Laws on blasphemy and apostasy are being used to silence political dissent and suppress government critics, according to the U.S. State Department’s annual report, which documents a pronounced decline in religious liberty that has generated growing religious intolerance and sectarian violence.

“These laws are frequently used to repress dissent, to harass political opponents and to settle personal vendettas,” Secretary of State John Kerry said in comments introducing the report.

“When countries undermine or attack religious freedom, they not only unjustly threaten those whom they target; they also threaten their countries’ own stability, and we see that in so many places,” he said.  “Attacks on religious freedom are therefore both a moral and strategic national security concern for the United States.”

China, Russia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Central Asia’s authoritarian regimes are among the world’s most difficult places to worship freely, said the 2012 International Religious Freedom Report which also details  “a continued global increase in anti-Semitism.”

Positive developments were found in Turkey, said U.S. Ambassador-at-large Suzan Johnson Cook, citing relaxed restrictions on religious clothing, and in Vietnam, where the regime now allows religious meetings.

But Vietnam deserves a tougher assessment, said U.S. Rep. Ed Royce, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

“Religious freedom remains under attack in Vietnam,” he said, noting that “the Communist government has denied its people the most basic freedoms.”

The report echoes many of the findings of a recent report from the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom.

“Extremists target religious minorities and dissenters from majority religious communities for violence, including physical assaults and even murder,” USCIRF chief Dr. Katrina Lantos Swett told a recent meeting at the National Endowment for Democracy (above). “Authoritarian governments also repress religious freedom through intricate webs of discriminatory rules, arbitrary requirements and draconian edicts.”

“Qatar’s wealth, underpinned by the world’s third largest natural gas reserves, is a potent weapon in its quest for political influence in a Middle East undergoing transition,” analysts suggest:

Nowhere is this influence more clear than in Libya and Syria. In 2011, Qatar helped to boost the rebels who toppled Libyan leader Muammer Gaddafi. Today, Qatar is a leading backer of the forces trying to topple the Assad regime in Syria. As an FT investigation has shown, its effort on armament in Syria is now beginning to be overtaken by Saudi Arabia. Still, the emirate has spent $3bn over the past two years supporting the rebels, far exceeding the contribution made by any other government.

As tentative steps begin towards talks to end the conflict in Syria, “Qatar has emerged as a driving force: pouring in tens of millions of dollars to arm Syria’s rebels,” say two prominent analysts.

“Yet it also stands accused of dividing them – and of positioning itself for even greater influence in the post-Assad era,” according to the Financial Times investigation by Roula Khalaf and Abigail Fielding-Smith:

When it comes to backing Syria’s rebels, no one can claim more credit than the gas-rich Gulf state. Whether in terms of armaments or financial support for dissidents, diplomatic manoeuvring or lobbying, Qatar has been in the lead, readily disgorging its gas-generated wealth in the pursuit of the downfall of the House of Assad.

Yet, as the Arab world’s bloodiest uprising grinds on into its third year, Qatar finds itself pulled into a complicated and fractured conflict, the outcome of which has a decreasing ability to influence, while simultaneously becoming a high-profile scapegoat for participants on both sides. Among the Syrian regime’s numerous but fragmented opponents the small Gulf state evokes a surprisingly ambivalent – and often overtly hostile – response.

Qatar’s high degree of exposure partly “reflects the reluctance of western governments to intervene in Syria,” say Khalaf, the FT’s Middle East editor, and Fielding-Smith, the paper’s Lebanon and Syria correspondent.

“However, for Qatar, Syria is also the culmination of an opportunistic foreign policy which saw Doha become the unlikely backer of other Arab revolts in north Africa – and a friend of those who emerge as winners, in most cases Islamists,” they note:

Qatar’s ruling family, the al-Thanis, have no ideological or religious affinity with the Islamists – they are simply not choosy about the beliefs held by useful friends. Qatar has supported the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and Tunisia’s Islamist al-Nahda party, which won the first elections after the popular revolts. Some politicians in the region believe the emir is trying to position himself as the “Islamist [Gamal] Abdel Nasser”, as one Arab politician put it, referring to the late Egyptian president and the Arab world’s only true pan-Arab leader.

Most of Doha’s neighbours in the Gulf are hostile to the Islamist trend in the region, but this is of little consequence to a state that takes pleasure in being contrarian. Nor are the al-Thanis embarrassed by the contradictions of an autocracy cheerleading for revolution. “The Qataris say if there’s a tsunami coming your way you ride it, not let it hit you,” says a western diplomat describing Qatar’s attitude towards Islamists.

“Qatar’s involvement in Libya also builds on its long relationship with (and subsequent perceived loyalty by) some Libyan Islamists,” notes Lina Khatib, the head of the Program on Arab Reform and Democracy at Stanford University’s Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law.

Since the 1990s, Qatar had hosted a number of Libyan Islamists, mainly from the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group.

In an interview with al-Jazeera on September 7, 2011, the Emir of Qatar said “he believed radical Islamists whose views were forged under tyrannical governments could embrace participatory politics if the promise of real democracy and justice of this year’s Arab revolts is fulfilled. If so, the Qatari ruler said, ‘I believe you will see this extremism transform into civilian life and civil society’”.

“As the Qataris have attempted to unite the political opposition by championing the formation of the Syrian National Coalition (the main front) they have been accused of dividing it – just as their efforts to shape a fragmented rebel army into a more coherent form by helping to unify the brigades under one command have contributed to its incoherence,” say the FT investigators:

In the years before the Arab uprisings, Qatar had cultivated its role as a mediator, capable of talking to all sides on the divisions that polarised the Middle East. It hosted the US’s biggest military air base in the region, while maintaining cordial relations with Iran; it held contacts with Israel while simultaneously backing the Palestinian group Hamas and Lebanon’s Hizbollah. On Syria, Qatar soon emerged as one of the few angry voices at Arab summits, pushing for a tougher line.

“In Syria, Qatar became an active protagonist,” says a western diplomat. Having worked to become a kind of Norway of the Gulf, he adds, it also wanted to be “the Gulf version of the UK and France, and you can’t be both at the same time”.

Qatar has come under criticism for funding illiberal actors, including ultraconservative Salafist militants, during the Arab uprisings while suppressing fundamental freedoms at home.

