Nation-state building and the transition to democracy: The case of Palestine

The closely related theories of democracy and democratic transitions provide a general framework for studying the Palestinian case of nation-state building and transition to democracy. By developing a theoretical framework from these theories, and testing the generated hypotheses using three polls (29, 32, 35) of the Center of Palestine for Research and Studies and analyzing them, new insights will emerge about how Palestinian attitudes may or may not make democracy work. Furthermore, I measure whether the intensity of national sentiment is linked with a strong commitment to nation-state building or to democracy and democratization processes.; The results suggest that the Palestinian experience in nation-state building as well as the democratization process do not fit the general framework for theories of nation-nation building, and transitions to democracy. The results of this dissertation explain the different dimensions of state-nation building and the transitions to democracy that affect Jihad Hamad the whole process of Palestinian state formation and its relationship to democracy and democratization. The findings also suggest unique preconditions to nation-state building and transitions to democracy for the Palestinian case. Furthermore, I conclude that Palestinian nation-state building as well as the transitions to democracy suggests that the theories of transition should pay greater attention to cases that have different features and situations from the classic cases.