The Modern Middle East - A Political History Since World War I (Third Edition)

by Mehran Kamrava

  Fertility rates tend to be higher in sub-Saharan Africa because of pervasive insecurity and fears about the future, in turn prompting parents to procreate for posterity’s sake. In the Middle East, high fertility rates tend to be a product of factors that are mostly cultural rather than economic. Women in the Middle East and in other Islamic countries tend to get married at a much younger age. Overall, the prevalence of teenage brides tends to be higher in Muslim countries as compared to other parts of the developing world. Although cultural norms regarding marriage appear to be changing, women in the Middle East are likely to get pregnant earlier and more frequently. Early marriages are encouraged by social and cultural values that attach high esteem to the institution of the family and uphold the virtues of motherhood.4 For many parents, especially those from more traditional backgrounds, there is also the fear that their daughter, if not quickly married off, may engage in premarital sex and bring dishonor to herself and her family.5 Although not unique to the region, greater prestige attached to having male children also accounts for high fertility rates in the Middle East. Male offspring are often seen as carriers of the family name and tradition, as well as protectors of parents in old age and in times of need. They are, in essence, guarantors of the continuance of the family in the uncertain world of the future. Most parents, therefore, continue having children until they have produced the number of boys that they consider sufficient.

  The low availability and use of contraceptives also account for the high rate of fertility among women in the Middle East. According to most interpretations of the sharia (Islamic law), Islam does not prohibit the use of contraceptives as such, and couples are able to exercise some control over reproduction.6 This does not extend to abortion, however, which as a method of birth control is legally banned in almost all countries of the Middle East.7 Nevertheless, despite a general lack of religious prohibitions on the use of contraceptives, married women in the Middle East are half as likely as women elsewhere in the developing world to be using some form of birth control: 22 percent in the Middle East as compared to 54 percent in other developing countries.8 Statistics published by the World Bank in 2007 place the average prevalence of contraceptives among women in the Middle East and North Africa, married and unmarried alike, at 39.0 percent, compared to 41.4 percent in Asia and the Pacific and 49.4 percent in Latin America and the Caribbean.9 Again, most of the reasons for avoiding contraception appear to be cultural: men do not like using them, and, given that sex as a subject remains taboo and sex education tends to be nonexistent, most couples depend on natural, unreliable methods of contraception (such as withdrawal).10

  Table 13.Population Characteristics in the Middle East

  SOURCE: World Bank, World Development Indicators, 2012 (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2012), pp. 42–44, 46–48, 94–96, 128–30, 186–88; World Bank, World Development Indicator Database, “Population, Total,” “Population Growth (Annual %),” “Labor Force, Total” (used to calculate annual labor force increase), “Urban Population (% of Total),” “Life Expectancy at Birth, Total,” “Mortality Rate, Infant,” and “Literacy Rate, Adult Total,” under “Data,” “Indicators,” http://data.worldbank.org/indicator.

  a Data are for the most recent year available.

  b Figure is for 2007.

  c Increase is due to a surge in the number of migrants since 2004.

  d Includes South Sudan.

  Table 14.Fertility Rates in the Middle East as Compared to Other World Regions (births per woman)

  SOURCE: World Bank, World Development Indicators 2009 (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2012), pp. 112–14; World Bank, Development Indicators Database, “Fertility Rate, Total (Births per Woman),” http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.TFRT.IN.

  A second reason for the high rate of population growth in the Middle East is the migration of many “guest workers” to the oil-rich countries of the Arabian peninsula in search of employment. The oil boom created vast employment opportunities in the oil monarchies, which had insufficient labor resources. As a result, beginning in the 1960s and 1970s, expatriate workers began streaming into the oil monarchies in search of jobs and better opportunities. By 2008, foreigners composed more than 77 percent of the total labor force in the oil-rich countries of the Arabian peninsula (table 15). Most of the earlier immigrants came from the less wealthy parts of the Arab world, such as Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, the Palestinian territories, and Yemen. Significant numbers also come from the Philippines and South Asia, especially India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal, and Pakistan. Although they could not enjoy many of the economic privileges that citizens enjoyed, many expatriates decided to stay and have now become part of the population. In fact, as much as 85 percent of the populations of Qatar and the United Arab Emirates are made up of noncitizens. After the Gulf War, Kuwait and some of the other Gulf states compelled many Palestinians and other Arab expatriates to leave—in retaliation for the PLO’s siding with Iraq during the conflict—and in recent years there has been an attempt to encourage the immigration of workers from the Indian subcontinent and the Philippines instead of other Arab countries. Nevertheless, the overall structure of the population remains largely intact, as does overdependence on foreign laborers.

