Rise and Fall of Arab Presidents for Life [Hardcover]

"Timely...Owen reveals how the Arab Spring demonstrates the inherent contradictions and weaknesses in the regimes, showing how their creation (and fall) resulted from modern political and economic circumstances...This comprehensive and balanced history illuminates the current upheaval."-- Publishers Weekly, 30th 2012

"No other book solely addresses this topic or examines it with the same scope or historical depth. Highly recommended for anyone interested in current foreign affairs or the history and future of modern Arab states." -- Leslie Lewis, Library Journal, 2nd April 2012

" A thoughtful and incisive evaluation of Arab political authoritarianism in all its components. Owen points out the many ways in which Arab Presidents and Kings imitated one another, with Presidential sons following--or attempting to follow--their fathers, and all relying on extensive security services and webs of patronage. His analysis of the personalization of power challenges recent efforts to distinguish Arab monarchies from their Presidential counterparts, and lays bare the internal logic of such personalized security states. As an historian, Owen is sensitive, and admirably transparent, about the limits of our knowledge about the inner workings of these regimes. But his brief discussions of each country effectively convey both the commonalities and differences across the cases. Owen's highly readable book serves as a fitting requiem for a system of rule which long seemed immovable, has now been exposed in all of its flawed brutality, but seems likely to adapt to new structural conditions rather than simply fade away." -- Marc Lynch, Foreign Policy, 16th May 2012

" Events have enhanced its timeliness, as it is a kind of obituary for the "monarchical presidencies" of the Arab world. The book looks at the local differences and underlying similarities between the region's leaders...Owen's book provides a sharp look at the tyrannies the Arab spring is attempting to sweep away."-- The Economist, 4th August 2012

" Owen suggests that like Mafia dons, Arab presidents for life observed one another and learned from one another's experiences and argues that the Arab League has provided a loose supportive framework for their ambitions. Although the shadows of monarchical presidents will be cast long into the future, Owen is confident that the uprisings have brought their era to an end." --John Waterbury, Foreign Affairs, 3rd September 2012

Roger Owen is A. J. Meyer Professor of Middle East History at Harvard University.