>>85 >>88
The population of the country is predominantly Arab, but 8% consider themselves Berbers, and up to 3% – Tuaregs. Moreover, the Arabs, Berbers, and Tuaregs are still very firmly entrenched in the tribal structure of society (there are over 140 tribes in the country, and in each, as a rule, there are several tribal clans). Loyalty to the clan and tribe both in the Middle Ages and now is valued more (with the exception of the narrow strata of the modernized elite) than loyalty to any rulers –sultan, caliph, king, president, leader of the nation, and so on. Right up until the era of independence (1951), tribes in Libya were effectively autonomous political, military, and economic units with the relative territory (“watan”) that was secured for each of them. The majority of the population has always led (and to a large degree, still does lead) a nomadic Bedouin lifestyle. The urbanization that has taken place (primarily under Gaddafi) has weakened, but not abolished the system of clan and tribal identification.
http://www.stratfor.com/node/21463/archive
The main religion is Islam, in the particular form of the Sufi order Senussi, which was founded by Muhammad Ali as-Senussi (from an Arab clan descended from the Prophet Muhammad through the line of his daughter Fatima) in Mecca in 1837, and who “hybridized” Sufism and Wahhabism in the new order with the following objectives:
– the revival of the pure faith and the practice of Islam in accordance with the teachings of the Prophet;
– the unification of all Sufi tariqas into a single order;
– propaganda of Islam on the periphery of the Arab world.
The first Senussi religious center (zawiya) was established in Libya 1843 in al-Bayda (Cyrenaica) and subsequently played a decisive role in the unification of the constantly feuding Libyan tribes. Each tribe created its own zawiya and in this manner, it led the tribes through the lodge members of Senussi under a common “denominational umbrella”. Soon Senussism became a single theocratic banner in the fight for Libya’s independence from the Turks and the Italians. After the receipt of independence, the first king of the Federal Kingdom of Cyrenaica, Tripolitania, and Fezzan (present-day Libya, which became a unitary state only in 1963) became the religious, military and political leader of Senussiism and the Emir of Cyrenaica Idris as-Senussi (great-grandson of the founder of the Order of the tribe Kharaba), who relied upon the elite of the leading clans of Cyrenaica.
After huge oil reserves were discovered in Libya in the late 1950s, the autocratic domination of Cyrenaica lead to the rapid deterioration of relations between King Idris I and the sheikhs and even with the lodge members of the majority of tribes and in particular with the tribes of Tripolitania and Fezzan, which were deprived of their rightful share of oil revenues. It was this factor, along with the dissatisfaction with the presence of U.S. and British military bases in Libya, which determined the broad elite and social base of Gaddafi’s military coup that took place in 1969. On the one hand, Gaddafi brutally suppressed the resistance of the Senussi elite (predominantly from the Kharaba tribe) as well as of the elite of the Warfalla, Obeidat, Magarha, and other tribes that were close to King Idris. On the other hand, being from the relatively weak Gaddafi tribe, he had to contain and stabilize his power by relying on both the elite of the leading tribes and on the Senussi lodge members. The main tool of his policy became the relatively equitable division of oil revenues among tribes and also attempts to “torpedo” the tribal structure of society with ideas of national unity and pan-Arabism. Gaddafi’s political course became a specific form of “leveling” socialism, economically based on oil revenue rents, plus a legal system based on the rules of the sharia. At first, Gaddafi also sought to intermarry with the Senussis (which for Bedouin society is practically the equivalent of “to make peace with”). His first wife Fatiha Khaled, from the marriage with whom his son Muhammad was born, was from the clan of as-Senussi. But this marriage soon fell apart, and Gaddafi’s second wife became Safia Farkash, from the large Obeidat tribe. Furthermore, Gaddafi quickly incorporated large groups from the elite of the most influential Libyan tribes into power, including the Cyrenaica tribes. However, already in the first half of the 1970s, an intertribal massacre and revolt began in Libya, fueled by tribal sheikhs and Senussi zawiyas. Gaddafi brutally suppressed the revolts, confiscated a part of the Kharaba clans’ land, and distributed it to other tribes . The majority of the Senussi Kharaba elite, and also a part of the elite of other tribes who participated in the uprisings, fled the country (to London, Egypt, Paris, and so on). It was after this that Gaddafi began to write his Green Book, which advocates a “third way” between capitalism and socialism as a system of direct popular rule (Jamahiriya) and also a fundamental transformation of the entire system of government. Upon proclamation of the Libyan Jamahiriya in 1977, the Revolutionary Command Council was created instead of a Defense Ministry and a General Staff, and the army was divided into “resistance forces” and “security forces”. At the same time, universal compulsory military service was introduced, women were allowed to be called up for military service, and also the armies of the Local People’s Militia were created, and they included a large part of the country’s population. The structure of political power turned out to be presented as a system of directly elected people’s congresses, as well as people’s and revolutionary committees. Gaddafi absolved himself from all official posts, leaving himself unofficially in the position of “Leader of the Revolution” and supreme commander. In the context of a tribal society, this power structure could be maintained only in the absence of strong grassroots protest. Gaddafi ensured this with rather equitable distribution of revenues from the nationalized oil industry, whose assets were concentrated in the National Petroleum Corporation, and also through the creation (almost along the lines of Norway’s template) of large foreign investment funds that make a profit from oil windfalls on account of investment in several dozen developed and developing countries of the world. As a result, Libya has the highest human development index level in Africa, free education and healthcare, no unemployment, full literacy, and one of the longest life expectancies in Africa. (The Global Competitiveness Report 2008-2009, by World Economic Forum)