After 13 years of civil war, and 54 years of ruling Syria with an iron fist, the brutal Assad regime has fallen. This marks a pivotal opportunity for Syrians to rebuild a social compact, create viable political alternatives, and chart a brighter future for the country.

But to take advantage of this crossroads, Syrians need to understand their country’s post-independence history. It suggests that a successful transition to a post-Assad Syria will require efforts to foster an inclusive national identity and a political conscience that transcends the sectarian and ethnic divides entrenched by Assad family rule and the civil war.

In 1946, the French left Syria, marking the country’s independence. This ushered in a quarter century of instability, marked by frequent coups, military revolts, and civil disorders. The country was the most coup-prone country in the Arab world and it was more often governed by military officers than civilian governments.

In 1963, the Ba’ath Party seized power, initiating a 61-year era of military rule. Syria became the ideological heart of Ba’athism, a political ideology that combined elements of secularism, Arab nationalism, and Arab socialism. Yet, Ba’ath rule did not immediately bring stability. For the first seven years, two party factions remained locked in a power struggle. One side was led by Aflaq and al-Bitar, two prominent Ba’ath politicians, and the other by Salah Jadid and Hafez al-Assad, an ultra-left-wing general and the commander of the Syrian Air Forces respectively.

Then Assad staged a coup in 1970, known as the Corrective Movement, ousting Syria’s de facto leader, Salah Jadid. In order to bring authoritarian stability to Syrian politics, Assad deployed unrestrained violence. He also exploited sectarian and ethnic divisions to consolidate power, and cultivated international alliances to avoid outside scrutiny or pressure.

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Assad elevated people from his own minority religious group — the Alawite community — to positions of power in the military and intelligence operations and cultivated an intricate web of patronage. His regime redefined Alawite identity to revolve around Assad’s personality cult. This tactic provided him with a base of support and suppressed dissent. The regime also encouraged Alawites to move from their traditional home in northwest Syria to specific neighborhoods in Damascus. By increasing the Alawite presence in strategically important areas, Assad aimed to counterbalance the Sunni majority in the city and........

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