A Lebanese senate is not a new idea. Indeed, Lebanon had a senate for a brief period during the French mandate but it was abolished in 1927, a year after it was established. Article 22 of the Lebanese Constitution states:
“With the election of the first Parliament on a national, non-confessional basis, a Senate is established in which all the religious communities are represented. Its authority is limited to major national issues.”
Furthermore, the Ta’if Agreement (1989) which ended the Lebanese Civil War reconfirmed the call for a senate among the list of required political reforms, using the same language found in the Constitution’s article 22.
The key condition for the establishment of a senate is “the election of the first Parliament on a national, non-confessional basis.” What this means is that the sectarian quotas governing the distribution of seats in the current parliament would be removed. In other words, instead of electing their representatives to parliamentary seats reserved for specific sects (Maronite, Greek Orthodox, Sunni, Shiite, etc.), citizens would have the freedom to elect a member of any sect to be their representative in Parliament. Similarly, any citizen, from any sect, would have the freedom to be elected representative of their district.
The Constitution states that once such a ‘non-confessional’ parliament is elected, a senate would be established “in which all the religious communities are represented.” The senate would thus serve as a representative body for Lebanon’s eighteen confessional communities, safeguarding their interests and protecting them from the so-called “tyranny of the majority”, as it is expressed by the Chamber of Deputies.
