Patrimonial Governance System
No matter how many coups brought radical regimes to influence in the Middle East during this
period, no matter how successful efforts to preserve regimes have been in other countries, this
same political structure of most Middle Eastern countries remains underdeveloped, with such a
significant level of traditionalism as well as a reduced tier of political institutional theory. When
it comes to power and decision-making, informal routes like family relationships, social
cleavages and informal decision-making are as critical or more significant than institutional and
official outlets.
Some of the most prominent Arab societies include those in Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, and the Gulf
States, where patrimonial and contemporary institutional and formal means of achieving social
and political status coexist. Non-existent or illegitimate opposition political organisations exist in
several countries (such as Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States; Iraq, Syria, and Libya) (e.g., the
Sudan, Egypt, and Morocco). Only the governments of Israel or Turkey have permitted
opposition parties to participate in competitive elections.
Although there are a few significant exceptions to this rule, labour unions either are non-existent
or completely ineffectual when it comes to negotiating on behalf of workers with the state and
commercial interests. In spite of the fact that political institutions seem to be contemporary on
the surface, when they exist they are ill-equipped. In the Middle East, only Israel and, to a lesser
extent, Turkey have functional opposition political parties. If there are political parties to be
found, they are dominated by a few powerful individuals who lack strong organisational bases at
the provincial and local levels, and they do not even have viable party's platform to unified their
members or to address the social or economic needs of the community at large. This means they
lack organisational strength and are narrow-minded. When it comes to hiring and promotion,
nepotism and favouritism play as big of a part in the government as merit does.
"State-owned firms are a net waste of government money," according to public officials who
have turned into rent-seekers. Managers, civil employees, ministers, and labour and business
leaders who have close links to the government prefer to protect their own interests instead of
work with the opposition for the greater good of the nation." Waterbury points out that
"coalitions of interests depending on state business might generate difficult impediments to
change" in Egypt and Turkey. However, these same coalitions often are weak and fragmented,
still unable resist a fundamental restructuring via privatisation in which administrations have
tried to remove public business first from reach of politics."
References
1. Ali R. Abootalebi, Civil Society, Democracy, and the Middle East, Middle East Review
of International Affairs, vol. 3, 1 (March 1998).
2. Nazih Ayubi, “Arab Bureaucracies: Expanding Size, Changing Roles,” p. 147, in
Giacomo Luciani, ed., The Arab State (Berkeley, Los Angeles: University of California
Press, 1990).
3. Ghassan Salame, “Torn Between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean: Europe and the
Middle East in the Post-Cold War Era.” Middle East Journal, Vol. 48, 2 (Spring 1994): p.
248
4. Howard Wiarda, Introduction to Comparative Politics: Concepts and Processes (Belmont,
California: Wadsworth Publishing, 1993), p. 135.
