimented with new governance models that aim to reflect the complexity of their societies. Innovative constitutional change in Brazil, Kenya, South Africa, and many other countries should serve as an inspiration for what can be achieved.
How can Syria develop a model of governance that fits its own specific context? For Syria’s constitutional process to be successful, new constituencies must be involved. In particular, the country needs to call on a new generation of negotiators and constitutional lawyers who are capable of thinking past existing governance models—something that all Arab constitutional processes have failed to do thus far.
Interim authorities can and should seek out younger Syrian politicians and professionals—negotiators, lawyers, and advisors—who are not bound by the strictures, including the legal and educational frameworks, imposed by the Baath regime or Arab constitutional tradition. Sharaa should assemble a constitutional team that is capable of designing a governance system based on real needs and learning from other countries’ experiences.
What’s more, the constitutional debate should be sustained on the basis of equality between each group of negotiators. Any suggestion that a specific group will have the final say creates an immediate disincentive to negotiations. One group’s domination over the process can even can contribute to violence, as was the case in Egypt, Iraq, Yemen, and elsewhere.
Finally, given the dynamic nature of Syria’s transition, it would be wrong to adopt a big bang approach—which is to say to maintain the existing system until a constitutional convention or other process completes a final text many years later. The fact that the current interim framework was adopted by decree—and can therefore be modified at any point—can be an advantage: Drafters and negotiators should be encouraged to develop partial agreements that could then be tested in practice and, if successful, improved and built on.
Syria’s new leadership may be making impressive gains in pushing the transition forward, but it still faces unprecedented challenges that could derail the transition at any moment. If the leadership hopes to be successful in the long run, it must be bolder in its effort to address those challenges. Otherwise, Syria risks falling back into the same patterns of instability and conflict that have plagued the region for decades.
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