Group items tagged

The article focuses on the Muslim Brotherhood's belief that Women's rights would result in the destruction of Egyptian Society. The brotherhood disagreed with the statements made in the UN Declaration regarding women's rights. Such concerns included the potential access women would have to travel, work, money, and contraception without the approval of their husbands. The U.N. Commission of the Status of Women seeks to improve the lives of women. The conflict that exist between women's rights/freedoms are restricted by the religious beliefs of the Muslim Brotherhood. 

After many years of trying to give women rights, a decision can not be made without bringing important issues like religion and culture to the table. The Muslim Brotherhood is on the opposing side when coming to a decision on giving rights to women.

After many years of trying to give women rights, a decision can not be made without bringing important issues like religion and culture to the table. The Muslim Brotherhood is on the opposing side when coming to a decision on giving rights to women.

The beheading of James Foley by the Islamic State triggered debate. David Greene talks to Robert Hernandez, assistant professor at USC Annenberg, about censorship with new tech platforms like Twitter.

The beheading of James Foley by the Islamic State triggered debate. David Greene talks to Robert Hernandez, assistant professor at USC Annenberg, about censorship with new tech platforms like Twitter.

The beheading of James Foley by the Islamic State triggered debate. David Greene talks to Robert Hernandez, assistant professor at USC Annenberg, about censorship with new tech platforms like Twitter.

Women are Egypt have been treated different than men since anyone can remember. The women are taking action and protesting that the constitution be revised to change rights. Seats in parliament is one of the goals they hope to achieve. Equality between sexes is their main goal.

Compiled by faculty members at the German University in Cairo, this working paper series addresses the effect that watsa has on competence and morality in Middle Eastern economics and society. The authors define watsa as, "the intervention of a patron in favor of a client to obtain benefits and/or resources from a third party." In simpler terms it is a system of social networking in Arab culture in which family and social ties play a significant role in the attainment of economic advantages and resources, largely in the hiring process in businesses and organizations. A person applying for a job seeks out watsa to increase their chances of getting hired. Comparable to nepotism and cronyism, but is not restricted to friends and associates, watsa can also involve strangers linked through some social web of people. Watsa runs somewhat parallel to a Chinese concept of guanxi, based on Confucian ethics and focusing on strong collective ties. While guanxi is a part of Chinese ethics it actually defies Muslim ethical values, which advocates hiring the person most capable. In a Jordanian survey, 87% of respondents want watsa eradicated. While we know that unemployment in the Arab region is widespread, we can assume that this motivates people to do anything they can to improve their chances of obtaining a job. However, the practice of watsa as a whole is actually degrading the economic systems in the Arab sates even further. The article explains the linkage between watsa and poor job performance, economic decline, and the festering of injustice and frustration among the masses in Arab countries.

This looks super interesting, but I can't get the link to open. Thanks for writing a thorough summary of it!

The author of this article strongly opposes Social Media companies, specifically Twitter censoring ISIS related materials on their website. The author argues it violates free speech and the democratic principles associated with the website, arguing censoring a beheading video would be a slippery slope for future content.

This is such a controversial topic. I saw a reference to it recently (was it possibly something that was brought up in the Bill Maher/Ben Affleck dust-up?) that pointed out that the practice is almost unheard of outside of central and northeastern Africa, with a few small pockets in Iraq and the Gulf.

Syria is determined to keep Russia in the loop when it comes to its presence in the Middle East. As the United States increases its presence so to those Russia and Syria claims that they encourage Russian presence solely to "keep the balance" in the Middle East. 

Activists who led the 2011 revolt reflect on growing disillusionment with prospects for positive social change. A vast majority of the youth have become apathetic toward any political policies. In the vote for the constitutional referendum, the youth mainly acted in boycott and did not participate in the voting. In addition, the Egyptian media outlets have been accused of participating in a smear campaign against the activists that led the 2011 revolution. Wael Ghonim, for example, has had to handle his public image as he has been accused of benefiting from the revolt that he helped to orchestrate. A blogger, who goes by the name "Sandmonkey" accused the older generations of resisting change. He claims they act on their own accord even when they have no plausible or other alternative solutions. He points out that the youth represents 70% of the population but receives no official representation and only pity from the older generation who continues to make decisions on their behalf.

This article basically condemns the intentions of US intervention in Libya. Larison conveys that the assumption that US intervention was crucial in Libya to oust Gaddafi was based on attributing "values" that Americans wanted to believe that they had, putting far more significance on the conflict than it truly possessed. US intervention was unpopular in the region because of distrust in the US and resentment to interference regardless of the side Washington chooses to take. The author says this tells us that the US is far too quick to take sides in foreign conflict, and far too eager to throw their weight behind their side to make sure it wins. The US ought to serve as a neutral mediator resolving conflict rather than initiating further bloodshed through their impulse to "do something" immediately. 

Human rights campaigners welcomed a landmark decision in Saudi Arabia to ban domestic violence. However, they urge caution. The law is a big step but there are many issues not being take into consideration. For example, the issues of rape within marriage. Further, how are women in particular supposed to report when they are abused if they have to go through their guardian for their every actions.

An extremely detailed article about the current state of Oil and Saudi's decisions direct effects.

The loss of the intelligence networks, in addition to the escalating conflict, contributed to the Obama administration's decision to halt drone strikes in Yemen for two months, to vacate the U.S. Embassy in Sana last month and to evacuate U.S. special operations and intelligence teams from a Yemeni air base over the weekend.

This article talks about the strategical approaches from Oil leaders including Saudi Arabia to maintain control of their market share, and how they use their oil as a "Weapon" in the sense that their decisions financially affect other countries greatly.

This week, Saudi Oil Minister Ali Al-Naimi will for the first time face the victims of his decision to keep oil pumps flowing despite a global glut: U.S. shale oil producers struggling to survive the worst price crash in years.

"Hezbollah Brigades fighters in Iraq have threatened to attack the American soldiers stationed in the country, following the decision by the US army to send reinforcements to Iraq to support the international coalition in its fights against ISIS."

"the decision to fork over $100 billion in sanctions relief to Iran as part of last summer's nuclear deal could be the worst thing that's happened to the Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah in years"

Discusses the stability of Egypt and the dynamic aspect of the confrontation between the government and Brotherhood. Can be tied into a number of controversies of globalization chapters regarding motives for many decisions.

This article is a response to International Women's Day, saying that gender equality doesn't exist in the world. In the middle of the article, they show a chart of the gender gap between men and women. Egypt is last in the chart.

This article goes into depth about the inequality in the Middle East which extends to today. This looks at the ideas of democratization which would promote higher education. Greater rights for women. and improve infant morality rates