Did Bush Democratize the Middle East? The Effects of External–Internal Linkages
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 10366153 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Bruce Gilley (0000-0002-1170-1502, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2013 |
| Volume | 128 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Pages | 653-685 |
| Publication date | 2013-01-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Political Science Quarterly (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0032-3195 • E-ISSN: 1538-165X |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press (OUP) (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1002/polq.12141 |
| OpenAlex | W1590883249 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 2 |
THE WAVE OF PRO-DEMOCRACY MOVEMENTS and openings that swept the greater Middle East region in 2010–2012 caught the world by surprise. While the future of these openings is uncertain, their occurrence, as well as democratic changes in the region since 2001, are in need of explanation. What motivated and empowered the incidence of pro-democracy protest movements and regime liberalizations during this time? A large literature has highlighted the importance of external as well as internal factors in democratization processes. The role of the United States as the most important external actor in the Middle East must be given due attention. More narrowly, the possible effects of U.S. policies under president George W. Bush between 2001 and 2008 deserve special attention because of the striking ways in which his administration sought to bring about such changes and because those changes occurred during and shortly after the Bush policies were enacted. This paper first reviews theories that link external factors to democratic change. It then examines both correlative as well as qualitative evidence about the effects of the Bush policies on democratic change in the region. The results show that the Bush “Freedom Agenda” generally contributed in positive ways to undermining authoritarian regimes in the Middle East and to strengthening their opponents, factors that interacted with domestic trends to contribute to rising democratic gains. However, the Freedom Agenda worked in complex and often unexpected ways, in particular by sparking nationalist sentiments against the United States. Studying this issue may help to recover the valuable lessons that the changes in the Middle East have to offer for democracy promotion practitioners as well as for analysts of democratization
Economics · Middle East · Political economy · Political science · Islamic Studies and History · Law · Political Conflict and Governance · Terrorism, Counterterrorism, and Political Violence
| Unique citing works | 2 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,2 |
| Citation span | 2016 - 2017 (2) |
| Citation velocity | historical |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 2 |