Class, violence and citizenship in the Arab uprisings: assessing deeper forms of transition
Published:
Dec 3, 2015
Keywords:
Representation Middle Class Violence State-Making Transition
Abstract
The article connects the literature on transitology with a comparative analyses of the Arab uprisings (also known as the “Arab Spring”). These uprisings should not only be assessed against the backdrop of institutional changes (elections, the writing of new constitutions, the emergence of party systems, etc.). Rather, we need to consider the revolts as a set of historical events sharing a common aspiration towards a renewed and reactivated sense of citizenship from below, that is, from spontaneous forms of civil society, in conjunction with innervated trade union movements, and the emergence of new coalitions pushing for a more participatory politics. The article concentrates on two features of citizenship: the role of the middle class in fighting for larger political enfranchisement and the attempts by the sovereign people to reappropriate the legitimate means of violence.
Article Details
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Challand, B. (2015). Class, violence and citizenship in the Arab uprisings: assessing deeper forms of transition. Historein, 15(1), 83–101. https://doi.org/10.12681/historein.278
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References
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Carapico, Sheila. Political Aid and Arab Activism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013.
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Hammami, Rema. “NGOs: The Professionalization of Politics.” Race & Class 37/2 (1995): 51–63.
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International Crisis Group. “Yemen’s Military-Security Reform: Seeds of New Conflict?” Middle East Report 139 (2013): 1–25.
Isaac, Sally K. “Explaining the Patterns of the Gulf Monarchies’ Assistance after the Arab Uprisings.” Mediterranean Politics 19/3 (2014): 413–430.
Isin, Engin F., and Bryan S. Turner. “Investing Citizenship: An Agenda for Citizenship Studies.” Citizenship Studies 11/1 (2007): 5–17.
Ismail, Salwa. Political Life in Cairo’s New Quarters: Encountering the Everyday State. Minneapolis: Minnesota University Press, 2006.
Jebnoun, Noureddine. “In the Shadow of Power: Civil–military Relations and the Tunisian Popular Uprising.” Journal of North African Studies 19/3 (2014): 296–316.
Khosrokhavar, Farhad. The New Arab Revolutions that Shook the World. Boulder: Paradigm, 2012.
Khuri-Makdisi, Ilham. The Eastern Mediterranean and the Making of Global Radicalism, 1860–1914. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2010.
Kornetis, Kostis. “1968, 1989, 2011: Reconsidering Social Movements, ‘Moments of Change’ and Theoretical Framing Over Time.” Historein 13 (2013): 57–70.
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Lynch, Marc. The Arab Spring: The Unfinished Revolutions of the New Middle East. New York: Public Affairs Books, 2012.
Negri, Antonio, and Michael Hardt. Déclaration: Ceci n’est pas un manifeste. Paris: Raisons d’agir, 2013.
O’Donnell, Guillermo, and Philippe Schmitter. Transitions from Authoritarian Rule: Tentative Conclusions About Uncertain Democracies. Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1986.
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Ouaissa, Rachid. “Thesis: The Misunderstandings about the Role of the Middle Class.” Middle East – Topics & Arguments 2 (2014): 12–16.
Ould Mohamedou, Mohammad-Mahmoud, and Timothy Sisk. “Bringing Back Transitology: Democratisation in the 21st Century.” Working Paper, Geneva Centre for Security Policy Research Series 13 (2013), Accessed 18 May 2015. http://www.gcsp.ch/content/download/14308/171469/download.
Patai, Raphael. The Arab Mind. New York: Scribner, 1973.
Poggi, Gianfranco. The State: its Nature, Development, and Prospects. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1990.
Prashad, Vijay. Arab Spring, Libyan Winter. Edinburgh: AK Press, 2012.
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Sayigh, Yezid. “Missed Opportunity: The Politics of Police Reform in Egypt and Tunisia.” Carnegie Endowment Working Paper, March 2015.
Schlumberger, Oliver. Debating Arab Authoritarianism. Dynamics and Durability in Nondemocratic Regimes. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2008.
Soliman, Samer. The Autumn of Dictatorship: Fiscal Crisis and Political Change in Egypt under Mubarak. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2011.
Thompson, Elizabeth F. Justice Interruptus: The Struggle for Constitutional Government in the Middle East. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2013.
Tilly, Charles. “Reflections on the History of European State-Making.” In The Formation of National States. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1975.
Weber, Max. “Politics as a Vocation.” In From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology, edited by Hans Heinrich Gerth and Charles Wright Mills. New York: Oxford University Press, 1946.
Wedeen, Lisa. “Ideology and Humor in Dark Times: Notes from Syria.” Critical Inquiry 39/4 (2013): 841–873.
Wedeen, Lisa. Ambiguities of Domination. Politics Rhetoric, and Symbols in Contemporary Syria. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1999.
Ayeb, Habib, and Ray Bush. “Small Farmer Uprisings and Rural Neglect in Egypt and Tunisia.” Middle East Report 272 (2014): 2–11.
Bayat, Asef. Life as Politics: How Ordinary People Change the Middle East. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2010.
