Does Political Reform in Arab World Help to Counter Terrorism?
Democratic political reforms can marginalize extremists and undermine support for terrorism, but enacting merely cosmetic reforms and backtracking on democratization can exacerbate the risk of terrorism, according to a RAND study. The study looked at the effects of liberalization processes on domestic political violence in six Arab states: Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, and Saudi Arabia. The belief that greater democracy reduces terrorism has played a significant role in recent U.S. foreign policy. However, the study finds little direct evidence that democracy has either a positive or negative effect on terrorism. Using data from the RAND–Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism, the study compared the number of terrorist incidents in each country with its score on the Freedom House index, which ranks a country’s level of freedom based on political rights and civil liberties.
