Forging a Counter-Narrative for Democracy

“The first battle lost by the defeated is the battle over naming things by their true names.” — George Orwell

In an era of political stagnation across the Arab world, where spaces for free action are shrinking and the grip of regimes is tightening, the central conflict is no longer confined to state institutions or the competition for official positions. The core of the struggle today lies in the ability to produce meaning and to shape the narrative that defines events and charts the course for the future.

As Antonio Gramsci observed, hegemony is not exercised through brute force alone, but through a system’s ability to convince people that its dominance is the natural and only possible order.

Modern authoritarianism has mastered the rules of this new game. It no longer relies solely on security apparatuses or bureaucratic control; it has transformed into a skilled engineer of narrative, crafting its own story and saturating the public sphere with it. The regime presents itself as the sole guarantor of stability and the true protector of national sovereignty, while meticulously demonizing democratic alternatives, branding them as synonymous with chaos, incompetence, national disunity, and foreign conspiracy.

Here, the analysis of discourse—as Pierre Bourdieu pointed out—becomes an essential tool for understanding how symbolic violence is converted into an instrument that reinforces legitimacy. It reveals how hegemony is first constructed at the level of meaning before it becomes entrenched in state institutions. This deconstruction is the crucial first step in carving out a different path and effectively confronting this hegemony.

Authoritarianism as a Dominant Narrative

In the years following the 2011 Arab revolutions, the Arab world, and Tunisia in particular, witnessed a profound narrative reversal. Democracy, once the horizon of liberation and dignity, became perceived by a significant portion of the population as a source of chaos and socio-economic decline.

The first transitional decade was rebranded as the “Black Decade,” a discourse that reduces the complexities of that era to an indictment of democracy itself. This narrative presents a return to centralized, one-man rule as the only viable option for stability, deliberately ignoring the symbolic, rights-based, and institutional gains of the revolution.

This counter-narrative was forged by a relentless media machine and repeated political and religious rhetoric, making the coup against the revolution seem like an inevitable, unquestionable outcome. Thus, the suspension of elected institutions on July 25, 2021, became the culmination of this narrative coup, justifying the concentration of power in a single hand as a necessary and final solution.

At its core, this trajectory was a systematic process of engineering consent—of investing in popular frustration and leveraging collective disappointment to legitimize a new authoritarianism. The very dream of democracy was subjected to devaluation and contempt until it died in the minds and hearts of many. Freedom was portrayed as a burden too heavy for the nation to bear. The result was the production of a populist leader, cast in the role of a savior from “democratic chaos.”

The Myths of the Democratic Backlash

Authoritarianism is not content with security control; it builds its legitimacy on foundational myths that resonate deeply within the popular psyche: that political freedoms do not put food on the table, that pluralism paralyzes the state and threatens its unity, and that democratic demands are merely an extension of foreign intervention.

These myths form a psychological wall that confines public imagination, transforming authoritarian stability into the only conceivable choice. Their success rests not on coherent logic, but on their ability to capitalize on fear, despair, and a false nostalgia for a mythical “time of stability.”

This embodies what Hannah Arendt identified as the crisis of modern politics: when the public sphere is inverted from an arena for free debate into a space for indoctrination and repetition.

The power of anti-democratic narratives lies not in the strength of their arguments, but in their capacity to recycle collective fear and popular despair into familiar symbolic molds. They invoke national and religious reservoirs to cover their political emptiness, transforming their slogans into daily, easily repeated axioms. Phrases like:

• “Democracy is chaos.”

• “The nation before freedom.”

• “Democracy doesn’t feed people.”

• “Pluralism shatters national unity.”

• “All politicians are corrupt.”

• “A foreign conspiracy is behind our crisis.”

These mantras, repeated by leaders, state-aligned media, and influencers, become foundational myths that redraw the boundaries of the politically possible and slam the door on critique and accountability. This is achieved through a language charged with symbols and a fake nostalgia for the past, leaning on a collective sense of grievance accumulated through decades of economic marginalization and regional/class inequality.

Words are thus transformed from tools of expression into weapons of hegemony that dominate the public sphere. Politics is reduced to ready-made slogans. Genuine public dialogue vanishes, replaced by media spectacles that sell the public illusory, individualistic solutions instead of real, systemic reforms. In this way, the collective consciousness is reshaped to accept authoritarianism as a given, rather than treating it as a choice that can—and must—be challenged and resisted.

The Fragility of the Democratic Discourse

We cannot understand the hegemony of authoritarian narratives without acknowledging the inherent fragility of the democratic discourse itself. In Tunisia, as in other Arab countries, democratic forces became engrossed in ideological squabbles and technical debates about constitutions, political systems, and abstract ideals of freedom and rights, while failing to connect them concretely to bread, work, and daily dignity.

