Last Friday, as I was meeting in my office in Washington, DC with Nazeh Ben Ammar, president of the Tunisian American Chamber of Commerce, Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali, now the former president of Tunisia, was fleeing his country. As my guest awaited word on when the airport would re-open and Lufthansa would be permitted to return him home to his family in Tunis, we talked about his country, entrepreneurship and a new generation of youth in the Arab region.
Of particular note, was his observation that perhaps the WikiLeaks scandal might be having some unintended consequences. As relayed to me, revelations in U.S. embassy cables gave credibility to accusations of corruption at the highest level of government and resonated strongly with young Tunisians. Such open media attention raised the public’s temperature and provided cover for the genuine public dissent that began last month. Now it appears the Arab region must respond to an increasingly open source world where new, fearless generations will rebel – not as extremists, but as educated, yet unemployed citizens. If accounts from the dissenting young Tunisians on news channels are any indication, the uprising is at its core not so much a call for personal and political freedom, but one for economic freedom and opportunity.
To read the full, original article click on this link: Tunisias Tipping Point - Entrepreneurship.org
Author: Jonathan Ortmans is president of the Public Forum Institute, a non-partisan organization dedicated to fostering dialogue on important policy issues. In this capacity, he leads the Policy Dialogue on Entrepreneurship, focused on public policies to promote entrepreneurship in the U.S. and around the world. In addition, he serves as a senior fellow at the Kauffman Foundation.
