Assessing (In)security after the Arab Spring: The Case of Yemen

2013 ◽  
Vol 46 (04) ◽  
pp. 721-726 ◽  
Author(s):  
April Longley Alley
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Arab Spring ◽  
Regime Change ◽  
Military Commander ◽  
Time Regime ◽  
Long Time ◽  
High Level ◽  
The Arab Spring ◽  
Large Sections ◽  
Major General

In January 2011, youth and civil society activists, inspired by protests in Tunisia, took to Yemen's streets calling for regime change. As in other Arab Spring countries, conditions were ripe for mobilization as large sections of the population had become increasingly frustrated with corruption, dwindling economic prospects, and a concentration of power and wealth in the hands of the ruling clique. Following Hosni Mubarak's resignation in Egypt, protests mounted across Yemen, and, although President Ali Abdullah Saleh promised reform, it was too little, too late, to satisfy the demonstrators (see ICG 2011a). After proregime gunmen fired on unarmed protesters in Sanaa on March 18, 2011—killing more than 50 demonstrators—a series of high-level defections began, including long-time regime insider and powerful military commander, Major General Ali Mohsen al-Ahmar.

Protest and Regime Change: Different Experiences of the Arab Uprisings and the 2009 Iranian Presidential Election Protests

2020 ◽  
Vol 57 (2) ◽  
pp. 144-170
Author(s):  
Kamran Rabiei
Keyword(s):  
Arab Spring ◽  
Regime Change ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
Mena Region ◽  
Green Movement ◽  
Arab Uprisings ◽  
Stability And Instability ◽  
Degree Of Stability ◽  
The Arab Spring ◽  
Significant Factors

Political developments, such as the ‘Arab Spring’, have led the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) towards instability, unrest and severe sectarian confrontations. Nearly 2 years before the ‘Arab Spring’, ‘the Iranian Green Movement’ swept over the country and led to the expectations that Iran would undergo a fundamental political change. The article addresses an important question as to why the 2009 Iranian unrest known as the ‘Green Movement’ did not lead to regime change, while on the other hand, the ‘Arab Spring’ ultimately led to the change of political systems in Tunisia and Egypt. Further, some significant factors are highlighted anticipating the degree of stability and instability for the future of political regimes in the MENA region.

scholarly journals THE SPRING OF THE NETWORKED NATIONS: SOCIAL MEDIA AND THE ARAB SPRING

2012 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 120 ◽  
Author(s):  
Harel Chorev
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Political Culture ◽  
Arab Spring ◽  
Regime Change ◽  
The Political ◽  
Global Trends ◽  
The Arab Spring

This essay argues that social media played an important role in the Arab Spring and contributed to a change in the political culture of some of those countries that have gone through regime-change through 2011-2012. The article further posits that the contribution of social media was mainly instrumental, not causal, and that the main reasons behind the Arab Spring were problems generated by regional, local and global trends, affecting each country differently.  

scholarly journals Spatial imaginaries and selective in/visibility: Mediterranean neighbourhood and the European Union’s engagement with civil society after the ‘Arab Spring’

2018 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 22-36 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hans-Joachim Bürkner ◽  
James W Scott
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Arab Spring ◽  
Central Element ◽  
Governmental Organizations ◽  
Non Governmental Organizations ◽  
Southern Mediterranean ◽  
Social Modernization ◽  
The Arab Spring ◽  
The Eu ◽  
Civil Societies

As part of a repertoire of the European Union’s (EU’s) geopolitical practices, the imaginary of Mediterranean Neighbourhood is a means with which to manage dissonance between the EU’s self-image as a normative power, changing political situations in the region and the Realpolitik of security. We argue that this also involved a ‘politics of in/visibility’ that promotes democratization and social modernization through structured cooperation while engaging selectively with local stakeholders. In directing attention to EU readings of and responses to the ‘Arab Spring’, we indicate how both a simplification of the issues at stake and highly selective political framings of local civil societies have operated in tandem. Drawing on a review of recent literature on civil society activism in the southern Mediterranean, we specifically deal with Eurocentric appropriations of civil society as a force for change and as a central element in the construction of the Mediterranean Neighbourhood. EU support for South Mediterranean civil society appears to be targeted at specific actors with whom the EU deems it can work: apart from national elites these include well-established, professionalized non-governmental organizations, and westernized elements of national civil societies. As a result, recognition of the heterogeneous and multilocal nature of the uprisings, as well as their causes, has only marginally translated into serious European Neighbourhood Policy reform. We suggest that an inclusive focus on civil society would reveal Neighbourhood as a contact zone and dialogic space, rather than a project upon which the EU is (rather unsuccessfully) attempting to superimpose a unifying narrative of EU-led modernization.

The Arab Spring a decade on: information and communication technologies as a mass mobilization tool

Kybernetes ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jelisaveta Blagojević ◽  
Radenko Scekic
Keyword(s):  
Theoretical Model ◽  
Information And Communication Technologies ◽  
Arab Spring ◽  
Regime Change ◽  
Communication Technologies ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Information And Communication ◽  
The Arab Spring ◽  
Crisis Situations

