Arab Spring: Difference between revisions

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Very few analysts of the Arab societies foresaw a mass movement on such a scale that might threaten the existing order. In his 1993 sociological study of the Arab societies, culture and state, Barakat stated confidently that "one should expect the first Arab popular revolution to take place in Egypt or Tunisia. This does not, however, exclude the possibility that revolutions may occur in more pluralistic societies as well."{{sfn|Barakat|1993|pages=15–17}} What was prevalent, according to the Syrian writer and political dissident [[Yassin al-Haj Saleh]] was three 'springs' that ensured the status quo. One of which was a "spring of despotic states that receive assistance and legitimacy from a world system centered around stability".<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.yassinhs.com/2016/02/19/syria-and-the-world-reactionarism-is-back-and-progressing|last=al-Haj Saleh|first=Yassin|date=19 February 2016|access-date=15 April 2019|title=Syria and the World: Reactionarism is Back, and Progressing}}</ref> Most democracy protests do not result in reforms.<ref>Dawn Brancati. 2016. ''Democracy Protests: Origins, Features, and Significance.'' New York: Cambridge University Press.</ref>
 
Two months into the Tunisian and Egyptian uprisings, ''[[The Economist]]'' magazine in a leader article spoke about a new generation of young people, idealists, "inspired by democracy" made revolutions. Those epic cool revolutions, the article stated, "are going the right way, with a hopeful new mood prevailing and free elections in the offing".<ref>{{cite magazine|url=https://www.economist.com/leaders/2011/03/31/islam-and-the-arab-revolutions|title=Islam and the Arab revolutions|date=31 March 2011|magazine=The Economist|access-date=16 April 2019}}</ref> For those on the streets of Egypt the predominant slogan was "bread, freedom and social justice".<ref>{{cite web|url=http://mediterraneanaffairs.com/bread-freedom-and-social-justice|title=Bread, freedom and social justice|publisher=Mediterranean Affairs|date=5 February 2015|access-date=16 April 2019}}</ref>
 
Some observers, however, have questioned the revolutionary nature of the 'Arab Spring'. A social theorist specialising in social movements and social change in the Middle East, [[Asef Bayat]], has provided an analysis based on his decades-long of research as "a participant-observer" (his own words). In his appraisal of the Arab revolutions, Bayat discerns a remarkable difference between these revolutions and the revolutions of the 1960s and 1970s in countries like Yemen, [[Nicaragua]] and Iran. The Arab revolutions, argues Bayat, "lacked any associated intellectual anchor" and the predominant voices, "secular and Islamists alike, took free market, property relations, and neoliberal rationality for granted" and uncritically.<ref name="Bayat">{{harvnb|Bayat|2017|p=11}}</ref> New social movements' define themselves as horizontal networks with aversion to the state and central authority. Thus their "political objective is not to capture the state", a fundamental feature in the twentieth-century revolutionary movements.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/63903/1/MahaAbdelrahman_Social%20movements-2015.pdf|last=Abdelrahman|first=Maha|title=Social Movement and the Quest for Organisation: Egypt and Everywhere|publisher=LSE Middle East Centre Paper Series, 08|date=September 2015|pages=6–7|access-date=6 April 2019}}</ref> Instead of revolution or reform, Bayat speaks of 'refolution'.<ref>{{cite journal|url=https://newleftreview.org/issues/II80/articles/asef-bayat-revolution-in-bad-times|last=Bayat|first=Asef|title=Revolution in Bad Times|journal=New Left Review|issue=80 |date=March–April 2013|access-date=15 April 2019}}</ref>