Tunisia is a country located east of Libya. It has many rulers and many different empires rule it. Most notably Tunisia was ruled by Carthage and Rome. In the Roman Empire was only able to exist as a dominating entity because most of the agricultural surplus came from Tunisia. Later in history France colonized and incorporated Tunisia into French dominance. After revolting against France, Tunisia was liberated from French rule. From 1987 to 2011 Tunisia had been ruled by authoritarian rule by Zine El Abidine Ben Ali. As the youth came to be a loud voice against the ideas of the president they started demonstrations against him. To suppress these actions the president made crack downs on those that oppressed him. The breaking point came in 2010 when a street vendor was forced to close his vegetable stand. This was his only source of income and to protest the president he set himself on fire. He later died from his injuries. After this the youth joined together and made massive non-violent demonstrations that were geared to overthrow the president and his regime. After two week of demonstrations the president left and the country is now in a transition to a more democratic national status.
I believe that Tunisia is a cross roads and it is a good one. It just shows that when people are feed up and are with dissolution, no government is powerful enough to stop the masses. I am happy that the people of Tunisia got what they wanted, maybe now they can truly be happy with their lives. Hopefully this is not the end of Tunisian reform but only the beginning for them.