“Groups get funding from both Qatar and Saudi Arabia and they deceive sponsors sometimes,” comments Elizabeth O’Bagy, an analyst at the US Institute for the Study of War, which has published extensive studies of Syria’s fragmented opposition: 

…..as the conflict progressed, the Qataris worked through members of the exiled Muslim Brotherhood to identify rebel factions that should be supported. For example, she says, that is how they linked up with the Farouq brigades, one of the largest and more mainstream factions. ……A rebel leader in the northern Aleppo province, who works with Liwaa al-Tawhid, says he has also received a Saudi intermediary who goes around rebel-held areas distributing funds.

“Indeed, if Qatar is, as its detractors say, seeking to build up a proxy force in Syria to implement its regional agenda, it is doing so in an environment which is not conducive to either loyalty or cohesion,” note khalaf and Fielding-Smith:

With so many different outside sources of sponsorship and no stable organisational structures, rebel groups lurch from alliance to alliance and continually rebrand themselves in the search for support.

Ironically, although the relationship between Riyadh and Doha has long been characterised by mutual suspicion, in many ways they have worked very closely on Syria. However, a crucial division over the Muslim Brotherhood has undoubtedly led to the pursuit of divergent agendas on the Syrian battlefield, with harmful consequences for an opposition in desperate need of unity. For the Saudis, the handful of secular rebel factions, plus the Salafi groups that espouse a stricter Wahabi Islam practised in Saudi Arabia, are vastly preferable to the Brotherhood, a more organised political group and therefore a greater political threat.

“The Saudis say ‘No to the Brotherhood,’” says Riad al-Shaqfa, the leader of the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood. Qataris, on the other hand, are “playing a positive role.”

Observers also give credence to allegations that Qatar has – directly or indirectly – provided assistance to the Al-Qaida-linked Jabhat al-Nusrah, although other suggest that may be due to leakage of arms and other charitable contributions from the Gulf.

“Because the Free Syrian Army [FSA] groups work so closely with non-FSA groups these weapons are spreading just because they are fighting side by side – and maybe the groups trade arms with each other as well,” says Eliot Higgins, who analyzes weapons used in the conflict on his Brown Moses blog.

Most Syrians have never heard of Mustafa Sabbagh, “though he is considered the most powerful man in the political opposition,” say the FT investigators:

He doesn’t make many speeches, or issue statements, but he does oversee the coalition’s budget, to which the Qataris are the biggest donors, and is responsible, as one western official says, “for writing the cheques”. While seen by both friends and detractors as a shrewd man who appealed to Qatar officials’ business-minded attitude, Sabbagh has come under criticism for supposedly using his position to control the opposition and further Qatari influence.

Tensions between Sabbagh and secular members of the new National Coalition, announced in Doha in November 2012, emerged after the disputed election of an interim prime minister, Ghassan Hitto, in March.

Claims of Qatari dominance of the opposition persisted….True, the Muslim Brotherhood was no longer the main component, but a new bloc of more than a dozen members, brought in by Sabbagh as representatives of local communities in Syria, sparked new disagreements,” the FT investigators reveal:

It was seen as another bloc that was loyal to Qatar…..Each of these members was supposed to represent a local council in Syria’s different provinces, and together the councils received $8m from Qatar soon after the formation of the coalition. Qatar was also the first – and possibly the only – country to provide funding for the coalition budget, to the tune of $20m, and it delivered the first $10m out of a pledged $100m package for the organisation’s new humanitarian assistance unit.

For all its investment in the conflict, “whether Qatar’s venture into Syrian opposition politics will have any returns will depend on whether Syria survives as a country – something that is by no means assured,” Khalaf and Fielding-Smith conclude:

Perhaps for the Qatari emir, the demise of Assad will be sufficient satisfaction. In theory, Qatar could also emerge with multiple points of influence through Islamists and loyal brigades. But it has already created many enemies inside Syria, and not just among pro-regime supporters. So torn apart is the fabric of Syria’s society, and so radicalised and suspicious its battered population, that the Qataris are more likely to find that they are neither thanked – nor even wanted – there.

RTWT

“The divisions between the Qataris and Saudis have partly come about because of the reluctance of the US to engage in the conflict,” the FT suggests:

Washington has recently tried to streamline the flow of arms by Gulf states to the rebels, creating “operation rooms” in Turkey and Jordan to co-ordinate deliveries. But the US effort should have come earlier. In the meantime, the rebels’ fight against Assad will remain confused until the US, Britain and France supply some arms of their own to moderates fighting in Syria.

RTWT

Qatar’s ruling emir ‘wants to be the Islamist Nasser’

“The gas-rich state of Qatar has spent as much as $3bn over the past two years supporting the rebellion in Syria, far exceeding any other government, but is now being nudged aside by Saudi Arabia as the prime source of arms to rebels,” according to a new report.

“The cost of Qatar’s intervention, its latest push to back an Arab revolt, amounts to a fraction of its international investment portfolio,” Roula Khalaf and Abigail Fiedling Smith write in The Financial Times:

But its financial support for the revolution that has turned into a vicious civil war dramatically overshadows western backing for the opposition…. According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, which tracks arms transfers, Qatar has sent the most weapons deliveries to Syria, with more than 70 military cargo flights into neighbouring Turkey between April 2012 and March this year.

The emirate’s reputation for punching above its weight as the little state that could is also based on its extensive support for the region’s Islamists groups.

For instance, “Qatar’s involvement in Libya also builds on its long relationship with (and subsequent perceived loyalty by) some Libyan Islamists,” notes Lina Khatib, the head of the Program on Arab Reform and Democracy at Stanford University’s Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law:

Since the 1990s, Qatar has hosted a number of Libyan Islamists, mainly from the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group…….In an interview with al-Jazeera on September 7, 2011, the Emir of Qatar said “he believed radical Islamists whose views were forged under tyrannical governments could embrace participatory politics if the promise of real democracy and justice of this year’s Arab revolts is fulfilled. If so, the Qatari ruler said, ‘I believe you will see this extremism transform into civilian life and civil society’”.

Qatar has come under criticism for funding illiberal actors, including ultraconservative Salafist militants, during the Arab uprisings while suppressing fundamental freedoms at home.

“Though its approach is driven more by pragmatism and opportunism, than ideology, Qatar has become entangled in the polarised politics of the region, setting off scathing criticism,” note the FT analysts:

Qatar’s support for Islamist groups in the Arab world, which puts it at odds with its peers in the Gulf states, has fuelled rivalry with Saudi Arabia. Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani (above), Qatar’s ruling emir, “wants to be the Arab world’s Islamist (Gamal) Abdelnasser”, said an Arab politician, referring to Egypt’s fiery late president and devoted pan-Arab leader.

