Syria Contextualized: The Numbers Game
Middle East Policy, Vol. XX, No. 1, Spring 2013
16 Pages Posted: 20 Oct 2017
Date Written: March 13, 2013
Abstract
The popular discourse on the Syrian conflict has largely taken for granted that Bashar al-Asad and his regime are unpopular in Syria, the revolution is widely supported domestically, the rebels are “winning” the war, and the fall of the regime is inevitable and imminent. To justify their interpretation of the conflict, opposition activists, Western policy makers and media outlets make frequent reference to a number of “facts,” often statistical in nature. However, should we contextualize this data more rigorously, it becomes apparent that a radically different dynamic may be at work “on the ground” in Syria. This becomes important, as a more nuanced understanding of what is happening will have implications for what strategy the United States should pursue.
Keywords: Syria, Civil War, Conflict and Peace Studies, Statistics, Sociology of Knowledge
JEL Classification: C12, Z18, F51, F52, F53
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation