scholarly journals Legitimation, regime survival, and shifting alliances in the Arab League: Explaining sanction politics during the Arab Spring

2020 ◽  
pp. 019251212093774 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maria Josepha Debre
Keyword(s):  
Arab Spring ◽  
Military Intervention ◽  
Majority Vote ◽  
Authoritarian Rule ◽  
Member States ◽  
Protest Movements ◽  
Arab League ◽  
The Arab Spring ◽  
First Time ◽  
Domestic Reform

The Arab Spring marks a puzzling shift in the sanction politics of the Arab League: for the first time, the Arab League suspended member states for matters of internal affairs by majority vote. This article argues that survival politics can explain the changing sanction politics of the Arab League. To re-legitimize rule during this unprecedented moment, member states selectively supported some protest movements to signal their understanding of public demands for change without committing to domestic reform. Contrasting case studies of the Arab League’s suspension of Libya and Syria and its simultaneous support for military intervention against protestors in Bahrain illustrate how concerns for regime legitimation and a short-lived alliance between Saudi Arabia and Qatar contributed to the sanctioning decisions. The Arab League can thus be considered a case of negative democracy protection, where regional sanctions are employed to selectively preserve authoritarian rule.

scholarly journals Bin Ali Authoritarianism and International Factors in Tunisia (1987-2008)

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 85-111
Author(s):  
Hatice Rümeysa Dursun
Keyword(s):  
Arab Spring ◽  
Transformation Process ◽  
Transition To Democracy ◽  
The West ◽  
Authoritarian Rule ◽  
Political Freedoms ◽  
Democratic Stability ◽  
The Arab Spring ◽  
New Literature ◽  
Shed Light

Despite being shaken by the Arab Spring, authoritarian structures still exist in the regions of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). Th is situation highlights the importance of studying the continuity of authoritarian structures more comprehensively. In addition to approaches that reduce authoritarianism to intra-state factors, literature has developed over the last decade emphasizing the importance of international factors. This literature in particular emphasizes the politics, economics, and diplomacy established by the West and that ties are effective in the continuity of authoritarianism in non-Western countries. This study attempts to explain Ben Ali’s period and the continuity of authoritarianism in Tunisia in the context of this developing new literature. Although Tunisia underwent a relatively positive transformation process after the Arab Spring, Ben Ali’s authoritarian rule was supported by the West as a model of an economic miracle and democratic stability; this administration managed to survive for 23 years. The study’s main argument can be expressed as follows: While the economic liberalization process imposed on Tunis by Western actors caused an increase in socio-economic inequalities, the instrumentalization of democracy by the West again served to suppress civil and political freedoms. Instead of focusing on the obstacles and opportunities in front of the transition to democracy in the post-Arab Spring period, examining theinternational factors influencing the continuity of authoritarianism in the Ben Ali period will shed light on how authoritarian structures still survive in MENA.

15. The Arab Spring: The ‘People’ in International Relations

2019 ◽  
pp. 339-367
Author(s):  
Larbi Sadiki
Keyword(s):  
New Media ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Arab Spring ◽  
Arab World ◽  
Authoritarian Rule ◽  
External Interference ◽  
Arab Uprisings ◽  
The People ◽  
Media And Technology ◽  
The Arab Spring

This chapter looks at the Arab uprisings and their outcomes, approaching them from the perspective of the peoples of the region. The Arab uprisings are conceived of as popular uprisings against aged and mostly despotic governments, which have long silenced popular dissent. Ultimately, the Arab uprisings demonstrate the weakness of traditional international relations, with its focus on states and power, by showing how much the people matter. Even if the Arab uprisings have not yet delivered on popular expectations, and the Arab world continues to be subject to external interference and persistent authoritarian rule, they are part of a process of global protest and change, facilitated by new media and technology, which challenges the dominant international relations theories.

scholarly journals Is Indonesia a Model for the Arab Spring? Islam, Democracy, and Diplomacy

2013 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 56-62 ◽  
Author(s):  
James B. Hoesterey
Keyword(s):  
Democratic Transition ◽  
Arab Spring ◽  
Asian Financial Crisis ◽  
Hillary Clinton ◽  
Economic Stability ◽  
Ideal Model ◽  
Authoritarian Rule ◽  
East Indies ◽  
The Arab Spring ◽  
The Ideal

