Siyasat Arabia is now accepting research proposal submissions contributing to the journal’s upcoming SpecialIssue on the State of Arab Political Science, which seeks to investigate and critically evaluate Arab political science “state of the art,” in the culture, and in the academy. The special issue aspires to spotlight this knowledge domain in epistemological evaluation, examining curricula and theoretical sources in the various subdivisions of international relations, comparative politics, political systems, and political thought. Importance is accorded to assessment of constructive insights and successes, evaluation of overall achievements registered in the priority topics taken up by research in the field, their importance, the practical internal-field and external-field applications, as a subject of pedagogy at various levels of teaching in Arab academies, and in the broader existing sociopolitical and cultural context, and all related issues.

The attached background paper (Arabic) points out that along with the emergence of numerous critical Arab contributions to political science, received critical voices suggest that Arabic political science has generally failed to systematically renew itself and keep abreast of worldwide developments in the field. Arab teaching academies have impeded receptivity to the embrace of such developments in innovative syntheses, effectively ossifying Arab political science in the bygone historical phases of its development. Since the mid-twentieth century, Arab authoritarian regimes that rose to prominence on the political scene further shackled the field, which ended seemingly condemned to a perpetual inability to meet the demands of scientific innovation, expand the stores of knowledge, or meet Arab thought’s needs and aspirations. A comparable situation exists in many developing countries and regions of the world.

Leaving aside any critical evaluation, Arabic writings have scarcely attempted to chronicle and reference the history and standing of the political science field within Arab culture, or show how Arab political science originated, developed, and became regulated within specialist degree-awarding institutions.

In view of the above, this Siyasat Arabiya Special Issue seeks to commence the task by investigating the following essential themes:

• The emergence and history of political science in the Arab world.
• Schools and tendencies in Arab world political science.
• Experiences of Arab world political science teaching.
• Arab researchers’ contributions to the fields of international relations, comparative politics and political theory.
• Political science responses to Arab region events.
• Research institutes concerned with political science and study of authority and State in the Arab world.
• Arab world policy analysis centers.
• Area studies and cross-disciplinary research in Arab world political science studies.

The Siyasat Arabia Editorial Board invites researchers and specialists wishing to participate in the journal’s special issue to submit 500-word Arabic language research proposals setting forth the main lines of study and defining the problem addressed in the research, its importance, and the expected added value produced by the research.

The contributing researcher shall attach an updated CV with the proposal, as well as titles of published studies in any areas related to the special issue topic, if any.

Proposals are to be sent to the journal Editorial Board: siyasat.arabia@dohainstitute.org

26 June 2021 is the deadline for Editorial Board receipt of research proposals.

The Editorial Board shall respond to proposal authors, either with acceptance or rejection, by no later than 4 July 2021.

Authors of research proposals approved by the Editorial Board are to submit the finalized research paper (between 6,500-10,500 words, including footnotes and references) in full for peer review by 25 September 2021 latest.

Completed research is subjected to the academic arbitration of a specialized scientific committee. The researcher shall be informed of the committee’s decision regarding the research submission, be it acceptance, rejection, or a list of observations with amendments to be made for the adoption of the research for publication in the journal issue.

Please see the attached reference paper (in Arabic) on the topic of this special issue.