A major factor behind the unrest in the Middle East is economic dissatisfaction.

[Better Believe It]

Middle Easterners Protest Against Failed Economic Policies
By Amitabh Pal
Managing Editor of The Progressive
February 7, 2011

The policies instituted by the governments in the area have failed to improve the lot of their people. Both Tunisia and Egypt undertook free-market restructuring in recent decades. Tunisia traveled such a distance in that direction that it was touted as a role model for other Arab countries. But the results were dismal for the Tunisian population.

“Tunisia—more than almost any country in the region—has followed the dictates of Washington and the International Monetary Fund in instituting ‘structural adjustment programs’ in privatizing much of its economy and allowing for an unprecedented level of ‘free trade,’ ”Professor Stephen Zunes wrote about the recently ousted Tunisian dictatorship. “These policies have increased rather than decreased unemployment while enriching relatives and cronies of the country's top ruling families.”

“Since a group of officers led by Gamal Abdel Nasser overthrew the monarchy in 1952, its corpulent king leaving behind a vast collection of pornography, the government has sought to claim the mantle of peasants and workers,” reports the New York Times. “Especially in the past decade, it has shed that pretense, concentrating its power around the military—long beyond criticism in the Egyptian media—as well as the loathed Interior Ministry, a governing party skilled in patronage and a clique of the very wealthy, many loyal to Mr. Mubarak’s son, Gamal.”

Middle Easterners are seeking liberation not only from authoritarianism but also from the economic policies that have impoverished them.

Read the full article at:

http://www.progressive.org/ap020611.html

[xchrom]

1. Recommend