Arrested Development in Beirut: Migration, Security and Dilemmas of Consociational Democracy

This article analyses two major dilemmas in contemporary Lebanon: Firstly, based on the theory of consociational democracy it identifies an increasing divide between the state that is building on a national security consensus among the power sharing elites and the society, which suffering from the political paralysis concerning reforms is depending on the market, the private initiative and the international donor community in coping with the challenges rooted in inadequate infrastructure, failing public services, corruption, and migration including the influx of Syrian refugees. Secondly, it discusses the contradiction between the cosmopolitan self-image of Beirut versus social exclusion of Palestinians, Asian and African migrant workers, and sexual minorities. Even if the Lebanese government points to terrorism and the refugees crisis as the biggest threats to the Lebanese state a closer analysis points to the increasing divide between state and society, which leads to a rise to a social crisis that involves all layers in the Lebanese society except the elite. Much of the discontent with this situation among Lebanese citizens and the Palestinians is today directed against the Syrians who are portrayed as the roots of the problems in Lebanon.
It is an open question though that how long time the Lebanese society accept this narrative: the mass mobilization behind first You Stink movement in 2015 and then Beirut Madinati in 2016 indicates a political awareness in Beirut that holds the government and political system responsible for the huge problems and at the same time acknowledges that political reforms leading to a better economic distribution of Lebanese resources and power sharing not only for the elites but for the Lebanese society as such is the only way ahead and the best bulwark
against a breakdown of the state.
Keywords: consociational democracy, migration, Syrian refugees, urban development, security, Beirut