Regional Outlook : Are Arabs Ready for Democracy? : Rigid regimes still dot the landscape. But from Morocco to the Arabian Peninsula, one can hear the faint echo of Eastern Europe.

Habib Bourguiba wore the smiling face of a kindly dictator.

The aging revolutionary hero had presided over Tunisia’s breakaway from France and, in a country populated with Berber mountain men and Muslim peasants, nurtured a nation that remained among the most Westernized in the Middle East, an Arab haven of gourmet seafood restaurants and liberal divorce laws, a Paris thrust oddly into the middle of North Africa.

All during his rule, there were no political parties other than Bourguiba’s; there was no need for them. Bourguiba had himself declared president for life. When there was dissent, he arrested the dissenters. When the country needed a hero, Bourguiba’s likeness, on posters and statues and television screens all over Tunis, provided a vehicle of respect. Religious activists complained that Bourguiba had sold out the country’s Islamic identity to the West. Bourguiba had them thrown behind bars. When the court sentenced them to modest jail terms, a furious Bourguiba stepped in and ordered them put to death.

Thus it was an unlikely day in Tunis last year when the 86-year-old Bourguiba, frail and tired looking, emerged in April from several months of seclusion and went to the polls for the presidential election--to cast his ballot for Zine Abidine ben Ali, the tough young prime minister who had declared him senile and bounced him from the presidency in 1987. “I am voting for Mr. Ben Ali and for the list of my party,” Bourguiba said humbly.

Ben Ali ran unopposed, taking 99.3% of the vote. His party took all 141 seats in the National Assembly. The political opposition, such as it was, charged that the election was rigged.

Hardly democracy in action. Yet the balloting marked the first time since 1974 that Tunisians have even been invited to the polls in a presidential contest.

As such, it was something of a small turning point in the Arab world, a region of sheiks, kings, emirs and military-backed presidents unaccustomed to democratic debate. Dwindling oil revenues, booming populations and the collapse of old Nasserite socialist ideals have fueled pressures for reform all over the region. And in recent months, the perestroika tide that has swept Eastern Europe has begun settling uncertainly over Arabian sands.

At least five Arab states have taken some steps in recent months to introduce democratic reforms, and two others have at least discussed some limited reforms. Here are the moves:

* Jordan--Bloody price riots in April last year highlighted widespread popular frustration and prodded King Hussein into restoring Parliament and overseeing the first national elections in 22 years in November. Political parties, banned in 1976, were allowed to campaign during the elections. Members of Marxist and Palestinian radical groups once held for years in prison were permitted to openly seek election, and some won seats. Afterward, Hussein said he would move to legalize political parties and lift martial law, in effect since 1967, when Jordan lost the West Bank to Israel.

In December, Hussein ordered the release of 48 political activists and freed an additional 29 convicted political prisoners in February in a continuing drive toward political liberalization.

* Kuwait--The 50-member National Assembly was dissolved in 1986 at the height of the Iran-Iraq War after deputies harshly criticized the government. But citizens, in a series of demonstrations over the past several months, are demanding restoration of Parliament and lifting of press censorship. “I Love Democracy” stickers have begun gracing the bumpers of Mercedes-Benzes all over the oil-rich emirate, and the prime minister has set June 10 as the date for elections to a “transitional” Parliament, pledging that the government will be accountable to the new assembly.

* Tunisia--Ben Ali has introduced a series of political reforms since wresting power from Bourguiba, pardoning nearly 5,000 political prisoners, loosening restrictions on the press, legalizing several political parties and holding Tunisia’s first elections since 1974 last April. However, the fact that Ben Ali’s ruling party took all the seats in the 141-member National Assembly prompted allegations from the opposition that the election was rigged, and opposition groups have complained that the pace of reforms, feverish at first, has slowed dramatically.

* Algeria--Following riots in October, 1988, that left at least 176 people dead, President Chadli Bendjedid brought in a new constitution that paved the way for a wide range of political reforms. The ruling FLN, Algeria’s only legal political party since independence from France in 1962, is now challenged by 22 other fledgling parties, including the only legalized Islamic party in the Arab world. The FLN still holds all the seats in Parliament, but local elections have been scheduled for June 12, and Algeria’s first national elections are set for 1992.

* Yemen and South Yemen--These two Arabian Peninsula neighbors, authoritarian in different ways--Yemen is a military-dominated republic and South Yemen is the Arab world’s only Marxist state--have both made tentative moves to open their societies with a view toward merging with each other. Both countries are talking of opening the doors to a multi-party system. In addition, South Yemen has eased travel restrictions on citizens and is improving relations with Western countries.

