Commentary
The targeting of Damietta Port appears to be more than a mere security message.
Amr Hamzawy
{
"authors": [
"Amr Hamzawy",
"Michael McFaul"
],
"type": "legacyinthemedia",
"centerAffiliationAll": "dc",
"centers": [
"Carnegie Endowment for International Peace",
"Malcolm H. Kerr Carnegie Middle East Center"
],
"collections": [
"Arab Awakening"
],
"englishNewsletterAll": "menaTransitions",
"nonEnglishNewsletterAll": "",
"primaryCenter": "Carnegie Endowment for International Peace",
"programAffiliation": "MEP",
"programs": [
"Middle East"
],
"projects": [],
"regions": [
"Middle East",
"North Africa",
"Egypt",
"Levant"
],
"topics": [
"Political Reform",
"Democracy",
"Security"
]
}
Source: Getty
In The Media
Ghosts of the Arab Spring
Supporting Arab autocrats may produce some short-term gains, but at the price of long-term disaster.
Published on Aug 22, 2016
Source: Hoover Digest
Five years after the Arab Spring, democracy seems a distant dream in the Middle East. Arab ruling elites, royal families, militaries, security services, and some businesspeople welcome this outcome. Restoring stability, the argument goes, is more important than democracy. Many Western governments have embraced this logic as well. Threatened as a result of state failure and an accompanying terrorist upsurge, US and European officials now argue that the most urgent need in the Middle East is fighting the Islamic State and its affiliates—a fight that requires collaboration with autocratic rulers. Strengthening Arab autocrats—including, for some, even the mass murderer Bashar al-Assad—is an evil necessary to defeating the Islamic State in Syria, Iraq, and the rest of the region...
About the Authors
Amr Hamzawy
Director, Middle East Program
Amr Hamzawy is a senior fellow and the director of the Carnegie Middle East Program. His research and writings focus on Egypt’s and other middle powers’ involvement in regional security in the Middle East, particularly through collective diplomacy and multilateral conflict resolution
Michael McFaul
Former Senior Associate
In addition to his role at Carnegie, McFaul is Peter and Helen Bing Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution and associate professor of political science at Stanford University.
Carnegie does not take institutional positions on public policy issues; the views represented herein are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of Carnegie, its staff, or its trustees.
More Work from Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
- The Drone Attack on Egypt and the Widening Middle East War
- "I Don’t Think Trump Wants to Pull America Out of NATO"Commentary
Does Donald Trump want to redraw the map of the world? Historian and geopolitical thinker Stephen Wertheim tries to parse the logic behind current American foreign policy
Stephen Wertheim
- Generative AI and Atrocity Denial in WarArticle
In the fog of modern war, generative AI offers every side a simple transaction: Trade documented reality for permanent doubt.
Mahsa Alimardani, Afsaneh Rigot
- The Channels of China’s Currency Promotion in Gulf MarketsCommentary
Is the Gulf moving beyond the dollar? This article examines how China is expanding the renminbi's role across Gulf markets, what that means for regional finance, and why the future of global currencies is more complex than the de-dollarization debate suggests.
Andrew Bonney
- Unlocking India’s Urban DividendArticle
As India undergoes a demographic transition, its cities will be its economic powerhouse—but only if it accurately captures city growth and empowers cities to support their citizens.
Apoorva Jadhav
