Jordan’s Political Landscape pt. 1
In the lead-up to the parliamentary elections in Jordan, the newly revamped political party sector prepares itself for campaigning. However, most of the parties are unknown and, worse, don’t seem to be doing much to change that fact. According to a recent poll by IRI, only 14% of Jordanians could name a single party. We now have over three dozen parties, many with similar names, few with clear platforms, and only a handful with anything approaching a brand.
The parties cannot be blamed too much (I’m kidding, I’m going to blame them for a lot in a few minutes) since Jordan has a rocky history with political parties which has made the public hesitant to engage with them. A hesitant public and a political system with few opportunities for their success resulted in weak parties that mostly revolved around a single personality who bankrolled them - except the leftists (more on them later) and the Islamic Action Front (a lot more on them later).
The current state of parties is about to change radically as many will be culled through the electoral process. However, the election is actually a major bellwether on the entire inclusion experiment - the goal of including more Jordanians in the political system through parties, quotas, lowered age requirements, redistricting, and a redesigned parliament. Poor performance by the parties could seriously contribute to declining public trust in the modernizations, and reduce the popular appetite to engage.
Three Things You Should Know:
1.Jordan’s History with Parties: From 1957-1989 Jordan was under martial law and political parties were banned. Under new liberalization after the removal of martial law, parties began forming in 1992. We still see some of these parties today, specifically the IAF. But for the first decade and half, parties were largely confined to being small echo chambers with a declining role in governance. As parties failed to represent, around 2010 we saw the rise of political movements or Hirak movements. Since the end of martial law, there have been four changes to the political parties law (1992, 2007, 2012, and 2015), and also regular changes to the electoral law. Few parties had electoral success in the 2013, 2016, and 2020 parliamentary elections. This was due to both the dismal campaigns by parties (if they even participated) but also political apathy from the public. Parties continued to split, boycott or lose elections, and suffer harassment and arrest. Most parties never had a successful leadership transition, and as party leadership calcified, more junior members saw no room for growth or promotion. They either quit or formed split-off parties. Many parties had little funding and so had little campaigning or communication. Few parties also participated in local elections. They lacked strategic plans and election plans, and did not have mechanisms to collect dues. The public saw parties as strident opposition and a quick ticket to police problems (or employment problems or scholarship problems or academic problems). All of this would result in very low knowledge of political parties, very low interest in political parties, and great hesitation towards the idea of joining political parties. As of February 2024, 86% of Jordanians could not name even a single political party.
2.Party Communication: Parties have a tremendous communication challenge. They are convincing Jordanians that they should vote (not only do Jordanians not vote, the vast majority don’t believe in the elections). They are also convincing them to listen to parties and choose one. Finally, they are trying to brand themselves. They need voters to at least remember their name, and how they stand out from the other (38?) parties. We understand this is daunting. Few of the parties seem up to the challenge if any. RASED conducted a study of the parties through interviews with the party leaders. Unsurprisingly almost all said they would participate in the coming elections. Surprisingly a few of them said they don’t believe in the elections! What message does it give voters if even the parties don’t believe in the elections? So, minus one for the parties here.
Let’s go back to that RASED study. The report claims that parties are ‘conservative’ regarding refugees. Since refugees aren’t mentioned in their platforms, that means the party leader was just giving an opinion, not approved by the party’s political council, and claiming it as the party position. This kind of ‘my opinion is the party opinion’ is what the new reforms meant to destroy. Second fail. Minus a second point for the parties.
Third, it was very evident that the majority of parties were using the anger over Gaza for their own marketing. One party even combined a Gaza protest in Zarqa with the ribbon cutting for their Zarqa office. Jordanians are almost unanimous in anger over the genocide in Gaza, so maybe that is a easy pick. But did they say they would do anything about it in Parliament when elected? Or is it just a quick attention grab.
Parties need voters, not members. Many parties are focused on party membership and not enough on voter buy-in. Parties need to work on their platforms (look for the next point to my analysis of the available platforms) but they need branding, policy proposals, and campaign rhetoric as well to get votes. What exactly are they communicating?
There are debates between party leaders on Al Mamlaka TV (I will do a full analysis of the debates soon).. In each debate, three party leaders are selected and given one issue to discuss. (I don’t know how they choose which leaders get which topic. Given how paramount economic concerns are, if I were a party leader and wasn’t given an economic topic, I would feel cheated. Also, will they cycle through all 38 parties?) The debates are much more than we have had before. A good step forward. But the party leaders debate like single mandate candidates. They are all debating executive branch policies and not legislative branch policies, though this is where the debate should be focused. We are not voting for a Prime Minister but voting for parties in parliament. I have yet to see anything that addresses the structural deformities in the legislative branch and the power imbalance between the two branches. The Parliament also plays an oversight role, yet which party is discussing oversight?
It is an American style debate between big personalities. Voters should see their ability for governance, not their public speaking skills. I understand the idea is to mobilize voters, but wouldn’t going head to head with the executive branch, prove ability to govern and provide solutions? A quick presentation of the legislation they would propose on the issue would be clarity and campaigning. A debate with a Minister or government official on the issue would give us the contract we need. In short, “How will your party address the current issue differently than the current government and what will be the first proposal on this your party brings to Parliament?” That’s it really.
