For almost forty years Syria has been ruled by a populist
authoritarian regime under the Ba'th Party, led since 1970 by
President Hafiz al-Asad. The durability and resilience of this
regime is a striking contrast to the instability and intense social
conflict that preceded the Ba'th's seizure of power, when Syria was
seen as among the least stable of Arab states. This dramatic
transition raises questions about how the Ba'th succeeded in
constructing the institutions needed to consolidate a radically
populist and authoritarian system of rule. The Ba'th's
accomplishment also poses a significant theoretical challenge to
the widely held view that populist strategies of state building are
inherently unstable.
Drawing on evidence from Syrian, American, and British archives
as well as from published French and Arabic sources, Steven
Heydemann explains the capacity of the Ba'th to overcome the
obstacles that typically undermine the consolidation of radical
populist regimes. He links the Ba'th's adoption of a radical
populist strategy of state building, and its capacity to implement
this strategy, to the dynamics of social conflict, state expansion,
and structural change in the political economy of post-independence
Syria. Arguing that conventional accounts of Syrian politics
neglect the centrality of institutions and institutional change,
Heydemann shows how shifts in the pattern of state intervention
after 1946 transformed Syria's poetical arena.
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