As the Arab Spring has swept across much of the Middle East and North Africa, large-scale popular protests have been generally absent in the Persian Gulf except in Bahrain where massive demonstrations have been met simultaneously with a strict government crackdown on dissent and only limited promises of reform. Al-Khawaja discussed the prospects for change in Bahrain, the current status of the protest movement, and options for U.S. policy in this regard.

Six leading Iran experts discussed the country’s domestic and international developments since the contested 2009 presidential elections, looking at how the Iranian regime has managed its internal political, economic, and social affairs as well as its foreign policy.

Gridlock draws on four years of Mahdavi's ethnographic research in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to look at the disconnections between policies on human trafficking and the realities of gendered labor and migration in Dubai and Abu Dhabi.

Women throughout the world are working towards viable democracies but not without challenges. NPR Journalist Jacki Lynden and Secretary General of the Jordanian National Commission for Women Asma Khader joined other women leaders from the Arab and Islamic regions to address these challenges and examine the influences of the Arab Spring on women.