JANUARY/FEBRUARY 1995, Pages 47, 78

Special Report

Moroccan Prince Analyzes Regional Trends

By Greg Noakes

Morocco has long been a crossroads and point of contact between the West and the Muslim world. Its geographic location has made the country a player in European and Mediterranean affairs for centuries. American-Moroccan relations date back to the earliest days of the Republic: in 1787, Morocco's Sultan Muhammad Ben Abdallah signed a treaty with George Washington, president of the fledgling United States. Today, thousands of Western tourists travel to Morocco annually, while thousands of people of Moroccan ancestry now call Europe and the Americas home.

Prince Moulay Hicham Benabdallah reflects his country's cosmopolitan nature. Grandson of the late King Muhammad V and nephew of King Hassan II, Prince Moulay Hicham is a member of the Alawi dynasty which has ruled Morocco since the 17th century. He holds degrees in political science and in engineering from Princeton University and is involved in a number of international social and cultural projects, including planning for the United Nations World Summit for Social Development scheduled for 1995 in Copenhagen.

During a recent U.S. visit, the prince spoke to a capacity crowd at Washington, DC's Middle East Institute, addressing the scope of political and economic change in the Arab world. Speaking in a private capacity rather than as a representative of the Moroccan government, Prince Moulay Hicham first addressed four recent events that have shaken the Arab world: the collapse of the Soviet Union and its satellites; the Arab-Israeli peace process; the Gulf War; and "the intensification of the Islamic protest."

The first two events, the prince argued, pushed Arab governments toward greater political change. The collapse of the Soviet Union not only changed geopolitical reality, but demonstrated the bankruptcy of corrupt, single-party states with centrally-planned economies, including such states within the Arab world. The peace process, assuming it is just and durable, unleashes a variety of political and economic opportunities for Arab regimes, while at the same time denying them the use of the Arab-Israeli conflict as an excuse to delay substantive political changes at home, the prince said.

The Gulf war and the rise of Islamism, however, have served to reinforce the status quo, according to Prince Moulay Hicham. The Gulf war produced widespread despair and social tensions in the Arab world. Democratic forces leading the "Arab street" against various regimes' support for the international coalition forced governments to crack down on political protests and seal off political openings. At the same time, the war was an economic disaster for the Arabs, the prince said, due to a loss of foreign investment and the diversion of resources to the war effort.

The rise of political Islam has led to fear of the movement's anti-democratic tendencies and prompted some regimes to exclude Islamists from the political process, the prince noted. This in turn has led to popular resentment. Arguing for the inclusion of Islamic groups in Arab political life, Prince Moulay Hicham conceded that there is no ready formula for the successful transition to Islamist participation.

The Inevitability of Change

Looking to the future, the prince said, "There is no way around political and economic change. Populations everywhere demand them." Failure to manage change, the prince warned, would result in the marginalization of the Arabs on the world stage.

Four areas pose challenges for the Arab world in the prince's opinion. First, Arab countries need to establish strong market economies, not only removing the state from economic decision-making but also doing away with the state economic bureaucracy, described by Prince Moulay Hicham as "crony-capitalists."

Second, scarce human and financial resources need to be redirected. Drawing upon an engineer's love for numbers, the prince noted that between 1978 and 1987, Arab countries spent $650 billion in military expenditures, representing an average 21 percent of national budgets. "Elsewhere in the developing world," the prince said, "that number was 5 percent."

Third, the Arab world has to face a shortage of capital by improving foreign investment legislation and ensuring an independent judiciary to address conflicts involving foreign investors. Money from the Gulf, the prince said, will not be spread around the rest of the Arab world unless Arab economies can be efficient and profitable.

Fourth, political opposition parties in the Arab world must adopt realistic and coherent platforms, proposing real alternatives and addressing each nation's overall political situation rather than criticizing economic and political symptoms. "These attacks inspire the masses, but they do not bring change," Prince Moulay Hicham said.

At the end of his MEI address, the prince argued that economic and political change in the Arab world must occur simultaneously. Calls for economic sacrifices must be accompanied by political reforms. Regime crackdowns can defer but not defuse future political explosions, the prince said in calling for democratization in the region.

Afterward, the prince expanded upon these and other issues in an interview with the Washington Report, again in his unofficial capacity. Addressing inter-Arab relations, the prince continued to emphasize the role of the Gulf war as "a watershed dividing the 'haves' from the 'have-nots.' This was a division that had always been internalized, but the Gulf war made it surface," he said.

As for issues which could unify the Arab world in the future, the prince said, "Things have to mature in each country. You can't come up with a big project from above, because there will be no consensus. The Palestinian problem was a very special case. It was perceived as an extension of colonialism, and because of the dimension of Jerusalem, it was a religiously charged issue. Thus it naturally produced cohesion among members of the Arab League. But clearly those days are over."

