When the Arab Spring came across our television screens in 2011 we all thought that democracy was finally arriving in the Middle East. No more dictatorships and unrepresentative kings - and no more Islamist terrorism (the deaths of Al Qaeda leader Usama bin Laden in May of that year and of US-Yemeni jihadi ideologue Anwar al -Aulaqi merely confirmed our confidence). How wrong we were - but why? Borealis talks to Daveed Gartenstein-Ross of Valens Global on why many over-analysed the importance of these events.