MERIP
Media Resource List, June 13, 2005
AVAILABLE FOR INTERVIEWS on the following topics:
- Hundreds of Iranian women protest at a sit-in in Tehran
for equal rights, June 12
- Third and fourth rounds of Lebanese elections on June 12
and June 19
MAHSA SHEKARLOO
A participant in the unauthorized women's protest in Tehran
on June 12, Mahsa Shekarloo is a member of the non-governmental
organization, The Women's Cultural Center, one of the women's
groups that organized the sit-in. She is a signer of the petition
outlining their positions, which was released in advance of
the sit-in. She maintains a website, www.badjens.com
, where the petition is posted.
KAVEH EHSANI
Kaveh Ehsani is a research scholar at the University of Illinois-Chicago.
He is on the editorial boards of Middle East Report ,
and Goft-o-gu (Dialogue) journal in Iran. He is
the author, most recently, of "Social Engineering and
the Contradictions of Modernization in Khuzestan's Company
Town" International Review of Social History
(2003), "High Stakes for Iran" Middle East Report
(Summer 2003) and "Neo-Conservatives, Hardline
Clerics and the Bomb" with Chris Toensing Middle
East Report (Winter 2004).
NAJIB BENJAMIN HOURANI
Najib Benjamin Hourani teaches Middle East history at Fordham
University and political economy of the Middle East at both
New York University and New School University. He recently
completed his doctoral thesis on the political economy of
the Lebanese civil war and post-war reconstruction. He said
today: "While millions turned out to call for democratic
reform and a renewal of Lebanese sovereignty in February and
March, only 28 and 40 percent of voters cast ballots in the
provinces of Beirut and the south in May. In the most hotly
contested round, held yesterday, only 55 percent of voters
took part. The low turnout reflects deep popular disappointment
in the so-called 'opposition' politicians who, like the 'pro-Syrian'
personalities they sought to replace, have little interest
in the promotion of true democracy. Compounding this frustration
is the realization that Syria's departure did not allow elections
free of foreign interference, but rather increased American,
French and Saudi influence. Indeed, it was the backroom negotiations
between local oligarchs and these newly powerful foreign patrons
that produced the current cabinet of Prime Minister Najib
Miqati, and, many believe, the electoral alliances that have
allowed a number of 'opposition' and incumbent candidates
to win their parliamentary seats unopposed."
LAURIE KING-IRANI
Laurie King-Irani, former editor of Middle East Report
, has researched post-war institution building in Lebanon,
where she lived and worked as a teacher and journalist from
1993-1998. She remains in close touch with colleagues in Beirut,
and has recently written about the requirements for democratization
in the Middle East. She is a researcher and consultant on
municipal governance in the Middle East at the University
of Victoria's Global Studies Centre, in British Columbia.
She commented today: "It has become clear that Syrian
occupation of Lebanon was a symptom of deeper crises in the
Lebanese political system. The celebrations of Syria's departure
in Martyrs' Square rarely touched upon these crises, which
center on questions of national identity, inter-communal conflict,
accountability for wartime atrocities and nation building.
The elections will be a telling illustration of how the Lebanese
will attempt to deal with these unresolved questions."
USSAMA MAKDISI
Ussama Makdisi is an associate professor of history at Rice
University. He is the author of The Culture of Sectarianism:
Community, History and Violence in Nineteenth-Century Ottoman
Lebanon (University of California Press, 2000). He is
also the author of "Anti-Americanism in the Arab World:
An Interpretation of a Brief History" which appeared
in the Journal of American History .
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