| | | | To end the year, the Global Briefing is running an exclusive series of quick takes this week from leading analysts. They will all be writing on the big issues to watch out for around the world in 2018.
Our regular Global Briefing newsletter will return on January 2. In the meantime, we would like to thank all of you for joining us in 2017. And we look forward to making the Global Briefing even better in 2018!
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| | Saudi Arabia Has Big Plans for 2018 | | From the economy to foreign policy to social issues, Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman showed he was willing to rip up the old playbook in 2017, says Michael Stephens, Middle East research fellow with the Royal United Services Institute. Next year will be all about realizing Bin Salman's ambitious vision.
"Cinemas are set to open in the Kingdom, women will finally be given the right to drive, and large scale economic restructuring (including a much-vaunted initial public offering for oil giant ARAMCO) will be pushed forward," Stephens.
"It will be a lot for the Kingdom's citizens to absorb. And while Saudis largely seem excited about what's in store, with so much going on at once there is a real risk of turbulence rather than the hoped for stability.
"Meanwhile, regional security challenges are an ongoing headache for Riyadh, with the Saudi-led coalition war in Yemen fast becoming an unwinnable quagmire, causing grievous suffering and hardship for the Yemeni people. In 2018, the Kingdom will need to radically rethink its strategy towards its southern neighbor, or risk losing support from allies. And with Iran hovering in the background, with its tight grip on security in Lebanon, Syria and Iraq, Bin Salman faces a set of challenges that would be daunting even without a reform agenda at home."
| | 2018 for Iran: Ripe for Miscalculation? | | Iran was at the center of developments in a volatile Middle East throughout 2017. Expect more of the same in 2018, writes Payam Mohseni, Iran Project Director and Fellow for Iran Studies at Harvard's Belfer Center.
"The defeat of ISIS in Iraq and the victory of Bashar al-Assad in Syria is a win for Iran and its allies," Mohseni writes. "As post-war reconstruction gets underway in these countries, Iran will play a crucial role in governance, economic, and security issues. As a result, all eyes will be on Iranian moves in 2018 to establish a more permanent security presence in Syria, and whether this elicits military reactions by Israel as the region tries to establish what could be described as the new rules of the game.
"Also important to watch in 2018 will be Iranian ally Hezbollah, and specifically whether it limits its regional operations. The broader political question, of course, is whether Iranian-backed militias that have fought in Iraq and Syria will be disbanded post-ISIS. That seems highly unlikely.
"Another factor impacting Iran? Regional rival Saudi Arabia, which has failed under the adventurous foreign policy of Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman to positively influence regional politics, from Qatar to Lebanon to Yemen. The risk of escalation between Iran and Saudi Arabia is high, and there will likely be many opportunities for miscalculation through 2018.
"One final issue that loomed large in 2017 and will continue to do so next year: the future of the Iranian nuclear deal under a Trump administration. The US President's election has empowered Iranian hardliners, and it remains to be seen if he will decide to pull out of the deal altogether after stating Tehran is not in compliance. Either way, President Trump's tough rhetoric has already given Iranian nationalism a boost."
| | 2018: An Unexpected Election Year for Israel? | | | "The big thing to watch for in Israel in 2018 will be whether Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will be indicted and respond by calling early elections," writes Martin Indyk, executive vice president of the Brookings Institution and former US ambassador to Israel. "While elections are not due until November 2019, Netanyahu, his wife and his closest advisers have been subjected to an exhaustive series of police investigations that may result in corruption charges in the new year.
"Rather than succumb to calls for his resignation, Netanyahu could seek a renewed mandate through early elections. Yet, although he remains the most popular politician, there is increasing disillusionment with political corruption as manifested in large street demonstrations, which could play to the advantage of his many challengers, including within his own Likud party.
