An Analysis of the Popular Uprising in the Middle East from the Viewpoint of Oil Political Economy

The present article tries to study the popular uprising in Arab countries of the Middle East and North Africa by a political economy of oil approach. The article makes use of a multi-variable analytical model that can both explain causes of uprising and different directions and outcomes of the events in popular revolt that started in Arab countries from late 2010. The article shows that all the countries of the Middle East and North Africa have similar characteristics that can explain them as dependence on foreign rents. Kind and level of these rents and the extent of dependency on them vary among the countries of the region but the presence of rents is common among them nevertheless that affects the political stability in different ways. The most important question of the article is how political economy of the Middle East oil has affected the popular uprising of the Arab countries and its process of the developments. The underlying hypothesis is that the political economy of oil of the Middle Eastern countries has created a rigid rentier structure and this particular structure has played an important role in popular uprisings. A different mix of oil revenue along with mediatory socio-political variables has led to different directions of political development of the uprisings of the people of the region. The article makes use of new theoretical framework in studies of oil and politics and by the help of it explains different directions of different countries uprisings. The article by the help of descriptive analytical method has analyzed qualitative and quantitative data to test the hypothesis.