On the Legacy of the Revolutions

The following remarks were made by Hibaaq Osman to the Forum on Women’s Rights in the MENA Region, “From the Arab Spring to the Post-COVID-19 Future”, Webster University Geneva, MENA Center for Peace and Development, Thursday December 3, 2020.

Whenever you are asked to reflect on the legacy of a revolution, it’s hard not to think of the words of Chinese Prime Minister Zhou Enlai.

When asked in 1972 about the significance of the French Revolution, he replied that it “was too early to say”.

He may well have been thinking of the protests of 1968, but in his words are a lesson for us when looking back at momentous events, especially those that we lived through.

What can we definitively say about the revolutions, apart from what felt unthinkable at the time: ten years later, no one would seriously suggest that they delivered on their promise.

To have experienced the revolutions at the time was truly extraordinary. To see the pictures of the crowds gathering on Avenue Habib Bourguiba in Tunis took your breath away. 

To be in Tahrir Square in Cairo. To feel the energy and determination. It felt like anything was possible.

That hope was tempered by realism. Women especially did not walk out onto those streets blindly.

Women truly knew the challenge that they faced in trying to bring change. They knew how strong the resistance would be, within and without our societies. They knew that it would be women who faced the first and most ferocious backlash. 

Perhaps most of all, women activists recognized that the people’s anger alone would not lead to a better society. 

Activists knew of the importance of an organized and established civil society.

We can see evidence for this in the country which arguably faired better than any other through the revolution - Tunisia. 

Even that notion, however, would be deeply contested by Tunisians. 

They would emphasize that their country continues to feel on the brink of collapse. The problems that made revolution feel inevitable are still endemic - inequality, corruption, food price inflation, and an economy that was faltering even before Covid-19.

It is an indictment of the revolutions that despite all this, Tunisia is still in a better position than other countries in the region. 

So why was Tunisia better equipped - though not exactly well equipped - to navigate the currents of the revolution?

It is because they had a better developed and well-established civil society. 

It was through the existence, determination and leadership of groups like the Tunisian National Dialogue Quartet that the difficult post-revolution process did not collapse entirely.

In societies left hollowed-out by authoritarians and dictators, the speed of revolutions left little or no time for the essential work of building constituencies and nurturing leaders with credibility and confidence. 

That has been one of the most significant barriers to women in particular realizing the potential of the revolutions.

In a situation where women are already discriminated against under the law, where they are politically marginalized, and where there has been little social and political space for discussion of the women’s agenda, women have even more ground to make up.

From Tunisia in 2010, to Sudan in 2019, women’s movements and women’s participation has been central to the revolutions we have seen.

The problem has been that as soon as the revolutions turn from mass movements to political processes, more established political forces assert themselves and that’s when we see women pushed aside.

This is exactly what has been happening in Sudan.

Women were at the forefront of the Sudan Uprising. Reports say that women made up the majority of the protestors - as much as 70 percent.

They became the icons of the revolution, their pictures shared across the globe on social media.

But the political establishment was happy for women to simply be the figureheads of the revolution, and not the leaders of the change they demanded.

Women’s participation in the transition has been far from the parity they demanded.

It’s the same story. Women find equality in the streets, but the inequality returns as soon as the movements disperse.

An underdeveloped civil society stunted through restrictions and lack of support leaves a vacuum where progressive voices would be able to participate in transitions and provide a support system to guide societies through uncertainty. 

However, the people who were prepared for the vacuum and the uncertainty of the revolutions were the Islamists. 

They were ready and willing to take full advantage, either at the ballot box, or with force of arms.

Their intention has not been simply to roll back any advances women were able to grasp through the revolutions, but to turn the clock back even further.

And their methods were calculated and insidious. 

In Egypt, Hosni Mubarak’s wife Suzanne had taken the cause of women’s rights as her own. At the Beijing World Conference on Women in 1995, it was Suzanne Mubarak who had led Egypt’s delegation - though only as a figurehead - and it was she who had publicly lobbied for women’s political quotas and reforms to divorce laws. 

So when Mubarak was ultimately forced out, the issue of women’s rights was closely associated by many people with his regime. Dedicated women’s rights defenders and advocates were tarred by this association. Conservatives were keen to promote in the public mind a view that demands for women’s political participation were masked calls for a return of the old regime.

