MENA in 2014: Do People Think Their Nation is Secure?

Much of the art of government lies in creating the infrastructure and institutions for a decent life. Basic security – freedom from disruption by uncontrolled violence – is a prerequisite for almost everything else that goes to make up the decent society. Where violence is beyond both control and prediction there can be no planning and no promises. Outside concerns are unlikely to make investments or to disburse development aid, internally it becomes difficult or impossible to run manufacturing, service, commercial or financial concerns beyond specific defended perimeters, and even planning housing, health, education or family formation becomes a risky business.
Security starts with how safe you feel in your neighbourhood. The ArabTrans survey asked people whether they felt safe there during the day and at night, and over 80 per cent felt safe always or mostly during the day (52% always) and over 70 per cent felt safe at night always or mostly (40% always). This leaves substantial minorities who do not feel safe: about 1 in 25 never or rarely felt safe during the day, and about 1 in 8 never or rarely felt safe at night. Everyone except the Iraqis says that the neighbourhood situation was better five years ago, but Jordan, Egypt and Morocco have substantial majorities saying the family is at least reasonably secure at present, with Iraq not far behind and Tunisia and Libya coming last at around 30 per cent, and all countries except Jordan tend to think things will be better in the future. . Everyone except the Jordanians say it will be better in the future (and a quarter of them still believe it will be good), though the lowest figure is below half the population (in Tunisia). The figures suggest a region that is not fundamentally unhappy about security at a local level, though Jordan and Egypt are a lot happier with this aspect of life than the other countries.
Most people seem to be socially integrated at a local level. In four of the six countries over three quarters (over 80% in three of them) would trust their neighbours to help them if they were in need, and in Morocco and Tunisia the proportion who say this is lower but still constitute a majority of the population. Three quarters trust the people in their neighbourhood and/or people known to them personally in a general sense, and in Egypt and Libya this is said by more than 90 per cent of respondents. However, there is little of the trust in the wider population – the ‘anonymous other’ – which is required for the social cohesion of the nation state.
Looking at national security in 2014 at the time of the ArabTrans survey, we see that Libya and Iraq are again the two countries that rate themselves as the least secure, and they are followed by Tunisia; Egypt, Jordan and Morocco follow a long way behind. In Libya and Tunisia things were perceived to have been much better five years ago; they were also perceived to have been better in Iraq, but not by much – very few Iraqis rate the security of the nation five years ago as good, and nearly 60 per cent rate it as bad. Egypt and Jordan were more secure five years ago than in 2014; Morocco was much the same, or perhaps a little better in 2014. In five years’ time all countries expect their security to be better, but all countries have a substantial percentage of respondents who say they do not know – at least 20 per cent, except in Jordan, and approaching 40 per cent in Libya, suggesting a significantly unstable or insecure outlook.
Factors which worry respondents or are seen by them as one of the main challenges for their country, in the context of security, are internal stability and security, worry about terrorist attacks, worry about an increase in sectarian or ethnic violence, worry about the possibility of civil war and/or worry about war with another country breaking out. Iraq and Libya show the highest level of concern, followed by Tunisia (though Egypt’s figures are also high) and Morocco and Jordan are the least concerned.