RTWT

“We’re going to keep working for a Syria that is free from Assad’s tyranny, that is intact and inclusive of all ethnic and religious groups, and that’s a source of stability, not extremism,” said US President Barack Obama yesterday after meeting with the Turkish Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

But it may already be too late to maintain Syria’s territorial integrity.

“After more than two years of conflict, Syria is breaking up,” writes The New York Times’ Ben Hubbard:

A constellation of armed groups battling to advance their own agendas are effectively creating the outlines of separate armed fiefs… …But as evidence of massacres and chemical weapons mounts, experts and Syrians themselves say the American focus on change at the top ignores the deep fractures the war has caused in Syrian society. Increasingly, it appears Syria is so badly shattered that no single authority is likely to be able to pull it back together any time soon.

Instead, three Syrias are emerging: one loyal to the government, to Iran and to Hezbollah; one dominated by Kurds with links to Kurdish separatists in Turkey and Iraq; and one with a Sunni majority that is heavily influenced by Islamists and jihadis.

“It is not that Syria is melting down — it has melted down,” said Andrew J. Tabler, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and author of In the Lion’s Den: An Eyewitness Account of Washington’s Battle with Syria. “So much has changed between the different parties that I can’t imagine it all going back into one piece,” Mr. Tabler said.

Syrian democracy advocates and moderates like Ausama Monajed, the Executive Director of the Strategic Research and Communication Centre, continue to plan for a post-Assad transition that incorporates a program of transitional justice and reconciliation.

In a recent interactive speech on ‘Syria’s Long Night’ at the Oslo Freedom Forum (above), he described the horrors taking place on the ground, a timeline of significant incidents since the start of the revolution and insisted that Syria’s citizens still aspired for freedom and justice and to build a new state with equal opportunities and where citizens are treated on an equal basis before the law.

But that vision is increasingly in jeopardy, according to The Times’ Hubbard:

Since mass defections of mostly conscripted soldiers shrank the government’s forces earlier in the uprising, it has largely given up on trying to reclaim parts of the country far from the capital, said Joseph Holliday, a fellow with the Institute for the Study of War.

 “The only real outcome I see in the next 5 to 10 years is a series of cantons that agree to tactical cease-fires because they are tired of the bloodletting,” he said. “That trajectory is in place, with or without Assad.”

Photo: VOA

US President Barack Obama and Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan (right) today discussed how to bolster the Syrian opposition and initiate a political transition.

“We’re going to keep increasing the pressure on the Assad regime, and working with the Syrian opposition,” Obama said. “The prime minister has been on the forefront of the international effort to push for a transition to a democratic Syria. Turkey is going to play an important role as we bring representatives of the regime and opposition together in the coming weeks.”

“That is the only way we’re going to resolve this crisis. And we’re going to keep working for a Syria that is free from Assad’s tyranny, that is intact and inclusive of all ethnic and religious groups, and that’s a source of stability, not extremism, because it’s in the profound interest of all our nations, especially Turkey.”

Erdogan said ending the conflict and securing a new government “are two areas where we are in full agreement with the United States. Supporting the opposition and Assad leaving are important issues. “

But his comments coincided with dismissive remarks by President Abdullah Gul about the international response to the conflict.  

“The international community’s contribution to Turkey’s financial aid to these people who are in a difficult situation is only symbolic,” Gul told reporters.

“From the very start the international community has only used rhetoric and heroism in their approach to the Syrian problem,” he said.

Erdogan also insisted that he will go ahead with a planned visit to the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip next month despite pressure from the US to delay it.

“Turkey has not faced a threat on the scale of the Syrian crisis since Stalin demanded territory in 1945,” two leading analysts note.

The war in Syria threatens Turkey’s emergence as a key economic and political player in the region, according to The Washington Institute’s Soner Cagaptay, author of the forthcoming book “The Rise of Turkey: The 21st Century’s First Muslim Power,” and James F. Jeffrey, a former U.S. ambassador to Turkey and Iraq:

Turkey has a 500,000 strong Alawite community whose Syrian ethnic kin support the al-Assad regime against the largely Sunni Arab Syrian rebels. The Alawite vs. Sunni conflict in Syria threatens to spill over into Turkey, a danger multiplied by the growing threat from the proliferation of chemical weapons and exposure to al Qaeda. Turkey’s security situation is not immune to the fallout of having a Somalia-style failed state next door. The mess in Syria risks ending the country’s economic miracle, something that would be bad news for the Turks and for Erdogan’s political fate. The Turkish leader wants to be elected as the country’s next president in the summer of 2014, and an economic downturn could upset his plans. Erdogan is aware that unless he secures more dynamic U.S. assistance against the al-Assad regime, Turkey could become the big loser in Syria — and Erdogan the loser at the ballot box. Yet U.S. national-security interests are also at stake in Syria, say two former U.S. ambassadors to Turkey.

“Yet the benefits of deposing Assad could prove short-lived if his repressive rule is replaced with another form of oppression or an unstable failed state,” according to Morton Abramowitz, a senior fellow at the Century Foundation and Eric Edelman, a former undersecretary of defense for policy:

To keep Syria together, a political transition must create a central government able to lead the entire country, but inclusive enough not to alienate frightened minority groups, which may by then include Assad’s Shiite Alawites in a majority Sunni country. Given the immense difficulty of this task, analyzing and planning for it should begin now.

Washington must take a leading role. The U.S. has great resources and coalition-convening power, but it lacks influence with the various forces of the opposition and has limited knowledge of the elements in Syria that can best shape a post-Assad government. Democratic Turkey’s help on this front will be paramount.

“Yet if the Muslim Brotherhood or some other Sunni regime asserts the tyranny of the majority without protecting minority interests, civil strife and refugee flows could well continue,” they fear. “Worse, if such a government is dominated or influenced by al Qaeda-allied extremists, post-Assad Syria could become a breeding ground for global terrorism.”

“There is urgency if the U.S. is to try to create a reasonably stable, more pluralist Syrian government,” conclude the two co-chairmen of the Bipartisan Policy Center’s Task Force on the U.S. and Turkey in the Middle East.

But interventionists tend to “underestimate the unwillingness of the ordinary people in the region to countenance yet another American military adventure in their midst,” a Turkey specialist suggests.

“More importantly, they vastly overestimate how thankful the Syrian public will be once Mr Al Assad is removed; anti-Americanism is an ingrained phenomenon across the whole region. If this crisis is directly affecting the regional powers, they need to share the burden of solving it,” says Henri J Barkey, a professor of international relations at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania:

It is likely that the Turks and others would recoil at the idea of sending in their own troops; they too have public opinion to heed. It has been easy for them so far to put the onus on the Obama administration. Were the US to offer its support to a Turkish-Arab intervention in this way, before long the regional powers would have to seriously reconsider their options for acting to end the crisis.

