Commentary

The Gulf States in International Political Economy by Kristian Coates Ulrichsen is a welcome addition to scholarship on the growing economic and political power of the six states of the Gulf Cooperation Council: Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Oman. The book, as its title suggests, explains the Gulf states’ successes in...

“Islamism is dead!” announced Said Ferjani, a leader of the progressive wing of Ennahda, Tunisia’s main Islamist party, as we drank coffee in a hotel cafe here last month. Mr. Ferjani, a former hard-liner who once plotted a coup against the regime of President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali, was upbeat as he described the historic transition his...

One of the key features of late Obama-era American foreign policy is the dominant mythology that all American – and, by extension, any western – military intervention in the Middle East is doomed to failure. President Obama has said as much, with increasing intensity, in a series of interviews, and it appears to have risen...

Dr. Hala Aldosari, honored by Freedom House on May 24 as co-winner of its 2016 Freedom Award, is a Saudi women’s rights advocate whose work on behalf of women is nearly without precedent in the kingdom. A researcher on women’s health issues including domestic violence, Aldosari talks here about prospects for significant social reform.

The battle to define the policy legacy of any two-term American presidency usually emerges as the election for a successor begins in earnest. Ever the astute campaigner, Barack Obama initiated the current debate through a series of interviews to The Atlantic magazine, published as The Obama Doctrine. The conversation has just been significantly extended by...

The American presidential election will almost certainly be between former secretary of state Hillary Clinton and real estate mogul Donald Trump. This unprecedented contest – a real-life “wacky race” – invites a thought experiment: compare and contrast Middle East policy report cards for these would-be national leaders. The manifest purpose of this academic fantasy is...

President Obama has just concluded what almost certainly will be his last meeting with the heads of state of the six Arab monarchies that comprise the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). By all accounts, the meeting was productive, as we would hope when the leaders of our nations gather. These are, after all, important and enduring...

Five years after al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden was killed by US Special Forces, the terrorist group seems to be temporarily shifting its tactics away from primarily focusing on large scale attacks. Instead, the group is now encouraging militants to carry out lone wolf attacks against American business leaders as part of an orchestrated effort...