(This publication was translated from its original Arabic version.)

Abstract: Contrary to expectations, the fall of the Assad regime did not lead to a repetition of the Iraqi scenario, as the new Syrian authority adopted an approach towards the remnants of the regime characterized by firmness and pragmatism. The preservation of state institutions for legitimacy considerations, firmness towards Assad’s remnants and his security and military structures for fear of a counter-revolution, and the retention of some of the regime’s economic and developmental arms were due to the necessities deemed necessary by the new authority. The approach may seem realistic, but it contains loopholes that create risks in the long run.

Introduction

On December 8, 2024, Syrians removed the Assad regime, which ruled them for more than five decades with iron and blood. The Kingdom of Fear, or the Republic of Silence as some called it, fell through a military operation called Deterrence of Aggression, launched by Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham with the support of other military opposition factions, taking control of the capital, Damascus, and declaring a Syria without Assad. The collapse of the Assad regime was a sudden and unexpected event for researchers and decision-makers, as was the course of the battle in terms of the Syrian Army’s lack of will to fight, its gradual withdrawal from cities under the pretext of redeployment and repositioning, and the dissolution of the security apparatus. It was also clear that the management of the military operations avoided the Iraqi scenario, i.e., avoiding the collapse of the central government and a comprehensive purge of regime loyalists leading to security chaos. This can be seen in the smooth transition of power between the “conquerors” and the defeated, the continued functioning of state institutions, albeit at a halting pace, as well as the absence of a comprehensive purge against the Assad regime individuals, institutions, and structures, as a process was launched to settle the status of members of the army and security services, the use of a number of bureaucratic regime elites to run things in some civil positions such as the Central Bank of Syria and the restructuring of some arms of the Assad regime.

The sudden fall of the Assad regime and the behavior of the new authority towards the remnants of the regime raise questions such as: What is the fate of the legacy of the Assad regime? What is the fate of its institutions, structures, networks, and elites? What is their role in the domestic political equation? Also, to what extent does the new authority accept or reject the regime’s remnants?

This expert brief attempts to answer these questions by dissecting the structure of the Assad regime on the eve of the fall to determine the levels of collapse of the regime’s structures and then analyzing the behavior of the new authority towards the remnants of the regime as a threat or an opportunity, which will help determine the form and role of the remnants of the regime in the post-Assad phase.

The Assad Regime on the Eve of The Fall: Assad Without Cover

The theoretical frameworks used to analyze the structure of the Assad regime, and its survival mechanisms are numerous. Still, they intersect in that it is composed of several levels and layers, all of which revolve around the person of Assad, who moves and controls them through a combination of mechanisms and links.

Hafez al-Assad established a complex, multifaceted family regime that scholars have tried to characterize and conceptualize either by relying on one of its components, such as the Alawite sect, to be a regime controlled by Alawites or by relying on the features of the regime’s structure to be authoritarian with an effective monopoly of power and sources of force that enables it to penetrate the state and society. The Assad regime has also been characterized as a Neopatrimonial Regime,1 in which the personal (hereditary) rule of Assad plays a central role in the regime and the state, a dimension that is reinforced by using patronage and clientelist networks to penetrate the state bureaucracy and society to serve the regime. By integrating the previous theoretical frameworks and analytical approaches, the Assad regime can be characterized as an authoritarian regime centered on the person of Assad, who has worked to penetrate and control the state and society through a combination of control structures and patron-client networks. Accordingly, the regime consists of the Assad family ruling the presidential palace, headed by Bashar al-Assad, and associated special structures, such as the Fourth Division, headed by General Maher al-Assad, which has a security office responsible for managing networks of war economy activities.2

