2019: Streets as Sites of Protest

In 2019 the street was habitually “on fire.” It has been a year synonymous with streets as the preferred setting for resistance, globally and the consequent emergence of street citizenry. The street according to Nicholas Fyfe is the “terrain of social encounters and political protest, sites of domination and resistance, places of pleasure and anxiety.”[i] The emergence of streets as favoured locales for protest is being attributed to the unavailability of credible and objective institutionalized mechanisms for articulation and redressal of dissent and grievances. In the current decade the Tahrir square and the Gezi Park are perhaps the most pertinent embodiments of public spaces as sites of resistance. Marco Giugni and Maria T. Grasso in their latest book, Street Citizens: Protest Politics and Social Movement Activism in the Age of Globalization explain the term street citizens in the context of citizens and protests as connoting citizens in the broader sense of the term, those who are “protesting in the streets against policies enacted or proposed by governments as well as against or in favour of certain issues.”[ii]

Gideon Rachman in a recent write-up for the Financial Times titled, “2019:the year of street protests” has aptly observed “Certain years in history — 1848, 1917, 1968, 1989 — conjure up images of street protests, mass demonstrations and revolutionary turmoil. When historians put 2019 in perspective, they may also declare it a vintage year for popular unrest. In terms of sheer geographical spread, it is hard to think of a year to rival this one. Protests large enough to disrupt daily life and cause panic in government have broken out in Hong Kong, India, Chile, Bolivia, Ecuador, Colombia, Spain, France, the Czech Republic, Russia, Malta, Algeria, Iraq, Iran, Lebanon and Sudan — and that list is not comprehensive.”[iii] The underlying trait of the aforementioned protests being their non-sectarian character with an emphasis on critical issues of everyday existence, glocal in character, marked by spontaneity and an absence of leaders, propelled into the international arena by means of sustained social media coverage or “digital mobilization.” Whats App, Twitter and Facebook provided a platform for the articulation of virtual protests to complement and disseminate street demonstrations as the virtual intertwined with the real.

The Middle East in particular witnessed a spate of protests. In Iran, civil strife saw massive street demonstrations as a result of a strike over increasing gasoline prices which intensified into one of the fiercest revolts in recent times. Iraq faced a comparable tumult steered by the “youth and lower-income residents who demanded an end to corruption, high unemployment and weak infrastructure.” Protests broke out in Egypt in the streets of Cairo, Alexandria, Damietta and five other Egyptian cities on 20, 21 and 27 September 2019 in which the protestors called for the removal of President of Egypt Abdel Fattah el-Sisi. On the other hand, protests in Lebanon brought together a frequently at loggerheads public in an unusual, nonetheless optimistic display of unity. A planned charge on internet voice calls prompted remonstrations from masses of “different sects and religions, waving Lebanese flags.” Multitudes of young, “leaderless” dissenters demanded economic restructuring and parity as well as an end to “government corruption.” The nonviolent remonstrations rapidly spiraled into nationwide protests that virtually shut the nation down for weeks, and compelled the Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri’s to resign in October. [iv]

Asia in Global Affairs in the course of the year, 2019 has been highlighting the culture of protest in the Middle East and North Africa through a series of reflections both on what transpired in 2019 and revisiting what could be argued as the starting point of street politics and protest, the Arab uprising of 2011 and the protests at Gezi. A few selected links on protests in the region are as follows:

1. Anti-Government Protests in Iraq and the Terminal Crisis of the Post-Saddam State: https://www.asiainglobalaffairs.in/reflections/anti-government-protests-in-iraq-and-the-terminal-crisis-of-the-post-saddam-state/
2. Arab Spring: Revisiting the Syrian Chapter https://www.asiainglobalaffairs.in/reflections/arab-spring-revisiting-the-syrian-chapter/
3. Nurturing a New ‘Nakba’?https://www.asiainglobalaffairs.in/reflections/nurturing-a-new-naqba/
4. Summer of Protests https://www.asiainglobalaffairs.in/reflections/summer-of-protests/
5. Revisiting the ‘Tahrir Moment’ https://www.asiainglobalaffairs.in/reflections/revisiting-the-tahrir-moment/
6. Why Iranians Are Protesting? Yet Again https://www.asiainglobalaffairs.in/reflections/why-iranians-are-protesting-yet-again/
7. Rhetoric, Symbolism and Gezihttps://www.asiainglobalaffairs.in/reflections/rhetoric-symbolism-and-gezi/
8. Resisting from the Margins https://www.asiainglobalaffairs.in/reflections/resisting-from-the-margins/
9. Looking Back: Reading the Arab Uprisings https://www.asiainglobalaffairs.in/reflections/looking-back-reading-the-arab-uprisings/

Asia in Global Affairs

December 31, 2019

[i] Nicholas Fyfe, Images of the Street: Planning, Identity and Control in Public Space, London and New York: Routledge, 1998.

[ii] Marco Giugni and Maria T. Grasso, Street Citizens: Protest Politics and Social Movement Activism in the Age of Globalization, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2019.

[iii] Gideon Rachman, “2019: the year of street protests”, Financial Times, December 23, 2019.

[iv] Maria Piñero and Mariana Atencio, “In 2019, protestors took to the streets around the world to demand change.” NBC News, December 25, 2019.