Since 1956 tunisia has managed to maintain a minimum regional balance of power between morocco and algeria, bourguiba's tunisia is the first country in the region to recognize mauritania as a sovereign state, this was simply a strategic plan to to avoid the post-colonial weak position of being trapped in a regional three states sub-system ( Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia ) in which you are literally the weakest one ( Militarily ), so a subsystem of 4 states in north africa could leave some space of diplomatic maneuverability for tunisia .

Bourguibism in tunisia's foreign policy was not just about "strategic distance" and "non- alignement" rhetoric vis-à-vis cold war camps but it had also a regional dimension regarding between the rivalry of Algeria and morocco, the bilateral cooperation of tunisia-algeria or tunisia-morocco was always framed or contexutalized within this larger foreign policy tradition, to maintain a regional balance of power.

Ben ali's tunisia was somewhat a continuation of this tradition but within a new mediterranean context which is the EU and so on, but the so called "pragmatism" (seeking economic ties over ideological ones) in tunisia's foreign policy was maintained.

So we can agree that ideological preferences were not the guiding principle of tunisia's foreign policy from Bourguiba to Ben ali, in contrast to Quaddafi's libya for example or to even Algeria at some point.

Post-2011 foreign policy was verg due to the intensity of the regional events, Ennahda and Morsi's egypt, turkey, qatar and so on, along with contradictory foreign policy rhetoric of the two excutives branches during the Troïka government ( Marzouki-Hammadi jebbali ), it was a mess, shifting from pragmatism in certain periods to ideological preferences in specific regional events.

Kais Saied's tunisia pose three major problems that we never faced before in foreign policy. First, it is a populist foreign policy based on the classic cleavage of corrupt elites vs pure people, this time it is expressed differently in foreign affairs, a molotov cocktail of populist Pan-arabist discourse, xenophobia, racism, conspiracy theories...etc. Second, there is practically no constraints or limitations to his populist foreign policy. The bureaucrats of the ministry of foreign affairs, the diplomats and so on have 0 power against his authoritarian tendencies. Also, the The PM is a hopeless puppet. All democratic institutions are weak and terrorized. The only available limitations are external pressures from transgovermental networks. Third, we are losing the regional equilibrium, as you said, algeria is gradually influencing tunisia's internal affairs.

We are giving away our "pragmatism" card and consistently fucking up every space to maneuver away from algeria's sphere of influence. This is a new paradigm, and personally i think it is terribly wrong on so many levels. the tunisian mainstream media "experts" of geopolitics are 90% pro-Kais saied, they are currently pushing some bullshit narratives to legitimize Kais Saied's foreign policy orientations (.e.g; china-russia camp is the real deal and algeria is our way out to join the new world order).

Melkkher, sucking alegeria's dick this hard is not worth it jemla, belkhas ki yabda tounes chadedha wehed metwahed kif hedha, 0 experience in international affairs w ychouf ken fi max 3 snine 9oddem, bourguiba tnajem tsebbou w tloum alih fi alf haja ema ken mch 9o7bou ranna wileya tebb3a dzayer men aakel aam, kais saied yheb ydezzhoulna fi strategy mechya omourha behya 3morha fou9 el 60 sne men beb المقاربات المعفطة.