MER Article "Model Employees" Twenty-two year old Leela made a promise to her family in Sri Lanka: she would earn enough money working abroad as a maid or a nanny to build a new house back home. Living thousands of miles from her husband and young son would be difficult, but Leela thought she would be able to send them money whi Monica Smith • 8 min read
MER Article A Putsch and Promises of Democracy When, on August 3, 2005, the palace guard of the president of Mauritania seized the reins of power in a bloodless coup, international condemnation was swift. The State Department issued a statement deploring the act and calling for “a peaceful return to order under the constitution in the establishe Alice Bullard • 6 min read
MER Article Falluja's Feelings of Exclusion Standing in line outside a Falluja polling station on December 15, 2005, a man named Qays spoke the words that the White House had been waiting to hear since the preceding January 30. “We Sunnis made a mistake in the last elections, and the people are suffering for that mistake. Even the armed group Quil Lawrence • 8 min read
MER Article Damanhour by Hook and by Crook On a November day in the sleepy Egyptian Delta town of Damanhour, around 1,000 townsfolk gathered in the central square to listen to Mustafa al-Fiqqi of the ruling National Democratic Party explain why they should vote for him as their parliamentary representative in two days’ time. Al-Fiqqi is a fo Joshua Stacher • 6 min read
MER Article Egypt's Paradoxical Elections For undemocratic regimes in a democratic age, elections are an extremely valuable tool. They create opportunities for limited popular participation, disarm domestic and international critics, and enhance political monitoring and control by revealing the relative political strength of government and Mona El-Ghobashy • 18 min read
MER Article Internalism of the Left Isam al-Khafaji, Tormented Births: Passages to Modernity in Europe and the Middle East (London: I. B. Tauris, 2005). Any book-length comparison of the historical trajectories of Western Europe and the region “extending from Iran in the east to Egypt in the west, and from Turkey in the north to the John Chalcraft • 8 min read
MER Article And the Winner Is... The administration of President George W. Bush claims a commitment to promoting democratization in the Arab world, whether through regime change or by pressuring authoritarian leaders through “transformational diplomacy” to open their political systems. It has been tempting for the administration’s Jillian Schwedler, Laryssa Chomiak • 17 min read
MER Article The Hamas Headache Two days before the January 25 Palestinian legislative elections, Birzeit University professor and Hamas campaign adviser Nashat Aqtash found himself in an unusual situation. Bound by US regulations forbidding direct contact with Hamas, the joint National Democratic Institute (NDI)/Carter Center ele Ranjit Singh • 3 min read
MER Article Hamas Risen On January 27, 2006, Fatah activists and Palestinian security personnel converged on the Palestinian Authority’s parliament building in Gaza City. Within minutes, cars were torched, tires set aflame and stones thrown at election banners displaying the visages of victorious Hamas candidates. The cry Graham Usher • 21 min read
MER Article From the Editor (Spring 2006) The ocean of ink spilled after the remarkable success of Hamas in January’s Palestinian Legislative Council elections has drowned a few salient facts. The Editors • 3 min read
