The reconstruction of Syria lacks a solid foundation, as Ahmad Al-Sharaa and his interim government prefer to establish facts rather than a social consensus.
In his victory speech at the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus, Ahmad Al-Sharaa promised a new social contract for all Syrians. Approximately 14 months later, not much seems to remain of this promise: in March and July 2025, troops affiliated with the interim government committed massacres against Alawites and Druze, respectively, and since the beginning of the year, the army has violently seized Kurdish neighbourhoods in Aleppo and then further Kurdish provinces. Meanwhile, the majority of the population continues to live in poverty, and there is no plan for reconstruction supported by society as a whole.
Al-Sharaa at very short notice cancelled his visit to Berlin, planned for mid-January, officially because of the military offensive in the formerly Kurdish-dominated North-Eastern Syria. However, given the large number of Kurds living in Germany, his change of travel plans is also a sign that the interim government has understood just how deep the social rifts are, including within the Syrian diaspora. These are unfavourable conditions for the making of a new social contract, which the post-war rulers themselves have set as a goal.
A social contract is essentially an agreement between the state and society on mutual rights and obligations, thereby lending stability to the current order. It shapes the relations between the state and society and within society itself. These mutual expectations are codified, either explicitly in constitutions, laws and agreements, or implicitly in norms and informal rules. In a functioning social contract, the government accepts responsibility for three state deliverables – protection, provision of public services and the opportunity for participation (the “three Ps”). The Syrian interim government has fallen short of this responsibility in all three areas, and the approaches and course of action it has pursued offer little hope for a new social order.
The current Syrian social contract - if it can even be called that - is failing to deliver on its promise to protect the population. Violence against civilians, particularly against minorities, continues relentlessly, and the number of victims has actually increased since the fall of the Assad regime. Atrocities against Alawites in March 2025, the terrorist attack on a church in June, fighting in Suweida in July, and clashes in Aleppo in October demonstrated that the country is once again at risk of descending into violent conflict.
In January 2026, Syrian units seized the Kurdish-inhabited Aleppo neighbourhoods of Ashrafiyeh and Sheikh Maqsud, before rapidly taking control of large parts of the territory previously held by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). The subsequent ceasefire proved fragile, and indeed, meanwhile government troops control the remainder of Kurdish territory, including the city of Kobane that, more than a decade ago, marked the turning point in the SDF’s defensive struggle against ISIS jihadists.
The monopoly on violence and Syria’s sovereignty remain contested, despite efforts to bring the army and security services under unified control. The most recent fighting was the result of the failure of the agreement signed in March 2025 with SDF commander Mazlum Abdi - more precisely, the failure of its implementation regarding integration. Whether the new SDF-Damascus agreement, enforced by early February, can settle all these questions remains to be seen. Nevertheless, the foreign Islamist fighters who were integrated into Syrian army divisions in June 2025 with U.S. approval, have been accused of committing serious human rights violations. Although Syria publicly joined the anti-IS coalition in November when Al-Sharaa met with U.S. President Trump, the transfer of IS fighters from formerly SDF-guarded detention camps is still underway and the situation remains instable. Overall, the substantial Turkish support for Syrian troops in the north, as well as Israel’s occupation in the south illustrates the many ways in which Syria’s sovereignty continues to be undermined.
After 15 years of a violent civil and proxy war, polarization and rivalries between militias fighting to establish territorial control risk becoming endemic. In relation to the immeasurable suffering inflicted on the Syrian civilian population, mob justice and acts of revenge within society have so far remained relatively limited - but allegations that security forces are involved in massacres, displacement, and looting, particularly in Alawite neighbourhoods, are of great concern. Without comprehensive and tangible transitional justice, announcements by the interim government to investigate abuses and ensure law and order are devoid of any credibility. What is missing is a positive concept of security that – notwithstanding resolute action against the IS – refrains from othering and polarization. Syrian transition needs a sense of collective security to back demobilization and lay the foundation for a new social contract.
Many investments focus on prestige projects such as luxury housing, a new airport, and a subway system.
After the fall of Assad, Syria lacks a functional social contract also when it comes to the provision of services and public goods. Given the enormous level of destruction, it is hardly surprising that the majority of the population continues to live in poverty and remains dependent on external aid or remittances from relatives abroad. There is a shortage of housing, educational institutions, and healthcare facilities. Due to strained state finances, the Syrian interim government – and the short-term transitional government before it – quickly made far-reaching decisions to revamp economic policies, including relentless privatization, budget cuts, the elimination of subsidies, and a resolute campaign for the lifting of international sanctions. At the same time, the interim government took decisive action against the drug trade, which had formed the backbone of Assad’s state finances previously. Attracting foreign direct investment has become a priority for the top levels, as demonstrated by Al-Sharaa’s state visits to the Gulf. The restructured “Supreme Council for Economic Development,” which serves as the leading investment body, is also directly subordinate to the president.
