IN THE THROES OF OSLO: PALESTINIAN SOCIETY, CIVIL SOCIETY AND THE FUTURE

By George Giacaman

The two Israeli-Palestinian agreements (Oslo I and II as they came to be called) represent the terms of settlement after the defeat, or more specifically, after the acceptance of defeat by the Palestinians. The acceptance of defeat was a process with many stages inasmuch as the Oslo agreements themselves constitute a process that continues to unfold and may not clearly end in its results and implications. The process was made possible by diverse factors, including the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Gulf war. Yet the Oslo agreements' main distinctive feature is that they ushered in a new reality, and henceforth any Israeli-Palestinian contestation over land, rights, sovereignty and the future will have the agreements as one of its main points of reference.

No less significantly for Palestinians, the new reality involved the creation of a Palestinian Authority with some jurisdiction over the two-and-a-half million Palestinians living in the West Bank and Gaza. It also included the establishment of an elected Palestinian Council with executive and legislative authority constrained by the agreements. A host of new questions, most of them still open, were posed to Palestinians, such as the relation of the Palestinian Authority to the PLO and of the Palestinian Council to the Palestinian National Council which is part of the PLO structure. But the more important questions revolve around the nature of the new Palestinian political system that is still in the process of development, its relation to Palestinian society and to the people that live under it, the new role of Palestinian political parties and other organised groups in society, and the ability of the new system to salvage national rights from the throes of an agreement made in an atmosphere of resignation.

BEGINNINGS

For a conflict that has spanned a century since the first waves of Zionist settlement in the 1880s, the road to Oslo has been long. It has been a history of limited successes and major defeats. Palestinian demands and expectations progressively grew more modest as time went by: from an attempt to retrieve the whole of a lost homeland, to the 'secular democratic state' for Palestinians and Jews, to the 'two-state solution', to a limited autonomy under the Oslo agreements, with further negotiations concerning the future under adverse conditions for Palestinians. The 'illusion of endurance of settler regimes' turned out to be less illusory, at least in Palestine, than many thought and hoped in the early 1970s.1 Yet the more proximate factors that made the Oslo agreements possible began, ironically, with the results of the Palestinian intifada in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

As a mass popular movement against occupation, the Intifada posed a novel challenge for Israel. The first priority in the field was military containment, but this could not be fully accomplished without higher civilian casualties among Palestinians, more than were politically acceptable given world attention. The Intifada was therefore able to break the political stasis imposed by Israel since its invasion of Lebanon in 1982, which had resulted in the removal of the PLO leadership to a more distant exile in Tunis. The Intifada could not be completely subdued by military means alone, and political initiatives appeared necessary.

Eager to utilise the political opening made by the Intifada, the PLO moved to formalise its acceptance of Israel as a state, a position it adopted gradually from the mid-1970s through the 'two-state' formula. The move brought it closer to entry in the political process since acceptance of Israel as a state within the 1967 boundaries was understood to be a minimum condition. This took place at the meeting of the Palestinian National Council in November 1988 in Algiers. Two main decisions were taken. The first included the recognition of Israel as a state through the acceptance of the principle of partition of Palestine. The second included the recognition of Israel within the 1967 boundaries through the acceptance of UN Security Council Resolutions 242 and 338.

Consensus politics had been a salient feature of PLO political life, at least when it came to strategic issues and in particular those related to Palestinian national rights. The Algiers conference introduced a change. The first decision was taken by consensus. The second, relating to Israel's borders, was taken by a majority vote. Consensus on the second would not have been possible given the position of some of the groups within the PLO. But the need to formulate a political position in line with the 'international consensus' was overriding. It was thought to be mandatory if the PLO was to be part of any political process resulting from the Intifada.

This was not the beginning of due process by majority vote, but in retrospect, the beginning of the breakdown of due process altogether in PLO political life. Thus when the Oslo agreements were signed, the Palestinian National Council was never called to ratify them. Whatever life it possessed before then quickly expired, especially after the election of a new Palestinian Council in January 1996 under the terms of the Oslo agreements.

In response to the Intifada, with the Gulf war as an important contributing factor, the Bush Administration in turn perceived a need for political movement. Former Secretary of State James Baker had already started a process of shuttle diplomacy several months before the eruption of the war in the Gulf, basing his approach on the Shamir plan of May 1989. Heading a Likud-led coalition, former Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, under US prodding as a result of the Intifada, had submitted a 'peace plan' that envisioned a 'two-track' approach to peace: an Arab track and a Palestinian track. However, Mr Shamir never tired of repeating after he announced his plan that the main item in it dealt with peace with the Arab states rather than with the Palestinians.

