Condemning sectarianism in Syria begins with acknowledging its existence first, as it is improper to condemn what we deny exists. How can it be denied after what we have witnessed, since 2011 at least, of brutal crimes on sectarian and ethnic grounds? However, acknowledging the existence of sectarianism does not mean asserting the permanence and absolute nature of its existence, because that implies the impossibility of coexistence.
Consequently, it would mean recognizing the validity of the propositions of separatist currents in Syria and those miserably dreaming of turning back the clock. It would even validate the discourse of imposing hegemony, coercion, and despotism on Syrian men and women under the pretext that the different other (sectarianly and/or ethnically) is lurking, waiting, and preparing for the moment the balance of power shifts to return as dominant, coercive, and despotic over the different other. Here, I explicitly mean the discourse of a segment of supporters of the ruling power, who see in everything that is politically-- or sectarianly-- different nothing but a hidden enemy.
Does this not mean, however, that we are denying a reality under the pretext of fending off the pretexts of isolationists and sectarianists, whether those in power and their supporters, or those in opposition to them? This statement would be valid if it corresponded with reality. Yet, anyone looking into the contemporary history of Syria, specifically in the first half of the twentieth century, will quickly realize that sectarianism and all forms of pre-nation-state loyalties are not an essence or a fixed cultural and social feature of Syrians. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Syrians led an intellectual, political, and social struggle against the logic of exclusion, the imposition of Turkish hegemony, and the millet system, ultimately leading to the dismantling of what was known as the "Muslim Caliphate" with all its historical narrative.
They replaced it with the logic of citizenship and the modern state, founding political parties, scientific and intellectual societies, newspapers, magazines, and cultural forums. They also rejected the French Mandate and its tutelage, along with all the practices it pushed, implicitly and explicitly, aimed at building political entities on sectarian, regional, and ethnic bases. They coordinated their revolution against the French Mandate among themselves, starting with Sheikh Saleh al-Ali's revolt against the landing of French forces on the Syrian coast in 1918, to Sultan Pasha al-Atrash leading the Great Syrian Revolt, and ending with the declaration of independence in 1946.
This independence ushered in an era of political polarization among Syrians, who developed what they had begun at the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth centuries-- namely, joining labor and professional trade unions, chambers of commerce and industry, and political parties.
Thus, the division among Syrians was not over national belonging, but was a political division dominated by divergence over economic policies between the rising industrial bourgeoisie and the workers and peasants, where this disagreement manifested in the structure of the parties that represented them.
Meanwhile, the question of the relationship between the state and religion did not constitute an obsession or a subject of conflict among them except within the limits raised by conservative Islamic groups, whose political and social presence and influence were extremely limited, as they failed even once to capture a significant share of seats in the Syrian parliament. The latter was a subject of competition between national bourgeois parties on the one hand, and socialists, communists, and Arab nationalists on the other.
Thus, Syrians were not sectarian all the time, so how did they become so? A simple and easy answer appears before us: that the Assad regime, with its security apparatus and policies, sowed discord among Syrians and revived sectarianism among them to control the country and ensure the survival of its rule. Although the Assad family did indeed employ sectarianism, it cannot be said that sectarianism in Syria was of their own making; first, because Hafez al-Assad arrived thanks to a non-sectarian leverage-- the Baath Party, to which thousands of peasants belonged at the time, from Hama (the party's stronghold at the time) to the countrysides of Aleppo, Idlib, Daraa, Homs, Suwayda, and all Syrian rural areas. Furthermore, army officers and its high command were not of a single color, and the disagreement among them was not built on Hafez al-Assad's sectarian background. In addition, his arrival to power and his continuation derived legitimacy from the backing of a broad section of Syrian Baathist peasants or those agreeing with his orientations, alongside support from a segment of Muslim clerics, merchants, and other social and economic groups.
The question then is: what was Assad's need for sectarianism? Does not sectarianism harm the legitimacy of his rule, belonging as he does to a sectarian minority? Why did he have to forbid speaking of or even referring to the sectarian issue? Most importantly, sectarianism is a social phenomenon, meaning it is not limited solely to the political realm, but appears in individual behavior and values. If we are able to explain its presence in the political realm, how can it be explained in the social realm-- that discrimination practiced on the basis of ethnicity, tribalism, regionalism, urbanity, family, etc., within society and away from the role of the ruling power's apparatuses?
Finally, conflicts, discrimination, and polemics of a sectarian character continued after the fall of the Assad regime and extended to the regional and tribal levels, encompassing a region like Suwayda-- which had seen anti-regime demonstrations in the few years preceding its collapse, and whose local factions participated in the "Deterrence of Aggression" operation; meaning it was supposed to be outside the frameworks of sectarian polarization in Syria.
How can one also justify the campaign of sectarian incitement and mobilization, the brutal killings that targeted the sons of the governorate, and the local fighting between a number of its Druze inhabitants and others from the Bedouins? It would also be easy to hold the current authority responsible, which is responsible in any case by virtue of its position. However, political sectarianism, as a social phenomenon, requires conditions of possibility for its existence-- that is, the economic, social, and political structures that allow its emergence as behavior, ideas, and values manifested within a given society. Without the realization of its conditions of possibility, an authority cannot impose it from above; rather, the sectarianism of the authority itself stems from these conditions.
The rise of national political thought and the decline of pre-nation-state loyalties during the first half of the twentieth century were the product of the rise of contractual capitalist relations of production. These, in turn, pushed toward social structures based on interest-based relations between individuals who formed their trade union and professional institutions and chambers of commerce and industry, and produced parties representing the class interests of those groups and competing in their electoral programs on this basis.
As for political sectarianism, Syrian men and women only knew it after decades of despotism during which the totality of those relations was destroyed, along with their institutions that were dominated by the Baathist power apparatus. During those decades, crony capitalism arose, making every economic activity dependent on relationships with figures of authority. Public sector employment became almost exclusive to those holding connections within authority circles.
From this regression in economic structure, in production methods, and the level of their modernization, and from the rampant spread of corruption and monopoly, pre-nation-state relations retreated from the public sector into the private sector and overall work relations in Syria. Consequently, the social relations of Syrian men and women regressed, returning them to their narrow circles; through those circles alone could they capture a job opportunity, a material gain, or social protection.
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