Number of results to display per page
Search Results
3162. The Integrity of States: Corruption in the EU's Southern Neighbourhood. Arab Transformations Policy Brief No 6
- Author:
- Andrea Teti and Pamela Abbott
- Publication Date:
- 04-2017
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Arab Transformations Project, University of Aberdeen
- Abstract:
- Corruption is the antithesis of the Rule of Law and erodes the discourse of fairness and mutual consideration which is necessary for peace, prosperity and socioeconomic development. It increases the risk of state capture and resistance to change by the political elite. It results in poor public management and resource allocation and an inequitable distribution of resources and national wealth. It is a problem not just for individual countries but also for harmonious diplomatic and economic relations. The European Union’s Neighbourhood Policy is intended to help its near neighbours develop into a sustainable economic, social and political stability. At the same time the EU deploys normative leadership to promote a social and political security based on a respect for human rights, a dependence on the Rule of Law and a style of governance which can listen to its people and can face replacement, if need be, without the need for armed confrontation. For this, the extent of corruption in MENA is a serious problem. Keywords: Corruption, Middle East, Arab Spring
- Topic:
- Corruption and International Law
- Political Geography:
- Europe and Middle East
3163. Iraq After ISIS: Continued Conflict or Rebuilding Beyond Ethno-Sectarian Identity? Arab Transformations Policy Brief No 7
- Author:
- Andrea Teti, Pamela Abbott, and Munqith Dagher
- Publication Date:
- 04-2017
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Arab Transformations Project, University of Aberdeen
- Abstract:
- With ISIS' influence declining, Iraq faces the challenge of rebuilding both its economy and its political system. • Amidst the devastation left by conflict, Iraq's political leaders have the opportunity to address the internal divisions which made ISIS possible. • Any post-conflict settlement must take into account the population's concerns and priorities. • Sectarian identity is less influential than commonly assumed in shaping people's political priorities: often more important are local conditions, particularly regarding security, the economy, and migration. • Ignoring popular priorities risks undermining post-ISIS attempts to build a stable country, with knock-on effects at a regional level.
- Topic:
- International Security and International Affairs
- Political Geography:
- Middle East
3164. What Drives Migration from the Middle East? Why People Want to Leave Arab States
- Author:
- Andrea Teti and Pamela Abbott
- Publication Date:
- 06-2017
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Arab Transformations Project, University of Aberdeen
- Abstract:
- Data from the Arab Transformations public opinion survey provides strong indications about the nature of population movements from Middle East and North African (MENA) countries. As such they are crucial in designing responsive, evidence-based policy. ArabTrans data shows those who have considered migrating tend to be young, male, and with higher levels of education (the notable exception being Libya). In all countries surveyed, young people are more likely to have considered migrating; in nearly all countries the economy is the main driver of migration; and although a substantial portion of those considering migration think of a permanent move, large proportions are considering only temporary migration. This underscores the importance of economic policies which actually deliver inclusive growth and social cohesion. Two major conclusions can be drawn from this data: first, that the economic causes and strong temporary dimension of migration provide EU Member states with opportunities to reap the benefits of migration, both to the economy as a whole and to welfare systems in particular; second, that MENA countries of origin present significant internal differentiation suggesting policy should reflect specific national circumstances. The single major obstacle to public discussion and designing evidence-based policies which maximise the benefits of migration to both host countries and countries of origin is a political context which conflates and securitizes refugees and migrants. Paradoxically, the tone of this debate and the way policy is designed and implemented may have much to do with any socio-political polarisation of migrants in host countries
- Topic:
- Migration and International Security
- Political Geography:
- Middle East
3165. Post-Conflict Re-Construction in MENA: Previous Experiences and Stakeholder's Inclusive Involvement in the Future Reconstruction of Libya, Syria and Iraq
- Author:
- Amaia Goenaga
- Publication Date:
- 09-2017
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- IEMed/EuroMeSCo
- Abstract:
- The European Institute of the Mediterranean (IEMed) and Casa Árabe, with the collaboration of ICEX (Spain Trade and Investment), organised in 2016 an international conference entitled "Post-conflict re-construction in MENA: Previous experiences and stakeholders’ inclusive involvement in the future reconstruction of Libya, Syria and Iraq". The aim was to tackle the different aspects and challenges related to reconstruction in post-conflict countries in the region. Given the dimension and complexity of the subject, the conference was structured in a double meeting, bringing together stakeholders, academics and experts. The first one took place in Barcelona on the 11 April 2016 and the second one on the 19 September 2016 in Madrid. This document gathers and assesses the main conclusions and recommendations reached in both meetings. Thus issues tackled have been grouped into five main lines of discussion, which are divided into epigraphs devoted to some key concrete issues:
- Topic:
- Conflict Resolution and Conflict Prevention
- Political Geography:
- Middle East
3166. Modi: Three Years On
- Author:
- Husain Haqqani and Arpana Pandey
- Publication Date:
- 09-2017
- Content Type:
- Special Report
- Institution:
- Hudson Institute
- Abstract:
- arendra Modi led the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to power during the May 2014 elections, promising radical changes. The party’s electoral manifesto outlined numerous problems that threatened Indian society, while promising to protect social values and enact “urgent changes” in the economy, agriculture, energy, education, and governance.1 Observers from around the world hailed the BJP’s victory as a success, and believed that a pro-business government assuring fundamental changes would tap into India’s unfulfilled economic potential.