3.The (Lack of) Party Proposals: When it comes to ideas, not all political parties are created equal. The Islamic Action Front (IAF) and Social Democrats both have dense documents with their programs and plans - other parties like Mithaq and Eradah are sticking to short, brief taglines and political tweaks. Honestly both approaches are insulting. This view may be harsh. Parties just started. It takes time to research sectors and develop policies. At least some parties have actually worked on creating party platforms (most have not to put it quite bluntly). So, we appreciate the parties that have put in the work. Voters still need to be persuaded to vote and to engage in the political party sector which has been moribund for the entire lifetime of most voters. Long, dense, PDF documents will deter voters as much as the empty promises they have heard before. Voters select based on party brand more often than a nuance of policy on page 13 of the PDF or on an empty slogan. They want representation for people like them.
Looking at the party brands, separate from their platform and policy communications:
IAF is hardcore opposition (entertain me here)
Mithaq (A safe selection of people familiar with power)
Social Democrats (progressive lefties)
HASHD (working-class hardcore lefties)
National Islamic Party (The Marouf Cafe to IAF’s Starbucks. Similar product but Jordanian, without the franchised baggage.)
Baathists (Saddam)
Communists (fueled by hammers and sickles)
Eradah (The Tesla of parties - sleek, looks innovative, personnel problems)
Analyzing the party platforms in-depth (at least the ones that exist) is confusing and unrealistic - for example Social Dems have a 12 page document on their fiscal policy in it they talk about reducing dependency on foreign aid, however they don’t discuss mitigating the effects of such reduction on social welfare and vulnerable populations. They explain that they will do that through increasing local revenue, What? Then they push for digital transition. A laudable and necessary goal. Though they say nothing about digital literacy, or how swaths of the population will be left behind with this transition as COVID demonstrated. The proposal disregards the cybersecurity landscape and how to have online protection or privacy laws. They do talk about digital literacy in their education document but briefly and demanding (everyone should have a laptop, be Internet literate, etc.). I wonder how they would achieve that after eliminating external aid? To be fair, their program is very robust, in comparison. The Social Dem documents are far superior to the IAF’s 2022 program (all 504 pages of it). The IAF jumps from social to economic to post-modern theory and then gives a recommendation along the lines of “we must guarantee kids have post school activity centers so they can better fit into society”. What? The IAF seems to confuse postdoc papers on theory with governance proposals.
The hard left - HASHD, Baathists, Communists - propose large-scale systemic change, not adaptation. As a result, winning a few seats will likely be insufficient for their plans, making their platforms close to irrelevant. How will they form coalitions? What legislation do they propose? How will they exercise oversight? They have a very interesting and revolutionary world view (power to the people!) but they have no plan for what to do with that power. They have not put forth one single program (other than a nice nostalgic trip to my leftist 20s).
The “ change” parties - parties that are offering something, anything - share a criticism of the status quo but offer little to no realistic legislative alternative. This is not a debate over coffee. This is not a political philosophy lecture. How will your MPs vote and behave in Parliament?
Two other major parties are Eradah and Mithaq. This can be labeled ‘tweak parties’. They are not demanding major reform and restructuring. There is little new here. They suggest how to streamline here or there, and demand innovation and forward thinking. This is Status Quo 2.0.
My Take:
I am not planning on joining a political party, but I was planning on voting. If you've read my previous newsletters I have explained that I have never voted in Jordanian elections and that this time is different and I was looking forward to voting. Frankly, that excitement is gone.
Where are we going? And how do we get there? Who are we? What are our priorities? These are questions I would have wanted an answer before going to the ballot box. If anything, reading and examining all the documents has left me more confused than when I started.
I don’t need a political WebMed. I don’t need the political version of a life coach. I want a committed group of people to tell me their vision for Jordan and what will be their first steps in Parliament to help us get there.
In the debates, why are parties debating one another? I want parties debating the Khasawneh cabinet. There is a real problem with the structure of power between the legislative and executive branch and this will not be changing any time soon, so I would like the political parties debating the executive branch. Parties are running for Parliament this September. Hopefully the 41 seats reserved for parties in Parliament will be active and expand Parliament’s power and role.
One of the most repeated lines by the government is “It is different when you’re in the thick of it”. I agree - criticism of the state is easy, putting forward aspirational solutions is easy too. So, I would like the parties to debate the state, to be presented with the “facts on the ground” which only the government seems to know, and I would like to see how parties approach those issues.
Overemployed public sector? Prime ministers have talked about it. It's not revolutionary to mention it. What would be revolutionary is telling me what your plan will be, what do you plan on doing for the impacted employees, what are the security, economic and social repercussions for such a move? Parties like to talk about supporting the private sector, empowering women, empowering youth. These ideas sound good, but what are your next steps? Why so little and vague on gender based violence, corruption, refugees, oversight, transparency, decentralization, and vote buying?
I am asking a lot. I know. But I believe the citizens of Jordan deserve it. In October 2022, when asked to what extent citizens have a say in government decision making, 70% of Jordanians said “None”. So, now when we have change and we have options - we have a lot of questions. Just because the people have new choices doesn’t mean the people need to make this easy. We won’t applaud you just for showing up. We won’t applaud political advertisement. Put in the work and convince us. It’s been a long time coming.