Historical Development
Transformations During the War Years
Different Approaches to the Question of Nationalism
National Will
The Argument from History
The Existance of a Mission or Function

It is perhaps appropriate, fifty years after independence, seventy-three years after the establishment of the Lebanese state in its present borders, eighteen years after the outbreak of a devastating internal war, and three years after its ending, to inquire afresh into the outlines of Lebanese nationalism.

Historical Development

Although this essay is not concerned with presenting a full history of Lebanese nationalism, but rather seeks to take a fresh look at the issue from a contemporary standpoint, it would be good to make a quick historical review of the idea and its roots. The Lebanese Emirate of the 17th-19th centuries provided the administrative and political framework for the first ideas of an autonomous or independent Lebanese entity. Political conditions and arrangements in the Emirate differed markedly from conditions and arrangements in neighbouring Ottoman wilayets. (a) The Emirate was governed by an Emir with local roots - first of the Ma`an family, then of the Shihabs - while most other wilayets were governed by non-indigenous, and in most cases non-Arab, military rulers. (b) The Emirate was populated in the majority by Druze and Maronites, both of whom were exempted from conscription into the Ottoman military. (c) Rule by the Emir was ensured by a network of alliances among leading shaykhly families and not through the direct agency of a praetorian military garrison. (d) Through trade relations with the Italian city-states and religio-cultural relations with France, and given the local Emir's margin of political autonomy, the Emirate developed relations to the West closer than any of the neighbouring Ottoman wilayets. For these and a number of additional reasons, the Emirate of Mount Lebanon and its inhabitants developed a relatively distinctive political culture and political identity within the larger Ottoman framework.

Tensions between Emir Bashir Shihab - most of whose family by that time had converted to Maronite Christianity - and a number of Druze shaykhs in the first decades of the 19th century, coupled with an ill-starred alliance of Emir Bashir with the conquering Egyptian forces of Ibrahim Pasha, led to the undoing of the Emirate. When Egyptian forces withdrew from the lands of Lebanon and Syria, mainly under British pressure, Emir Bashir was forced out with them, and serious Christian-Druze tensions emerged, virtually for the first time in the Mountain. Druze leaders, benefiting from Ottoman backing, sought to dismantle the Shihabi system and reclaim some of the political and economic ground lost to the Maronites, who by this time considerably outnumbered them in the Mountain. Christian-Druze tensions simmered between 1840 and 1860, boiling over occasionally, most seriously in the clashes of 1860.

The clashes triggered Western concern and intervention and resulted in the negotiation of the Règlement Organique in 1861 which provided for an autonomous mutasarrifiyya of Mount Lebanon, governed by a non-Lebanese Christian Ottoman. The Règlement was negotiated and signed between the Ottoman government and the governments of France, Prussia (later Germany), Austria, Russia, and Sardinia (later Italy).

With these developments, the idea of Lebanon began to be transformed from the fairly neutral label of a particular and special Ottoman province to something, as it were, more political. For the Maronites, at least, Lebanon began to signify (a) a political entity necessary for their security, and (b) one whose existence and security depended largely on Western support. The Druze, and other non-Christian communities, did not regard it in the same light. As Ottoman authority declined, the thorny question of which group or community, locally would gain the upper hand and which political and social identity would colour Lebanon became increasingly problematic.

The collapse of the Ottoman Empire in the First World War opened up the possibility of radically new arrangements for Lebanon and the region, and brought about a direct clash between the rival ideas of a Greater Lebanon and an Arab state. The former idea was championed by a fairly well-mobilized coalition of mostly Maronite religious, political, and business leaders; the latter idea was championed by the Hashemites under Sharif Husayn, a large coalition of Syrian notables and military officers, and a majority of Muslim leaders in what would later become Greater Lebanon. Husayn had established Damascus as the capital of the mutasarrifiyya, Maronite leaders had developed demands for an expansion of the province's borders to include more of the fertile plains of the coast and the Biqa`.