- Topic:
- International Relations
- Political Geography:
- Middle East
3167. The Qatar Crisis
- Author:
- Marc Lynch and Stephanie Dahle
- Publication Date:
- 10-2017
- Content Type:
- Special Report
- Institution:
- Project on Middle East Political Science (POMEPS)
- Abstract:
- On June 5, 2017, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates launched a campaign against Qatar. Tensions between these Gulf Cooperation Council members were nothing new, but few anticipated the sudden escalation or the intensity of the campaign. The anti-Qatar campaign leaders then failed to achieve a rapid resolution of the crisis in their favor through a Qatari capitulation. More than four months later, the GCC remains badly divided and both sides are increasingly entrenched in their positions. To make sense of this political conflict, POMEPS is pleased to release this collection of essays by a wide range of leading scholars published in The Monkey Cage and in POMEPS Studies over the last several years. The collection is divided into four major sections: the origins and course of the current conflict; regional responses; how the Arab uprisings impacted the GCC; and background on the divisive question of Islamism and the Muslim Brotherhood.
- Topic:
- International Political Economy and International Security
- Political Geography:
- Middle East
3168. Islam in a Changing Middle East: Local Politics and Islamist Movements
- Author:
- Marc Lynch
- Publication Date:
- 09-2017
- Content Type:
- Research Paper
- Institution:
- Project on Middle East Political Science (POMEPS)
- Abstract:
- Scholars and policymakers have increasingly recognized that Islamist movements and actors vary widely – from domestically oriented, quietist movements engaging in democratic systems to revolutionary, armed movements aiming to upend the nation-state system. Yet little has been done to understand how the nature of individual movements, and their success, often differs substantially at the subnational level. Some communities are much more likely to support different Islamist actors than others, and even the same movement may have very different strategies in some localities than others. Many questions remain regarding if and how Islamist movements and actors look or act differently in rural areas and secondary cities as they do in the capitals. To what extent do the strategies and performance of Islamists vary subnationally? And what explains this variation?
- Topic:
- International Relations and International Security
- Political Geography:
- Middle East
3169. Islam in a changing Middle East: Adaptation Strategies of Islamist Movements
- Author:
- Marc Lynch
- Publication Date:
- 04-2017
- Content Type:
- Research Paper
- Institution:
- Project on Middle East Political Science (POMEPS)
- Abstract:
- Long repressed, banned, and exiled, many Islamist movements and parties across the Middle East and North Africa witnessed a moment of electoral success after the 2011 uprisings. Since then, their fates have varied widely. Some have made significant compromises to stay in power, others have ostensibly separated their religious and political efforts, while others have been repressed more brutally than before or have fragmented beyond recognition. What accounts for these actors’ different adaptation strategies and divergent outcomes? Earlier this year, the Project on Middle East Political Science brought together a dozen top scholars for our 4th Annual workshop on Islamist politics to address these questions.
