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THE BA‘TH PARTY IN BAGHDAD: STATE-SOCIETY RELATIONS THROUGH WARS, SANCTIONS, AND AUTHORITARIAN RULE, 1950-2003 A Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences of Georgetown University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in History By Alissa Walter, M.A. Washington, DC March 27, 2018 Copyright 2018 by Alissa Walter All Rights Reserved ii THE BA‘TH PARTY IN BAGHDAD: STATE-SOCIETY RELATIONS THROUGH WARS, SANCTIONS, AND AUTHORITARIAN RULE, 1950-2003 Alissa Walter, M.A. Thesis Advisor: Judith Tucker, Ph.D. ABSTRACT How did 50 years of oil wealth, non-democratic rule, wars, and sanctions shape state-society relations in the Iraqi capital city of Baghdad? This dissertation charts key trends in state-society dynamics during important periods of disruption: oil-fueled modernization (1950-1979), the Iran- Iraq War and the Gulf War (1980-1991), and the period of international sanctions (1990-2003). During these periods of change, I focus on specific points of interaction between the government and residents of Baghdad: the construction of new neighborhoods through state-subsidized housing, citizen petitions sent to regime representatives, and food rations distributed during sanctions. Drawing attention to the important role that ‘ordinary’ Baghdadis, including women and rural migrants, played in shaping the city and influencing the government, I show how residents of the capital advocated for their needs and, at times, challenged the authority of the regime. At the same time, the regime’s governance strategies shaped how Baghdadis related to the government and one another. Four key conclusions emerge from this history of contentious interactions between state and society in modern Iraqi history: the continued importance of neighborhoods as a political and social unit, the limitations of Saddam’s surveillance and influence over Baghdad’s population, the complexities of defining ‘resistance’ and ‘collusion’ in Saddam’s Iraq, and the influential role of women and rural migrants in the city’s history. These conclusions are based on fieldwork in Erbil, Iraq and research in the following archives: the Iraqi Ba‘th Party archives; the Saddam Hussein collection at the National Defense University; the Constantinos Doxiadis Associates archives; and American, British, and French diplomatic archives. Drawing on these sources, I present new iii arguments about the social, political, and economic consequences of Saddam’s rule for the people of Baghdad. iv Acknowledgements This dissertation is nine years in the making, from my first day as a Master’s student in Contemporary Arab Studies at Georgetown University in 2009 to today, as I prepare to graduate from Georgetown’s History Department. I am, above all, indebted to the Georgetown scholars and faculty mentors who provided intellectual training, professional guidance, and encouragement along the way. My advisor Judith Tucker sharpened my thinking and methodological approaches to studying women and gender in Middle Eastern history. The latitude she granted me in my research helped make my experience as a PhD student meaningful and productive. Not only did she graciously permit my switch from focusing primarily on Egyptian history to Iraqi history early in the doctoral program, but her willingness to let me carry out my dissertation research and writing in California were immeasurably valuable to imbuing my final years in the PhD program with focus, balance, and peace of mind. I am grateful for her example of diplomatic leadership and professionalism, and I greatly appreciated her encouragement and support of my research over the years. Joseph Sassoon has been a mentor since his History of Iraq class in the spring of 2011, during the final semester in my master’s program, piqued my interest and ultimately converted my entire research program. As his research assistant and, later, as a collaborator and co-author, I have grown as a scholar by observing up close his work habits, writing process, and research methodologies. I remain grateful for his confidence in my scholarship and the opportunities he created to help me grow professionally through writing articles, presenting at conferences, and assisting with book projects. Several other professors at Georgetown also deserve special thanks. Bryan McCann, Fida Adely, John Voll, Sara Schalenghe, Osama Abi-Mershed, and Carol Benedict each invested time in helping me develop my research, identify relevant bodies of literature outside my main field, hone v my writing, and ask larger questions of my sources. Rochelle Davis took me on as a research assistant while I was still a master’s student, opening me up to the world of refugee studies and offering valuable practice in carrying out fieldwork—an experience I drew on in conducting interviews in Erbil for this dissertation. I traveled to six archives around the world to research this dissertation, and this travel would not have been possible without the generous financial support of several grants. My