Libya

Continuity and Change

Ronald Bruce St John

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2015
• ISBN:
  9781135036539
• Edition: 2
• Topic: Politique et relations internationales
• Subtopic: Politique

Retaining the conceptual framework of the first edition through emphasis on the dual themes of continuity and change, the second edition of Libya is revised and updated to include discussion of key developments since 2010, including:

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• The February 17 Revolution and the death of Muammar al-Qaddafi.

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• The political process which evolved in the course of the February 17 Revolution and led to General National Congress elections in July 2012, Constitutional Assembly elections in February 2014, and House of Representative elections in June 2014.

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• Post-Qaddafi economic policy from the National Transitional Council through successive interim transitional governments.

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• Post-Qaddafi foreign policy.

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• The on-going process of drafting a new constitution which will be followed by the election of a Parliament and a President.

Providing a comprehensive overview of the Libyan uprising, seen to be the exception to the Arab Spring, and highlighting the issues facing contemporary Libya, this book is an important text for students and scholars of History, North Africa and the Middle East as well as the non-specialist with an interest in current affairs.

1 Introduction

DOI: 10.4324/9780203768884-1

Libya is a relatively new state situated on a land that has been conquered, occupied, and administered by outsiders for centuries. The ancient Egyptians applied the name Libya to a desert people living beyond their western frontier, and the early Greeks applied it to all non-Punic Africans living west of the Egyptian border. From the time of the Punic Wars, both Greeks and the Romans applied the term Libya to Africans living on Carthaginian territory. When Italy invaded in 1911, it applied the name Libya to the provinces of the Ottoman Empire it targeted for occupation as part of a policy aimed at justifying its aggression by linking it to the former North African territories of the Roman Empire. No one applied the term Libya to what is now the State of Libya before the last century, and the Italians did not do so in a formal sense until 1929 when the separately administered territories of Tripolitania, Cyrenaica, and Fezzan were joined under a single governor. Following independence in 1951, the United Kingdom of Libya became the Kingdom of Libya in 1963, the Libyan Arab Republic in 1969, the Socialist People’s Libyan Arab Jamahiriya in 1977, the Great Socialist People’s Libyan Arab Jamahiriya in 1986, and the State of Libya in 2013. For the sake of convenience, the country generally will be referred to as Libya throughout this book.

In the beginning

The names Tripolitania, Cyrenaica, and Fezzan were first used during the Ottoman period (1551–1911) to define the three geographical areas making up Libya. Tripolitania consists of the fertile Jifara Plain in the northwest and the Jabal Tarabulus (Jabal al-Nafusha), which extends south to the great stony plateau of the Hamadah al-Hamra. The oases of the Fezzan lie below the Hamadah, stretching from the Wadi as-Shatti to the Murzuk Depression. In the eastern half of the country, Cyrenaica encompasses the fertile region of the Jabal al-Akhdar, and to the south, the oasis systems of Awjilah, Jalu, Jaghbub, and Kufrah, together with the Great Sand Sea. Tripolitania and Cyrenaica are separated by almost 500 kilometers (310 miles) of desert, known as the Sirte Plain, which stretches to the Mediterranean coast. This natural barrier has long divided the country into east and west, fostering regionalism as an important influence on the country. Drainage systems accommodate seasonal rainfalls in various parts of Libya, but the country has no permanently flowing streams or rivers (Goudarzi 1970: 6–18; Rivlin 1949: 36).

From at least 7000 BC, it would appear the coastal plain of Libya shared in the Neolithic culture common to the Mediterranean littoral. In the south in what is now the Sahara and Sahel, a savannah people flourished until changing climatic conditions around 2000 BC caused the region to desiccate. In the process, most of the area’s rivers disappeared with sediment filling the alluvial valleys and driving the remaining water into underground aquifers, the source for the Great Manmade River project in the modern era. Retreating from the approaching desert, nomadic herdsmen and hunters migrated to the Sudan or were absorbed by local Berbers. Egyptian inscriptions dating from the Old Kingdom (c. 2700–2200 BC) constitute the first recorded testimony of Berber migrations as well as the earliest written record of Libyan history. Berber speakers now constitute a minority in North Africa as a whole and also in Libya, but the magnitude of the geographical area in which they are found testifies to the size of the original population (Brett and Fentress 1996: 1–25; Raven 1993: 6–7; Dupree 1958: 33–6).

The Garamantes were a tribal confederation of Saharan peoples who lived in what is now Fezzan. Little is known of them, including what they called themselves. The name Garamantes was Greek in origin and was later adopted by the Romans. The Garamantes were a local power for almost 1,000 years (500 BC to AD 500). Confined to a chain of oases only 400 kilometers (250 miles) long, they were situated on a direct route from central Africa to the Mediterranean. Consequently, the Garamantes largely controlled trans-Saharan trade from Ghadames south to the Niger River, east to Egypt, and west to Mauritania (Daniels 1970; Liverani 2000: 17–28).