In addition, the following two countries, although markedly authoritarian, have made tentative moves to ease repression:

* Iraq--President Saddam Hussein recently announced that a new constitution, to be approved by referendum, would provide for a free press and the formation of political parties. “Democracy is a source of strength, not weakness,” he told a gathering of Arab lawmakers in January. Iraq for the first time recently released national budget figures that drew criticism in the state-run press, a rare case of officially tolerated criticism of government policy. Iraq has also ended a ban on travel abroad for Iraqis, held local elections and privatized parts of the public sector. But prospects for true democratization appear doubtful. The Washington-based Middle East Watch said in February that Iraq remains “one of the most brutal and repressive regimes in power today.”

* Syria--Syrian President Hafez Assad has scheduled parliamentary elections for May 22, to reflect population growth and ensure representation of “all factions of the people.” There have been rumors for months that the political system might be liberalized. Prominent writers have demanded increased political rights, including the release of political prisoners and freedom of the press. Assad, while complaining that changes in Eastern Europe have benefited mostly Israel, recently hinted at some upcoming changes. Among them might be a government study on limiting use of emergency laws and a broadening of political participation in the National Front, which is dominated by Assad’s ruling Baath Socialist Party. He stressed, however, that his version of “organized freedom” is based on community, not just individual, rights.

Two other countries, although making no recent changes, round out the list of those with democratic touches:

* Egypt has for several years been a nominal democracy, although its 458-member People’s Assembly has limited powers and is dominated by President Hosni Mubarak’s National Democratic Party.

* Morocco has legalized 11 political parties and allows its 306-member National Assembly limited powers.

All the recent political openings may be small, but they are felt. One obvious question is, why now?

“There’s an Arab saying: ‘When your neighbor shaves, you should wet your beard,’ ” one Kuwaiti daily remarked recently. “After what happened in Romania, many should prepare their beards for shaving, as the people will not forgive them. There are regimes in the Middle East which destroyed their peoples and their economic resources.”

Indeed, the region is home to some of the most autocratic regimes in the world. Romania’s feared dictator, Nicolae Ceausescu, was to many political analysts a relatively mild example compared to Iraq’s Saddam Hussein, who has summarily ordered the arrest, torture or execution of political opponents and who is believed to have used poison gas on thousands of Iraq’s Kurdish people.

Syrian President Assad ordered in the army and wiped out much of the city of Hama in 1982--unofficial estimates of the dead range from 10,000 to 25,000--to quell dissent among Islamic fundamentalists there.

Arab regimes have long argued that the bitterly divisive tribal and sectarian nature of Middle Eastern societies bodes ill for any kind of representative government. To buttress their argument, they usually point only to Lebanon, whose Parliament, divided between Christians and Muslims and a dozen or more sub-sects, has proved wholly unable to govern the country during 15 years of civil war.

At the same time, many Arab rulers are finding themselves with little choice. Analysts say the primary impetus for democracy in the Middle East has been not philosophy but economy, a failure on the part of many post-colonial regimes to provide the economic prosperity and independence they promised--or any real hope that the future will be better.

Arab governments are opening up in small ways to hold back the tide of revolution, many analysts say. “The second law of politics says an incumbent government will do absolutely anything to stay in power--and that includes talking about democratization,” said one Western diplomat.

“By democratizing, you enhance legitimacy,” suggested Ali E. Hillal Dessouki, political science professor at Cairo University. “You are participating in the process, you are not its victim. . . . Ben Ali (in Tunisia) saw the handwriting on the wall, and in effect Ben Ali gave the regime a new lease.”

But in the end, said Dessouki, the Arab world is unlikely to move toward the kind of open democracy familiar in the West, simply because, unlike Eastern Europe, there is little or no history of independent government here--and a continuing need, according to other Arab analysts, on the part of many regimes to suppress potential threats from such fronts as the Islamic movement, which could gain important new inroads through the democracy movement. (In Jordan, in fact, the fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood holds 25 of the Parliament’s 80 seats following the elections late last year.)

“King Hussein (of Jordan),” quipped one Western diplomat, “--they told him they wanted a parliament. ‘A parliament?’ he said. ‘Fine. Good idea. I control it.’ ”

“Democratization is a process,” Dessouki said. “We cannot really compare ourselves to an advanced, liberal democratic regime. There is pluralism, but it is a controlled one. Still, it opens up options, and the more you have, the more it is irreversible.”