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The perception of Wasta is dominated by the dimension of rent-seeking, cronyism and nepotism. Considering the long and positive tradition of mediation and arbitration in Arab and Islamic culture, the political dimension of Wasta needs to be assessed in order to understand the predominantly negative perception of Wasta. Wasta as a concept, besides its traditional meaning, is inherently political in Jordan. The seeds for the rent-seeking dimension of modern Wasta were laid at the early stages of state-building in Jordan. The Ottoman Empire seeking control over the Arab peninsula never managed to successfully penetrate the entire region and only formally governed those areas of inner Arabia beyond urban and semi-urban settlements. These areas were of lesser interest to Ottoman rulers and not much effort was taken to totally integrate Bedouin tribes into Ottoman administration. “[The] badlands of the empire, and the Sublime Port was resigned to leaving it alone as long as it did not jeopardize more important regional interests or possessions such as Syria, Jerusalem or the Hejaz.” (Ghazi bin Muhammad, 1999: 13) While providing a relatively modern and integrative institutional framework, particularly at the late stages of the Ottoman Empire during the tanzimat period, control of tribal areas was limited to building coalitions with local leaders and so relying on existing power bases (Alon, 2007; Al-Rahami, 2008b). By limiting interaction to communication with tribal leaders, sheiks became the gate-keepers for distribution of wealth and power in this part of the Ottoman Empire. “To lessen tribal raids on settled areas and main trade routes, heads of tribes (shaykhs) were paid a tribute (surrah) by foreign powers.” (El-Said and Harrigan, 2009: 1238) For both the Ottoman administration and tribal people, sheiks began to play the role of middlemen between a state-structure and ordinary people. The powers that followed the Ottomans after the defeat of the Ottoman Empire in 1918 continued and further developed that strategy. After WWI the territory of today´s Jordan was part of the British mandate of Palestine. Only 1921 a separate entity named Transjordan was created

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under formal rule of Abdullah I of Transjordan but still under British administration until its independence in 1928. Abdullah I, an allied of the British against the Ottoman Empire,was promised the rule of an independent Arabia as a reward for loyalty during the Arab revolt. Abdullah, an offspring of the Hashemite clan originated from the Hejaz region, which belongs to Saudi Arabia today.

The Hashemites competed with the house of al Saud for power in an Arabian state in post- Ottoman times. Since the al Saud in an alliance with the Wahhabites succeeded to become the rulers of a modern Saudi Arabia the Hashemites moved to Transjordan as the new rulers. As a family originating from the Hejaz and lacking any power base in Transjordan, Emir Abdullah had create alliances and convince local leaders to follow the Hashemite rule secure loyalty to the newly established polity. In order to integrate existing power-structures King Abdullah and later King Hussein explicitly drew an Arab-Bedouin narrative to reach legitimacy among tribal leaders. Both rulers spent considerable time in the desert camping with tribes, building alliances, serving as Wasta and mediator in conflicts. With his open-door policy King Abdullah maintained a system of traditional tribal participation and gained the sheikh´s legitimacy (Alon, 2007; Al-Rahami, 2008b, 2008a).

Besides the central aspect of this Hashemite nation-building strategy of anticipation of existing tribal power-structures the distribution of, mainly British, resources to and through tribal leaders became a cornerstone in this system. The combination of these two factors, anticipation of traditional institutions and the provision of material resources had a severe impact on social development in Jordan. By granting sheikhs institutionalized political power and rewarding loyalty materially an “hourglass society” and a rentier-economy emerged. Slowly sheikhs became powerful gatekeeper with partly constitutional guaranteed rights to participate in state-power while traditional check and balance mechanism to control power

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vanished. “In their capacity as intermediaries and for administrative convenience they became the main channel for distributing state resources. By fulfilling this function, the shaykhs enjoyed greater leverage vis-à-vis their own constituencies.” (Alon, 2007: 73) Particularly after the occupation of the West Bank and the war against Israel, when Jordan has seen a major influx of Palestinian population securing alliances with tribal leaders became vital to stabilize the existing power balance. The institutional consensus provided sheiks a guarantee to maintain their privileged status in Jordanian society. This policy laid the foundation of the modern perception of Wasta.

While in the past Wasta mainly contained mediation services and processes of getting people connected. Modern Wasta suddenly became the dominant strategy for many Jordanians to survive in the modern state structure. The new gatekeepers that maintained a position of exclusive access to state-resources were expected to serve their tribe by distributing public goods or providing jobs in the public administration (Loewe, 2007; Richards and Waterbury, 2008). “Once in power, the occupier of the position is expected to serve the best interests of his kin group. His effectiveness in performing this social duty---commonly known as Wasta -- - then forms the main criterion for his fellow tribespeople for judging him.” (Alon, 2007:155) To date Jordan remains largely a rentier-economy with large proportions of the public budget originating from the United States in order to maintain a pro-Western mood in the country. (Al-Rahami, 2008a) Cronyism and nepotism are a widespread phenomenon in Jordan and officially efforts are taken to abolish these practices (Loewe, 2007). But it needs to be kept in mind that the privileged and institutionalized access to state resources are the downside of a system that has successfully provided stability and channels for political participation, absent in so many countries of the region, by drawing on indigenous institutions and customs. “It created a broad base of support for the stance in Jordanian society, something that was lacking

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in many Middle Eastern countries and other new states in the colonial world. By giving tribesmen a clear stake in the existence of the state and the regime…. Who proved their loyalty in times of crisis and uncertainty when the regime seemed about to collapse and the state been undone.” (Alon, 2007:151) Since this social consensus has been the cornerstone of nation-building in Jordan it must be approached carefully and very differentiated before designing policies demanding the crowding out of Wasta. In this sense it must be considered a double-edged sword that binds a society together and at the same time creates discontent and marginalises parts of the same society that it stabilizes. It must be considered what replaces Wasta if it is abolished and what happens if stability is threatened in the attempt to make a system fairer. Just as growing discontent can destabilize a society so can an erosion of the institutional base of a society. In order to prevent a crowding out mechanism a detailed discussion of the precise role of Wasta and its many dimensions is required as well as a clear distinction of when and how Wasta can be harmful and under which circumstances it has positive contributions.

5.5 Conclusion

The previous chapter has demonstrated how the institutional structure of Jordan has developed historically and outlined the central role of mediation in Arab culture and in the modern political unit of Jordan. The function of mediation in pre-Islamic Arab culture as well as in Islamic jurisprudence and the anticipation these traditions in Jordan has been discussed. This chapter has also demonstrated the emergence of rent-seeking structures through colonial policies and nation building strategies. Jordan´s institutional history and rent-seeking structures in Jordan are inextricably intertwined and an understanding of this relation essential for a discussion of Wasta and its ambiguous role in Jordan.

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