The ‘subaltern’ foreign policies of North African countries: old and new responses to economic dependence, regional insecurity and domestic political change

Abstract

This article introduces the special issue by explaining why researching change and continuity in the foreign policies of North African states is relevant in spite of these countries' peripheral and 'subaltern' position within the global system. It situates the special issue's content in the context of the extant academic literature on the foreign policies of dependent/Third World/Global South countries, the foreign policies of MENA states and the consequences of the 2011 Arab uprisings in terms of international relations. It then moves on to discuss the case study selection by outlining key commonalities and differences between Mauritania, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya and Egypt in terms of historical, political and economic foreign policy determinants. The country case studies each focus on a particular level of analysis, from the global -Tunisia's financial predicaments and foreign debt negotiationsthrough the (sub)regional -Egypt's relationship of necessity with Saudi Arabia, Algeria's half-hearted policies towards the conflicts in Libya and Malito the domestic sphere -Morocco's power balance between the monarchy and the Islamist Justice and Development Party (PJD) heading the government, Libya's extreme state weakness and internal power competition among proliferating private actors -, reaching also the deeper non-state societal level -Mauritania's new forms of social activism questioning the official religious identity and the socio-political makeup of the state. The last part of the introduction critically relates the empirical findings of the special issue to theoretical debates on subalternity in International Relations and Mohammed Ayoob's subaltern realism in particular.

Unravelling the adoption of youth quotas in African hybrid regimes: evidence from Morocco

“…This consisted of the strengthening of political institutions, the renewal of political elites and a governance style based on the principles of efficiency and technocracy: it was time to make way for the next generation of entrepreneurs and technocrats (Catusse 2008). This entailed a fundamental shift in the methods of power and the techniques of government with strong political and economic ties to both western and African countries (Fernández Molina et al 2019).…”

Rethinking Islamist politics in North Africa: a multi-level analysis of domestic, regional and international dynamics

“…Others focus on the parties and movements' participation in the political and electoral game (Masoud, 2014;Pellicer & Wegner, 2014;Szmolka, 2015Szmolka, , 2019Wegner & Cavatorta, 2019), the nature and characteristics of parties' membership (Cimini, 2020;Tomé-Alonso, 2016) or a more far-reaching comparative perspective (Esposito et al, 2018;Kraetzchmar & Rivetti, 2018). More recently, some researchers have turned to the foreign relations of Islamist actors (Abouzzohour & Tomé-Alonso, 2019;Adraoui, 2018;Azaola-Piazza, 2019;Fernández-Molina et al, 2019;Schraeder et al, 2019). When the failure to bring about 'either the breakdown of authoritarian regimes or transition to some form of post-authoritarian governance' (Heydemann, 2016) became clearly apparent, researchers more vocally explored the impact of the closing of democratic horizons on Islamist politics in terms of the repression-radicalization hypothesis 1 (Lynch & Schwedler, 2020).…”

Islam y política exterior: El caso de Marruecos

“…El modelo religioso marroquí, presentado como una herramienta de prevención de la radicalización y una barrera preventiva del terrorismo, ha sido también uno de los instrumentos utilizados por la diplomacia marroquí en su retorno a las instancias regionales africanas de la que se había apartado tras su retirada de la Organización para la Unidad Africana (OUA) en 1984. 52 El hundimiento del Estado maliense en 2012 y el control de su inmenso territorio septentrional, primero por los rebeldes tuaregs del Movimiento Nacional para la Liberación del Azawad (MNLA) y luego por los islamistas de Ansar Dine, respaldados por Al Qaeda en el Magreb Islámico (AQMI), permitieron a Rabat situar el conflicto en el norte de Mali en clave religiosa, aprovechando el vacío que en este ámbito había dejado la caída del régimen de Gadafi 53 . La escalada yihadista proporcionó a Marruecos la oportunidad de exportar la experiencia adquirida en el ámbito de la reforma y gestión del campo religioso.…”