  The consequences of rapid population growth rates, whether due to natural increases or immigration, are manifold. To begin with, the population of the Middle East tends to be skewed in favor of the young, especially those under the age of fourteen, who constitute some 31 percent of the total population (table 16). Such a young population poses particular challenges, especially in such areas as adequate schooling (at both high school and university levels), the provision of health care and other necessary facilities, and future employment opportunities. As we saw in chapter 10, Middle Eastern states are ill equipped to create adequate employment opportunities for existing and new entrants into the job market in the coming decades. There are other, more immediate ramifications as well. Adequate and affordable housing is a major concern; its insufficient availability has resulted in the growth of vast shantytowns on the margins of all Middle Eastern cities.11 Overpopulation and housing shortages are endemic throughout the Middle East. Those who can afford to live outside squatter settlements often either build unsafe dwellings without official permits or stay with family and friends. In Fez, Morocco, for example, one-family houses sometimes have thirty families living within them, with as many as three families occupying a single room.12

  Table 15.Foreign Labor Force in the Oil Monarchies, 1975–2008

  SOURCE: Nasra M. Shah, “Restrictive Labour Immigration Policies in the Oil-Rich Gulf: Effectiveness and Implications for Sending Asian Countries,” paper presented at the United Nations Expert Group Meeting on International Migration and Development in the Arab Region, Beirut, May 15–17, 2006, www.un.org/esa/population/meetings/EGM_Ittmig_Arab/P03_Shah.pdf, p. 17; Michael Bonine, “Population, Poverty, and Politics: Contemporary Middle East Cities in Crisis,” in Population, Poverty, and Politics in Middle East Cities, ed. Michael Bonine (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 1997), p, 7; Martin Baldwin-Edwards, Labour Immigration and Labour Markets in the GCC Countries: National Patterns and Trends, Research Paper (London: Kuwait Programme on Development, Governance and Globalisation in the Gulf States, London School of Economics and Political Science, 2011), p. 9.

  a 2005.

  Also, as chapter 10 argued, most Middle Eastern countries have been paying far more attention to industrial development than to the development of the agricultural sector. Added stress on available food supplies increases the need for additional food imports, thus deepening international dependence on foreign suppliers and vulnerabilities to market fluctuations. Currently, the Middle East as a whole imports more than 60 percent of its food supplies. This reliance on food imports is expected to grow significantly over the next few decades.13 The Arab world is the largest grain-importing region in the world, and is, as a result, highly affected by spikes in global food prices. Six of the top ten
wheat-importing countries in the world are located in the Middle East, with Egypt being the world’s single largest wheat importer. Increasingly, rising global food costs place severe pressures on the states and the peoples of the Middle East at both the national and household levels.

  Table 16.Age Structure in the Middle East, 2010 (% of population)

  SOURCE: World Bank, World Development Indicators, 2012 (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2012), pp. 42–44; World Bank, Development Indicators Database, “Population Ages 0–14,” “Population Ages 15–64”, and “Population Ages 65 and Above,” http://data.worldbank.org/topic/health.

  a Includes South Sudan.

