title: The Arab Bed Spring? Sexual rights in troubled times across the Middle East and North Africa.
abstract: In recent decades, attitudes in many parts of the Arab region have hardened towards non-conforming sexualities and gender roles, a shift fuelled in part by a rise in Islamic conservatism and exploited by authoritarian regimes. While political cultures have proved slow to change in the wake of the 'Arab Spring', a growing freedom of expression, and increasing activity by civil society, is opening space for discreet challenges to sexual taboos in a number of countries, part of wider debates over human rights and personal liberties in the emerging political and social order.
authors.affiliation: Visiting Fellow, Institute for Development Studies, University of Sussex, Brighton, UK. Electronic address: shereen.ef@theglobalexperts.org.
authors.forename: Shereen
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: El Feki
mesh_terms: D000352:Africa, Northern; D018912:Arabs; D014943:Global Health; D006806:Human Rights; D006801:Humans; D008877:Middle East; D011057:Politics; D012725:Sexual Behavior / Q000208:ethnology*; D000072339:Sexual and Gender Minorities; D019529:Sexuality; D012922:Social Change
keywords: Islam; LGBT; Middle East and North Africa; abortion; social media