Equality-Social Justice

Women's Rights in the Egyptian Constitution: (Neo)Liberalism's Family Values

“Woman and the constitution: Fear of woman’s marginalization rules over all” blared an April 2012 headline in al-Ahram, joining other protests over the role of women in Egypt’s new constitution. Organizations (“EgyptSoft”) sprang up, with articles and posts about how “the Egyptian woman screams in the face of the constitution of discrimination.” Fear reigned about how the post-revolutionary Islamist government would approach women’s rights, with many women’s organizations striking a defensive posture. The government of Mohamed Morsi pushed through the new constitution, despite protests all around, including a ritualistic hair cutting ceremony in Tahrir ...

Bahrain's "Blogfather" Emerges from Hiding

[Jason Stern wrote the following blog post about Ali Abdel Imam for the Committee to Protect Journalists.] For two years, Bahrainis have been asking "Where is Ali Abdel Imam?" And now finally, they have an answer. The prominent opposition blogger suddenly emerged from hiding last week, announcing he had been granted asylum in the United Kingdom, news sources reported.  He had not been heard from since 17 March 2011, when he cryptically tweeted, "I get tired from my phone so I switched it of no need for rumors plz." The Bahraini government had just declared a state of emergency, as massive reform protests rocked the island country. Abdel Imam, ...

On the American Association of University Professors' Opposition to Academic Boycotts

On 10 May 2013, the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) issued a “Statement on Academic Boycotts” which states, not for the first time, its “opposition to academic boycotts as a matter of principle.” The statement was issued in response to two recent victories for the movement for an academic and cultural boycott of Israel: physicist Stephen Hawking’s recent announcement that he would not attend a major conference in Israel, and the Association for Asian American Studies’ (AAAS) adoption of a resolution at their national conference in April to endorse the academic boycott. As the momentum for the academic boycott of Israel builds globally, the AAUP seems ...

Arabian Peninsula Media Roundup (May 8)

[This is a roundup of news articles and other materials circulating on the Arabian Peninsula and reflects a wide variety of opinions. It does not reflect the views of the Arabian Peninsula Page Editors or of Jadaliyya. You may send your own recommendations for inclusion in each week's roundup to ap@jadaliyya.com by Monday night of every week.]  Regional and International Relations Saudi minister: US to remain energy dependent A news report on the oil minister’s dismissal of talk of US energy independence and assertion that the United States’ imports of oil from the Middle East in the second half of 2012 were the highest since the 1990s, on Al Jazeera ...

Egyptian Women: Between Revolution, Counter-Revolution, Orientalism, and "Authenticity"

The Egyptian revolution appears to present a “gender paradox.” On the one hand, women have been marginalized in many formal political institutions since the downfall of Hosni Mubarak. On the other hand, representations and images of women and women’s bodies have been ubiquitous. Representations of women through media and art, as well as the regulation of women’s sexuality through state laws and constitutions are an essential part of defining national identity and national difference, marking the boundaries between “them” and “us” and constituting the national polity. Representations of women and particular gender orders are also used as symbolic markers to ...

Justice Is Universal: A Panel Discussion on Palestine, Comparative Frameworks, and Solidarity

Though some may find it easy to use terms like “apartheid,” understanding the material relationships that ground the comparison between Palestine and South Africa is a more difficult endeavor. Similarly, the ease with which activists link the struggles of indigenous peoples in the Americas to the Palestinian cause often belies the everyday details that make this relationship so powerful. With that in mind, Students for Justice in Palestine at the University of California Los Angeles organized a panel on 26 February 2013 as part of their Palestine Awareness Week. The panel was co-sponsored by the Afrikan Student Union, Muslim Students Association, Queer Alliance, ...

The Terror of Capitalism

Delhi. On Wednesday, 24 April, a day after Bangladeshi authorities asked the owners to evacuate their garment factory that employed almost three thousand workers, the building collapsed. The building, Rana Plaza, located in the Dhaka suburb of Savar, produced garments for the commodity chain that stretches from the cotton fields of South Asia through Bangladesh’s machines and workers to the retail houses in the Atlantic world. Famous name brands were stitched here, as are clothes that hang on the satanic shelves of Wal-Mart. Rescue workers were able to save two thousand people as of this writing, with confirmation that over three hundred are dead. The numbers for the ...

سامر العيساوي والسلطة الفلسطينية

Nabeel Rajab's Letter From Prison

[The following letter from Nabeel Rajab was originally published on Freedom in Bahrain. Click here for an Arabic version of the letter.] To all HR activists and defenders in all local, regional and international HR groups and organizations March 2013 Dear friends and colleagues, I write to you from Jaw prison in Bahrain to express my gratitude and sincere appreciation for all your persistent and unrelenting efforts to advocate for my case in which I am facing unjust harassment and imprisonment by the Bahraini regime. I also thank you for the continuing and consistent efforts to expose and stop the human rights violations committed against the peaceful citizens of ...

World Social Forum Highlights Shock Doctrine in Tunisia

An estimated fifty thousand people from five thousand organizations in 127 countries spanning five continents participated in the World Social Forum (WSF) in Tunisia over the past week. By choosing to come together in Tunis, this year’s Forum evoked the sprit of the 2011 revolt that inspired uprisings around the world. The WSF also focused attention on the complicated status of that revolt, which in Tunisia has not brought the political or economic changes many hoped for. Conversations with local activists often focused on the recent assassination of opposition leader Chokri Belaïd and government dealings with the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Many in the ...

Settler Colonialism and Alliance: Comparative Challenges to Pinkwashing and Homonationalism

Critics of Israeli pinkwashing in the United States and Canada have increasingly engaged in comparative critiques of settler colonialism. Queers Against Israeli Apartheid in Toronto has invoked this critique for many years. Pinkwatchers across Canada also draw ties between Palestinian and Indigenous solidarity that are heightened by the recent emergence in Canada of the Indigenous people’s movement Idle No More. Today, scholars and activists ask how homonationalism and pinkwashing perform settler colonialism in Palestine, Canada, and the United States, and how settler colonialism in each state impacts their work. I write this piece to encourage such questions, and to ...