Many of those centres are independent, operating outside the framework of the state, so they do not fall victim to groupthink, which tends to foster similar approaches and treat deviation as something akin to heresy.
To avoid the pitfalls of groupthink, decision-making circles have resorted to a “devil’s advocate” – someone whose role is specifically to challenge the prevailing views by presenting alternative theses and scenarios. However, this approach stops being effective by the time the problems pose concrete threats to national security, compelling security and intelligence agencies to focus on countering the dangers. At such moments, operational imperatives overshadow analysis. Systematic analytical thinking is important at all times, but it is most crucial before disasters loom, so as to ensure precautions are taken and deterrents are in place and functioning effectively.
At present, national strategic thinking of the sort that grapples with current realities and extends into a carefully managed future is either completely absent, conflated with an ideological zeal that obscures the facts, or confined to the opinions of an individual or group of individuals who believe they alone possess the truth.
As in major industries, strategic thinking has become essential for government decision-making processes within clear frameworks. These processes are inherently complex, as is most vividly exemplified in the current state of the Middle East, marked by wars and crises on the one hand, and bold attempts to forge paths to development, progress, and the achievement of strategic objectives on the other. Unfortunately, strategic thinking has experienced a decline in recent decades as a result of insufficient hands-on analyses of national and regional challenges.
For example, while studies and other intellectual works on religious fundamentalism, political Islam, and terrorism flourished, studies on Israel and Iran have declined in both quality and boldness. While those were undeniably useful to society, to the state and above all to decision-makers, who largely succeeded in repelling the terrorist threat to the nation-state, the problem did not suddenly end. Violent fundamentalist militias continued to exist, creating states within states and other external challenges.
In 2012, in the aftermath of the so-called Arab Spring, the Regional Centre for Strategic Studies (RCSS) was established in Cairo. Over the next five years, this think tank monitored, analysed and assessed strategic meta-transformations in the Middle East. It examined the impact of international interactions on regional and domestic developments, regional political dynamics, economic trends, security affairs and public opinion, utilising a variety of research approaches and techniques.
The RCSS also established specialised programmes, such as the Egyptian Studies Programme dedicated to contemporary Egyptian affairs, the Islamist Movements Programme focussing on fundamentalist extremism and terrorism in the region and the American Studies Programme.
In general, RCSS work involved a broad and interconnected network of academic, advisory, and interactive activities, including daily analytical event-tracking, continuous strategic assessment reports on the state and future of the region, publishing journals and studies on major trends and current issues and public opinion surveys in various countries. In collaboration with regional partners, the centre engaged in long-term projects and programmes, conducted workshops and specialised courses, and organised public seminars and regional conferences in various Middle Eastern capitals.
The academic and scientific output of all these activities has been widely disseminated digitally. Of particular note was the RCSS’s security index, which tracked violence and terrorism in Egypt and elsewhere in the region.
The RCSS quickly earned a widespread reputation for its dynamic treatment of pressing challenges. Fortunately, it paved the way to the establishment of many similar Arab think tanks.
However, the current crises centring on Iran and Israel, not to mention the persistent threat of terrorism, present new and more complex challenges, requiring not only intensive study and analysis, but also a deeper understanding of contexts in the third decade of the 21st century.
Studies on Israel have become scarce and they fail to move beyond the dimension of conflict to examining its role in peace, whether through bilateral treaties or in the framework of the Abraham Accords. This subject exemplifies the need for careful attention to numerous details and definitions, as well as closer examination of how past legacies interweave with unfolding realities in these precarious times.
* A version of this article appears in print in the 23 April, 2026 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly
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