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Dr. Sheila Carapico is a professor of political science at the University of Richmond. She is the author of Civil Society in Yemen: A Political Economy of Activism in Modern Arabia (1998) and of chapters and articles on subjects including gender, human rights, political economy, and international development assistance. The author wishes to thank Monica Perini for comments on and contributions to this essay.
This project was originally imagined as a multi-authored consideration of Yemen’s April 2009 parliamentary process — its lead-up, outcomes, and likely consequences. Following the postponement of these elections, the authors have instead sought to examine not only the stated and implicit reasons for the delay, but also Yemen’s increasing political unrest — turmoil which the regime has helped foster and to which it has begun to overreact. For the authors, the key question is less whether the elections will be held in 2011, but whether the country will remain intact until then.
