Springing Democracy

As spring is among us, so is a new Arab world. As we are experiencing new flowers and budding vegetation, the Arab world is experiencing new leadership and budding democratic rule. Rashid Khalidi wrote a very interesting editorial piece for The Nation. He describes how US and Arab perceptions of the Arab world are changing. Arabs are now proud of their region and media coverage refers to the Arab world with optimism.
He notes three things about the international change in perceptions about Arabs, Muslims, and Middle Easterners. First is that the Western media portrayed false images of the region. Much to our dismay, the region isn’t solely comprised of terrorists, radicals, and despots.
The second thing to consider is that the new perceptions are fragile. There is still the “us verses them” in the region and there will continue to be so even if all the despots are overthrown. There is an industry that was built out of this. An industry that supports the “war on terror”. “…it also includes a large ideological archipelago of faux expertise, with vast shoals of “terrorologists” deeply committed to propagating this caricature of the Middle East.” As Americans, we have been taught to look at the Arab world and see anything but ordinary people who want a representative government. We are supposed to see fanatical people. Not anymore!
And finally, the third thing to consider is that things could change quickly for the worse. Nothing has officially been resolved. Hopefully things do not turn sour! There is hope… the area has not always suffered from “appalling regimes.” In the late 19th century, there were many debates over how to limit the power of rulers, and those debates are surfacing once more.
There is still a long way to go, but change is happening slowly by slowly!