The European Union and the Arab Spring: Promoting Democracy and Human Rights in the Middle East
Author(s): Joel Peters
Publisher: Lexington Books
Publication Date: 8 Mar. 2012
Language: English
Print length: 180 pages
ISBN-10: 9780739174432
ISBN-13: 0739174436
Book Description
The European Union and the Arab Spring: Promoting Democracy and Human Rights in the Middle East, edited by Joel Peters, analyzes the response of the European Union to recent uprisings in the Middle East. The past year has witnessed a wave of popular uprisings across North Africa and the Middle East which the Western media dubbed “the Arab Spring.” Demanding greater freedoms, political reform, and human rights, the protesters swept away many of the region’s authoritarian autocratic regimes. The events of the Arab Spring have been truly historic. They led to profound changes in the domestic order of Middle Eastern states and societies and impacted the international politics of the region. Additionally, these events necessitate a comprehensive reappraisal by the United States and most notably by the EU in their relations with the states and peoples of the region. This timely collection brings together nine leading authorities on European foreign policy and the Middle East, and investigates three central questions: What role did the European Union play in promoting democracy and human rights in the countries of North Africa and the Middle East? How did the EU respond to the uprisings of the Arab street? What challenges is Europe now facing in its relations with the region? Peters’ The European Union and the Arab Spring is at the forefront of scholarship on this historic socio-political shift in the Middle East and its wider implications for the West.
Editorial Reviews
Review
Revealing the gaps between rhetoric and practice, this important and timely volume is a hard hitting account of the shortfalls of EU policy in human rights and democracy promotion in the Middle East. One overriding message that unites the different chapters is that a change in direction is urgently needed to address the new challenges facing the Arab world.
The contributors to this volume look at the role played by the EU in promoting democracy and human rights in the Middle East during the Arab Spring. They analyse the extent to which the EU responded to the uprisings and identify the challenges Europe now faces as the Middle East continues to evolve.
The historic events that have swept across the Arab world in 2011 compel the European Union to revise and possibly reverse its approach towards the region. The European Union and the Arab Spring provides a timely, illuminating, and refreshing analysis of the potential and the pitfalls of the EU’s past, present, and prospective policies towards the southern Mediterranean.
This volume provides a crucial and very timely contribution to the debate on how the European Union can best assist in the strengthening of freedom, justice, and dignity in the Middle East and North Africa at a time when the region is undergoing significant processes of political restructuring. Comprising critical analyses of concepts, preferences, and policies that have been underwriting EU democracy promotion in the region hitherto, this volume is essential reading for academics and policy-makers alike.
About the Author
Joel Peters is Professor of Government and International Affairs in the School of Public and International Affairs at Virginia Tech. He was a founder member of the department of Politics and Government at Ben Gurion University of the Negev, and an Associate Research Fellow in Middle East Programme at Chatham House, London, UK. He has published several books and numerous articles and book chapters related to Israeli foreign policy and the Israeli-Palestinian peace conflict and is the lead editor (with David Newman) of the recently published Routledge Handbook on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (2013).
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