For Immediate Release **Please credit Arab Barometer** Citizens across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) continue to express support for democracy, but frustrations with both authoritarian rule and stalled democratic transitions are driving some toward alternative systems, according to Arab Barometer’s eighth wave of surveys. The new report examines which forms of governance MENA publics believe can best deliver…
Ultimately, these findings reveal a region that is still searching for the best system of governance. Citizens want dignity, but years of non-democratic rule have, in much of the region, not led to this outcome. Yet, the limited democratic experiments, as democracy is defined in the technical sense, have also not produced desired outcomes.
When Israel began to normalize relations with some of its neighbors in 2020, as part of the U.S.-brokered Abraham Accords, many analysts began to wonder whether the Palestinian cause still mattered to the Arab world. Doubts about the salience of the issue for Arabs grew in late 2023, when it appeared that Saudi Arabia might also join the accords, normalizing…
For Immediate Release **Please credit Arab Barometer** Across the Middle East and North Africa, citizens continue to prefer democracy—but this preference is not focused on elections alone. New data from Arab Barometer show that the reason people effectively support democracy is the belief that it will translate into dignity, including bringing political equality, economic security, and personal safety. In a…
Findings from Arab Barometer Wave VIII surveys make clear that while citizens across the region have come to realize democracy does not represent a panacea for all their country’s problems, they remain most supportive of it compared with other political systems.
For Immediate Release **Please credit Arab Barometer and Foreign Affairs Magazine** A new Foreign Affairs article analyzes Arab Barometer’s latest wave of surveys, revealing a sharp decline in support for normalization with Israel—and in favorability toward its Western allies—across the Middle East and North Africa following Israel’s war in Gaza post-October 7. Public opposition has halted normalization efforts, constraining regional governments’…
The War in Gaza has had dramatic effects on views of publics across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), as Arab Barometer findings have revealed. Unsurprisingly, views of how the Palestinian-Israeli conflict should be resolved have also been affected. Given the images coming out of Gaza, it might be expected that views toward the peace process would have hardened…
As China reemerged as a major actor in the Middle East and North Africa over the past decade, particularly through its Belt and Road Initiative, Arab publics initially held very favorable attitudes toward the world power. Yet as this relationship deepened and the scope of engagement became clearer, positive views of China began to fall. That trend has reversed over…
This episode of MEnbar, recorded during the Doha Forum 2024, features Amaney Jamal, the Dean of the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs and co-principal investigator of the Arab Barometer project. Jamal provides an in-depth look at the Arab Barometer’s critical work, which captures Arab public opinion on the region’s political, social, and economic issues. She unpacks findings from…
