The Carnegie Foundation for International Peace recently sponsored a series of papers that frame key issues relating to democracy promotion policies and programs in the Middle East. The fourth one in this thought-provoking series was authored by Marina Ottaway and offers a critical appraisal of the relationship between women's rights and democracy in the Arab world, and about what an outside...

This site from Harvard University allows visitors to learn about the lives of women during the Qajar era in Iran from 1796 to 1926 via a "wide array of materials from private family holdings and participating institutions." The site is most remarkable as it allows visitors to access the materials in both Arabic and English. It offers thousands of personal papers, manuscripts, photographs,...