Local Solidarities: How the Arab Spring Protests Started

Coming as a surprise to most observers and following the self‐immolation of a street vendor in a remote town of central Tunisia, the Jasmine Revolution of 2010–2011, the first uprising of the Arab Spring, has often been seen as a success story for digital communication through widespread use of social media. We suggest that this applied to the later phase of the protests in Tunisia but not to the initial phase, which occurred in local areas in impoverished and marginalized regions with highly limited access to the Internet. The initial phase lasted a full 10 days before the protests reached major cities where social media operated. Building on Tilly's concept of trust network, we offer the concept of local solidarities as key to the beginning of the Arab Spring uprisings and as encompassing spatial proximity, shared marginalized status, and kinship, all of which combined to serve as a basis for trust and collective action.     

The use of political motherhood in Egypt’s Arab Spring uprising and aftermath

ABSTRACT

Political motherhood, which uses traditional motherhood to mobilize and sustain women’s political participation, is understudied in political science. Women played a significant role in Egypt’s Arab Spring and its aftermath by “bargaining with patriarchy” and strategically using traditional motherhood to access the political sphere. In this article, we develop a theoretical argument based on the work of Gentry, Carreon and Moghadam and Amar. We illustrate it with examples drawn from news articles on women’s political activism and social media posts by Egyptian activists. Our argument explores how women’s agency and the larger political context in which women operate reveals how political motherhood takes the particular shape that it does. In the context of Egypt, we examine how the state’s choice to highlight women as “hypervisible” citizens, worthy of protection, backfired. Through a bottom-up political motherhood, women used their respectability as mothers in need of state protection against the state, thereby legitimizing anti-Mubarak and anti-Muslim Brotherhood demonstrations and challenging these governments.     

What's Going on? Making Sense of the Role of the Media in the Arab Uprisings

The article reviews recent scholarship on the role of the media in the Arab uprisings. After a summary of events, it sets out the debate between researchers who attribute a central and significant role to social media in the mobilizations that spread from Tunisia to Egypt and beyond in early 2011, and those who are more sceptical of such ‘techno‐enthusiasm’. Different theoretical perspectives on the media and protest are then presented, followed by an overview of empirical approaches to the topic. It is argued that the impact of social media must be viewed in relation to how they fit into wider media ecologies and social and political structures.     

Between organization and spontaneity of protests: the 2010–2011 Tunisian and Egyptian uprisings

ABSTRACT

This paper investigates the role of social groups in mobilizing resources for protests in repressive contexts. In particular, it examines the impact of organizations and informal groups on individual engagement in the protests developed in 2010 in Tunisia and in 2011 in Egypt. The empirical analysis draws on the following data sources: the second wave of the Arab Barometer (2010–2011), two focus groups in Egypt conducted between 2011 and 2015 with members of trade unions and of Popular Committees who had participated in the 2011 protests in Egypt, eight semi-structured interviews conducted in 2017 to workers in Tunisia who had engaged in the 2010–2011 protests, and interviews conducted in January and February 2011 to 100 women in Tunisia within a study tackling police violence against women during the Tunisian uprisings.

Findings show that both in Egypt and Tunisia protests were neither spontaneous nor fully organized as formal organizations and informal and spontaneous groups strictly interconnected in sustaining protests. In Egypt, established Islamic charity networks provided the structural basis for Popular Committees to engage in the 2011 protests and the initially spontaneous workers’ groups, institutionalized through the legalization of EFITU, were crucial for national wide protests occurred throughout 2011. In Tunisia, the major trade union UGTT was essential for mobilizing workers in the initial stages of protests but was backed by informal and spontaneous groups of workers during the process of protest diffusion.

Results remark that the 2010–2011 Tunisian and Egyptian uprisings were therefore well-grounded on intermediate mobilizing structures capable to survive in the interstices of an authoritarian context. Findings suggest to consider that, in repressive context, spontaneous groups and more established and formal organizations continuously switch from one form to another, overlap, and transform themselves faster than they would do in democratic contexts.     

Understanding regime divergence in the post-uprising Arab states

Despite the fact that democracy was a main demand of the protestors who spearheaded the Arab uprisings, five years later only Tunisia qualifies as democratic while elsewhere the outcomes have been either authoritarian restoration or failing states. This paper seeks to understand these three divergent trajectories in the post-uprising Arab states, with Tunisia, Egypt and Syria taken as representative of each.     

