ABSTRACT
This concluding chapter summarizes the main findings of my ethnographical research on civil society in post-authoritarian Tunisia. The analysis presented in this book allows the reader to rethink the current conceptualization of civil society in the context of regime change through the study of relational dynamics in which local associations are embedded. This embeddedness is empirically observable in the formal or informal multi-positionality of prominent members of local associations. Indeed, the findings presented in this volume indicate that associations do not act as isolated units. Still, their members occupy multiple positions and are involved in complex relational dynamics with actors outside the so-called ‘civil society sphere.’ In other words, associations are permeable to interactions, and civil society ultimately emerges as the by-product of relational dynamics. Furthermore, the concept of arena highlights that association contours are not set in stone but, on the contrary, fluctuate and depend on the interactive dynamics between all actors involved in the process of political change, where the civil and the political spheres are not separate dimensions.