If the regional powers did not step up their response under those conditions, they would still have to face the consequences of the civil war on their own populations, security infrastructure and resources. They would not, however, be able to put the blame on the United States and its western allies.

President Obama should also raise concerns over the state of Turkish democracy, the Washington Institute’s Cagaptay and Jeffrey contend:

Turkey is currently drafting its first civilian-written constitution. The new charter ought to enshrine liberal democracy, as well as release the pressure points of Turkish society, by providing for constitutionally-mandated gender equality and freedom of expression. The charter should also mandate freedom of religion and freedom from religion, so that both secular and conservative Turks feel welcome in the new Turkey.

“The takeaway of the new Turkish constitution for the White House is simple,” they write. “Erdogan wants to make Turkey a Middle East leader, and he wants Washington to treat his country as such. Turkey can achieve this goal only if it becomes a true liberal democracy.”

China, Russia and Egypt impose restrictive conditions on private philanthropy that helps cultivate civil society development, while democracies tend to enjoy more conducive arrangements, according to a new analysis.

In a 13 country pilot study, the Hudson Institute’s Center for Global Prosperity examined barriers to and incentives for philanthropic freedom – the ability of individuals and organizations (both profit and non-profit) to donate time and money to social causes. The researchers scored and compared countries on their ease of giving by collecting information on three main indicators: the ease of registering and operating civil society organizations (CSOs); domestic tax policies for deductions, credits, and exemptions; and the ease of sending and receiving cash and in-kind goods across borders.

Egypt is joined by Russia and China with the most restrictions on philanthropic activity due to the governments’ interference in civil society activities and cross-border flows.

“The analysis showed that of all financial flows to the developing world, some 80 percent are private and only 20 percent are official, the reverse of 40 years ago,” said Carol C. Adelman (left), the center’s Senior Fellow and Director.

“As international philanthropy increases, there is growing interest in how philanthropy can be encouraged for humanitarian causes, economic growth, and community development,” she told a meeting at the National Endowment for Democracy.

The report’s findings will be discussed at a Washington forum on Thursday May 16, featuring Tomicah Tillemann, Senior Advisor for Civil Society and Emerging Democracies, U.S. Department of State; Douglas Rutzen, President and CEO, the International Center for Not-for-Profit Law; Yulya Spantchak, Research Fellow and Deputy Director, Center for Global Prosperity; and moderated by Dr. Adelman (details below).

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Philanthropy does not stand on its own, but is dependent on a vibrant civil society. Even a nation of the wealthiest donors cannot exhibit generosity without a civil society to help identify, organize, and implement activities that help people in need.

Furthermore, philanthropy’s role in creating civil society organizations (CSOs) and other sources of wealth and power outside of central government control helps democracies flourish by strengthening freedom of assembly and freedom of speech. This integral role of philanthropy in strengthening civil society can be best demonstrated by current political events in Egypt and Russia.

The post-revolutionary transition in Egypt has resulted in a governmental tightening of civil society rules. To ensure control of non-profit organizations’ activities, the Egyptian government has proposed restrictive legislation to prohibit philanthropic flows to organizations working in Egypt. Similarly, in Russia the government has enacted new regulations on cross-border financial flows to limit the activities of non-profit organizations. Thus, the existence of philanthropic freedom in a nation can strongly impact the health of that nation’s civil society and vice versa

Philanthropy is defined by the distinguished scholar, Dr. Helmut Anheier, as the “voluntary use of private assets for the benefit of public causes.” It can take on many forms such as individuals giving to non-profit organizations; diaspora communities funding relief and development projects; foundations and charities supporting community projects; corporations undertaking cause-related marketing campaigns; religious organizations’ missions to help orphanages in Africa; individuals using SMS to transfer funds to disaster victims, donating to overseas projects through internet websites; and, entirely new financial tools to transfer funds for social impact investing.

Countries with Low Barriers

The top scoring countries, Japan, Netherlands, Sweden, and the U.S. all have low barriers to entry for civil society organizations. The Netherlands, Sweden, and the U.S. have all had long histories of active civil societies, and the non-profit sector in all countries continues to grow. Although the non-profit sector is rarely scandal free, generally the populations in these countries have trust in CSOs. While Japan has a shorter history with civil society, its laws governing the establishment and operations of CSOs are currently conducive for the sector to grow in the future.

Countries with Low to Medium Barriers

While the countries that scored the highest are all high income, some emerging economies scored well above a four on this indicator. Besides Australia, Mexico also provides an easy entry for civil society organizations to register, obtain status, and operate. In Brazil, South Africa and India, the right to associate is freely granted and setting up a nonprofit organization is relatively easy and inexpensive. Nevertheless, government bureaucracies can hinder the process by creating delays. Thus the laws on the books may not vary significantly from higher scoring countries, however, the implementation of the laws is hindered by inefficiencies, causing delays and impediments.

Countries with Medium Barriers

Of the 13 nations reviewed, Turkey has some significant barriers to civil society operations. Individuals are not allowed to act collectively, unless they register for legal status as an association. Some CSOs, depending on their activities, encounter more operating constraints than others. Furthermore, involuntary termination of CSOs is possible under a process that is not transparent.

In Russia, registering a CSO can be a highly bureaucratic and political process. Organizations may face restrictions on the types of communication technologies they can use, and organizations can be terminated involuntarily. Russia has recently implemented and proposed a number of new regulations regarding civil society operations. Newly proposed laws in 2012 have created stringent requirements for any nonprofit that receives funding from abroad.

Countries with Medium to High Barriers

The countries with the lowest scores on the Civil Society Regulation indicator have some of the highest barriers. China and Egypt both create heavy obstacles to registering a CSO. Organizations in these countries often choose to register as businesses or remain unregistered to avoid the complex and political process.

In China, while a CSO registered as a business is technically illegal and can be shut down, most continue to operate anyway. Interestingly, although the laws on the books for CSO registration are highly restrictive, the implementation of these regulations is inefficient, allowing for a larger space for CSOs off the books than what is available legally. Furthermore, some Chinese provinces are beginning to implement local laws that would ease registration barriers for CSOs.