Managing Organizational Emotions: Framing Feelings of Illegitimacy in the Radical Women's Prison Movement

Abstract

This article examines how activists manage the potentially deleterious emotions that arise in social movement organizations. Using data from a case study of an organization in the contemporary radical women's prison movement in California, I explore how feelings of illegitimacy are managed and sublimated by activists, during the course of organizational life, to sustain participation in the movement. Drawing on framing theory, I find that organizational frames serve as mechanisms that manage and focus activists' feelings, delimit movement strategies, and inspire and legitimate collective action.     

The frustrated generation youth exclusion in Arab Mediterranean societies

In Arab Mediterranean countries (AMCs), insecurities and a lack of opportunities have continuously kept young people from becoming independent and being full, active, and integrated members of society; a process commonly referred to as social exclusion. This paper explores the driving factors of youth exclusion in Algeria, Egypt, Lebanon, and Tunisia. It is argued that not only the extent but also the structure of social exclusion varies across countries. Based on the social exclusion framework developed by the UNDP [2011. Beyond Transition – Towards Inclusive Societies. Bratislava: United Nations Development Programme], we construct a social exclusion index that takes economic, social, and political factors into account. The results obtained indicate that the share of young people suffering from social exclusion is highest in Tunisia (46.7%), followed by Algeria (43.4%), Egypt (42.1%), and Lebanon (33.2%). In contrast to the prevailing assumptions on social exclusion, we find that economic exclusion does in fact play a minor role. The strongest driver of youth exclusion in all Arab Mediterranean countries is the exclusion from social and political life.     

THE POLITICAL ECONOMICS OF THE ARAB SPRING

There were large differences in the responses of Arab dictators to the Arab Spring protests. To understand these differences, I present a stylized model of how a dictator responds to mass protests for democratization in a polarized country with two ethnic or religious groups. In this model, the dictator's response crucially depends on oil revenues and his affiliation to either the majority or the minority group. I document that the model's predictions are consistent with the observed differences in the Arab dictators' responses. Hence, ethnic politics and religious divides may play an important role in political transitions and regime changes. (JEL D72, D74)     

The impact of the Arab Spring on democracy and development in the MENA region

In evaluating the consequences of the Arab Spring 8 years later, this paper not only focuses on the short‐term consequences of the uprisings that swept through a number of countries in the Middle East and North African region but also analyzes the long‐term prospects for democratization and development in the MENA region. The impact of the Arab Spring, despite its promises and the expectations of the rest of the world, has been dismal. While only Tunisia made a successful transition to a democratic polity with a constitution guaranteeing the basic rights of the people, the rest of the Arab Spring countries remain in the grip of the authoritarian rule, and countries such as Syria, Libya, and Yemen have been degenerated into bloody civil wars with dwindling hope of peace and freedom. On economic front, the growth has been tardy, showing little difference with countries that were unaffected by the Arab Spring. Yet, the paper concludes, echoing historian Eric Hobsbawm's view, that revolutionary outcomes need not be judged as failure too quickly as they are likely to be partial success in the long term. The impact may be observed in the area of social opening, newer class alliances, and the emergence of a less rapacious, reformed, hybrid authoritarianism.     

当前阿拉伯革命态势分析

阿拉伯世界自2011年以来发生持续动荡，埃及、突尼斯、利比亚、叙利亚先后出现政局动荡甚至政局颠覆。当前阿拉伯世界的各种力量之间相互博弈，这将长期左右阿拉伯世界的政局。伊斯兰政治势力不断壮大，其极端思想及行为是阿拉伯世界政局动荡的重要影响力量，阿拉伯世界的青年人对政局不满，不断爆发大规模示威游行，处于边缘地位的工人阶级、世俗主义者与非政治民众对当前局势的态度也影响着阿拉伯地区的稳定。     

New politics and satire: the Euro financial crisis and the one-finger salute

ABSTRACT

This article argues that the conventional conceptualization in political science of politics is problematic, that it is overly narrow and constrained. This is because it excludes a range of actions like satire and humour which have come to play an increasing role in inspiring and provoking powerful political emotions and in informing the political agenda. Drawing on the work of critical scholars, it is argued that emotion, ethics and art can be deeply political. Moreover, new forms of media have encouraged new–old forms of political action often at the hands of young people who hitherto have been marginalized from the public sphere. Digital technology enables the production of user-generated content, opening new spaces for information, the exchange of ideas and mobilization. This article highlights the work of the young German satirist Jan Böhmermann to demonstrate how expressive art is playing a major role in shaping public opinion, in contesting power elites and informing political debate. In short, I use Böhmermann’s 2015 satire depicting Greco-German relations in the midst of a financial crisis and fears of loan defaults to argue for a broader understanding of politics that is inclusive of activities conventionally deemed non-rational.     

