“The fall of the Egyptian dictator, Hosni Mubarak, ten years ago today, was a triumph for popular mobilization. But the revolutionary forces lacked the political organization and vision needed to head off a counterrevolutionary backlash that restored the authoritarian state’s power.”
Category: tragic politics
Robert Solé: “Ten Years of Hope and Blood”
“But in Lebanon, as in Algeria or Sudan, the game is not over. The same can be said of all the countries that have experienced a “Spring”, however fleeting, followed by a counter-revolution. The Arab peoples now know that it is not enough to overthrow an authoritarian regime to achieve democracy. Elsewhere in the world,…
“A Decade After the Arab Spring, Autocrats Still Rule the Mideast”
“Ten years later, the collisions between that old order and the popular uprisings across the Middle East in 2011 that became known as the Arab Spring have left much of the region in smoldering ruins.”
“Refusing to forget a revolution: The Arab Spring”
“An event, a revolution, is neither objectively caused so as to be explained, nor subjectively undertaken under some calculus of rational self-interest susceptible to an evaluation based on the success or failure of meeting the chosen ends.”
“Fear and uncertainty as Kyrgyzstan mob rule spreads”
“A power vacuum is threatening to destabilise Kyrgyzstan, which is struggling to come up with legitimate ways of initiating a power transfer following the violent uprising over a disputed parliamentary election result. The euphoria felt after opposition groups seized the parliament building has quickly turned to uncertainty and insecurity.”
“Hopes Fade for New Political Course in Algeria a Year After Popular Uprising”
“The revolt in the streets that began last year, known here as Hirak, initially appeared to signal a new dawn in a country that had been stifled for decades by its huge military. But when the movement’s failure to coalesce around leaders and agree on goals created a vacuum, the remnants of the repressive Algerian…
Daniel Herwitz: “Good ideals gone bad or bad ideals made good?”
“one wonders if freedom meant to them the freedom to take on the responsibility of creating an equitable and dignified society for all, or if in their heart of hearts freedom meant … freedom as a surge of power, power of self over others, power to command, power to become, to have things and control…
David Ost: “The Triumph and Tragedy of Poland’s Solidarity Movement”
“To say that Solidarity was a democratic left alternative to state socialism thus does not mean that all of its leadership and members saw it that way. Nevertheless, from August 1980 to December 1981, Solidarity invented in Poland the kind of grassroots, democratic, noncapitalist, participatory social experiment that the Left has always tried to bring…
Assembling a revolutionary movement
My reflections on Robert Kramer’s movie Ice (1970) 10 June 2020
Asad Haider: “Pessimism of the Will”
“Optimism of the intellect, because we have to start by recognizing that all people are capable of thought, that they are able to not only form conceptions of the world but also to experiment with new possibilities. … But pessimism of the will, because we know that the will has to take a material organizational…