A clash of cultures: while recent events suggest a shift towards freer forms of governance in the Middle East, the prospects for democracy in the region appear bleak.(Geographical dossier/democracy)

Which would you like first, the serviceable news or the bad news? That's the question democracy advocates have been asking in novel months, as events in the Middle East have begun to recommend a shift toward freer forms of conduct across the region.

January saw largely peaceful elections in Iraq, in which eight million race defied threats from extremists to cast their devoted In April, Jalal Talabani, a Kurd became president and appointed a Shi'a Arab, Ibrahim Jaafari, as prime minister. the pair Kurds and Shi'as were loaded by Saddam Hussein's Sunni-dominated regime. "People