0:00:01.747,0:00:03.785
My talk today is about something

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maybe a couple of you have already heard about.

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It's called the Arab Spring.

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Anyone heard of it?

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(Applause)

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So in 2011, power shifted,

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from the few to the many,

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from oval offices to central squares,

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from carefully guarded airwaves

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to open-source networks.

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But before Tahrir was a global symbol of liberation,

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there were representative surveys

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already giving people a voice

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in quieter but still powerful ways.

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I study Muslim societies around the world at Gallup.

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Since 2001,

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we've interviewed hundreds of thousands of people --

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young and old, men and women,

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educated and illiterate.

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My talk today draws on this research

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to reveal why Arabs rose up

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and what they want now.

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Now this region's very diverse,

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and every country is unique.

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But those who revolted

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shared a common set of grievances

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and have similar demands today.

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I'm going to focus a lot of my talk on Egypt.

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It has nothing to do with the fact that I was born there, of course.

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But it's the largest Arab country

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and it's also one with a great deal of influence.

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But I'm going to end by widening the lens to the entire region

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to look at the mundane topics

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of Arab views of religion and politics

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and how this impacts women,

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revealing some surprises along the way.

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So after analyzing mounds of data,

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what we discovered was this:

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Unemployment and poverty alone

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did not lead to the Arab revolts of 2011.

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If an act of desperation by a Tunisian fruit vendor

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sparked these revolutions,

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it was the difference between what Arabs experienced

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and what they expected

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that provided the fuel.

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To tell you what I mean,

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consider this trend in Egypt.

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On paper the country was doing great.

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In fact, it attracted accolades

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from multinational organizations

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because of its economic growth.

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But under the surface was a very different reality.

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In 2010, right before the revolution,

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even though GDP per capita

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had been growing at five percent for several years,

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Egyptians had never felt worse about their lives.

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Now this is very unusual,

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because globally we find that, not surprisingly,

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people feel better as their country gets richer.

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And that's because they have better job opportunities

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and their state offers better social services.

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But it was exactly the opposite in Egypt.

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As the country got more well-off,

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unemployment actually rose

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and people's satisfaction

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with things like housing and education plummeted.

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But it wasn't just anger at economic injustice.

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It was also people's deep longing for freedom.

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Contrary to the clash of civilizations theory,

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Arabs didn't despise Western liberty,

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they desired it.

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As early as 2001,

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we asked Arabs, and Muslims in general around the world,

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what they admired most about the West.

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Among the most frequent responses

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was liberty and justice.

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In their own words to an open-ended question

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we heard, "Their political system is transparent

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and it's following democracy in its true sense."

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Another said it was "liberty and freedom

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and being open-minded with each other."

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Majorities as high as 90 percent and greater

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in Egypt, Indonesia and Iran

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told us in 2005

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that if they were to write a new constitution

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for a theoretical new country

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that they would guarantee freedom of speech

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as a fundamental right,

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especially in Egypt.

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Eighty-eight percent said moving toward greater democracy

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would help Muslims progress --

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the highest percentage of any country we surveyed.

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But pressed up against these democratic aspirations

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was a very different day-to-day experience,

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especially in Egypt.

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While aspiring to democracy the most,

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they were the least likely population in the world

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to say that they had actually voiced their opinion

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to a public official in the last month --

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at only four percent.

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So while economic development made a few people rich,

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it left many more worse off.

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As people felt less and less free,

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they also felt less and less provided for.

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So rather than viewing their former regimes

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as generous if overprotective fathers,

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they viewed them as essentially prison wardens.

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So now that Egyptians have ended Mubarak's 30-year rule,

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they potentially could be

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an example for the region.

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If Egypt is to succeed

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at building a society based on the rule of law,

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it could be a model.

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If, however,

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the core issues that propelled the revolution aren't addressed,

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the consequences could be catastrophic --

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not just for Egypt,

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but for the entire region.