Civil society in China is composed of grassroots NGOs which are private and more regulated than government-organized NGOs (GONGOs). NGOs that are active in sensitive activities, which are unclearly defined, can be shut down at the discretion of the government, while organizations that work on democracy-related issues are not allowed to operate in China. The process for receiving donations from abroad is highly bureaucratic, while GONGOs are exempt from the heavy regulation that non-governmental CSOs have to follow.

In Egypt, any incoming foreign funding must go through the Egyptian government, which can refuse the transfer of such funds without reason. In 2013, the Egyptian government proposed a new law which will further restrict foreign funding to Egyptian CSOs. Already the process to receive funding has increased to nearly 15 months. The law is especially burdensome for organizations working on human rights issues.

Registering a CSO in Egypt is met with many barriers and involves cumbersome procedures. Organizations with activities that are viewed as out of line with national unity are denied registration. Moreover, once an organization is registered, it is subject to rigid structural regulations, including instructions on how to hold meetings and select board members. The government is able to remove any members from the board of directors whom it does not see as qualified. Additionally, government representatives can attend the general assembly or board meetings of organizations. Egyptian CSOs can be involuntarily terminated for a number of reasons, many of which are at the discretion of the government.

Regardless of what form private giving and social investing take, the presence of philanthropic activities in a country is encouraged by fundamental liberties such as the ability of individuals and organizations to assemble, own property, and engage in free speech and voluntary transactions.

This brief extract is taken from a longer analysis available here.

Philanthropic Freedom: “If You Can’t Measure It, You Can’t Improve It.”

May 16, 2013, 12:00 – 1:30 PM - Hudson Institute, Washington, D.C. Headquarters

Hudson Institute’s Center for Global Prosperity (CGP) invites you to a luncheon

Hudson Institute’s Center for Global Prosperity (CGP) is pleased to announce the publication of its pilot study on Philanthropic Freedom, the first time that ease of giving has been fully measured in 13 countries across the globe. The pilot study and each of the detailed country reports can be downloaded for free from www.hudson.org/philanthropicfreedom. The new study fills a major gap in development policy and philanthropic research by surveying barriers and incentives to philanthropic giving in three main areas: the ease of registering and operating civil society organizations (CSOs); domestic tax policies for individual and corporate deductions, credits, and exemptions; and, the ease of sending and receiving cash and in-kind goods across borders.

Like the World Bank’s Doing Business report and Freedom House’s Freedom in the World report, this research is intended to help governments remove barriers and create incentives for growing philanthropy.

Please join a distinguished panel in a conversation on the key factors that encourage and inhibit philanthropy and the important policy implications of this pilot study. 

Panelists: 

Tomicah Tillemann, Senior Advisor for Civil Society and Emerging Democracies, U.S. Department of State

Douglas Rutzen, President and CEO, the International Center for Not-for-Profit Law

Yulya Spantchak, Research Fellow and Deputy Director, Center for Global Prosperity

Moderator:Carol C. Adelman, Senior Fellow and Director, Center for Global Prosperity

The theory of inclusion/moderation posits that the more ideologically fanatical parties are included in the political process, the more realistic, pragmatic and respectful of democratic rules they become. But this has not been the case with Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood, writes Khalil al-Anani (right), a leading expert on the Islamist group.

The theory appeared to explain the moderation of many socialist, leftist and religious parties in post-war Europe, and the integration of Turkey’s Islamists under the leadership of the Justice and Development Party. Consequently, “it was only logical that some researchers approached Arab Islamist parties and movements from the same angle, to test whether the theory of inclusion and moderation could be applied,” says Anani, a Scholar of Middle East Politics at Durham University who was recently appointed Senior Fellow at the Middle East Institute (MEI) in Washington, D.C.

While the question of whether the inclusion of Egypt’s Islamists has resulted in the moderation of their ideological discourse and political conduct is hard to answer for several reasons, the Brotherhood’s recent record presents “a serious challenge” to the inclusion/moderation thesis, he writes for Al-Ahram:

First, a quick comparison between Brotherhood rhetoric and conduct before and after the revolution reveals that oppression, not inclusion, was the motivation for developing the group’s intellectual discourse and maturity and rationality of its political conduct.

Second, the sudden transformation of the Brotherhood and switching its political status from an opposition movement that was suppressed for decades to becoming the sole party in power was not accompanied by any transformation or transition in vision, thought process or policies.

Third, unlike in the cases of Turkey, Morocco, Jordan, Yemen and Kuwait, the Brotherhood was not integrated gradually but was suddenly and quickly catapulted into the driver’s seat and put in charge of running the country and affairs of state without any technocratic experience, or psychological, ideological or organizational readiness.

Four, the Brotherhood’s sudden inclusion did not occur under normal circumstances or at lower levels that could help the group reposition itself or organize its thoughts and priorities. Instead, it came after a people’s revolution, followed by mismanagement and severe floundering by those who were in charge of the democratic transition.

Finally, the inclusion of the Brotherhood occurred at a time of high tension as well as identity, religious and social polarization that mostly took the form of competition/conflict rather than consensus/cooperation, not only among political and ideologically divergent forces, but also within the Islamist camp itself.

The Brotherhood has also proved incapable of producing policies to address Egypt’s economic woes, said Alison Pargeter, a specialist in political Islam and the author of a new book on the group.

Its Renaissance Project was simply a “crystallization” of old reform ideas – a “vague and generalized wish list that bears little relation to the reality on the ground.” It highlighted the “Brotherhood’s political naïveté, with their seemingly believing that promises alone will be sufficient to bring people over to their side.”

While the Brotherhood’s political conduct has led many observers to “lose hope in the possibility of viable democratic transition,” Anani says, others consider it a reflection of the group’s pre-revolutionary “organizational, doctrinal and ideological authoritarian structure.”

“Doubt is no longer confined to whether the Brotherhood has the political competence and skill to manage the affairs of state,” he writes. The group’s “ideological credibility and commitment to democracy as a value, conduct and discourse” are also questionable,’ argues Anani, author of the forthcoming, tentative titled book, Unpacking the Muslim Brotherhood: Religion, Identity and Politics.

For decades, the Arab world’s Islamist parties assumed that the only thing really holding them back were non-Islamist dictators, writes Hussein Ibish (right):

But as dictatorships have fallen and political space has opened up, they’ve discovered something disturbing: their followers don’t appear to be majorities in Arab states, and they have run up against unexpectedly powerful and widespread opposition. …..Islamist “revolutionaries” are therefore now turning to that time honored method of undemocratically consolidating power, the mass purge.

