2019 年 94 巻 p. 151-168
The purpose of this paper is to reveal the transformation of the media
landscape in Middle Eastern countries since the beginning of the Arab Spring
began. Although a series of protests started as requirements for better governance,
political freedom, and qualified life, its outcomes seem to have been far
from successful. To date (excluding Tunisia), there have been no countries
experiencing substantial democratic progress. Therefore, contrary to the initial
optimistic views on the uprisings that emphasized people’s power and the effectiveness
of social movement regarding authoritarian governments, recent studies
tend to take a more severe viewpoint of the incidents. Although many
observers regard the Arab Spring as momentous historically for showing the
power of media freedom enabled by the development of media technologies,
most studies have never focused on the whereabouts of media freedom in Middle
Eastern countries after these uprisings. For a better understanding of the
relationship between media and the Arab Spring, this study considers the Arab
Spring’s impact on media situations, as well as the media freedom situation in the Middle East since the beginning of the uprisings. As this paper shows,
except for Tunisia, media freedom in Middle East has not improved; rather, a
deterioration can be observed. Though the Arab Spring remains in people’s
minds as showing the power of media, the mid-to-long term trend may show
that the incident was just an opportunity for Arab authoritarian governments
to upgrade their adaptability to the new media environments.