Mr Baker's shuttle diplomacy continued after the war. Its aim was threefold: to make the Shamir government take its plan seriously, to find a place in it for Palestinians and to get Palestinians and Arabs to accept it, at least as a starting point. The result was the 'Madrid formula' in terms of which Palestinians were to be represented as part of the Jordanian delegation.

The Madrid conference was convened at the end of October 1991. In the following two years, several rounds of negotiations took place but remained deadlocked, in part because the Palestinian leadership, then in Tunis, was not a direct party in the negotiations. In contrast to the Likud-led government, a Labour government under Rabin and Peres was willing to trade recognition of the PLO with an agreement it could defend domestically. The result was the Declaration of Principles signed in Oslo on 13 September 1993 between the PLO and Israel. This was followed by the Agreement on Palestinian interim Self-Rule, the 'Gaza-jericho' agreement signed on 4 May 1994. A few days later, on l0 May, Palestinian police entered the Gaza Strip.

VIRTUALLY NEW REALITY

For most Palestinians living in the West Bank and Gaza, the new political reality became more concrete only after the Palestinian Authority assumed control over the main cities and towns, and joint control with Israel over most of the population in Palestinian villages. This took place within one month following the signing of Oslo ll' in Washington on 28 September 1995.

A central feature of the new reality brought about by Oslo is that it was no longer possible for Palestinians and Israelis to engage in politics totally outside the framework of the Oslo accords. This applies both to Palestinian relations with Israel and to internal Palestinian Political life. Prime Minister Netanyahu discovered this soon after his election in June 1996, with the crucial difference that the Oslo cards were decked on his side with US backing at every turn. It also took a bloody conflagration in late September of the same year and an ensuing, but brief, international isolation to make him modify his position on the Oslo agreements. On the Palestinian side, the new reality precipitated a major crisis in Palestinian political life, and for parties in the opposition in particular. Their inability or refusal to enter, in some fashion, the 'new politics' had a detrimental effect on the development of Palestinian civil society after Oslo, and on the achievement of Palestinian national rights or what was possible under the 'negotiated process'. Whereas Israel is a state with a question about its borders but not its existence, crucial questions remain at least partially open about the political future of Palestinians and about the structure, nature and future of the society now being formed in part of Palestine. To the analysis of some of these issues we will now briefly turn.

SOCIETAL ORGANISATION

In its pre-modern form, societal organisation in Palestine existing in relative independence from the state has had a long history. By this I mean forms of association that are ethnic, tribal or kinship-based, functioning in relative autonomy which varied in accordance with the ability of the central government to extend its authority to the various regions formally under its control. Considerable local autonomy, for example, was possible at different periods under Ottoman rule. Various communities organised aspects of their life with custom and tribal law as central elements contributing to their cohesion.

Modern forms of association based on voluntary membership increased in the twentieth century. The Zionist-Palestinian conflict was a contributing factor. In the inter-war period new political parties emerged whose main focus for political work was the continuing and increasing Zionist colonisation of Palestine. These parties however were largely led by notables from well-known land-owning or urban families. As a result political life and rivalry acquired a traditional family and clannish colouring. Nevertheless, this period also witnessed an increase in other forms of association such as unions, charitable societies, clubs, professional associations and the like.

This trend continued through the 1950s and the early 1960s, in part spurred by the dispossession of 1948. It also prepared the ground for the qualitative changes that began in the early 1960s and remain with us in one form or another to the present day. The emergence of the PLO brought a qualitative change to specific aspects of Palestinian political life and organisation. It brought political diversity and a clearer definition of ideological pluralism within Palestinian society and introduced modern party association with a concentrated focus on Palestinian national issues. The PLO was not led by traditional landed families. Membership in the groups and parties within the PLO was open, and, for ill or for good, upward mobility within parties was possible based on the rules of the game of party politics. This was not always a democratic process, but success did not require a pedigree. Thus it was possible for many from rural backgrounds or from refugee camps or from the ranks of the poor to rise to positions of prominence in the PLO and within Palestinian society in the West Bank and Gaza. Many were later to become the 'new elite' within the system established by the Palestinian Authority after Oslo, especially those loyal to Yasser Arafat who were allowed by Israel to come from Tunis after the accords were signed.