The Assad family has also succeeded in developing informal clientelist economic networks (networks of traditional crony businessmen, supplemented by networks of front businessmen formed after the outbreak of the revolution),3 run by a small group of businessmen associated with the regime. At the second level, the regime’s structures of care and control over the state and society, consisting of the security apparatus, the Baath Party, popular organizations, affiliated trade unions, and local militias, as well as the Syrian Secretariat and the Al-Arin Humanitarian Foundation, are informal structures that provide humanitarian and developmental support to regime-affiliated social groups. All of these structures are managed by Assad’s entourage, a group of officials whose loyalty and obedience to Assad is unquestioned. At this level, family, sectarian, and regional ties are present, as well as professional considerations in selecting these officials. At the third level is the state, with its three institutions (legislative, executive, and judicial) run by loyal bureaucratic elites whose commitment is guaranteed by grants, privileges, and protection. At the last level are the networks of local elites and intermediaries that act as informal channels of communication between the regime and local communities and control, and who are contained and managed in competition with each other through the structures of control and state bureaucracy.

Before 2011, the regime’s structure contributed to its resilience and ability to overcome existential challenges. The regime lost its advantages over time under the pressure of the dynamics triggered by the Syrian revolution, as well as Assad’s policies. It became more isolated with a narrow social base and more dependent on external support and backing for survival. Assad has worked to reinforce his personalization of the regime as the source of power and decision-making.4

This was demonstrated by removing his rivals within the ruling family,5 concentrating economic rents in his hands by removing Rami Makhlouf from the economic scene,6 and reshaping the landscape of the regime’s informal economic networks by establishing networks of businessmen more closely linked to him than the traditional patronage businessmen networks.7

The security and military institutions are vital to the survival of the Assad regime. Still, they have become more corrupt and infiltrated by the regime’s clientelist networks, less professional and cohesive than they were before 2011, and more dependent on vital support from outside, whether through the use of local militias that were highly capable of mobilizing fighters to defend the regime, as well as reliance on support from Iranian and Russian allies.8

While external support strengthened the resilience of both institutions, it also created serious challenges for the regime in the long term related to issues of organization, mobilization, integration, and control. Since 2020, Assad has attempted to reform the two institutions, taking advantage of the atmosphere of calm with the opposition following the Putin-Erdoğan agreement on Idlib. However, his plans exceeded his resources and capabilities, and his plans were designed to strengthen his dominance over both institutions rather than restoring them and developing their performance in a professional manner. This can be seen in Assad’s manipulation and periodic replacement of security and military elites,9 disbanding local militias for fear of the emergence of warlords and integrating them into the army in an unprofessional manner.10 Allies also did not share Assad’s vision for reforming the two institutions, and as Iran and Russia faced challenges, their role in providing vital support to the security and military institutions declined.

After 2011, there was a gradual decline in the pro-Assad regime’s social base. Several factors contributed to weakening the ability of the regime’s structures-the Baath Party, unions, and federations-to mobilize support from social groups and legitimize the regime. The most important of these factors are: 1) Assad’s continuation of his neoliberal policies in liberalizing the economy and the emergence of crony capitalist elites, more interested in maximizing their wealth at the expense of impoverishing social classes that supported the regime.11 2) The impact of economic sanctions and the widespread destruction caused by the war reduced the available economic resources, limiting the ability of state institutions and regime structures to provide services to large segments of society that depended on the regime for their economic survival. It also limited the regime’s ability to provide privileges to its entourage and elite state bureaucracy. 3) On the other hand, the regime’s informal structures, such as the Syrian Secretariat and the Al-Areen Humanitarian Foundation (the successor to Rami Makhlouf’s Al-Bustan Charitable Society), were unable to fill the void caused by the decline in the social role of the regime’s official structures and state institutions, as the size of the need is greater than the size of the available resources.

