Pierre Vermeren, Le Maroc de Mohammed VI, la transition inachevée, Paris: La Découverte, 2009; Ali Amar, Mohammed VI, le grand malentendu, Paris: Calmann-Lévy, 2009 Mohammed VI became king of Morocco in July 1999, succeeding his father, Hassan II, who had reigned since 1961 and was one of the Arab world's longest-serving rulers. Parliamentary elections in 1997 had brought opposition politicians to power, and a wave of liberalisation was sweeping the country and its institutions. Morocco was undergoing a "Moroccan spring," and it was hoped that the new young king would extend and accelerate this process. Discussion at the time focused on political transition, with Gorbachev's reforms of glasnost and perestroika in the former Soviet Union being put forward as models. After decades of political and social closure, it was felt that Morocco was in sore need of a dose of openness and transparency. Among the individuals suggested as role models for Mohammed VI to follow was the Spanish king Juan Carlos, who had helped manage the transition to democracy after the death of Franco. These possibilities were raised when Mohammed VI ascended the Moroccan throne. Ten years on, commentators in Morocco and elsewhere have been gauging how far they have been realised. According to at least some of the many books that have appeared to mark the anniversary, while the record has inevitably been patchy, some hopes at least have not been disappointed. French academic and Morocco specialist Pierre Vermeren has written a book, Le Maroc de Mohammed VI, la transition inachevée, which, despite its title ("unfinished transition"), has good things to say about the reform programme that Mohammed VI has put in place. This is mostly not the case for Moroccan journalist Ali Amar, the title of whose book, Mohammed VI, le grand malentendu, speaks for itself. According to Amar, Mohammed VI's reputation as a reformer particularly outside Morocco is a case of a "vast misunderstanding." Vermeren has been following Moroccan affairs for many years (his Le Maroc en transition was reviewed in the Weekly in October 2001), and Le Maroc de Mohammed VI, la transition inachevée is a tour d'horizon of the country ten years into Mohammed VI's reign. While he has useful things to say on many aspects of Moroccan affairs, three in particular have exercised commentators the most. These include Mohammed VI's political reforms, his economic programme and his attempts to transform the country's wider culture. A key task facing the new Moroccan monarch when he ascended the throne in 1999 was opening up the country's political life and establishing what had happened in Morocco during the "years of lead," the period of social and political repression that extended from the 1960s to the 1990s. Ten years on, the impression one gets from Vermeren's book is that the first part of this programme has been partially realised, while the second has been both more successful and more intriguing. The advent of the new Moroccan parliament in 1997 and of regular and contested elections since marked a clear break with the past. Certain government portfolios were handed over to opposition politicians (the most important were retained), and members of the country's old guard, notably minister of the interior Driss Basri, were eventually sent into retirement. Two problems have nevertheless confronted Moroccan democracy. The first is whether the country, having instituted democratic procedures, has yet to experience something approximating to the real thing. The second is how to account for the fact that despite the proliferation of political parties only a minority, sometimes a small minority, of Morocco's electors turn out to vote, with the country's young people being apparently particularly alienated. According to Vermeren, Moroccan politics has long been an affair of entrenched elites, and during the rule of Hassan II stability was achieved by allowing those in the "makhzen," the establishment running the country, to "enrich themselves and develop their careers, such that they had more to fear from a change in the regime than from its continuation." During the reign of Hassan II, challenges to the system tended to come from the left, and repression was used against subversion. With today's fragmentation of the left, challenges to the system tend to come from the country's Islamists, whose parliamentary arm is the Moroccan Justice and Development Party. Fearing perhaps that Morocco would become "another Algeria," where the army intervened to prevent Islamist victory at the polls, or that the political transition to democracy would end in chaos, Mohammed VI has not surrendered the executive role that the Moroccan constitution grants him. While the country's political structures have been modernised, there has been no reform of the country's constitution and little redistribution of powers. In assessing this situation, Vermeren's conclusion is that "while for the elites of the makhzen the three objectives of promoting 'an enlightened monarchy,' reforms and transparency remain at the top of the agenda, this is on condition that the traditional structures of authority are retained." If there has thus been little redistribution of power outside the country's ruling elite, there has, however, been an investigation into past abuses, with Mohamed VI playing a determining role. The full extent of the human-rights abuses that took place in Morocco between the 1960s and 1990s came to international attention some years ago with the publication of Ahmed Marzouki's memoir Tazmamart cellule 10 (reviewed in the Weekly in April 2001), which details the torture inflicted on prisoners in the Moroccan state security prison of the same name. Apparently personally determined to clarify what had happened in the country under his father's rule, in 2004 Mohammed VI set up the Instance Equité et Réconciliation (IER), a sort of Moroccan version of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which was charged, in Vermeren's words, with "reconciling the country with its darkest years and giving recognition to the victims of abuses carried out between 1956 and 1999." By the time the IER submitted its final report in November 2005, tens of thousands of allegations had been investigated, thousands of witnesses interviewed, and 11,706 victims had received financial compensation amounting to some 1.5 billion dirhams (140 million euros). Former detention centres had been turned into museums, and hundreds of hours of statements recorded, making up a valuable archive. Perhaps in order to ensure that the commission could carry out its work without disruption, the names of alleged torturers were never