Internationally syndicated political columnist and author Rami Khouri will present the talk “Rights, Respect, Resistance and Righteousness: Understanding the New Power Equations Throughout the Middle East,” at 4-5:30 p.m. Dec. 8 at the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy Annenberg Auditorium, 1120 Weill Hall.
Khouri is the director of the Issam Fares Institute of Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut, as well as editor-at-large of the Beirut-based Daily Star newspaper.
The Middle East is defined today by a new set of issues and actors that often seem incomprehensible to local and foreign observers. Khouri maintains that most of the conflicts or tensions in the region easily are understood if one grasps the significant changes that have taken place throughout the region in the past two decades.
The driving forces for many of these new actors comprise more intangible factors such as respect and righteousness, while resistance is invoked to achieve a set of rights that have not been achieved through traditional diplomacy or politics. Khouri says these forces balance each other and provide intriguing new opportunities for citizens to express themselves and engage in a form of political contestation that is new to the modern Arab world.
The event is co-sponsored by the Center for Middle Eastern and North African Studies.
