Kingdom poised between tradition and modernity

Jordan lies betwixt desert and town, tradition and modernity, monarchy and democracy, native Jordanians and Palestinian refugees, opulence and poverty, Israel to the west and the Arab hinterland to the east, and is caught up in the struggle between Iraq and the US.

Amman, Jordan's capital, is no longer a tiny settlement clinging to seven hills ranged round a crumbling second-century Roman amphitheatre, the Philadelphia. Amman is a rapidly expanding city, built of hand-hewn blocks of local white stone. Buildings great and small have red tile peaked roofs and carefully cultivated walled gardens.

Cars cram the highways, navigating a confusion of overpasses and underpasses attached to broad roads stretching tens of kilometres from the first traffic "circle" to the eighth.

Amman has grown into a handsome city, cleaner and tidier than most Middle Eastern capitals.

Outlying Palestinian refugee camps have become closely-built suburbs blending into quarters housing poor native Jordanians. In spite of the transformation of the capital from hamlet to metropolis, Amman is essentially a small town, a conservative backwater. The older generation of "Jordanian Jordanians" remains rooted in tribalism, committed to paternalistic monarchy and determined to maintain its privileges vis-a-vis Palestinian refugees who comprise half the population.

The economy and the process of democratisation have stagnated and the Palestinians, who dominate commerce, are campaigning for full political rights.

Young King Abdullah II, who inherited the throne from the late King Hussein in February 1999, is determined to revolutionise the kingdom. In June Abdullah appointed a dynamic businessman as prime minister and instructed the new government to carry out radical reforms.

The king's primary objectives are to create an integrated society where Jordanians and Palestinians enjoy equality, stamp out nepotism and corruption, privatise public firms, secure foreign investment and wipe out the kingdom's staggering $7 billion external debt. Young Jordanians support the king's programme while the ruling elite, which grew wealthy under the old system, resents and resists change and tries to obstruct his reforms in the legislature.

"He's a courageous army officer, not a politician," asserted an establishment figure. "Abdullah wasn't groomed to be king. His Arabic is atrocious [since he was educated in Britain and the US] but his pretty Palestinian wife is very popular."

Mr Ibrahim Izzedin, a former minister who promoted democratisation, dismissed this attitude. "He is liberalising. We have few political prisoners and press freedom. The debt is nearing the ratio [to gross domestic product] recommended by international institutions. He is doing fine." But Jordan still has a long way to go. Although inflation has been reduced, the growth rate is only 1.9 per cent, unemployment is more than 20 per cent and one-third of Jordanians live below the poverty line. Jordan's short-term economic problems could be resolved if the peace process is successful and massive reparations are paid to the 2.3 million Palestinians who live in the kingdom.

Jordan's economy would expand rapidly enough to keep up with its high birth rate if Israel and the Palestine Authority were to lift restrictions on Jordanian imports and if the international community ended sanctions against Iraq, formerly Jordan's main market. Three problematic "ifs".

Planning for the long term, King Abdullah has instructed the school system to begin teaching English in the first grade and he launched a programme to make Jordanian children computer literate. Early this year he concluded a deal with Microsoft for the purchase of 8,000 computers and state-of-the-art software. His aim is to develop "e-government", by installing computers in administrative offices, and turn Jordan into a regional electronic communications centre.

"IT", information technology, is the king's watchword. "This will take a dozen years or more," asserted a Jordanian who matured during the past decade of economic crisis. "We don't have that much time. We want economic improvements now."