Inside Tunisia's al-Nahda

Between Politics and Preaching

Rory McCarthy

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Year: 2018
• Print ISBN:
  9781108472517
• eBook ISBN:
  9781108680936
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Middle Eastern Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

In the wake of the Arab uprisings, al-Nahda voted to transform itself into a political party that would for the first time withdraw from a preaching project built around religious, social, and cultural activism. This turn to the political was not a Tunisian exception but reflects an urgent debate within Islamist movements as they struggle to adjust to a rapidly changing political environment. This book re-orientates how we think about Islamist movements. Drawing on extensive fieldwork with grassroots activists of Tunisia's al-Nahda, Rory McCarthy focuses on the lived experience of activism to offer a challenging new perspective on one of the Middle East's most successful Islamist projects. Original evidence explains how al-Nahda survived two decades of brutal repression in prison and in social exclusion, and reveals what price the movement paid for a new strategy of pragmatism and reform during the Tunisian transition away from authoritarianism.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half-title
• Series information
• Title page
• Copyright information
• Dedication
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Note on Transliteration
• Abbreviations
• 1 Introduction
• 2 Morality, Behaviour, and Networks
• 3 Rethinking Politicization
• 4 Confronting Prison
• 5 Beyond Social Exclusion
• 6 Rebuilding and Fragmenting
• 7 Conclusion
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index