Yet far too often, the urgency and alleviation of the humanitarian catastrophe are not at the center of reconstruction efforts. Many investments focus on prestige projects such as luxury housing, a new airport, and a subway system – all clustered in the capital. Austerity measures and no meaningful redistribution are driving up living costs, as for instance the sharply rising electricity prices. Nepotism and corruption persist. Wooing foreign investment often benefits particular interests and strategic networks—mainly those linked to the Gulf region or Turkey.
Economic interests are intertwined with foreign economic interests and sometimes even take precedence over the protection of Syrian population. Thus, Turkey can to a large extent operate freely in northern Syria—both economically and militarily. According to reports, in autumn 2025 militias affiliated with the Syrian army were involved in the expropriation and displacement of Alawites from a suburb of Damascus designated for subway construction.
Without a tangible peace dividend benefiting broad parts of the population, the new political order will not live up to the expectation of a legitimate social contract. What is missing is a strategy to rebuild the domestic economy that relies less on grandiose projects and instead focuses more on economically sound reconstruction based on local value chains. Local businesses lack grants and subsidies to reopen or reinvest, including those operating outside the Damascus metropolitan region. Syria is entering a new phase of external dependency and risks once again becoming a rentier state, relying primarily on political rents and foreign aid.
The new public discourse remains largely confined to a mere exchange of opinions among individuals.
Of all state duties in a social contract, there appeared to be positive area in the field of participation granted to Syrian society. For many Syrians, who had lived their entire lives in Assad’s repressive state, Al-Sharaa’s rise to power represented a revolutionary shift, as it suddenly became possible to publicly discuss politics and even criticize the political leadership, including the president himself. However, this new public discourse also carries risks. As genuine reconciliation and transitional justice process remains absent, so the public discourse manifest as hate speech on social media, proliferating in light of the ongoing violence. Many Syrians complain that their fellow citizens understand the new freedoms as a privilege of the long-oppressed Sunni majority. Participation thus risks becoming a simple matter of majority rule, without a commitment to pluralism and tolerance. Yet, it is precisely pluralism and diversity that constitutes the true strength of Syria’s multi-confessional and multi-ethnic society.
Moreover, the new public discourse remains largely confined to a mere exchange of opinions among individuals. It bears little resemblance to close state–society relations or genuine influence on political decision-making. The “milestones” of Syria’s political transition to date illustrate this clearly: both, the Syrian National Dialogue Conference in February 2025 and the adoption of an interim constitution in March 2025 fell short of achieving adequate representation. Indirect parliamentary elections did take place in October, but not even in all provinces and closely orchestrated by the political executive. Minority representatives in particular, but also many Sunnis, criticize the growing Islamist influence over politics, the judiciary, and the public sphere. This Islamist interpretative prerogative represents a massive setback for women’s rights – worse even than under the largely non-participatory, human-rights-abusing social contract of the Assad regime.
Even investors from the Syrian diaspora require a minimum level of trust in rule of law and planning security.
Syria’s privatization campaign and efforts to attract foreign investment also aim at Syrians abroad. The interim government has recognized that, after years of war-related brain drain, the large Syrian diaspora possesses important skills, financial assets and access to international stakeholders—and can therefore play a key role in reconstruction. Many Syrians abroad have remained connected to their homeland and are considering returning or may be more willing than non-Syrian investors to invest in reconstruction despite the associated risks.
So far, however, the success in involving diaspora actors has also been modest. Even investors from the Syrian diaspora require a minimum level of trust in rule of law and planning security. After all, they have built new lives abroad; their children were often born there and attend school there. As a result, they are also risk-averse. Furthermore, they are more aware of clientelistic favoritism and entrenched networks than to non-Syrian investors. What different members of the diaspora consider a “minimum level” of trust and security varies depending on individual preferences, personal backgrounds, and networks. Consequently, Syrians abroad assess the situation on the ground very differently, and there is a risk of self-selection among those willing to engage with their homeland beyond remittances – potentially deepening social fault lines in the worst case.
Since taking office, the Syrian interim government has created faits accomplis across all areas. Its authoritarian style of governance seamlessly continues from Assad’s rule and the wartime order, thereby offering no genuine transition, neither economically nor security-related or politically. Syria’s diversity, which could be its greatest asset, continues to divide the country. In the euphoria following Assad’s fall, foreign actors quickly recognized Al-Sharaa’s claim to power and rushed to lift international sanctions on Syria as well as to remove HTS and members of the interim government from lists of designated terrorist. During this period, however, Al-Sharaa and his power apparatus were unable or unwilling to fulfil the promise of a new social contract.
Amid the current far-reaching geopolitical and economic shifts, international partners are primarily interested in some form of stability in Syria and increasingly act based on national interest rather than norms and values. In the wake of Trump's power politics over Greenland, European politicians initially expressed only cautious criticism of Syria's military action in North-East Syria – after all, Turkey forms NATO's South-Eastern flank. In total, the international community has been remarkably silent on Syria’s domestic politics, which offer little improvement in protection, provision, and participation for large segments of the population. Yet this silence does nothing to stabilize Syria.
Tina Zintl is a political scientist and senior research associate in the research program “Transformation of Economic and Social Systems” at the German Institute of Development and Sustainability (IDOS).
