The story of a pivotal moment in modern world history when Arabs established a representative
democracy-and how the West crushed it When Europe's Great War engulfed the Ottoman Empire Arab
nationalists rose in revolt against their Turkish rulers and allied with the British on the
promise of an independent Arab state. In October 1918 the Arabs' military leader Prince
Faisal victoriously entered Damascus and proclaimed a constitutional government in an
independent Greater Syria. Faisal won American support for self-determination at the Paris
Peace Conference but other Entente powers plotted to protect their colonial interests. Under
threat of European occupation the Syrian-Arab Congress declared independence on March 8 1920
and crowned Faisal king of a civil representative monarchy. Sheikh Rashid Rida the most
prominent Islamic thinker of the day became Congress president and supervised the drafting of
a constitution that established the world's first Arab democracy and guaranteed equal rights
for all citizens including non-Muslims. But France and Britain refused to recognize the
Damascus government and instead imposed a system of mandates on the pretext that Arabs were not
yet ready for self-government. In July 1920 the French invaded and crushed the Syrian state.
The fragile coalition of secular modernizers and Islamic reformers that had established
democracy was destroyed with profound consequences that reverberate still. Using previously
untapped primary sources including contemporary newspaper accounts reports of the Syrian-Arab
Congress and letters and diaries from participants How the West Stole Democracy from the
Arabs is a groundbreaking account of an extraordinary brief moment of unity and hope-and of
its destruction.
