{"id":476,"date":"2011-02-04T16:34:24","date_gmt":"2011-02-04T21:34:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cyrussamii.com\/?p=476"},"modified":"2011-02-04T16:34:24","modified_gmt":"2011-02-04T21:34:24","slug":"more-on-contagion-from-tunisia-to-egypt-and-beyond","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cyrussamii.com\/?p=476","title":{"rendered":"More on contagion from #Tunisia to #Egypt and beyond"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jonah Schulhofer-Wohl and Julia Choucair have a post at HuffPo on the current contagion of protest movements in the Arab world (link<\/a>). As I noted in a previous post (link<\/a>), from the perspective of current social science theory it isn’t at all obvious why events in Tunisia should inspire events in other countries in the region. I proposed that the contagion may be based on the events in Tunisia creating a “normative reset” moment, with Tunisian protesters having “established a new embodiment of dignity” to which others in similar circumstances are emotionally driven to live up. In addition to rational “focal point” effects and updating about the vulnerability of authoritarian regimes, Schulhofer-Wohl and Chocair propose a similar hypothesis to explain this contagion: <\/p>\n

Tunisians’ sacrifices have created a new moral climate in the region. If Tunisians were willing to die for the future of their country, then citizens of other countries have to ask a new question about facing down their regimes. Rather than calculating the risks and rewards to participating in uprisings, the question now is: If Tunisians were willing to make this sacrifice, why shouldn’t I also be willing? Continuing sacrifices, now on the streets of Egypt, underscore it.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I find this to be a compelling hypothesis, worthy of more rigorous investigation. I find that it is consistent, for example, with the fact that the Iranian protests did not inspire protests elsewhere: the emotional connection to other peoples in the region would not have been as strong. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Jonah Schulhofer-Wohl and Julia Choucair have a post at HuffPo on the current contagion of protest movements in the Arab world (link). As I noted in a previous post (link), from the perspective of current social science theory it isn’t at all obvious why events in Tunisia should inspire events in other countries in the … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “More on contagion from #Tunisia to #Egypt and beyond”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-476","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cyrussamii.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/476","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cyrussamii.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cyrussamii.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cyrussamii.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cyrussamii.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=476"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/cyrussamii.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/476\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":492,"href":"https:\/\/cyrussamii.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/476\/revisions\/492"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cyrussamii.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=476"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cyrussamii.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=476"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cyrussamii.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=476"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}