“Bread, freedom and social justice” was one of the slogans around which the demonstrations revolved, summing up the demands of the millions of people who took to Arab streets and squares in 2011 to demand “the fall of the regime,” from Tunisia to Bahrain, and including Libya, Egypt, Syria and Yemen, with mobilizations in Morocco, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Iraq, as well. Despite the downfall of some rulers, the wars and open conflicts, and the political and social changes that have taken place in the region ten years after what came to be known as the “Arab Spring,” these demands have not been met to date.

Youth unemployment in the region continues to reach new world records, and just a few weeks ago we saw how the streets of Tunisia were once again taken over by young people crying out for opportunities and a better future. Throughout these years, uprisings and changes have spread to other countries like Sudan, Algeria and Lebanon... having only slowed down over the last year because of the restrictions caused by the pandemic. What will happen when these restrictions are lifted? What are the deep economic and social problems underlying the political unrest and upheaval beneath the surface in these countries? Where do we stand after a decade of Arab Spring or Springs?

Professors Gilbert Achcar (SOAS) and Hèla Yousfi (Université Paris Dauphine) will provide a critical overview of what these ten years of uprisings have meant and what pathways they see in the future, at the opening ceremony of the international congress on “The Arab Springs Ten Years Later: Social, political and economic challenges,” to be held on February 10, 2021 in an online format.

The congress, scientifically coordinated by Ignacio Álvarez-Ossorio Alvariño, Isaías Barreñada Bajo and Laura Mijares Molina, professors at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid (UCM), has been organized by Casa Árabe and the UCM through the R&D project: “Resilience of Authoritarianism: The clash between Islamisms and the intensification of sectarianism in the Middle East and North Africa” (CSO2017-86091-P), forming part of that university’s Arab and Islamic Studies Section in the Department of Linguistics, Arab and Hebrew Studies and East Asia Section and the Complutense Institute of International Studies and Casa Árabe.

Opening session of the Congress
6:00-6:15 p.m.     Opening event
Pedro Martínez-Avial, General Director of Casa Árabe
Ignacio Álvarez-Ossorio, professor of Arab and Islamic Studies at the UCM
6:15 p.m.   Opening conferences
The Arab Spring Ten Years Later
Gilbert Achcar, professor of Development Studies and International Relations, SOAS (London)
The Everyday Revolution in Arab Countries: Power of the weak
Hèla Yousfi, professor at the Université Paris-Dauphine/PSL and director of the MBA IP Tunisie Program (Paris)
Presented by: Laura Mijares, professor of Arab and Islamic Studies, UCM
Moderated by: Olivia Orozco, Casa Árabe’s Training and Economics Coordinator
7:15 p.m.    Debate
Further information about the congress

Gilbert Achcar
Gilbert Achcar grew up in Lebanon and has worked as a researcher and professor in Beirut, Paris and Berlin. Since 2007, he has been a professor of Development Studies and International Relations at SOAS, University of London. He has authored several books and articles, including: The People Want: A Radical Exploration of the Arab Uprising (Saqi Books, 2013); and Morbid Symptoms: Relapse in the Arab Uprising (Stanford University Press, 2016). In Spanish, he has had published: El choque de Barbaries; Estados peligrosos: Oriente Medio y la política exterior estadounidense (Clash of the Barbarians; Dangerous States: The Middle East and American foreign policy), with Noam Chomsky; Los árabes y el Holocausto: La guerra de narrativas árabe-israelí (The Arabs and the Holocaust: The Arab-Israeli war of narratives); Marxismo, Orientalismo, Cosmopolitismo (Marxism, Orientalism, Cosmopolitanism); and in 2021, El pueblo quiere (The People Want, published by the Universidad Veracruzana in Mexico, at press).

Hèla Yousfi
Hèla Yousfi is a professor with the Department of Management and Administration at Paris-Dauphine University (DRM). A specialist in the sociology of organizations, she has conducted extensive studies on management practices and economic institutions in Arab countries. Her work has also focused on issues related to social movements, governance, public-private partnerships and socio-economic transformations in the Arab world. She has authored: L’UGTT, une passion tunisienne, enquête sur les syndicalistes en révolution (2011-2014) (Edition Karthala/MedAli, 2015); translated into the English as Trade unions and Arab revolutions, the Tunisian case UGTT (Routledge, 2017).