  Moreover, high fertility rates appear to have negative effects at the household and individual levels. In particular, mothers with multiple pregnancies run higher risks of disease or even death. And children, especially girls, who have multiple siblings are more likely to be deprived in various ways.14

  Equally consequential are the effects of high population growth rates on the uncontrollable growth of cities. An examination of the dilemmas associated with rampant and unplanned urbanization in the Middle East is beyond the scope of this book. But expanding urban populations, from high birthrates and also as a result of migration from rural areas into the cities, have created multiple problems in Middle Eastern (and other developing world) cities. From the megacities of Tehran to Istanbul, Cairo, and Algiers, to the smaller, “secondary” cities of Shiraz, Izmir, Ismailiyya, and Oran, and everywhere in between, urban infrastructure and services have been pushed to the breaking point and, in many instances, have collapsed under the pressure. Statistics cannot adequately capture the magnitude of the difficulties that cities and their inhabitants face. In the words of one observer, “The rapid urbanization and burgeoning city populations, similar to most of the Third World, have led to problems and to declines of quality of urban life. There are too many people, insufficient jobs, inadequate infrastructures, shortages of basic services, deficient nutrition, poor health, and a deterioration of the physical environment. Middle Eastern cities are in crisis.”15

  It is little wonder that the Middle East as a whole and its cities in particular are facing such acute crises of environmental degradation. In many of the Middle East’s larger cities, the air is often unbreathable and there are looming shortages of water for drinking and irrigation. If left unattended, environmental pollution is likely to have disastrous consequences for the Middle East.

  ENVIRONMENTAL POLLUTION

  Throughout the developing world, preoccupation with industrial development and the many struggles of daily life relegates popular concerns about the environment to the back burner. Especially in the inner cities and in other urban areas, where employment, housing, and other economic considerations are primary, protecting the environment is not a concern for the average person. Especially outside the oil monarchies, life for the popular classes can be harsh and constricting or at least beset with bureaucratic obstacles and other economic difficulties. Thus the average person is either unaware of the need to safeguard environmental resources or unwilling to assume the added economic costs of such an undertaking.

  Environmental pollution takes a variety of forms, most commonly air, water, and soil pollution. Of these, air pollution has reached critical levels in many of the Middle East’s larger cities—such as Tehran, Istanbul, and Cairo—and has already had adverse consequences for public health, especially in the form of various respiratory ailments.

  Air pollution has two main sources, both of which are plentiful in the Middle East (and elsewhere in the developing world): motor vehicles and industrial complexes and factories. As far as industrial complexes are concerned, most of the larger enterprises tend to employ older imported technology that is not always fully efficient and is often a major source of environmental pollution.16 Air and especially soil pollution also result from the operations of small workshops and business establishments—coppersmiths, mechanics, furniture makers, and so on—of which every Middle Eastern city has thousands. Many of these semiformal businesses, often family owned and operated, are too small to enable their proprietors to invest in environmentally friendly technology and practices. Again, the question confronting these small business owners is one of priorities. Given the importance of ensuring the viability of the family business by maximizing profits and keeping overhead to a minimum, protecting the air or the ground from pollutants often becomes a nonissue.

  Motor vehicles are an even bigger source of air pollution. For example, in Tehran, whose air is among the most polluted in the world, 71 percent of the air pollution comes from the city’s estimated two million cars.17 In the relationship between vehicles and air pollution, three factors are important: the sheer numbers of commercial and private vehicles in circulation, the toxicity and levels of their exhaust emissions, and the type of gasoline used. Recent decades have seen an astounding rise in the numbers of vehicles in the Middle East, so much so that traffic jams have become daily features of even smaller cities and towns throughout the region. For example, in 1974 there were 674,947 motor vehicles in operation in Turkey, but by November 2000 the number had jumped to 7,109,844, an increase of over 1,053 percent. During the same period, the number of buses increased by 551 percent and trucks by more than 412 percent. There were similar rises in the number of minibuses and small trucks, though by far the biggest rise, by some 1,400 percent, was in the number of passenger cars (table 17).18 Added to these staggering numbers in Turkey and elsewhere is the continued and widespread use of leaded gasoline and diesel fuel by both passenger cars and trucks and buses throughout the Middle East, thus increasing the emission of harmful pollutants to the environment. Not surprisingly, as evident in table 18, the rate of harmful CO2 emissions has been on the rise in almost all countries of the region.

