Introduction. Why Arab Spring Became Arab Winter

Arab MENA Countries: Vulnerabilities and Constraints Against Democracy on the Eve of the Global COVID-19 Crisis

2020

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Our exercise of standard development accounting attempts to arrive at a synthesis of the performance of Arab countries as they approach the abyss of the impending global economic recession and health crisis, connected with the Corona (Covid-19) pandemic. The choice of our indicators was guided by world system (Frank, ReOrient: Global economy in the Asian Age Ewing, University of California Press, 1998) and dependency approaches to development (Bornschier et al., Transnational corporations and underdevelopment. Frederic Praeger, New York, 1985); by later globalization-oriented debates about development (Tausch, Int J Heal Plan Manag 27(1):2–33, 2012a; Tausch, International macroquantitative data. Faculty of Economics, Corvinus University of Budapest. Available at http://www.uni-corvinus.hu/index.php?id=47854&tx_ttnews%5Btt_news%5D=0&tx_ttnews%5BbackPid%5D=31638&tx_ttnews%5BcalendarYear%5D=2012&tx_ttnews%5BcalendarMonth%5D=6&cHash=af8ef6888f7c9922b83b113f71c1ca32 , 2012b; Tausch, Int Soc Sci J 68(227–228):79–99. DOI: 10.1111/issj.12190, 2018); and by indicators featuring internal, “home-made” restrictions on democracy and gender equality. The choice of our indicators was also guided by research on Islamism, and the issues of the way, religion, culture and values are structured in the region (Grinin et al. 2020). Our data support the perspective of the UNDP Arab Human Development Report (UNDP, Arab Human development report 2016: Youth and the prospects for human development in a changing reality. UNDP, New York. Available at http://hdr.undp.org/en/content/arab-human-development-report-2016-youth-and-prospects-human-development-changing-reality , 2016) which diagnosed that, deficient as it may be, the state-led development model in the Arab world has expanded access to key entitlements and raised some levels of human development. Arab countries had a relatively low incidence of poverty and income inequality, shielding disadvantaged groups from some of the worst economic pressures of our times. On all accounts of standard development accounting (Grinin et al., Economic cycles, crises, and the global periphery, Springer, Cham, 2016; Tausch, Int Soc Sci J 61(202):467–488, 2010; Tausch and Heshmati, Globalization, the human condition and sustainable development in the twenty-first century: Cross-national perspectives and European implications. Anthem Press, London/New York/Delhi. https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-84939789242&doi=10.7135%2fUPO9780857286550&partnerID=40&md5=32618c3ba9b7101853ea357f86de2703 . 10.7135/UPO9780857286550, 2012a; Tausch and Heshmati, Sociologia 44(3):314–347, 2012b), the performance of the Arab countries since the 1960s was mixed at best. The multivariate indicator analysis of the development performance of the countries in the world system along seven different dimensions: Democracy Economic growth Environment ...

Section: Background: Assessing Development On the Eve Of The Current mentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Background: Assessing Development On the Eve Of The Current mentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Achievements and Deficits of the Arab MENA Economies on the Eve of the Current Global Corona Crisis

Arab MENA Countries: Vulnerabilities and Constraints Against Democracy on the Eve of the Global COVID-19 Crisis

2020

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“…Drawing from these recent developments in the field of development accounting (see Tausch 2012a , b , 2018 , 2019a , b ; Tausch and Heshmati 2012a , b , 2013 ) and value development analysis ( Tausch et al 2014 ; Grinin et al 2018 ), we attempt to pinpoint the positive and negative development assets of the Arab world, and logically also the Arab MENA countries in these respects. These analyses of the World Values Survey data derived the following factor analytical scales of a Democratic Civil Society, well compatible with a large social scientific literature (see also Grinin et al 2018 ): The non-violent and law-abiding society (Tyler and Darley 1999 ) Democracy movement ( Huntington 1993 ) Climate of personal non-violence (APA 1993 ) Trust in institutions (Alesina and Ferrara 2000 ; Fukuyama 1995 ) Happiness, good health ( Post 2005 ) No redistributive religious fundamentalism ( Huntington 2000 ) Accepting the market economy ( Elzinga 1999 ; Glahe and Vorhies 1989 ; Hayek 2012 ) Feminism (Ferber and Nelson 2009 ) Involvement in politics ( Lipset 1959 ) Optimism and engagement ( Oishi et al 1999 ) No welfare mentality, acceptancy of the Calvinist work ethics (Giorgi and Marsh 1990 ) …”

Section: Background: Combining Globalization Research and Global Valumentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Our present meta-factor analysis of globalization indicators and factor analytically derived results from the World Values Survey builds on a recent thorough reconsidering of global value research and has been presented at length in Grinin et al ( 2018 ). The country factor scores from this analysis were then entered into a meta-factor analysis, using KOF data and the data from Tausch and Heshmati ( 2013 ).…”

