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On 16 May, 1916, the famous Sykes-Picot agreement was signed secretly between the United Kingdom and France. The agreement was also approved by Tsarist Russia. The post-Ottoman order in the Middle East and territories of the region were shaped significantly according to this agreement, and secret diplomacy, negotiations and pacts between the great powers, as well as bargains over the extraterritorial zones were the order of day. The legacy of Sykes-Picot for the people of the Middle East has proved to be painful. One-hundred years after the agreement, the Middle East is not a more peaceful or prosperous place.
Despite the criticisms to the regional order shaped by the Sykes-Picot agreement, the shattering of the existing order and borders in the Middle East constitute a greater challenge today than its survival, as the existing state system in the Middle East is doomed to fail. Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and Yemen seem to be failed projects in terms of state-making and maintenance, as the mismatches between the social fabrics and the political structures of these political entities has generated deep grievances over the century. ISIS seems to be the new Trojan horse that could prevent the possibility of pluralistic political entities in the region.
A century after Sykes-Picot, we are still puzzled by the same questions: Is it possible to institute sustainable and peaceful political order in the region? Will the peoples of the region and the regional political actors be the agents in such transformations? Looking at the ongoing developments in Syria or Iraq, we can reason that the answers to both questions seem to be negative. It is frustrating to recognize that the model and the spirit that reshaped the Middle East are still alive and deciding the fate of Syria, and Iraq and Lebanon may soon fall into the same trap. The declining significance of the Middle East’s oil is the only promising development for the people of the region who have suffered the political consequences of the competition for this resource. The same development seems to be the curse of dictators and the families that have enjoyed prosperity and power over the last few decades.
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