Structured Response 10/29, week of 11/1

To find any similarities between the US democratic system and any other potential democracy world-wide (including MENA), we must break down and examine one of the basic components of a functioning democracy, Civil Societies. After examining this impact and the parallels we can then examine and compare the effect of these civil societies and social movements.
     At the root of any democracy, is the power of its civil societies. Cavatorta and Elananza make a critical point in their discussion of civil societies in democracies. To paraphrase, a weakening of civil society leads to a weakening of trust in democracy. This is one point that is true in the US or MENA. Many civil societies in the MENA region are seen as pillars reinforcing the authoritarian rule of the countries, because they offer such an unappealing alternative to authoritarian rule. As Prezeworski puts it, the survival of a regime is based on the appeal of its alternatives, and in countries such as Jordan the alternatives aren't very appealing. This concept is true in any democracy however, an incumbent first term president won't be pushed out of office unless the outside party can run up a strong candidate. This lesson can than be drawn to fledging democracies in the MENA region, it is of the utmost importance to always offer strong opposition in a democracy.
      In terms of social movements themselves however, the chief ones that come to mind are the Civil Rights for African-American and Women movements of the past two centuries in the US. The most key factors of these movements is that they were able to draw from a wide range of the American political spectrum to obtain their common goal. They were, as Cavatorta and Elanaza put it able to form  a "informal alliance against corruption" (573). This same concept can be drawn to movements in the Middle East. Particularly in the recent uprisings, the ones that were most successful were the ones that drew from the largest contingent of society. In this instance by studying the similarities between the US and MENA social movements, we can determine another lesson to be drawn, that the most successful movements are able to draw from a wide variety. We must be sure however, to formalize these alliances and make sure they do not fall apart once the corruption has been targeted, as was achieved in the US Civil Rights movements, and as is still struggling to be achieved in the MENA movements.