This is a comparative study that seeks to demonstrate how integration into global markets has affected political development in Egypt and Saudi Arabia. It is widely believed that free markets foster democracy by decentralizing political power and strengthening civil society. Careful analysis of recent developments in Egypt and Saudi Arabia, however, reveals that market integration can have widely divergent political consequences based on the nature of the domestic economy "linking in" to the global marketplace. In Saudi Arabia, market integration has actually led to weakened ...