‘Arab’ or ‘established’ Democracies? Egypt’s and Tunisia’s post-revolutions elections

Type Report
Title ‘Arab’ or ‘established’ Democracies? Egypt’s and Tunisia’s post-revolutions elections
Author(s)
Publication (Day/Month/Year) 2011
Publisher Radboud University
City Nijmegen
Country/State The Netherlands
URL http://www.ru.nl/publish/pages/660726/spierings-araborestablisheddemocracies.pdf
Abstract
The political events in Egypt have intensified the debate over democratic attitudes in the Arab world and Islamic actors such as the Muslim Brotherhood. The results of the 2011 constitutional referendum have been used to substantiate the theory that the Middle Eastern electorate in general, and the Muslim Brotherhood in particular, is not truly democratic: their behaviour aborts democratization. A closer analysis of the recent events and analyses of the turnout and ‘no’ votes, however, show that the developments are equally consistent with theories on democratic behaviour in established democracies: voters give politicians room for electoral reform that increases their power. Empirically, either of these perspectives can be supported. Commentators and media (BBC & Al-Jazeera) report on the recent events in Egypt, Morocco and Tunisia favouring one perspective over the other without explicit attention to the alternative. It seems that both scientist and media are using different measuring sticks to Western and Arab electorates and politicians.

Related studies

»