Some highlights:
- Qadaffi systematically destroyed basically all organizations in Libya. They don't even have organizations of doctors, or stamp collectors. There's no way for people to group or congregate, because that might lead to dissent.
- Qadaffi's got a serious yes-man problem. No one can speak against him, so he just hears his own words back alla time.
- Qadaffi also ended most private business, including rental of apartments and houses, and restaurants. He created a membership-required system of supermarkets. If you displeased him, you could lose membership, and be unable to buy food.
That's a totalitarian state for you. Scary stuff. I've also heard that Libya's economy is based almost entirely upon oil, either producing and selling it or serving the oil workers. So compared to a country like neighboring Egypt, there's little to no economic diversity in Libya. All the wealth in concentrated in a single resource and the people who control it.
ReplyDelete--doug