Classical period

After founding the colony of Carthage in what is now Tunisia around 814 BC, the Phoenicians (or Punics) extended their influence along the north and west coast of North Africa (Wright 2012: 7–13). In Tripolitania, they built three large coastal cities, Oea (Tripoli), Labdah (Leptis Magna), and Sabratha, known collectively as Tripolis (three cities). The Punics established good trade relations with the Berbers of Tripolitania, teaching and learning from them, and in the process, the Berbers became somewhat Punicized in language and custom. Carthage and Tripolis drew support from Berber tribes in both the first Punic War (264–41 BC) and the second Punic War (218–2 BC). After the Romans sacked Carthage at the end of the third Punic War (149–6 BC), Punic influence on the region remained significant (Aubet 1993; DiVita et al. 1999: 146–61).

Greek influence

The region of Cyrenaica takes its name from Cyrene. Founded in 632 BC, it was the first Greek city in North Africa and one of the foremost cities in the Greek world. Over the next 200 years, the Greeks established four more cities on the North African shore: Ptolemais (Tolmeita), Euesperides (later Berenice and now Benghazi), Teuchira (later Arsinoe and now Tukrah), and Apollonia (later Susa, the port of Cyrene). Known as the Pentapolis, these five cities eventually became republics and experimented with a variety of democratic institutions. Libya would not again experience democratic experimentation for almost 2,000 years. The cities constituting the Pentapolis traded together and shared a common coinage, but intercity rivalries limited other forms of cooperation, even when faced with a common foe. Due to this weakness, they were conquered in 525 BC by the Persian king, Cambyses III, and for the next 200 years, they constituted the westernmost province of the Persian empire (MacKendrick 1980: 117; DiVita et al. 1999: 184–239).

In 331 BC, Cyrenaica returned to Greek rule under Alexander of Macedonia, and it remained so until the last Ptolemaic king, Ptolemy Apion, bequeathed it to Rome in 96 BC. In 67 BC, Cyrenaica was joined with Crete as a Roman province, and in AD 115–17, Cyrene suffered considerable damage during an insurrection by its Jewish community, a revolt brutally suppressed by Emperor Trajan (ruled 98–117) (De Felice 1985: 1–2). In 300, Emperor Diocletian (ruled 284–305) separated Cyrenaica from Crete, forming the provinces of Upper Libya and Lower Libya and marking the first time that the term Libya was used as an administrative designation in the country. With the partition of the Roman Empire in 324, control of Cyrenaica passed to Constantinople and the Byzantines while Tripolitania was attached to the western empire (MacKendrick 1980: 121).

Roman Empire

In the third century BC, Carthage and Rome began to compete for control of the central Mediterranean, an epic struggle that concluded with Rome’s destruction of its rival at the conclusion of the third Punic War in 146 BC. At the time, the Roman provinces of Africa approximated the territory earlier controlled by Carthage, but by 27 BC, the Romans had expanded their influence to include virtually all of the coastal areas of contemporary Tunisia. Systematic Roman colonization of North Africa, including Tripolitania, did not begin until one century later (Raven 1993: 33–48). In the process, the region became an important granary for Rome as well as a significant trading center for consumer goods, like ivory, ostrich feathers, and salt. Ancient trading routes from the interior of Africa to the Mediterranean coast included routes from Tripoli in the northwest to Ghadames, Ghat, Air, and Kano in what is now northern Nigeria; from Tripoli to Murzuk, Fezzan, and Bornu, west of Lake Chad; and from Benghazi in the northeast to Awjilah, Kufrah, Wadai, and Abeche in what is now eastern Chad (Wright 1989a: 16; Ahmida 2005: 3–4).

Following the destruction of Carthage, the Romans occupied the three trading posts of the Tripolis. Roman culture in North Africa was largely urban, and one of them, Leptis Magna, later developed into the finest example of a Roman city in Africa (MacKendrick 1980: 143–75). The economic and political importance of Leptis Magna rested on its geographical location in relation to the Mediterranean and the well-watered littoral of Tripolitania (DiVita et al. 1999: 44–143). The city prospered from the first to the early third centuries; however, following a serious economic crisis in the second half of the third century, attacks by Berber tribes, especially the Austuriani, were increasingly frequent (Warmington 1954: 9–10).

In 238, the increasingly heavy tax burden imposed by Rome sparked a revolt in North Africa which left many of the important towns of the region devastated. For a time, the economic center of the area shifted to the smaller towns of the interior that were spared the worst effects of the Roman suppression of the revolt. The projection of imperial power into the hinterland antagonized already tenuous relations between Romans and native Berbers as the autonomy of the latter was increasingly circumscribed. The Emperor Diocletian granted the region autonomy in 294–305, but sometime in the early fourth century, Tripolitania was made a Roman province (Rinehart 1979: 10).

