Democratisation, Counterrevolution, War: Tunesia, Egypt, Syria

The Arab uprisings of 2011 unfolded along three principal tracks: After initial success, the Egyptian revolution was soon coopted by Islamists, before the old elites reasserted their power and re-established authoritarian rule. What options do people have in this dictatorship 2.0? The Syrian dictator Assad did everything to crush a civil uprising with violent means. The country descended into (civil) war und became a theatre for regional and international power struggles. What hope remains for Syria? Only in Tunisia people managed to channel the revolutionary energy of 2011 into a political transformation process. But is the only Arab democracy not merely a wishful projection of the West, whose actions simultaneously risk to destabilize the country?

Panelists:
Dr. Mahmoud Al-Zayed – Literary Theorist, Academy in Exil, Freie Universität Berlin
Dr. Heike Löschmann – Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung, Head of Office Tunis
Prof. Dr. Cilja Harders – Otto-Suhr-Institute for Political Science, Freie Universität Berlin

Chair:
Dr. Christiane Fröhlich –  GIGA Institute for Middle East Studies, Hamburg

Venue:
The event will take place online on the platform zoom. Registered participants will receive the login data by E-Mail ahead of time.

Please register by sending an E-Mail to anmeldung@boell-hamburg.de

We work hard to make our offerings inclusive and easily accessible. Please don’t hesitate to contact us in case you need assistance!

About the lecture series:
Ten years ago, popular uprisings challenged authoritarian systems across the Middle East and North Africa. The Arab Spring uprisings of 2011 and their aftermath, together with the Green Movement in Iran (2009) and the Gezi-protests in Turkey (2013), appeared to form part of a regional protest cycle. A decade later, these uprisings seem to have hardly left any traces, and their memory is eclipsed by other events.Over the course of this semester, we will look back at the events of the Arab Spring in its broader regional and international context. What were the root causes for the uprisings? What were the results? Why did they largely fail? To what degree are current protest movements in countries of the Middle East and North Africa related to the Arab uprisings of 2011?

The lecture series is jointly organized by Heinrich-Böll-Foundation Hamburg and the University of Hamburg, the Leibniz-Institute for Global and Regional Studies (GIGA) and Academy in Exile.

With financial support by Landeszentrale Politische Bildung Hamburg

10 Years After the Arab Spring: Protest Cycles in the Middle East and North Africa in Context: Complete Program