The arts and societies of the Kafirs of the Hindu Kush

A considered examination of the causes of the Arab Awakening and the likely appeal of Turkey. The next 5-10 years will be unstable and uncertain. But the previous regimes were in any case inherently unstable as autocratic leaders shut down almost all political life and thus slowly widened the constituency for Islam. As the Arabs forge theirb way forward, they will not look to the democracies of the West which in many cases supported the autocrats. They will look instead to regional models. It seems that Turkey is more attractive than the theocratic models of Saudi Arabia and Iran. Turkey is seen as a vibrant democracy and a dynamic economy. It is not just the Turkish model, but the success of the model which attracts.