Amid Tunisia’s struggle to democratize following its 2011 Arab Spring revolution, the country’s first-ever elected local governments may offer hope, USIP staff suggest:
Tunisia’s 350-plus localities are inaugurating elected councils this summer, half of whose 7,000-plus members are women and a third of whom are younger than 35. Still, the May election that put them in office included a reduced voter turnout—34 percent—that underscores public frustrations and the need for concrete solutions to Tunisia’s unemployment, poverty, and underdevelopment, especially in 
the country’s interior.
Rached Ghannouchi, the leader of Tunisia’s Ennahdha party, makes the case for the compatibility of Islam and democracy in the July 2018 edition of the National Endowment for Democracy’s Journal of Democracy.
