The Tunisian revolution under the gender lens: 10 years later, the situation and perspectives for women

Temps de lecture : 11 minutes

The Tunisian revolution under the gender lens: 10 years later, the situation and perspectives for women

April 6, 2021 

Written by Mathilde Morel 
Translated by Julie Penverne

We are now in the year 2021 and the Tunisian revolution is celebrating its tenth anniversary. Yet, the role of women throughout this event has yet to be studied. While the media has focused on the centrality of Tunisian youth and their revolutionary demands, an analysis of the Tunisian Arab Spring in terms of gender dynamics would underline the determining role of women and their demands on the movement. Looking at the revolution through a gender lens also leads us to question what remains of these demands today. In August 2018, UN Women insisted on the historic turn taken by Tunisia, with 47% of women elected to local governments^[1]UN Women « Historic leap in Tunisia: Women make up 47 per cent of local government », August 27, 2018. Available at: … Continue reading. In order to grasp the Tunisian revolution in all its complexity, it is important to understand the place which women held within it. This article proposes to analyse the proactive approach of women during the revolution and use it to better understand the obstacles that Tunisian women had to face before being able to celebrate the registration of their equality with men in the new Constitution of 2014. It will also aim to highlight the different consequences that this revolution had on women’s daily lives.

The status of Tunisian women: a concept shaped by the legal system

The Personal Status Code is a set of laws proclaimed by decree at the time of Tunisia’s independence in 1956. It aims to promote equality between Tunisians. This code has often been considered unique in the Arab and Muslim world^[2]Tobich, Faïza. “Chapitre II. Le code du statut personnel tunisien : Le choix de l’ambivalence normative”. Les statuts personnels dans les pays arabes : De l’éclatement à l’harmonisation. … Continue reading. The Personal Status Code was presented by Habib Bourguiba, President of the Council, in August 1956 and made public three days later. It is the first project of social, legal and cultural “emancipation” for the interest of the nation^[3]Tobich, Faïza. “Chapitre II. Le code du statut personnel tunisien : Le choix de l’ambivalence normative”. Les statuts personnels dans les pays arabes : De l’éclatement à l’harmonisation. … Continue reading.

This suite of legislation profoundly transformed the legislative status of Tunisian women. Polygamy was declared illegal, as was unilateral repudiation of marriage and marital coercion. In practical terms, this means that the Tunisian president has placed a great deal of emphasis on legislation within the familial sphere. However, Tunisian society in the 1960s was steeped in conservative religious values. In order to understand the various forms of violence against women in the context of contemporary Tunisia, since the country’s independence, it is necessary to understand the paradox between, on the one hand, the prevalence of the patriarchal model, reinterpreted and updated both in the new conjugal family and in modern political and economic structures; and on the other hand, the conquest by Tunisian women of a new social position and new political, economic, social and cultural rights.

The ambiguity of the Personal Status Code and its profound advances lie in this set of contrasting parameters. Family law in Tunisia – which the Personal Status Code (PSC) condenses without covering its entire scope – has undergone various modifications over the course of its sixty years of existence, which have confirmed its current antagonisms: the permanent tension between conservatism and change of a family reconfigured on the patriarchal principle, with the husband remaining the head of the family, and the wife, his “second”.

The establishment of this system by Habib Bourguiba sets religion and traditions as the backbone of his speeches since “[b]eyond the legal system, the position of Tunisian women is also governed by religion^[4]Ibid”. Moreover, he stresses, for example, that “Tunisian women should not be too independent of their husbands^[5]Ibid”. The PSC has reshaped the traditional family (patriarchal, endogamous, polygamous and patrilineal) by propelling it into the model of the conjugal, relational, individual family^[6]Lilia BEN SALEM, Famille et changements sociaux en Tunisie, Tunis, Centre de publication universitaire, 2009.. The PSC therefore made adjustments at the state level to the domestic environment by means of a few targeted modifications: the recognition of the “free” choice of spouse, the regulation of civil status (1957) and the reworking of the rules of devolution of the inheritance to the benefit of the only daughter or daughters.