Beinin, Joel, and Zachary Lockmann. Workers and Working Classes in the Middle East: Struggles, Histories, Historiographies. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1993.
Beinin, Joel. “The Rise of Egypt’s Workers.” Paper, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace (June 2012). Accessed 18 May 2015. http://carnegieendowment.org/2012/06/28/rise-of-egypt-s-workers/.
Bermeo, Nancy. “Democracy Assistance and the Search for Security.” In New Challenges to Democratization, edited by Peter J. Burnell and Richard Youngs, 73–92. London: Routledge, 2010.
Bonnefoy, Laurent, and Marine Piorier. “The Structuration of the Yemeni Revolution: An Attempt at Analysing an Ongoing Process.” Revue française de science politique 62/5–6 (2012): 895–913.
Bozarslan, Ahmit. Une histoire de la violence au Moyen-Orient. Paris: La Découverte, 2008.
Brown, Nathan. When Victory is not an Option: Islamist Movements in Arab Politics. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2012.
Brumberg, Daniel. “Theories of Transition.” In The Arab Uprisings Explained: New Contentious Politics in the Middle East, edited by Marc Lynch, 29–52. New York: Columbia University Press, 2014.
Carapico, Sheila. “Yemen.” In Dispatches from the Arab Spring, edited by Paul Amar and Vijay Prashad, 101–121. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2013.
Carapico, Sheila. Political Aid and Arab Activism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013.
Carothers, Thomas. “The End of the Transition Paradigm.” Journal of Democracy 13/2 (2002): 5–21.
Challand, Benoît. “Against the Grain: Locating the Spirit of the Arab Uprisings in Times of Counter-revolution.” Constellations 20/2 (2013): 169–187.
Challand, Benoît. “Revisiting Aid in the Arab Middle East.” Mediterranean Politics 19/3 (2014): 281–298.
Challand, Benoît. “The Counter Power of Civil Society and the Emergence of a New Political Imaginary in the Arab World.” Constellations 18/3 (2011): 271–283.
Challand, Benoît. Palestinian Civil Society: Foreign Donors and the Power to Promote and Exclude. London: Routledge, 2009.
Chibber, Vivek. Postcolonial Theory and the Specter of Capital. London: Verso, 2013.
Chomiak, Laryssa, and John P. Entelis. “Contesting Order in Tunisia: Crafting Political Identity.” In Civil Society Activism under Authoritarian Rule: A Comparative Perspective, edited by Francesco Cavatorta, 73–93. London: Routledge, 2013.
Clarke, Killian. “Aish, huriyya, karama insaniyya: Framing and the 2011 Egyptian Uprising.” European Political Science 12 (2013): 197–214.
Dahi, Omar. “The Political Economy of the Egyptian and Arab Revolts.” IDS Bulletin 43/1 (2012): 47–53.
Elias, Norbert. The Civilizing Process: Sociogenetic and Psychogenetic Investigations. London: Blackwell, 2000.
Finn, Tom. “In Revolt: Yemeni ‘Untouchables’ Hope for Path Out of Misery.” Reuters, 7 March 2012. Accessed 18 May 2015. http://reut.rs/Ax5nXw.
Gana, Nouri. “Tunisia.” In Dispatches from the Arab Spring, edited by Paul Amar and Vijay Prashad, 1–23. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2013.
Gilbert Achar, The People Want: A Radical Exploration of the Arab Uprising. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2013.
Halperin, Sandra. “The Post-Cold War Political Topography of the Middle East: Prospects for Democracy.” Third World Quarterly 26/7 (2005): 1135–1156.
Hammami, Rema. “NGOs: The Professionalization of Politics.” Race & Class 37/2 (1995): 51–63.
Hanieh, Adam. Lineages of Revolt: Issues of Contemporary Capitalism in the Middle East. London: Haymarket, 2013.
Harik, Ilya. “Democracy, ‘Arab Exceptionalism,’ and Social Science.” Middle East Journal 60/4 (2006): 664–668.
Hatzis, Aristides. “Rent-seeking and Vested Interests.” In Encyclopedia of Political Economy, edited by Phillip A. O’Hara, 974–977. London: Routledge, 1999.
Heydemann, Steven, and Reinoud Leenders. “Authoritarian Learning.” In The Arab Uprisings Explained: New Contentious Politics in the Middle East, edited by Marc Lynch, 75–92. New York: Columbia University Press, 2014.
Heydemann, Steven, ed. War, Institutions, and Social Change in the Middle East. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000.
Hibou, Béatrice. The Force of Obedience: The Political Economy of Repression in Tunisia. Cambridge: Polity, 2011.
Hmed, Choukri. “Abeyance Networks, Contingency and Structures: History and Origins of the Tunisian Revolution.” Revue française de science politique 62/5–6 (2013): 51–63.
International Crisis Group. “Yemen’s Military-Security Reform: Seeds of New Conflict?” Middle East Report 139 (2013): 1–25.
Isaac, Sally K. “Explaining the Patterns of the Gulf Monarchies’ Assistance after the Arab Uprisings.” Mediterranean Politics 19/3 (2014): 413–430.
