Neo-Ba'athism

Neo-Ba'athism is a far-left variant of Ba'athism that became the state ideology of Ba'athist Syria, after Arab Socialist Ba'ath party's sixth national congress in September 1963. As a result of the 1966 Syrian coup d'état launched by the neo-Ba'athist military committee led by Salah Jadid and Hafez al-Assad, Ba'ath party's Syrian regional branch was transformed into a militarist organization that became completely independent of the National Command of the original Ba'ath Party.

Neo-Ba'athism has been described as a divergence from Ba'athism proper that had gone beyond its pan-Arabist ideological basis by stressing the precedent of the military and purging the classical Ba'athist leadership of the old guard, including Michel Aflaq and Salah al-Din al-Bitar. The far-left neo-Ba'athist regime in Syria, which was influenced by various Marxist ideological schools, espoused radical leftist doctrines such as revolutionary socialism abandoned pan-Arabism, sought to strengthen ties with the Soviet Union, and came into conflict with Arab nationalists such as Nasserists and the Iraqi Ba'athists, particularly Saddamists, with whom they maintained a bitter rivalry. From their seizure of power in the Syrian Arab Republic as a result of the 1963 Syrian coup d'état, neo-Ba'athist officers purged traditional civilian elites to establish a military dictatorship operating along totalitarian lines.

Neo-Ba'athism is primarily associated with Assadism, based on the policies of the successive governments of Hafez al-Assad and his son Bashar al-Assad. This system was largely characterized by nepotism and sectarianism, with Hafez al-Assad's seizure of power in the 1970 Syrian coup d'état leading to the consolidation of Alawite minority dominance within the military and security forces. State propaganda portrayed Assadism as a neo-Ba'athist current that evolved Ba'athist ideology with the needs of the modern era. Neo-Ba'athism has been criticized by the founder of Ba'athist ideology, Michel Aflaq, for diverging from the original principles of Ba'athism.

A series of revolutionary offensives launched by the Military Operations Command and allied militias in late 2024 led to the collapse of the Assad regime in December 2024. Since then, remnants of the Ba'athist military apparatus and Assad family loyalists have engaged in violent clashes across Alawite strongholds in Latakia, Tartus and parts of Western Syria.