Francis Fukuyama is a senior fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford University, where he is also director of the Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law. Fukuyama is best known for his 1992 book The End of History and the Last Man. Diwan asked Fukuyama to discuss the U.S. role in the Middle East, the role of ideology in the region, and whether the region proved his point about the end of history.

Fukuyama did so on the margins of a conference in Washington, D.C. held on September 6–7. It was organized by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and Stanford University’s Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law, and was titled “Security, Prosperity, and Governance in the Middle East/North Africa.”