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1. Tunisian Youth and Political Life: From Stagnation to Revival?

Author:
Zied Boussen and Mohammed Islam Mbarki
Publication Date:
01-2021
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Arab Reform Initiative (ARI)
Abstract:
Tunisian youth are no different from their peers across the world when it comes to their indifference to public life. This apathy towards politics is not new; it goes back before 14 January Revolution. A 2008 national survey of youth showed that around 83% of Tunisian youth were not concerned with politics and 64% were not concerned with elections or joining civil society associations. Nonetheless, the Tunisian youth surprised observers and played an essential role in the revolution that led to the fall of Ben Ali. Immediately after, however, they returned to their position of indifference. The political tensions and episodes of instability that accompanied the democratic transition disappointed the youth greatly and led to apathy towards politics in all its forms. Successive elections were the most glaring example of this attitude: the youth abandoned the ballots and stopped taking initiatives of political work, either as candidates or as voters. The rise of Kais Saied as a presidential candidate seemed to have reignited the Tunisian youth’s interest in politics. They walked with him through all the stages of his elections. They led his most unusual campaign at the smallest cost; they confronted media attacks against him and provided him with alternative and new media platforms that improved his image. This support brought the youth and Kais Saied closer together. Saied also showed great understanding of the youth’s economic and social demands and gave them priority. He shared their anger at the political establishment, so they decided to stand by him to punish the establishment that they see as the source of their successive disappointments. The results of the presidential elections, in which one candidate won the bulk of the votes of the youth participating in the elections, generated many questions about the reasons for the youth’s support of Kais Saied, and the hopes that they hanged on him. What can we infer from this experience that can benefit the youth political participation generally? How does this experience help us understand the actual needs that push young people to participate in public life?
Topic:
Political Activism, Elections, Youth, and Participation
Political Geography:
Africa and Tunisia

2. Mapping Algerian Trade Unions in the Time of Mass Mobilization: Current Dynamics and Future Challenges

Author:
Nacer Djabi
Publication Date:
05-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Arab Reform Initiative (ARI)
Abstract:
Algeria has a long and rich history of trade union activism. With the 2019 Hirak, independent unions have participated and supported the protest movement’s demands for regime change, yet achieved only limited success in mobilizing their base. This paper explores the evolution of unions in Algeria and the factors that precluded their full participation in the Hirak. It highlights the need for unions to move beyond a culture of narrow sectoral demands if they are to play a role in the democratic transition.
Topic:
Political Activism, Reform, Unions, and Mobilization
Political Geography:
Africa and Algeria

3. Ending Denial: Anti-Black Racism in Morocco

Author:
Stephen J. King
Publication Date:
08-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Arab Reform Initiative (ARI)
Abstract:
Morocco is a diverse country that has yet to come to terms with its own black population and the impact of centuries of the trans-Sahara slave trade. Diversity, the history of slavery in Morocco, and the racism that is generally inherent in post-slave societies are not openly discussed and often denied by non-Blacks. This paper examines the efforts of black Moroccans to tell the stories of racial discrimination against them as a first step in an attempt to raise awareness, pierce the taboos and end the denial surrounding anti-black racism in Morocco.
Topic:
Minorities, Political Activism, Discrimination, and Racism
Political Geography:
Africa and Morocco

4. LGBTIQ Rights in Kenya: On Artivism and Social Change

Author:
Deborah P. Amory
Publication Date:
05-2019
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
Abstract:
The struggle for LGBTIQ rights in Kenya provides a unique and fascinating case study of the powerful social change taking place right now. On May 24, 2019, the High Court of Kenya will rule on whether to decriminalize same-sex relationships, which are currently punishable by up to fourteen years in prison. The court was originally scheduled to decide this case in February but delayed the ruling, citing mounds of documents that had still not been read. Activists pointed out that judges had already had several years to read the documents, and some worried that the delay was a sign of government interference with the judicial process.
Topic:
Social Movement, Political Activism, Courts, and LGBT+
Political Geography:
Kenya and Africa

5. The Mobilization of Conservative Civil Society

Author:
Richard Youngs, Gareth Fowler, Arthur Larok, Pawel Marczewski, Vijayan Mj, Ghia Nodia, Natalia Shapoavlova, Janjira Sombatpoonsiri, Marisa Von Bülow, and Özge Zihnioğlu
Publication Date:
10-2018
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
As the domain of civil society burgeoned in the 1990s and early 2000s—a crucial component of the global spread of democracy in the developing and postcommunist worlds—many transnational and domestic actors involved in building and supporting this expanding civil society assumed that the sector was naturally animated by organizations mobilizing for progressive causes. Some organizations focused on the needs of underrepresented groups, such as women’s empowerment, inclusion of minorities, and LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) rights; others addressed broader societal issues such as economic justice, social welfare, and antipoverty concerns. In many countries, the term “civil society” came to be associated with a relatively bounded set of organizations associated with a common agenda, one separate from or even actively opposed by conservative political forces. However, in the past ten years, this assumption and outlook are proving increasingly incorrect. In many countries in the developing and postcommunist worlds, as well as in long-established Western democracies, conservative forms of civic activism have been multiplying and gaining traction. In some cases, new conservative civic movements and groups are closely associated with illiberal political actors and appear to be an integral part of the well-chronicled global pushback against Western liberal democratic norms. In other cases, the political alliances and implications of conservative civil society are less clear. In almost all cases—other than perhaps that of the United States, where the rise of conservative activism has been the subject of considerable study—this rising world of conservative civil society has been little studied and often overlooked. This report seeks to correct this oversight and to probe more deeply into the rise of conservative civil society around the world. It does so under the rubric of Carnegie’s Civic Research Network project, an initiative that aims to explore new types of civic activism and examine the extent to which these activists and associations are redrawing the contours of global civil society. The emerging role and prominence of conservative activism is one such change to civil society that merits comparative examination. Taken as a whole, the report asks what conservative civic activism portends for global civil society. Its aim is not primarily to pass judgment on whether conservative civil society is a good or bad thing—although the contributing authors obviously have criticisms to make. Rather, it seeks mainly to understand more fully what this trend entails. Much has been written and said about anticapitalist, human rights, and global justice civil society campaigns and protests. Similar analytical depth is required in the study of conservative civil society. The report redresses the lack of analytical attention paid to the current rise of conservative civil society by offering examples of such movements and the issues that drive them. The authors examine the common traits that conservative groups share and the issues that divide them. They look at the kind of members that these groups attract and the tactics and tools they employ. And they ask how effective the emerging conservative civil society has been in reshaping the political agenda.
Topic:
Civil Society, Politics, Political Activism, and Conservatism
Political Geography:
Uganda, Africa, Europe, South Asia, Turkey, Ukraine, Caucasus, Middle East, India, Poland, Brazil, South America, Georgia, North America, Thailand, Southeast Asia, and United States of America

6. Women's Political Participation In Sub-Saharan Africa

Author:
Aili Mari Tripp
Publication Date:
05-2014
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Social Science Research Council
Abstract:
One of the most interesting developments in African politics since the mid- 1990s has been the increase in women's political participation. Women are becoming more politically engaged and seeking representation at all levels, from local government to legislatures and even executive office. To state the obvious, access to political power is important to groups that have historically been excluded from formal and informal politics because it means being able to have control over basic decisions affecting one's life in areas including health, education, and access to land and resources, among many others. Many women seek power to affect how justly resources are divided in society and how equitably policy decisions are made.
Topic:
Human Rights and Political Activism
Political Geography:
Africa