![]() ![]() Syria’s complex internal conditions particularly since 2010 paved the way for civil war inside the country. In particular, this paper suggests that the US-led Western response to the post Arab-Spring conflicts was not one of 'Responsibility to Protect' (R2P) to protect civilians, but Distancing (or Dissociation) to Protect (D2P) the regimes themselves. Building on the works of Eva Bellin and Ian Lustick, this paper argues that the failure of the post-Arab Spring transitions could be put down to a pattern of consistent foreign intervention, which have tipped the scales in favour of the ancien regimes and the emergence of 'new-old' authoritarianisms. After a brief period where these analyses were widely argued to have been disproved, the destructive aftermaths of the uprisings in the years since - from the wars in Syria, Iraq, Libya and Yemen, to the return of authoritarianism in Egypt - has seen a resurgence of narratives that cite the turmoil as vindication for theories that the region is 'exceptional' in its failure to democratise. After long being seen as a region resistant to democratisation, the uprisings seemed to rebuke the culturalist and orientalist analyses that argued that the populations of the region were intrinsically prone to authoritarianism and uninterested in and unsuited to democratic governance. The 2011 Arab Spring uprisings represented a watershed in Middle Eastern history. ![]()
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