The new women’s rights are the product of a state’s will to accelerate the process of gender equality. They are part of a “state feminism” that was expressed in the first years of independence under the tutelary action of a head of state, President Habib Bourguiba, and continued thereafter as a doctrine and a policy of the state power and its apparatus. In fact, if the so-called women’s rights have effectively allowed to “correct” the excesses of the patriarchal model of sexual segregation, to fight against the relegation of women and their social confinement, they have never been posed as rights of equality between women and men. For the “State feminism”, far from being a form of feminism, is rather similar to a tutelary statism. The originality of the Personal Status Code is therefore not enough to complete this wave of “State feminism” measures^[7]Ibid”.

In 1985 Tunisia signed the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), but the situation of Tunisian women at the beginning of 2011 had not changed much since. They were still particularly affected by economic insecurity. In addition, some articles of the CEDAW remain unratified, such as those concerning the transmission of nationality and the choice of place of residence.

When in March 2008, the Tunisian government of Ben Ali announced its accession to the additional protocol of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, the president of the Tunisian Association of Democratic Women, Khadjia Chérif described this process as “positive but still insufficient^[8]« La Tunisie va adhérer au protocole additionnel de la convention de l’ONU », Agence France Presse,‎ 8 March 2008.”. In conjunction with this declaration, International Women’s Rights Day was being held and Khadjia Chérif assured that she would continue to “campaign for the lifting of the reservations that render the convention meaningless^[9]Hejer Charf, H. C. (1 Avril 2009). Khadija Chérif et l’égalité dans l’héritage en Tunisie. Entretien. Mediapart. … Continue reading”.

Three years later, as Tunisia’s transitional government introduced a bill to end these reservations, the Ennahdha movement, a conservative Islamist political movement, came to power and reshuffled the deck for women in Tunisian society.

The role of Tunisian women in the 2011 revolution

On the eve of the 2011 revolution, the voice of women is central to the Tunisian demands. They are, with the youth and artists, among the most creative and most faithful to the spirit of the revolution^[10]Kilani, Mondher. « Femmes, Révolution et nouveau gouvernement des corps en Tunisie. » Anthropologie et Sociétés, volume 42, numéro 1, 2018, p. 57–80. Available at: … Continue reading. In the aftermath of the fall of Ben Ali, the Tunisian Association of Democratic Women played an important role in the struggle for democracy and gender equality. Very quickly, the associations, mostly composed of women, which were often monitored, censored or even banned, emerged again during the revolution and organized themselves in order to make strong demands such as access to power for women, their place in high instances against violations of women’s rights as well as the separation of religion and politics.

In this regard, we can cite the example of the association Equality and Parity, which is involved in the fight for mandatory parity among elected officials, both in the National Assembly and on electoral lists. It is also worth noting the important share of women in the High Authority for the realization of the objectives of the Revolution: they represent 23.2% and constitute half of the members of the National Commission for the investigation of the excesses and violations during the Revolution^[11]Inès Chaalala, Thouraya Hammami Bekri, Tunisie : Le rôle des femmes dans la construction démocratique, 27 février 2018, Ritimo, url : … Continue reading.

In parallel with feminist associations promoting democratic values, the period was marked by a return of women’s associations with an Islamist and conservative ideology demanding rights such as the wearing of the niqab, which was banned under Ben Ali, and a model in which women have a predominant role in the family as wives and mothers, etc. Gender relations are therefore at the heart of the Tunisian revolution.

After the revolution, what about women and their progress?

Besides the claims, Tunisian women obtained some victories related to their status. Alongside the association Equality and Parity, four important feminist associations in Tunisia came forward and founded the Union of Free Women Tunisia^[12]Kréfa, Abir. « Les rapports de genre au cœur de la révolution », Pouvoirs, vol. 156, no. 1, 2016, pp. 119-136. Disponible sur : … Continue reading.

This coalition accentuates the claims and the defense of the Arab-Muslim identity mentioned above. Following the revolution and the fight for the right to write the new Constitution, this coalition also participated in the denunciation of any form of tutelage or political exploitation of women. The words of Thouraya Chtiba Chebbi, president of the association Haouwa (Eve) go in this direction: “women must ensure an efficient role on the political scene and not be limited to a symbolic presence^[13]Remarks by Thouraya Chtiba Chebbi for the Tunis Afrique Presse agency in September 2011.”.

