ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the political dynamics in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya in the post–Arab Spring period by giving particular attention to the characteristics of political leadership. Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya, which all took on divergent political trajectories, are characterized by different leadership dynamics. Nidaa Tunis, a secularist party, won the 2014 parliamentary elections. Mohamed Beji Caid Essebsi became Tunisia’s first democratically elected president by winning the 2014 presidential elections. The democratic and consensual character of the 2014 constitution and the peaceful transition of power epitomize the relatively successful democratization of Tunisia in the post–Arab Spring period. The decrees also deepened the division within society. Non-Islamists groups, opposing Morsi’s efforts to control the constitution-drafting process, took to the streets. General Abdul Fattah el-Sisi, the head of the Egyptian military, became president by receiving 96.1% of votes in the 2014 presidential elections, whose validity was rightly questioned by international observers.
