Al Jazeera and Democratization analyses the increasing role of the media in political transformations with a special emphasis on the Arab world. Taking the Al Jazeera media network as a case study, the author explains how engaging the public and providing platforms for open debate and free expression contributed to the emergence of a new vibrant Arab public sphere. The launch of Al Jazeera in 1996 was a significant event that led to subsequent changes both in Arab media and politics. Among these changes, the Arab spring is certainly the most remarkable. This unprecedented phenomenon has already resulted in political change in a number of countries and is expected to generate a democratizing wave and reshape the face of the region. The Arab spring provides us with a telling empirical example where the interplay between media and politics is manifest. The public sphere that has emerged out of this newly communicative environment has undoubtedly played its role in the current political transformations. In this context, Arab democratization is no longer an abstract, it is rather a developing process that needs our attention and requires concerted scholarly efforts. Highly topical, this book provides a fresh theoretical perspective on Arab democratization in light of the Arab Spring, and is essential reading for researchers and students of Middle East Politics, Media Studies and Democratization.

Less than twenty-four months after the hope-filled Arab uprising, the popular movement had morphed into a dystopia of resurgent dictators, failed states, and civil wars. Egypt's epochal transition to democracy ended in a violent military coup. Yemen and Libya collapsed into civil war, while Bahrain erupted in smothering sectarian repression. Syria proved the greatest victim of all, ripped apart by internationally fueled insurgencies and an externally supported, bloody-minded regime. Amidst the chaos, a virulently militant group declared an Islamic State, seizing vast territories and inspiring terrorism across the globe. What happened? The New Arab Wars is a profound illumination of the causes of this nightmare. It details the costs of the poor choices made by regional actors, delivers a scathing analysis of Western misreadings of the conflict, and condemns international interference that has stoked the violence. Informed by commentators and analysts from the Arab world, Marc Lynch's narrative of a vital region's collapse is both wildly dramatic and likely to prove definitive. Most important, he shows that the region's upheavals have only just begun -- and that the hopes of Arab regimes and Western policy makers to retreat to old habits of authoritarian stability are doomed to fail.

This collection of articles, many by Arabic-speaking scholars, gives us more information and analysis of the Al Jazeera - the satellite television news channel network - and how it has affected the public and even the foreign policies of Western governments - than any other of the very few books published in English up to now.

Offers an introduction and analysis of some of the most important issues surrounding the media revolution in the Middle East, in particular examining the two Janus-like faces of the media in the Middle East: its role in reflecting developments within the region as well as its function in projecting the Arab world outside of the Middle East.

Explores the impact the Al-Jazeer and other satellite television stations have had on Arab politics over the last decade, discussing how these new Arab medias have encouraged open debate about Iraq, Palestine, Islamism, Arab identity, and other key political and social issues.

In this book, leading international scholars examine the way new media is reshaping lives and politics. Covering topics from women's rights to terrorism, and countries from Israel to Saudi Arabia, these authors explore the global and regional ramifications of the proliferation of communication technologies and the information they disseminate.

In the wake of the Ottoman Empire’s nineteenth-century reforms, as guilds waned and new professions emerged, the scholarly ‘estate’ underwent social differentiation. Some found employment in the state’s new institutions as translators, teachers and editors, whilst others resisted civil servant status. Gradually, the scholar morphed into the public writer. Despite his fledgling status, he catered for the public interest all the more so since new professionals such as doctors, engineers and lawyers endorsed this latest social role as an integral part of their own self-image. This dual preoccupation with self-definition and all things public is the central concern of this book. Focusing on the period after the tax-farming scholar took the bow and before the alienated intellectual prevailed on the contemporary Arab cultural scene, it situates the making of the Arab intellectual within the dysfunctional space of competing states’ interests known as the ‘Nahda’. Located between Empire and Colony, the emerging Arab public sphere was a space of over- and under-regulation, hindering accountability and upsetting allegiances. The communities that Arab intellectuals imagined, including the Pan-Islamic, Pan-Arab and socialist sat astride many a polity and never became contained by post-colonial states. Examining a range of canonical and less canonical authors, this interdisciplinary approach to The Making of the Modern Arab Intellectual will be of interest to students and scholars of the Middle East, history, political science, comparative literature and philosophy.

This book provides a clear and authoritative introduction to the emerging Arab media industries in the context of globalization and its impacts, with a focus on publishing, press, broadcasting, cinema and new media. Through detailed discussions of the regulation and economics of these industries, the authors argue that the political, technological and cultural changes on the global media scene have resulted in the reorganization of the Arab media field. They provide striking examples of this through the particular effects on media policies, media technology and the content and genres developed for the new generation of media consumers. As part of the book's overview of the contemporary characteristics of Arab media, the authors outline the development of the role of modern Arab media from a tool of mobilizing the public to a tool of commercial and symbolic profit. Overall, the volume illustrates how the Arab region represents a unique case where the commercialization and liberalization of selected media industries has gone hand in hand with continuous state intervention and an increasing self censorship. Written for students without prior knowledge of the topic, Arab Media will be essential reading for all interested in the contemporary global media industries.

Why did Tunisian protests following the self-immolation of Mohammed Bouazizi lead to a massive wave of uprisings across the entire Arab world? Who participated in those protests, and what did they hope to achieve? Why did some leaders fall in the face of popular mobilization while others found ways to survive? And what have been the lasting results of the contentious politics of 2011 and 2012? The Arab uprisings pose stark challenges to the political science of the Middle East, which for decades had focused upon the resilience of entrenched authoritarianism, the relative weakness of civil society, and what seemed to be the largely contained diffusion of new norms and ideas through new information technologies. In this volume, leading scholars in the field take a sharp look at the causes, dynamics, and effects of the Arab uprisings. Compiled by one of the foremost experts on Middle East politics and society, The Arab Uprisings Explained offers a fresh rethinking of established theories and presents a new framework through which scholars and general readers can better grasp the fast-developing events remaking the region. These essays not only advance the study of political science in the Middle East but also integrate the subject seamlessly into the wider political science literature. Deeply committed to the study of this region and working out the kinks of the discipline, the contributors to this volume help scholars and policymakers across the world approach this unprecedented historical period smartly and effectively.

Using interviews, newspaper articles, online texts, official documents, and national surveys, Lei shows that the development of the public sphere in China has provided an unprecedented forum for citizens to organize, influence the public agenda, and demand accountability from the government.