Read all posts for ‘arab spring’

There she was, sitting in a sweltering sitting room in Cairo, her scarred face haloed by her Islamic headscarf, her pregnant belly pushing out a bit, her 18-year-old hands resting lightly in her lap. Her name is Ghada, and she is one of the bravest women I have ever met.

Ever since the eruption of the mass uprisings in 25 January 2011, the face of  politically stagnant Egypt has changed forever. 2011 was a year packed with unexpected events, unpredictable by even the most authentic intellectuals. Just like 2011, 2012 was truly a year to remember. As a year with many setbacks! […]

Our world is more democratic than ever. Proving the post-Cold War mass democratization to be a historical rather than circumstantial development, the proliferation of democratic regimes has continued to the present day. Look at the Arab Spring, Egypt, and the unrest that continues to unnerve non-democratic regimes in countries such […]

The Arab Spring uprisings have triggered notable shifts throughout republican Arab states. The story in the Gulf monarchies, however, is starkly different. The Gulf Monarchies are, for the most part, autocratic, hydrocarbon-rich states whose regimes derive legitimacy from tradition and an inflated ability to pacify populations through the distribution of […]

World-renowned linguist and political analyst Noam Chomsky spoke to 1000 Egyptians at the American University in Cairo (AUC) on 23 October in a lecture entitled “Emerging World Order and the Arab Spring.” The event’s location was quiet poetic; at the AUC’s Tahrir Square campus, an eclectic audience with politicians, journalists, activists and students […]