The League of Arab States and Regional Security: Towards an Arab Security Community?

This article examines the historical role of the League of Arab States in regional security through the prism of order and sovereignty in the Arab states system. It argues that the League is a product of the dilemma between state sovereignty and Arab nationalism that beset the Arab regional order for decades. Strained by role conflict, Arab rulers opted for a weak inter-regional organisation that they subsequently undermined, exploited or promoted for statist purposes. However over time, the consolidation of state sovereignty and the decline of pan-Arabism have led to the emergence of a more stable regional order. This creates more opportunities for the development of a collective security framework, in which the Arab League could play an important role.     

Arab Nationalism and the Arab Union of 1958

The late 1950s was a turbulent period in the history of Arab nationalism. It saw the birth and demise of unity states (the United Arab Republic and the Arab Union), civil war, revolution and Western intervention. Despite its short five-month lifespan, the Iraqi–Jordanian Hashemite Arab Union contributed to the intensification of the traditional Egyptian–Iraqi rivalry, the overthrow of the Iraqi monarchy in 1958 and the American intervention in Lebanon the same year. It was the result of Arab nationalism, lingering British imperial dreams, the East–West conflict, economic considerations and an inter-Arab cold war. The Arab Union had obvious advantages over the United Arab Republic. Two such advantages were the greater number of cabinet posts granted to Jordan by the Arab Union than were granted to Syria by the United Arab Republic, and the fact that Amman retained its status as capital (one of two union capitals), whereas Damascus was downgraded to the status of provincial capital. These advantages, however, failed to prevent the premature demise of the union, which was caused by a combination of negative domestic and regional perceptions, economic constraint and military commitments.     

The New Arab Media Phenomenon: Qatar's Al-Jazeera

This paper was given at the thirty-fourth annual meeting of the Middle East Studies Association, November 16–19, 2000, in Orlando, Florida.     

Change and Continuity after the Arab Uprising: The Consequences of State Formation in Arab North African States

This article provides a comparative macro-level overview of political development in Morocco, Tunisia and Egypt. It examines their evolution from the colonial period through several distinct phases, showing how differences in their origins were followed over time by a certain convergence towards a common post-populist form of authoritarianism, albeit still distinguished according to monarchic and republican legitimacy principles. On this basis, it assesses how past state formation trajectories made the republics more vulnerable to the Arab uprising but also what differences they make for the prospects of post-uprising democratisation. While in Morocco the monarch's legitimacy allows it to continue divide-and-rule politics, in Egypt the army's historic central role in politics has been restored, while in Tunisia the trade union movement has facilitated a greater democratic transition.