How has the foreign policy of Tunis been affected by the democratization process that began in January 2011? The relationship that can be established between a certain type of political regime and foreign policy is particularly complex and far from unambiguous, let alone during critical political transitions (Nohlen and Fernández 1991, Whitehead 2008). In the case of Tunisia, without prior, substantive experience with democratic institutions (A. Stepan, 1986), the effects of the transition from authoritarian rule in the foreign policy were relatively pronounced, especially during the first three years (2011-2013). The immediate effect of new personalities, interests, institutions, and ideologies in the process of democratization increased uncertainty and instability in Tunis’ relations. The foreign policy during this period was two-track, presidential and islamist, both based on their respective reactivated international networks. Then, from 2014 on, patterns of state-societal interaction were established through new constitutional structures, making the societal influences over foreign policy less subject to principles-based contingencies, or factors such as personal charisma. Interpersonal and partisan rivalries in 2013 put an end to what remained of “presidential diplomacy”, and a predominantly securitarian approach to international politics was confirmed. This adjustment did not mean, however, a complete return to Ben Ali’s foreign policy. All out, in both periods, 2011-2013 and 2014-2017, the self-conscious use, by the post-revolutionary leadership in Tunisia, of foreign policy as a tool for national integration and legitimation of authority (Cerny 1979) is evident, as is the necessity for coping with international power structures and an evolving regional conflictivity (i.e. war in Libya). To explore the above argument further, I examine the causes and consequences of the political transition and liberalization for foreign policy in the Tunisian stances towards a) the Palestinian question, and b) the war in Syria. Much of this case study is based on the reconstruction of facts and empirical evidence around the actions and statements by Tunisian, Arab and international presidents, prime ministers, ministers of foreign affairs and other important high-level officials. It is also based on the identification and examination of institutional and personal networks of Tunisian foreign policy (this is done through interviews to Tunisian, Arab, and Western specialists and actors).

It is hardly surprising that political uprisings resulting in war, famine, and civil conflict produce mass disillusionment. However, it is surprising that populations undergoing largely-peaceful political liberalization experience widespread disillusionment, as in the case of Tunisia after the 2010 uprising. Existing literature, couched largely in studies of former communist states, depicts post-revolution disillusionment as the product of widespread desires to a return to a unifying state ideology and economic regulation after neo-liberalization. However, these explanations do not match the already-neoliberal Tunisian case. We use national-level data, responses to cross-national opinion surveys, and original qualitative fieldwork conducted in Tunisia in 2013 and 2014 to investigate why the Arab Spring’s only “successful” revolution produced mass disillusionment. Building on theories ontological security and quotidian disruption, we find that disillusionment stems not from economic restructuring or antipathy toward democracy as an ideal, but from disruptions to individuals’ taken-for-granted, everyday routines due to an attenuation of state capacity, economic disruptions, and changes to the nation’s vulnerability vis-à-vis other states. In so doing, we shed theoretical light on the paradox of why even successful revolutionary movements produce disillusionment, de-mobilization, and atomization among populations supportive of democratic ideals.

The Globalisation of Political and Civil Society and its Effects on Democratisation. Evidence from US-Tunisia Relations (2004–2010) During the early 2000s the neoliberal economic experiment in Tunisia was losing strength, gradually causing domestic discontent and internal upheavals. Within the national elite frustration was also growing steadily, leading some actors to seek ‘aid beyond the borders’. Against this backdrop, Ben Ali’s tightening repression was perceived as unacceptable by the US administration, which during the last official meeting in 2004 in Washington urged him to bring about a number of liberalising steps in a short space of time. As none of the requirements were fulfilled, the US raised its critical profile vis-à-vis Ben Ali. While maintaining good official relations at the diplomatic level, a multifaceted range of agencies, think tanks, academic institutions and international lobbies associated to the US administration implemented programs and launched initiatives in order to strengthen transnational ties with relevant members of the civil and political communities. Analysing data from the archives of the US State department, US agencies, US institutions and relying on a number of semi-structured interviews in Washington (DC) and Tunisia, this paper argues that Tunisia’s journey to Ben Ali’s demise was not exclusively a domestic game among political and social players. Without claiming any direct involvement by the United States in the planning of the revolution, this paper demonstrates that a number of interactions promoted by the US, including informal talks and training programs with Tunisian political and civil societies, lowered the geopolitical significance of Ben Ali’s hold on power. Moreover it illustrates how the rise of international interactions via embassies, international conferences and international lobbies enabled the US in identifying?–?and bargaining?–?with the alternative coalitions of power, potentially filling any vacuum in the event of Ben Ali’s demise. This article provides empirical data to test the theories of the international dimension of regime change (Pridham 1993, Whitehead 1996, Yilmaz 2002, Levitsky and Way 2010) in the only democratised Arab country, where dominant domestic explanations have hitherto prevailed. In conclusion, drawing on previous research by the author, this paper attempts to frame a theoretical template for explaining what the international variables are essential in allowing a transition to democracy in the MENA regions.

The outpouring of collective memory in Tunisia in the aftermath of the 2011 revolution corresponded with several anniversaries of the actors of the Tunisian left, including the Perspectives/Af?q movement and the Tunisian Labor Union (UGTT). Public events mourning the passing of influential figures accelerated the movement from former Tunisian leftists to release their memoirs to the domestic market as they began to talk openly about the years spent in Bourguiba’s jails from the sixties to the eighties in newspapers and on documentaries. In addition, testimonies delivered to the Tunisian transitional justice commission and shared on prime time national television have lifted the veil over this dark and silenced period of Tunisia’s past in efforts to address a shared collective trauma. Their experience has the potential to reshape the history of the recent past in Tunisia: for two decades, several dozen activists and leaders of the left were arbitrarily detailed and poorly treated in the state’s violent prisons, in addition to shorter sentences for hundreds of student protesters. Their imprisonments have dislocated families and continued to be silenced even after their releases, and their erasure from the national narrative has been symptomatic of the oppressive authoritarian state that provoked the uprisings of 2011. This paper will review the state of this “archive of trauma” and highlight the complex task of rewriting a history of the Tunisian left and a more inclusive history of the recent past in Tunisia that accounts for the social experience of imprisonment and torture, and the trauma of having to re-integrate life under an oppressive system without rehabilitation. The left in Tunisia contains a high number of highly-educated individuals (professors, journalists etc.) keen to share their stories, hence the availability of memoirs and written testimonies on which this paper will be based. This dimension of political transition is often neglected, corresponds to a growing academic literature on memory, violence and reconciliation in practice in the Middle East. This case will be discussed in relation to the Moroccan truth commission and the Algerian amnesty, and hopes to show how actors in the Tunisian public, civil society and political process see the potential that memory and history would play for a robust national transition.