Abstract
If the Arab uprisings of 2011 drew massive attention, one reason is that the 22 members of the Arab League form the world’s only bloc of fully undemocratic states. For the Islamic Middle East as a whole (the Arab world plus Iran and Turkey), the leading comparative indicators of political performance all tell a story of restricted personal freedoms, high corruption, and weak rule of law (Table 5.1). Even Turkey, the best political performer according to these measures, has had an imperfect democracy by global standards. Since Turkey’s first democratic elections in 1946, there have been three military coups, and only in 2010 was the watchdog role of the top brass rescinded through a referendum.
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Kuran, T. (2012). Political Consequences of the Middle East’s Islamic Economic Legacy. In: Aoki, M., Kuran, T., Roland, G. (eds) Institutions and Comparative Economic Development. International Economic Association Series. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137034014_6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137034014_6
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