Making Sense of Social Change: Observing Collective Action in Networked Cultures

This article presents an overview of rising trends in the study of networked interactions conveyed by social media technologies and the emergence of new meanings associated with social change. In recent years, a healthy amount of studies has focused on ICT uses within collective action, considering social media tools to have become crucial components of many transnational movements and social change projects. Crossing boundaries between social movements theories, political science, and communication studies, literature suggests that ‘online activism’ and increasingly networked interactions may have transformed the meanings and definitions associated with ‘collective action’ and ‘social change’. To make sense of these meanings, we identify three approaches used by scholars, which focus on (i) the actual networking of actors, (ii) the diffusion of new repertoires and frames through networks, and (iii) making sense of new meanings conveyed within networked cultures. We conclude by suggesting the need for more comprehensive research to better observe and make sense of how's actors define collective action and how they use social media tools when striving to convey social change.     

Working on the Revolution in Bahrain: From the Mass Strike to Everyday Forms of Medical Provision

The 2011 Arab Spring uprising with the highest levels of popular support took place in Bahrain. This level of mobilization was due in part to the organizational capacity of trade unions and professional associations, and yet their role in the ‘near-revolution’ has received very little scholarly attention. In contrast to Egypt and Tunisia, where the official trade union federations played an ambiguous or even hostile role as workers began to organize strikes during the protests against Ben Ali and Mubarak, the official General Federation of Bahrain Trade Unions not only supported the protests against the Al Khalifa regime, but called for two general strikes. As significant as the strikes were, the work of unpaid volunteers constituted another less recognized, but equally important form of labor activism. Understanding the mass mobilization in Bahrain, and elsewhere, requires an encompassing approach to labor: one that can conceptualize equally the ability of collectivities to stop working, but also the ability to collectively continue to work, even on an unpaid basis. I will illustrate the contradictory role of the labor movement with examples from the Bahrain Teachers’ Association and the Bahrain Nursing Society. The majority of members of both associations were women. Finally, the Bahraini regime punished both forms of labor activism – both the teachers who went on strike, and the nurses who declared they would not strike but continue to work and care for the injured protesters.     

Religious Identity as an Historical Narrative: Coptic Orthodox Immigrant Churches and the Representation of History

Abstract  The Coptic Church has a very unique historical trajectory that includes an early separation from the Greco-Roman Byzantine Christian world in the fifth century followed by a legacy of subordination in Egypt after the Arab Conquest. This paper looks at how the Coptic Church narrates this history particularly as it transcends the national boundaries of Egypt to serve migrant Copts in Western societies. The historical narrative of the Coptic Church celebrates its contributions to early Christianity; defends its stance in the Chalcedon Council in 451 CE; and celebrates a legacy of triumph and survival after the Arab conquest. Building on theories on collective memory, this paper shows how the present and the past shape one another in a very complex way. The paper is based on interviews with both lay and clerical members of Coptic immigrant communities in Canada and the United States and on textual analysis of books, bulletins and websites launched on and by the Church.     

Lineages of the Islamic State: An International Historical Sociology of State (De-)Formation in Iraq

Existing accounts of the Islamic State (IS) tend to rely on orientalist and technicist assumptions and hence insufficiently sensitive to the historical, sociological, and international conditions of the possibility of IS. The present article provides an alternative account through a conjunctural analysis that is anchored in an international historical sociology of modern Iraq informed by Leon Trotsky's idea of ‘uneven and combined development’. It foregrounds the concatenation of Iraq's contradictory (post-)colonial nation-state formation with the neoliberal conjuncture of 1990-2014. It shows that the former process involved the tension-prone fusion of governing institutions of the modern state and the intermittent but steady reproduction, valorization, and politicization of supra-national (religious-sectarian) and sub-national (ethno-tribal) collective identities, which subverted the emergence of an Iraqi nation. The international sanctions regime of the 1990s transformed sectarian and tribal difference into communitarian tension by fatally undermining the integrative efficacy of the Ba’ath party's authoritarian welfare-state. Concurrently, the neo-liberal demolition of the post-colonial authoritarian welfare states in the region gave rise to the Arab Spring revolutions. The Arab Spring however elicited a successful authoritarian counter-revolution that eliminated secular-nationalist forms of oppositional politics. This illiberal neoliberalisation of the region's political economy valorised the religionisation of the domestic effects of the 2003 US-led destruction of the Iraqi state and its reconstruction on a majoritarian basis favouring the Shi’as and hence transforming sectarian tension into sectarian conflict culminating in IS. Thus, IS is, the paper demonstrates, the result of neither an internal cultural pathology nor sheerly external forces. Rather, it is the novel product of an utterly historical congealment of the intrinsically interactive and multilinear dynamics of socio-political change.     

