Congrès Mondial des Études sur le Moyen-Orient et l'Afrique du Nord

Barcelone du 19 au 24 Juillet 2010

· NOT_DEFINED institution: Centre for Middle East and North African Studies (Australia)

· NOT_DEFINED organizer: Gennaro Gervasio

· NOT_DEFINED language: English

· NOT_DEFINED description: Scholarly debates on polities and societies in the Greater Middle East have focused mainly, if not exclusively, on the palais du pouvoir, the officially sanctioned loci of power. Much less attention has been devoted to the exploration of the so-called ‘hidden geographies’ of power that is political dynamics occurring outside or beyond institutional fora. By observing less frequented spaces of power, co-option, and negotiation, this interdisciplinary series of panels provides a new insight in the study of the intersection between policy-making and un-official political space in the Greater Middle East. Academic and non-academic observers have often portrayed the old picture of politics in the Greater Middle East as a small area reserved to local authoritarian rulers. This series of panel builds upon prior debates, to ultimately argue that hidden power plays a crucial role in regional political dynamics, both in support of official power and, less frequently, in opposition to it. Paper presenters will unveil and discuss three distinct yet not unrelated typologies of relationships between official and informal power in the region. To begin, tribal, religious and military powers ‘which have seldom received official sanction’ have offered indispensable political support to ruling elites.
Secondly, we have detected the emergence of new forms of informal powers, particularly in ‘post-populist’ States where regime stability is no longer the direct outcome of military coercion and large-scale political cooptation. In these cases, the ‘new asabiyyat’ ‘extensive networks of local patronage and clientele’ supported ruling elites during protracted crises of legitimacy through extensive electoral support, extended in exchange of informal recognition of actual localised powers.
Finally, these panels will recognise the emergence of a new dialectic between formal and informal powers in the Greater Middle East, namely one that probes the role of the ‘power of civil society’ as an alternative to authoritarian governance through the region. If, on the one hand, civil societies and formal opposition parties can be seen as challengers to established regimes, recent scholarship is arguing that it is the mere existence of these organizations that strengthens the regimes, as it offers them a much desired democratic façade. This new debate is a further demonstration of how a scientific investigation of the hidden geographies of power, based on extensive fieldwork and on collection of fresh data, is timely and topical.

Panel I: Civil society in ‘uncivil’ contexts: Theoretical and Empirical Approaches

Currently, the nature of civil society and the rationale for its repeated failure in delivering change are issues hotly contested within academia and in the policymaking circles alike. Papers included in this panel are focused on the roles played by civil society actors in contemporary non-democratic contexts in the Arab world.
In particular, paper presenters will address the issue of Western democracy promotion, its impact on local civil society actors (CSAs), and its role in reinforcing – rather than challenging – ruling elites. Central attention will also be placed on Civil Society Activism in two key states of the region – Egypt and Morocco – with a view of examining two complex interactive patterns. On the one hand, papers will focus on the difficult relationships between CSAs and the Egyptian and Moroccan states. On the other, great relevance will be granted to tensions arisen within the CSAs, especially those emerged between Islamists and Secularists.
The analysis presented in this panel will be concluded with a discussion of transnational civil society forces in the area.

Chair: Dr. Vincent Durac, University College Dublin

Paper presenter: Emanuela Dalmasso (University of Turin), “The emerging power of civil society-The role of Islamist Human Rights Organisations in Morocco”
In the last decade, associational life has become a major trait of Moroccan politics and for many it constitutes the real counter-power to the monarchy given the insignificance of political parties. At closer scrutiny, it emerges that civil society activism and the dynamics it creates seems to strengthen the role of the monarchy because it makes the King the central figure in allocating ‘rewards’ for different associations. This is particularly true in the context of the profound divisions that exist between secular/leftist association and Islamist ones. This paper moves away from the understanding of associational life as a support base for the monarchy and analyses the role of Islamist human rights organisations in attempting to ‘break’ the monopoly of the human rights and democracy discourse that both the regime and secular associations have held. The paper focuses its attention on two groups that utilise the traditionally Western concepts of human rights and democracy to wrest discursive power away from the monarch and from liberal-minded human rights associations.

Paper presenter: Gennaro Gervasio (Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia), “Between resistance and cooptation: civil society actors in Egypt”
This paper critically engages with ongoing debates on civil society under authoritarian rule in the Arab World and assesses the potential of civil society in delivering change. While a still prevalent view considers civil society as the main avenue for political opening and eventual liberalisation, an emerging body of literature is advancing the idea of an ‘un-civil civil society’ that helps the consolidation of authoritarian regimes in the region, rather than challenging them. Building upon extensive fieldwork, analysis of local media and literature, this paper will look at the case of Egypt. In particular, the aim here is to investigate the potential for change offered by secular and religious ‘the often overrated’ Islamic NGOs, especially: Civil Society Actors (CSAs). At the same time, attention will be devoted to the analysis of the main patterns of (often informal) interaction between CSAs and the state. Finally, the paper will assess the possibilities for the formation of a united front within the ‘independent civil society’ vis-à-vis the ‘uncivil society’, largely controlled by the regime.

Paper presenter: Lucia Sorbera (Università di Milano), “Geographies of power and resistance in transnational feminist networks. A glance on literature and arts”
This paper deals with the contemporary debates on gender and women studies in the Arab World, and it assesses the potential of transnational feminist networks in promoting cultural and social change. While a still mainstreaming theoretical approach is focused on the traditional bond between feminism and nationalism and, later, on the use of gender politics inside national state agendas, a new line in gender and women studies is looking at the way how transnational women’s networks act against the power. This paper is focused on the role played today by transnational women’s networks in strengthening strategies of resistance against traditional understanding of power and the hegemonic discourse on gender in the Middle East and in the West. Building upon a strong historical background, it engages a deep analysis of a selected corpus of Arab women expatriated writings (autobiographies, novels, autofictions), trying to highlight the counter-hegemonic geographies of power, suggested by women’s contemporary art and literature.