162 Sigrid Faath and hanSpeter Mat teS
(failed) attempts by nationalist and socialist ideologies to gain the upper
hand in the 1960s and 1970s (especially in Egypt, Algeria, Yemen and Syria),
pursuant to the Iranian Revolution of 1979, there emerged a dominance
of Islamic dogmas, propagating the socio-political claim that ‘Islam is the
solution’. Against the background of the ever-more-acute impact of globali-
sation in the MENA states, however, a change is taking place in the tone
of new ideologies mobilising the masses. The discussion of purely Islamic
societies is now absorbing the anti-globalisation mindset of distancing
oneself from ‘the West’ (particularly the hegemonic superpower, the US)
and emphasising, in turn, the local identity and, since the Arab Spring, the
Islamist identity, which means that Islamists and nationalists have come to
the forefront again. A signif icant example is the new Tunisian leadership
since December 2011, composed of President Moncef Marzouki, an Arab
nationalist, and Prime Minister Hamadi Jebali, secretary general of the
Islamist Ennahda party. When Jebali stepped down in February 2013, he
was succeeded by Ali Larayedh, also a member of the Ennahda Party and
Interior Minister in Jebali’s cabinet.
A look at the development of the population in the MENA countries (in
1950, around 100 million, in 1995, 325 million and, in 2030, 600 million; also
see Ulrich in this volume) shows that there are both regional and national
differences that may have long-term political repercussions. If we compare
the situation in North Africa, the Near East, the Arabian Peninsula/Gulf
States and the Middle East, we see that North Africa has the smallest growth
at 31 per cent and the Arabian Peninsula the largest at 59 per cent, in both
periods from 1995-2010 and from 1995-2025, respectively. The Maghreb
area (encompassing Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Libya) turns out to be
the region in North Africa that has best been able – thanks to government
efforts – to reduce its birth rate the most (1999 in Tunisia: 1.5 per cent).
Thus, the demographic pressure will subside somewhat in these countries.
The absolute numbers of inhabitants (including the projected develop-
ment through to 2015) tells us that there are three demographic heavyweights
among the MENA states: Egypt with 88.2 million, Iran with approximately
80 million and Turkey with 82.6 million people. Turkey and Iran together
will have over 160 million inhabitants by the year 2015 which, in the light
of their specif ic interests and demographic weight, will surely intensify the
regional tensions in both the Near and the Middle East. We can already
see some of these developments occurring even now (water shortages, the
Kurdish question, Turkey-Israel frictions and ‘anti-Arabic’ cooperation).
Of the MENA countries that called themselves Arabic, Egypt plays a
dominating role. It currently has (and, in 2015, will continue to have) double