As the trial of Hosni Mubarak begins in Cairo this week, the last death throes of Arab authoritarianism are echoing around a turbulent region that is striving to put an end to tyranny and to start afresh with a new democratic era. This time last year, few academic experts on the Middle East would have predicted such a swift upheaval across the Arab world.
Not many would have foreseen the dramatic images of Hosni Mubarak appearing before a court bedridden, but a year is a long time in politics and undoubtedly 2011 will go down in Middle Eastern history as one of the most spectacular in contemporary times Continue reading