Shadi Hamid is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, research professor of Islamic Studies at Fuller Seminary, and a contributing writer at The Atlantic. He was named one of the world's top 50 thinkers by Prospect magazine in 2019. Hamid is the author of Islamic Exceptionalism: How the Struggle Over Islam is Reshaping the World, which was shortlisted for the 2017 Lionel Gelber Prize for best book on foreign affairs, and co-editor of Rethinking Political Islam. His first book, Temptations of Power: Islamists and Illiberal Democracy in a New Middle East, was named a Foreign Affairs Best Book of 2014.

The most serious effort in years to rethink whether and how the United States should support democracy in the Middle East. Hamid's sharp challenges to both skeptics and supporters of conventional democracy policy will unsettle some readers. But his willingness to put forward a deeply felt set of genuinely new ideas—applicable not just in the Middle East but globally—makes the journey highly stimulating and worthwhile.

• Preface 1. Is Democracy Worth Supporting? 2. Democratic Minimalism in Theory and Practice 3. The Problem of Islam 4. Democratic Dilemmas: Egypt, Jordan, and Algeria 5. The American Veto 6. Culture versus Interests 7. Anti- Despotism or Democracy Promotion? 8. Islamists in Government 9. On Hypocrisy 10. On Power Notes Index

Shadi Hamid is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, research professor of Islamic Studies at Fuller Seminary, and a contributing writer at The Atlantic. He was named one of the world's top 50 thinkers by Prospect magazine in 2019. Hamid is the author of Islamic Exceptionalism: How the Struggle Over Islam is Reshaping the World, which was shortlisted for the 2017 Lionel Gelber Prize for best book on foreign affairs, and co-editor of Rethinking Political Islam. His first book, Temptations of Power: Islamists and Illiberal Democracy in a New Middle East, was named a Foreign Affairs Best Book of 2014.

The most serious effort in years to rethink whether and how the United States should support democracy in the Middle East. Hamid's sharp challenges to both skeptics and supporters of conventional democracy policy will unsettle some readers. But his willingness to put forward a deeply felt set of genuinely new ideas—applicable not just in the Middle East but globally—makes the journey highly stimulating and worthwhile.

• Preface 1. Is Democracy Worth Supporting? 2. Democratic Minimalism in Theory and Practice 3. The Problem of Islam 4. Democratic Dilemmas: Egypt, Jordan, and Algeria 5. The American Veto 6. Culture versus Interests 7. Anti- Despotism or Democracy Promotion? 8. Islamists in Government 9. On Hypocrisy 10. On Power Notes Index