Asserts that the Arab-Israeli dispute has dropped well down the list of priority concerns for most of the Arab world. Sets out the other and more important issues, the possibility of US contribution to which has brought the Arab-Israeli peace process towards "the most promising point in history".
Barry Rubin, a Senior Fellow at The Washington Institute for Near East Policy and Fellow at the Johns Hopkins University Foreign Policy Institute, is author of two forthcoming books, Islamic Fundamentalists in Egyptian Politics and Revolution Until Victory? The Politics of the PLO. Copyright (c) 1990 by Barry Rubin.
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What enthusiasts took for a global rush to democracy may be reversing direction, with backsliding and stalled transitions in the former Soviet Union, Africa, the Middle East. So far, one sees disarray or new strongmen much like the old; no competing ideologies seem to be beckoning. Market reforms have not been the cause in most cases. More affluent countries with Western ties seem to be sticking the course better. However the trend plays out, it should lead the administration to rethink democracy promotion. The truth is that U.S. policy is not significantly responsible for democracy's advance or retreat in the world.
