Press Release
An audio recording from Ambassador Marwan Muasher, Vice President for Studies and Director of the Middle East Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and former Jordanian Ambassador to the United States.
On October 22, 2014 at MEI, Ambassador Muasher looked back over four years of popular uprisings in the Arab World and took stock of the hope for transition to genuine stability, prosperity, and democracy and tools necessary to do the job. He examined the roots of unrest around the Arab World, the impact of oil and Western military involvement in the region, the rise of radical actors such as ISIS, and the hopeful example of Tunisia. He also looked ahead, calling for decades of grassroots work to spur the development of sustainable, pluralistic democracy in the Arab World.
Listen to the full recording of the October 22, 2014 event here:
Click here to view photos of this event on the Middle East Initiative Facebook page.
About Marwan Muasher:
Marwan Muasher is vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment, where he oversees the Endowment’s research in Washington and Beirut on the Middle East. Muasher served as foreign minister (2002–2004) and deputy prime minister (2004–2005) of Jordan, and his career has spanned the areas of diplomacy, development, civil society, and communications. He was also a senior fellow at Yale University in 2010-2011.
Muasher began his career as a journalist for the Jordan Times. He then served at the Ministry of Planning, at the prime minister’s office as press adviser, and as director of the Jordan Information Bureau in Washington.
In 1996 he became minister of information and the government spokesperson. From 1997 to 2002, he served in Washington again as ambassador, negotiating the first free trade agreement between the United States and an Arab nation. He then returned to Jordan to serve as foreign minister, where he played a central role in developing the Arab Peace Initiative and the Middle East Road Map.
In 2004 he became deputy prime minister responsible for reform and government performance, and led the effort to produce a ten-year plan for political, economic, and social reform. From 2006 to 2007, he was at the Jordanian Senate.
Most recently, he was senior vice president of external affairs at the World Bank from 2007 to 2010.
He is the author of The Arab Center: The Promise of Moderation (Yale University Press, 2008), and The Second Arab Awakening, (Yale University Press, 2014).