The Everyday Life of the State: A State-in-Society Approach

11. Negotiating National Identity: Berber Activism and the Moroccan State

176 11 Negotiating National Identity Berber Activism and the Moroccan State SEnEm ASlAn On October 17, 2001, in the presence of his advisors, members of the government , and leaders of the political parties and unions, the Moroccan king Mohammed VI announced the establishment of the Royal Institute of the Amazigh Culture (l’Institut Royal de la Culture Amazighe, or IRCAM).1 The institute was charged with conducting research on different aspects of Berber culture and preparing school textbooks to teach elementary school students the standardized Berber language to make it “a source of pride for all Moroccans.”2 These initiatives represented a dramatic reversal of the official definition of national identity and a major victory for Berber activists in their long struggle for cultural recognition. The establishment of IRCAM represented the first substantial change in the state’s attitude toward its Berber-speaking population, from a policy of subtle neglect to explicit recognition and support. The interaction between the Moroccan state and Amazigh activists provides important insights into the conditions under which ethnic movements become successful in transforming the conventional nationbuilding policies of states. The bulk of the social movement literature takes a state-centric approach and concentrates on how states determine the fate of social movements, not the opposite. That is, scholars tend to disregard the possibility that social movements can influence state policies 177 Negotiating National Identity as much as state policies affect the fate of social movements. A limited body of research, taking a bottom-up approach, analyzes the impact of social mobilization on legislation and institutional change.3 This bottomup approach is built on case studies of movements in democratic countries where rights activists find at least some channels, especially through litigation , to promote policy reform. The social movement literature is mostly silent on the ability of rights activists to influence policy changes in countries where basic individual rights of expression and association are not guaranteed and where there is no independent judiciary. It is assumed that in undemocratic systems social movements have little impact because governments are not accountable to people and simply would not consider the need to respond to social demands (Burstein 1999). This case study on Morocco discusses how activists can create their own political opportunities and influence policy change even in authoritarian contexts. This case study is explored through the “state-in-society” framework (Migdal, Kohli, and Shue 1994; Migdal 2001a), which emphasizes that state and society do not exist independent of each other and that a mutually transformative relationship between social actors and the state should be taken into account. It calls attention to Berber activists’ specific strategies, in particular their use of informal channels to negotiate with the state center and strategic concessions to placate the state, in explaining their policy success. Such change in policy, nevertheless, also worked to transform the movement in ways unintended by Berber activists. This study also underlines the gap between the state image and its practices and calls attention to the non-monolithic nature of states. While the Berber activists formulated their strategies in accordance with the monarch’s image as the “ultimate arbiter” of competing interests and ultimate decision maker of the country, they were disappointed by the state’s actual practices, which various parts of the state at different levels undertook. As Joel S. Migdal (1994, 14) argues, policy implementation is rarely a clean and smooth process controlled by the top leadership, “as if it alone constitutes the state, as if its collective will is recreated faithfully throughout the labyrinth of state branches and bureaus.” In Morocco, too, implementation of policy changes proceeded slowly, unevenly, and with contention on the ground because of bureaucratic resistance and unwillingness to recognize Berber identity as a component of Moroccanness. As William Roseberry (1994, 365) states, “The state . . . has a number of audiences who hear different things and who, in repeating what the state says to still other audiences, change the words, tones, inflections, and meanings.” 178 Senem Aslan thE AmAZigh movEmEnt Soon after its independence from French colonial rule in 1956, the Moroccan state began to implement Arabization policies, which aimed at the exclusive use of Modern Standard Arabic in education, bureaucracy, and the courts. The nationalist discourse emphasized the Arab-Islamic character of Moroccanness; underscored the purity, superiority, and sacredness of Classical Arabic; and portrayed the Berber dialects as inferior and deformed. The Amazigh movement emerged as a response to Arabization...