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Abstract
State failure, sovereignty disputes, non-state territorial structures, and revolutionary and counter-revolutionary currents, among others, are intertwined within the Arab Spring process, compelling old and emerging regional actors to operate in the absence of a regional order. The emergent geopolitical picture introduces the poisonous mix of loss of state authority spiralling toward instability, defined by sectarianism, extremism, global rivalries, and ultimately irredentism within interdependent subregional formations. This assertion is substantiated by detailed and specific evidence from the shifting and multi-layered alliance formation practices of intra- and inter-state relations, and non-state and state actors. Analysis of the relations and alliances through a dichotomous flow from domestic to regional and regional to global also sheds light on prospective future order. A possible future order may take shape around a new imagination of the MENA, with porous delimitations in the form of emerging subregions.
Notes
1. Buzan and Waever, Regions and Powers, 50; Lake and Morgan, “The New Regionalism,” 9.
2. Fawn, “’Regions’ and their Study,” 14.
3. Frazier and Stewart-Ingersoll, “Regional Powers and Security.”
4. Pedersen, “Cooperative Hegemony.”
5. Scholte, Globalisation.
6. Aras and Falk, “Authoritarian ‘Geopolitics.’”
7. Popescu, “The Conflicting Logics,” 420.
8. Tuathail and Agnew, “Geopolitics and Discourse,” 190.
9. Aras and Falk, “Authoritarian ‘Geopolitics.’”
10. Gelvin, “Conclusion.”
11. Ibid.
12. Mansfield and Synder, “Democratisation and the Arab Spring”; and Rabah, “The Prospects for Democracy.”
13. Jones, “Hope and Disappointment.”
14. Aras and Yorulmazlar, “Turkey and Iran.”
15. Matthiesen, “A ‘Saudi Spring?’”
16. Steinberg, “Leading the Counter-Revolution.”
17. History and geography were construed as defining elements of Turkish foreign policy by the JDP’s foreign policy architect Ahmet Davutoglu. See Davutoglu, Stratejik Derinlik.
18. Then Foreign Minister Davutoglu unequivocally declared his commitment: ‘A new Middle East is being born. We will continue to be the patron, pioneer and servant of this new Middle East. Instead of tyrannies, suppressions and dictatorships, the will of the people and the voice of the right and the just will rule in this new Middle East. Turkey will be the strong supporter of this voice everywhere’. “Ortadoğu'da Değişimi Biz Yöneteceğiz,” Sabah, 26 April 2012. http://www.sabah.com.tr/gundem/2012/04/26/ortadoguda-degisimi-biz-yonetecegiz.
19. Bellin, “The Robustness of Authoritarianism”; and Bellin, “Reconsidering the Robustness.”
20. Shahin, “Egypt and the Politics of Token Reforms.”
21. Mullin, “Tunisia’s ‘Transition.’”
22. Akpinar, “Mediation as a Foreign Policy.”
23. Brennan, “Withdrawal Symptoms.”
24. Ibid.
25. “U.S. Opts not to Define Egypt Ouster as a Coup; Tensions Rise Ahead of Planned Protests,” CNN, 25 July 2013. http://edition.cnn.com/2013/07/25/politics/obama-egypt/.
26. “US Attack on Syria Delayed after Surprise U-Turn from Obama,” The Guardian, 31 August 2013. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/31/syrian-air-strikes-obama-congress.
27. Jones, “Hope and Disappointment.”
28. Samuels, “The aspiring Novelist Who Became Obama’s Foreign-Policy Guru,” New York Times, 5 May 2016. http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/08/magazine/the-aspiring-novelist-who-became-obamas-foreign-policy-guru.html?_r=0.
29. “Obama: Iran Can Be 'Very Successful Regional Power,'” The Weekly Standard, 29 December 2014. http://www.weeklystandard.com/obama-iran-can-be-very-successful-regional-power/article/822522; and Friedman, “Iran and the Obama Doctrine,” New York Times, 5 April 2015. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/06/opinion/thomas-friedman-the-obama-doctrine-and-iran-interview.html?_r=0.
30. President Putin’s obsession with reclaiming grandeur has been at the forefront of Russian foreign policy since his assumption of power. See Trenin, “Of Power and Greatness.”
31. Lund, “Stand Together or Fall Apart: The Russian–Iranian Alliance in Syria,” CEIP Syria in Crisis, 31 May 2016. http://carnegieendowment.org/syriaincrisis/?fa=63699
32. Yorulmazlar, “U.S.–Iran Nuclear Deal: The Need for a Regional Perspective,” SAIS Foreign Policy Institute, 24 March 2015. http://www.fpi.sais-jhu.edu/#!USIran-Nuclear-Deal-The-Need-for-a-Regional-Perspective/c1qvb/55118e910cf21e26baa881f2.
33. See Goldberg, “The Obama Doctrine,” Atlantic Monthly, April 2016. http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/04/the-obama-doctrine/471525/
34. “How Paris Missed the Jasmine Revolution,” Voxeurop, 18 January 2011. http://www.voxeurop.eu/nl/node/467051.
35. Owen, The Rise and Fall of Arab Presidents for Life.
36. See Weiland and Nelles, “Germany has Marginalised itself over Libya,” The Guardian, 18 March 2011. http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2011/mar/18/libya-germany-un-security-council.
37. See “The ISIS Papers: A Masterplan for Consolidating Power,” The Guardian, 7 December 2015. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/dec/07/islamic-state-document-masterplan-for-power.
38. Walt, “ISIS as Revolutionary State.”
39. See, Weiss and Hassan. ISIS: Inside the Army of Terror. New York: Regan Arts, 2015.
40. Lund, “Stand Together or Fall Apart: The Russian–Iranian Alliance in Syria,” CEIP Syria in Crisis, 31 May 2016. http://carnegieendowment.org/syriaincrisis/?fa=63699
41. Steinberg, “Leading the Counter-Revolution.”
42. Wickham. Muslim Brotherhood.