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The
implications of the revolutions that swept over
Tunisia, Libya and Egypt in 2011 are of such
magnitude that the Arab world will never be the
same again. They caused the fall of the
presidents of Tunisia in January 2011, of Egypt
in February, of Libya in August and of Yemen in
February, followed by a wave of popular
uprisings covering Bahrain, Morocco, Syria,
Jordan, Mauritania and other countries. The
Tunisian revolution was the focal point that
started the “Arab Spring”. The world “was
inspired by Tunisia's demands for democracy,
freedom and dignity,” according to UN Secretary
General Ban Ki-moon.
The
revolts in the Middle East and North Africa
reflected a yearning for democracy by Arabs
seeking to regain their long-suppressed national
pride and dignity. The struggles that gave birth
to each demonstration, occupation or revolution
were separate and yet connected; part of a
collective roar from young people who, for the
first time in modern history, faced a future in
which they would be worse off than their
parents.
Let us look at the key players and at the role
they may play in this post-revolutionary era:
The
Tunisian General Labor Union
(UGTT): this is historically a major social
force and a key interlocutor of the government
in the organization and management of social
affairs. It has traditionally mediated in social
conflicts but has also played a rallying role at
historic moments in the country’s history, such
as during the independence period. Later it
became the main countervailing force to the
one-party system under both Bourguiba and Ben
Ali.
In the
revolt that started in December 2010, it was the
union rank and file, as opposed to the
leadership, who mobilized the different sections
and structured the movement in its early days.
It developed with leftist parties the slogans,
orchestrated the strikes in different cities,
managed the demonstrations and negotiated with
the army. However, last October the UGTT called
for a general strike in reaction to the series
of violence targeting unionists and civil
society activists and political players in the
country. The strike was canceled at the last
moment after guarantees given by the governing
coalition led by the Ennahdha party. The UGTT
called again for a general strike and a day of
national mourning, following the assassination
of activist and politician Chokri Belaid,
Secretary-General of the Unified Democratic
Patriotic Party on February 6, 2013.
Civil society:
together with the labor union, Tunisia’s
professional associations, students, university
professors and human rights organizations all
played an instrumental role in casting a civic
face on the revolt. The Tunisian League for
Human Rights, along with a whole host of human
rights activists and opposition journalists, are
now well-known among the public as a result of
their dramatic protests, primarily hunger
strikes. Women’s movements were particularly
vocal and confident. Lawyers and judges’ unions,
whose members felt that their profession had
been stripped of its credibility under Ben Ali,
were also prominent.
Civil
society’s influence has continued post-revolt.
Three national commissions were established in
the week after the fall of Ben Ali. Beyond their
specific missions, these commissions represented
an interesting model of the new structures of
governance that flank the traditional branches
of power and seem designed to compensate for the
weakness of the political parties in the first
months after the revolution.
The
particularity of Tunisia among Arab countries is
the legal status of women, the protection of
their personal rights, equality on the workplace
and representation in public institutions. All
enjoy a strong consensus among the political,
economic and intellectual elites, as well as
within significant portions of the middle class.
Some analysts foresaw that the Ennahdha will
evolve towards the model of Turkey’s Justice and
Development Party (AKP), by softening its
discourse and positions to adapt to mainstream
Tunisians, who have a fairly clear consensus on
the social model and values they want. But after
winning in the last elections as the first party
(with 39.5%), the Ennahdha party is leading
society to a polarized state between Islamism
and secularism.
The
military:
in Egypt and Tunisia, the armies proved to be
the supreme political forces, easing unpopular
leaders Hosni Mubarak and Ben Ali from office in
part due to their reluctance to fire on
protesters. Libya was very different, however.
In
Tunisia the army has been popular during the
revolt and described as patriotic by the public.
It came out in support of the demonstrators,
refusing to shoot at the population and seeking
to protect civilians from repression by the
security forces. Having refused to comply with
Ben Ali’s orders to suppress the protests, the
army’s role in the revolt was therefore clearly
political in that it made the decision not to
protect Ben Ali’s regime any longer.