revealed and no crimes were ever prosecuted. Vermeren notes that all this made Morocco a "pioneer of 'transitional justice' and unique among Arab and Muslim countries." Aside from reforming the country's political life and trying to lay the ghosts of the past to rest, a second challenge facing Mohammed VI when he ascended the throne was how to speed up economic reform. The need for this had long been flagrant, with Morocco exhibiting high levels of poverty and offering few opportunities to its young people. In 2005, a "national initiative for human development" was announced that was designed to combat such problems. According to the reforms carried out over the past decade, the answer to Morocco's economic problems lies in the liberalisation of the economy and the by-now familiar prescriptions of privatisation, greater foreign investment and the development of manufacturing and services in which the country is believed to have a comparative advantage. Increased investment, particularly from France, Spain and the Gulf, has flowed into the country, though this seems to have been largely restricted to areas like telecoms and tourism. Vermeren's opinion is that Mohammed VI's reign has seen impressive results in the development of infrastructure, notably of roads and of port facilities designed to leverage on the country's geographical position and the role of Casablanca and Tangiers as container ports. However, the economy as a whole is susceptible to external shocks, being reliant on the export of raw materials, textiles and tourism, and the current international financial crisis has hit Morocco hard. Moreover, the development of tourism, turning the city of Marrakech into a venue for international festivals that offers attractive investment opportunities for Europeans and others, has done little to solve Morocco's high levels of unemployment, and it has not improved a failing educational system that still tolerates high levels of illiteracy, particularly in rural areas and among women. Though official unemployment figures are not extraordinarily high, much employment is in the informal sector, and attempts to extend social protections have been shelved. What Vermeren calls the "incredible malaise of Morocco's youth" -- unable to find stable employment, save enough money to find a flat or to get married and start a family -- has led to the growth of radical Islamist movements, particularly in the slums surrounding Moroccan cities. Such problems have had effects on efforts to transform Moroccan society, the third of the priorities earmarked by Mohammed VI on his accession. Two such efforts have been of particular importance: the limited recognition given to the Berbers as a constituent part of Moroccan society and the reform of family law particularly as this affects women. Vermeren describes how, in a remarkable break with the past, Mohammed VI announced in 2001 that the linguistic, cultural and historical dimensions of "amazighité," or Berberism, would be officially recognised as "an essential part of Moroccan identity and civilisation." A Royal Institute of Berber Culture was set up whose first director was a prime mover behind the Berber Manifesto of 2000 that had called for the recognition of Berber culture and the teaching of Berber languages in schools. Nevertheless, promises to set up a Berber television station have so far not been kept, and it is still apparently illegal in Morocco for Berber children to be given Berber names. The major source of Berber discontentment -- "the economic poverty and marginalisation of the areas where Berber populations live, often without schools, jobs, basic infrastructure, doctors or teachers" -- has yet to be fully addressed. Vermeren also describes reforms to the law on divorce, marriage, inheritance and other issues -- everything that in Morocco comes under the moudawana, or family law --that were enacted by Mohammed VI in 2004. Under the new laws, marriage for both sexes was set at 18, and women were no longer viewed in Moroccan law as minors. Women now have the same rights in marriage as men, and should divorce take place they have the right to a share of the family property. Greeted with enthusiasm by women's and human rights groups, opposed by those of a conservative turn of mind, the reforms to the moudawana were the first time that a Moroccan monarch had used his status as Commander of the Faithful to push through measures that touched upon areas otherwise reserved to the country's ulema. The reforms affected important aspects of Moroccan identity and society, and they demonstrated Mohammed VI's desire to recognise the cultural and linguistic rights of the country's minorities and to extend the legal rights of women. Yet, while Vermeren's book, in cataloguing these things, has positive things to say about the reforms carried out in Morocco over the last decade, while recognising their limitations, this is not the case for Ali Amar in Mohammed VI, le grand malentendu. For the latter author, perhaps the best that can be said about Mohammed VI's reign is that it has been a wasted opportunity, though he is also critical of Mohammed VI himself. Amar is a well-known Moroccan journalist, co-founder of the opposition newspaper Le Journal, and he stresses the frequent recourse made to Morocco's press laws, apparently to stifle criticism. There have been improvements -- those convicted on charges of attacking the royal family, religion or the "territorial integrity" of Morocco now risk up to five years in prison as opposed to the 20 previously prescribed -- but the "red lines" have not moved as much as they might. As the editors of publications such as Tel Quel, Nichane and Amar's own Le Journal and Le Journal hébdomadaire have discovered, the authorities are not averse to imposing large fines on those found guilty of crossing them, a sure-fire way of strangling a free press according to the editor of Tel Quel. Were this all, Amar's criticisms would not add much to those contained in Vermeren's book. However, his general view seems to be that Mohammed VI's reputation as a reformer and as a "king of the poor" (owing to his social and economic reforms) is misplaced. Thus, Amar writes that "beneath the surface of a Morocco that is very close to Europe and in particular to France, a country that is a paradise for expatriates and for holidaymakers in search of a dose of exoticism fewer than three hours flight from Paris, lies an archaic regime puffed up with pomp and circumstance." Energetically written and a bracing contrast to Vermeren's account, Amar's book is an interesting memoir by someone who has been close to the heart of events. Reviewed by David Tresilian