Migrant encounters with neo-colonial masculinity: producing European sovereignty through emotions

The EU/European political community’s reaction to irregular migrants is ambivalent. On the one hand, migrants are produced as people to be pitied, rescued, and saved. On the other hand, they are feared, despised, and left to die. The article explores this ambivalence from a gender perspective and asks how sovereign masculinities are produced through emotional performances in the politics of migration control and management. It will be argued that emotions such as fear, disgust, and compassion are performed in the biopolitical security governance of irregular migration by producing a “socially abject” life as its object. This is a life that is to be killed, despised, and saved. Encounters between the irregular migrant and a European border security actor constitute a neo-colonial masculinity. During the moment of the encounter with the other’s life, sovereignty is produced through emotional performances of border security actors. The discussion concludes with illustrations of how racialized bodies and lives are produced as objects of fear, disgust, and compassion through European neo-colonial masculinity. The article speaks to the debates in the literature on masculinities in global politics, emotions and politics, and critical border studies.     

Social Movements and New Media

This article explores the contention that social movements are a significant social force transforming societies through their engagement with new media, such as the Internet, Web 2.0, and digital communications, which are seen as capable of facilitating new power structures. Utilizing della Porta and Diani's framework, it considers how new media technologies may be shaping the structure, identity, opportunity, and protest dimensions of social movements. It concludes by suggesting that new media does offer important opportunities for cost‐effective networking, interpretive framing, mobilization, and repertoires of protest action. However, their adoption does not represent the creation of entirely new virtual social movements but rather a new means of providing existing social movement organisations, local activist networks, and street‐level protest with a trans‐national capacity to collaborate, share information, and communicate with a wider audience. Such new media‐enabled social action is both more congruent with a politics of identity but may also increasingly be competing within a media environment saturated by user‐generated content.     

2010～2011年突尼斯变革:起因与现状

2010年12月17日,突尼斯"茉莉花革命"爆发后,总统本.阿里带家人离境,飞抵沙特阿拉伯,结束了其长达23年的统治。随后,在突尼斯变革的"雪球效应"的影响下,埃及、利比亚、也门、叙利亚以及其他阿拉伯国家相继发生了反政府的变革。本文着重探讨导致2010～2011年突尼斯变革的内外原因,阐述变革后突尼斯的政局现状并展望其未来走向。     

Creating Cohesion from Diversity: The Challenge of Collective Identity Formation in the Global Justice Movement*

Collective identity formation is important because it plays a crucial role in sustaining movements over time. Studying collective identity formation in autonomous groups in the Global Justice Movement poses a challenge because they encompass a multiplicity of identities, ideologies, issues, frames, collective action repertoires, and organizational forms. This article analyzes the process of collective identity formation in three anti‐capitalist globalization groups in Madrid, Spain, based on 3 years of ethnographic fieldwork. The author argues that for new groups practicing participatory democracy the regular face‐to‐face assemblies are the crucial arena in which collective identity can form and must be both effective and participatory in order to foster a sense of commitment and belonging. The article raises the possibility that scholars should consider what seems to be an oxymoron: the possible benefits of “failure” for social movements.     

Conceptualizing Cultural Politics in Subcultural and Social Movement Studies

In this article it is argued that combining theories of social movements and subcultures provides a way of 'conceptualizing cultural politics'. The focus is on debates that have taken place over the conceptualization of subcultures and social movements as well as the status and viability of cultural politics. Contemporary subcultural theorists are critical of the rigid concepts used by the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies (CCCS) but, it is argued, they provide few feasible alternatives. They also have little to say about the supposed contemporary significance of cultural politics. New social movement (NSM) theorists, on the other hand, have generated conceptual frameworks that recognize the complexity of collective phenomena and have developed an approach which enables us to engage with the controversy over cultural politics. However, they concentrate too narrowly on struggles waged at the level of lifestyle, culture and civil society. The article shows how, like the CCCS, critics of NSM theory rightly question the potency of symbolic challenges and stress the persistent role of material issues and the continued part that conventional political actors, such as the state, play in contemporary social conflicts. Finally, the case of New Age Travellers is used to illuminate these debates in subcultural and social movement studies and to show how elements of each approach can be employed fruitfully in empirical research.