Fairfield University DigitalCommons@Fairfield Sociology & Anthropology Faculty Publications Sociology & Anthropology Department Winter 2004 Amazigh Activism and the Moroccan State Paul Silverstein David Crawford Fairfield University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.fairfield.edu/sociologyandanthropology- facultypubs Copyright 2004 Middle East Report Peer Reviewed Repository Citation Silverstein, Paul and Crawford, David, "Amazigh Activism and the Moroccan State" (2004). Sociology & Anthropology Faculty Publications. 9. https://digitalcommons.fairfield.edu/sociologyandanthropology-facultypubs/9 Published Citation Crawford, David L. and Silverstein, Paul. (2004). "Amazigh Activism and the Moroccan State" in The Middle East Report, issue 233. Ed. Chris Toensing. Pp. 44-48. Washington, D.C.: MERIP 2004. This item has been accepted for inclusion in DigitalCommons@Fairfield by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@Fairfield. It is brought to you by DigitalCommons@Fairfield with permission from the rights- holder(s) and is protected by copyright and/or related rights. You are free to use this item in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. For other uses, you need to obtain permission from the rights-holder(s) directly, unless additional rights are indicated by a Creative Commons license in the record and/or on the work itself. For more information, please contact [email protected]. SPECIALREPORT Amazigh Activism an the Moroccan State Paul Silverstein and David Crawford W hen primary school students in the major Berber- of Amazigh activists, nor been recognized as anything other speaking regions of Morocco returned to class in than distant state "politics"by the mass of Berbers in the September 2004, for the first time ever they were re- countryside.Activists have challengedevery decision leading quired to study Berber(Tamazight) language. The mandatory up to curricularreform, as they suspect that the institute is language classes in the Rif, the Middle Atlas, the High Atlas simply a state attempt to coopt the Amazigh opposition and and the SousValley represent the firstsignificant policy change turn living Berberculture into static folklore. In spite of the implemented by the Royal Institute of the Amazigh [Berber] dahir, Amazigh militants have been detained repeatedlyby Culture,a governmentbody establishedby King Mohammed police and threatenedwith chargesof treason for taking part VI on October 17, o00I, following throughon a promisemade in streetdemonstrations for Berberland rightsand the naming in July of that year on the second anniversaryof his ascension ofTamazightas a constitutionallyrecognized national language to the Moroccan throne. of Morocco. Such a climateof perceivedrepression is accepted This royal edict, or dahir, representsa dramatic reversal with evident apathy by most Berbers,but has ironically radi- of legal discrimination against Imazighen (Berbers) and an calized some Amazigh militants into the ideal supportersof explicit attempt to reclaimBerberness as "aprincipal element GeorgeW. Bush'sglobal war on terror.Viewing the Moroccan of national culture, as a cultural heritage present across all state as a bastion of Arab nationalism, the latter have taken stagesof Moroccan history and civilization."Since Moroccan increasinglyanti-Arab positions that go so far as to deny the nationalist discourse has tended to emphasize links to the legitimacy of the Palestiniancause and support the US inva- high culture of Arab-Islamic civilization, and in particular sion of Iraq, positions that have led to conflict with Islamist the royal patriline leading back to the Prophet Muhammad, and Marxist opposition groups, as well as with elements of the dahir indicates a shift in, or at least an amendment to, the Moroccan state security.Rather than assuringnational unity, official national imaginary.Instead of posing Berberculture the establishment of IRCAM has arguablyexacerbated the as a challenge to national unity, the king promoted embrac- fragmentationof not only the Amazigh movement, but also ing it as a necessarystep in his project for a "democraticand Moroccan oppositional politics in general. modernist society." The dahir and subsequentestablishment of the Royal Insti- AmazighMilitancy and State Cooptation tute, known in Morocco by its French name, l'Institut Royal de la Culture Amazighe, or IRCAM, are partly the result of Berberspeakers are estimated to make up 40 percent of the domestic and international pressureto create a transparent Moroccanpopulation.1 In spite of the fact that Muslim Berber regime of social justice and human rights. These initiatives dynastiescontrolled Morocco at variouspoints since the arrival met