When famine gripped the Mountain during World War I and killed off almost one third of its population, concerns over economic security escalated into panicked demands directed at the French authorities to establish a Lebanon with wider borders. Partially to allay Christian fears, but mostly to cut into the power and authority of the Arab nationalist movement in Damascus, France decreed the establishment of 'Le Grand Liban' (Greater Lebanon) which added portions of the mostly-Muslim Ottoman provinces of Tripoli, Damascus, and Sidon to the traditional territories of Mount Lebanon. The move was welcomed by a majority of Christians, especially among the Maronites, and opposed by a majority of Muslims.

In the inter-war years, a number of intellectuals, led by Michel Chiha, struggled to develop a national identity and ideology to fit the new multi-confessional state. The idea that Chiha and his colleagues developed was a liberal Lebanon in which minorities of all kinds could find security and dignity, in which power was shared among communities, in which Christianity and Islam, and East and West, mixed healthily, and in which some distant ancestry of industrious, adventurous, multi-racial, mercantilist, and alphabet-spreading Phoenicians would provide an overarching national identity. The Phoenician identity never found much mass appeal, but a national ideology of Lebanon as an entity characterized by confessional pluralism, political freedoms, and economic liberalism, flourished robustly in the post-independence years and struck especially sympathetic chords among the growing, multi-confessional, entrepreneurial middle class. In many ways, this loosely-defined ideology is still the most widespread in Lebanon.

A more hard-nosed nationalism among some Christian leaders, who saw Lebanese nationalism more in terms of its confessional roots and failed to be carried away by Chiha's vision, clung to a more security-minded view of Lebanon. They regarded the national project as mainly a program for the security of Christians and a bulwark against threats from Muslims and their hinterland. Christian members of the government elite tended toward the Chiha vision, while among the Christian non-elites, political mobilization around the security-minded approach was more effective.

In both cases, the ideas of Lebanese nationalism had little to offer Muslim communities. To be sure, Chiha's liberalism did appeal to wide sections of the Muslim upper and middle classes whose trading and entrepreneurial activities meshed well with a liberal conception of political power. But to most others, the concepts of Christian security, Western support, and Lebanese particularism in the region, held little appeal. The ideological void was filled in various stages by Arab nationalism, Syrian nationalism, revolutionary Marxism, Nasserite socialism, and Islamic fundamentalism.

Transformations During the War Years

This Hydra of competing conceptions of nationalism and political organization contributed to the breakdown of political order in the early 1970s, and exploded into armed conflict in 1975. The war years had differing effects among different communities. For many Christians, the bloody nose that they acquired during the war with Muslim and Palestinian militias soured their appetite toward the Grand Liban ideal. With its Muslim majority, the Grand Liban was increasingly regarded as ungovernable and in itself a threat to Christian security. A smaller Lebanon with a clear Christian majority, somewhat akin to the old Emirate, was increasingly regarded by many as more desirable.

The undeclared project of Bashir Gemayel, throughout much of his early career, to establish a mainly Christian core pseudo-state stretching from the mountains of Ehden and Bsharreh, through the Koura, Batroun, Jubayl, Kisirwan, and Metn districts, across the Aley and Shouf mountains, down to the Jizzin and Marja`youn regions (including a wing tip in Zahleh), reflected the deep disillusionment with the Greater Lebanon scheme. The project was thwarted at several stages: although Bashir consolidated his hold over Jubayl, Kisirwan, and Metn, he lost his bid for control of the North in the face of opposition by the Franjiyyeh family and a coalition of Muslim, leftist, and Syrian forces. After his death, the Lebanese Forces militia that he had established quickly lost the active support of the Israelis and also, in a series of ill-fated maneuvers, lost all presence in the Aley, Shouf, Iqlim al-Kharroub, and Sidon regions. With the Bashirist project in tatters, the Lebanese Forces hunkered down in the small eastern enclave (al-sharqiyyah) composed of the districts of Jubayl, Kisirwan, and the Metn. As a political program, they promoted the idea of a Lebanese confederation of semi-autonomous districts in which national borders would be preserved, while different confessional and political groups would retain their own autonomous zones of influence.

