Tunisia

Achcar rejects the concept of a sudden 'Spring', arguing instead that there is a long term deep-seated revolution which will take many years to develop. Achcar's Marxist inspired analysis stresses the basic socio-economic changes required.  He also covers the role of both the relatively tolerant monarchies of Morocco and Jordan and the 'oil monarchies' of the Gulf. 

Part 2 of the article, published on 21 January 2011, is available at http://www.jadaliyya.com/pages/index/472/the-tunisian-revolution_initial-reflections_part-2.

Part 1, Part 2 is available at http://pambazuka.org/en/category/features/72931.

The authors explore women’s activism and political representation, as well as discursive changes, with a particular focus on secular and Islamic feminism. They also examine changes in public opinion on women’s position in society in countries like Tunisia, Egypt, Morocco, Algeria and Jordan.

This section includes three articles: Schraeder, Peter J. and Hamadi Redissa, ‘Bem Ali’s Fall’, pp. 3-19; Howard, Philip N. and Muzammil M. Hussein, ‘The role of the digital media’, pp. 35-48, compares Tunisia and Egypt; Masoud, Tarek, ‘The Road to (and from) Liberation Square’, pp. 20-34, is primarily about Egypt.

Explores how the feminist movement in Tunisia has been a victim of brutal hijacking, exploitation, and politicization, which has fragmented its foundation.

This book sponsored by The Independent newspaper is written by its two major Middle East reporters and cover the events of 2010-11 and the aftermath.  Both correspondents have extensive expertise on their area, and have tended to diverge in their assessments from much mainstream western reporting.

The authors studied the impact of feminism in some Arab countries following the Arab Spring uprising across North Africa in 2011. They assessed the specific forms of the uprisings. They also examined whether pre-existing anti-Western value and gender relations influenced the visibility and resonance of feminist norms. 

The author traces the history of Tunisia's politics back to the 19th century and early reforms relating to religion, education and women's rights, to explain the relatively liberal context in the 21st century.  Masri therefore argues that Tunisia is not a model for other Arab states, but an exception, given the general role of Islam in shaping education and social and political agendas. The book draws on interviews as well as historical analysis and personal knowledge.

The authors look back to 2011 and the varied outcomes in four different contexts which shaped the possibility of and the reactions to mass protest. These are: the Maghreb (Tunisia and Morocco); Egypt; the Levant (Syria and Iraq) - states created out of  the Ottoman Empire and then dominated by the colonial powers Britain and France; and the Gulf Arab monarchies. They then discuss 'whither the second wave?' in relation to Sudan, Algeria, Labanon and Iraq and draw some provisional conclusions.

dedicates a section with articles from leading US-based social movement theorists, including Mario Diani, William Gamson, Jack Goldstone, and Jeff Goodwin – ‘Why we were surprised (again) by the Arab Spring’, pp. 452-6 – with Sharon Erickson Nepstad on ‘Nonviolent Resistance in the Arab Spring: The Critical Role of Military-Opposition Alliances’, pp. 485-491.

After a general overviews of politics and resistance in the region, experts on individual countries explore the immediate impact of the Arab Spring in Tunisia, Egypt, Bahrain, Libya, Yemen and Syria, and the subsequent developments, discussing the reasons for reassertion of repression on Bahrain and later Egypt; political breakdown in Libya and civil war intensified by external interference in Yemen and Syria. There are also chapters on the monarchical response to pressure for reform in Jordan and Morocco, and why the Arab Spring did not ignite massive resistance in Palestine. Adam Roberts provides a concluding assessment of the problems of using civil resistance in the Arab Spring, the difficulties of democratization, and the lessons to be learned. 

The article argues that the Hirak is a revolutionary movement that connects with the 1954-62 independence struggle, uniting diverse social groups in a movement seen as 'the People' versus 'the System'. It also combines nationalist themes with the strategy of nonviolent resistance. The analysis draws parallels with 2011 in Tunisia, and notes the attempts to launch a similar nonviolent resistance movement in Algeria in January 2011 were successfully deflected by the regime. It then examines the record of the Boutifleka government over 20 years, which led to the Hirak.

This article examines the impact of the uprisings on popular attitudes, using 45 public opinion surveys across the region to test his theoretical framework of a consequence-based approach that includes the concept of deprivation. When the data are combined to provide a country by country analysis they suggest that countries like Egypt and Morocco where initial protest had rapid political results but failed in the longer term, disillusionment was highest. Conversely a lack of major protest (Algeria) or of initial reform (Yemen) maintained desire for democracy.  Results for Lebanon and Tunisia showed very different respomnses from different groups in society: Sunnia in Lebanon and the very poor in Tunisia.

This comparative study of 16 countries documents women's political resistance during and since 2011, with essays by both activists and scholars.  The book stresses the diversity of the social groups and attitudes of the women involved, and gives a voice to often marginalized groups such as housewives and rural women. After an introductory chapter 'Advancing Women's Rights in the Arab World', the book is divided into five parts: What They Fight For; What They Believe; How They Express Agency; How They Use Space to Mobilize; and How They Organize.