- Topic:
- International Relations, International Security, and Political Power Sharing
- Political Geography:
- Middle East
3170. Refugees and Migration Movements in the Middle East
- Author:
- Marc Lynch
- Publication Date:
- 03-2017
- Content Type:
- Special Report
- Institution:
- Project on Middle East Political Science (POMEPS)
- Abstract:
- The Middle East has experienced a dramatic flood of refugees and forced migration over the last fifteen years. The UN High Commission on Refugees reports more than 16 million refugees and 60 million displaced persons around the world today, including asylum seekers and the internally displaced. The wars in Syria and Iraq have produced the greatest share of the Middle East’s refugees in recent years, but many more have fled wars and failed states in Afghanistan, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen. Neighboring states have faced severe challenges in absorbing millions of refugees, while North African states and Turkey have emerged as key transit hubs for refugee flows into Europe.
- Topic:
- Human Rights, International Security, International Affairs, and Refugee Crisis
- Political Geography:
- Middle East
3171. New Challenges to Public and Policy Engagement
- Author:
- Marc Lynch
- Publication Date:
- 03-2017
- Content Type:
- Research Paper
- Institution:
- Project on Middle East Political Science (POMEPS)
- Abstract:
- Engaging and influencing public policy debates on areas of their expertise is a core part of the mission of academics. The last decade has in many ways been the golden age of academic policy engagement. Social media, the proliferation of online publishing platforms, and a generational change in disciplinary norms and practices has unleashed an impressive wave of writing by academics aimed at an informed public sphere. The Project on Middle East Political Science has worked to promote such public and policy engagement, with hundreds of academics each year contributing their expertise on the Middle East on publishing platforms such as The Middle East Channel and The Monkey Cage and through direct policymaker engagement.
- Topic:
- International Security and International Affairs
- Political Geography:
- Middle East
3172. Islam in a Changing Middle East: New Islamic Media
- Author:
- Marc Lynch
- Publication Date:
- 02-2017
- Content Type:
- Research Paper
- Institution:
- Project on Middle East Political Science (POMEPS)
- Abstract:
- In years past, Islamist televangelists like Amr Khaled, Yusuf al-Qaradawi and Tareq Suwaidan seemed like the future of Arab media. Advancing a form of “soft Islam” focused on personal betterment and religiosity, these preachers were seen by some as a potential counterweight to extremist voices and by others as a sinister leading edge of radicalization. The contretemps between Amr Khaled and Yusuf al-Qaradawi over the Danish Cartoons Crisis of 2006 inspired numerous academic articles
- Topic:
- International Affairs and Social Media
- Political Geography:
- Middle East
3173. The Middle East and Europe in These Turbulent Times
- Author:
- Genci Mucaj
- Publication Date:
- 04-2017
- Content Type:
- Commentary and Analysis
- Institution:
- The Ambassadors Review
- Abstract:
- A few years ago, it would have been difficult to imagine the regional transformation underway in the Middle East. From the Arab Spring to the rise of ISIS, to a catastrophic Syrian war, we see a Middle East in turmoil and crisis. While the region’s geopolitical map varies, the root causes of conflict remain the same.
- Topic:
- International Affairs
- Political Geography:
- Middle East
3174. The Muslim Brotherhood Movement in the Arab Winter
- Author:
- Stig Jarle Hansen, Mohamed Husein Gaas, and Ida Bary
- Publication Date:
- 09-2017
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
- Abstract:
- Although it may seem that the Muslim Brotherhood has weakened since the onset of the "Arab Winter" in 2013 and onward, organizations with their origins in the Brotherhood still have access to power in countries as diverse as Somalia, Bahrain, Morocco, and Yemen, and might regain power in other countries as well. Most Brotherhood-affiliated movements are committed to some form of democracy, unlike many of their rivals in the Middle East. Even the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia have sought allies among Brotherhood affiliates, despite banning a majority of affiliated organizations.
- Topic:
- International Affairs
- Political Geography:
- Middle East
3175. Iraqi security forces and popular mobilization forces
- Author:
- Jessa Rose Dury-Agri, Omer Kassim, and Patrick Martin
- Publication Date:
- 12-2017
- Content Type:
- Special Report
- Institution:
- Institute for the Study of War
- Abstract:
- The liberation of the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham’s (ISIS) urban holdings in Iraq was necessary but not sufficient to secure America’s vital national interests. ISIS has lost neither the will nor the capability to fight, even as it withdraws into desert hideouts and sleeper cell formations in November 2017. Rather, dispersed ISIS militants have begun an insurgent campaign in northern and western Iraq as some of its foreign fighters have returned to their home countries to serve in ISIS’s external operations network.
