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1. How Autocracies Fall

Author:
Erica Frantz and Andre Kendall-Taylor
Publication Date:
04-2014
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
The Washington Quarterly
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
Because autocrats can rarely be voted out of power, most find themselves exiting office in far less conventional ways. Since the 1950s, the coup d'état—or the illegal seizure of power by the military—has been by far the most common. During the 1960s and '70s, for example, about half of all autocrats who lost power did so through a coup. But fast-forward to the 2010s, and a different picture is emerging. The chain of protests during the Arab Awakening, which toppled four of the world's longest-standing rulers—Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali of Tunisia, Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, Muammar Qaddafi of Libya, and Ali Abdullah Saleh of Yemen—led many political observers to rejoice in the masses' ability to unseat autocratic strongmen. But are these revolts evidence that autocrats are becoming increasingly vulnerable to the masses? Or are they short-term exceptions to a longer-standing rule of autocratic ouster?
Topic:
Foreign Policy
Political Geography:
Libya, Yemen, and Egypt

2. Drone Wars

Author:
Peter Bergen and Jennifer Rowland
Publication Date:
10-2013
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
The Washington Quarterly
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
At the National Defense University (NDU) on May 23, 2013, President Barack Obama gave a major speech about terrorism-arguing that the time has come to redefine the kind of conflict that the United States has been engaged in since the 9/11 attacks. Obama asserted that ''[w]e must define the nature and scope of this struggle, or else it will define us.'' Thus, the President focused part of his speech on the Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF), which Congress had passed days after 9/11 and which gave President George W. Bush the authority to go to war in Afghanistan against al-Qaeda and its Taliban allies. Few in Congress who voted for this authorization understood that they were voting for what has become the United States' longest war, one that has expanded in recent years to countries such as Pakistan and Yemen.
Political Geography:
Pakistan, Afghanistan, United States, and Yemen

3. Israel's Pessimistic View of the Arab Spring

Author:
Daniel Byman
Publication Date:
06-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
The Washington Quarterly
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
Americans took heart as they watched Egyptian demonstrators rally in Tahrir Square and topple the regime of Hosni Mubarak in a peaceful revolution. Next door in Israel, however, the mood was somber: “When some people in the West see what's happening in Egypt, they see Europe 1989,” an Israeli official remarked. “We see it as Tehran 1979.” Political leaders vied to see who could be the most pessimistic, with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu publicly warning that it was even possible that “Egypt will go in the direction of Iran,” with the new Cairo government becoming even more dictatorial and lashing out abroad. As he pointed out in remarks to the Knesset, “They too had demonstrations; multitudes filled the town squares. But, of course it progressed in a different way.” As unrest spread from Egypt to Bahrain, Jordan, Syria, and Yemen, the gloom seemed to deepen.
Political Geography:
America, Europe, Iran, Yemen, Arabia, Syria, Egypt, Jordan, and Bahrain