She was jailed soon after she joined the Trotskyist Social Workers Organisation, an illegal party, in 1981 and again after the 1988 October Riots, which brought about the end of the National Liberation Front's (FLN) single-party rule.

During Algeria's civil war of the 1990s, Hanoune was one of the few opposition voices in parliament, and, despite her party's laicist values, a strong opponent of the government's "eradication" policy toward Islamists.

[1] With Algeria's free and compulsory education system, Hanoune completed secondary school and went on to obtain her bachelor's degree before joining the air transport sector.

[3] She is known for denouncing the dissolution of the Islamic Salvation Front, being outspoken in favor of reconciliation, and—along with other parties—signing the Sant'Egidio platform "for a political solution to the Algerian crisis".

During the period of newly-independent Algeria, Hanoune formed her political ideals: "The whole country was still pulsing from the war of liberation, everybody was talking about socialism, of justice, of progress.

[8] accusing the Algerian regime of intending to exclude her and prevent free candidacy without clarifying those details, Hanoune criticized the National Independent Authority for Elections for its failure to manage the signature collection process.

In March 2010, Hanoune joined other women's-rights activists in calling for repeal of Algeria's Family Code on grounds of its failure to provide adequate protection for females.

Her editorial message called on "activists, members and supporters to form popular committees ... to establish their demands through free discussion, and [press for] exclusively national, Algerian solutions".