The End of Authoritarian Rule and the Mythology of Tunisia under Ben Ali

Rather than concentrating on potential explanations for the Tunisian uprising or focusing on the future challenges the country has, this article looks back at the time of Ben Ali and the mythology that the regime created around political, economic and social development in Tunisia. The article argues that the authoritarian resilience paradigm and the democratization one tended to obscure the complexity of Tunisian society and how it reacted and adapted to the policies the regime implemented over the course of more than two decades. Thus, the article problematizes the rigidity of paradigms and contends that a more nuanced and holistic approach is necessary to understand both Tunisian politics and Arab politics more generally.