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The U.S.-Middle East Partnership Initiative (MEPI) is a U.S. State Department program that supports organizations and individuals in their efforts to promote political, economic, and social reform in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). MEPI provides direct support to both international and MENA-based NGOs, educational institutions, local governments and private businesses to implement projects designed to directly engage and invest in the people of the MENA region. Through these partnerships, MEPI helps build the capacity of those that serve as the region’s most successful agents of change - local civil society and business leaders, activists, scholars, students, and lawmakers. MEPI-supported projects cover a wide range of topics from voter education programs in Egypt, judicial reform seminars in the Persian Gulf, women’s literacy campaigns in Yemen, and a region-wide partnership program between U.S. and Middle Eastern universities. Two of MEPI’s most prominent programs are its annual Student Leaders program that brings students from all over the region to participate in a summer-long seminar, and its Middle East Entrepreneur Training program, which assists aspiring young business and civil society leaders. MEPI’s budget has been steadily increasing. After initially receiving $29 million, its budget in FY2005 was $75 million.〔Thomas Carothers, “A Better Way to Support Middle East Reform,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Policy Brief 33, February 2005, p. 2.〕 As of 2009, MEPI has granted roughly $530 million to over 600 projects in 17 different countries, including the Palestinian Territories.〔MEPI website, http://mepi.state.gov.〕 In support of this Bush Administration's signature program, President Obama continued his support for MEPI and received a requested increase of $86 million from Congress targeted towards the Governing Justly and Democratically (GJD) objective. This program develops civil society in key locations in volatile regions covered by the State Department's Bureau of Near East Affairs(NEA).〔Stephen McInerney,"The Federal Budget and Appropriations for Fiscal Year 2010,Democracy, Governance, and Human Rights In The Middle East,July 2009, p. 9. http://pomed.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/fy10-budget-analysis-paper-final.pdf〕 ==History== U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, serving under President George W. Bush, announced the creation of MEPI in a December 2002 speech at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, DC,〔David Isenberg “Pennywise commitment to Arab democracy,” ''Asia Times Online'', January 9, 2003, http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/EA09Ak01.html〕 declaring that the goal of MEPI was to create “a long-term prospect” for reform, “not something that is going to be done in one year or five years.”.〔Sharon Otterman, "Middle East: Promoting Democracy," ''Council on Foreign Relations'', October 10, 2003 http://www.cfr.org/publication.html?id=7709.〕 MEPI was designed to target areas not served by USAID, the United States’ main foreign aid and development program. Initially dependent on USAID in support of its mission, MEPI has come into its own and targets short-term programs addressing political change in order for USAID longer-term development programs to be successful.〔Stephen McInerney,"The Federal Budget and Appropriations for Fiscal Year 2010,Democracy, Governance, and Human Rights In The Middle East,July 2009, p. 10. http://pomed.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/fy10-budget-analysis-paper-final.pdf〕 In 2002, Elizabeth Cheney, known as Liz, and daughter of Vice-President Dick Cheney, was appointed U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary for Near Eastern Affairs and tasked with supervising MEPI. Cheney explained that under MEPI, the US administration funded programs as diverse as training Arab journalists to revising current teaching methods from rote learning to more child-oriented teaching methods. Additionally, MEPI supported countries seeking to sign Free Trade Agreements with the United States to meet President Bush’s goal to establish a joint Middle East Free Trade zone by 2013.