Transitional justice in process

Plans and politics in Tunisia

Mariam Salehi, Simon Mabon

• Publisher: Manchester University Press
• Year: 2022
• ISBN:
  9781526155375
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Middle Eastern Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Transitional justice in process is the first book to comprehensively study the Tunisian transitional justice process. After the fall of the Ben Ali regime in 2011, Tunisia swiftly began dealing with its authoritarian past and initiated a comprehensive transitional justice process, with the Truth and Dignity Commission as its central institution. However, instead of bringing about peace and justice, transitional justice soon became an arena of contention. Through a process lens, the book explores why and how the transitional justice process evolved, and explains how it relates to the country's political transition. Based on extensive field research in Tunisia and the United States, and interviews with a broad range of Tunisian and international stakeholders and decision-makers, Transitional justice in process provides an in-depth analysis of a crucial period, beginning with the first initiatives aimed at dealing with the past and seeking justice and accountability. It discusses the development and design of the transitional justice mandate, and looks at the performance of transitional justice institutions in practice. It examines the role of international justice professionals in different stages of the process, as well as the alliances and frictions between different actor groups that cut across the often-assumed local-international divide. Transitional justice in process makes an essential contribution to literature on the domestic and international politics of transitional justice, and in particular to the understanding of the Tunisian transitional justice process.

1
The past is not another country:¹ Tunisia background chapter

Before looking at how Tunisia has sought to deal with its repressive past, it is important to look at what kind of past we are talking about, as well as the political context in which transitional justice is taking place. To this end, this chapter examines Tunisian history from the end of the colonial period to the transition following the fall of the Ben Ali regime. By giving a short overview of relevant periods and features of Tunisian history,² the chapter aims to identify the main societal cleavages and lines of conflict, power structures and changes to them, and the nature of the regime that people rose up against in 2010/11. Although the chapter describes historical processes ‘leading up’ to the transition, it does not mean to imply that transitional politics and their corresponding conflicts should be perceived as historically predetermined. The chapter instead aims to show that the Tunisian revolution did not provide a clean slate for transitional justice and that transitional justice is therefore neither neutral nor happening in a historical and political vacuum. The chapter also presents possible explanations for the regime's collapse, as discussed in the academic literature, as well as a discussion of post-revolutionary political developments, power shifts, and frictions. It thereby also outlines the political climate after the ruptures of 2011 to better understand the dynamics of transitional justice, the course it takes, the friction the transitional justice project provokes, and the challenges it faces.

The legacy of colonialism, the fight for independence, and Bourguiba's rule

Tunisia is a small country in the Maghreb – a term referring to the western part of North Africa. In its current form, as a sovereign nation-state, Tunisia has existed for just over sixty years. European colonisation had a considerable influence on some of the most recent territorial demarcations of North Africa. But beyond territorial determination, French colonialism, as well as the resulting fight for independence, has had important repercussions for the cleavages and conflictual dynamics still dominant in Tunisia today,³ a connection that the truth commission explicitly establishes in its final report (TDC 2019, e.g. 137, 154).⁴ The colonial period is briefly described below, before turning to the independence period and the conflictive dynamics that have their origins in that period.

Colonial period

Tunisia was under French colonial rule for seventy-five years, from 1881 until 1956, with the status of the French Protectorate of Tunisia. Nominally, the Bey, the Tunisian monarch, continued as ruler and the French ruled indirectly through them. Yet, in reality, a French résident général exercised de facto power. This allowed France to have “the advantages of annexation without the inconveniences” (Chouikha and Gobe 2015, 11; quoting Martin 1993; own translation). In Tunisia, elaborate administrative structures had already existed before colonisation, as well as an educational and military system, that aspired to give the central administration control over the countryside. The French were consequently able to use pre-existing administrative structures during the period of colonial rule, and the post-colonial state could also make use of them after the French had left.

One may not necessarily agree with Hatem M’rad's (2015) assessment that the colonisation of Tunisia was “soft,” since I would question whether this is possible at all; however, to put the country's colonial experience into perspective, it can be described as somewhere between the Moroccan and Algerian experience: longer and more intrusive than in Morocco, but shorter and less brutal than in Algeria. Among these three North African countries, Morocco experienced the shortest period of colonisation, lasting for forty-four years from 1912 to 1956.⁵ Arguably, it was also the one that affected the country the least, not only because of its shorter duration, but also because the first French résident général responsible for Morocco applied a “policy of minimal interference in traditional Muslim life” (Willis 2014, 22). Combined with adherence to monarchical traditions, this helped to strengthen the traditional political institutions that had emerged in Morocco before colonisation. Algeria, meanwhile, spent the longest period under colonial rule: 132 years from 1830 to 1962. It was ruled by the French for three times as long as Morocco was under foreign control. Here, external rule took on another dimension: Algeria was not just a French colony; it was in theory fully integrated into France's administrative structures, to be initially administered as three départements of the colonising country.⁶ This means that ‘French Algeria’ was also part of the European Union's predecessor organisations until its independence in 1962. There was also a much larger population of European origin that had migrated to and settled in Algeria – the so-called pieds-noirs – accounting for about 10 per cent of the population, a dynamic that Tunisia did not experience to the same extent. Tunisia was also spared a lengthy war of independence, unlike Algeria, which experienced a protracted and extremely violent conflict lasting eight years from 1954 to 1962.

Although there was domestic opposition to French colonisation in Tunisia, some of the literature claims that parts of Tunisian society were not actually opposed to the establishment of the protectorate.⁷ French rule during the protectorate period in Tunisia fostered the emergence of different sectors, such as an agricultural or industrial workforce (Chouikha and Gobe 2015, 11). It also “served to aid further the development of a significant urban, reform-minded middle class that had already begun to emerge during the Ottoman period” (Willis 2014, 21). Those urban Tunisians saw French rule as facilitating a welcome influx of ‘modernist’ ideas. They also profited from access to education in France, since Tunisians made up three-quarters of North African students admitted to French universities in the early 1930s despite the country having a much smaller population than Morocco and Algeria. As a result, French education significantly shaped the leaders of the future Tunisian state, and it continues to be a factor shaping Tunisian society today.⁸ Although Arabic is the official language, French is still widely spoken in the country sixty years after independence from colonial rule. French is particularly important as a business language and among much of the urban elite.

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Table of contents

• Cover
• Half-title page
• Series page
• Title page
• Copyright page
• Contents
• List of figures
• List of tables
• Acknowledgements
• List of abbreviations
• Preface
• Introduction
• 1: The past is not another country: Tunisia background chapter
• 2: Transitional justice in process: developments and dynamics
• 3: Initiating transitional justice
• 4: Designing transitional justice
• 5: Performing transitional justice
• Conclusion
• Appendix
• References
• Index