What is private, what is public, and who exercises media power in Tunisia? A hybrid-functional perspective on Tunisia's media sector

Local associative media in Tunisia and the value of voice

“…HAICA's regulatory powers have also been challenged, and at times completely ignored, by private media interests (Farmanfarmaian 2014;Labidi 2017). Private media ownership, and instrumentalisation, by political actors, despite it being banned outright by HAICA's charters, remains common (Farmanfarmaian 2014;Richter 2017).…”

“…HAICA's regulatory powers have also been challenged, and at times completely ignored, by private media interests (Farmanfarmaian 2014;Labidi 2017). Private media ownership, and instrumentalisation, by political actors, despite it being banned outright by HAICA's charters, remains common (Farmanfarmaian 2014;Richter 2017). A study conducted by Reporters without Borders and Tunisian civil society initiative al-Khatt, on media ownership in Tunisia, found that 6 out of 10 television channels had a 'direct or indirect link with a party or a politician' (Al-Khatt and RSF 2016).…”

The Subtle Dynamics of Power Struggles in Tunisia: Local media since the Arab Uprisings

“…The national media in Tunisia has not entirely broken free of its past close connections to the political and business elite who have bought into the democratic transition only as far as "the more things change, the more they stay the same." The extent that the national media, then, contributes to the democratic transition is uncertain given that, as Farmanfarmaian (2014) has said, the "power of media barons is immense." However, as this article has argued, local community media in Tunisia demonstrates the potential of local community media to empower local communities and promote democratisation.…”

Media and the politics of the sacral: freedom of expression in Tunisia after the Arab Uprisings

“…Political platforms of competing party leaders appeared in the newspapers; television talk shows – too unscripted to be countenanced by the Ben Ali authorities – proliferated; and evening news programmes, previously so anodyne that they had drawn less than 20% of the watching public, skyrocketed in popularity, reaching 80% of the population during the elections (Farmanfarmaian, 2014). Tunisians repeatedly noted that liberation of the media was one of the first clear achievements of the revolution and daily reminded them as citizens that their society was free from official interference and control (Hichem Snoussi, HAICA, 24 January 2014, personal communication).…”

“…The government obstructed enactment of the new Decree Laws 115 and 116, refused to enable the establishment of an auto-regulatory press council and delayed for months appointments to HAICA, the audiovisual regulator. Instead, it illegally placed its own supporters at the head of Wataniya Television and other key media institutions, prompting INRIC to disband and leaving a vacuum that went unfilled for over a year, when at last, HAICA could take shape (Farmanfarmaian, 2014; Laabadi, 2013). A sense of humiliation and indignity gripped the media in this period.…”