The unsatisfactory nature of this 'enclave' solution was expressed during the Aoun period in which Christian fears and hopes were forged into an advanced form of passionate Lebanese fundamentalism. In cutting across Christian concerns, General Aoun presented absolutist solutions: total control and authority, or Armageddon. To many Christians, Aoun presented an epochal choice: Lebanon was worth preserving if the Christians could maintain control over it; if such control could not be ensured, then the dangers from the Muslims and from Syria were too great for Christians to withstand. Thousands of Christians fled the country during the battles of 1989 and 1990; but as Aoun himself left the country in 1991, many Christians had already concluded with him that since the country could not be controlled by the Christians, it was effectively lost to them, and they should seek to leave the country and find residence elsewhere.

Among many Christians today, Lebanese nationalism is in abeyance, Christians are comfortable with the old Lebanon, dominated by Christian elites and close to the West; but they are not comfortable with the new Lebanon, dominated by Muslim elites and close to Syria. Their attachment to the Grand Liban is emotionally strong but politically weak; many no longer believe the nation-state is viable nor do they trust their Muslim compatriots to govern properly. On the other hand, few see a realistic alternative.

The experiences of other communities during the war was equally telling. The Shi`a coalesced as a political and ideological super-group during the war. In the 1960s and 1970s they had been open to calls from the Arab nationalist and Marxist-leftist camps, as well as from the religious but moderate establishment led by the charismatic Musa al-Sadr. During the war, the Shi'a grew increasingly disillusioned with these ideologies and tended more and more toward their own confessionally-organized identities and political structures. The serious conflict that developed between Shi`a and Palestinian groups for control of the South throughout the late 1970s embittered the Shi`a toward the Palestinian movement and what it symbolized in terms of both Arab nationalism and revolutionary secular Marxism-leftism. Similar conflicts with the Druze over control of Khaldeh and Beirut further distanced them from secular leftism.

The Islamic revolution in Iran in 1979 gave a boost to Shi`a militancy in Lebanon and introduced a strong religious fundamentalist flavour to it. Hizballah was founded in the early 1980s, and throughout the ensuing decade would compete for control and leadership of the Shi`a community with the more secular and mainstream Amal movement. After Amal's own battles with the Palestinians, the Druze, and other groups, and after the long Iran-Iraq war, the aborted Shi`a uprising in Iraq, and the ill-treatment of the Shi`a in Saudi Arabia, the Shi`a community grew more attached to Lebanon as their sole haven in the surrounding Sunni Arab world. This sense of attachment to Lebanon has been enhanced by the fact that, as the largest minority in Lebanon - still growing rapidly in size - and after the defeat of both the Palestinians and Maronites, the Shi`a generally feel confident about their present and future ability to play a dominant role in Lebanese politics. While their conception of Lebanonism differs considerably from previous conceptions - they favour a more state-socialist, Eastern Islamic-oriented sort of Lebanon - their attachment to Lebanon as a nation-state has grown markedly during the war years.

Despite the repeated and tragic devastation of the mostly-Shi`a South by Israel, the war years represented a period of political mobilization and empowerment for their community contrary to the effect it had on the Sunni community. Unlike the Maronite, Druze, and Shi`a communities and similar to the Greek Orthodox community, the Sunni community did not become significantly militarized during the war. This is partially due to its sociological - urban middle and lower-middle class - makeup, and partially due to the fact that up until 1982, the Sunni community relied considerably on the largely-Sunni Palestinian armed movement for protection and support.

