By Ilyes Bellagha*
Tunisian identity cannot be said, it is sought.
Between loyalty and betrayal, between memory and the fear of dwelling,
we have made confusion a national art.
This text questions this shifting identity, between History and non-culture,
where even the word “Inshallah” becomes a mirror of our relationship with the world.
The magma of origins
Tunisian identity is not an addition of origins, but a fertilization. Amazigh, Arab, Ottoman, Andalusian — it draws on all these roots, but remains in fusion. Like the first article of the Constitution, it names before understanding. This inner magma fertilizes our collective being: it inhabits us more than it defines us.
Fidelity and the paradox of “yes but no”
Outside of the debate, we are all Tunisians — out of loyalty. But as soon as we talk, yes but no emerges, this paradox more expressive than negation. Identity becomes tension: between recognition and distrust, between proclaimed union and refused trust. Tunisianness is this in-between where we want to belong without giving in.
The CIN and the ʿAsabiyya: from the link to suspicion
The national identity card — the famous CIN — claims to represent the citizen, but only registers him. It records belonging, without guaranteeing recognition. In Ibn Khaldoun’s logic, ʿasabiyya (solidarity) here becomes suspicion: to belong is already to risk being called into question. The fraternity turns into a file; citizenship as proof of loyalty.
History versus geography
We confuse identity and territory. However, to be Tunisian is to belong to a History, not to a geography. We have replaced the geopolitics of reality with a geopolitics of myth: from Iraq to Andalusia, from the river to the sea. This golden thread connects the ruins, but it no longer connects the living. Identity becomes a story, not a map.
Carthage, or shared non-fidelity
By non-fidelity to those who share, we proclaim ourselves Carthaginians. Not by inheritance, but by refuge. Carthage becomes the common nostalgia of those who no longer believe in the common. It offers a substitute grandeur, a myth to mask the present. To be Carthaginian is to refuse to be contemporary.
Architecture, or the confused trace of identity
The very conception of this trace – this imprint that we call “identity” – troubles our architecture. Our cities no longer know whether they should be born or collapse. They oscillate between the desire for rebirth and the fear of disappearing, between the call of the new and the nostalgia of the past. Building, here, always means answering a question of identity. And when this identity becomes blurred, architecture becomes hesitation. The gesture freezes, the hand trembles, the stone doubts.
Noise and text
What defines our culture is this non-culture: a noise, not a structured text. Noise is what remains when speech dissolves, when memory no longer has syntax. Tunisian culture is not absent: it is confused, that is to say alive in disorder. This noise, however, is not in vain. It is the breathing of the people when the institutions no longer write.
The fear of structure
We were the founders of Facebook before Facebook was even born. In our cafes, our squares, our alleys, everything was already there: the whispered statuses, the sharing of moods. And yet, today, we are terrified of artificial intelligence — not because it is too intelligent, but because it is a structure. What we fear is the mirror that it holds up to us: that of a society that still refuses to accept its own complexity.
The code betrayed
In Tunisia, everything that falls under the code – whether economic, legal or road – seems destined to be circumvented. Not out of a spirit of freedom, but out of a habit of betrayal. Transgression is no longer an act of resistance: it has become a collective reflex. We are no longer living Shakespeare’s dilemma — to be or not to be — but a more perverse form: let it happen, let it go. The Tunisian paradox is no longer that of being, but of grumbling avoidance: disobeying without revolutionizing, complaining without building, denouncing without repairing.
Towards a people who try without really wanting to live
We try without really wanting to. We talk about the future without inhabiting it, about change without embodying it. Our people are groping forward, not for lack of intelligence, but for fear of inhabiting what they create. Living requires courage: that of putting down roots without becoming rigid. But our national reflex is Inshallah – a splendid word, which has become lazy. If it became a motto again, not a wish, it would mean: not “may God will it in my place”, but “may the meaning come about through my act”.
*Ilyes Bellagha – Architect ITAAUT – Temple du Sens, Tunis 2025
