Culture and Conflict in the Middle East is a 2008 book by Philip Carl Salzman, an emeritus professor of Anthropology at McGill University and senior fellow of the Frontier Centre for Public Policy, a Canadian thinktank associated with free-market, conservative political thought.
This tribal framework renders it nearly impossible to have a constitution or a regime of law and order, thereby "generating a society where all groups are on an equal basis."
Not until this archaic social system based on the family is dispatched can democracy make real headway in the Middle East.
Writing in The New York Times, David Brooks drew on Salzman's work to argue that "many Middle Eastern societies are tribal.
"[7] Culture and conflict is cited for its explanation of one of the "obstacles" blocking "individual freedoms, civil rights, political participation, popular sovereignty, equality before the law, and representative elections" in Arab lands.