The October 2021 Tunisian elections are particularly interesting in this respect. Indeed, 47% of the candidates were women, that is to say 5 502 candidates. However, they constituted only 7% of the heads of the electoral list^[14]UN Women. «  Tournant historique en Tunisie : 47 pour cent de femmes élues au sein des gouvernements locaux », 27 August 2018. Available at: … Continue reading. In 2014, this rate increased to 12%. In 2011, there were only 27% of elected women in the National Constituent Assembly. In 2014, they accounted for 31% of elected parliamentarians in the Assembly of People’s Representatives. They will remain very poorly represented in successive Tunisian governments throughout the transitional period. Progress in terms of women’s political participation following the Tunisian Revolution is clear. Tunisian women have succeeded in bringing strong demands to fruition alongside the young population. In addition, they also succeeded in uniting in the face of possible censorship of their associations and movements. In 2014, Tunisian women, representing a third of the elected members of parliament, had managed to truly invest the political field, one of their major claims led by the latter during the Tunisian revolution.

However, since 2014, their progress seems to be fading, with only 22% of elected female deputies in 2019. Yosra Frawes, president of the Tunisian Association of Democratic Women, explains that the declining presence of women is due to the willingness of political parties to be virtuous after the Constitution. Today, according to her, this parity in the Constitution no longer represents a major issue^[15]Remarks made by Yosra Frawes in an interview for the newspaper La Croix in October 2019.. Just 15% of the 1,500 lists for the legislative elections were headed by women. Thus, and despite the new electoral law that encourages parity for which women have fought, their representation in Tunisian political life remains well outside their expectations.

A principle put forward by the Ennahda party in the public debate insists on complementarity rather than equality between women and men^[16]Kilani, Mondher. « Femmes, Révolution et nouveau gouvernement des corps en Tunisie. » Anthropologie et Sociétés, vol. 42, no. 1, 2018, pp. 57–80. Available at: https://doi.org/10.7202/1045124ar. In Article 28 of its draft Constitution, following the fall of the Ben Ali regime, this party asks the State to “protect the achievements of women by considering them as complementary and associated with men. Following and in opposition to this vision, the member associations of the coalition Union of Free Women Tunisia denounce a “representation of the woman made essentially of its reproductive function”. Rached Ghannouchi, an Islamist thinker close to the Ennahda party, is notably strongly criticized for his opinion according to which “the sexual function is a fundamental thing for the woman whereas it is contingent for the man^[17]Ibid”. “. Rached Ghannouchi, an Islamist thinker close to the Ennahda party, is notably strongly criticized for his opinion according to which “the sexual function is a fundamental thing for the woman whereas it is contingent for the man^[18]Ibid”.

Thus, the constitutional project of the Ennahda party is the keystone of the complementarity system defended by this party. It enters in full opposition with the values of emancipation defended by the women fighting for an advance of their statute, and not for a return to the conservatism and the essentialization of their body of woman.

In the end, the drafting of these numerous articles proposed by the Ennahdha party was aimed at a refusal if not a setback regarding the status of women. Despite Ennahda’s proximity to the old regime, the new Constitution did not consider this draft Constitution relevant, so it was aborted. The project saw, for example and through Article 24, the development of a specific working time for mothers or the encouragement of marriage and family in Article 37.

Despite the conservative party’s 40% of the vote and its largest female representation in the political spectrum, it is indeed “equality” and not “complementarity” that was voted in the new Tunisian Constitution of 2014: “Citizens, male and female, are equal in rights and duties. They are equal before the law without any discrimination” (art. 21). This development was accompanied by other provisions such as the protection of women’s acquired rights and their improvement, the promotion of equal opportunities and parity between the two sexes in elected councils, as well as the eradication of violence against women (art. 46).

Ten years after the revolution, the situation of women in Tunisia seems to be challenged once again by Kaïs Saïed, who became the new president of Tunisia in 2019. On August 13, on the anniversary of the promulgation of the Personal Status Code, he did not hesitate to return to the issue of inheritance for Tunisian women, a
subject animating the debates for years and a strong claim in the fight against legal inequality between men and women.

