The Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies and the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies have published Issue 17 (September/October 2024) of the peer-reviewed English language journal Al-Muntaqa: New Perspectives on Arab Studies. It features six articles, an analysis of the Arab Opinion Index survey, and one book review.
The opening article by John Keane, titled “The Beautification of War: Digital Communications, Public Indifference, Rebel Journalism, and Civilian Resistance in the Age of Meta Wars”, explores how the new meta wars, characterized by the “gamification” and “beautification” of war, generate public indifference and feelings of emotional disconnection. However, a counter-trend emerges marked by the birth of new media platforms whose rebel journalists digitally expose the terrible realities of these wars.
In “Emergency Telephone: The June 1967 War and Its Impact on Nablus in the Correspondence Between Hamdi Kanaan and Akram Zuaytir”, Bilal Mohammed Shalash discusses the ramifications of the June 1967 War in the city of Nablus as demonstrated in the correspondence between Hamdi Kanaan and Akram Zuaytir in the immediate aftermath of the war. Their exchange highlights how the war disrupted traditional means of communication but provided the occasion for an alternative form of communication based on personal relationships.
Hani Mousa’s “Tribalism, Regionalism, and the Stalled Building of the Modern State in Libya” unveils the underlying causes of the stalled state-building process in Libya, identifying tribalism and regionalism as the primary obstacles, which hindered the country’s necessary transition to democracy and building of a modern state.
In “Political Science in the Arab World”, Abdelwahab El-Affendi emphasizes the importance of assessing the state of political science within Arab academic institutions, drawing on observations from both the Arab region and beyond. El-Affendi notices the existence of a multifaceted crisis affecting education and research, arguing that the primary obstacle to the success of political science in the region is the absence of an Arab academic community.
Moataz El Fegiery assesses in his article, “The Arab Charter on Human Rights and International Human Rights Standards: The Practices and Approaches of the Arab Human Rights Committee”, the Arab Human Rights Committee (AHRC)’s interpretation of the rights enshrined in the Arab Charter on Human Rights. He finds that the AHRC has positioned its work not as contradictory to the international human rights system, but as supportive of and complementary to it.
Farah Z Aridi’s “Mapping the Literary: A Spatial Reading of Hilal Chouman’s Kāna Ghadan” looks at the significance of space as a narrational component capable of opening up a text to various possibilities, treating the text as a critical roadmap capable of producing meaning and knowledge. Aridi leans on the relationality of spatiality and textuality to offer a spatial reading of a literary work by Hilal Chouman.
In the Arab Opinion Index Analysis section, Majd Abuamer’s “What Do Arabs Think About When They Think About Migration? Insights from the Arab Opinion Index (2011-2022)” analyses data from eight Arab Opinion Index surveys conducted in 14 Arab countries, focusing on Arab public opinion trends on migration, particularly the desire to migrate, the motives behind migration, and the preferred destination.
Lastly, the issue concludes with a book review essay. Khaled Alkhaldi reviews Madoukh Ajmi al-Otaibi’s The Horn of Africa: A Strategic Depth for Gulf States.