"In the Middle East of the new millennium ...few Arab activists had really strategized for a revolution, even though they might have dreamed about it. The postsocialist neoliberal ideas and practices had structured the conduct of and deradicalized much of the political class.
At the same time that marketization caused social exclusion and dissent among the grassroots, it conditioned the activism of groups like yoith, women, and political opposition, including the Islamists. In pre-uprising Yemen, for instance, activism largely meant 'civil society work' in NGOs concerned with human rights, empowerment of women, charity, and development (up from five thousand in 2008 to more than thirteen thousand by 2013).
The effect of which has been "depoliticizing activism and deradicalizing the idea of change."
—Asef Bayat, Revolution without Revolutionaries, 2017, p. 174
The NGO-zation of resistance
By Arundhati Roy
At the same time that marketization caused social exclusion and dissent among the grassroots, it conditioned the activism of groups like yoith, women, and political opposition, including the Islamists. In pre-uprising Yemen, for instance, activism largely meant 'civil society work' in NGOs concerned with human rights, empowerment of women, charity, and development (up from five thousand in 2008 to more than thirteen thousand by 2013).
The effect of which has been "depoliticizing activism and deradicalizing the idea of change."
—Asef Bayat, Revolution without Revolutionaries, 2017, p. 174
The NGO-zation of resistance
By Arundhati Roy
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