The Conference

Arab Geopolitics in Turmoil

Rome - 25 and 26 February 2016

The Arab revolutions, together with the US-Iranian peace overtures, have changed in a significant way the strategic landscape of regional security even in countries where no political upheaval was experienced. In fact these events have shown the importance of pluralism and diversity in Arab societies and media and that political establishments need to take into account the contribution of different political orientations. It is now important to analyse with far-sightedness the perceptions and the concrete consequences of change in order to overcome short-term political and diplomatic disarray with meaningful policies capable to guarantee the security and sovereignty of all countries of the area. Revolutionary processes have quite ramified consequences that include also a number of still unfathomable or partially appraisable factors that need to considered in order to synergize national and regional evolutionary responses. Therefore the conference is structured into four panels in two distinct and intertwining sets: one on soft strategic factors and on hard security. The first panel takes a look at non-state actors and disintegration risks. The second tries to imagine different scenarios for the twin issue of pluralism and democracy in the area, while the third wants to gauge the different societies as enduring mainsprings for change. The fourth panel introduces concentrates on the possibilities of reconciling regional hegemonies. The function of the conference it to set the indispensable context that allows to grasp the new developments affecting Arab security and societies in order to better focus on successive concrete studies and measures in order to improve NATO’s co-operative security and coverage of the Southern Region.