During the war, as Shi'a and Druze military power increased, and especially after the Palestinian defeat in 1982, Sunni power waned considerably. While traditional Sunni families continued to wield considerable influence in the main Sunni cities of Sidon, Beirut, and Tripoli, all three strongholds came under considerable threat. Beirut was inundated by Shi`a refugees from the South and came under the militia control of Amal, the Druze Progressive Socialist party, and Hizballah; Sidon retained considerable autonomy but was fairly stranded in the otherwise Amal-and Hizballah-controlled South. Tripoli fared considerably better given its comfortable confessional makeup and the Sunni hinterland in the Dinniyyeh and Akkar regions, but even there, Sunni power had to accept Alawi suzerainty emanating from the strong Syrian military presence and the Alawi regions to the north of the border.

As the war came to a close, however, the Sunnis could make use of their community's overwhelming presence in the neighbouring Arab regions, and that community's regional and international influence through the oil industry, to maintain- indeed, reclaim - a central role for the Sunni community in the Lebanese political system. Despite its setbacks during the war, the Sunni community has been the principal beneficiary of the Taif reforms in the institutions of government, and the Sunni prime minister has emerged as the central political player in the new constitutional setup.

In ideological terms, the Sunni community has been somewhat at a loss during the war. The traditional Arab nationalism of the community had already been on the wane after 1967 and 1973 and was weakened further by the defection of Egypt to the American-Israeli camp, the embroilment of Ba`thist Iraq in a long war with Iran, the defeat of the Palestinians, and the deep involvement of Syria in Lebanese affairs. Moreover, the Islamic fundamentalism that many Sunni communities adopted around the region as a mode of political mobilization and expression to fill the void left by the collapse of Arab nationalism, was not very appealing to Lebanese Sunnis because it had already been adopted by their Shi`a rivals in the country.

Throughout the last decade of the war, the majority of Sunnis remained fairly unmobilized ideologically, managing as best they could amid the maze of competing militias and armies, and drawing on their coreligionists in the Gulf for occasional political and economic sustenance. The link to the Gulf countries paid off handsomely in the late 1980s and early 1990s as Soviet power declined and American power - with vital interests and alliances in the Gulf - increased. The agreement that brought an end to the war was negotiated in the Saudi resort town of Taif with heavy Saudi and American involvement, and the deal that brought an effective end to opposition to that agreement in October 1990, was made under the shadow of a growing American military presence in the Gulf and the development of an American-led, Saudi-financed, military coalition against Iraq. Sunni regional influence was further confirmed by the appointment of the Saudi-Lebanese billionaire, Rafiq al-Hariri, as prime minister of Lebanon in the fall of 1992.

The war years had an equivocal effect on Sunni attitudes toward nationalism. The potent threats from various Lebanese communities - Maronite, Druze, and Shi`a - did not strengthen Sunni attachment to Lebanese particularism; the war confirmed their fears that, left isolated in Lebanon, their fortunes might decline precipitously. On the other hand, their attachment to the Lebanese state as a political institution was enhanced for a number of reasons: first, it provided an alternative to the condition of anarchy in which they found they stood much to lose; second, their power in government, both before and after the war, was considerably larger than it was on the ground; third, a strong and independent Lebanese state in which they could play a significant role would also relieve them of the pressures and difficulties introduced by the heavy Syrian presence both in Beirut and Tripoli.

As Sunni links with the Gulf countries became more important, and as the community drifted away from Arab nationalism and stayed clear of revolutionary Islamic fundamentalism, many came to identify more with the conservative, Islamic-traditional, mercantilist outlook of the Gulf states. After the liberation of Kuwait, and after the appointment of Hariri, the Sunnis regained some of their lost confidence as a community with a strong regional presence and a settled traditional outlook. Within this outlook, an independent, commercialized, and small state such as Lebanon, akin to other such small, commercialized, and independent states like Kuwait, Bahrain, Abu Dhabi, the UAE and others, was an increasingly acceptable option to most Lebanese Sunnis. The dream of a larger regional state, whether based on Arab nationalist or Islamist lines, had been badly tarnished by Syria and Iraq on the one hand, and Iran on the other. The Sunnis would be satisfied with a workable regional order in which their reasonable position within the Lebanese state would be enhanced by open political and economic links with other Sunni communities in the region.

