Pigeon holes?

For this assignment, we were asked to assess Henry & Springborg's assertion that countries in MENA can be classified as 'praetorian republics,' monarchies, or democracies. The prompt asks specifically whether this classification is the most useful, and I don't have a good answer to that question.

Given the readings by Anderson and Entelis, it seems that these classifications might not be particularly useful. I think that for the purposes of our class, classifying the different regimes in MENA is counterproductive because it encourages generalization and trying to force countries into categories where they don't quite fit. For example, Israel and Iran are both democratic, but how similar are they actually? Although the classification might provide some basic framework or structure to a discussion, I think that terms such as 'democracy' and 'monarchy' have too much baggage; it seems likely that people are likely to draw comparisons whatever democratic country and monarchy they are most familiar with whatever MENA country they have been asked to think about.

That being said, I don't feel comfortable prescribing a system of classification of my own. When I think about trying to devise broad categories, I run into two problems. First, the limited knowledge I have and the discussion in our most recent class make me hyper aware of not trying to make arbitrary generalizations. It's easy to assume that Islam or other cultural factors weigh heavily on the politics of the region as a whole, and more importantly, that important comparisons can be drawn between the states in question based on these cultural and religious commonalities.

Second, I think that classifying the countries without a more substantial understanding of the individual states is counterproductive. My concern is that categorizing something I'm not very familiar with will lead to drawing foregone conclusions and being reluctant to discard the labels, even if they are proven erroneous. I think that it's worthwhile to look at states by themselves before you start categorizing them, simply because categorizing before you understand might as well be completely arbitrary. In theory, understanding should help you make a more informed argument as to a decision to place something in a certain category. That or it will paralyze you, bog you down in details and prevent you from seeing the forest for all the trees.