The Integration of Modern Iraq
Abbas Kelidar
Croom Helm
Many factors have made Iraq a country of considerable importance in the modern world. Its strategic position, its oil resources, as well as rapid economic development have made Iraq a country to be reckoned with, not only in regional Arab politics, but also in world affairs. It is playing a leading role in determining the nature of the newly emerging economic structure which governs the relationship between the developing countries and the highly industrialized world. And yet Iraq is one of the least studied countries of the Middle East.
This collection of essays, by a number of Iraqi and British scholars, examines some of the most crucial problems affecting the political evolution and economic development of modem Iraq. These concern the origins of the constitutional parliamentary system of government and the questions of social conflict it attempted to resolve upon the establishment of the modern state, the formation of a new political elite and its pan-Arab nationalist aspirations.
The phenomenon of civil-military relations is traced to the foundation of the Iraqi armed forces indicating the degree of politicisation and the resultant radicalization, which has set Iraq on a coup syndrome for many decades.
The impact of oil revenue expenditure on society and the economy is examined and its effects on the agricultural as well as the industrialized sectors are analysed and assessed. Finally some of the prominent features of Iraqi politics, such as the Kurdish problem and communist influence, are outlined.
Abbas Kelidar is a Lecturer in Middle East Politics at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
Contents
Introduction / 9
1. The Elections for the Constituent Assembly in Iraq, 1922-4, M.M. al-Adhami / 13
2. Faisal’s Ambitions of Leadership in the Fertile Crescent:
Aspirations and Constraints, A. Shikara / 32
3. The Use of German and British Archives in the Study of the Middle East:
The Iraqi Coup d’Etat of 1936, H.H. Kopietz / 46
4. From Elite to Class: The Transformation of Iraqi Political Leadership, David Pool / 63
5. The Formation of the Iraqi Army, 1921-33, Paul P.J. Hemphill / 88
6. Internal Migration in Iraq, A theel A l-Jomard / 111
7. The Distribution of Income in Iraq, 1971, Shakir M. Issa / 123
8. Iraq: Problems of Regional Development Keith McLachlan / 135
9. Industrial Policy and Performance in Iraq Edith Penrose / 150
10. The Kurdish Problem in Iraq, Sa'ad N. Jaw ad / 171
11. Aziz al-Haj: A Communist Radical, A.R. Kelidar / 183
Notes on Contributors / 193
Index / 195
INTRODUCTION
This work deals with some important aspects of development in the fields of history, politics and economics in modern Iraq. It arose out of an interdisciplinary seminar organised by the Near and Middle East Centre of the School of Oriental and African Studies, which was held in June 1977. The concern of the contributors was, for each of them, to examine a particular feature or a specific problem in their own field of interest, without any preconceived notion or an established procedure of approach. The result has been remarkable and extremely illuminating for students of modem Iraqi society. The chapters have indicated a pattern of continuity and change in the social, political and economic evolution of the country. In many ways what happened in the country since the foundation of the modern state of Iraq has been a reflection of the political hopes, aspirations and ideological orientation of the ruling elite.
The modern state of Iraq was set up in 1920, in a country where the social structure was so fragmented that it was practically impossible to have a general agreement among its various and divergent components on common basic fundamentals which could provide the essential guidelines for the new social structure. The absence of an indigenous source of authority acceptable to the social groups meant that the British Mandatory authorities were able to propose a Sharifian prince — Faisal - to head a constitutional parliamentary system of government under a hereditary monarchy.
