A Comparative Political Economy Of Tunisia And Morocco

Examines how rising economic integration with Europe impacts Tunisia and Morocco.

Contrary to other world regions, political regimes in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) remain largely authoritarian. While the search for explanations is still ongoing, Christian Neugebauer draws attention to a hitherto underresearched factor: economic liberalization. Being part of a global shift from state-led development towards structural adjustment in the economy, these policies also deeply affected the countries of the MENA region. This makes the resilience of authoritarianism in the region all the more puzzling, as a large part of the scientific community expected economic liberalization to undermine authoritarian regimes. Neugebauer strives to solve the puzzle with a comparative case study that covers four countries (Egypt, Tunisia, Jordan, and Morocco) and their political regimes, from independence in the 1950s to the Arab Spring in 2011. He shows that two specific policies of economic liberalization might in fact have been relevant for regime stability: consumer-price liberalization and privatization. About the author Christian Neugebauer was a PhD candidate and lecturer in political economy of the Middle East and North Africa at the Center for Near and Middle Eastern Studies (CNMS), University of Marburg, Germany. He currently works as a regional expert (Middle East, North Africa, and Turkey) for an institution of the private economy. .

Pre-economic liberalization relations between business and the state condition how groups organize before large-scale economic change.

This book analyzes the economic development choices initiated by Morocco’s King Mohammed VI since he ascended the throne in 1999 and situates those choices in the political economy development literature. Examining the policies enacted by the King, the authors argue that over the past twenty years Mohammed VI has achieved some outstanding successes in modernizing the foundational economic sectors of Morocco, but the benefits of this development have not reached all Moroccans. With its focus on economic development, this book explores the way in which Mohammed VI’s development strategies have, in part, resembled the neoliberal model advocated by Western powers and institutions, as well as how the King also adopted some of the European practices of state intervention found in the "varieties of capitalism" models across Europe. Additionally, Mohammed VI’s Strategies for Moroccan Economic Development looks at the way in which the King has sought to utilize "leap frog" technologies so that Morocco has become a leader in certain productive sectors and is not just catching up to rival producers. The book also examines the extent to which Moroccan citizens have benefited from the economic transformations, arguing that not all Moroccans have benefited; many Moroccan citizens in 2019 echo the same economic concerns that were voiced in 1999 when King Mohammed VI first assumed the throne. With its focus on economic development, this book will be of interest not only to scholars and students of Middle East and North African Studies, but also Economics, International Development, and Politics.

Sandberg and Aqertit analyze how, over the course of twenty-five years, dedicated, smart, and politically effective Moroccan women, working simultaneously in multiple settings and aware of each other’s work, altered Morocco’s entrenched gender institution of regularized practices and distinctive rights and obligations for men and women. In telling the story of these Moroccan gender activists, Sandberg and Aqertit’s work is of interest to Middle East and North Africa (MENA) area specialists, to feminist and gender researchers, and to institutionalist scholars. Their work operationalizes and offers a template for studying change in national gender institutions that can be adopted by practitioners and scholars in other country settings.

Contrary to other world regions, political regimes in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) remain largely authoritarian. While the search for explanations is still ongoing, Christian Neugebauer draws attention to a hitherto underresearched factor: economic liberalization. Being part of a global shift from state-led development towards structural adjustment in the economy, these policies also deeply affected the countries of the MENA region. This makes the resilience of authoritarianism in the region all the more puzzling, as a large part of the scientific community expected economic liberalization to undermine authoritarian regimes. Neugebauer strives to solve the puzzle with a comparative case study that covers four countries (Egypt, Tunisia, Jordan, and Morocco) and their political regimes, from independence in the 1950s to the Arab Spring in 2011. He shows that two specific policies of economic liberalization might in fact have been relevant for regime stability: consumer-price liberalization and privatization.

This challenging new perspective on Tunisia's al-Nahda movement focuses on the lived experience of Islamist activism.