- Topic:
- Islam, War, and International Security
- Political Geography:
- Iraq and Middle East
3176. The Summer of Our Discontent: Sects and Citizens in Lebanon and Iraq
- Author:
- Maha Yahya
- Publication Date:
- 06-2017
- Content Type:
- Special Report
- Institution:
- Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
- Abstract:
- Lebanon’s and Iraq’s political systems are based on sectarian and ethnic power-sharing. In summer 2015, both countries faced popular protests demanding better governance. These protests began over poor service provision but escalated into opposition to the countries’ overarching power-sharing systems. These demonstrations were framed as nonsectarian, civic responses to deteriorating conditions and corrupt leadership. While protestors raised hopes that change was possible, their curtailment by the sectarian leadership underlined the challenges of political transformation in divided societies.
- Topic:
- International Relations and International Security
- Political Geography:
- Middle East
3177. Environmental Peacebuilding across boarders and sectors a concerted approach to multilateral cooperation in the Middle East
- Author:
- Inga Schierholz
- Publication Date:
- 11-2017
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Geneva Centre for Security Policy
- Abstract:
- Disputes over water constitute a major area of disagreement between Israel and Palestine. The uncoordinated and irresponsible environmental actions on both sides have created serious ecological and humanitarian hazards that require rapid, yet sustainable action. Those who argue that the water problem can be resolved only as part of a comprehensive peace deal between the Israelis and Palestinians fail to recognise both the urgency and the potential of cross-border water cooperation. The bottom line of this Flanking Cooperative Idea is that because water- and sanitation-related issues extend both horizontally across national borders and vertically across various sectors, environmental cooperation can be used to create positive linkages with and spill-overs into other policy fields with the potential to initiate new forms of collaboration in currently deadlocked areas, including the field of disarmament and non-proliferation.
- Topic:
- International Affairs and Peacekeeping
- Political Geography:
- Middle East
3178. A Building block for a Middle East without WMD: An all inclusive nuclear test free zone
- Author:
- Marc Finaud
- Publication Date:
- 10-2017
- Content Type:
- Commentary and Analysis
- Institution:
- The Geneva Centre for Security Policy
- Abstract:
- Since Egypt, Iran, and Israel have signed but not ratified the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), they agree to the goal of prohibiting the testing of nuclear weapons. As a building block towards the establishment of a weapons-of-mass-destruction-free zone (WMDFZ) in the Middle East, they could jointly or concurrently ratify the CTBT, thus creating a de facto nuclear-test-free zone in the region that Saudi Arabia, Syria, and Yemen could join. This could act as a confidence-building measure and facilitate the participation of these states in the activities of the CTBT Organization (CTBTO), which verifies compliance with the test ban.
- Topic:
- International Affairs
- Political Geography:
- Middle East
3179. A UN Special Envoy to manage the Middle East WMD-Free zone conference process
- Author:
- Marc Finaud
- Publication Date:
- 10-2017
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Geneva Centre for Security Policy
- Abstract:
- In view of the failure of efforts to convene a conference on a zone free of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and their delivery vehicles (DVs) in the Middle East (WMD/DVs-free zone), the Arab countries and the Russian Federation proposed that the United Nations (UN) Secretary-General appoint a special representative to lead the preparatory process for the conference. A process facilitated by such a UN envoy would be compatible with consultations among regional states, including Israel, as advocated by the United States (US). Also, it would allow for broad discussions on both the regional security context and disarmament issues. Such a process would also be an opportunity for submitting contributions from nuclear-weapon states, relevant international organisations, and providers of ideas at the Track II level.
- Topic:
- International Affairs and Nuclear Power
- Political Geography:
- Middle East
3180. The Israel- Turkey deal could benefit the Palestinians
- Author:
- Muhammed Ammash
- Publication Date:
- 02-2017
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Global Political Trends Center (GPoT)
- Abstract:
- An extended period of strained relations has finally ended with a series of lengthy negotiations.
- Topic:
- International Affairs
- Political Geography:
- Middle East