Dubai: Arab revolutions not only changed the political scene in many countries, they also changed the social and intellectual scenes, bringing in new faces and marginalizing former elites that did not rise to the challenge, panelists at the second session of the Arab Media Forum discussed on Tuesday.
Moderator Jamil Azar, Anchor at Al Jazeera Arabic news channel, said Arab revolutions started spontaneously as a reaction to decades of oppression and wondered what the role of the leading elites was during these events, and what it would be in the future.
Abdullah Al Ghathami, Professor of Criticism at King Saud University, said with the development of modern means of communication, institutions found out that they were isolated from social reality, which was taken over by a new culture.
"Even those who took place in the revolutions were surprised that their presidents stepped down. They were not expecting that their efforts would pay off," he said.
Al Taher Labib, Professor of Social Sciences in Tunisia, said although Arab intellectuals were not present in the revolutions, that did not mean that they had no role.
"They have a history of giving, struggling and sacrificing, and it is not fair to say that they were not present in revolutions because intellectually, they were," he said.
Mariam Lootah, Assistant Professor of Political Science in UAE University, said that although reality is ever changing, in the Arab world everyone works with the static logic.
"Although that there is an old Arab proverb that says ‘there's a different state and men for each time', yet Arabs were shocked because of the changes," she said.
On his part, Palestinian writer and political science professor Tamim Al Barghouthi said the upheaval in the Arab countries was different because it did not have an organisational structure, but was organized.
"We saw protestors in Egypt form a shadow state in the Midal Al Tahreer and manage health, media, defence and security without ministries. They also found a way to live and work together, men and women, Muslims and Christians, the rich and the poor, all worked together as if they had written a new constitution," he said.
Jordanian writer Khairi Mansour said it was not fair to exclude Arab elites as they existed long before the revolutions started and many intellectuals sacrificed before the spark of revolution in Tunisia.