〔''Al-Ahram Weekly'', August 21–27, 2003, Issue N. 652, http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2003/652/re11.htm〕 In March 2003, William Joseph Burns, Assistant Secretary, Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs, U.S. Department of State, and Wendy Chamberlin, Assistant Administrator for Asia and the Near East, U.S. Agency for International Development, testified before the House Subcommittee on the Middle East and Central Asia on the operational aspects of MEPI and how they reflected U.S policy of the War on Terrorism. Rep. Steve Chabot, R- OH and Rep. William Janklow, R-SD, questioned how reforms would be enacted to deal with textbooks that taught Arab children “anti-Jewish sentiment” and “racist” hatred. Burns responded that “detoxification” would be encouraged by MEPI, particularly in the Palestinian school system. Chamberlin stated that USAID would attempt to address this through teacher training programs.〔Hiromi Hyashi, “House Hearing on the Middle East Partnership Initiative,” ''National Iranian American Council (NIAC)'', March 19, 2003, http://www.niacouncil.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=89&Itemid=2〕 A February 2, 2010, article in the Jerusalem Post reported that a UK watchdog group, The Taxpayer's Alliance, has tracked European taxpayer-funded aid to the Palestinians. In recently released reports, the Alliance found that anti-Semitic and anti-Israel narratives continue to persist in Palestinian textbooks in violation of the 1994 Oslo Accords.〔Nicole Brackman and Asaf Romirowsky, "Promise of Reform in Palestinian Schools Unmet," ''Pajamas Media'', March 12, 2010, http://www.romirowsky.com/7053/reform-palestinian-schools〕 In a November 2003 speech given at the National Endowment for Democracy, also known as the NED, President Bush stressed the need to spread democracy to the Arab and Muslim-majority countries of the Middle East to address the deficits of freedom.〔Jeremy M. Sharp, CRS Report for Congress, ''The Broader Middle East and North Africa Initiative: An Overview'', p. CRS-2, February 15, 2005〕 Carl Gershman, president of the NED, in his remarks delivered at the December 12, 2003 Conference on Mideast Regional Security V, reinforced President Bush’s words with his own, “By any category that is meaningful in the world today, there is only one set of countries that is completely undemocratic: the Arab world.” Mr. Gershman stated further that “democracy will not come about if people dwell on the past or are obsessed with blame-placing, but only if they seek practical solutions to real problems. If this is true, it follows that a change in political culture – replacing attitudes of victimization with a readiness to engage in self-criticism and to take responsibility for one’s own fate – can only come from within the Arab world.”〔Carl Gershman “A Democracy Strategy for the Middle East,” ''National Endowment for Democracy'', December 12, 2003. http://www.ned.org/about/board/meet-our-president/archived-remarks-and-presentations/121203〕 MEPI’s original mandate was to address four deficits in the Arab world identified by the 2002 Arab Human Development Report—deficits in political freedom, economic freedom, knowledge, and women's rights.〔United Nations 2002 Arab Human Development Report, http://hdr.undp.org/en/reports/regionalreports/arabstates/RBAS_ahdr2002_EN.pdf.〕 In that same U.N. report, Arab scholars wrote that a choice had to be made between ‘inertia…() an Arab renaissance that will build a prosperous future for all Arabs.”〔David Isenberg “Pennywise commitment to Arab democracy,” ''Asia Times Online'', January 9, 2003, http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/EA09Ak01.html〕 Today, MEPI’s programs increase the capacity of civil society organizations in the region to advance political participation, foster economic reform, support quality education, and empower women and youth in the Middle East and North Africa, areas identified as critical by President Barack Obama in his June 4, 2009 speech at Cairo University. MEPI advances the cause of democracy and women’s rights in the Middle East by promoting female literacy and health programs, as well as business and political training. MEPI can serve as a model for women’s advocacy programs globally. This U.S. foreign policy, in turn, encourages economic growth, thereby contributing towards the development of democratic institutions and countering extremism.〔Isobel Coleman “The Payoff from Women’s Rights,” ''Foreign Affairs,'' May/June 2004, http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/59896/isobel-coleman/the-payoff-from-womens-rights 〕 These reforms were accelerated by the Obama administration after the Arab Spring/ Arab awakening in light of the 2011 revolutions.〔Oz Hassan "Constructing America's Freedom Agenda for the Middle East" 2012, http://www.amazon.co.uk/Constructing-Americas-Freedom-Agenda-Middle/dp/0415603102〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Middle East Partnership Initiative」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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