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Independent news websites and press played a vital role in creating spaces of contention in the context of the Moroccan pro-democracy movement of 2011. This article looks at the role of this press in disseminating alternative narratives in the hybrid media and political environment that followed the pro-democracy movement. Based on extensive interviews with journalists, this article examines journalists' practices in countering hegemonic media and political discourse, to understand how they contribute to—or hinder—the formation of counter publics under tough repression. The article uses the critical frameworks of dominant and counter-publics and Judith Butler's concept of silencing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Egyptian media displayed a high level of content diversity in the final years of the Mubarak regime, prior to the 2011 uprising. This diversity expanded considerably after the uprising when national media embodied expressions of dissent with unprecedented openness, in defiance of the entrenched identity of the journalist as the regime's guard. This article investigates the dynamics of journalistic agency in Egyptian newsrooms in search for a new identity, investigating the challenges, hopes and trade-offs of a painful process of change. It looks at the complex interplay between these agentic dynamics and inherited structures within an uncertain and highly contested transition to democracy, which finally collapsed into a new chapter of authoritarianism. The article argues that while journalistic agency helped support trends towards democratization in media and politics in the immediate aftermath of the uprising, it also acted as powerful platform in 'othering' opponents preparing the ground for the return of autocratic practices and ultimately the fall of the democratic experiment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]