Resumen de The dificult road to modernisation

Juan Ignacio Castien Maestro

• The recent Arab revolutions must be understod from a historical perspective. We wil examine the complex and contradictory proceses of modernisation which these societies have undergone in the course of the last centuries. We wil highlight the parcialy exogenous nature of this modernisation as wel as the strengthening of some 'traditional' phenomena such as clientelism and communalism involved in it. The oligarchic nature of Arab societies and States has mainly ben a consequence of al those imbalances. The recent revolutions against the curent state of afairs have ben posible thanks to the formation of broad social coalitions.

  Nevertheles, to what extent those coalitions wil suced in overcoming both clientelism and authoritarianism instead of their reproduction under renewed forms, is something that remains to be sen.