All major parties within the PLO had extensions in the occupied territories and supporters in mass organisations such as unions, student groups, women's groups and various 'committees' throughout the West Bank and Gaza. The PLO also gave a boost to the formation of new non-governmental organisations (NG0s) and charitable societies whose main work was service delivery and relief work for different sectors in society.

In general it can be said that the PLO gave support to the process of societal organisation of varied forms under occupation. This was also accompanied by rivalry between the groups of which the PLO was composed, a rivalry that often hampered the work of civic organisations, or duplicated it unnecessarily. Nevertheless, organised groups working within the developing sphere of civil society became a clear feature of Palestinian society, especially during the past two decades.

ANTINOMIES OF THE PLO'MODEL'

The PLO 'model' therefore harboured within it two antinomial and contradictory elements: a pluralistic civil society-in-themaking lodged within the confines of a proto-state, the PLO. For, by definition, the sphere of civil society is the non-state sphere, or that which exists in relative independence from the state. Yet in the absence of a state and in the conditions of the diaspora, the antinomy of state/civil society endured as a temporary necessity and as a means of shouldering national responsibilities, in what was hoped would be a transitional stage.

Thus the PLO was not only a proto-state composed of political formations, but also contained within its structures labour unions, student unions, teachers' unions, women's unions, writers' unions, productive enterprises, research centres and NG0s. The requirements of the national struggle and of survival in the diaspora appeared to mandate such a mobilisational effort. An all encompassing organisation also seemed essential for the expression and preservation of a collective identity, for a definition and preservation of the self in juxtaposition to a community uprooted and to a society destroyed.

But once a new Palestinian entity emerged on the ground in Palestine after Oslo, the threat to civil society from such a unitary model and history became quickly apparent, especially in light of the disarray of the opposition within the PLO and the resultant weakness of political parties, as well as the requirements of the agreement with Israel.

Early public signs of the tensions endemic to the unitary model however, pre-date Oslo and can be clearly pinpointed. On 14 December 1990, a conference was held in Jerusalem devoted to social issues related to women with the Intifada as a backdrop.5 Representatives of different political parties attended, thus giving legitimacy to the public discussion of issues related to women aside from their connection to the national struggle. It was the first Palestinian conference with local PLO participation to view women's issues as being of significance in their own right. Hitherto, issues related to the national question were viewed as taking precedence over all others. Indeed, an active suppression of public discussion of women's problems was the accepted norm among parties and groups within the PLO, including leftist ones. Such issues were deemed divisive since inevitably questions related to patriarchy were bound to be raised. The convening of the conference no less significantly also signalled disillusionment with what the national question had come to, thus asserting the need to address issues long postponed on account of the struggle for liberation. It was a harbinger of things to come, including Oslo and the crisis of political parties.

PARALYSIS OF POLITICAL PARTIES

The Madrid conference was the first watershed to herald the crisis of political parties. As a result of their opposition to the Madrid formula (that is, having the Palestinian delegation represented as part of the Jordanian delegation, in addition to other factors) most Palestinian parties found themselves outside the political process but unable to stop it or influence its direction.

The second crucial watershed, also leading to the total paralysis of opposition parties within the PLO, was the formation of a Palestinian Authority as a result of the Oslo agreements. Not only were they not part of the new Palestinian political entity being formed on the ground, but most did not join the elections for the Palestinian Council held in January 1996. The elections for the Council were the only available opportunity at that time to enter the new system. In addition, the opposition could neither mobilise public support against the election, nor run on platforms opposed to the Oslo agreements. Indeed, the elections generated heated debates within most parties and some were aired in public at conferences and in newspapers. In the end, the winners were the 'hard-liners', comprising mostly the leadership outside the West Bank and Gaza. Hence, most parties which were members of the PLO (as well as Hamas, which is not) found themselves not merely outside the political process, but outside politics altogether.

The crisis of Palestinian political parties, however, had begun earlier. For a few years the Intifada helped mask the impasse they had reached. Unable to realise their programmes for a 'just, comprehensive, and permanent' peace, most parties, especially those on the left, were unable or unwilling either to change their programmes or to follow 'pragmatically' the lead of Yasser Arafat. By the late 1980s and early 1990s it was clear that most parties, especially those on the left, were quickly losing whatever mass base they had or could mobilise during the Intifada. The phenomenon was not restricted to the West Bank and Gaza and could be seen clearly in Palestinian communities in the United States and Europe as well . Much organisational work done there during the Intifada or earlier quickly collapsed with the flight of members and loss of supporters. Loss of a clear cause, lack of hope, perception of the end of the national project, and the limited results of the Intifada were all factors (though heroic in more than one respect, finally the Intifada was an expiring splutter lighting the road to Oslo).

