An Open Letter to President Barack Obama

Dear President Obama:

As political scientists, historians, and researchers in related fields who have studied the Middle East and U.S. foreign policy, we the undersigned believe you have a chance to move beyond rhetoric to support the democratic movement sweeping over Egypt. As citizens, we expect our president to uphold those values.

For thirty years, our government has spent billions of dollars to help build and sustain the system the Egyptian people are now trying to dismantle. Tens if not hundreds of thousands of demonstrators in Egypt and around the world have spoken. We believe their message is bold and clear: Mubarak should resign from office and allow Egyptians to establish a new government free of his and his family’s influence. It is also clear to us that if you seek, as you said Friday “political, social, and economic reforms that meet the aspirations of the Egyptian people,” your administration should publicly acknowledge those reforms will not be advanced by Mubarak or any of his adjutants.

There is another lesson from this crisis, a lesson not for the Egyptian government but for our own. In order for the United States to stand with the Egyptian people it must approach Egypt through a framework of shared values and hopes, not the prism of geostrategy. On Friday you rightly said that “suppressing ideas never succeeds in making them go away.” For that reason we urge your administration to seize this chance, turn away from the policies that brought us here, and embark on a new course toward peace, democracy and prosperity for the people of the Middle East. And we call on you to undertake a comprehensive review of US foreign policy on the major grievances voiced by the democratic opposition in Egypt and all other societies of the region.

Sincerely,

Jason Brownlee, University of Texas at Austin [To sign]

Joshua Stacher, Kent State University

Tamir Moustafa, Simon Fraser University

Arang Keshavarzian, New York University

Clement Henry, University of Texas at Austin

Robert Springborg, Naval Postgraduate School

Jillian Schwedler, University of Massachusetts at Amherst

Noam Chomsky, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Chris Toensing, Middle East Research and Information Project

Joel Beinin, Stanford University

Ellen Lust, Yale University

Tarek Massoud, Harvard University

Amaney Jamal, Princeton University

Helga Tawil-Souri, New York University

Anne Mariel Peters, Wesleyan College

Gregory White, Smith College

Asef Bayat, University of Illinois

Diane Singerman, American University

Cathy Lisa Schneider, American University

Robert Vitalis, University of Pennsylvania

Ahmet T. Kuru San Diego State University

Toby Jones, Rutgers University

Lara Deeb, Scripps College

Michaelle Browers, Wake Forest University

Mark Gasiorowski, Louisiana State University

Samer Shehata, Georgetown University

Farideh Farhi, University of Hawai’i at Mānoa

Emad Shahin, University of Notre Dame

John P. Entelis, Fordham University

Tamara Sonn, College of William & Mary

Ali Mirsepassi, New York University

Kumru Toktamis, Pratt Institute

Rebecca C. Johnson, Northwestern University

Nader Hashemi, University of Denver

Carlene J. Edie, University of Massachusetts at Amherst

Laryssa Chomiak, University of Maryland

Mohamed Nimer, American University

Steven Heydemann, Georgetown University

Miriam Lowi, The College of New Jersey

Wendy Pearlman, Northwestern University

Hesham Sallam, Georgetown University

Melani Cammett, Brown University

Michael Robbins, University of Michigan

Katherine E. Hoffman, Northwestern University

Asli Bali, UCLA School of Law

Hamid Dabashi, Columbia University

Guilain Denoeux, Colby College

Tom Farer, University of Denver

Norma Claire Moruzzi, University of Illinois at Chicago

Saad Eddin Ibrahim, American University of Cairo & Drew University

Asma Barlas, Ithaca College

Ethel Brooks, Rutgers University

Maren Milligan, Oberlin College

Alan Gilbert, Josef Korbel School of International Studies, University of Denver

Glenn Robinson, Naval Postgraduate School

Ahmed Ragab, Harvard University

Kenneth M. Cuno, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Agnieszka Paczynska, George Mason University

Zillah Eisenstein, Ithaca College

Quinn Mecham, Middlebury College

Riahi Hamida, Faculty of Arts and Human Sciences Sousse Tunisia

Jeannie Sowers, University of New Hampshire

Hussein Banai, Brown University

Joel Gordon, University of Arkansas-Fayetteville

Ed Webb, Dickinson College

David Siddhartha Patel, Cornell University

Thomas Pierret, Princeton University

Nadine Naber, University of Michigan

As`ad AbuKhalil, California State University at Stanislaus

Dina Al-Kassim, University of California at Irvine

Ziad Fahmy, Cornell University

William B. Quandt, University of Virginia

Lori A. Allen, University of Cambridge

Eugene Sensenig-Dabbous, Notre Dame University Lebanon

Alfred G. Gerteiny, University of Connecticut (ret.)

