Some error occured while loading the Quick View. Please close the Quick View and try reloading the page.
Achcar argues that the Arab Spring was but the beginning of a long-term revolutionary process – a perspective confirmed by a second wave of uprisings in 2019 – and outlines the requirements for a solution to the crisis; this new edition features a preface drawing a balance sheet of the upheaval’s first decade.
‘The people want’ – thus began the slogans chanted by millions of protesters in 2011 in what was dubbed the ‘Arab Spring’. While the protests revealed a long-suppressed craving for democracy, they also laid bare a deep structural crisis.
In this landmark work, Middle East analyst Gilbert Achcar examines the socio-economic roots and political dynamics of the regional upheaval. He assesses the peculiarities of the region’s states and regimes, and sheds light on the movements that use Islam as a political banner.
‘The most careful, insightful, and erudite study to date of the Arab uprising.’-Kevin Anderson (University of California, Santa Barbara), Marx and Philosophy Review of Books
‘Achcar’s precise and illuminating analyses contrast with the usual discourses on the Arab Spring.’-Henry Laurens (Collège de France), L’Orient Littéraire
‘A thoughtful and acute analysis … Jargon-free, clear, and a model of marrying theory to empirical material.’- Laleh Khalili (Queen Mary, University of London), Middle East in London
‘[This book] extends an invitation to the reader to leave a hall of mirrors that often guides explanations of the uprisings … historical events and conceptual constructs start to take a completely different shape.’ - Maha Abdelrahman (University of Cambridge), Jadaliyya
List of Tables viii
Preface to the Second Edition ix Acknowledgements xxii Introduction: Uprisings and Revolutions 1
Chapter One Fettered Development 9
The Facts 14
Poverty, Inequality, Precarity 20
Informal Sector and Unemployment: The Bouazizi Syndrome 29
Youth Underemployment 33
Female Underemployment 37
Graduate Unemployment 42
Fetters on Development 46
Chapter Two The Peculiar Modalities of Capitalism in the Arab Region 49
The Problem of Investment 51
Public and Private Investment 54
A Specific Variant of the Capitalist Mode of Production 68
1. Rentier and Patrimonial States 72
2. A Politically Determined Capitalism: Nepotism and Risk 81
The Genesis of the Specific Regional Variant of Capitalism: An Overview 90
Chapter Three Regional Political Factors 101
The Oil Curse 102
From “Arab Despotic Exception” to “Democracy Promotion” 115
The Muslim Brothers, Washington and the Saudis 127
The Muslim Brothers, Washington and Qatar 137
Al Jazeera and the Upheaval in the Arab Mediascape 147
Chapter Four Actors and Parameters of the Revolution 155
Overdetermination and Subjective Conditions 156
The Workers’ Movement and Social Struggles 168
New Actors and New Information and Communication Technologies 176
States and Revolutions 187
Chapter Five A Provisional Balance Sheet of the Arab Uprising 198
Coups d’État and Revolutions 198
Provisional Balance Sheet No. 1: Tunisia 199
Provisional Balance Sheet No. 2: Egypt 203
Provisional Balance Sheet No. 3: Yemen 213
Provisional Balance Sheet No. 4: Bahrain 220
Provisional Balance Sheet No. 5: Libya 225
Provisional Balance Sheet No. 6: Syria 237
6. Co-opting the Uprising 260
Washington and the Muslim Brothers, Take Two 261
NATO, Libya, and Syria 272
The “Islamic Tsunami” and the Difference between Khomeini and Morsi 287
Conclusion: The Future of the Arab Uprising 302
The Difference between Erdogan and Ghannouchi ... 302
… And the Difference between Erdogan and Morsi 312
Conditions for a Genuine Solution 327
Notes 340
References and Sources 380
Further Reading 404
Index 406