A good political analyst needs political understanding, not area expertise or sympathy

Evidence

I cite Stone not just because he happens to have been right in his predictions but also because he was not, and never pretended to be, an “expert” on Iran, much less a man known for his pro-Islamic sympathies. Look through his article and you will find no references to the Islamic mentality or Shi’a predilections for martyrdom or any of the other nonsense parading as relevant “information” on Iran. He understands politics; he understands and makes no attempt to lie about what moves men and women to act in this as well as other societies; above all, he does not doubt that even though Iranians are not Europeans or Americans they may have legitimate grievances, ambitions, hopes of their own, which it would be folly for Westerners to ignore. — Edward W. Said, Covering Islam, 253

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: A genuine paradigm challenge: expertise (language, area credentials) can degrade rather than enable understanding when it licenses ‘mentality’ generalizations instead of plain political realism.