“The urge to purge is directly proportional to the level of frustration in attempting to gain and consolidate state power,” says Ibish, a senior fellow at the American Task Force on Palestine, citing Libya’s new political isolation law, foisted upon the state by pro-Muslim Brotherhood militias and the attempt by Egypt’s ruling Brotherhood to purge the judiciary – “the most problematic branch of the government not yet under their control.”

The Muslim Brotherhood is also finding its hegemony challenged in Egypt, where conflict between rival Islamist players over the country’s institutions and identity is undermining economic and political stability, the FT’s Borzou Daragahi reports from Cairo:

While Egypt observers have fixated on the battle between secularists and Islamists as the defining fact of political life since the Muslim Brotherhood’s Mohamed Morsi won the presidency last year, some analysts say there is an equally intense contest between competing religious groups. This fight has already had economic consequences and political implications as rival groups battle for popular advantage on issues such as a new market for debt securities, a multibillion dollar IMF loan package and the country’s rising birth rate.

“I think what we’re seeing is a battle for who represents Islam in Egypt,” said Shadi Hamid, a scholar at the Brookings Doha Centre. “It’s up for grabs and there are a lot of competitors. Each has a different conception of the role of Islam in public life.”

Islamist groups have proliferated since the revolution more than two years ago but are broadly divided between the politically dominant Brotherhood, the Salafis and the leadership at al-Azhar (left), Egypt’s most revered Islamic school of learning. All three foresee Islam playing a vital role in the public life, institutions and economy of post-revolutionary Egypt but are divided by political loyalties and doctrinal differences…..

The most potentially destabilizing fallout from the power struggle could be over Egypt’s economy, analysts say. After Mr Morsi secured the passage of a law to create and regulate a market in debt-like securities called sukuk al-Azhar scholars wanted to review the legislation for compliance with Muslim jurisprudence. Some Salafis oppose a $4.8bn proposed IMF loan deal on the grounds that interest is forbidden.

 “You’ve got these movements that draw their authority from different sources,” said Nathan J Brown, an Egypt expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace think-tank. “The Brotherhood draws from democratic credentials. Azhar has it on the basis of their own expertise. And the Salafists refer to the original texts. The question is who speaks authoritatively and finally in the name of Islam.”

 “Long-term I think that there is a battle going on over who speaks for Islam and over the ways in which Egypt’s status as a Muslim society will translate into day-to-day affairs,” Prof Brown said.

The fact that Islamists in Libya and Egypt “are resorting to a purge splurge to gain or consolidate political power is a symptom of the welcome fact that they are finding it difficult to do so legitimately,” Ibish writes for Now Lebanon:

However, while purges are quintessentially abusive and anti-democratic, when they actually happen, they typically tend to work. So preventing them is not only achievable, it’s absolutely imperative.

“Syria’s main opposition bloc wants to consult its allies before deciding on joining a U.S.-Russia initiative to negotiate a peaceful transition, Associated Press reports:

The time, venue and agenda of the conference have not been set, reflecting disagreements between the two warring sides in Syria that scuttled previous initiatives. Both have agreed in principle to attend, but the opposition Syrian National Coalition says it will not negotiate unless President Bashar Assad steps down first, while the regime has been vague about a truce.

“It is still early to make a decision on attending the conference,” George Sabra (left), head of the SNC, said today. “It still has no agenda, program and list of attendees,” adding that the coalition would consult its allies, including Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, prior to making a decision.

But “the likelihood of success for the Syrian opposition is wavering among some of its strongest backers, amid some reports that Bashar al-Assad’s regime is not on the verge of collapse,” reports suggest.

The “natural conclusion” of recent coalition statements is that the Syrian opposition has been pressured by outside powers to open negotiations with the Assad regime, said Salman Shaikh, director of the Brookings Institution’s Doha Center, noting that the “international community is scrambling now to find a way to deescalate the situation.”

“Up till now their legitimacy has come from the international community’s recognition of them as representatives of the Syrian people,” he said. “With that in mind, yes they can come under pressure because this is their main source of support.”

The opposition’s international backers are also concerned that the rebels are losing ground militarily to pro-Assad forces.

“If things continue as they are, the government will certainly be the party that has the major advantage” in any talks, said Charles Lister of the London-based IHS Jane’s Terrorism and Insurgency Center. “If we press pause on where we are today, it is clear the insurgency does not pose an existential threat to the regime.”

British Prime Minister David Cameron, who is visiting the White House today, is expected to tell President Barack Obama that Russia is prepared to adopt a more flexible approach to the conflict.

After meeting Russian President Vladimir Putin over the weekend, Cameron said that the Kremlin recognized “that it would be in all our interests to secure a safe and secure Syria with a democratic and pluralist future, and end the regional instability.”

Graphic: The Washington Post

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry “made a real breakthrough” in talks with Putin when they agreed to an American-Russian peace conference on Syria, Cameron told NPR today:

Will Putin be able to help push Assad into peace talks? “That is the $60 million question,” Cameron conceded. “The sense I have is that … we still have an open and public difference about Assad. I think he is completely illegitimate because of what he has done to his people. He has to go. President Putin takes a different view. While there is that difference, there is still this recognition that we need to have a talks process that could bring about a transitional government.”

“All options for the Obama administration look grim,” says one observer, while leading analysts told Agence France Presse that diplomatic initiatives are unlikely to resolve the conflict.

Agreement on a peace conference “moves the Geneva [peace plan] formula one step further, but what is one step beyond complete meaninglessness?” asked Stephen Sestanovich, an expert in Russian and Eurasian studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, and a board member of the National Endowment for Democracy.

“The real issue is whether the Russians are prepared to tell Assad and his supporters that the jig is really up for their regime,” he added.

The different players’ positions had not changed “that much,” said Brookings’ Shaikh, adding that “the situation on the ground” — rather than diplomatic initiatives — “will continue to shape events.”

Some observers suggest that the US also lacks the diplomatic resources to adequately address the situation.

“Critical jobs like Assistant Secretary for Europe, for Africa, for the Near East–and the list is quite long–sit vacant,” says Council on Foreign Relations analyst Elliott Abrams.

British premier Cameron today cautioned that no political progress is possible unless the opposition demonstrates its ability to withstand the regime’s current offensive. In that regard, observers are pessimistic about the rebels’ prospects.

The Assad regime “shows no signs of cracking,” says analyst Jonathan Spyer.

“The momentum of the fighting has shifted somewhat,” he suggests. “Regime forces have clawed back areas of recent rebel advance. The government side, evidently under Iranian tutelage, has showed an impressive and unexpected ability to adapt itself to the changing demands of the war.”