Lucia Volk, San Francisco State University

Anne Marie Baylouny, Naval Postgraduate School

Ulrika Mårtensson, The Norwegian University of Science and Technology

Emma Deputy, University of Texas at Austin

Sherry Lowrance, University of Georgia

Kaveh Ehsani, DePaul University

Ebrahim Moosa, Duke University

Benjamin N. Schiff, Oberlin College

Jeff Goodwin, New York University

Margaret Scott, New York University (adjunct)

Mehrzad Boroujerdi, Syracuse University

Kevin M. DeJesus, York University, Toronto

Courtney C. Radsch, American University

Gamze Cavdar, Colorado State University

John F. Robertson, Central Michigan University

Amir Niknejad, College of Mount Saint Vincent

Mehdi Noorbaksh, Harrisburg University of Science and Technology

Anthony Tirado Chase, Occidental College

Russell E. Lucas, Florida International University

Ariel Saizmann, Queen’s University

Patrick Kane, Clatsop Community College

Behrooz Moazami, Loyola University New Orleans

Anthony Shenoda, Scripps College

Mark Allen Peterson, Miami University

Amel Ahmed, University of Massachusetts-Amherst

Ilana Feldman, George Washington University

Marwan M. Kraidy, University of Pennsylvania

Mohamad Daadaoui, Oklahoma City University

Sidney Tarrow, Cornell University

Nathalie Peutz, New York University Abu Dhabi

Kamran Rastegar, Tufts University

Najib Ghadbian, University of Arkansas

Mojtaba Mahdavi, University of Alberta, Canada

Stefanie Nanes, Hofstra University

Rochelle Davis, Georgetown University

Zeinab Abul-Magd, Oberlin College

Stephen Zunes, University of San Francisco

Andrea Teti, University of Aberdeen

Denise M. Walsh, University of Virginia

Frances S. Hasso, Duke University

Waad El Hadidy, New York University

Elliot Colla, Georgetown University

Monika Halkort, Queen’s University

Sonia Alvarez, University of Massachusetts, Amherst

Christa Salamandra, City University of New York

Shirin Saeidi, Cambridge University

Shiera Malik, DePaul University

Steve Tamari, Southern Illinois University

Sean Yom, Temple University

Ali Banuazizi, Boston College

Sinan Antoon, New York University

Moustafa Bayoumi, City University of New York

Jennifer Derr, Bard College

Mirjam Künkler, Princeton University Wilson

Jacob, Concordia University, Montreal

Alan Mikhail, Yale University

Narges Erami, Yale University

Gwenn Okruhlik, Trinity University

Pete Moore, Case Western Reserve University

Max Weiss, Princeton University

Margaret Susan Thompson, Syracuse University

Sarah Shields, University of North Carolina

Sonia Alcarez, University of Massachusetts Amherst

Roberto Alejandro, University of Massachusetts Amherst

Manal Jamal, James Madison University

Jason Stearns, New York University

Nicholas Xenos, University of Massachusetts Amherst

Rebecca Hopkins, University of Texas Austin

John Calvert, Creighton University

Nir Rosen, New York University

Ian Lustik, University of Pennsylvania

Steve Niva, The Evergreen State University

Michael C. Hudson, Georgetown University and National University of Singapore

Shane Minkin, Swarthmore College

Feisal Mohamed, University of Illinois

Ahmed Kamel Khattab, Free University Berlin

Benjamin Simuin, University of Utah

Stephen Engelmann, University of Illinois at Chicago

Stacy Fahrenthold, Northeastern University

Sondra Hale, UCLA

Nicole Watts, San Francisco State University

Stacey Philbrick Yadav, Hobart and William Smith Colleges

Alan Fisher, Michigan State University

Laurie King-Irani, Georgetown University

Gary Fields, UC San Diego