Mohamed Bouazizi's self-immolation sparks the Arab Spring
- Date
- 17 December 2010
- Category
- Politics & governance
- Region
- Tunisia / Middle East & North Africa
- Era
- Contemporary
- Significance
On 17 December 2010 Mohamed Bouazizi, a 26-year-old street vendor in Sidi Bouzid, Tunisia, set himself on fire after police confiscated his goods and humiliated him. He died on 4 January 2011.
His act crystallised widespread anger over unemployment, corruption and authoritarian repression, igniting nationwide protests that forced Tunisian president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali to flee on 14 January 2011 after 23 years in power. The Tunisian revolution became the opening act of the 'Arab Spring', a wave of pro-democracy uprisings that spread within weeks across North Africa and the Middle East, reaching Egypt, Libya, Yemen, Bahrain and Syria. While Tunisia produced the region's most durable democratic transition, most uprisings led to renewed repression, state collapse or civil war. Bouazizi's death is widely treated as the symbolic trigger of a decade of upheaval that reshaped the politics of the Arab world.
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Related politics & governance events
- The end of apartheid and Nelson Mandela's election in South Africa27 April 1994 (election); 10 May 1994 (inauguration)
- Dissolution of the Soviet UnionAugust–December 1991
- German reunification3 October 1990
- Fall of the Berlin Wall9 November 1989
- Revolutions of 1989 across Eastern Europe1989 (Autumn of Nations)
- Gorbachev's glasnost and perestroika1985–1991 (from 11 March 1985)
Also relevant
Further reading
The wider story
The State of Africa: A History of the Continent Since Independence
Gripping account of Africa's nations from independence to the present.
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