Ditto what Patrick said. In the end, one of the most important aspects of whether or not an insurrection is successful is which way the military goes. In Egypt, for the most part, the military refused to fire, and in the end sided with the rebels. The question for Egypt now is whether or not the military will give up control in an election (it looks like they will, but you never know).
One important correlate of this, is that it matters who the military is. The Egyptian military was made entirely of Egyptians, and the crowds were Egyptians. One of the things you kept hearing out of Libya when this mess started, was that people were unsure who the military personnel were that were attacking them. If the Libyan army was composed mostly of foreign mercenaries, which seems likely, that might explain much of the difference between the two situations. (For a US example, recall that Robert E. Lee would likely have stayed with the Union, and not joined the Confederacy, if Lincoln had not made the mistake of ordering him to attack fellow Virginians.) Eric On Sun, Mar 20, 2011 11:11 AM, Gary Schiltz <[email protected]> wrote: > I fear that this sounds like blaming the victims (i.e. the Libyan >people), but I haven't heard discussion of the difference between how >Egypt managed its overthrow of its dictator versus how Libya has attempted to >do so. At least from just watching the two situations unfold on network TV >(CNN & BBC), it seems that the Egyptian "revolution" >was essentially peaceful, with passive resistance to the status quo by a large >number of unarmed people. Perhaps Mubarak was just that much less of a tyrant >than Gadhafi, or maybe it really does show the power of nonviolent resistance. >In any case, the Libyan rebels took up arms early on, and in a sense empowered >Gadhafi by giving him an excuse for retaliating. I wonder what would have >happened if the resistance there had remained peaceful. Thoughts? >============================================================ >FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv >Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College >lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org > > > Eric Charles Professional Student and Assistant Professor of Psychology Penn State University Altoona, PA 16601
============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
