Apropos of my earlier post on public opinion in Egypt comes this piece by my colleague Marc Lynch. He notes the increased importance of learning about Arab public opinion:
bq. In the past few years, when American policy was devoted almost exclusively to “combating violent extremism”, it was possible to argue that such broad survey results had little use for policymakers. The salafi- jihadists of al Qa’eda and their passive supporters were never a mass movement: their numbers were microscopic and unlikely to be represented in opinion surveys – and they did not, at any rate, tend to respond to queries from pollsters. Views of America had little to do with support for al Qa’eda, and vice versa: campaigns to diminish support for terror groups did not necessarily increase support for American policies.
bq. But today that insight no longer holds: al Qa’eda has become even more marginal, but among the Arab mainstream broad support has formed for a mass-based “Resistance”, which is now the principal focus of Arab political discourse and argument. The views that matter now are those of the mainstream rather than a narrow slice of extremists – and the issues are political, not religious.
But then he describes some challenges in conducting and interpreting these polls. Perhaps most interesting is his call for pollsters to expand their purview beyond Arab attitudes toward the United States and its leaders.
Recommended.
