BLACK HOLE OF DEMOCRACY IN THE MIDDLE EAST

HOW AUTOCRATS SUPPORT OTHER AUTOCRATS AND LEARN FROM THEM

Thomas Demmelhuber, Professor of Politics and Society of the Middle East at FAU Erlangen-Nuremberg since 2015. In 2015, he was also appointed Visiting Professor at the College of Europe (Natolin). Previously, Demmelhuber was Junior Professor of Political Science specialising in Politics and the Internet at the University of Hildesheim (2012-2015).

Moderation Gudrun Harrer, Senior Editor, Der Standard; she teaches Modern History and Politics of the Near and Middle East at the University of Vienna and at the Diplomatic Academy of Vienna.

Until 2011, the Middle East was often cited as an example of the absence of democracy. With the Arab upheavals of 2011, a democratic revolutionary romanticism and another wave à la Huntington seemed to prevail for a short time. Eight years later, the absence of freedom, participation and the rule of law has long since solidified, with a few exceptions. We even recognise a clustering of autocracies and a self-confident appearance of autocrats in their attempts to promote autocracy. International democracy promotion is, however, a discontinued product of history. The lecture draws on the results of the research project „Gravitational centres of authoritarian rule“, which was funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) from 2015-2018.