We see here the twin problems at work. A hollowed out civil society, in which the elite plays the role without building sustainable support. And secondly, established and organized forces of regression.

This is not to say that women’s movements were starting from zero.

Even in countries that had in effect outlawed civil society, such as Libya, there were prominent and capable women with a vision for equality and democracy.

But building a national consensus during a crisis is a difficult task for governments, let alone organizations whose first struggle is simply for sustainability.

It was our experience that the revolutions did see an increase in the willingness of women’s groups to work together. 

The opportunity presented by the revolutions fostered greater collaboration and cooperation. Prior to this, there was more competition and rivalry. These were - to an extent - set aside, with people prepared to unify their vision and work toward it.

Where women’s groups were able to innovate, they have been able to shine.

The digital space proved to be a very significant point of entry for young people into the political space. 

Women were able to organize and build truly remarkable platforms. Social media was an important tool for protest - though not in itself a serious pillar of the revolutions - but its utility is now greatly diminished, and even gone into reverse. 

Just as male violence drove women off the streets and into the margins, online platforms have become another means through which women activists are harassed, defamed, and attacked. 

I do not want to preempt anything in the next discussion on social media, but I will say that this situation is particularly acute in countries that are experiencing conflict.

It is not simply a cliche to say that social media has become another battlefield. Militias are deployed to attack online as a key part of their overall tactics and strategy.

Social media has become a more dangerous place for women and girls, something that has become more prominent during the current pandemic. 

Thanks to Covid-19, those of us who are able to reliably connect now do everything we can online. It has meant we have been able to approximate much of our work - but it has also exposed the limitations of technology. Not only are we subject to a regulatory wasteland where our data and our access are at the mercy of big corporations, but online work is an adjunct to activism and not a substitute.

Though its significance for organizing and mobilizing are questionable, we still see how important traditional media and social media can be for inspiring on a vast scale.

Global social movements are still able to give voice to those who have been politically marginalized. 

Black Lives Matter emerged from very particular and very local issues. It quickly transcended them to become a call to action globally to address and end racial injustice and inequality. 

It is a movement that we in North Africa and the Middle East especially need to pay heed to. 

We have all been outraged by the murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Eric Garner and so many more in the United States. We are all disgusted by the brutal attack on the music producer Michel Zecler by police in France. We see racism blight the lives of black and brown people across North America and Europe.

But we must recognize and actively work to end anti-black racism in this region. 

We need to dismantle the systems of oppression that lead to the appalling treatment of refugees and migrants moving through North Africa, the abuse of domestic workers, and the every day discrimination and marginalization experienced by Black people across the region.

This urgently needs to be national agenda across North Africa and the Middle East. 

There are more global policies and attitudes that we must address. 

I explored earlier the internal forces that confronted women’s movements in the revolutions. But they were not the only enemies of justice and equality. For all that many international governments wish to emphasize their commitment to democracy, it is a fact that foreign influence and interventions throughout the last decade have been misguided, misconceived, and entirely disastrous for the people of the region. 

I can only imagine the world we might be in had the billions spent on military aid been instead invested in education, sustainable economies, and trying to prevent climate disaster.

It is fair to ask why international governments save their most ardent support for warlords and dictators, rather than those with a hope of building a more democratic and equal society.

The immediate post-colonial era was drenched in the blood of African democrats, murdered at the hands of the retreating colonial powers. 

Equally foreign governments conspired with or acquiesced in the authoritarian era that led to December 2010. Rotten institutions whose facades and corruption were supported by the international community.

The Arab revolutions were bloody, especially so for women, and for a new generation of activists in jail, in exile, in the grave.

When we ask the question, ‘why did the revolutions fail?’ let us not forget that there are answers to be found here in Europe as well as in North Africa and the Middle East.

At this time, we should not forget the moment we identify as the start of the revolutions. A man, trying to make a decent living, was so desperate, so frustrated by corruption at once both petty and all-consuming, that he saw no future for himself. 

The problem - one that to this day has not been solved - is that people recognized themselves in Mohamed Bouazizi’s despair. That is why his death stirred millions of people.

Too many of the same problems are apparent in the lives of people across the region. Does that mean we are still living through the revolutions?

If I can return to Zhou Enlai, it is too early to say.