Meanwhile, it was clear that the PLO was no longer a functioning body, especially after the establishment of the Palestinian Authority in parts of the West Bank and Gaza. The historic leadership of the PLO, represented by Mr Arafat, was now in charge of Palestinian society, without the presence of an organised opposition working within the new system, or able to influence it from without. With a Palestinian authority on the ground but without the presence of political parties with a mass base in the opposition, the tension inherent in the duality of state/civil society finally reached its point of crisis.

THE PERIL OF THE MODEL

The unitary model of the PLO, applied to the emerging political entity in the West Bank and Gaza, threatens to engulf society in the absence of organised societal strength in the form of effective opposition parties and mass-based movements. The essence of the model stems from the mobilisation aims of the PLO towards a community in dispersion. But once the model is transposed in order to govern a population living on its own land, its latent totalitarian traits quickly come to the fore.

The all-encompassing totality of the model envisions society 'organised' into 'General' and 'Higher' unions, associations, organisations, societies, and councils, at the top of which, after Oslo, the Palestinian Authority presides. The irony of having the government establish a 'Higher Council for Non-Governmental Organisations' in the spirit of the unitary model, appears to have escaped its founders. What apparently confuses matters is the 'transitional' nature of the situation in which the Palestinian Authority operates. Most of the main Palestinian national issues remain outstanding and relegated by Oslo to the 'final status talks'. These include the fate of Palestinians scattered in the diaspora, the right of return, the borders of the state of Israel, the right to self-determination, and Jerusalem. Such a context lends itself to the transposition of the unitary model to the new situation under the pretext of achieving mobilisational goals. In addition, many political and social activists appear to face a genuine dilemma, especially after the election of the Netanyahu government. Internally, on issues related to human rights, civil liberties, the rule of law, accountability and civic organisation, they feel constrained to play an oppositional role. But given the conflict with Israel and the indeterminate future for Palestinians, they feel equally constrained to play a supportive role and are not averse to mobilisational aims for that end.

Nevertheless, this has not prevented limited oppositional efforts in spite of the relative weakness of organised strength in Palestinian society at present. Such an effort took the form of contests over draft laws, human rights issues, academic freedom and civil rights. Union and working-class issues have not figured prominently, in part because the majority of the labour force is dependent on work in Israel with a sizeable portion of the remaining labour force dispersed on different locations in the West Bank and Gaza. Thus lack of access to work accentuates the political as opposed to the class factor, which in turn is used by Israel as a bargaining counter with the Palestinian Authority.

A single but significant exception was the strike waged by government school teachers in March 1997, many of whom receive subsistence wages. The leadership of the official General Union of Palestinian Teachers did not support the strike which was led by 'Teachers' Committees' with no specific loyalty to the Palestinian Authority. As the strike progressed, the leadership of the General Union found themselves in the difficult position of being opposed to the demands of the vast majority of the constituency they were supposed to represent, thus risking their own delegitimisation?

This was a clear case of the contradiction inherent in the unitary model. It was also clear that change in the model would only come about through contestation over the terrain of civil society.

CIVIL SOCIETY

The revival of the concept of the 'civil society' in the early 1970s and its popularisation by the media in the context of the struggle of the Polish Workers' Movement against the state has left a wealth of material written on the subject. As a rallying cry, the phrase has been inducted into the service of various causes in Asia, Latin America and the Middle East. But writings on the subject, including those in Arabic, show no agreement on some of the components, institutions and actors within this sphere. Should political parties be included? Should ascriptive and primordial forms of association be included? Are totalitarian groups dedicated to the diminution of ' such a sphere to be considered agents of 'civil society'? Is a capitalist economy an essential component?

Such questions raise issues that go beyond the scope of this chapter. I merely note that any definition of the phrase, given the history of its evolution and the changes attendant on what it denotes, must of necessity contain a normative starting point, stating what the phrase ought to mean in a specific historical context and giving a justification for its usage.

