Information Technology and Social Change in the Arab World

Translated by Jahanshir Siah-Mansoury Many scholars predict that the rise of new communication technologies will deeply change political and social realities in the Middle East region. Such a presumption may ignore the importance of the role played by trust in the Arab societies. In the Arab Middle East, gaining information through oral sources still enjoys more reliability than through written sources. This article, written by one of the prominent scholars on the Arab World, tries to examine the influence of new media in the region. Drawing on three examples of Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, he assesses the extent of the ability of new media and the relationship between such media and trust, and demonstrates that new information technologies and the rise of civil society or public sphere will not only lead to fundamental political and social changes.