Four Middle Eastern ambassadors discussed strategies for bringing democratic reform to their region Wednesday at Marvin Center.
One hundred students from Duke, Georgetown and GW attended the symposium, hosted by the Global Language Group. Ambassadors from Qatar, Morocco, Egypt and Tunisia discussed similar concerns about roadblocks to reforming private property holdings, a lack of women’s rights, respect for human rights, political parties, terrorism and government corruption.
Andrew Brown, executive director of the Global Language Group, said he chose democratic reform because of its increased importance in U.S. and international policy.
“In recent years, specifically after Sept. 11, 2001, there has not only been an interest of international affairs scholars in Middle Eastern studies, but there has also been a large demand for experts in any related fields,” Brown said.
Democratization was a focus of all of the speakers.
“The process of developing democracy is not an instant coffee, it is never ending,” Ambassador Mourad Belhassen of Tunisia said.
Each of the ambassadors spoke about changes to their respective constitutions while pointing out that those changes need time to take effect.
Ambassador Nabil Fahmy of Egypt gave another reason as to why the change to democracy has yet to entirely take hold in his country.
“We have 7,000 years of history, and we have only started to develop something like a Western democracy within the last 50 years,” Fahmy said.
Most recently, Egypt had a socialist economy and Fahmy said that it will take time for Egyptians to become more comfortable with a market economy.
While the ambassadors agree that reforms are necessary in the Middle East, some disagreed about the means to pursue these reforms.
“Democracy is a concept that is overused and misused,” Ambassador Nasser Bin Hamad Al-Khalifa of Qatar said. “Everyone is talking about democracy but there is no agreement about what is means.”
The ambassadors agreed that governments must rid themselves of all corruption to be successful democracies.
Al-Khalifa said, “We are striving for transparency of the system, which I do not think you have here (in the United States).”
