Talk about the Middle East and those who study it has become understandably heated. But we can learn more through a calm assessment of the achievements and weaknesses of this field.
About the Author
Ibrahim Karawan is director of the Middle East Center at the University of Utah, where he teaches international politics. From 1995 to 1997, he was a senior fellow and directing staff member at the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) in London. He is the author of The Islamist Impasse (1997).
The secularization hypothesis has failed, and failed spectacularly. We must find a new paradigm to help us understand the complexities of the relationship between religion and democracy.
The uneasy accommodation of competing visions of authority that has characterized Iran’s political system since 1979 is a familiar phenomenon in the Middle East and elsewhere.
