Arab Democracy is Possible!

The Conservative Republican ^

[CaliRepublican97]

With Iraq rapidly descending into bloody chaos, the prospects for holding successful democratic elections in January, as the United States and the Iraqi interim government have promised, look bleak. Some skeptics go further, arguing that the Iraq debacle proves that prospects for democracy throughout the Arab world are dim. Are they right?

Half the world's countries are democracies, yet none of the 22 Arab countries is among them. The United Nations' "Arab Human Development Report" is frank in its criticism of the region's economic and social progress. Economic growth has been slow, approximately half of the women are illiterate, and the region is not well integrated into the world economy. Indeed, with a population of more than 300 million, Arab countries export less to the world, excluding oil and gas, than Finland.

An enormous "youth bulge" in the Arab world's demographic tables looms, with 45 percent of the population now under the age of 14, and the population as a whole set to double over the next quarter-century. Yet the region has inadequate opportunities for young people to find meaningful work. Unemployment

[CaliRepublican97]

http://www.theconservativerepublican.com/arabdemocracy.html

[wwalk841]

I seriously doubt it.