  Table 17.Passenger Cars per 1,000 Individuals in Selected Middle Eastern Countries

  SOURCE: World Bank, Development Indicators Database, “Passenger Cars (per 1,000 People),” http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/IS.VEH.PCAR.P3.

  Table 18.Annual Growth Rate of CO2 Emissions in the Middle East

  SOURCE: World Bank, Environment Data and Statistics, “CO2 Emissions Annual Growth Rate,” http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/COUNTRIES/EASTASIAPACIFICEXT/EXTEAPREGTOPENVIRONMENT/0,,menuPK:502908pagePK:51065911piPK:64171011theSitePK:502886,00.html.

  Information on environmental degradation in the Middle East is not readily available. However, some statistics from Iran can help put things into perspective. Although the average life span of a car is estimated at 15.9 years, international sanctions and official restrictions on car imports have pushed the age of most cars in Iran to between 10 and 22 years. Every twenty-four hours, cars operating in Tehran alone produce sixteen tons of tire particles, seven tons of asbestos (used in their brake shoes), and five tons of lead. Every year, 495,000 tons of pollutants are produced in Tehran alone, accounting for 25 percent of all the pollutants produced in the country. The city’s population, meanwhile, is estimated at around twelve million inhabitants. Tehran officials estimate that air pollution kills on average forty-six hundred residents every year. Countless others suffer from poor vision, burning eyes, and respiratory problems because of the city’s heavy, soupy air.19 In the mid- and late 2000s, several times the Iranian government ordered the closure of schools and government offices in Tehran and encouraged Tehranis to stay indoors in order to avoid the city’s polluted air. Meanwhile, demand for even more cars far surpasses the available supply.

  These and other similar statistics have made it difficult for officials in Iran and elsewhere to continue ignoring the adverse effects of environmental pollution. As pollution rates approach crisis levels, government agencies and to a lesser extent nongovernmental organizations have become active in trying to reverse some of these alarming trends. Every government in the region has set up a cabinet-level agency or a separate ministry devoted to the environment.20 In several countries popular awareness of the importanc
e of environmental protection has increased. In Iran, for example, a Green Party started low-key operations in the mid-2000s and is trying to attract members. A study conducted in Sharjah in the UAE found that there has been a steady rise in environmental awareness among women in the emirate.21

  Official measures and popular attitudes regarding environmental protection still have a long way to go, however. The demands for industrial and economic development are far too great to allow policy makers to devote financial and technological resources to environmental protection. Official rhetoric notwithstanding, the rates at which the air gets polluted, landfills are capped with refuse, and industrial and domestic waste is generated dwarf the limited resources that governments allocate to environmental initiatives or the small steps that people take on their own. In many of the more populous and less wealthy countries—Iran, Iraq, Egypt, and Morocco chief among them—environmental pollution has already reached crisis levels, yet many of the developments that lead to environmental degradation continue full speed ahead. Environmental pollution in the Middle East is not simply a challenge of the future; it is a crisis of the present. Neglect or insufficient attention will only deepen the crisis.

  WATER SCARCITY

  Equally troublesome is the increasing scarcity of water in the region. Most parts of the Middle East are among the most arid in the world, and in many Middle Eastern countries rainfall levels tend to be irregular, localized, and unpredictable. Of all the countries of the region, only Iran, Turkey, and Lebanon have adequate rainfall and other water resources to meet their present and future needs, including those of agriculture. More than half the countries of the Middle East, however, are currently facing serious water shortages.22 Per capita water supplies are projected to decline throughout the region over the next two decades or so, and, as table 19 demonstrates, many Middle Eastern countries are already withdrawing a greater percentage of water from renewable supplies than is being replenished. The costs of water supply and sanitation are estimated to be higher in the Middle East than in any other part of the world, being twice over those in North America and five times those in Southeast Asia. It is estimated that by 2025 Middle Eastern countries will need four times as much water as they now have available in their indigenous natural resources.23 By 2050, per capita annual water availability throughout the Middle East and North Africa will decline from today’s one thousand cubic meters to five hundred.24