Under this system the way to national integration was by the selection and appointment of local notables and educated young Effendis to government posts. This form of nation-building was started by Sir Percy Cox, who was appointed British High Commissioner in Baghdad in 1920, when he set up the Arab Executive Council as the nucleus of a national administration. A prominent member of the major communities that made up Iraqi society was appointed as Minister on this council. The method was enshrined and became the normal practice for all government appointments. However, the aspirations and ambitions of the Sharifian politicians who dominated the political process accentuated the difficulties towards national integration by their constant reference and express desire to seek the disestablishment of the new state, and seek its merger in a larger whole yet to be created, constituting the Arab nation. Mr Shikara explains the grounds on which these claims were made, as well as the obstacles that faced Faisal and his supporters in their quest for Arab unity and a bigger domain. Mr Adhami examines the same problem in its internal dimension. The pluralist system of representation proposed by Cox also served as the basis on which members of the Constituent Assembly and subsequent Parliaments were selected and elected. Parliamentary government in Iraq had inauspicious beginnings and it was soon discredited, not only because it had perpetuated the division among religious and ethnic communities, but also as a living indictment of the democratic system as it worked in Iraq. The political radicals of the 1930s and 1940s were able to condemn the whole edifice as a British creation and a sham that ought to be abandoned.
The various vicissitudes to which the new state was subjected become the focus of the contributions by Mr Hemphill, Mr Kopietz and Dr Pool. To maintain the unity of the country, the creation of an organised coercive force at the disposal of the new state became imperative, so that any challenge to its authority - and there were many - could be put down. Mr Hemphill, therefore, takes up the task of explaining the processes by which the Iraqi army was created. He also undertakes an assessment of the social and political factors that influenced its development.
The disenchantment with the system of government as it was operated in Iraq compounded the failure to evolve a uniform political loyalty and allegiance to the state of Iraq, and was further aggravated by the radicalisation of Iraqi politics under the impact of the European ideologies rampant in the 1930s, which had a direct impact on the evolutionary processes which characterised Arab politics at the time. Political aspirants who felt deprived of appropriate channels to vent their political demands found willing allies among the freshly recruited rank and file of the armed forces. Dr Pool attempts to trace the manner by which the Sharifian political elite was transformed into a ruling class with a vested interest in the economic resources of the country. The fact that this kind of transformation could only proceed by virtue of the exercise of power at the disposal of the central government served only to reinforce the alienation of the population, and widen the gulf separating the rulers and their subjects. Mr Kopietz examines all these processes in the internal politics of Iraq from the European viewpoint. The perception of the European powers, namely Britain, who had a direct and immediate interest in Iraq, and Nazi Germany, who was determined with some Arab goodwill to supplant Britain’s dominant position in the region, is, of the various political upheavals in the country, of considerable relevance to the understanding of Iraqi political attitudes and the events which took place.
The contributions by the economists are of far-reaching importance in view of the huge development programme which Iraq has been attempting for the last thirty years. The direct impact of investment has meant a change not only in the economic structure but also in the nature of the economic relationship which prevailed under traditional modes of production. This change has been rather haphazard and accompanied by many of the problems associated with rapid economic growth, despite governmental planning and the exercise of administrative control. Mr Issa and Mr Jomard highlight these effects through their examination of the distribution of national income for 1971, and the complex and vexing question of internal labour migration respectively.
Professor Penrose and Dr McLachlan direct their attention to the vital and complementary fields of economic activities: agriculture and industry. Iraq is primarily an agricultural country attempting to industrailise at an extremely fast pace a process which has been characterised as ‘explosive development’. While Dr McLachlan concentrates on some features of development in tire agricultural sector, outlining the resources available and assessing future prospects, Professor Penrose takes up the delicate problem of industrial policy, examining the methods employed in the management of the nationalised industries. Both chapters point out the highly significant need for a number of prerequisites for a successful development programme of the kind which Iraq has been undertaking.
The aspects of the economy dealt with in these papers mark a turning-point in the political evolution of Iraq. State control of economic resources in the Middle East is not an abnormal phenomenon. The role of government in this area has been growing with a consistency that lias been matched only by the increase in the revenues derived from oil.
In the case of Iraq this has been of considerable importance. Iraq has not simply been seeking an increase in its oil revenues but also asserting its total control over the industry. To this extent Iraq has been one of the leaders amongst the oil-producing countries to call for the nationalisation of its oil resources. This clamour for nationalisation has come as a direct result of the radicalisation of Iraqi politics in which both the Iraqi Communist Party since the early 1930s and the ruling Baath Party since the mid-1950s played no mean part.
