Hard transition

The Project on Middle East Democracy held a panel discussion April 15 about Algeria’s protests and what will happen next. The panel included Rochdi Alloui, Independent Analyst on North Africa at Georgia State University, Alexis Arieff, Specialist in African Affairs at Congressional Research Service, Amel Boubekeur, Research Fellow at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, and William Lawrence, Visiting Professor at George Washington University.

Boubekeur stated that people are protesting on the street asking for a functional state to provide water, electricity, and decent jobs. Since 1962, the regime built its legitimacy on the revolution by painting itself as the ones who got rid of France, built the military, and thus deserve to be leading the country. This narrative echoed for a while. By installing the recently ousted president in 1999, the army had wanted to end the civil war with armed Islamic groups, show the people that a new civil president would lead the country, and extract itself from politics. But throughout Bouteflika era, the president’s circle, the secret services and the army have governed. Ousting Bouteflika peacefully has shown the people that the country can do without him and even build a stronger state. Contrary to the regime’s narrative, he was not the only source of stability and peace.

Alloui pointed out the protests did not happen out of the blue, and the causes are complex. The political structure around Bouteflika seeking a fifth term was drove people to take to the street, in addition to grievances accumulated over decades. The people united around an important theme: kicking Bouteflika out. Once this goal was accomplished, it gave the protest movement a further boost and raised the bar to ridding Algeria of its traditionally bad politics. The protest movement wants to restructure the Algerian state to reproduce a new system and embark upon the second republic. Many pitfalls may lie ahead that can still divide the protest movement.

Lawrence gave an overview of the first Algerian democratic opening started in the late eighties, which Algerians have begun calling the first Arab spring. The Algerian regime since then has acted opaquely, operating on the basis of consensus reached in secret meetings to select the president. But recently many cracks have appeared: the veterans’ association, army officers, the National Liberation Front all turned against the president. High official figures like Algeria’s richest businessman, Ali Haddad, was caught at the Tunisian border trying to escape. The current protest movement is unlikely to be able to replace the regime. It may look like a “soft” revolution like those in 2001, but the Algerian military is likely to come out on top.

Arieff argues Algeria is probably the least market-driven economy in the world. That does not, however, mean young people want to move to a market economy and get rid of the social safety net. Living standards in Algeria have increased quite a bit over the last two decades. People have more access to social services than before, mainly in the restive southern part of the country. Most undemocratic leaders attribute the problems their states are going through to economic grievances rather than political ones. But the Algerian protest movement has grown mature enough to know that the two are intertwined: oligarchic rule and corruption have an impact on an individual opportunity for those without connections.

Bottom line: Pushing the president to resign and asking high political figures involved in corruption to do the same thing might be a good start towards a more democratic country but will certainly have implications on the functioning of the state. It is hard to replace a system that has been running the country for decades with a new one without facing structural challenges. Finding a person who is trusted and with integrity to serve as president will be difficult. It also remains to be seen how successful and democratic the transition will be in Algeria with the military still having a big say in politics.