Turkey and the Arab Spring
The 21st century has transformed relationships in the Middle East. Turkey has undergone the most massive change in its modern democratic history and is now a key player in the Middle East. The rollercoaster events of the “Arab Spring” have cast the region into geopolitical turmoil on a long, lurching path to change. And the balance of global power has also shifted dramatically, breaking the previous U.S. hegemonic hold on the Middle East and world politics.
This book examines this important turning point in the history of the Middle East. The politics of the Middle East are now up for grabs — but what are the sources of its future leadership? Turkey’s experience, for all its growing pains and warts, offers the only convincing Muslim model of dynamic and effective governance anywhere. Iran too may at last be re-emerging onto the world scene as a legitimate and influential actor. Neither Turks, Arabs or Iranians will ever be the same again nor will they interact with the West in the old familiar ways.
Beneath the superficial headlines, what are the deeper underlying forces that really drive the Middle East today? This book breaks with traditional U.S.-centric analysis of the Middle East to capture the political and social aspirations of the region, reflecting its own history, cultures and views of the world.
Graham Fuller is a former high-ranking CIA official who has spent over four decades living, working and traveling in the Muslim world. He speaks numerous languages — Russian, Turkish, Arabic and Chinese — and is widely recognized as an insightful, provocative, and original thinker on the political culture of the Muslim world and global politics. This clear and lucid analysis of complex regional turmoil offers some unconventional conclusions.
Published by Bozorg Press April 2014
Available in paperback at Amazon
Reviews
“…the book is insightful… The hallmark of Fuller’s books, Turkey and the Arab Spring included, is a long-term view that eschews the standard U.S.-centric analyses of Turkish politics and foreign policy. That quality is displayed again and shines through an occasionally uneven text. Fuller makes a compelling case that rumors of the Turkish model’s death are greatly exaggerated. The skeptics, however, will want to have an obituary drafted.” – Andrew A. Szarejko, Insight Turkey, Vol 16 No 3, Oct 2, 2014
“Despite his years as a Middle East analyst for the CIA, the National Intelligence Council, and the RAND Corporation, Fuller is a fierce critic of U.S. policy in the region. He spreads the blame for the Middle East’s woes among Western powers and local actors – especially Saudi Arabia, whose regime he believes will not survive much longer. Fuller’s portrait of the present state of the region is at odds with most conventional accounts… [a] sweeping survey. – John Waterbury, Foreign Affairs, Nov/Dec 2014
“A sober reflection on the rapidly changing political landscape of Turkey and a consideration of the nation’s role in the tumult of the Arab Spring. Fuller (A World Without Islam, 2010, etc.) has written extensively on the Middle East in general and Turkey in particular. His latest volume offers a searching, vigorous reappraisal of Turkey’s modern secularization and democratization… [he] delivers an exacting, original examination… [It is] an astute accounting of the political future of the Arab world, using Turkey as a bellwether.” – Kirkus Reviews