Because King Hassan is the head of the Jerusalem Committee of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, Morocco has long had a special role to play in the fate of the Holy City. Prince Moulay Hicham sees a need for a shift in thinking on the city's status. "The problem of Jerusalem has been properly addressed in terms of the religious dimension, but we need to go deeper," he said. "The Israelis and Palestinians have to sit down and talk about issues which affect ordinary citizens—municipal affairs, roads, communications, etc. I think that beyond religion, if these items are touched upon we will have a better understanding of where we stand in the process."

With regard to Islamism, Prince Moulay Hicham is convinced that it will be a long-term regional trend for several reasons. "First, the Arab world has known a variety of regime types, whether socialist on the Ba'th model, nationalist on the Nasserist model, or liberal as in Lebanon or present-day Egypt. There is a broad consensus among Arab peoples that these have all led to failure. Their lives have not improved, their ambitions for their children have not been realized and there is a feeling that maybe we missed something that is true, that belongs to our culture," he explained.

The prince also pointed to the Islamists' ability to mobilize at the grassroots level. "Islamic groups are very efficient at helping to alleviate the suffering of people at a neighborhood level, providing social services, picking up on a lot of community work. That role has not been occupied by anyone else.

"In my own personal opinion," the prince continued, "beyond violence and the narrow view of systematic opposition to the West, and given a willingness to abide by the rules of the game and make way for others if they fail, why shouldn't Islamic groups have their place in democratic societies?"

Prince Moulay Hicham also discussed the notion of a "clash of civilizations" between Islam and the West. "If things do not improve economically in the Arab world, beyond macroeconomic indicators which may not reflect the social condition of a country, then there will be a recourse toward fundamentalism." In the prince's view, this will produce "a tendency among many countries to demonize the Islamic world and Islamists—and Islam in general—and treat them as enemies. And there will be a similar reaction among many citizens of Islamic countries" toward the West. "There has to be a way to break that spiral," the prince said.

A key variable in the equation is the status of Muslim communities in the West. "Europeans in general are much more conscious of the problem because it affects them in a much more direct way," according to the prince. For many Muslim immigrants in Europe, "integration as they see it cannot be achieved; for many there cannot be a French Islam, a Belgian Islam, a Dutch Islam. There is one Islam, and a need to address economic and social suffering within these countries rather than these notions of conforming to some kind of civic ideal," the prince said.

Prince Moulay Hicham sees a distinction between American and European perceptions of and approaches to Islam. This is due in part to the fact that "the American Muslim population is more well-to-do and assimilation has been easier because links to the homeland have been severed, unlike in the European Muslim community," Prince Moulay Hicham said. "Also, the American experiences in Iran and the Sudan have led to a stress in policy circles on not being surprised, and there is a nuanced difference in the American approach to Islamic groups, as in Algeria."

As for Arab economies, Prince Moulay Hicham sees a reversal of the "clustering" trend of the late 1980s. The emergence of a new Eastern Europe led Arab regimes to fear a loss of foreign investment to post-communist Europe, producing a tendency toward regional economic groupings in North Africa, the Levant and Fertile Crescent, and the Gulf. Now, the prince says, "There is a realistic attitude which sees the limitations in such a trend. Individual initiatives are being launched to approach other groupings," the prince said, citing Moroccan and Tunisian overtures to the European Union and Egypt's recent bid for admittance to the Arab Maghreb Union. "This is a tendency which will grow more pronounced, but at the same time we are not closing the door on any meaningful integration with other Muslim countries," he added.

Asked about statements by European leaders calling for more foreign investment in the Maghreb to avoid a wave of North African immigration, the prince smiled. "If this translates into meaningful efforts to inject resources into the Maghreb, so be it! Let them overinflate the problem, but I don't see it that way."

Finally, Prince Moulay Hicham discussed the state of Middle East and Islamic studies in the U.S., an issue whose place on the prince's agenda is apparent from his efforts as founder of Princeton's new Institute for the Transregional Study of the Contemporary Middle East, North Africa and Central Asia. "At the university level, there are two flawed approaches," the prince said. "First, there is a school of thought which sees the Arab world as a place where change never happens because you have Islam and cultures which constrain change, and therefore it's hopeless. Second, others are sometimes too naive. They see the Middle East and North Africa as an entity with no specificity, an entity which does not demand a special approach." He is heartened, however, by an intermediate approach "which is slowly emerging."

Asked about advice for secondary school and university educators who teach Middle Eastern topics, Prince Moulay Hicham Benabdallah's advice is simple. "Try to communicate understanding, because that's what is lacking."