Assad loyalists ‘steadily squeezing’ rebels

“In the hotly contested eastern suburbs of Damascus, one of the areas where Assad’s rejuvenated forces are regaining lost ground, rebel fighters with the still-disorganized Free Syrian Army (left) say the merging of the militias with the conventional army has bolstered the regime’s manpower by as much as a third,” writes The Washington Post’s Liz Sly:

Though the rebels retain most of the strongholds they have controlled for much of the past year, Assad loyalists are steadily squeezing them, isolating them from one another and cutting their supply routes, the rebels say. Units are running out of ammunition, and some sound increasingly desperate…. Meanwhile, the regime can still call on its conventional superiority to project its power into areas where the rebels hold sway on the ground, including air strikes, ballistic missiles and artillery. And unlike the rebel force, which has received only sporadic supplies of relatively low-caliber weaponry from its reluctant Western and Arab allies, Assad’s military can count on steady supplies of arms and ammunition from Iran and Russia…

“We do not know fear here, but we are worried about our future,” said Zainaldin al-Shami of the Free Syrian Army’s First Brigade, speaking by Skype from the Damascus suburb of Barzeh. “We are facing all kinds of weapons and we can’t defend ourselves. We need massive support.”

A new strategy for Assad

“The army is 70 percent Sunni, and so the regime kept a lot of them in their barracks,” said Salem Zahran, an analyst and journalist who meets regularly with leaders of the Assad government. “The National Defense Force is made up of people who believe in the regime.”

The conflict not only threatens Syria’s territorial unity but that of its neighbors too, says a prominent analyst.

“Look to Iraq, on Syria’s eastern border, for the region’s quintessential artificial entity,” writes Fouad Ajami, a senior fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution:

Today, the government in Baghdad, Shiite-led for the first time in a millennium, sides with the Alawite dictatorship in Damascus. But in western Iraq, the Sunni strongholds of Anbar province and Mosul have been stirred up by the Syrian rebellion….. The Sunnis have bottomless grievances against the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. To them, Maliki, who spent a quarter-century exiled in Syria and Iran, is an agent of the Iranian theocracy.

By contrast, “a Syria ruled by a Sunni majority would rewrite the rules of the region’s politics,” he writes in The Washington Post:

It could put an end to the militarization of Syrian society that has wrecked that country. Free of despotism, the Syrian middle class might erect the foundations of a more open and merciful nation. Syria is a land of merchants and commerce, and therein lies the hope that a better country could emerge from this ruin.

Lebanon, too, would be given a chance at normalcy. The power of Hezbollah in that country has derived to a great extent from the power of the Syrian dictatorship. If Syria is transformed, Lebanon must change as well, and the power of Hezbollah could be cut down to size. Utopia will not visit the region after the fall of the Syrian tyranny, but there is no denying that better politics may take hold in Syria and in its immediate neighborhood.

“A Greater Middle East, an Islamic world, used to American campaigns of rescue — Kuwait in 1991, Bosnia in 1995, Kosovo in 1999, Afghanistan in 2001, Iraq in 2003, Libya in 2011 — is now witnessing the ebb of American power and responsibility,” writes Ajami, the author of “The Syrian Rebellion” and “Dream Palace of the Arabs: A Generation’s Odyssey.”

“Syrian rebels sure that the American cavalry would turn up after this or that massacre have been bitterly disappointed,” he contends.

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For the Obama administration, “the costs of inaction have started to outweigh the costs of action”, says a leading analyst, warning that Syria’s civil war is “metastasizing” into a wider regional conflict.

“It is spreading to other states in the region”, says Michelle Dunne, Director of the Atlantic Council’s Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East.

A US military intervention to prevent the regime’s chemical weapons stocks falling into the hands of Al-Qaeda-linked jihadists is unrealistic, she believes.

“That would have to be done either by the Syrian rebels who are there on the ground, perhaps after the overthrow of the al-Assad regime, or by some fairly large-scale foreign intervention”, says Dunne, a board member of the National Endowment for Democracy. “So I think that the administration, the U.S. administration is now seeing that the costs of inaction have started to outweigh the costs of action.”

“The key would be to get the Syrians trained to use the weapons to defect to Nusra”, says Bruce Riedel, a terrorism expert with the Brookings Institution.

Geostrategic rivalry

The conflict has “not only spread into Syria’s neighbors, like Lebanon, Iraq, Jordan and Turkey — but has also become a battlefield wherein Israel and Iran are challenging each other”, writes Fawaz A. Gerges, a professor of international relations at the London School of Economics where he directs the Middle East Centre. “There is also a fierce geostrategic rivalry unfolding in Syria between Sunni-dominant Saudi Arabia and Shiite Iran, a rivalry invested and fuelled with sectarianism.”

The decision whether to provide lethal assistance to the Syrian opposition is unlikely to be linked to the recent Israeli airstrikes, says Steven Simon, a former senior official on Mr. Obama’s National Security Council. 

“The U.S. and Israel have overlapping but not identical interests at stake in the conflict”, he tells The New York Times.

“On chemical weapons, assuming that the regime did use them, the U.S. is looking for options to deter further use that don’t undercut — or, in the best case — don’t foreclose a political resolution”, said Simon, who heads the Washington office of the International Institute for Strategic Studies. “It’s not clear that arming the opposition meets either objective.”

The Israeli air strikes complicate President Obama’s efforts “to coordinate the response to the Syrian conflict among several players, including Europeans, Turkey and Arab states from Jordan to Saudi Arabia, the Times’ Mark Landler and Eric Schmitt write.

“The Israelis’ being assertive, while Obama is not, doesn’t play in his favor”, said Andrew J. Tabler, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near Eastern Policy. “You need to have the Arabs onside.”

Mr. Tabler said Ms. Del Ponte’s charge that the rebels might have used chemical weapons raised questions about the unity of the United Nations in dealing with Syria.

“It struck me as political”, he said. “They’re trying to blur the situation to stave off some kind of intervention.”

The administration is preoccupied with “the alarming prospect that radical Islamists could acquire Syrian chemical weapons and try to use them beyond Syria’s borders, perhaps even within the United States.” writes Time magazine’s Michael Crowley:

Syria is believed to have tons of chemical weapons, including the nerve agents sarin and VX, as well as cyanide and mustard gas, which are stored at as many as 20 different sites around the country. The good news is that those sites are some of the most secure in the country.

“You’ve seen the regime consolidating forces around these facilities”, says Elizabeth O’Bagy, a Syria analyst at the Institute for the Study of War.