Section: Globalization Values and Development: A Meta-factor Analysimentioning

confidence: 99%

Arab MENA States and Value Change: What Happens When Economic Globalization Is More Rapid Than Cultural Globalization

Arab MENA Countries: Vulnerabilities and Constraints Against Democracy on the Eve of the Global COVID-19 Crisis

2020

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This chapter attempts to close a gap in the recent literature on Arab MENA countries economic development: how globalization affected human values in this part of the world. First, we assess the overall picture of the degree of globalization according to the Zurich KOF-Index data series, affecting the MENA countries. We then go on to use new comparable indices of global value development derived from the latest set of World Values Survey data and determine the Arab MENA countries’ place on a new factor analytical index of Global Civil Society, building on Grinin et al. (Islamism, Arab spring, and the future of democracy, Springer, Cham, 2018) and Solomon and Tausch (“The age of ignorance” and the civic culture of democracy: A multivariate analysis based on World Values Survey data. In: Islamism, crisis and democratization. Springer, Cham, 2020, pp 23–85). We relate these results (country factor scores) with macro-economic and social and political indicators, presented in Tausch and Heshmati (Globalization, the human condition and sustainable development in the twenty-first century: Cross-national perspectives and European implications. Anthem Press, London/New York/Delhi. 10.7135/UPO9780857286550. https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-84939789242&doi=10.7135%2fUPO9780857286550&partnerID=40&md5=32618c3ba9b7101853ea357f86de2703 , 2012a; Sociologia 44(3):314–347, 2012b) and Tausch (Jewish Polit Stud Rev 30(1–2):65–225. Available at http://jcpa.org/article/migration-from-the-muslim-world-to-the-west-its-most-recent-trends-and-effects/ (with data definitions and sources). Free data download available from https://www.academia.edu/37568941/Migration_from_the_Muslim_World_to_the_West_Its_Most_Recent_Trends_and_Effects , 2019a; Int J Heal Plan Manag, 10.1002/hpm.2781, 2019b), and the globalization indicators of the KOF-data series (Gygli et al., Rev Int Organ 14(3):543–574, 10.1007/s11558-019-09344-2, 2019). Our statistical calculations were performed by the routine and standard SPSS statistical program (SPSS XXIV), available at many academic research centres around the world, and we relied here on the so-called oblique rotation of the factors, underlying the correlation matrix. The SPSS routine chosen in this context was the so-called promax rotation of factors, which in many ways must be considered to be the best suited rotation of factors in the context of our research. Our comparisons reveal that the Arab MENA countries would be well advised to further social globalization.

Political Islam in the Arab MENA Countries: The Evidence from the Arab Barometer (5) Data About the “Unword” of Middle East Research?

Arab MENA Countries: Vulnerabilities and Constraints Against Democracy on the Eve of the Global COVID-19 Crisis

2020

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Political Islam has been a major force across the MENA for much of the twentieth century. Reaching the zenith of their political ascendancy in the immediately aftermath of the 2011 Arab Uprisings, it is clear that Islamism is on the wane across the region. Opinion polls demonstrated that the Arab street, in particular the youth, are becoming more secular, less conservative in their attitudes and more suspicious of the role of religion in the public sphere. What is driving this disenchantment with Islamist parties relates to their aligning themselves with anti-democratic forces, the endemic corruption and nepotism they have demonstrated once in office, their inability to govern and their internal divisions. Our multivariate empirics of the support rates for Political Islam in the region relied on data from the Arab Barometer survey (5). If the people of the entire Arab world had a free vote in a referendum, the following rules and regulations still would gain an absolute majority: Against a marriage of a female with a man who does not pray. Terrorism against the USA is a logical consequence of US interference in the region. Males are better political leaders. The USA, the UK and Israel pose the greatest threat to the stability and well-being of the region. Banks should not be allowed to charge interest. More than a third of Arab opinion still supports, among others, the following contentions: In favour of Shari’a using physical punishments. A woman cannot be prime minister/president. In society, non-Muslims’ rights should be inferior. Rejecting neighbours – people of a different religion. Shari’a should restrict women’s role. From the Arab Barometer data, we constructed parametric and non-parametric indices of Overcoming Islamism and of Political Islam. The indices show a very high correlation with each other. The country values of the Index components are found in Table 7.2 . Islamism is defined as high values along our 24 indicators across the board. Table 7.3 reports our UNDP-type Index “Overcoming Islamism” based on the valid country-level Arab Barometer results with 24 variables, aggregated with equal weights. Tunisia, according to Table 7.3 , is the country whose population is rendering least support for Islamist worldviews, followed by Lebanon and Iraq. Yemen, Sudan and Algeria are the three Arab nations, whose population still lends biggest across-the-board support for the 24 Islamist positions under consideration here. We could show the close relationship between support of the most salient global Islamist leader today, Turkish President Erdogan, and Political Islam among the interviewed Arab publics. Support for Political Islam is also still very clearly connected to Anti-Westernism in the region. Politica...