PurposeThe purpose of this research paper is to address the main research gap related to the lack of sufficient information regarding the role of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in second Arab Spring wave in comparison to the first one. The authors analysed the role of ICTs via data regarding the access to ICTs and its influence on organization and spread of the anti-regime protests, i.e. regime change.Design/methodology/approachCrisis situations are unpredictable, complex and unexpected. The consequences produced by the crisis situations or events may be negative for an individual, community, organization or society as a whole. In the new millennium, ICTs have an important role in deep social crises. The new technologies enable not only the rapid spread of certain political ideas, spin information, but also the spread of misinformation. The control over ICTs in the crisis situations is crucial. The aim of this paper is to indicate effect of the use of ICTs in the crisis situations, i.e. political upheavals in 11 countries of the “Arab Spring”. The contribution of this paper is based on the development of a special theoretical model of analysis that represents the combination of the theoretical considerations in the field of ICTs, as well as the analysis in the field of transitology, i.e. democratization. The first part of the paper is focussed on the development of ICT transition theory of ICTs’ impact on the process of political change, setting the hypotheses and the explanation of methodological approach of the paper. The second part is related to the review and description of data regarding ICTs use, while the third one discusses the impact of the use of ICTs in organizing and spreading protests in the Arab world, in line with the defined theoretical framework. Finally, there are given the research results in terms of confirming or refuting the hypotheses through the analysis of Arab transition cases.FindingsThe authors confirmed the main hypothesis of the paper that the factors that determined the role of ICTs in first Spring, also, have determined the role of ICTs in second Spring wave. These factors include high access to ICT tools, weak regime's control over ICTs’ use and important cross-border networking with regional and international audience. All that formed the promotional role of ICTs in regime change in 8 of the 11 countries mentioned in the paper.Originality/valueApart from the developed special theoretical model and the analysis of new wave Arab Spring cases, the significance and originality of this paper is reflected in a comprehensive and multidisciplinary approach that connects political changes and the use of ICTs in disseminating certain policies and ideas.

Civil society and social movements

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carmelo Pérez-Beltrán ◽  
Ignacio Álvarez-Ossorio
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
General Framework ◽  
Arab Spring ◽  
Political Agenda ◽  
Mena Region ◽  
Civil Society Organisations ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Organisational Structures ◽  
Charity Work ◽  
The Arab Spring

This chapter establishes a general framework that enables to assess the situation of civil society in the MENA region, before and after the Arab Spring. The Arab Spring undermined many of the theories that dwelt on the depoliticisation of civil society, its inability to influence the political agenda and the customary use made of it as an instrument of authoritarian regimes. Although this activism appeared to take on new forms, it was not spontaneously generated, but included an accumulation of baggage from the past, in constant relationship and tension with the state; hence, along with associations concerned with charity work and development, there also existed another more critical and politically committed type of organisation, in which the theory of the persistence of authoritarianism had not shown sufficient interest. Likewise, the Arab Spring questioned the institutionalised, structured, organisational nature of civil society that transitology usually supports. During the uprisings, none of the traditional or formal civil society organisations came to the fore, either in their interventionist (NGOs) or their most contestatory dimensions (human rights organisations, Islamist groups, or more politicised platforms). Thus, the chapter shows that it is necessary to go beyond a certain reductionist view of what civil society is and to propose another concept, much more dynamic, creative and horizontalist that involves not only hierarchical organisational structures, but also other spaces of mobilisation in which the citizenry can express its social, political and economic commitment.

“The War Took Us Backwards”

Hawwa ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 16 (1-3) ◽  
pp. 266-308
Author(s):  
Sophia Pandya
Keyword(s):  
Gender Roles ◽  
Family Dynamics ◽  
Arab Spring ◽  
Religious Groups ◽  
Family Separation ◽  
Ritual Performance ◽  
Political Activities ◽  
And Gender ◽  
High Level ◽  
The Arab Spring

AbstractIf political activities (demonstration, revolution, war) can be understood as forms of ritual performance in which temporary social hegemonic inversions typically are followed by competing efforts to restore structure or define a new structure, then under what conditions would they offer potential for changes in family dynamics and gender roles? The past few years in Yemen have witnessed extraordinary political and socioeconomic turbulence, from the 2011 Arab Spring revolution to the 2015 brutal war. Yemeni families have been significantly impacted in myriad ways, including displacement, family separation, poverty, violence, unemployment, sectarian strife, disruption of education, and mental illness. Men and women have demonstrated a high level of public activism during the Arab Spring and the war, further altering family dynamics and the gendered social tapestry, in a highly patriarchal country. Social “disorder,” including modification of gender roles, is often challenged by those desiring to restore “order,” the “traditional” family structure, and patriarchy. This study analyzes gendered dimensions of the “Yemen Spring” and the subsequent war, with a particular focus on the link between gendered family dynamics and the sociopolitical landscape, also considering the role religion and religious groups play.

scholarly journals “Arab Spring” in the Context of Contemporary Transformation Process in the Near and Middle East

2016 ◽  
pp. 109-122
Author(s):  
V. Shved
Keyword(s):  
Model Transformation ◽  
Arab Spring ◽  
Arab World ◽  
Arab Country ◽  
Transformation Process ◽  
Long Time ◽  
Syrian Conflict ◽  
The Arab Spring ◽  
Revolutionary Period

The article analyses the role of the “Arab Spring” as the beginning of long time process of deep transformation changes in the Arab World. Special attention is paid to understanding of particularities of contemporary stage of the above-mentioned post-revolutionary period. The article also studies such actual problems as internal and external aspects of defeat of the first wave of the contemporary Arab revolutions, content and direction of contemporary change of format of the Arab Spring and results of acute sharpening of the Sunni-Shiite confrontation. It also studies reasons and purposes of the direct Russian intervention in the Syrian conflict. The analysis values of the Tunisian development model transformation prospects for democratic renewal of Arab society and identified the reasons why after the "Arab Spring" Tunisia became virtually the only Arab country which has been extended and deepened the democratic process.

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