The decolonization experience in Tunisia is comparable within narrow (North Africa), broader (Arab-Islamic World, French Empire), and broadest (world) contexts. This study focuses on the context of Arab Muslim lands under European rule and especially on the immediate context of French North Africa. The author employs M. Bloch’s contextual comparative strategy to construct a questionnaire, to recognize the general stimuli and responses in the form of European-side and Arab-side variables, and to pinpoint the special features that define the Tunisian case. By contrasting Syria (as a Fertile Crescent model) with Algeria (as a Maghribi model), he demonstrates that virtually all Arab-Islamic societies share some of the variables of decolonization but in peculiar combinations and sequences. Characteristics peculiar to Tunisia include a strong but brief militant assimilation movement and an incomplete transition from ‘parliamentary’ to ‘populist-totalitarian’ nationalism. Tunisia’s experience conforms mainly to a Maghribi pattern, although in a few respects to a Fertile Crescent one. Notes, ref., sum.
