U.s. Strategy Of Promoting Democracy,

Resulting from the important geo-political positions, abundant energy resources and severe ethnic and religious conflicts, Middle East has been U.S. foreign polices'first concern for most U.S. Administrations. President Barack Obama launched an innovative speech in Cairo University to express his sincerity and enthusiasm for welcoming a"New Beginning"with the Arab world short after he stepped into the office. Along with waves of democratic revolts broken out throughout the Middle East and North Africa since the end of 2010, Obama Administrations'Middle East Policy has attracted great attention and debates."Promoting Democracy"is one of the ever-lasting topics in the United States. Various U.S. Administrations provides different explanations and understandings about the necessity and patterns of promoting Democracy. The theme question of this article is how Obama Administration balances democracy promotion and America's national interests in the area of Middle East. From the author's point of view,"American Democracy"is one of the U.S. core spirits and national interests. Therefore almost ever U.S. Administration carries the task of exporting, promoting, or at least supporting"American Democracy"throughout the world. However, in the trend of globalization and multi-polarization, President Obama prefers a strategy of protecting U.S. interests over promoting democracy in the Middle East. The long and short term U.S. national interests include reshaping regional order in the Middle East area, maintaining U.S. pre-dominant position, anti-terrorism, preventing the proliferation of nuclear weapons and Weapons of Mass Destructions (WMD), stable energy supply and economic growth. Obama Administration's Middle East Policy is more likely based upon common interests with Arab countries then common values with them. By critically analyzing the"Democratic Peace Theory", the author argues that strategies based on common interests are more likely achieving mutual peace and cooperation than those based on common values, such as polity types. In order to prove U.S. Middle East policy trend, the author conducts a comparative analysis of three bilateral relations between"US-Saudi Arabia","US-Egypt"and"US-Syria"respectively by examining these three countries relationship with the United States, the polity types of these three nation-states, and U.S.'s response to their domestic democratic unrests in the recent waves of political reforms across the Middle East and North Africa area.