Also, the changes in local communities and the system of local intermediaries, who formed unofficial channels to connect the regime with local communities, cannot be ignored. They were part of the regime’s strategy to penetrate local communities and ensure their loyalty by organizing them into regime structures and state institutions and relying on them to spread the regime’s clientelist networks throughout the country.12

Bashar al-Assad’s policies before 2011 undermined the pillars of the system his father had established in the localities. The revolution forced Assad to reshape the system of local intermediaries by bringing some closer, marginalizing and crushing others while creating new ones. It seems that the course of this process was linked to the socio-political dynamics of each region, both in terms of its past and what happened in it during the years of the revolution. This explains the emergence of multiple models of mediators in the post-conflict phase. However, Assad’s efforts do not seem to have succeeded. Relying on post-war intermediaries to reestablish the regime’s authority is doubtful since they lack the resources and authority to build clientelist networks, and the local fragmentation of power and the weakness of regime structures and state institutions have made their tasks difficult.

In light of the Assad-or-nothing scenario, the decline in the effectiveness of the structures of control and patronage, the decline of the pro-regime social base, and the weak effectiveness of the system of local intermediaries, Assad has no internal cover and is more dependent on external support to survive, and without it, Assad has fallen.

The New Syrian Authority and The Remnants of The Regime: A Mix of Assertiveness and Pragmatism

With the fall of Assad, the structures of his regime collapsed, and the behavior of the new Syrian authority toward the structures of the regime was surprising. It maintained the continuity of state institutions under a new government while showing firmness towards the Assad family and the remnants of the security and military institutions, in addition to restructuring some regime structures and laxity towards others. The approach was characterized by assertiveness and pragmatism.

The ruling family and its own structures automatically collapsed when Bashar al-Assad fled to Moscow, and the Fourth Division ceased to exist as an organized military unit. On the other hand, the fall had a mixed effect on the control structures. Some collapsed, such as the security and military institutions, which no longer exist as official institutional structures, while the Baath Party announced the suspension of its activities and the handover of its headquarters to state institutions.13 In contrast, the regime’s economic and developmental networks remained active in various forms and levels. No large-scale arrests of businessmen associated with the regime or the seizure of their properties by official decisions have been recorded as of the writing of this paper, and while some of them left Syria, others continued their activity in chambers of commerce and industry, which have not yet been restructured.

Contrary to expectations, the fall of the Assad regime did not lead to the collapse of Syrian state institutions and a repetition of the Iraqi scenario. This was evident in the fact that the military operations department did not deter aggression against institutions during its control of cities, and the government of Muhammad Ghazi al-Jalali was kept in place to temporarily conduct business until the transfer of power to a new government, which was assumed by Muhammad al-Bashir, the head of the Salvation Government in Idlib.14

The new authority utilized many of the regime’s bureaucratic elites to manage some state institutions, such as the Central Bank of Syria, while replacing them in other positions, such as customs and crossings, perhaps the main criterion was whether or not they had cadres capable of filling these positions. The caretaker government also began to reorganize the reality of state employees, issuing decisions such as the dismissal of thousands from the public service and the accompanying protests and sit-ins, which were concentrated on the Syrian coast. The decision to preserve state institutions was likely driven by the following considerations: 1) The new authority’s understanding of a transnational consensus among regional and international powers that Syrian state structures must be preserved to avoid a repeat of the chaos of post-Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. 2) Reassuring segments of Syrian society, including bureaucratic elites, about the change that is taking place, thereby broadening the base of societal support for the new authority. 3) The flexibility of HTS and its previous experience in governing the Idlib region, where the Salvation Government coexisted with the structures of the Syrian Interim Government until it was able to impose its hegemony. 4) The general structure of the Salvation Government in Idlib is similar to the state institutions run by the Assad regime in terms of form, role, and legal references. 5) The new authority is less concerned about the state institutions in terms of the possibility of their involvement in a counter-revolution, given the tangible weakness of these institutions and the need for them to confirm their legitimacy as a representative of the Syrian state. On the other hand, the new authority had less tolerance for the Assad family and a significant portion of the regime’s control structures. This can be seen in the removal of Assad as a symbol and idea for Syrians. This can be seen in amendments to school curricula to remove anything related to the old era, and the renaming of centers and hospitals that signify Assad and his regime with new names. The Military Operations Department also launched security campaigns against remnants of the Assad regime in a number of provinces and announced the opening of centers to settle the status of members of the army and security services, without any clear measures to hold perpetrators of crimes accountable, while the new authority does not seem to accept the idea of including former members of the military and security institutions in the new security and military structures. Many of the Assad regime’s control and mobilization structures have been frozen, as seen with the National Union of Syrian Students, as well as talk of dissolving other structures at the Syrian National Dialogue Conference to be held in the near future,15 while the situation remains unclear regarding the Baath Party,16 which announced the suspension of its party activity on its own. The new authority’s tough stance toward the Assad family and its associated structures of control and mobilization shows that it is haunted by the counterrevolutionary obsession it studied earlier17 and the threat these structures could pose to its control and Syria’s stability, given their resources, expertise, and network of relationships.

