Narrating the “Arab Spring”: Where Expertise Meets Heuristics in Legislative Hearings

Abstract

International reaction to the Arab Spring, explain Freund and Braga (2012, p. 131), “could be summarized by one word: surprise.” This was the case for the vast majority of countries, including the United Kingdom (UK) and United States of America (hereafter US). These countries, so often portrayed as close allies, encapsulated in the “special relationship” (or, as it has become today, the “essential relationship”), have long cooperated in foreign policy. There has been significant scholarly and journalistic interest in the reaction to the Arab Spring of the UK and US executive branches. Yet, in contrast, few scholarly works have compared and contrasted the foreign policy positions of the legislatures. In this chapter, we turn the spotlight that way and analyze the discursive responses of British and American legislators to the Arab Spring over a 13-month period from April 2011 to May 2012. Specifically, we compare hearings in the US House of Representatives Committee on Foreign Affairs and the UK House of Commons Select Committee on Foreign Affairs.KeywordsForeign PolicyMiddle EastForeign AffairFrench RevolutionSelect CommitteeThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.