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Il Settarismo Come Strumento Di Securitizzazione Della Mobilitazione Politica in Bahrein

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Il Settarismo Come Strumento Di Securitizzazione Della Mobilitazione Politica in Bahrein Corso di Laurea magistrale in Relazioni Internazionali Comparate Tesi di Laurea Il settarismo come strumento di securitizzazione della mobilitazione politica in Bahrein Relatrice Ch.ma. Prof.ssa Maria Cristina Paciello Correlatrice Ch.ma. Prof.ssa Barbara De Poli Laureando Leonardo Jacopo Maria Mazzucco 872034 Anno Accademico 2018 / 2019 INDICE INDICE...................................................................................................................................................... 2 ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................................................ 4 INTRODUZIONE ....................................................................................................................................... 9 1. IL SETTARISMO NELL’ISLAM: UN CONCETTO CONTESO .............................................................. 13 1.1 La fitna e l’origine dello sciismo ........................................................................................... 13 1.2 Ta’ifah o Ta’ifiyyah? Le problematicità della definizione e le criticità della traduzione linguistica .......................................................................................................................................... 21 1.3 L’approccio identitario per lo studio del settarismo ........................................................... 30 2. L’EVOLUZIONE DEL SETTARISMO IN MEDIO ORIENTE E NORD AFRICA ...................................... 39 2.1 L’evoluzione del settarismo durante l’Impero Ottomano .................................................... 40 2.2 La Nuova Guerra Fredda ....................................................................................................... 42 2.3 Le Rivolte Arabe .................................................................................................................... 47 2.4 Il settarismo come strategia politica .................................................................................... 49 2.5 Come esaminare il settarismo in Bahrein ............................................................................ 54 3. L’ASCESA E LE RAMIFICAZIONI DEL SETTARISMO IN BAHREIN TRA UN NUOVO RENTIER-STATE, UN RINNOVATO AVVENTURISMO POLITICO E L’IMPATTO DELLE RIFORME NEOLIBERALI ............... 64 3.1 I mutamenti nel contesto regionale ..................................................................................... 65 3.2 L’organizzazione e la costruzione dello spazio in Bahrein................................................... 73 3.2.1 La politica di costruzione del suolo ................................................................................ 73 3.2.2 La memoria dei luoghi tra passato, presente e futuro ................................................ 77 3.2.3 La politica urbanistica ................................................................................................... 80 3.2.4 L’ingegneria residenziale: gli insediamenti di Isa Town e Hamad Town .................... 83 3.3 Il tessuto sociale: tra lavoro e migrazioni ............................................................................ 85 3.4 Gli apparati di sicurezza: tra pratiche di naturalizzazione e le trasformazioni demografiche 91 3.5 Welfare, opportunità e servizi ............................................................................................. 95 4. LO SCIISMO POLITICO E LA STORICITÀ DELL’OPPOSIZIONE IN BAHREIN: TRA COOPTAZIONE E REPRESSIONE ...................................................................................................................................... 100 4.1 Lo sciismo politico ............................................................................................................... 101 4.2 L’evoluzione storica della mobilitazione politica in Bahrein: dal protettorato britannico alla vigilia delle rivolte arabe del 2011 .......................................................................................... 104 4.2.1 La storicità delle rivendicazioni .................................................................................. 106 4.2.3 Gli sciiti tra cooptazione e minaccia: dalla Rivoluzione Iraniana all’Intifada ........... 114 4.3 Da emirato a monarchia: tra riforme ed autoritarismo .................................................... 119 2 5. LA “PRIMAVERA ARABA” IN BAHREIN: LA SECURITIZZAZIONE DELLA MOBILITAZIONE POLITICA 125 5.1 Cause ed evoluzioni della “Primavera Araba” in Bahrein ................................................. 126 5.2 Il fronte delle rivendicazioni: .............................................................................................. 129 5.2.1 Le prime rivendicazioni: la dialettica tra manifestanti e movimenti politici storici ........ 130 5.2.2 Pearl Roundabout: tra innovazione e tradizione .............................................................. 134 5.3 La risposta del regime e l’escalation della tensione: tra repressione, stallo e radicalizzazione ............................................................................................................................... 137 5.3.1 L’altra “Roundabout”: la moschea Al Fateh ..................................................................... 139 5.3.2 L’imporsi della narrazione settaria: la mediatizzazione del conflitto, gli scioperi sindacali e la rottura nel fronte dell’opposizione ..................................................................................... 141 5.3.4 L’intervento del Peninsula Shield Forces e l’importanza del Bahrein nello scacchiere saudita ......................................................................................................................................... 145 5.4 La controrivoluzione e la de-democratizzazione ..................................................................... 147 5.4.1 La securitizzazione delle proteste: dalle rivendicazioni politiche alla minaccia iraniana 148 5.4.2 L’eradicazione dell’opposizione politica ........................................................................... 154 5.4.3 L’eradicazione dell’opposizione dagli spazi fisici .............................................................. 157 5.4.4 Dialogo nazionale e la Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry .............................. 158 5.4.5 I “backfired effects” dell’uso strategico del settarismo ................................................... 162 CONCLUSIONI ...................................................................................................................................... 168 BIBLIOGRAFIA: .................................................................................................................................... 173 3 ABSTRACT The Arab Uprisings occurred in 2011 not only have they represented a political turmoil for the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), but they have also unleashed an unprecedented wave of sectarian violence along the region whose effects have reverberated until nowadays. Even if the resurgence of the sectarian divide is traceable to the crackdown of the Iraqi regime in 2003, caused by the US-led occupation which redrawn the equilibrium of the geopolitical balance of power of the region, it is with the 2011’s unrests that sectarianism became the main focal point though which the Arab uprisings would have been framed. This study aims to prove that, in Bahrain, during the Arab Uprisings in 2011, the main reason behind the failure of the reform’s process was the securitisation of the popular political mobilisation through a framework based on sectarian identities. While having old historical roots, the sectarian conflict has been nurtured in the recent time by a regime-driven strategy designed to frame the political opposition to the Al Khalifa Monarchy as a security threat which needs to be addressed through the violent repression perpetrated by the security- regime apparatus. In order to evaluate the possible impact of a sectarian strategy on the Bahraini political mobilisation, the first part of this work is aimed at analysing both the origins of sectarianism in the Islamic religion by explaining the intrinsic significance of the division (fitna) between Sunni and Shi’a and the sectarian phenomenon as a contested concept in the academic literature on sectarian studies. Besides, this study develops a path that traces the main transformations of sectarianism in the MENA region, moving from the decline of the Ottoman Empire in the late 1800’s to the closer Arab Uprisings in 2011. Furthermore, the research will focus on the case study of Bahrain by examining how the sectarian phenomenon can be turned by the regime into a political instrument able to reinforce the economic and social discrimination as well as the residential segregation of the Shi’a community. Before concentrating on the 2011’s upheavals, the analysis will move backwards by investigating the political mobilisation in Bahrain through a historical framework in order to highlight the fact that a regime opposition built on cross- sectarian and cross-ideological instances is a recurring feature in the Bahraini context. For this work, centred on the securitisation of the popular uprisings, the study will compare the instances promoted by the agendas of the different political movements which gathered in 4 Pearl Roundabout, the protests’ core in Manama, to validate the research hypothesis of the protests as a movement demanding political reforms and moved by cross-sectarian and cross- ideological roots. As far as the
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