As protestors filled Tahrir Square in Cairo in January 2011, Western diplomats, academics, and political pundits were searching for the best political analogy for the promise—and problems—of the Arab Uprising. Whereas neoconservative skeptics fretted that Egypt and Tunisia might go the way of post-revolutionary Iran, Hillary Clinton and Madeleine Albright praised Indonesia’s democratization as the ideal model for the Arab Spring. During her 2009 visit to Indonesia, Clinton proclaimed: “If you want to know whether Islam, democracy, modernity, and women’s rights can coexist, go to Indonesia.” Certainly Indonesia of May 1998 is not Egypt of January 2011, yet some comparisons are instructive. Still reeling from the Asian financial crisis of 1997, middle class Indonesians were fed up with corruption, cronyism, and a military that operated with impunity. On 21 May 1998 Soeharto resigned after three decades of authoritarian rule. Despite fits of starts and stops, the democratic transition has brought political and economic stability. Whereas academics and pundits have debated the merits of the Indonesia model for democratic transition, in this article I consider how the notion of Indonesia as a model for the Arab Spring has reconfigured transnational Muslim networks and recalibrated claims to authority and authenticity within the global umma.An increasing body of scholarship devoted to global Muslim networks offers important insights into the longue durée of merchant traders and itinerant preachers connecting the Middle East with Southeast Asia. In his critique of Benedict Anderson’s famous explanation of “imagined communities” as the result of print capitalism within national borders, historian Michael Laffan argued that Indonesian nationalism had important roots in global Muslim networks connecting the Dutch East Indies with Cairo’s famous al-Azhar University.

Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), Qatar and dispute mediations: a critical investigation

2015 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 535-552 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohammed Nuruzzaman
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Arab Spring ◽  
Gulf Cooperation Council ◽  
Institutional Structure ◽  
Security Threats ◽  
Policy Recommendations ◽  
Gulf Region ◽  
Arab League ◽  
The Arab Spring ◽  
Critical Investigation

This paper investigates the role played by the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) in mediating disputes since its creation in 1981 to 2011, the year of the outbreak of the ‘Arab Spring’. It analyzes the contributions of the GCC as a conflict mediator by cross-checking this sub-regional group's institutional structure and policy approach, and presents two major findings. Firstly, the GCC was hardly designed as a conflict mediator, given that the Gulf Arab states created it as a vehicle to respond to intra-Gulf and external security threats and challenges. Secondly, in order to promote its foreign policy independence and boost its regional and global diplomatic profile to ensure its security and survival in the dangerous environment of the Gulf region, it is Qatar that has extensively attempted to mediate conflicts in Lebanon, Yemen and Sudan, with varying degrees of success, under the banners of the GCC and the Arab League. Finally, the paper presents a series of policy recommendations, based on critical insights from Qatari mediation experiences, to enable the GCC to be a proactive dispute mediator.

scholarly journals The attitude of the Arab League from the Arab Spring Revolutions in North Africa.

2018 ◽  
Vol 225 (2) ◽  
pp. 79-91
Author(s):  
Instructor Faisal Shallal Al-Mehdawi
Keyword(s):  
North Africa ◽  
Arab Spring ◽  
Arab Region ◽  
The Third ◽  
Arab League ◽  
The Arab Spring ◽  
The Revolution

    Arab League position form a milestone of the revolution in the Arab region, especially in North Africa, was unsatisfying, blurred and hesitant in its direction to what is called variables (revolutions of the Arab Spring).  The paper is divided to four axes and the conclusions presented. the first axis deals with the Arab League's position on the revolution in Tunisia, e second axis is on the position of the Arab League in the revolution in Egypt occur, and the third axis is the Arab League's position on the revolution in Libya, finally, an analytical vision on the Arab League's position on the Arab revolution in North Africa is elaborated.

The role of the external factor in the process of democratic transformation (Arab spring countries model)

2019 ◽  
Vol 3 (11) ◽  
pp. 207
Author(s):  
Sabah Mohammed Saleh
Keyword(s):  
Democratic Transition ◽  
Arab Spring ◽  
External Factor ◽  
Military Intervention ◽  
Arab World ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
Protest Movements ◽  
Democratic Transformation ◽  
External Interventions

The democratic transition through the revolutionary context is considered to be the only way in the Arab world, as if there is no room for a process of democratic transition without solution or military intervention (internal or external), revolutions, coups or protest movements. Has become the focus of the problem of internal democratization, which has led to the absorption of the idea of external interventions and regional influences, mainly because of the internal content of Arab political systems.

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