Tunisia

Sultan of Sultans

New Texts Out Now: David McMurray and Amanda Ufheil-Somers, The Arab Revolts

David McMurray and Amanda Ufheil-Somers, editors, The Arab Revolts: Dispatches on Militant Democracy in the Middle East. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2013. Published in association with Middle East Research and Information Project (MERIP). Jadaliyya (J): What made you compile this volume? David McMurray & Amanda Ufheil-Somers (DM & AU): MERIP recently published an edited volume with Verso on just the events in Egypt, examining the initial eighteen days of the uprising as well as looking back on the political and social shifts of the previous two decades that gave shape to the revolt: economic reforms and restructuring, the activities of organized ...

Wafa Ben Hassine on Social Media in Post-Ben Ali Tunisia

[This post is part of an ongoing Profile of a Contemporary Conduit series on Jadaliyya that seeks to highlight distinct voices primarily in and from the Middle East, North Africa, and South Asia.] Jadaliyya (J): What do you think are the most gratifying aspects of Tweeting and Twitter? Wafa Ben Hassine (WBH): The intellectual exchange of information. The most unique aspect of Twitter is the ability to form little niches about very particularized topics. You want to talk classical Arabic literature? Got it. You want to talk unemployment in Sidi Bouzid? Governmental reshuffle in Tunisia? Check. In using Twitter, one is guaranteed to find (mostly) meaningful exchanges ...

Statement Supporting Topless Tunisian Feminist

[The following statement was published by FEMEN on 22 March 2013.]  19 year old Tunisian Amina who posted a topless photo of herself bearing the slogan “my body belongs to me, and is not the source of anyone’s honour” has been threatened with death. Islamist cleric Adel Almi, president of Al-Jamia Al-Li-Wassatia Tawia Wal-Islah, has called for Amina’s flogging and stoning to death saying Amina’s actions will bring misfortune by causing “epidemics and disasters” and “could be contagious and give ideas to other women…” We, the undersigned, unequivocally defend Amina, and demand that her life and liberty be protected and that those ...

Social Struggles in Tunisia: A Curse or a Revolutionary Opportunity?

The Tunisian revolution was often painted as a sort of “divine” event during which the united and homogenous “Tunisian people” succeeded in getting rid of their “dictator.”  As if by the force of some quasi-magical act, all it took was the coming together of the people screaming a unified dégage on 14 January 2011 for the dictator to suddenly take flight. In using this lens, the causes and consequences of the revolt itself are glossed over. Moreover, the historical context is abandoned in favor of a de-politicized narrative that revolves around young bloggers triggering a spontaneous movement, managing to succeed in dragging a whole population out into the streets ...

Ennahda: A Party in Transition

Since the assassination of Chokri Belaid, Tunisia is living the most difficult stage of its revolutionary transition. Even before the murder of Belaid, a long institutional crisis had kept the country in limbo with the prolonged absence of a constitution. Belaid’s death pushed it on the edge of chaos. Much has been written about the context within which the assassination took place, with the secular-leftist camp openly accusing the Islamist party, Ennahda, of having provided the ideological and political context for it. In order to bring the country back from the brink of a potential explosion of violence, on the night of the assassination, Prime Minister Hammadi Jebali ...

Tunisia and the IMF: A Beggar State and an Impoverished People

In November 2012, Tunisia signed a loan with the World Bank for a total value of five hundred million dollars. This was on top of other loans received in November from various lenders that totaled seven hundred million dollars. Following an interview with Reuters last month, Riadh Bettaieb, the Tunisian minister of investment, he affirmed that the loans from the World Bank and the African Development Bank had fully covered the state budget. He also declared that the government will seek another precautionary loan worth nearly two billion dollars from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), over concerns of the 2014 budget. It is important to note that since 2012 until the ...

Poems from the Maghreb: Introduction and Selections

[To celebrate the publication of Poems for the Millennium: Vol 4, edited by Pierre Joris and Habib Tangour (University of California Press, 2013), a comprehensive anthology of the written and oral literatures of the Maghreb, Jadaliyya is publishing the editors' introduction and a selection of poems (Mehdi Akhrif, Omar Berrada, Ahmad Al-Majjaty, Djibril Zakaria Sall, and Cheikha Rimitti. For more information and to purchase the book, click here] Introduction This book has been incubating in our minds for a quarter century now, and we have been gathering material for even longer—with the aim of assembling and contextualizing a wide range of writing from North ...

Call for Applicants: Summer Arabic & Politics Exchange (14 June - 12 July, Tunis)

Mideastwire.com and its partners - Université Paris-Dauphine I Tunis, Tunisia Live and the Bosphore Academy - are pleased to announce the first Summer Arabic & Politics Exchange June 14-July 12, 2013, in Tunis, Tunisia. The four-week course will immerse our participants in the language and politics of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), with a particular emphasis on direct engagement with some of the leading academic, political, intellectual and religious figures active across the spectrum in Tunisia. This summer's Exchange will also be opened by a two-day conference, June 15-16, led by more than a dozen MENA experts from the International Crisis Group ...