The political culture behind Lebanon’s constitution

The Lebanese Constitution did not emerge from a revolutionary rupture, nor was it the product of a single ideological current or a small circle of heroic “founding fathers.” It was shaped, instead, through a deliberate, consultative, and institutionally cautious process between 1925 and 1926, under the framework of the French Mandate but with substantial local agency. Understanding the political culture that animated this founding moment requires shifting attention away from personalities and toward procedures, arguments, and collective decision-making.

Between the proclamation of Greater Lebanon in 1920 and independence in 1943, Lebanese political elites faced a central dilemma: how to construct a modern state in a society marked by deep religious, social, and regional plurality. Their response was neither to deny diversity nor to dissolve it into an abstract civic nationalism, but to manage it through representation, proportionality, and negotiated consensus.

This choice would leave a lasting imprint on Lebanon’s constitutional order.

A political culture rooted in pluralism

The founding generation did not imagine Lebanon as a homogeneous nation-state. Rather, they conceived it as a plural society bound together by shared public institutions, a common language, economic interdependence, and overlapping urban and social spaces. The absence of a single, unified historical narrative was not seen as an obstacle to statehood, provided that political mechanisms could prevent domination by any one group.

This outlook shaped a political culture that privileged restraint over majoritarianism, balance over ideological clarity, and institutional design over revolutionary transformation. The Constitution was meant to be a framework for coexistence rather than an instrument for social engineering.

The constitutional process as historical evidence

Dr. Antoine Hokayem in his reference book, La Genèse de la Constitution Libanaise, 1996 show that, in December 1925, the Representative Council of the State of Greater Lebanon formally established a constitutional drafting body known as La Commission des treize. The commission was chaired by Moussa Nammour, President of the Representative Council, and was deliberately composed to reflect Lebanon’s confessional plurality rather than a single ideological current. Its members were distributed as follows: two Greek Orthodox members, Chebl Dammous and Petro Trad; three Maronite members, Georges Zouein, Roukoz Abou Nader, and Georges Tabet; two Sunni Muslim members, Omar Daouk and Abboud Abdelrazzak; two Shiite Muslim members, Soubhi Haidar and Youssef al-Zein; one Druze member, Emir Fouad Arslan; one Greek Catholic member, Youssef Salem; and one Latin representative of minority communities, Michel Chiha.

This confessional distribution was not incidental but intentional, embedding plural representation directly into the constitutional drafting process and reflecting a political culture that sought legitimacy through balance, inclusion, and negotiated coexistence rather than majoritarian dominance.

Consultation as a founding principle

To that end, the commission organized a wide-ranging consultative exercise unprecedented in the region at the time. A formal questionnaire was circulated to representatives of professional syndicates, chambers of commerce, legal orders, medical and pharmaceutical associations, municipal authorities, religious leaders, journalists, and economic bodies across Lebanon.

In total, 189 delegates from these organized bodies were contacted. 132 written responses were received and systematically analyzed, forming the empirical foundation of constitutional deliberations. Others declined to participate for political reasons - notably supporters of Syrian unity who refused to recognize the independence of Greater Lebanon - while some abstained on procedural or personal grounds.

This consultative method reveals a great deal about the political culture of the founding moment. The Constitution was not presented as a gift from the Mandate authorities, nor as a unilateral decision of a ruling elite, but as the outcome of structured dialogue with organized society.

Republic versus monarchy: A foundational choice

The constitutional questionnaire exposed two distinct political logics. Advocates of the republican system emphasized accountability and equality, arguing that elected leadership prevents tyranny, allows the peaceful removal of ineffective rulers, and opens the highest office of the state to merit rather than birth. They viewed equality among citizens as essential to national sovereignty and social cohesion, and saw the republic as the system most capable of teaching self-government and reflecting the political experience of modern states. Crucially, republican supporters warned that monarchy would concentrate power in the hands of a single community, threatening coexistence in a plural society, while also imposing unsustainable financial burdens.

Supporters of monarchy, by contrast, framed their position around authority, stability, and order. They argued that Lebanon’s diversity required a ruler standing above factions, ideally a foreign prince, capable of unifying society and enforcing security. Monarchy was presented as a system that commands greater respect for authority, ensures administrative continuity, and protects governance from constant political change, while also limiting external interference.

Democracy with safeguards

The same logic guided debates on parliamentary structure. When asked whether the legislature should consist of one or two chambers, the overwhelming majority favored a bicameral system, seeing it as a safeguard against concentration of power and legislative excess. Two chambers were viewed as a mechanism for deliberation, correction of error, and mediation between social interests.

Here again, political culture reveals itself: democracy was embraced, but tempered by fear of omnipotence, whether of an assembly, a majority, or an executive.

Proportionality and political justice

This same concern for balance underpinned the logic of proportional representation that would later evolve into Lebanon’s communal quota system. In its original conception, proportionality was not designed to freeze identities or institutionalize sectarianism, but to protect smaller communities from marginalization and to prevent electoral competition from becoming existential.

By guaranteeing representation regardless of electoral fluctuations, the system sought to remove incentives for zero-sum politics. Political justice, in this framework, meant reassurance before efficiency and stability before ideological coherence.

Liberty within a plural order

The consultative responses also reveal a strong attachment to civil liberties. Freedom of expression, political participation, and public debate were widely assumed as foundational principles. Lebanon’s early republican culture would indeed be marked by a vibrant press, parliamentary debate, and economic openness.

Yet these liberties were never imagined in isolation from communal realities. The preservation of religious jurisdiction over personal status law was accepted as a stabilizing compromise, allowing the political sphere to function without encroaching on deeply rooted social structures.

A founding culture, not a finished system

The political culture that produced the Lebanese Constitution was thus deliberate, cautious, and deeply procedural. It sought to reconcile democracy with diversity, liberty with security, and sovereignty with social reality.

Many of the tensions that later plagued the Lebanese system arose not from these original principles, but from their erosion, distortion, or instrumentalization. To read the founding moment accurately is not to idealize it, but to recognize that Lebanon’s constitutional crisis today is not the inevitable result of pluralism itself.

Why this matters today

Revisiting this founding political culture offers more than historical clarity. It challenges simplistic narratives that reduce Lebanon’s failure to its diversity or its constitutional design. The archival record shows a society that consciously chose consultation over imposition, balance over domination, and republican accountability over hereditary rule.

The Lebanese Constitution was born not of illusion, but of realism. Its tragedy lies less in its origins than in what was later done to it.