Explaining success and failure in the Middle East revolts of 2011

The most striking aspect of the Middle East Revolts is the great variety of outcomes that evolved from movements that shared pro-democratic aims --  Morocco has seen a conservative constitutional reform, Tunisia an emerging democracy with a surging Islamist party, Libya a civil war, Egypt a struggling democracy with a resurgent military leadership; Yemen a simmering civil war, Bahrain a suppressed democratic movement, Syria and Iran bloodily repressed revolutionary movements, and Iraq a weak democracy riven by sectarian and regional divides. Explaining these diverse outcomes requires close attention to the relationship between movements and states -- examining both state structure and the dynamics of elite actions in response to protests.  Looking beyond opportunity structures to social movements viewed as elements in broader relational fields, I examine the internal and external factors that influenced movement success.  This approach offers a new integration of insights from the sociology of revolutions -- e.g.the role of personalist states, intra-elite conflicts, international factors,and  the development of revolutionary coalitions -- with social movement theory.