Session 2 - Oil, Rentier States, and Capitalist Development

Session 3 - Social Networks and Civil Society

Session 4 - Diversification of Political Islam: From AKP to Al Qaeda

Session 5 - Oil, Israel-Palestine Conflict, and Terrorism: U.S. Middle East Policy

Session 6 - The Politics of Rogue States in Libya, Syria, and Iran

Conference Sketch by Dr. Robert P. Parks

Director of the Center for Maghreb Studies in Algeria

“Democracy and Development in the Middle East After the Arab Spring” examined the multiple domestic and international dimensions of the political and social turbulence that has unfolded in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) since January 14, 2011. On that day, Tunisian President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali was forced to quit power following close to a month of protest and popular demonstration. That event triggered widespread protests in other Arab states, shaking the foundations of some, though not all, of the most enduring authoritarian regimes in the world. The conference brought together fourteen international experts in the field, and focused on a number interlaced dimensions of the Arab Spring organized under four broad themes: 1) Defining and situating the Arab Spring; 2) Domestic socio-economic and political variation and the Arab Spring; 3) Political Islam and the Arab Spring;4) The role and shape of U.S. foreign policy before, during, and after the Arab Spring.

To view the full conference sketch, download the pdf file at the top of the page.