This article examines the effect of domestic and regional political dynamics on Saudi Arabias' stance toward the Muslim Brotherhood and the Sahwa movement. The article utilizes official narratives to reflect on how Saudi Arabia has oscillated between securitization and national rebranding, particularly under the rule of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Findings show that Saudi Arabias' use of co-optation and securitization against the Brotherhood contributes to its diminishing influence across the region. Changing Saudi identity and policies indicate that its ontological security is anchored in state survival after the Arab uprisings.
Since Syrias' independence, the states' capacity to govern its border peripheries has enhanced national cohesion and stability. The civil war fragmented Syria along center-periphery lines, with several borderlands slipping out of Damascus' orbit and forging security ties with neighboring countries. Reintegrating these borderlands into a unified Syria requires a framework that is simultaneously credible to local communities, reassuring to neighboring states, and pursued through a calibrated mix of coercion and persuasion.
The wars that have raged in the Middle East since October 2023 have contributed to the further rise of Huthi power. This article assesses how the Islamic Republic of Iran has perceived this rise and how it has shifted the nature of its support since 2023. It also analyzes the implications of the rise of the Huthis for Iran-Huthi ties and for the regional balance ofpower.
The outbreak of the Gaza war in October 2023 exposed the fragility ofPalestinian citizenship inside Israel, causing an unprecedented wave ofpolitical repression, loyalty tests, andpublic incitement against Israels'Arab citizens. These measures were not just a result of wartime emergency. Rather, they were extensions of prewar measures that embedded and reinforced Jewish ethnocratic dominance over the state. This article demonstrates how citizenship for Palestinians in Israel has been hollowed out, producing what may be termed "bare citizenship." This article argues that the systematic exclusion of Palestinian citizens accelerates Israels' democratic decay, deepens Jewish-Arab estrangement, and undermines the prospects for peace.
Kuwaits' civil society lacks the tools to be able to participate effectively in build-ing community-based climate adaptation. Drawing on government documents, fieldwork, and semi-structured interviews, this article demonstrates that the suc-cess of community-based adaptation in Kuwait depends on factors such as social class, citizenship, and material resources. Thus, Kuwaits' existing socio-political hierarchies create uneven distributions of climate vulnerability and opportunities for adaptation. Situating Kuwait within broader debates on climate governance, this article explains the emergence and limitations of climate activism in Kuwait and the wider Arab Gulf.
How has the retrenchment of US democracy promotion under President Donald Trump affected processes of autocratization in US allies globally and in the Middle East specifically? We provide theory and evidence to address this question by analyzing two US allies with preexisting processes of executive aggrandizement: Israel and Türkiye. We argue that the decline in US pro-democratic pressure has enabled autocratization in both countries. Furthermore, we show that the degree and processes of US autocracy promotion differ depending on two domestic factors: political leaders’ control over the state and domestic attitudes toward the United States. These factors shape whether US foreign policy enables autocratization through active “autocracy promotion,” in which the United States helps undermine domestic institutional constraints, or instead through a “normalization of authoritarianism,” in which strongman rule becomes an accepted norm. We further show that when public attitudes are pro-American, illiberal political leaders can leverage US support as part of their domestic legitimation strategy by fostering “symbolic alignment” with the US president. By contrast, in anti-American societies, leaders practice “managed incoherence,” in which a leader’s anti-American narratives coexist uneasily with US acquiescence to autocratization. We demonstrate the theory in Israel and Türkiye, two US allies with differing levels of incumbent control over the state and contrasting public attitudes toward the United States. We find that in both Israel and Türkiye, the retrenchment of US democracy promotion has enabled autocratization, but to different degrees and through different pathways. Our findings contribute to scholarly understanding of the international dimensions of democratic backsliding, authoritarianism in the Middle East, and the effects of US hegemony.
Moroccos'Party ofJustice and Development (PJD) once appeared as a model of pragmatic Islamism, winning elections and leading cross-party coalitions for a decade. Yet policy compromises and an entrenched authoritarian context sparked serious internal divisions and contributed to a heavy electoral defeat in 2021. In this essay, we explain how the party is trying to rebuild itself. We analyze a shift in political strategy, the emergence of a new generation of leaders, and the future viability of the Islamist project.
In this study, I examine the case of local authorities in Yalova, a non-metropolitan city in T & uuml;rkiye, to explore how local actors navigate loosely coupled policy within a tightly coupled system characterized by a high degree of centralization imposed by the central government. The research employs a qualitative method based on semi-structured interviews with key local stakeholders in the Yalova province. The findings highlight several critical factors driving this approach, including the influence of local political agendas, constraints on budget autonomy, the prioritization of local interests, and responsiveness to citizen needs.
This article examines Kamal Jumblatts' multifaceted political transformation throughout the 1950s and its impact on Lebanese elite dynamics. By analyzing his simultaneous roles as feudal Sheikh, Ottoman Beik, and revolutionary Muallim, I explore how Jumblatt reconciled his traditional background with progressive politics during the 1952 Rosewater Revolution and 1958 Lebanon Crisis. Drawing on recently available intelligence reports from Emir Farid Chehab alongside British andAmerican archival sources, this study reveals how Jumblatts'revolu-tionary persona enabled him to transcend traditional sectarian boundaries while preserving feudal authority and maintaining his familys'prominence. At the same time his political strategies intensified rivalries among elites and frustrated their integration into a cohesive governing class.
Since the 1990s, there have been a number of suicide attacks in T & uuml;rkiye carried out by various extremist organizations, including the Kurdistan Workers'Party, the Revolutionary Peoples' Liberation Party/Front, al-Qa'ida, and the Islamic State ofIraq and Syria. Yet, despite the increasing tactical use of and growing scholarly attention to the subject of suicide terrorism, scholars have paid scant attention to its causes within T & uuml;rkiye. Our analysis thus demonstrates that, despite differing expectations, all groups have generally employed suicide terrorism to pressure the Turkish governments to accept their demands, discourage state military operations, exploit public frustration with the government, increase their own influence, recruit new members, and display coordination with other terrorist organizations.
In this article, we explore the relationship between e-government implementation and administrative corruption between 2012 and 2024 within the Gulf Cooperation Council. We assess the strength of Government Effectiveness and Rule of Law as the two explanatory variables for the shift in corruption. The results demonstrate that there is a trend of declining corruption levels in Saudi Arabia and Oman, stagnating (but low) corruption levels in the United Arab Emirates, and increased corruption levels in Bahrain, Qatar, and Kuwait. Thus, we find that e-government implementation alone is not sufficient to curb corruption, but rather government effectiveness, rule of law, economic diversification, and geopolitical constraints mediate its impact.
