“The Arab Spring Reconsidered Twelve Years On” A discussion: Ibrahim Kazerooni and Rob Prince. Tuesday, February 14, 2023 @ 8 pm Mountain States Time

Tunisian couscous

The Arab Spring was hailed at the time it burst forth and a wave of democracy sweeping the Middle East and North Africa, initiating a “new dawn”, a “new Middle East” as Condoleezza Rice called it. Yet a movement of social change triggered by growing economic and social disparity, repressive, corrupt and ineffectual governments never lived up to its earlier billing. It turns out that much of that uprising had the “made in Washington DC” label all over it, with NGOs and foundations like the National Endowment for Democracy, the Open Society Foundation in tandem with the then Bush Administration, pedaling what was essentially “all the change necessary to sustain the status quo”. Some of the more promising movements for social change, those in Tunisia and Egypt which undoubtedly involved mass movements involving hundreds of thousands of people – if not more – resulted in removing dictators but their original impulse was “hijacked” by religious movements, the Moslem Brotherhoods in particular. After the dictators were swept from power, these movements for change were hijacked by religious fundamentalists, their essence stripped of all content. In other countries, Libya, Syria, the initial movements for reform and accountability were quickly taken over by even more fanatical religious elements, backed by NATO, Washington and London. The uprisings there resulted in the “successful” partition of Libya and the near successful partition, but ultimate failure of that in Syria.

With the wisdom of hindsight, Kazerooni and Prince discuss these uprisings and their results, twelve years on. Join us on Facebook or YouTube on February 14, 2023 @ 8 pm Mountain States Time. The interviews will remain available afterwards.