This article examines the crisis of civic raison d'& eacute;tat in post-war Syria through the predicament of the Druze minority following the July 2025 massacre. It argues that the new regimes' sectarian consolidation of power has deepened minority insecurity, forcing vulnerable communities to navigate strategies of exit, voice, and loyalty under existential threat. The article shows how exclusionary state-building, regional interventions, and internal leadership divisions have amplified calls for external protection and autonomy. The Druze experience illustrates the failure to transform sectarian domination into civic legitimacy, rendering minority security a decisive test of Syrias' future sovereignty and stability.
The Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood has long been considered the archetypal case through which scholars study Sunni Islamism. This article instead uses the Bahraini Muslim Brotherhood as a starting point for analysis of the organization regionally. This methodology allows us to cover two gaps in literature: empirically in terms of literature in English on the history, ideology, and political stances of the Bahraini Muslim Brotherhood, and theoretically regarding the use of different branches of the Muslim Brotherhood as a basis for analysis. In comparing the Egyptian case to the Bahraini Muslim Brotherhood, the article challenges the notion that one single transnational Muslim Brotherhood still exists and demonstrates that different groups determine their actions based on ties with local regimes.