Under authoritarian regimes, and in the Palestinian case in particular, any expansion in the sphere of civil society must appear desirable. Authoritarian regimes, particularly in the Middle East, do not normally seek to restrict economic activity, in contradistinction to political activity, civil liberties and the right to unionise and organise. Any attempt to bring about change in society must therefore give precedence to the protection of political and civil liberties and to respect of human rights as necessary conditions for further change in society. In the Palestinian context, political parties in the opposition, together with other organised groups with a vested interest in change and in the protection of civil liberties and human rights, appear as main agents in the endeavour to expand the sphere of civil society.

It must be clear as well that civil society cannot endure without the protection of democratic structures. This is the lesson to be drawn if one were to survey the situation in many a country in the world today, including a majority of Arab countries. Hence, in the Palestinian case, the question concerning the prospects for the development of civil society can be rephrased as a question concerning the prospects of democracy in Palestinian society. I will briefly discuss stages in the process and refer to actors and agents necessary for its development.

Historical Analogies

The history of the development of civil society in the West is instructive and in some of its aspects relevant to the Palestinian situation. The rights of citizenship that are now taken for granted in many countries in the West came about gradually and as a result of the struggle of groups and classes that were denied those rights. The history of the development of civil society in the nineteenth and twentieth century, in Western Europe in particular, was a history of struggle for the achievement of specific rights. The rights of unionisation, association, freedom of speech, free press, but most importantly the right to organise political parties and to vote, were all denied to large sections of the populace, principally the working classes. It took large-scale general strikes in Austria in 1896 and 1905, in Finland in 1905, in Belgium in 1902 and 1913, and in Sweden in 1902, to secure universal voting rights. In Britain, the first Reform Act of 1832 left five out of six adult males (let alone women) without the right to vote, and only in 1918 was universal political citizenship recognised.12 Securing social and economic rights was no less a matter for struggle. Some success was achieved, but conditions varied from one country to another with ebbs and flows continuing to the present day.

However, the rights of citizenship are inseparable from the development and expansion of the sphere of civil society. For, if honoured, rights as claims with correlative duties for the state increase entitlements and expand the sphere of freedom of action in society. Equally important is the fact that securing those rights came about as a result of the effort and struggle of social forces and organised groups with a vested interest in their political, social and economic inclusion in society.

Keeping in mind that historical analogies can be misleading, there is nevertheless reason to argue that Palestinian society at the present stage of its development is, at least in one respect, comparable to some European societies during the nineteenth century. The development of civil society in the Palestinian context will only come about as a result of the work, effort and struggle of organised groups and social forces active in society.

Here the analogy with Europe ends, since we are not talking about the inclusion of classes that have been outside the scope o full citizenship. Rather the problem lies in the fact that the concrete realisation of the rights which Palestinians formally agreed all Palestinians ought to have is subject to the vagaries of authoritarian politics. What are absent are the structural guarantees necessary for the security and durability of those rights, hence the connection between democratisation and the development of civil society. Without constitutional and legal guarantees, but more importantly, without the separation of powers, independence of the judiciary, rule of law, accountability and rotation in government, any expansion in the sphere of civil society will remain vulnerable.

Twofold Dilemma

The problem then is twofold. The first is internal and concerns the nature of the Palestinian Authority and its relation to society. The second relates to the agreement with Israel and to the pressures that are brought to bear by Israel on the Palestinian Authority that are detrimental to the process of democratisation. It has been the demand of both the Labour and Likud governments in Israel that the Palestinian Authority play a policing role among its own population without regard to civil and human rights.

The confrontations that have taken place since September 1996 are a bleak reminder not only that peace has not been achieved, but also that there is a connection between the process of democratisation and the achievement of a political agreement that is acceptable to Palestinians. The stronger the resentment of the political situation, the more internal suppression is required to keep the population at bay.

A political agreement that is widely perceived by Palestinians to be unjust and to the detriment of their national interest will not snake it possible for any Palestinian authority to be democratic if it were to remain wedded to such an agreement. Ultimately it will come into conflict with its own population on issues related to national rights and national future. To admonish the Palestinian Authority to respect human rights and to govern democratically, without reference to Palestinian national rights and to the failings of the current political process, is to pay only lip-service to those causes.

In the long run it will be not be possible for Palestinian society to develop in a democratic direction without a political settlement which a majority of Palestinians feel satisfies a minimum of their, by now, modest aspirations. Hence, the development of civil society in Palestine will neither take place in a political vacuum nor proceed on a track unrelated to the question of national rights.