How to See the Current Sectarianism in Syria
A year after Assad, Syria lives between relief and fear, old wounds and new uncertainties. How was sectarianism was made, why it persists and what it means for the country trying to build itself again
The way we explain a situation usually shapes it, and when that situation is a conflict that demands resolution, our explanatory frame often predetermines the kind of solution we deem possible.
With that in mind, I look at the past year, the first after Assad’s fall following more than a decade of civil war and many more decades of dynastic oppression. It is not a brilliant year. Communal strife persists, nearly fifteen hundred people were killed in a massacre, and there is still no concrete prospect of building democratic institutions anchored in an inclusive constitution.
Yet this is expected. Transitional periods rarely deliver instant progress. The chances of last year being better than it was were always slim, and it could easily have been much worse. Far worse.
The pragmatism and …