Many Tunisian women recognize that important texts have been adopted, such as the abolition of the circular prohibiting women from marrying foreigners, the possibility for them to travel with their children without the father’s authorization, and the law against violence against women, even if it has yet to be applied. And while Tunisian women have fought many battles, notably to raise the age of sexual maturity from 13 to 16, the failure to include marital rape in the law appears to be a defeat. Some rights are in regression like those of women graduates. Women with higher education are twice as likely to be unemployed as men, with rates rising from 22.6 percent to 45.3 percent; the proportions are quite similar for all unemployed people: 13.9 percent and 23.3 percent. These figures, which come from employment offices, greatly underestimate the unemployed population, especially in rural areas where there are no such offices. If women have, in Sidi Bouzid, Kasserine, etc., massively taken part in social movements and these cities have experienced respectively in 2008 and 2011 a day during which almost all women took to the streets, their concerns are daily and their claims are material. Rural women are often “distant from political, trade union or associative organizations^[19]Élie Octave Bousquet, “Transformation capitaliste de l’espace rural des hautes steppes : une variable des mouvements révolutionnaires en Tunisie ?”, master dissertation, EHESS 2015.”.

Conclusion

In Tunisia, the Code of Personal Status (CSP) established by Habib Bourguiba, president of the nation from 1957 to 1987, set the tone for a first wave of liberalization of women’s rights and was initially praised by Tunisians and the foreign media. This set of texts modified the legislative status of women by granting them new rights but was, in hindsight, considered as a set of texts mostly residing in a “state feminism” perspective, a use of the new texts far from a true equality between women and men.

The Tunisian revolution – and more particularly the flight of the dictator Ben Ali – anchored the female position in a proactive approach of struggle for democracy and for an advance of rights. Alongside a union of feminist associations, women managed to forge a place for themselves in the political sphere and reached a third of the Tunisian deputies in 2014 after the new Constitution in which they largely participated.

The reality remains mixed, however, despite concrete advances in the status and rights of women and their political participation. They have been able to advance their integration into society by making their popular demands heard, but this has not prevented a certain retreat from this progress, such as in the political sphere, where there has been a decline in the number of women in positions of responsibility, or the question of inheritance, which the current president has not hesitated to question.

Bibliographie :

• Kilani, Mondher. « Femmes, Révolution et nouveau gouvernement des corps en Tunisie. » Anthropologie et Sociétés, vol. 42, no. 1, 2018, pp. 57–80. Available at: https://doi.org/10.7202/1045124ar
• Limam-Tnani, Najet, « Les femmes dans la révolution tunisienne : corps, sexualité et islam en question », Chimères, vol. 92, no. 2, 2017, pp. 209-220. Available at: https://www-cairn-info.scd-rproxy.u-strasbg.fr/revue-chimeres-2017-2-page-209.htm?contenu=resume
• Kebaïli, Sélima. « Expérience de la répression et mobilisations de femmes dans la Tunisie post-révolution. Le cas d’une association à référent islamique », Archives de sciences sociales des religions, vol. 181, no. 1, 2018, pp. 121-140. Available at: https://www-cairn-info.scd-rproxy.u-strasbg.fr/revue-archives-de-sciences-sociales-des-religions-2018-1-page-121.htm#no5
• Kréfa, Abir. « Les rapports de genre au cœur de la révolution », Pouvoirs, vol. 156, no. 1, 2016, pp. 119-136. Available at: https://www-cairn-info.scd-rproxy.u-strasbg.fr/revue-pouvoirs-2016-1-page-119.htm
• Mahfoudh, Dorra, et Amel Mahfoudh. « Mobilisations des femmes et mouvement féministe en Tunisie », Nouvelles Questions Féministes, vol. vol. 33, no. 2, 2014, pp. 14-33. Available at: https://www-cairn-info.scd-rproxy.u-strasbg.fr/revue-nouvelles-questions-feministes-2014-2-page-14.html
• Tobich, Faï “Chapitre II. Le code du statut personnel tunisien : Le choix de l’ambivalence normative”. Les statuts personnels dans les pays arabes : De l’éclatement à l’harmonisation. By Tobich. Presses universitaires d’Aix-Marseille, 2008. (pp. 89-126) Available at: http://books.openedition.org/puam/1012
• UN Women « Historic leap in Tunisia: Women make up 47 per cent of local government », August 27, 2018. Available at: https://www.unwomen.org/en/news/stories/2018/8/feature-tunisian-women-in-local-elections 

To quote this article: Mathilde MOREL, “The Tunisian revolution under the gender lens: 10 years later, the situation and perspectives for women”, 04/06/2021, Gender in Geopolitics Institute.