Baath Party

Baath Party, political party and movement influential among Arab communities in the Middle East, especially in Syria and Iraq. The Baath was from the beginning a secular Arab nationalist party. Socialism (never Marxism) was adopted as the Party's economic dogma very early on: “Unity [Arab], Freedom [from colonialism], and Socialism” were its watchwords, although its attempts to promote unity were abandoned after the 1960s and in recent years its socialism has been much attenuated. The name “baath”, which means resurrection or renaissance, indicates the party's basic idea of encouraging a rebirth of Arab national spirit. Its secular socialist nature made it attractive to disadvantaged and marginal communities, such as the Alawites in Syria or the various Christian groups in the region.

The three major proponents of early Baathist thought, Zaki al-Arsuzi, Salah al-Din al-Bitar, and an Arab Christian, Michel Aflaq, were all educators who were middle class in origin and whose political thought had been influenced by partial education in the West. During the 1930s Arsuzi, Salah, and Aflaq expounded their vision of Arab nationalism to small audiences in Syria, and in the early 1940s Salah and Aflaq organized demonstrations in support of Rashid Ali al-Gailani's government in Iraq against the British presence there. The movement evolved into a party, the official founding of which may be dated from the first Party Congress in Damascus on April 7, 1947, when a constitution was approved and an executive committee established. Organizationally the Baath Party was divided into a national command, that is the all-Arab party, and regional commands in each Arab country. It was intended that the national command would predominate but during the 1960s its importance was wholly overshadowed by the regional commands of the Baath parties of Syria and Iraq, each of which created its own national command. Regional commands of the Baath Party existed in other Arab countries, including Jordan, Lebanon and Yemen, but were not significant and looked variously to Syria or Iraq for guidance.

In 1952 the Syrian Baath merged with the Arab Socialist Party of Akram al-Hurani to form the Arab Baath Socialist Party and in 1954 won seats at the election. From then on Baath members played an important part in the politics of Syria and were instrumental in procuring the union with Egypt in 1958 that led to the official and temporary dissolution of the party and the disillusion of the Baathists. The Baathists returned to the centre of Syrian politics in the coup of 1963 and after seven years of confused struggling for power, marked by conflicts between the military and civil wings of the party, within the military wing, and between individuals, established in 1970 the long-lasting regime led by Hafez al-Assad and subsequently his son Bashar. In the 1973 Syrian constitution the Baath was described as “the leading party of the society and state” and so it remained, although in practice it became no more than a mass rally and real power passed to the security forces dominated by the Alawi minority and led by the president. In the meantime the Baath Party in Syria grew from a few hundreds in the early 1960s to 35,000 in 1968 and to more than half a million members in 1984.

The Baath party in Iraq was founded in 1952 but remained a tiny, extra-parliamentary group until 1958. In 1959 it failed in an attempt to assassinate the Iraqi leader, ‘Abd al-Karim Kassem, and in 1963 was one of the two groups that overthrew him. In the following five years the Baath Party (although deeply divided) remained a prominent factor in Iraqi politics and eventually seized full power in the second coup of July 1968. From that time onwards the Baath Party, or more precisely its successive leaders, Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr until 1979 and Saddam Hussein, ruled Iraq until 2003. Unlike the Syrian Baath, which fell completely under the control of its military leaders, control of the Iraqi Baath remained in civilian hands and the military was subordinated to it. Until 1980 the Iraqi Baath remained a small, well-organized, elite party rising in numbers from 5,000 in 1968 to 50,000 in 1979. As Saddam Hussein established his personal regime, relying principally on his kin and the internal security forces, the Baath Party grew in size and lost effectiveness. When the Baathist regime in Iraq was overthrown it was estimated that membership had reached two million and the party was really no more than a great patronage engine, distributing rewards and privileges to its members. Nonetheless, Saddam still valued it for its ability to reach the masses and during the 1990s made several attempts to reform and reinvigorate the party and to attract women and youth to it. After the War on Iraq by the United States and its allies in 2003 the Baath regime was overthrown and the party dissolved on May 13; its senior members were barred from holding public office.