Tunisia: Understanding Conflict 2012 - Johns Hopkins School of ...

imperceptibly over time. In many ways this creates more anxiety for the average
secularist.
A Creeping Conservatism? Or the Lessons of Democracy?
The most frequent response I received regarding questions of women’s rights involved a
suspicion or anxiety over Ennahdha’s true colors, and thus their future stance on
women’s rights when they are presumably in power after the governmental elections later
in 2012. The interviewees expressed this fear in different ways. Some referenced the
discrepancy between the beliefs of Ennahdha’s leadership and those of its base—and thus
the incongruity between the party’s words and its actions. As Alaya Allani, professor of
contemporary history at Manouba University and expert on political Islam, explained:
The political discourse of Ennahdha is much more developed than its
ideology. They share many ideas with the salafists…This is where their
ambiguity versus the salafists comes from…The base is close to the
salafists, not the leaders…It is not their actions that are bad; it is the
silence on the part of the government. They don’t want to lose part of their
base…Their political language is “enlightened” but their texts’ doctrines
are still inspired by the shari’a” (SAIS Group Meeting, 27 January
2012). 12
While some, like Radwan Masmoudi (President of the Center of the Study of Islam and
Democracy), see this as a consequence of the party’s young age and the “learning curve”
Tunisia will face in transitioning to a democracy (SAIS Group Meeting, 26 January
2012); others, such as Mohamed Salah Hedri (President of the Islamist Party of Justice
and Development (PJD)), believe it is because “the core of Ennahdha is not democratic;
they want a centralized democracy” (SAIS Group Meeting, 24 January 2012).
12 Ahmed Ibrahim, of the Democratic Modernist Pole, echoed this sentiment (SAIS Group
Meeting, 25 January 2012).
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