Isin, Engin F., and Bryan S. Turner. “Investing Citizenship: An Agenda for Citizenship Studies.” Citizenship Studies 11/1 (2007): 5–17.
Ismail, Salwa. Political Life in Cairo’s New Quarters: Encountering the Everyday State. Minneapolis: Minnesota University Press, 2006.
Jebnoun, Noureddine. “In the Shadow of Power: Civil–military Relations and the Tunisian Popular Uprising.” Journal of North African Studies 19/3 (2014): 296–316.
Khosrokhavar, Farhad. The New Arab Revolutions that Shook the World. Boulder: Paradigm, 2012.
Khuri-Makdisi, Ilham. The Eastern Mediterranean and the Making of Global Radicalism, 1860–1914. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2010.
Kornetis, Kostis. “1968, 1989, 2011: Reconsidering Social Movements, ‘Moments of Change’ and Theoretical Framing Over Time.” Historein 13 (2013): 57–70.
Leca, Jean. “Questions on Citizenship.” In Dimensions of Radical Democracy: Pluralism, Citizenship, Community, edited by Chantal Mouffe, 17–32. London: Verso, 1992.
Lynch, Marc. The Arab Spring: The Unfinished Revolutions of the New Middle East. New York: Public Affairs Books, 2012.
Negri, Antonio, and Michael Hardt. Déclaration: Ceci n’est pas un manifeste. Paris: Raisons d’agir, 2013.
O’Donnell, Guillermo, and Philippe Schmitter. Transitions from Authoritarian Rule: Tentative Conclusions About Uncertain Democracies. Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1986.
Ottaway, Marina. “Democratic Transitions and the Problem of Power.” Working Paper, Woodrow Wilson Center. Occasional Paper series, Middle East Program, 2014. Accessed 18 May 2015. http://www.wilsoncenter.org/sites/default/files/democratic_transitions_and_problem_of_power.pdf.
Ouaissa, Rachid. “Blockierte Mittelschichten als Motor der Veränderungen in der arabischen Welt?” in Arabellions: Zur Vielfalt von Protest und Revolte im Nahen Osten und Nordafrika, edited by Annette Jünemann and Anja Zorob, 257–277. Wiesbaden: Springer, 2013.
Ouaissa, Rachid. “Thesis: The Misunderstandings about the Role of the Middle Class.” Middle East – Topics & Arguments 2 (2014): 12–16.
Ould Mohamedou, Mohammad-Mahmoud, and Timothy Sisk. “Bringing Back Transitology: Democratisation in the 21st Century.” Working Paper, Geneva Centre for Security Policy Research Series 13 (2013), Accessed 18 May 2015. http://www.gcsp.ch/content/download/14308/171469/download.
Patai, Raphael. The Arab Mind. New York: Scribner, 1973.
Poggi, Gianfranco. The State: its Nature, Development, and Prospects. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1990.
Prashad, Vijay. Arab Spring, Libyan Winter. Edinburgh: AK Press, 2012.
Rabbani, Mouin. “Qatar and the Palestinians.” Jadaliyya, 1 Dec. 2012. Accessed 18 May 2015. http://www.jadaliyya.com/pages/index/8692/qatar-and-the-palestinians.
Ryzova, Lucie. “The Battle of Cairo’s Muhammad Mahmoud Street: Opinion.” Al Jazeera English, 29 Nov. 2011. Accessed 18 May 2015. http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2011/11/201111288494638419.html.
Salvatore, Armando. “Beyond Orientalism? Max Weber and the Displacements of ‘Essentialism’ in the Study of Islam.” Arabica 43/3 (1996): 457–485.
Salvatore, Armando. “New Media and Collective Action in the Middle East: Can Sociological Research Help Avoiding Orientalist Traps?” Sociologica 3 (2011). Accessed 1 Jun. 2015. http://www.sociologica.mulino.it/journal/issue/index/Issue/Journal:ISSUE:15.
Sayigh, Yezid. “Above the State: The Officers’ Republic in Egypt.” Carnegie Endowment Working Paper, August 2012. O
Sayigh, Yezid. “Missed Opportunity: The Politics of Police Reform in Egypt and Tunisia.” Carnegie Endowment Working Paper, March 2015.
Schlumberger, Oliver. Debating Arab Authoritarianism. Dynamics and Durability in Nondemocratic Regimes. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2008.
Soliman, Samer. The Autumn of Dictatorship: Fiscal Crisis and Political Change in Egypt under Mubarak. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2011.
Thompson, Elizabeth F. Justice Interruptus: The Struggle for Constitutional Government in the Middle East. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2013.
Tilly, Charles. “Reflections on the History of European State-Making.” In The Formation of National States. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1975.
Weber, Max. “Politics as a Vocation.” In From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology, edited by Hans Heinrich Gerth and Charles Wright Mills. New York: Oxford University Press, 1946.
Wedeen, Lisa. “Ideology and Humor in Dark Times: Notes from Syria.” Critical Inquiry 39/4 (2013): 841–873.
Wedeen, Lisa. Ambiguities of Domination. Politics Rhetoric, and Symbols in Contemporary Syria. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1999.