"A second big thing to watch for next year is conflict in Syria between Iran and its proxies and Israel. Since the winding down of the civil war there, Iran has been establishing permanent bases and encouraging its militias to push south toward the Golan Heights border with Israel, a crossing of Israel's redlines. Netanyahu has been able to gain little support from Washington or Moscow for his genuine security concerns beyond tolerating Israel's military strikes aimed at deterring Iran. This is the first time that Iran and Israel are facing direct confrontation with the high potential for escalation.
"Meanwhile, a breakthrough in the peace process with the Palestinians is unlikely, despite President Trump's commitment to 'the ultimate deal.' Trump's decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital has jeopardized the US role as honest broker in Palestinian eyes and complicated Saudi and Egyptian support for Trump's efforts. Although his envoys, Jared Kushner and Jason Greenblatt, have worked hard to put a US plan together, the two sides are so far apart -- and so distrustful of each other -- that it's unlikely the plan will see daylight in 2018. However, if early elections in Israel were to generate a coalition government more committed to the two-state solution, and if changes in Palestinian leadership generated a greater capacity to negotiate a solution, then Trump might be tempted to put his plan on the table. The chances of success would still be limited, though." | | Want a Glimpse of Egypt in 2018? Look at 2017 | | The attack on a Sufi mosque last month that claimed more than 300 lives was described by Egyptian officials as the deadliest in the country's modern history. But there's little reason to think that there won't be more violence in 2018, writes Steven A. Cook, Eni Enrico Mattei Senior Fellow for Middle East and Africa Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.
"The reality is that with an insurgency in the Sinai Peninsula and a terrorist threat in its Western desert, Egypt is an unstable country. This in turn makes accurate predictions about what might happen there particularly challenging," Cook writes.
"The big event on Egypt's political calendar in 2018 will be the presidential election. Abdel Fatah el Sisi first came to power through a coup d'etat in July 2013, and was elected president the following spring. By then the broad enthusiasm for the military's intervention had waned and low turnout marked the election.
"Sisi and his advisors are looking to the 2018 election to boost his legitimacy. But their likely approach to achieving this objective will produce the opposite result. It's safe to assume that the Egyptian government will continue a crackdown on media perceived to be hostile to the president, and Sisi will hound his political rivals. Meanwhile, the extremists who are waging war against the Egyptian state will do everything they can to disrupt the elections.
"In other words, Egypt in 2018 will look a lot like Egypt in 2017."
| | Why the Stakes are so High for Nigeria | | Nigeria's Muhammadu Buhari, president of Africa's largest economy and citizenry, spent much of 2017 out of the country receiving treatment for an undisclosed condition. Expect plenty of questions about his health -- and whether he will be able to make good on his tough talk on Boko Haram and corruption -- in a year that Elizabeth Donnelly, deputy head of Chatham House's Africa Program, says will be dominated by the build-up to the 2019 election.
"Political maneuvering and machinations around the two main parties, the ruling All Progressives Congress and opposition People's Democratic Party, will generate a lot of attention," Donnelly writes. "Indeed, former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has already defected to the PDP."
"But pre-election theater aside, it's important to remember why the stakes are so high in the upcoming elections, and the potential consequences of next year's political shifts.
"Security and the economy will remain key concerns for the vast majority of Nigerians -- both have come under pressure this year from the combined challenges of Boko Haram, heavy-handed responses to calls for secession in the southeast, militancy in the oil-producing Niger Delta, religious and ethnic violence in the middle-belt, and perhaps most important of all, escalating clashes between pastoralists and settled farmers. Add tension-generating electioneering to these factors and you have a potent mix for instability and suffering.
"True, Nigeria this year edged out of recession, helped by slightly higher oil prices and output. But production may be stymied again if militant group the Niger Delta Avengers make true on their promise to resume attacks on oil installations in the south.
"All in all, 2018 will be a year of headlines for the political elite and hardship for their citizens."
| | Syria in 2018: A New Phase in the Crisis | | At first glance, the headlines about ISIS's battlefield setbacks in 2017 suggest that Syria's almost seven-year civil war is drawing to a close. Not so fast, suggests Charles Lister Senior Fellow and Director of Counter-Extremism and Counter-Terrorism at the Middle East Institute.
