Spatial Dynamics of the Arab Uprisings

Abstract

Analyses of the spread of the Arab uprisings have been dominated by three comparative angles. Single-country studies have emerged as the most common framework, often put to use in a second comparative approach of examining variation across cases. For example, studies explore which states have had major uprisings and which have not, which uprisings were peaceful and which were violent, and so on (Amar and Prashad 2013; Haddad, Bsheer, and Abu-Rish 2012; McMurray and Ufheil-Somers 2013; Sowers and Toensing 2013). A third approach explores comparisons with other waves of popular mobilization against authoritarian regimes, for example, in Europe during the mid-nineteenth century, Eastern Europe following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989, and so on (Patel, Bunce, and Wolchik 2013 Weyland 2012). These literatures investigate the complex processes of mobilization, revolution, and transition unfolding in parts of the Middle East since the outbreak of the uprisings in late 2010. From the literature on revolutions, for example, we know that a popularly based movement that brings about some change in political leadership does not necessarily lead to a regime change resulting in a fundamental overturning of an economic, political, or social system. From past cases we have learned that at least some old institutions and alliances almost always reemerge, and what form the new institution will take eventually is often unknown for several years—for example, think of the Iranian revolution, let alone the French revolution. As events in postrevolutionary Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, and Yemen continue to unfold—and it is questionable whether those revolutions are even over—and as the bloody civil war in Syria continues, these insights provide us with useful tools for examining how institutions, processes, and power relations are changing—and how they are not.

The Generative Power of Protest: Time and Space in Contentious Politics

“…Instead, space "constitutes and structures relationships and networks (Martin & Miller, 2003, p. 143). Studies of the 2011 Arab uprisings and other occupation-based movements, for instance, have drawn attention to struggles over space as a core feature of contentious activism, and have highlighted the symbolic dimensions of space (Gregory, 2013;Gunning & Baron, 2014;Hammond, 2013;Schwedler, 2013). As Jillian Schwelder notes, the Arab uprisings "have attempted, sometimes successfully, a radical reclaiming of public spaces by citizens who are insisting that their countries belong to them rather than to corrupt and repressive regimes" (2013, p. 232).…”

Constructing an Islamic Nation: National Mosque Building as a Form of Nation-Building

“…Instead analysis has tended to focus on a single national mosque as a case study (Baram 2014, Rogan 1986, Wainscott 2017) with a few notable exceptions (Hassner 2009; Koch, Valiyev, and Zaini 2017; Rizvi 2015). Mosques, within the broader category of gathering places, received some attention in the wake of the Arab Spring protests as scholars emphasized the importance of appropriate physical space in overcoming collective action problems (Butt 2016, Schwedler 2013) as well as how regimes often responded to mass collective action by destroying the spaces in which it had occurred (Ehsani 2014, Hasso and Salime 2016).…”

Public Space and the Public Sphere: The Legacy of Neil Smith

“…Contemporary social movements and political uprisings belie arguments that public space and the public sphere can be conceptually or physically separated. The tumultuous events of the Arab Spring including the Egyptian "revolution" and the global Occupy movement including Occupy Wall Street and Occupy Boston drew inspiration and generative capacity from the places in which they occurred, the affective atmospheres created and the energy the public settings provided (American Ethnologist 2012;Schwedler 2013). If the public sphere can be described as "the sphere of private people coming together as a public" (Habermas 2001:27), its emergence then has a geography as well as history.…”