The Middle East: Top-Down vs. Bottom-Up Bottom-Up Security Perceptions
The Middle East: Top-Down vs. Bottom-Up Bottom-Up Security Perceptions

Summary/Abstract: In the broader context of discussions regarding a global “Islamic threat” and of the mainstream interpretation of the Middle East as a region to which the classic realist theory of International Relations fits par excellence, the present article’s aim is a comprehensive comparative analysis of six alternative perspectives on regional security in the Middle East - “Cold War”, linked to the former US and Soviet security strategies; “Arab”, corollary of pan-Arabism; “Islamic”, based on the guiding principle of Islamic “ummah”; “Greater Middle East”, of the current American strategists; “extended Barcelona”, an incipient stage attempt of extending EU’s Mediterranean process to the East of Jordan; “Broader Middle East and North Africa”, recognizable in a G8 project of trans-level partnership adopted last year.1 Built upon significantly different understandings of the concept of “security”, subsequent to different philosophical traditions, these six contending security perspectives appear to reveal a surprising application of Einstein’s aforementioned words to our theme of analysis: a proper nomination, delimitation, understanding and explanation of the Middle Eastern area and its problems represents the crucial prerequisite for a successful formulation and implementation of regional security policies. As a last preliminary observation – in order to understand how and why the Middle East provides “the” case study on different regional security perspectives, our comparison is preceded by some conceptual and methodological observations focused on historical definitions of the “Middle East” on …

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