Conclusion

Abstract

The concluding chapter looks at ‘cascade’ phenomena such as the Arab Spring to show how universal human rights and freedoms are demanding greater enforcement across borders in the MENA region. It helps further an understanding of the growing importance and soft power potential of human rights variables, or the rights imperative, to domestic and international relations even in authoritarian settings. Appreciating the paradox of progress amid regress and the protracted, nonlinear path this process takes helps to recalibrate the reading of regional developments. It also positively situates such regional events along the more universal continuum of humanity’s progress and evolution.