Take a look at this handy pie chart I whipped up that displays all of the (officially) Arabic speaking countries based upon population figures found here.
These countries contain about 1/3 Billion people, the entire Arabic speaking World. And most of these people, cruelly beset by dictators mostly supported by so-called Western democracies, have entered a state of open, peaceful, non-violent non-cooperation that is toppling these dictatorships and replacing them with steps toward popular elective democracy. Just look at the chart with me.
That big piece of blueberry on the top left is Egypt. One quarter of the Arabic speaking world. Egypt changes everything. The entire Arabic speaking world gets its movies and other leading pop and modern cultural influences from Egypt.
That slice of cherry that comes next is Sudan, a special case. The part of Sudan that abuts Egypt is under a sort of Islamist government that is taking the country through partition from its more demographically African Southern region after discovering that it couldn't just kill everyone there instead.
But the next two pieces, the lemon and the spinach quiche, are Algeria and Morocco, both very large populations. Algeria is no stranger to state violence, but sustained demonstrations against the government, organized around social networking services, seem to be growing. Major demonstrations are being reported almost daily.
As for Morocco, watch this:This video is raising support for a major demonstration in Morocco on February 20. It is a series of cuts from one Moroccan to another, from various walks of life, each giving a reason for why that person will demonstrate on February 20, whether, jobs, education, police misconduct, etc. The entire second half of the spot, however is a fabulous rant from one older woman in a hajib. I transcribed it for the streaming impaired:
I am joining the protest on February the 20th. I will protest and more than that! Because food prices are too high and I am suffering from that. When I go out and join a peaceful demonstration to object against food prices I am met with violence. I don't know how it can be that I am being oppressed in my own country! When I go out an join a peaceful demonstration I get beaten up. The oppressive forces are oppressing me. I am being crushed by high food prices and poverty and on top of that I am being oppressed... THIS IS TOO MUCH!!!
I'd say Moroccans are starting to get a jones for some of that democracy stuff.
As we continue around the piescape, we next come to two more special cases, the plum tart that is Iraq and the Kamikaze Cream pie that is pale blue Saudi Arabia. With Iraq it's hard to tell if there is unrest because there always is unrest ever since Bush 43 stumbled in and crapped all over the shag carpet. With Saudi Arabia, it's hard to know what's really going on, it is still such a closed country.
The last three significantly large countries on the chart are Yemen, Syria and Tunisia. Tunisia, the little country that could. Yemen, the little country that is trying to and just might yet. I'm leaving Syria and even Libya (where unrest is growing) out of the mix for now, but that still gives us this breakdown of Arabic speaking populations whose countries are falling to this movement, a movement, I remind you, that didn't actually exist until this year.
So, here is the new reality: Most of the Arabic speaking World is in a state of revolutionary, nonviolent, non-cooperative (what I call the Ghandi paradigm) resistance to the dictatorships that govern their nations. It is a new and, at least among the punditry and other public forums of discussion of international issues, unforeseen phenomenon. Many of the smaller states may yet succumb to the influence of this revolution, and even some larger ones. Libya would be nice. Syria, too. But, with them or without them, the political landscape in the Middle East has changed and Egypt will undoubtedly lead the way, given it's population and cultural position in the Arabic speaking world.
The term Arab Awakening is hardly original to me and is being used rather widely in current reporting on these events. In 1938, George Antonius, a Lebanese Christian agent for the British Foreign Office, wrote a book entitled The Arab Awakening that misinformed and reinforced the prejudices of generations of later, English speaking diplomats in the Middle East. I don't think that today's Arabs' aspirations for a better life and self determination have much to do with the way George saw things way back when.