Un printemps arabe ? L’émulation protestataire et ses limites

The term “Arab Spring” has become patently obvious to describe a process of protest emulation unprecedented in the region. Such metaphor owes much to media fluency. However, issues raised by the “Arab Spring” cannot be limited to this type of acceptations. They refer to both the limits of protest em...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Michel Camau
Format: Article
Language:fra
Published: CNRS Éditions 2012-10-01
Series:L’Année du Maghreb
Subjects:
Online Access:https://journals.openedition.org/anneemaghreb/1383
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
_version_ 1832581765465636864
author Michel Camau
author_facet Michel Camau
author_sort Michel Camau
collection DOAJ
description The term “Arab Spring” has become patently obvious to describe a process of protest emulation unprecedented in the region. Such metaphor owes much to media fluency. However, issues raised by the “Arab Spring” cannot be limited to this type of acceptations. They refer to both the limits of protest emulation and those of our own knowledge. No one had foreseen the “Tunisian Revolution”, no more than its spinoffs in Egypt and other Arab countries. The protest momentum spread but it did not occur in the same form or with the same intensity elsewhere, and above all, it did not produce the same effects. There is an overall margin of uncertainty, which may be elucidated through consideration of three types of problems, closely related but analytically distinct: the ambiguity of the “revolution” label, the surprise generated by events regarded afterwards as inevitable, and the effects of demonstration and context in the protest cycle. We attempted to address those issues based on the idea of crisis of legitimacy as a criterion of differentiation between the “Arab revolutions”, and of pluralistic ignorance with regard to the unclear preferences of those in authority positions and finally of the rulers’ learning in relation to their methods of prevention and management of crises of legitimacy.
format Article
id doaj-art-547c5f2b02e84188bff0b6174e3e7ae0
institution Kabale University
issn 1952-8108
2109-9405
language fra
publishDate 2012-10-01
publisher CNRS Éditions
record_format Article
series L’Année du Maghreb
spelling doaj-art-547c5f2b02e84188bff0b6174e3e7ae02025-01-30T09:56:59ZfraCNRS ÉditionsL’Année du Maghreb1952-81082109-94052012-10-018274710.4000/anneemaghreb.1383Un printemps arabe ? L’émulation protestataire et ses limitesMichel CamauThe term “Arab Spring” has become patently obvious to describe a process of protest emulation unprecedented in the region. Such metaphor owes much to media fluency. However, issues raised by the “Arab Spring” cannot be limited to this type of acceptations. They refer to both the limits of protest emulation and those of our own knowledge. No one had foreseen the “Tunisian Revolution”, no more than its spinoffs in Egypt and other Arab countries. The protest momentum spread but it did not occur in the same form or with the same intensity elsewhere, and above all, it did not produce the same effects. There is an overall margin of uncertainty, which may be elucidated through consideration of three types of problems, closely related but analytically distinct: the ambiguity of the “revolution” label, the surprise generated by events regarded afterwards as inevitable, and the effects of demonstration and context in the protest cycle. We attempted to address those issues based on the idea of crisis of legitimacy as a criterion of differentiation between the “Arab revolutions”, and of pluralistic ignorance with regard to the unclear preferences of those in authority positions and finally of the rulers’ learning in relation to their methods of prevention and management of crises of legitimacy.https://journals.openedition.org/anneemaghreb/1383learningcrisis of legitimacypluralistic ignoranceforecastingrevolution
spellingShingle Michel Camau
Un printemps arabe ? L’émulation protestataire et ses limites
L’Année du Maghreb
learning
crisis of legitimacy
pluralistic ignorance
forecasting
revolution
title Un printemps arabe ? L’émulation protestataire et ses limites
title_full Un printemps arabe ? L’émulation protestataire et ses limites
title_fullStr Un printemps arabe ? L’émulation protestataire et ses limites
title_full_unstemmed Un printemps arabe ? L’émulation protestataire et ses limites
title_short Un printemps arabe ? L’émulation protestataire et ses limites
title_sort un printemps arabe l emulation protestataire et ses limites
topic learning
crisis of legitimacy
pluralistic ignorance
forecasting
revolution
url https://journals.openedition.org/anneemaghreb/1383
work_keys_str_mv AT michelcamau unprintempsarabelemulationprotestataireetseslimites