many of the demands made over the last 20 years by of Islam, the conflation of Arabiclanguage, Islamic legitimacy the various cultural associations, student groups and politi- and Arab ethnicity has nonetheless proved to be an enduring cal movements associatedwith the diffuse Amazigh Cultural feature of Moroccan consciousness.Viewing Berbercultural Movement (MCA), and increasingly,the United States and identity as largely a colonial invention designed to fragment other allieshave heraldedMorocco's reform efforts as a success the Moroccannation, the I95osnationalist movement-under story. The shifts in the national imaginary also signal a cre- the direction of the IstiqlalParty, consisting primarilyof Fez- ative responseof the Moroccan state to transnationalIslamist basedFrancophone elites-sought to forgea univocalidentity politics, a response that weds the rhetoric of ethno-national for Moroccansalong the ideologicallines of an Arab national- identity to a universalistdiscourse of democracy.The dahir ism imported primarilyfrom Egypt and Lebanon. Until the thus serves to transformAmazigh militants into allies of the IRCAM dahir, the monarchy,deriving its temporalauthority state in Morocco'slocal "waron terror." from its religious lineage, had repeatedlyunderwritten such Nonetheless, the creation of IRCAM and its interventions an Arabo-Islamistideology that has entailed the adoption of to promote Berber art and culture in the spheres of media Arabic as the official and national languageof Morocco. and education have neither gone unopposed within the ranks This version of Moroccan nationalism has faced severeop- position, particularlyfrom the Berberophoneleft. Alreadyin PaulSilverstein, an editorofMiddle East Report, teaches anthropology at Reed College. David Crawfordteaches anthropology at FairfieldUniversity. the I96os, Berberstudents and intellectualsin Rabatand Paris, EASTREPORT 233. WINIER2004 4444MiDDLE MIDDLEEAST REPORT 233 - WINTER2004 under the aegis of the Association Marocainede la Recherche et des Echanges Culturels (AMREC), began collecting and disseminatingBerber folklore and oral traditions.In the 1970s, these activities became more politicized, with the growth of severalcultural associations, the Universited'Ete d'Agadirand Tamaynunt, who actively promoted Berber identity.2 How- ever, it was the Algerian-Kabylestudent uprisings of April I980 (known internationallyas the Berber Spring) and the subsequent solidification of a transnationalBerber Cultural Movement (MCB) that galvanizedMoroccan Amazigh ethno- linguisticmilitancy into a public movement, with conferences and a publishedjournal, Amazigh. While this movementwas largelyrepressed during the I98os, therehas been an immense resurgencewithin the last ten years. In 1994, seven teachers,most of whom were members of the Amazigh associationTilelli (Freedom) from the southeastern oasis town of Goulmima, were arrestedafter their participa- tion in a May Day parade in nearby Errachidiafor carrying bannerswritten in Tifinagh. Police held the seven for several weeks, after which the courts sentenced three of them to prison terms and large fines. The three were later releasedon appeal and the charges subsequently dropped after the case receivedwidespread international publicity and offers of aid. Responding to the outcry, the Moroccan government prom- ised reforms,with Prime Minister Abdellatif Fillali opening channels for Berber-languageprogramming in the national broadcastmedia and the late King Hassan II declaringin his uutismeme Hoyaimsmire oI me Amazlg0 August 1994 ThroneDay speech that Amazigh "dialects"were Cuture, "one of the components of the authenticity of our history" Riyadh and owned by the Group Ominum North Africa, the and in should theory be taught in state schools. Since this largest Moroccan enterprise controlled by the royal family. speech, Amazigh associationsand newspapers(now number- The IRCAM is building its own state-of-the-artfacility whose in double ing digits) have flourishedthroughout Morocco. In monumental design incorporates a number of recognizable a variety of chartersand internationaldeclarations, Amazigh Amazigh motifs. The administrativeand researchcenters are militants have promulgateda redefinitionof Morocco on the fabulouslyequipped with the latesttechnology, and the library basis of its pre-colonial and pre-IslamicBerber heritage, and has actively acquired printed and audiovisual materials. Re- have sought political change to preserveBerber culture and gardlessof any actual policies put in place by IRCAM, such as language a "human right." expenditures constitute a bold public relations gambit, per- To address these demands the state created IRCAM. The forming the commitment to