A simplified take: Tunisian Women and the Redrafting of the Constitution
There is no doubt that Habib Bourguiba, a French-trained lawyer, set a precedent across the Arab world when he came to power in 1956 as the first prime minister of Tunisia (The Economist). Ostensibly, his choice to follow suit of Tahar Haddad's determination and Mustafa Kemal Atatürk's vision, Bourgaiba was working with what they left behind (Fahem). Aside from the fact that the liberalization of Tunisia from French colonial and Ottoman monarchy rule was imminent at the time, his direct address and attention to liberalize and, what some might say controversial, take to radically distort social norms, those especially concerned with woman's rights, through tropes of governmental trickle-down nature was astounding.
Through the teachings of this course, I will further delve into the nature of the role of Tunisian civil society, specifically focusing on the aftermath of the Tunisian Revolution for women's rights in Tunisia for length and clarity. I seek to better understand what the current position of Tunisian women is in the remaking of the Tunisian constitution.
Since the Tunisian Revolution took place in 2011, the drastic changes that Tunisia has made regarding women's rights, in comparison to its neighbors, are to be noted. Remarkably, the commencement of drafting the new Tunisian Constitution in February 2012, in which women's rights and autonomy are central. On the global scale, the proposition to withdrawing its specific reservations regarding the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) (Daniele). Taking down all its preservations against the CEDAW law, such as the right of women to pass their nationality to their children, and equality in marriage and family life (qtd. in Daniele). While such advances denote a form of change in the way women's rights are regarded, a closer look the history of women's civil activism is due to better understand the role of Tunisian civil society.
What is noteworthy when understanding Tunisian women's activism in historical contexts, it is distinctly limited to Bourguiba's adaptation of the workings of Tahar Haddad's political and social thought and the reworking of Ataturk's abolition of shari'a law and choosing to reform through permissible Islamic reinterpretation, known as ijtihad (Wing et. al). What it signifies is that current understandings of women's rights activism can be examined only after Tunisia's independence in 1956 and the adoption of the Code of Personal Status (CPS) (Wing et. al), which at its core focuses on reforms related to women and family law (Daniele). But what does that signify in better understanding the current position of Tunisian women in post-revolution Tunisia?
The Code of Personal Status (CPS) is central to understanding the development of women's role in the remaking of the constitution, especially it being the stepping stone on which Tunisian women have been able to develop their strength in gaining momentum in their social activism. What is significant to bring to light here is that Tunisian women have made major advances in part because male-dominated patrilineages that emphasize traditional communitarian norms no longer hold sway, and there has been more emphasis on individual rights norms that benefit women's status (qtd. Wing et. al). In effect, what this stands for is that the place of Tunisian women, in comparison to their Moroccan and Algerian counterparts, is distinctly different and is spearheaded in this respect (Wing et. al). Therefore, Tunisian women's role is one and the same as their male counterparts when participating in the changes that continue to take place since the nationwide mobilization. Yet, how would such a position be translated and the remaking of the constitution?
The role and influence that Islamist secular movements have had since the ousting of Ben Ali are undeniably evident. From the considerable debate between Islamic political groups, represented by the Nahda Islamic Party (al-Nahda), and secular movements, represented by the Congress Party for the Republic and the Democratic Forum for Labor and Liberties, known as Ettakatol, during the process of drafting the new Tunisian Constitution in 2012 (Sadek). To the pronounced opposition by secular parties and civil society groups pushing back against a proposed provision to the Penal Code criminalizing blasphemy, as well as the increased Islamic political factions insisting that constitutional provisions and domestic legislation related to women adhere to what they view as Islamic law in the new constitution (Sadek). Despite the unmistakably pronounced Islamist stronghold in the Constituent Assembly, the revolution provided a critical opportunity to replace old hegemonic framework for women's rights with a new bottom-up model based on popular discourse and civil-society-led initiatives (de Silva de Alwis et al.). There is no doubt that the revolutionary outset and in relation to women's institutional representation in the National Constituent Assembly (NCA) has been used as a political tool used mainly to convince people of the closeness of political parties to gendered issues by often instrumenting the role of women (de Silva de Alwis et al.). This particular aspect has been only used when the ousted Ben Ali sought global political support, and at the outset of the Revolution, the discourse had completely shifted; and in turn prompted an increased participation in the debate on gender issues in which Tunisian women, both Islamist and secular, have occupied crucial positions (de Silva de Alwis et al.). What is significant to mention here is that women were well represented in most NCA decision-making bodies, as well as their omnipresence in the six constituent committees in charge of drafting provisions under specific constitutional themes, with the Committee on Human Rights and Liberties, which was responsible for most issues related to women's rights being headed by a woman (de Silva de Alwis et al.).
While the aforementioned points and references barely touch on the tip of the iceberg, what do they signify in terms of better understanding the current position of Tunisian women is in the remaking of the Tunisian constitution through the teachings of this course? There is no doubt that the strength of Tunisian civil society stems from its ability to organize and lead change, to rallying support from a bottom-up standpoint where Tunisian youth have been fronting mobilization on all aspects of the revolution (El Fani). From the numerous workshops held by national NGOs for young people from all over Tunisia to meet and network, to their direct engagement in expressing their concern about the redrafting of the Tunisian constitution, civil society organizations have frequently made their presence and mobilization strength accounted for (de Silva de Alwis et. al). What can be evidently deduced is that a constitutional centric culture that has room to house women's participation, in an unprecedented manner, in the redrafting of the new constitution is one that is civically engaged and has historically undergone through ideological transition that permits the active political participation of women in an ever more turbulent and changing discourse.
References
Daniele, Giulia. “Tunisian Women’s Activism after the January 14 Revolution: Looking within and towards the Other Side of the Mediterranean.” Journal of International Women’s Studies, Vol. 15, no. 2, July 2014, pp. 16-32. http://vc.bridgew.edu/jiws/vol15/iss2/2/
Wing, Adrien Katherine and Hisham Kassim. The Future of Palestinian Women's Rights: Lessons from a Half-Century of Tunisian Progress. Washington and Lee Law Review, Vol. 64, no. 4, Fall 2007, pp. 1551- 1568. ProQuest Central. https://scholarlycommons.law.wlu.edu/wlulr/vol64/iss4/13
de Silva de Alwis, Rangita, Mnasri, Anware and Estee Ward. "Women and the Making of the Tunisian Constitution." Faculty Scholarship. Berkeley Law Scholarship Repository, vol. 35, no.1, 2017, pp. 90-148. http://scholarship.law.upenn.edu/faculty_scholarship/1756.
Sadek, George. “The Role of Islamic Law in Tunisia’s Constitution and Legislation Post-Arab Spring.” Library of Congress. 2013. https://www.loc.gov/law/help/tunisia.php
El Fani, Nadia. Neither Allah Nor Master. Documentary. https://www.idfa.nl/en/film/c10f5db1-c2a8-4283-a96a-1f12f13e8595/neither-allah-nor-master/docs-for-sale.
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