At a time when the Syrian regime is facing an unprecedented wave of popular unrest, the political stance of the ulama is of utmost importance. In the 1960s and 1970s, as urban, religious, and Sunni elites, the ulama numbered among the main opponents of the Ba‘thist regime, which was led by sons of peasants who were often members of the Alawite community and were driven by secular and socialist ideals. In the early 1980s, moreover, the bloody suppression of the Islamist insurgency, in which many sons and followers of the ulama were directly involved, led to dozens of clerics being driven into exile.

Three decades later, as the flame of revolt flares up, the influence of the clergy over Syrian society has increased considerably. This situation results from the population’s growing religious fervour, and from official policies which, although still extremely repressive even by regional standards, have nevertheless relaxed in the last two decades. Potentially, then, the ulama could now constitute a more significant threat to the regime than they did in the past; but in fact the reality is more complex, both because of the clerics’ understandable fears of state repression and because of the rapprochement between state and clergy that has taken place over the previous decade. This deepening partnership has been part of a broader trend whose consequences are now unfolding before our eyes: the Ba‘th’s alliance with its former enemies, the urban elites, has led it to turn its back on its original social base, peasants and the poor; and the latter have provided most of the manpower in the current uprising.