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Abstract
The Algerian diaspora mobilized massively to support the 2019 peaceful uprising known as the Hirak. In so doing, Algerians from abroad contributed to collective performances of citizenship and civility that redefined political subjectivities in both their country of origin and their host country. This article studies the experience of activists based in Tunis, Paris and the Bay Area. Drawing on the works of theorists of radical democracy such as Chantal Mouffe and Bonnie Honig, it shows the way in which diasporic citizens supporting a revolutionary movement challenge traditional statehood and interrogates the limits of their subversive political practices. It emphasizes three aspects of this transnational mobilization: the contradictory dynamics of deterritorialization and reterritorialization, the constitution of agonistic arenas, and the emergence of new modes of subjectivation.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1 The IRMC is a French research center attached to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the National Center for Scientific Research.
2 Dimitris Vardoulakis argues that the justification of state sovereignty and the resulting violence are based on three modalities (fighting evil, the self-preservation, and the biopolitical duty to save lives) which “seem to cover our entire epistemological field” (2017, 53).
3 All the names have been changed to preserve the interviewees’ anonymity.
4 Interview with Rayane, software engineer, founding member of DZ United, Bay Area, Winter 2023.
5 Interview with Mounir, analyst for an NGO, member of Ibtikar, Tunis, Summer 2020.
6 Algérie Presse Service, “Participation importante dans les wilayas, taux global de 39,93%,” December 13, 2019, www.aps.dz/algerie/98913-presidentielle-du-12-decembre-taux-de-participation-de-41-14.
7 Algérie Presse Service, “Naissance du Collectif citoyen de la communauté algérienne en Tunisie,” February 25, 2019, https://www.aps.dz/algerie/86093-naissance-du-collectif-citoyen-de-la-communaute-algerienne-en-tunisie.
8 Imane’s criticism was echoed by Leïla, another interviewee who had attended marches in San Francisco and was disappointed by the turnout. Interviews with Rayane & Leïla, journalist, Bay Area, Winter 2023.
9 During a meeting organized in July 2022 in Paris by a recently created opposition movement attended by the author, the organizers observed bitterly that all but one attendee were born in Algeria, suggesting that second and third generation of French-Algerians had abandoned the struggle.
10 According to a local leader of a Muslim-conservative organization, TV channels accessible online and broadcasting from abroad were instrumental in the promotion of pacifist resistance in Algeria. Interview with Walid, accountant, member of the movement Rachad, Spring 2021, Paris.
11 Ibtikar is a liberal-leaning organization founded abroad in 2017 in order to build a “democratic, pluralist, social, modern and open Algerian Republic.” It has sections in Algeria, as well as abroad, notably in France and Canada. Interview with Malika, member of Ibtikar and the Local Coordination of Students at the university of Oran, Winter 2021 (remote interview).
12 Interview with Mounir.
13 Interview with Rayane.
14 Informal discussions with former members of RAJ in Tunis and Marseille (2023).
15 Eric Goldstein, “Algeria Targets Diaspora Critics. Efforts to Crush Domestic Protests Reaches Algerians Abroad,” Human Rights Watch, May 26, 2022, https://www.hrw.org/news/2022/05/26/algeria-targets-diaspora-critics.
16 “Algeria: Lift Arbitrary Travel Bans on Diaspora Activists,” Amnesty International, May 6, 2022, https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2022/05/algeria-lift-arbitrary-travel-bans-on-diaspora-activists/#:∼:text=(Beirut%2C%20May%206%2C%202022,Human%20Rights%20Watch%20said%20today.
17 On the case of human rights defenders, see “Algérie: après quatre ans de contestation, la société civile à l’agonie,” Fédération Internationale pour les Droits Humains, February 23, 2023, https://www.fidh.org/fr/themes/defenseurs-des-droits-humains/algerie-apres-quatre-ans-de-contestation-la-societe-civile-a-l-agonie.
18 Interview with Rayane.
19 Eradicators are those who supported the military coup of January 1992 that suspended the electoral process to prevent a victory of the Islamic Salvation Front, in the name of saving the Republic from turning into a theocracy. Reconciliators are those who advocated for a political settlement to the ensuing civil war and include members of Islamic organizations but also representatives of various leftist and nationalist movements. In the context of the Hirak, eradicators tend to argue that the danger posed by an Islamist takeover should lead to a negotiation with the state, when reconciliators often refuse to compromise with state actors responsible for human rights violation in the 1990s.
20 Interview with Walid.
21 On the role of an “political imaginary of Europe” in expressing a sense of entitlement for members of the Moroccan diaspora, see (Schwarz Citation2021).
22 Interviews with Mounir and Imane.
23 The Algerian journalist Khaled Drareni was arrested repeatedly and jailed for his coverage of the Hirak.
24 Interview with Nidhal, member of the Youth Action Rally, Paris, Summer 2021.
25 Interview with Malika.
26 Interview with Hichem.
27 The cartoonist Dilem notably portrayed an infuriated Emmanuel Macron directing violent French protesters to follow the example of a “civilized society” by pointing at Algeria (Liberté, March 18, 2019). See also (Souiah Citation2020, 39).