"The Syrian crisis will enter a new phase in 2018, as the international community's obsession with ISIS will fade and be replaced by questions over Syria's future," Lister writes. "Syria's mainstream opposition lost most from ISIS's rise to infamy, as 'countering terrorism' grabbed the attention and skewed perspective over the country's broader conflict. Yet, while ISIS was a horrible symptom of Syria's conflict, it was not a cause. Having dealt quite successfully with this symptom since late-2014, the international community now appears too fatigued with Syria to deal with the principal root cause of the country's instability: the Assad regime. That is reinforced by Russia and Iran's doubling down in their support of Assad – on the battlefield and the negotiating table."
"So, what does this mean for Syria? Conventional wisdom tells us that the war is winding down. But what war, and to what end? The war against ISIS is fading, but the jihadist group remains active. Al Qaeda and other non-ISIS jihadist groups command at least 20,000 militants elsewhere in Syria; tens of thousands of mainstream opposition fighters remain at-arms, and Iran reportedly controls at least 150,000 Shia militiamen in Syria. Russia's de-escalation zones are temporary measures that have not ended fighting altogether, while Moscow's attempts to force through a political settlement are being resisted as strongly by its supposed ally Assad as by the opposition. Iran is actually the key powerbroker, but has little interest in negotiation or compromise.
"This is not a recipe for peace, but for a festering conflict that will continue to empower extremists and war criminals and weaken anyone who might stand for something good."
| | In Dying Days of 2017, ANC Gives South Africa Hope for 2018 | | The biggest boost to South Africa's fortunes for 2018 might have come right at the end of 2017, suggests John Campbell, the Ralph Bunche senior fellow for Africa policy studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, as the ruling African National Congress named its successor to President Jacob Zuma.
"Cyril Ramaphosa's victory in the ANC leadership race will be good for democratic institutions, the rule of law, and the South African economy in 2018. He is likely to become the state president following the 2019 elections and may force out the corrupt and discredited President Zuma in 2018," Campbell writes.
"Zuma's candidate in the ANC leadership race had been Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, a medical doctor, multiple times minister, a former chairwoman of the African Union Commission -- and his ex-wife. Her strong run benefitted from Zuma's patronage/clientage networks and his hold over the party's machinery.
"An architect of the post-apartheid political settlement based on the rule of law and the constitution, and a billionaire businessman, Ramaphosa favors growing the South African economy following market-oriented principles. Those will be his themes in 2018. Had Dlamini-Zuma won, in contrast, we could have expected to see more populist policies -- her rhetoric favored redistribution of the country's wealth from the white minority to the black majority and the continuance of her ex-husband's attacks on the media, the courts, and the rule of law." | | Iraq Faces (Another) Year of Divisions | | With Iraq's military claiming this month that the country had been fully liberated from ISIS, attention in 2018 will revert to the struggle for power and resources, suggests Emma Sky, a senior fellow at Yale's Jackson Institute for Global Affairs and the author of "The Unraveling: High Hopes and Missed Opportunities in Iraq."
"In national elections in May, the main competition that will play out is within and between Shia parties. Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi is riding a wave of popularity, credited with the military victory against ISIS, and a political victory against the Kurds," Sky writes.
"But the war against ISIS has left Sunni towns devastated, with populations displaced and fearful of militias. Meanwhile, the Kurds, following their ill-advised independence referendum in September 2017, have lost control of territories, are internally divided, and are at loggerheads with Baghdad.
"Will Abadi next year be able to pull together a cross-sectarian government, offering reconstruction funds, a special status on Kirkuk, the demobilization and integration of militias, the combating of corruption, and a more functional political-economic system? Or will he seek to cement his personal position? Either way, his Shia rivals -- more closely aligned with Iran -- will seek to block his second term." | | | | | | |
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