Consequently, democracy remained a seemingly elitist project, confined to political salons and party corridors, distant from the pressing concerns of the unemployed, the marginalized, and those in the peripheries. Its socio-economic vision was often vague, unable to present a bold developmental plan that convincingly linked freedom with justice and tangible reform. As the idea of consensus eroded into mere partisan horse-trading, public trust in the entire democratic project waned.

This intellectual and practical vacuum was exploited by populism, which presented itself as the voice of the “real people,” using a simple, emotionally charged language and vague promises of revenge against the elites. Despite being unfeasible, this approach successfully hijacked the language of daily suffering, until democracy itself, in the eyes of many, became part of the problem rather than a viable path to a solution.

Towards an Alternative Democratic Narrative: Linking Bread and Dignity

An effective response to the hegemony of authoritarian narratives requires more than moral indignation or condemnation. It demands the reconstruction of a compelling counter-narrative capable of reaching people’s hearts and minds.

This new discourse must be persuasive and tangible, presenting democracy as a horizon for development, social justice, and an lived experience intrinsically tied to daily sustenance, work, and dignity—far removed from elitist slogans.

Inspiring global examples, such as Spain and Portugal after decades of dictatorship, and South Korea after military rule, demonstrate that political transformation, freedom, transparency, and accountability are gateways to sustainable economic and social growth. They prove that democracy is the strongest bulwark against corruption and the most vital source of developmental legitimacy.

These models confirm the thesis of Nobel laureate economist Amartya Sen: that democracy is a prerequisite for unleashing development. It is in a free environment that individuals gain the real capacity to act and choose, creating a direct link between freedom and socio-economic growth.

In the Arab context, the urgent task is to transform democracy from a vague, elitist discourse into a concrete, daily vocabulary that inseparably links bread with freedom, and dignity with social justice. This narrative must replace the authoritarian binary of “Security vs. Chaos” with a new, powerful proposition: “Participation and Justice vs. Corruption and Decay.”

It is a narrative that places the citizen at the heart of the project as the primary agent, and presents politics not as the management of a sterile status quo, but as a transformative act capable of opening the doors to the future.

Discourse as a Strategic Weapon: The Battle for Hearts and Minds

Democratic and civil forces in Tunisia and the Arab world must recognize that the battle has evolved. It is no longer just about attaining power, but about winning the war of the grand narrative that captivates minds and wins hearts.

Democracy maintains its legitimacy not only through laws and elections, but primarily through its ability to generate a meaning that people can feel and live daily.

What is required is the engineering of a new discourse—one that concerns itself not only with content, but also with language and delivery. A discourse that connects daily demands with fundamental rights, speaks to the fears of the youth and the marginalized, and legitimately rekindles hope. Creatively using national, religious, and social symbols can transform politics from a technical exercise into a space for collective participation, where truth is built through public debate, as Hannah Arendt reminded us.

This narrative battle is decisive: Whoever wins the battle of the narrative, wins the battle for legitimacy. Whoever controls meaning, defines the future. Without this, democracy will remain a fragile project, suspended in mid-air, vulnerable to collapse with every economic or security crisis, and incapable of being a genuine tool for change and the preservation of human dignity.

From Discourse to Action

The Tunisian experience clearly reveals that a democratic transition collapses when freedom itself is redefined as a threat, and when the symbolic field is left vacant to be filled by narratives of fear and despair. Those who do not possess their own story will be consumed by the story of their opponent. Those who neglect the battle for consciousness will lose the battle of politics. The story is the first front, and those who own it, own the future.

The battle for democracy in the age of authoritarianism is, first and foremost, a struggle over the grand narrative. Therefore, it is imperative to go beyond abstract slogans of freedom and dignity; we must translate them into a living, tangible narrative that convinces the masses that authoritarianism and corruption are the true causes of their suffering, and that democracy and participation are the only way to overcome it.

To transform this narrative into a practical force capable of shaping the future, several strategic steps are urgently required:

1. Build Campaigns that Connect: Launch discursive campaigns that explicitly link immediate economic demands (employment, tax justice, anti-corruption) with the essence of democracy, presenting the latter as a fundamental condition for development and justice.

2. Conquer the Digital Frontier: Wage the battle in the digital space by supporting civil youth initiatives that produce visual and digital content in an accessible language, confronting authoritarian narratives in their very stronghold.

Whoever succeeds in convincing people that democracy is not the source of their suffering, but their path beyond it, will hold the real keys to an Arab political renewal.

Only then will discourse become a true political and strategic weapon, and the alternative democratic narrative will mark the decisive beginning of the battle for a genuine Arab renaissance.