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The signs don't look good, some have said.

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Islamists, not the young liberals that sparked the revolution,

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won the majority in Parliament.

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The military council

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has cracked down on civil society and protests

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and the country's economy continues to suffer.

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Evaluating Egypt on this basis alone, however,

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ignores the real revolution.

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Because Egyptians are more optimistic

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than they have been in years,

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far less divided on religious-secular lines

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than we would think

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and poised for the demands of democracy.

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Whether they support Islamists or liberals,

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Egyptians' priorities for this government are identical,

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and they are jobs, stability and education,

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not moral policing.

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But most of all,

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for the first time in decades,

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they expect to be active participants, not spectators,

0:07:10.649,0:07:12.950
in the affairs of their country.

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I was meeting with a group of newly-elected parliamentarians

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from Egypt and Tunisia

0:07:18.501,0:07:20.033
a couple of weeks ago.

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And what really struck me about them

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was that they weren't only optimistic,

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but they kind of struck me as nervous,

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for lack of a better word.

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One said to me,

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"Our people used to gather in cafes to watch football" --

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or soccer, as we say in America --

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"and now they gather to watch Parliament."

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(Laughter)

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"They're really watching us,

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and we can't help but worry

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that we're not going to live up to their expectations."

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And what really struck me

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is that less than 24 months ago,

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it was the people that were nervous

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about being watched by their government.

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And the reason that they're expecting a lot

0:08:07.771,0:08:11.375
is because they have a new-found hope for the future.

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So right before the revolution

0:08:13.161,0:08:16.638
we said that Egyptians had never felt worse about their lives,

0:08:16.638,0:08:20.938
but not only that, they thought their future would be no better.

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What really changed after the ouster of Mubarak

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wasn't that life got easier.

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It actually got harder.

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But people's expectations for their future

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went up significantly.

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And this hope, this optimism,

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endured a year of turbulent transition.

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One reason that there's this optimism

0:08:43.276,0:08:47.007
is because, contrary to what many people have said,

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most Egyptians think things really have changed in many ways.

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So while Egyptians were known

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for their single-digit turnout

0:08:57.490,0:08:59.758
in elections before the revolution,

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the last election had around 70 percent voter turnout --

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men and women.

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Where scarcely a quarter believed in the honesty of elections in 2010 --

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I'm surprised it was a quarter --

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90 percent thought that this last election was honest.

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Now why this matters

0:09:17.874,0:09:21.040
is because we discovered a link

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between people's faith in their democratic process

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and their faith that oppressed people

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can change their situation

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through peaceful means alone.

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(Applause)

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Now I know what some of you are thinking.

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The Egyptian people,

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and many other Arabs who've revolted and are in transition,

0:09:53.635,0:09:57.052
have very high expectations of the government.

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They're just victims of a long-time autocracy,

0:10:01.850,0:10:04.067
expecting a paternal state

0:10:04.067,0:10:06.446
to solve all their problems.

0:10:06.446,0:10:10.035
But this conclusion would ignore

0:10:10.035,0:10:13.185
a tectonic shift taking place in Egypt

0:10:13.185,0:10:17.201
far from the cameras in Tahrir Square.

0:10:17.201,0:10:20.867
And that is Egyptians' elevated expectations

0:10:20.867,0:10:24.234
are placed first on themselves.

0:10:24.234,0:10:28.401
In the country once known for its passive resignation,

0:10:28.401,0:10:30.267
where, as bad as things got,

0:10:30.267,0:10:33.736
only four percent expressed their opinion to a public official,

0:10:33.736,0:10:37.048
today 90 percent tell us

0:10:37.048,0:10:39.320
that if there's a problem in their community,

0:10:39.320,0:10:41.753
it's up to them to fix it.

0:10:41.753,0:10:49.446
(Applause)

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And three-fourths

0:10:51.249,0:10:54.080
believe they not only have the responsibility,

0:10:54.080,0:10:57.050
but the power to make change.