The spread of Christianity into Africa in the first and second centuries complicated an already explosive situation. With Christianity seen as a vehicle of dissent, Berbers converted to the faith, not out of conviction, but as a challenge to Roman rule. Adding to the mix, the Donatists, a North African sect holding strict views regarding sanctity and purity, split with the mainstream Catholic Church around 312. Thereafter, Berber revolts flared for more than a century under the banner of Donatism. In 405, Emperor Honorius (ruled Roman Empire 393–5 and Western Roman Empire 395–423) declared Donatism a heresy, and in 411 he made it a criminal offense. In the interim, persistent religious conflict progressively undermined Roman authority throughout the region (Warmington 1954: 76–102; Raven 1993: 150–61, 168–81, 190–4; Wright 2012: 37–43).

Vandals

The Vandals, a group of Germanic tribesmen, crossed into North Africa from Spain in 429 (Warmington 1954: 14, 51). After the Teutonic onslaught left only a few North African towns in Roman hands, Emperor Valentinian III (ruled 425–55) in 435 concluded a treaty with Gaiseric, the Vandal leader, in which Rome retained Carthage but surrendered the surrounding provinces to the Vandals. Four years later, Gaiseric reneged on the agreement, capturing Carthage in 439. Valentinian III concluded a new agreement with the Vandals in 442 in which he ceded to them North Africa from Tripolitania to eastern Numidia, a former Berber Kingdom overlapping present-day Algeria and Tunisia. Thirteen years later, the Vandals crossed to Italy and sacked Rome itself (Raven 1993: 196–200). Fourteen centuries would pass before Italy again ruled even a part of Libya.

While they occupied North Africa for almost a century, the territory ruled by the Vandals was smaller than the old Roman provinces and gradually ringed by independent Berber kingdoms. Gaiseric used bribes and other forms of patronage to exercise some authority over these smaller fiefdoms, but with his death in 447, the efforts of his successors were less successful. With the Vandal Kingdom slowly disintegrating from within, Emperor Justinian I (ruled 527–65) sent an army to North Africa in 533 to reassert Roman rule. His army succeeded in defeating the Vandals in 534, but the Byzantine Empire never reached the full extent of the old Roman Empire (Raven 1993: 205–20; Wright 2012: 45–53).

Early Arab influence

With the death of the Prophet Muhammad in 632, Arab armies initiated a campaign of proselytism that eventually led to the conquest of half the known world. The Byzantine provinces of Egypt, Syria, and Persia proved the more attractive early prizes with the remote and less wealthy regions of North Africa a secondary target. Alexandria was not occupied until 643 followed by Cyrenaica in 644. Two years later, the Arabs moved into Tripolitania, overrunning isolated Byzantine garrisons on the coast and consolidating Arab control of the region. Almost two decades then passed before the Umayyad general, Uqba bin Nafi, invaded the Fezzan in 663, forcing the capitulation of Germa, capital of the Garamantes. Stiff Berber resistance in the Tripolitanian hinterlands later delayed the Arab advance, but Arab armies in 670 surged into present-day Tunisia. By 715, the Arab Empire stretched north to the Pyrenees in Spain, and in North Africa, it conformed to the limits of the old Roman Empire (Laroui 1977: 79–81; Raven 1993: 224–30).

Libya has been subjected to a long history of invasion and occupation; however, it was the arrival of the Arabs in the seventh century which had the most lasting impact. Islam and the Arabic language, backed by a social system well-suited to pastoral nomadism, were easily absorbed by a North African people whose lives were still structured to some degree by the ethos of Punic civilization. In the process, the often confusing, even contradictory, message of sectarian Byzantine Christianity was gradually cast off (Hardy 2002: 19). In its place, Cyrenaica and Tripolitania were systematically organized under the political and religious leadership of the Umayyad Caliphate (661–760). Successful in extending their power and influence into North Africa, Spain, and southern France, the Umayyads imposed a degree of Arab sovereignty, if not Arabization or Islamization. The process of Arabization required many more centuries to complete while Islamization was largely the work of the Berbers themselves (Laroui 1977: 87; Wright 2012: 55–9).

Abbasids, Aghlabids, and Fatimids

In a period of turmoil, the Abbasid dynasty (750–1258) replaced the Umayyads and relocated the caliphate to Baghdad. Recognizing the difficulty of governing their North African domains from afar, the Abbasids accepted the autonomy of military officers and regional governors as long as they recognized the spiritual leadership of the caliph and paid an annual tribute. In 800, the Abbasid caliph Harun al Rashid (ruled 786–809) appointed Ibrahim ibn Aghlab the amir of a significant part of the contemporary Maghrib. Establishing a hereditary dynasty at Kairouan in northeastern Tunisia, the Aghlabids ruled Tripolitania and present-day Tunisia, largely functioning as an autonomous state (Laroui 1977: 115–22, 127–8).

In the late ninth century, missionaries of the Ismaili sect of Shiite Islam converte...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half-title Page
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication Page
• Table of Contents
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• Note on transliteration and use of names
• Chronology
• List of abbreviations
• Map
• 1 Introduction
• 2 State formation
• 3 Politics
• 4 Economics
• 5 International relations
• 6 Conclusions
• Bibliographical survey of the recent literature
• Glossary
• Bibliography
• Index