Hence the belief that it must be dealt with firmly. The new authority faces a number of challenges, perhaps the most important and urgent of which is related to revitalizing the deteriorating Syrian economy. With its vision to move from a socialist economy to a free and competitive economy, according to the statements of the caretaker economy minister,18 and its previous experience in developing a private sector in Idlib based on the networks of merchants and businessmen close to it,19 the new authority finds in part of the regime’s economic networks and businessmen who are not organically linked to Assad an opportunity that can be exploited to revitalize the Syrian economy and develop its economic network, given their capital, extensive network, and considerable expertise in several sectors. Moreover, despite the fact that many representatives of local intermediaries have declared their allegiance to the new authority, the new authority remains without deep roots in the localities, especially those that were under Assad’s control. Perhaps this was the motivation behind the new authority’s acceptance of some of the Assad regime’s developmental arms, as happened with the Syrian Secretariat for Development, to benefit from its expertise, cadres, and local networks in order to empower the new authority.

Conclusion

The elder-Assad established an authoritarian family system, reinforcing this dimension with a range of mechanisms and power structures that enabled him to penetrate and control the state and society. Assad Jr. did not preserve his father’s legacy, as his pre-revolutionary policies gradually undermined the pillars of the old regime, leaving it without internal cover and more dependent on its allies for survival. Contrary to expectations, the fall of the regime did not lead to the collapse of Syrian state institutions, nor did the regime automatically collapse at all levels and structures.

The new authority deals with the remnants of the regime with an approach that combines firmness and pragmatism. The preservation of state institutions was for the purpose of gaining legitimacy internally and externally, and firmness towards the remnants of the Assad family and its structures of control, especially the security and military, is motivated by fear of a counter-revolution. As for the laxity towards the regime’s economic networks and some of its businessmen, this stems from the need for them and their compatibility with the new authority’s economic vision. At first glance, the new authority’s approach to the remnants of the Assad regime seems realistic, but on closer inspection it becomes clear that it suffers from gaps that may not pose a serious danger, but the potential for such a danger is gradually increasing.

There is a dilemma facing the new authority, as the decaying state institutions are still filled with pro-Assad bureaucratic elites who possess the expertise, resources, and network of relationships that make them capable of disrupting the new authority’s procedures. In addition, the new authority does not seem to have enough qualified cadres to manage the state bureaucracy, nor does it show signs of opening up to Syrian opposition cadres who are not affiliated with its movement, which makes the institutions closer to a crisis-generating state of inactivity. The new authority’s measures to dismiss thousands of employees may be justified by reducing the burden on the public budget and streamlining state institutions, but rushing this process without providing economic alternatives for those laid off adds a number of unemployed people to those who lost their jobs earlier due to the dissolution of the military and security institutions, and with their concentration in the Syrian coastal region, the opportunity to mobilize them against the new authority is ripe.

Retaining part of the regime’s businessmen and their economic networks carries the risk of entrenching the approach of managing the Syrian economy through patronage networks, which created socio-economic contradictions that were one of the generators of instability in Syria.

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