Introduction: reading the revolutionary process in North Africa with Gramsci

Abstract

ABSTRACT This special section is based on part of the papers presented at the ‘Gramsci in the Arab World’ conference, held at the Università degli studi di Bari (Italy), in late 2017. Academic writings of Arab societies have been scarce and fragmented until the 1990s, when with the crisis of the Arab State and the end of the Cold War, Gramsci became one of the most cited European thinkers in the Arab region. Eventually, the ‘Gramscian moment’ in the MENA had a sudden ‘explosion’ at the time of the Arab Uprisings. Indeed, from 2011 onwards Arab and non Arab scholars have increasingly resorted to Gramsci’s analytical categories to read the ongoing revolutionary events. The rationale of this special section is to contribute to this debate, with a special focus on Egypt and Tunisia. Contextualized by an historical introductory article, the special section is composed of five contributions, analyzing the pre and post-2011 situation in Egypt and Tunisia, through a Gramscian lens.