Tunisia's 'historic' election: 4 lessons

Moderate Islamists appear to be the big winner in historically secular Tunisia's first free elections. Is this a Pyrrhic victory for democracy?

A Tunisian man holds his son as he casts a vote at a polling station
(Image credit: REUTERS/Jamal Saidi)

Ten months after Tunisian street vendor Mohammed Bouazizi burned himself to death as a political protest — and set off a chain of events that led to the Arab Spring — more than 90 percent of Tunisian voters turned out this weekend for the country's first free and democratic election. Official results won't be released until Tuesday, but the biggest winner in the election for a 217-member assembly charged with writing a new constitution is expected to be the moderate Islamist party Ennahda, long banned under deposed President Zine El-Abidine Ben Ali. What can we learn from what United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon hailed as a "historic" and "landmark election"? Here, four lessons:

1. Arab countries can do democracy

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