A decade after the outbreak of the revolution, the Tunisian experience - despite its successes - still faces many challenges and risks of multiple dimensions.

It can be said that, since the outbreak of the revolution of December 17, 2010, Tunisia has succeeded in achieving its democratic transition in a peaceful and smooth manner, after the regime of former President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali was toppled on January 14, 2011, by organizing the first free and fair elections on October 23 2011 and the election of the National Constituent Assembly (Parliament).

The successes of this transition followed the ratification of the Constitution of the Second Republic on January 26, 2014, which guaranteed rights and freedoms, and the establishment of constitutional bodies such as the Independent High Authority for Elections.

Despite these bright spots, this transition faces setbacks and stumbling blocks at various political, economic and social levels, threatening its stability.

This setback relates to the outcomes of the democratic transition that was supposed to lead to a transition from a political file to an economic one, as a result of the instability and agreement of the political class - until today - on a developmental pattern that makes this shift, as political analyst Sami Braham says to Al-Jazeera Net.

Judgment setback

As for the researcher in political communication, Sumaya Bal Ragab, she considers that Tunisia is experiencing a setback in governance through the disappearance of the justifications for the old political consensus, with the decline of the Nidaa Tounes party, as well as the fragmentation of the political arena in the level of control over the state's management tools, as a result of the absence of a clear vision and a real national project.

The researcher in political communication Sumaya Bal-Rajab (Al-Jazeera)

This fragmentation - according to what she said to Al-Rajab to Al-Jazeera Net - has left a deepening political crisis, which is reflected in the Parliament’s relationship with the current economic and social requirements more than ever before, where political pluralism formed a bad political scene at the level of government.

The struggle of existence

Brahm attributes the reasons for what he describes as the current setback to the failure to entrench the idea of ​​coexistence at the level of political reality, through the failure of the political class to emerge from the struggle of existence and to link the issue of its survival with the negation of the other.

Braham believes that the problem is not in the solutions and perceptions related to development and the social file, but in the absence of a unified political will that implements these perceptions to solve the economic crisis.

He believes that the political class with its various currents, led by the Free Constitutional Party representing the old system, contributed with its exclusionary and isolationist vision to this setback, by working to disrupt the path of development and sabotage the existing one, especially the parliamentary institution, to facilitate the process of containing the state and attacking it.

Impotent government

For its part, the political parties that won the confidence of Tunisians - such as the Ennahda Movement, the Dignity Coalition, the Democratic Current, and the New Constitutional Party - bear the primary responsibility for disrupting the work of the House of Representatives.

It also holds the government responsible for its impotence in the face of wide-open files, such as employment and major economic benefits for the country, as well as the presidency, as "President Qais Saeed's speeches only increased the current situation," according to her estimation.

According to Brahm, the political stability that allows for a serious devotion to the economic and social files is the biggest challenge awaiting the future of the democratic transition in Tunisia, and if the political class does not unite on a common word between them, then it is threatened by the massive social protest movement that may bring down everyone.

National dialogue

He stresses that Tunisia today needs a common national will and a national dialogue that is not parallel to the democratic system, but rather from within the institutions of democratic transition to implement real and deep economic reforms.

In turn, she affirms the need for Tunisia today to direct the helm towards a truly integrated national development project, similar to that of post-independence Tunisia, capable of saving the country, and believes that the Labor Union initiative calling for a national dialogue "came at the appropriate time."

Economic failure

On the other hand, the economist Rida Qawia believes that the great economic failure is one of the most important reasons for the faltering democratic transition in Tunisia.

The economic expert, Rida Qawiaa (Al-Jazeera)

Qwaia says to Al-Jazeera Net that one of the indicators of this failure is that the economic growth rate has reached its lowest level, as it did not exceed 2.8% during the first years of the current decade, while it reached 5.5% in the pre-revolution decades.

He added that Tunisia did not witness a qualitative leap in the issue of employment, as the situation worsened in the public sector, which provided 750,000 job opportunities, which he considered unscientific and did not give an added value to the Tunisian economy, which increased the state budget deficit.

The strikes also contributed to the decline in the rate of economic growth and the exacerbation of social problems, which increased the debt owed by the state, which before the revolution did not exceed 45% of the gross domestic product, while today it has reached 95% and is expected to reach 110% during the current year, according to Qawa'a. .

He attributes this stumbling - as he describes it - to the remnants of the past based on the disparity in the distribution of the country's wealth between regions, and to the high unemployment rate in the interior regions, which left a kind of social movement in them.

Social congestion, the security situation, and governmental instability also negatively affected foreign investments, and caused the spread of corruption in the country, and it had a share in this stumbling, according to Qwaia.

In order to save Tunisia, the economist stresses the importance of providing security, political and social stability, and finding scientific policies and solutions, with the intervention of all political, economic and human resources parties in the country.