Like the Sunni and other communities, the Druze community was deeply affected by the war years. Under the leadership of Kamal Junblat, the community found itself in the beginning of the war at the forefront of a wide leftist-Muslim-Palestinian coalition against the Christian-dominated political system. The coalition suffered its first setback in 1976 when it was opposed by incoming Syrian forces. In the following year, the coalition and the Druze community lost its leader to assassination. The coalition slowly unravelled in the late 1970s and early 1980s as Shi`a Palestinian animosity grew; it collapsed finally in the wake of 1982 as the Palestinians were defeated and the Shi'a and Druze began fighting over residual control of Beirut and the coastal road to the South. At the same time, the Druze were challenged in the mountain by the Christian Lebanese Forces who sought to benefit from the Israeli presence to claim control of the Aley and Shouf mountains and thus secure a mountain corridor south to Jizzin and Marja`youn. Despite various difficulties and sensitivities, the Druze community still maintained important relations with both Israel and Syria, and managed to reverse Lebanese Forces challenges and reassert complete control over the mountain.

Despite its tactical successes in its mountain regions, the Druze community ended the war in a somewhat precarious and embattled position: a deep divide had developed between the Druze community and the large Christian communities further north, in the wake of the displacement of many thousands of Christian villagers in 1983 and 1984; the Druze had also lost a secure access to the coast and alliances in Beirut and its southern regions after losing battles with Amal in the mid-1980s. United behind Walid Junblat, and controlling a considerable area of the mountain, the Druze community arrived at the end of the war somewhat triumphant but unsure of its gains and its position.

In ideological terms, the war also left the community at loose ends. Lebanese particularism, which had never much appealed to the Druze because of its heavy Christian -Maronite component, was not enhanced by the experiences of the war. The appeal of Arab nationalism also waned significantly in the wake of regional developments and early clashes with Syria. The secular socialism of the Progressive Socialist Party was eclipsed with the death of Kamal Junblat, its main proponent and personification, and after clashes with other pseudo-leftist parties. As the 1980s wore on, the Druze community settled into a more particularistic confessionally-based identity and political outlook, developing their own social and political institutions in the mountain.

The Druze remain today in a fairly precarious position. In both particularist Lebanese and regionalist Arab formulations they find reason for concern, and after the collapse of the Soviet Union they lost an important patron. Within the country, they control a larger area than they feel they can securely hold and their considerable militia power during the war has not been reflected in similar power in the postwar political system. Ambivalent about Syrian power, they have yet to find a more reliable alliance within the Lebanese political system. They enter the postwar Lebanese order ambivalent about the Taif agreement, and apprehensive about Maronite, Shi`a, and Sunni power.

So far, we have only given a political and necessarily over-simplified account of the orientations of the four most influential confessional communities. Other than the aspects which can be generalized in the experiences of other communities, such as the Greek Orthodox and Greek Catholics, Armenians, and others, which we will not go into in this paper for lack of space, it is very important to recall the set of experiences shared by virtually all Lebanese as witnesses and victims of the same conditions of protracted anarchy and warfare.

Despite confessional differences over several political issues, there is a shared experience of loss and suffering that cuts across all lines. The common suffering of the war - physical, emotional, and economic - the common hostility to local militias and outside armies, the common yearning for an end to the war, the common wish for a return of the state and law and order, provide a deep reservoir of common sentiments and attitudes forged nationwide. It is the first experience of this magnitude and intensity that all Lebanese have experienced similarly as victims. It is a common sorrow that links all Lebanese and defines their socio-political world over and above the narrower political orientations of their communities. No doubt, it will play a considerable role in defining the tone and content of Lebanese nationalism in the future.