The Arab Spring and Democratization; Why is Syria Different?
Abstract
The Arab Spring is the momentum of the rise of the political power in the Middle East. It brought hope to have political power, namely democracy. So the people power demanded democracy for their life. Syria is one of the states impacted by the Arab Spring where the regime is shaken by this political turbulence.In this paper, it’s said that the democratization in Syria failed before the successfulness of the people in overthrowing Assad’s regime. Syria is different from Tunisia which succeeded in consolidating democracy. Syria is also different from Egypt which succeeded in consolidating democracy and passing background condition, even though failed in the prefatory fase (second step of the democratization). Here, it’s found that one of the factors why the democratization in Syria failed is the foreign intervention. Two biggest states are contesting in having influence and control in Syria, those are United States of America and Russia.