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This paper discusses the proposition of the rise of social Islam in Morocco by studying the country's two largest political Islam movements, the Justice and Charity Association (jamāʿat al-ʿadl wa-l-iḥsān) and the Unity and Reform Movement (ḥarakat al tawḥīd wa l-iṣlāḥ). It focuses on the concept of social Islam which implies the provision of financial and in-kind assistance and healthcare, education, athletic, artistic, and pedagogical services to a variety of social strata. The study proceeds from the rise of social Islam, how it relates to the concept of the urban poor under the development "crisis" Morocco has faced since the 1980s, and highlighting the social implications for the most important social stratum: the lower middle class and the poor. The study shows that the Islamist movements under study have managed to form new and old bonds of solidarity on a religious or tribalist basis, which have replaced traditional forms of solidarity that previously used to embrace the lower and lower middle classes.

​A one-day academic symposium hosted by the Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies will bring together experts from Russia, the Arab world and the region to examine Moscow’s latest military intervention in Syria, on Saturday, October 24, 2015. While Russia’s decision to intervene directly in the conflict in Syria comes as the culmination of more than four years of diplomatic and military support for the Assad regime, the move by the Kremlin to deploy its military forces has come as a surprise to many observers, becoming a turning point not only in the militarized revolution within Syria, but also in the broader Middle East and indeed in a larger global arena. To better study the circumstances which gave rise to the Russian maneuver and the outcomes likely to result from it, the Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies will convene “Russian Military Intervention in Syria: Motives, Objectives and Repercussions”. In the highly volatile climate which the Middle East is presently witnessing, selected participants at the meeting will be asked to examine the fallout of Russia’s actions on the future stability of the region.

This study investigates the causes beneath the absence of non-Western theorizing efforts in the field of International Relations (IR), aiming to shed light on intellectually and politically defectiveness of the Arab World in the field, as manifested since the outbreak of the Arab Spring revolutions. To this end, the study discusses the position of the Arab World in IR and illustrates how the North (the Centre) deliberately ignores knowledge production on international relations from the South (the Periphery) through abstraction, reductionism, and exclusion. Finally, the study scrutinizes how the situation in the Arab World reflects the continuation of colonialism in two evident forms: epistemologically through the knowledge-power nexus; and by subjugation or keeping states, even those that are nominally independent, subservient to the Great Powers in international politics.

US and Gulf relations are based on more than self-interest, but common selfinterest is always a key (or the key) factor in shaping an alliance and strategic relationship. The key common self-interests that drives US and Arab Gulf relations are security – the need to deal with Iran, fighting extremism, and securing the flow of petroleum exports out of the Gulf and Arabian Peninsula to meet the needs of the global economy, and to provide the key source of income for the Gulf states. This study explains why the United States maintains close ties with its Arab strategic partners in the Gulf. The study finds out that the US and its Gulf strategic partners face serious challenges, including domestic political change in the US, divisions between Arab states, the impact of regional conflicts and instability, and the growing role of non-Western powers.

The youth revolution in Yemen at the beginning of 2011 kindled a ray of hope that the walls of tyranny could be broken down and the country could be pulled back from the clutches of narrowly defined identities. It sharpened the will that formed a “historical bloc” capable of rendering democratic transition successful. However, the youth revolution never transcended the ecstasy of a romantic revolutionary act to reach the stage of building institutions capable of enforcing respect for the law and accommodating ethnic, tribal, sectarian and political pluralism. This study addresses the impact of the Saudi-Iranian role on Yemen's transition. It is premised on considerable importance attached regional factors, which perhaps have even greater influence than domestic factors on the outcome of the Yemeni revolution. The study stresses that the effects and limits of regional factors are related to several variables, such as the vicissitudes of international politics; international and regional balances and interests; as well as the strategic location of the country subject to interference; its resources; its internal dynamics; the maturity of local elites; the weight of political opposition; and the quality of institutions.

The presence of the external factor is usually related to the context of the popular hirak, the periods of political transition and the transitional phases in many countries. This factor is evident in countries with a geopolitical position in regional and international competition. This study discusses the variable of the external factor in the 22 February 2019 hirak in Algeria by examining the limits of international and regional interventions in steering the course of the popular hirak compared to other Arab cases where the external factor seemed to be more influential. It aims to discuss the determinants of Algeria's relations with regional and international powers and to explain the issue of the lack of external interference in the popular hirak, ending with the modalities of the future of the turbulent political path and discussing the possibilities of transformation from abroad. The study concludes that the lack of regional and international intervention in the popular hirak is mainly related to geopolitical and strategic constraints, far from value and normative considerations. The behaviour of external forces is determined by Algeria's geopolitical situation. The risks of instability in the country would create highly complex security challenges in the Mediterranean region. Added to this is the importance of Algeria in assessing the strategic balances in the region, especially for European security.

The study criticizes the general framework that has governed the broader current of the researchers in civil-military relations, their method of thinking about the military institution since the inception of the field, the paper presents the theoretical and practical gaps in that literature, in particular the researchers of "Coup-Proofing". The study shows the weakness of the explanatory capabilities of the field in extrapolating and analyzing the historical era that the research seeks to reveal its theoretical and historical ambiguities, which is the phase of political pluralism in Syria between 1954-1958, which the researchers viewed as a democratic phase. The paper examines why did the army step down from the presidency and allowed civil forces to engage in political action at the time, in spite of that phase is in the midst of two series of coups. The paper is based on a basic premise that the army as a military institution do represent wings, sectors, units, brigades, and power relations, before it is an expression of any other social segments, which is in contrast to what the literature says in examining the sociological backgrounds of the officers.

​This section lists the most prominent political documents related to the democratic transition in the Arab world. We publish, in this issue, a number of documents from Sudan, Tunisia and Iraq. We stop at the publication of the documents for the months of May and June 2022.

​This study provides an overview of development stages in post-conflict reconstruction since World War II. The authors attempt to summarize a set of lessons learned from accumulated experiences, which could then be used to better inform Arab decision-makers. The authors also call for an indigenous, Arab perspective, distinct from Western approaches, to post-conflict reconstruction policies. The first section in the study addresses the differences between the traditional definition of war and contemporary conflicts, focusing on how armed conflicts in the Arab region have caused vast levels of destruction requiring immense, cooperative efforts to aid in the post-conflict reconstruction. The paper goes on to explain the concepts and terminology which underpins post-conflict reconstruction and recovery, as well as the historical and analytical arc of the most significant milestones in the development of post-conflict reconstruction methodology.

The occupied West Bank has experienced a steady expansion of settlement construction and settler demographic presence since 1967. This study analyzes the strategies of settler colonialism in the West Bank using interactive maps produced by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) and the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. It argues that settler colonialism operates as an ongoing structure rather than a discrete event, relying on evolving forms of the logic of elimination and the spatial and demographic reconfiguration of Palestinian society. The study highlights the central role of the Israeli Civil Administration and state institutions in regulating the indigenous population in ways that facilitate settlement expansion. It demonstrates a shift from direct exclusion to more complex mechanisms of domination based on population management and bureaucratic control. The findings identify two core strategies: consolidating control over the Jordan Valley and land behind the separation barrier, and tightening control over the heart of the West Bank through three settlement belts surrounding Jerusalem.