2 - A Political Economy of Democracy Aid

Summary

In this chapter, I elaborate on the conceptual and methodological framework that I use to examine the construction and practice of US democracy programming in the Middle East. I highlight limitations and weaknesses with recent approaches to studying democracy aid and show that existing research on such aid elides the contested meaning of democracy itself as well as the assumptions underlying democracy aid projects. I argue that a political economy approach to studying democracy aid takes such meaning seriously while also giving us a nuanced understanding of the motivations and intentions of donor and recipient states. I develop a political economy framework that considers how ideas, institutions, and interests can mediate and shape the form and function of democracy aid. This framework allows us to capture the complex interactions between actors engaged in such efforts in what I call the micropolitics of democracy aid.