“I think we should be worried”, says Jeffrey White, an analyst at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and a former military intelligence officer. “As the war progresses and the rebels gain territory, assuming they do, inevitably they’re going to close in on some of the regime’s chemical facilities.”

‘No negotiated settlement’

More than two years after the conflict began, “there does not seem to be a military solution”, says the LSE’s Gerges.  “It is a long war of attrition with no end in sight. Neither internal camp seems to have the means to deliver a decisive blow.”

“Only a political solution will put an end to the shedding of Syrian blood and prevent the unthinkable: a region-wide conflict that would have catastrophic consequences”, he contends.

That will never happen, says a prominent regional analyst.

“There’s not going to be a negotiated settlement”, argues Rami Khouri, director of the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut.

‘Existential battle’

The conflict is the “mother of all proxy wars…. the biggest proxy war over the last century in the entire world”, he believes:

You’ve got every single major player in the region – Iran, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Israel, Jordan. All of the players in the Middle East are involved in this directly or indirectly. You’ve got the two greats – biggest powers, the Russians and the Americans and then the Chinese in a more quiet way. And you have these lingering Cold War – regional Cold War issues of Saudis versus monarchists, conservative monarchists versus nationalist republics…..You’ve got Iranians versus Arabs, Shiites versus Sunnis. Now, you’ve got Kurd versus everybody else.

“I don’t think it’s going to happen where there will be stabilization, where they’ll eventually agree on how to resolve this through a negotiated transition to a new government”, he tells NPR:

Proxy wars end usually by one side beating up the other, as happened in Vietnam and other places. So I think this is an existential battle. The Iranians and Hezbollah has a lot to lose if Syria falls. They’re going to put everything they can into this. The Saudis and others on the other side, the Turks, they’re all doing what they can. The Israelis are now getting involved. So this is a bunch of gladiators now, and some of them are going to win, and some of them are going to die.

His sentiments are partly echoed by Tabler, author of “In the Lion’s Den: An Eyewitness Account of Washington’s Battle with Syria.”

“Where you have the Syrian regime trying to shoot the Syrian opposition into submission, over 76,000 killed, I believe, or thereabout…. When you start launching SCUD missiles on your largest city, Aleppo, it’s hard to know how politically you come back from that”, he says.

“Muslims around the world express broad support for democracy and for people of other faiths being able to practice their religion freely,” according to a major new survey. “At the same time, many Muslims say religious leaders should influence political matters and see Islamic political parties as just as good or better than other political parties.”

Slight majorities favor democracy in key Middle Eastern states – 54 percent in Iraq, 55 percent in Egypt – but only 29 percent in Pakistan, says a study from the Washington-based Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life. By contrast, it enjoys the robust support of 81 percent in Lebanon, 75 percent in Tunisia and 70 percent in Bangladesh.

Large majorities want to see Islamic legal and moral code of sharia as the official law, but there is little consensus on its definition and purview.  Over three-quarters of Muslims in the Middle East and North Africa, South Asia and Southeast Asia want sharia courts to decide family law issues such as divorce and property disputes, with support highest in Afghanistan, where 99 percent of respondents support sharia, followed by the Palestinian territories, Malaysia, Niger and Pakistan.

“While the vast majority of Muslims in most countries say suicide bombing is rarely or never justified to defend Islam against its enemies, substantial minorities in a few countries consider such violence justifiable in at least some circumstances,” says the report – 40 percent in the Palestinian territories, 39 percent in Afghanistan, 29 percent in Egypt and 26 percent in Bangladesh.

“With the notable exception of Afghanistan, fewer than half of Muslims in any country surveyed say religious leaders should have a large influence in politics,” says the report:

Democracy

In 31 of the 37 countries where the question was asked at least half of Muslims believe a democratic government, rather than a leader with a strong hand, is best able to address their country’s problems.

Support for democracy tends to be highest among Muslims in sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia. In 12 of the 16 countries surveyed in sub-Saharan Africa, roughly two-thirds or more prefer a democratic government, including nearly nine-in-ten (87%) in Ghana. Fewer, though still a majority, prefer democracy over a strong leader in Guinea Bissau (61%), Niger (57%) and Tanzania (57%). In Southeast Asia, more than six-in-ten Muslims in Malaysia (67%), Thailand (64%) and Indonesia (61%) also prefer democracy.

In the Middle East and North Africa, at least three-quarters of Muslims support democracy in Lebanon (81%) and Tunisia (75%). At least half in Egypt (55%), the Palestinian territories (55%) and Iraq (54%) do so as well.

In South Asia, the percentage of Muslims who say a democratic government is better able to solve their country’s problems ranges from 70% in Bangladesh to 29% in Pakistan. In Central Asia, at least half of Muslims in Tajikistan (76%), Turkey (67%), Kazakhstan (52%) and Azerbaijan (51%) prefer democracy over a leader with a strong hand, while far fewer in Kyrgyzstan (32%) say the same.

Religious Leaders’ Role in Politics

Compared with support for democracy, sharper regional differences emerge over the question of the role of religious leaders in politics. The prevailing view among Muslims in Southeast Asia, South Asia and the Middle East-North Africa region is that religious leaders should have at least some influence in political matters. By contrast, this is the minority view in most of the countries surveyed in Central Asia and Southern and Eastern Europe. With the notable exception of Afghanistan, fewer than half of Muslims in any country surveyed say religious leaders should have a large influence in politics.

Support for religious leaders having a say in political matters is particularly high in Southeast Asia. At least three-quarters of Muslims in Malaysia (82%) and Indonesia (75%) believe religious leaders should influence political matters, including substantial percentages who say they should play a large role (41% and 30%, respectively).

In South Asia, a large majority in Afghanistan (82%) and Bangladesh (69%) believe religious leaders ought to influence political matters, while 54% of Pakistani Muslims agree. Afghan Muslims are the most likely among the populations surveyed to say religious leaders should have a largeinfluence on politics (53%), while roughly a quarter of Muslims in Pakistan (27%) and Bangladesh (25%) express this view.

In the Middle East-North Africa region, a majority of Muslims in most countries surveyed say religious leaders should play a role in politics. Support is highest among Muslims in Jordan (80%), Egypt (75%) and the Palestinian territories (72%). Roughly six-in-ten in Tunisia (58%) and Iraq (57%) agree. Lebanese Muslims are significantly less supportive; 37% think religious leaders should have at least some role in political matters, while 62% disagree. In each country in the region except Lebanon, about a quarter or more say religious leaders should have a large influence on politics, including 37% in Jordan.

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