Democracy & Reform

Damascus has already taken steps toward this end, but intensive international economic assistance and political mediation will still be vital—the latter drawing on relevant elements from Iraq’s governing model.

To ensure the U.S. peace plan meets the long-term goal of a Gaza that is not ruled by Hamas and does not pose a threat to its neighbors, authorities need to combine realistic and measurable achievements with efforts toward disarmament, civilian reconstruction, and changing the public agenda.

Facing an uncertain economic future and fed up with corruption and mismanagement, young people in countries from Morocco to Iran have begun voicing demands for more responsive leadership and a more open society.

Ongoing delays in implementing their integration agreements threaten to derail the entire post-Assad national project, but the Kurds and Damascus don’t need to solve all of their core issues right away—they just need to take a well-defined set of urgent confidence-building steps.

Although top-down change seems increasingly unlikely, elected Libyans may stand a better chance of challenging the national status quo by pushing from the local level.

The government and military’s decision to seize the group’s weapons is unprecedented and welcome—but it won’t mean anything without a clear and viable timeline for implementation, especially as political maneuvering for next year’s election begins.

Existing programs are plagued by a broken tenure system, suspect foreign donors, Hamas apologists, and other ailments, but new programs at up-and-coming universities can help the field return to practical, non-ideological scholarship and respect for civil discourse.

The director of the Institute’s Turkish Research Program testifies on why Ankara remains vitally important to U.S. policy in the Middle East and the great power arena despite its major domestic shifts in mosque-state relations under President Erdogan.

China and Russia get higher marks than the United States, and Israel normalization is on hold—but respondents view Hamas negatively, want Arab involvement in the peace process, and increasingly support moderate interpretations of Islam.