The
main ideologies:
at the beginning of the uprisings in Tunisia,
Egypt and around the region, the calls for
change were less and less linked to a particular
ideology like Islamism. Instead, analysts and
activists say the forces that brought people to
the streets in Tunisia and excited passions
across the Middle East were far more fundamental
and unifying: concrete demands to end government
corruption, institute the rule of law and ease
economic suffering.
In
1979, the Iranian revolution introduced the
Muslim world to the force of political Islam,
which frightened entrenched leaders, as well as
the West. That ideology still has a powerful
hold on people’s imaginations across the region,
which continues to feed fighters to jihadist
movements. But like Arabism and socialism before
it, the political Islam of Ayatollah Khomeini of
Iran and the radicalized ideology of al Qaeda
and Osama bin Laden have failed to deliver in
practical ways for the millions of people across
the Middle East who lived in bastions of
autocratic rule.
Now,
ideology has receded in the background, giving
room for the political class to address the
thorny question of reform. Yet the leaders of
the Ennahdha party has been focusing only about
its survival, avoiding confrontation in the name
of a reformed state.
But,
after months of reassuring secularist critics,
Islamist politicians in Tunisia have begun to
lay down markers about how Muslim their state
should be - and first signs show they want more
religion than previously admitted. With
political deadlines looming, the Tunisian
coalition led by the Islamist Ennahdha party
made statements revealing a stronger emphasis on
Islam in government. Thedraft constitution
defined Islam as “the principle source of
legislation” - a phrase denoting laws based on
Shari’a.
The
Secularists:
they warned voters against trusting the
Islamists, and the subtle changes being
introduced in the core principles of the
Tunisian state could have come straight from a
secularist playbook on how Islamists would
gradually insert more religion into the
political and legal systems. Ennahdha leader
Rachid Ghannouchi once again attempted to
reassure secularists by agreeing with them that
the first article of Tunisia’s constitution
should remain unchanged. The article, which
states Tunisia’s language is Arabic and its
religion is Islam, was “just a description of
reality (...) without any legal implications”,
he said last November. And“There will be no
other references to religion in the
constitution”.
However, in the draft constitution, it is stated
that “Islam is Tunisia’s religion and the
principal source of its legislation”. It is also
stated that“Using Islamic Shari’a as a principle
source of legislation will guarantee freedom,
justice, social equality, consultation, human
rights and the dignity of all its people, men
and women”. Mentioning Shari’a means all laws
must be consistent with Islam, a condition found
in many constitutions in Muslim countries. This
can be interpreted broadly, or strictly if those
vetting the legislation impose a narrow reading.
The
political parties: a major concern for
Tunisians after the fall of Ben Ali was to
ensure that not only he disappears but that his
system is dismantled. The main cleavage has been
between those who called for conciliation and
those who advocated for the eradication of all
remnants of Ben Ali’s regime and the dismantling
of the ruling party. Before the revolt, the
political system in Tunisia was entirely
structured by the ruling party, the
Constitutional Democratic Rally. Other small
parties were brought in to present a semblance
of pluralism, except the PDP (Parti democrate
progressiste) who was under close surveillance
and kept outside the parliament.
In conclusion, the 2011 revolutions are
post-Islamist in the sense that they are driven
not by young Muslims seeking to escape from
perceived Western humiliation through political
identification with Islam — as in Tehran in
1979— but by young Muslims (not Islamists)
demanding freedom, representation and the rule
of law.
These
are Western values. But the revolutions are also
anti-Western, as they seek to escape from a
Western “trap” – the trap of telling Arabs that
the only option open to them if they were not to
be controlled by radical Islamists was to be
suppressed by Western-backed despots. This
binary definition of the Arab world, more than
30 years after the eruption of Islamism, had
become a shameful artifice.
At
this point, no one knows how one of the most
critical chapters in the history of the modern
Arab world will end, as the region pivots from a
movement against dictatorship toward a movement
for something that is proving far more
ambiguous, as Antony Chedid said before dying
(*). Will the generation shaped by jail, exile
and repression and bound by faith and alliances
years in the making, have the greatest say in
determining what emerges?
(*) Anthony Shadid: Islamists’ Ideas on
Democracy and Faith Face Test in Tunisia,
February 17, 2012
Mideast Flashpoints - 12/2/2013
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