Human Rights

Since the beginning of the 2011 Arab Spring, observers have been examining the various underlying factors that may have helped fuel revolution and unrest across North Africa and the Middle East. One of the factors frequently cited is the unusually high rate of youth unemployment throughout the region.

Since the beginning of the “Arab Spring” in December 2010, governments in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya have fallen, while protests and strife continue in Syria, Yemen and other nations. The source of the discontent was diverse, but deeply felt — decades of struggling under authoritarian regimes, certainly, but also high rates of unemployment and a grinding sense of inequality.

Following the initial euphoria of the 2011 Arab Spring, citizens in countries such as Libya, Egypt and Tunisia set about the hard work of reforming and rebuilding their public institutions. One central question, particularly in the wake of the Muslim Brotherhood’s electoral victory in Egypt and the killing of the U.S. ambassador in Libya, remains how truly democratic these societies will become. Will they favor Western-style politics, Islamist rule or a distinctive hybrid?

News coverage of the “Arab Spring” has often focused on the potential role of social media in facilitating the Middle East’s ongoing  political upheaval. Tools such as such as Facebook and Twitter, it has been suggested, helped citizens communicate and organize when governments were persistently unresponsive to their requests, and may have played a central role in the still-unfolding events.

Women played a significant role in the 2011 protests in Egypt. More educated and outspoken than women of earlier generations, they will continue to have an impact on Egyptian society, evidence suggests, in a post-revolution landscape.