0:10:57.050,0:10:59.314
And this empowerment

0:10:59.314,0:11:02.246
also applies to women,

0:11:02.246,0:11:03.917
whose role in the revolts

0:11:03.917,0:11:06.068
cannot be underestimated.

0:11:06.068,0:11:08.469
They were doctors and dissidents,

0:11:08.469,0:11:10.035
artists and organizers.

0:11:10.035,0:11:15.168
A full third of those who braved tanks and tear gas

0:11:15.168,0:11:20.203
to ask or to demand liberty and justice in Egypt

0:11:20.203,0:11:21.876
were women.

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(Applause)

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Now people have raised some real concerns

0:11:30.208,0:11:33.874
about what the rise of Islamist parties means for women.

0:11:33.874,0:11:38.158
What we've found about the role of religion in law

0:11:38.158,0:11:40.674
and the role of religion in society

0:11:40.674,0:11:43.660
is that there's no female consensus.

0:11:43.660,0:11:47.843
We found that women in one country

0:11:47.843,0:11:49.810
look more like the men in that country

0:11:49.810,0:11:54.474
than their female counterparts across the border.

0:11:54.474,0:11:55.992
Now what this suggests

0:11:55.992,0:12:00.059
is that how women view religion's role in society

0:12:00.059,0:12:05.340
is shaped more by their own country's culture and context

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than one monolithic view

0:12:07.855,0:12:10.692
that religion is simply bad for women.

0:12:10.692,0:12:14.457
Where women agree, however,

0:12:14.457,0:12:16.040
is on their own role,

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and that it must be central and active.

0:12:18.573,0:12:23.691
And here is where we see the greatest gender difference within a country --

0:12:23.691,0:12:26.441
on the issue of women's rights.

0:12:26.441,0:12:29.041
Now how men feel about women's rights

0:12:29.041,0:12:32.490
matters to the future of this region.

0:12:32.490,0:12:34.524
Because we discovered a link

0:12:34.524,0:12:38.526
between men's support for women's employment

0:12:38.526,0:12:41.725
and how many women are actually employed

0:12:41.725,0:12:44.909
in professional fields in that country.

0:12:44.909,0:12:46.373
So the question becomes,

0:12:46.373,0:12:50.548
What drives men's support for women's rights?

0:12:50.548,0:12:57.297
What about men's views of religion and law?

0:12:57.297,0:13:00.182
[Does] a man's opinion

0:13:00.182,0:13:03.067
of the role of religion in politics

0:13:03.067,0:13:06.716
shape their view of women's rights?

0:13:06.716,0:13:07.949
The answer is no.

0:13:07.949,0:13:10.834
We found absolutely no correlation,

0:13:10.834,0:13:12.648
no impact whatsoever,

0:13:12.648,0:13:15.183
between these two variables.

0:13:15.183,0:13:18.899
What drives men's support for women's employment

0:13:18.899,0:13:21.783
is men's employment,

0:13:21.783,0:13:24.282
their level of education

0:13:24.282,0:13:27.067
as well as a high score

0:13:27.067,0:13:31.166
on their country's U.N. Human Development Index.

0:13:31.166,0:13:32.357
What this means

0:13:32.357,0:13:35.431
is that human development,

0:13:35.431,0:13:37.727
not secularization,

0:13:37.727,0:13:40.447
is what's key to women's empowerment

0:13:40.447,0:13:44.131
in the transforming Middle East.

0:13:44.131,0:13:47.080
And the transformation continues.

0:13:47.080,0:13:50.963
From Wall Street to Mohammed Mahmoud Street,

0:13:50.963,0:13:53.020
it has never been more important

0:13:53.020,0:13:55.364
to understand the aspirations

0:13:55.364,0:13:57.482
of ordinary people.

0:13:57.482,0:13:59.213
Thank you.

0:13:59.213,0:14:09.399
(Applause)