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Session
Committees
Groups
Constituency Week
Conciliation Committee
14.07.2010
13:00 - 14:00
U.S. Middle East Policy, Human Rights and Democracy
The Henry Jackson Society (HJS)
210 Pentonville Road
N19JT London, United Kingdom
Phone: +44 20 7340 4520
Fax: +44 20 7340 4521
Link to the organizer
URL of event
13:00 - 14:00
U.S. Middle East Policy, Human Rights and Democracy
The Henry Jackson Society (HJS)
210 Pentonville Road
N19JT London, United Kingdom
Phone: +44 20 7340 4520
Fax: +44 20 7340 4521
Link to the organizer
URL of event
Conference / Convention
Type of Event
Foreign & Security Policy
Policy Field of Event
Registration required
Limitation
Contact
House of Commons
London
United Kingdom
London
United Kingdom
Location of event
Few foreign policy differences have set the Obama administration apart from the Bush administration as much as the tenor of their respective approaches to the Middle East. In an address designed to mark a clear break with his predecessor – entitled ‘A New Beginning’ – President Obama laid out a vision in Cairo in June of 2009 for relations between America and the Middle East and Islamic nations. Henceforth, the US would seek to engage America’s allies and adversaries in the region in an attempt to craft an approach based on cooperation and diplomacy, and which embraced engagement with many of the repressive regimes in the region in an attempt to secure changes in their behaviour. Praised for having seemingly created a new paradigm of US foreign policy in the region, it is often forgotten that despite the spirit of compromise embodied within the speech, President Obama did reiterate his belief in the core value of universal freedom, and made clear that America would remain committed to the spread of democracy and human rights.
As time has passed however, questioning about the positioning of U.S. policy on strategic, democratic and human rights questions in the Middle East has become more acute. Attempts to engage the theocratic Iranian regime in diplomatic negotiations to end its nuclear programme have been comprehensively rebuffed, and the mullahs have brutally repressed the nascent democratic movement. America’s strategic ally Israel feels increasingly isolated while its NATO ally Turkey has engaged in freewheeling diplomacy that has raised more than a few eyebrows in the West. Although Iraq has succeeded in managing a democratic transition, many other countries in the region remain steeped in the same oppressive domestic policies that successive American presidents have sought to roll back, with seemingly little prospect of change. So what are the successes and difficulties in this regard for U.S. policy in the region? And what role do human rights and human development values play within the priorities of the Obama administration’s approach to the region?
As time has passed however, questioning about the positioning of U.S. policy on strategic, democratic and human rights questions in the Middle East has become more acute. Attempts to engage the theocratic Iranian regime in diplomatic negotiations to end its nuclear programme have been comprehensively rebuffed, and the mullahs have brutally repressed the nascent democratic movement. America’s strategic ally Israel feels increasingly isolated while its NATO ally Turkey has engaged in freewheeling diplomacy that has raised more than a few eyebrows in the West. Although Iraq has succeeded in managing a democratic transition, many other countries in the region remain steeped in the same oppressive domestic policies that successive American presidents have sought to roll back, with seemingly little prospect of change. So what are the successes and difficulties in this regard for U.S. policy in the region? And what role do human rights and human development values play within the priorities of the Obama administration’s approach to the region?
Infos
Dr Tamara Wittes, U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary for Near Eastern Affairs; Michael Dugher MP, the Henry Jackson Society.
People
