THE TRANSITION TO THE NEW ARAB WORLD
Egypt led the New Arab World from the late days of its monarchy to the late days of President Sadat, propelled by the largest and most sophisticated Arab Economy.
However Egypt's share of total regional GDP sank and is still sinking as a result of the disastrous socialist economic policies introduced by President Nasser. Starting with the nationalization of private enterprises and the criminalizing of private ownership to the closing of the economy to the global market place.
Many other Arab countries followed Egypt's path; countries like Iraq, Syria, Algeria, and Libya and as a result all suffered the same fate, losing economic wealth and hence political and military influence.
At the same time other Arab nations maintained a minimum degree of stability, preserved their private economy and encouraged it to grow, allowed competition to flourish and welcomed private and foreign capital. Those nations continued to grow and over time greatly increased their share of total regional GDP. Key amongst those were the GCC Nations. Helped by oil wealth, the GCC nations were able to grow their share of total Arab GDP from very little in the 1950's to about 40% of the total Arab GDP. Other nation's that did well were Morocco in North Africa and Jordan in the Levant. As a result, those nations were able to increase their relative political and military influence.
This major transition of economic fortunes over 40 years has put in motion a need for transition in the Arab League's Leadership responsibilities starting with a transition period where Egypt was not willing to give up the role but not able to afford it, through a period where other Arab Nations such as Iraq of Saddam Hussein, challenged to take that role by forces. A transition period where Egypt was not ready to hand over its leadership and the GCC led by Saudi was not ready to take the responsibility. But also a period where the balance of economic and military power had not shifted far enough to make the decision a no brainer. A period where the Arab League's efforts were scattered, indecisive and with no clear direction.
Finally though, with the recent troubles in Egypt as a result of the Arab Spring, and the start of the Saudi led military intervention in Yemen this leadership transition issue has been settled. Egypt officially passed the lead role responsibility to Saudi Arabia supported by its GCC alliance and Saudi officially accepted responsibility of that role. And in the absence of the trouble makers (Muammar Al Qaddafi of Libya, Saddam Hussein of Iraq and Assad of Syria), the Arab league officially endorsed the new leadership and showed its acceptance via the latest Arab Summit's attendance, conformity, decisiveness and support to the Saudi led action in Yemen. The world has also taken notice and demonstrated acceptance via the support it gave the Saudi led Yemen intervention and in passing the Saudi proposed Security Council resolution.
Inside the GCC the leadership role was always that of Saudi Arabia, however, a transition has happened in the second position within the GCC. A position Kuwait held in the early days, because it held the second largest economy through the 70's and 80's. However Kuwait has since fallen to third position after the UAE which has over taken Kuwait as the second largest economy for exactly the same reasons that Egypt, Iraq and Syria lost relative economic importance (Kuwait being the most closed GCC economy with the largest government ownership of the economy) and the UAE was propelled forward for exactly the same reasons that propelled the GCC forward.
Regionally the biggest loser was Iran. Again for the same reason, nationalization, elimination of private ownership, corruption and closing its self from the global economy. IRAN has dropped way down from its peak at the time of the Shah, when it was by far the largest regional economy, with the largest political influence regionally and globally and the strongest regional military capability. Today Iran is moving closer to being an irrelevant economy globally and with much reduced influence regionally.
From an Iran that moved with no resistance to capture the contested UAE Islands to an Iran that couldn't provide the necessary air support to its ally government in Baghdad against ISIS. An IRAN that had to accept the fall of its sponsored government of Al Malki and seek or accept the help of its declared enemies (UAE/Jordan/France and USA) in providing air cover to the Iraqi forces supported by Iranian backed militia's to help them survive and resist ISIS. An Iran that basically had to surrender Iraq to the USA and Arab coalition because it could not economically and militarily afford to keep it.
How can an Iran this weak, with a nonexistent air force, protect or defend its navy or operate in long distance military action. Iran that has just lost Iraq because Iraq today needs the USA and the Arab coalition to defend its borders, to fight ISIS and to keep its internal national unity. For the Kurdish North and the Sunni Centre will not accept a federal Iraq without USA and GCC guarantees. Iran has also lost Sudan, Hamas, its foothold in Yemen and soon its foothold in Syria and Lebanon. With Hezbollah losing as a result of a weaker ally (Iran), and the burden of the weight and costs of its military intervention in Syria, while at the same time dealing with the challenge to its leadership posed by the increasing power of the traditional Arab Shiite leadership.
Iran's economic slide is not going to stop anytime soon. Iran still needs to reconcile its Iran Spring issues, build the necessary consensus to reverse its current economic policies, by privatizing its Government owned economy, opening the market to foreign capital, encouraging local private ownership etc. However that alone will not be enough, Iran needs to do all of this much better than its other regional challengers in order to not only to stabilize its economic slide but seek to recover lost ground. Iran in my opinion is out, busy internally for the next 15-20 years.
The new regional winner is Turkey, it has managed to find a way of achieving minimum social peace via a democracy and focus on economic development. It has used the national consensus to join the EU, to drive its economic and political reform agenda. Turkey has managed to grow to the 14th largest economy in the world, slightly bigger than Saudi Arabia (but with ⅓ the per capita GDP). With this economic growth came increase regional and global political influence and increase military strength and confidence. The Turkish economy today is critical to many parts of the Arab World. The Kurdish Zone in the Arab World is today tied economically more to Turkey than the Arab World and nations in the Levant will find themselves with stronger economic ties to the Turkish economy.
With leadership finally settled in the Arab World, and regional power shifting to the GCC and Turkey and with Iran more and more internally focused. With the change in mind set that was forced on the leaders of the Arab World as a result of the Arab Spring movements and the new found energy and aspiration of the Arab Street as a result of the same. The region should in my view have seen its worst days, and should slowly move to stabilizing the current conflicts and focus its energy on economic growth, especially that its new leadership, unlike Nasser's Egypt or Khomeini's Iran has no political agenda to sell to the world except the need to focus on peace and prosperity.