The New Arab Public Sphere

Since the 1990s, a new Western intellectual tradition has argued that global transformations sweeping the Arab World mark a shift in Arab political communications. Western writers have taken the introduction of new media technologies as manifestations of a new - more democratic - public sphere. Such arguments have been closely aligned with Western efforts to bring about democratic reforms to a region long shackled by 'political authoritarianism'. In this book, the writer takes this vision to task for failing to grasp the real dynamics of an Arab public sphere. The author argues that we could never conceive of the Arab public sphere outside the boundaries of sustainable egalitarian and participatory political developments in Arab societies. He harnesses the notion of 'Islamo-cracy' to put forward a new public sphere perspective that draws on both Islamic moral values and contemporary political practices. This synthesis holds a great promise both for inter-Arab World communications as well as for dialogue with other cultures.

Muhammad I. Ayish is Professor and Dean of the College of Communication at the University of Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates. He holds a Ph.D. in international communication (University of Minnesota, Twin-Cities). Ayish has published two books and over 50 articles in both Arabic and English on issues ranging from political communication to media convergence to war coverage to women representation.