research trips to archives in the UK, Greece, and France were funded by the Academic Research Institute in Iraq (TARII), a Dissertation Research Travel Grant from Georgetown University’s Graduate School, and a Piepho Grant from the Georgetown University History Department. The Dolores Zohrab Liebmann Fund supported two years of my work in the Iraqi Ba‘th Party archives and other US- based collections, and a Silas Palmer Research Grant from the Hoover Institution covered my relocation expenses to the Stanford area. My final year of dissertation writing was supported by grants from the American Association of University Women and the United States Institute of Peace. I am grateful for the generosity of these funders, without which this dissertation could not have taken its present form. The staff and archivists of the collections I visited generously shared their wealth of knowledge and patiently facilitated my research. Special thanks go to Giota Pavlidou at the Constantinos Doxiadis archives in Athens, who identified many sources for me that I would have been otherwise unaware of and who has been a valuable resource in answering questions in the time since my visit. I also share my appreciation for the staff at the Hoover Library and Archives, and especially for Haidar Hadi. His knowledge of the Ba‘th Party archives, his years of personal experience with the collection, and his dedication to helping researchers better understand and utilize the archive are truly unparalleled. He was a vital source of help and encouragement during many long months of research in the Hoover Institution. vi My fieldwork in Erbil, Iraq in October 2016 was among the most memorable and valuable experiences of my research. The outbreak of fighting between Iraqi government forces and ISIS less than 30 miles from Erbil during my stay added an additional layer of anxieties to my fieldwork, and I’m indebted to my friends and colleagues who ensure that my trip was both safe and productive. Mélisande Genat was critical for providing my initial contacts and walking me through the basics of carrying out fieldwork in Iraq, and Sarah Ali was also a source of tremendous encouragement and practical information prior to my arrival. On the ground, Hoveen Sabah provided exceptional services as a research assistant and fixer in setting up interviews with a wide array of families from Baghdad living in Erbil. I could not have done it without him, and I’m grateful he stayed away from the excitement of battle long enough to help me before beginning his work with the war journalists covering the campaign against ISIS. Mustafa al-Tayar and Ali Ahmed joined our work as friends and informants themselves, helping to connect us to still more Baghdadi families. At the same time, I relied on research assistants in Baghdad to carry out interviews with current residents of the city. Saud Bashar has worked with me for two years, since March 2016, as my main research assistant. He carried out nearly twenty interviews in Baghdad on my behalf and helped me locate copies of al-Thawra newspapers, unpublished dissertations, and other resources currently inaccessible to me outside of Iraq. His curiosity, tenacity, professionalism, and work ethic are truly exceptional, and I am proud to count him as a friend. Through the help of Saud and others, we also recruited a small number of additional research assistants to help carry out interviews with women: I am thankful for the work of Elaf Saleh and Noor al-Mosawi in conducting these. I am grateful to friends and colleagues who helped refine the arguments and ideas presented here. Students and faculty at Stanford University deserve special thanks for welcoming me into the intellectual life on campus during my years researching in the Hoover Institution. The 2016 Workshop on Authoritarian Regimes organized by the Hoover Institution and the Modern Middle vii East Workshop series and Arab Studies Roundtables organized by Stanford graduate students were helpful opportunities to present my preliminary research and receive feedback. Joel Beinin and Lisa Blaydes were instrumental in welcoming me into the Stanford community. I owe Lisa special thanks for taking me on as a research assistant for her forthcoming book on Iraq, for which I also received training in GIS and access to Stanford’s Green Library. My dissertation would have been much for difficult to complete without these resources, and it was illuminating to compare our findings from the Ba‘th Party archives from our different methodological approaches. Fellow panelists and participants at MESA, AHA, and the Hoover Workshop on Authoritarianism deserve special thanks for providing feedback on earlier drafts of my chapters. My gratitude goes especially to Michael Degerald, Ban Ali, Sam Halfont, Andy Algers, Michael Brill, and Eckart Woertz, along with friends and colleagues in the Georgetown History Department who are too numerous to name, but whose revisions and comments greatly improved my writing.

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