Despite the fact that the structure of political power and the nature of rule in Iraq has continued to be largely authoritarian, and in many ways personal, these parties have exerted considerable influence on the adoption of a certain semi-revolutionary political terminology in which the ideology of various groups has been couched. The influence of the Soviet Union on the hearts and minds of young people in Iraq, and the example it set up for economic development, should not be underestimated.
When the state was established in 1920, for most Iraqis the model to be emulated was that of the advanced countries of
Western Europe. After the Second World War, however, the constitutional parliamentary system as practised in Iraq could not accommodate or deal with the social, economic and political discontent prevalent among a new generation of disgruntled Iraqis.
Revolution and radical notions of nationalism became the order of the day. The example of the Soviet Union could not but serve to make such a revolutionary-military regime conscious of the importance of totalitarian control. Thus from a parliamentary system of government the country has come to look to the East European method of setting up a National Front of progressive nationalist and patriotic political parties and groupings under the domination not so much of the Communists, but the Baathists. Some manifestations of the reaction to this trend are discussed by Dr Jawad, who offers a brief outline of the history of the Kurdish problem of Iraq, and the assertion made by Kurds of both their contributions to radical notions of ideology and their claim to autonomy and ultimate nationhood. Dr Kelidar examines a more extreme reaction, and indicates the extent to which ideology could provide a motivation for violent political action by focusing attention on the politics of the Communist movement of Iraq and the role played by one of the most influential radical writers, Aziz al-Haj.
The Elections for the Constituent
Assembly in Iraq, 1922-4
M.M. al-AdhamiThe occupation of the three Ottoman provinces, Basra, Baghdad and Mosul, which were together known as Mesopotamia or Iraq, was completed by British troops in October 1918. For the disparate indigenous population of these provinces, an Iraqi nationality had hardly developed. Men felt the ties of loyalty to their tribes and religious leaders, or to their town and region, but not to their country. This was because the state of Iraq did not exist as a political entity before 1920. Also, there were no political parties, but groups who were called by some British officials ‘extremists’. They were against the British Mandatory administration, demanding the establishment of an Arab state in Iraq to be headed by one of the Sharif Husain’s sons. In 1919, they established a secret party called Haras Al-Istiqlal (Guards of Independence), supported by the Shii religious leaders in the holy cities, Najaf, Karbala and Kazimain.1
On 3 May 1920, the British Mandate for Iraq was announced in Baghdad. It meant that Iraq became a British responsibility before the League of Nations. For Iraqis, the Mandate was a cover for domination. Its announcement caused great agitation.2 Secret meetings of the anti-British Mandate leaders were held, where they decided to set out the demands concerning the future of the country which they presented to the Acting Civil Commissioner, A.T. Wilson, for transmission to the British government. For this task fifteen delegates, ‘Mandubin’, were chosen in one of the big gatherings in al-Haidar Khana mosque in Baghdad,3 and on 2 June they presented Wilson with a document in which they demanded the immediate formation of a convention for Iraq, to be elected in accordance with the Turkish Electoral Law. It was envisaged that the Assembly would represent the whole of the country, sitting in Baghdad to draw up proposals for a national government in Iraq as promised in the Anglo-French declaration of 1918.4 In his reply, Wilson promised to urge the British government to expedite matters as much as possible.5
Delegates were chosen, also, in Karbala, Najaf, Hilla and Shamiyya. They presented to their local Governors a similar document to the one drawn up in Baghdad.6
…..
Abbas Kelidar
The Integration of Modern Iraq
Croom Helm
Croom Helm Ltd
The Integration of Modern Iraq
Abbas Kelidar
Croom Helm Series on the Arab World
Edited By P.J. Vatikiotis
Palestine In The Arab Dilemma
Walid W. Kazziha
The Integration Of Modern Iraq
Edited By Abbas Kelidar
Croom Helm London
© 1979 Croom Helm Ltd
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
The integration of modern Iraq.
1. Iraq - History
I. Kelidar, Abbas
956.7 / DS70.9
ISBN 0-85664-510-9
Printed in Great Britain
Printed in Great Britain by offset lithography by
Billing & Sons Ltd, Guildford, London and Worcester
