Middle East Media and Book Reviews Online Volume 1, Issue 1 | Page 64

2/2/2016

Middle East Media and Book Reviews Online

Beyond the Arab Spring: Authoritarianism and Democratization in the Arab World
By: Rex Brynen
Pete W. Moore
Bassel Salloukh Salloukh, et al.
Beyond the Arab Spring: Authoritarianism and Democratization in the Arab World. Boulder, CO: Lynne Reiner,
2012.349pp. $27.50. ISBN: 978-1588268785.
Volume: 1 Issue: 1
April 2013
Review by
Paul S. Rowe, PhD
Trinity Western University
Langley, British Columbia, Canada
The events of the “Arab Spring” of 2011 generally came as a surprise to scholars. For much of the past twenty years, analysts of Middle Eastern
politics had been preoccupied with explaining the unique persistence of authoritarianism in the region in contrast with widespread democratization
throughout Africa, Latin America, and other portions of Asia. In this book, the authors seek to explain the Arab Spring amid theoretical debates that
have dominated the discipline of political science, including political cultur R