MER Article Jordan's Unwelcome "Guests" Ask any Jordanian in Amman about Iraqis in their country, and they will immediately tell you that Iraqis have driven up the prices of virtually everything in the capital. Apartments cost double what they did five years ago. The prices of food and gasoline have soared. Iraqis arrive with suitcases fu Stefanie Nanes • 10 min read
MER Article Jordan's New "Political Development" Strategy “We have a problem here. There is no real [opposition] party except for the Muslim Brotherhood.” [1] So an official of Jordan’s new Ministry of Political Development and Parliamentary Affairs summed up the raison d’etre of his place of employment. Anne Baylouny • 11 min read
Current Analysis Reform Retreats Amid Jordan's Political Storms For weeks in the spring of 2005, banners advertising an international gathering at the Dead Sea resort of Shouna adorned every main street in Jordan’s capital city of Amman. The government was touting what it regarded as a significant national success: for the third year in a row, the Curtis Ryan • 10 min read
MER Article The Curious Case of Oil-Exporting Jordan From time to time, the boring economic data regurgitated by Jordan’s amply staffed ministries offers up a tantalizing mystery. In the Monthly Statistical Bulletin (May 2004) published by the Central Bank of Jordan, for example, one learns that Jordanian export of refined oil products increased 46 ti Pete Moore • 1 min read
MER Article QIZs, FTAs, USAID, and the MEFTA Jordan is the poster child for the Bush administration project of “transforming” the political order in the Middle East through free trade. If Jordan is any guide, however, economic liberalization does not lead inexorably to the diffusion of political power. Pete Moore • 12 min read
Current Analysis Ariel Sharon and the Jordan Option An avid enthusiast of Ariel Sharon and his unilateral disengagement plan recently opined that the plan “has one inborn defect: it has no vision, has no diplomatic horizon and is devoid of any ideological dimension.” [1] This view of the Israeli prime minister -- tactically brilliant but lacking as a Gary Sussman • 20 min read
Current Analysis No Jordan Option Could the plan of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to "disengage" from the Gaza Strip "include a Jordanian presence" in the West Bank? So Sharon told his cabinet on June 1, according to the Israeli daily Haaretz. Since then, rumors about such a role for Jordan, Marc Lynch • 11 min read
MER Article "Honor Crimes" and the International Spotlight on Jordan With the runaway success of Norma Khouri’s Honor Lost: Love and Death in Modern-Day Jordan, “honor crimes” -- killings of girls or women accused of sexual transgressions, in order to cleanse family honor -- are firmly equated in the eyes of the West with Jordan. Khouri’s book sold Janine A. Clark • 12 min read
Current Analysis Jordan's Troubling Detour When Washington cites examples of the potential for reform and democracy in the Arab world, Jordan is one of the first countries mentioned. For the first time since 1997, Jordanians went to the polls last month to vote for parliament, and by most accounts the elections went smoothly. Voter turnout t Toujan Faisal, Ian Urbina • 4 min read
Current Analysis The Newest Jordan: Free Trade, Peace and an Ace in the Hole In the 1950s, Jordan was to kick-start its own modernization through phosphates and potash. In the 1970s, it was to be "the new Beirut"—the banking and financial center of the Arab world. In the 1980s, it was to be "the Hong Kong of the Levant." Pete Moore • 7 min read
MER Article Boycott Fever in Jordan Sipping coffee in downtown Amman, a friend just returned from a three-week stay on a scholarship in the United States surprised me by saying, “I don’t know if I should smoke.” Had she fallen victim to the American anti-smoking frenzy? Not exactly, she continued: “You know, I’m boycotting American pr Sa'eda Kilani • 10 min read
MER Article More Than a Mob Tens of thousands of Jordanians took to the streets in support of Palestinians during the March and April 2002 Israeli invasions of seven of eight major towns in the West Bank. Remarkable enough for their sheer size (Jordan’s population is just over five million), most of these marches and Jillian Schwedler • 16 min read
