Public Budgeting in Transitional Syria
Surpluses in the Accounts, Deficits in Development, and the Reproduction of Inequality
4 minute read – April 15, 2026
Home / Publications / Public Budgeting in Transitional Syria: Surpluses in the Accounts, Deficits in Development, and the Reproduction of Inequality
Syrian Center for Policy Research:
This paper argues that Syria’s 2025 budget surplus should not, in itself, be taken as evidence of economic recovery or successful fiscal policy. That surplus, which amounted to around 46 million dollars, was achieved in an economy that recorded only marginal real growth of about 0.3 percent, meaning that the economy remained effectively stagnant. The paper contends that the criterion for successful public finance in the transitional period is not merely the recording of an accounting surplus, but the state’s ability to direct resources toward stimulating production, protecting the most vulnerable groups, and rebuilding trust and the social contract.
The findings show that the surplus was achieved in a context of compressed public spending, declining public investment, eroding subsidies, and expanding reliance on customs duties, fees, and indirect taxes. In 2025, customs duties accounted for 39 percent of revenues, while non-customs taxes and fees accounted for 31 percent, whereas investment expenditure did not exceed 7 percent of total spending. Subsidies also shifted from being an instrument of social and productive protection into a source of surplus. At the same time, widening disparities emerged within the public sector itself, with the formation of two tiers of public employees: a broad majority with low wages, and a limited minority receiving exceptional salaries and allowances. This weakens professionalism and reproduces inequality within state institutions.
The paper concludes that public finance in transitional Syria remains far from a just developmental path, and that the challenge is profoundly political and social, not merely technical. The core issue is not how much the state collected or spent, but where the resources came from, on whom the costs were imposed, and whether fiscal policy reduced or deepened inequality. It therefore calls for an alternative path based on full transparency, tax justice, rebuilding subsidies as instruments of protection and production, restoring public investment, unifying fiscal rules, and linking public finance to processes of economic transitional justice and the rebuilding of citizenship.
– April 15, 2026
Public Budgeting in Transitional Syria
Surpluses in the Accounts, Deficits in Development, and the Reproduction of Inequality
This paper shows that Syria’s 2025 budget surplus was more accounting-based than developmental in nature, as it was achieved in a stagnant economy marked by heavy reliance on fees and customs duties, declining public investment, the transformation of subsidies into a source of surplus, and widening wages gaps within the public sector itself. The paper calls for rebuilding public finance on the basis of justice, transparency, productive investment, and social protection, rather than on extraction, contraction, and the reproduction of inequality.
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Public Budgeting in Transitional Syria
Surpluses in the Accounts, Deficits in Development, and the Reproduction of Inequality
4 minute read – April 15, 2026
Syrian Center for Policy Research:
This paper argues that Syria’s 2025 budget surplus should not, in itself, be taken as evidence of economic recovery or successful fiscal policy. That surplus, which amounted to around 46 million dollars, was achieved in an economy that recorded only marginal real growth of about 0.3 percent, meaning that the economy remained effectively stagnant. The paper contends that the criterion for successful public finance in the transitional period is not merely the recording of an accounting surplus, but the state’s ability to direct resources toward stimulating production, protecting the most vulnerable groups, and rebuilding trust and the social contract.
The findings show that the surplus was achieved in a context of compressed public spending, declining public investment, eroding subsidies, and expanding reliance on customs duties, fees, and indirect taxes. In 2025, customs duties accounted for 39 percent of revenues, while non-customs taxes and fees accounted for 31 percent, whereas investment expenditure did not exceed 7 percent of total spending. Subsidies also shifted from being an instrument of social and productive protection into a source of surplus. At the same time, widening disparities emerged within the public sector itself, with the formation of two tiers of public employees: a broad majority with low wages, and a limited minority receiving exceptional salaries and allowances. This weakens professionalism and reproduces inequality within state institutions.
The paper concludes that public finance in transitional Syria remains far from a just developmental path, and that the challenge is profoundly political and social, not merely technical. The core issue is not how much the state collected or spent, but where the resources came from, on whom the costs were imposed, and whether fiscal policy reduced or deepened inequality. It therefore calls for an alternative path based on full transparency, tax justice, rebuilding subsidies as instruments of protection and production, restoring public investment, unifying fiscal rules, and linking public finance to processes of economic transitional justice and the rebuilding of citizenship.
