3è table ronde Aspirations contrariées, citoyennetés réinventées ?

Fifteen years after the Arab Spring, what remains of the hopes for freedom, dignity and change? Round table moderated by Jean-Christophe Ploquin Speakers: Leyla Dakhli, Youssef El Chazli and Chowra Makaremi

Fifteen years after the Arab Spring, seven years after the October uprising in Lebanon, nearly a decade after the Hirak in Algeria, but also one year after the mobilisation of Generation Z in Morocco and the recent movements in Iran, what remains of the calls for profound transformations in society?

These uprisings inspired powerful hopes among generations long deprived of freedom, dignity and effective citizenship. They also brought forth new ways of challenging the established order and politicising issues that affect material living conditions as much as the intimate sphere, alongside demands for justice, democracy and freedom.

But when horizons close, what remains of these promises? Between fear of repression and weariness, other forms of engagement take shape: withdrawal, internal exile or more discreet forms of action, at a distance from institutionalised politics. They manifest themselves through bodies and emotions, in the most modest gestures, recount new processes of politicisation and present new faces, particularly women’s.

But how can the struggle continue when aspirations are hampered by state violence? Can imagination be enough when survival is often at stake in authoritarian regimes?

With Leyla Dakhli (Franco-Tunisian historian), Youssef El Chazli (sociologist specialising in contentious politics and protest dynamics in North Africa and the Middle East), Chowra Makaremi (anthropologist and filmmaker specialising in migration and the uprising in Iran).

Latest publications

Leyla Dakhli and Laurence Dufresne-Aubertin, Les Révoltes de la dignité. Résister dans les mondes arabes méditerranéens, Seuil, 2026. Youssef El Chazli, Devenir révolutionnaire à Alexandrie, Dalloz, 2020; L’Esprit de la révolte, collective work, edited by Leyla Dakhli, Seuil, 2020. Chowra Makaremi, Résistances affectives. Les politiques de l’attachement face aux politiques de la cruauté, La Découverte, 2025.