Do we Need a Lebanese Senate ?

Elias Muhanna (a.k.a Q.N.) on why Lebanon needs an upper chamber in parliament:

The classical benefits are in a country like Lebanon where you have minorities that are construed as confessional, you have a weak center and communities that are concerned about the loss of their freedoms, their ways of life. The idea is that the senate provides a check against all of that. You basically open up the Parliament so that it’s one person one vote so it’s equal suffrage across the country. […] Anything that bares on confessional issues [has] to be passed through the senate as well. So that way every community no matter how small has a say in the affairs and destiny of the country.

This is great in theory but there’s a big catch: As the standoff between PM Mikati and the FPM demonstrates, the sectarian problem in Lebanon is not simply one of representation, but also one of patronage. The Various sectarian zaims want to have their people represented in the official bureaucracy.

Put another way, imagine an extreme situation of one-man-one-vote suffrage that results in a parliament of 100 Muslims and 28 Christians. The question to ask is: If a Shiaa block has 50 MPs and the Druze only have 5, can you make an argument for equal quotas for the Druze and Shiaas in the high posts of government, even if they’re equally represented in the Senate?

Besides, we already have a sort of defacto Senate. These are the various religious bodies (the council of Maronite Bishops, the higher Shiite council, Dar el Fatwa..etc) which traditionally get up in arms and mobilize the faithful whenever an issue is perceived to threaten the influence of their faith.