Munson - The Social Base of Islamic Militancy in Morocco

The Social Base of Islamic Militancy in Morocco Author(s): Henry Munson, Jr. Source: Middle East Journal, Vol.
40, No. 2 (Spring, 1986), pp. 267-284 Published by: Middle East Institute Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4327310 . Accessed: 23/12/2013 21:06
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THE SOCIALBASE OF ISLAMIC MILITANCYIN MOROCCO Henry Munson, Jr.
Whathas been the social base of the militantIslamicmovementin Morocco since the early 1970s?More specifically,what segmentsof Moroccansociety have been active in, or sympatheticto, the militantIslamicmovement, the ostensible goal of which is the establishmentof a state and society structuredsolely in terms of Islamic law? This is the basic questionaddressedin this paper, on the basis of the fragmentaryevidence available.1 IN MOROCCO THE MILITANTISLAMICMOVEMENT SINCE THEEARLY 1970S The militantIslamic movementin Morocco is actuallya congeries of various groups that have quite different interpretationsof their shared goal of a truly Islamic state and society. It would be misleading to characterize this entire movement as "fundamentalist," since the ideological orientation of the most conspicuous groupsin it is far more reminiscentof "liberationtheology" in Latin America than it is of Christianfundamentalismin the United States. This is illustrated by the Association of Islamic Youth (Jamiyyat al-Shabiba al-Islamiyya),which was foundedin 1972by Abd al-KarimMuti', an inspector in the Ministryof Educationand a formeractivist in the Union Socialiste des Forces
Populaires.2
1. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the April 1985 conference on "The PoliticalEconomy of Morocco" at The Johns HopkinsSchool of AdvancedInternational Studies. I would like to thankJean-Francois Cldment,GeorgeJoffd,SamNotzon andMohamed Tozy for helping me to obtain much of the documentationupon which it is based. And I would like to thank the following people for their comments:Jean-Francois Clement, Elaine Combs-Schilling, John Damis, Dale Eickelman,AbdallahHammoudi,MohammedKenbib, RichardParker,AbdallahSaaf, Saadia Sabahand MarkTessler. My researchin Moroccowas made possible by fellowshipsfrom the Social Science ResearchCounciland the Fulbright-Hays of the Officeof Education. Program 2. Mohamed Tozy, Champ et contre champ politico-religieuxau Maroc, These pour le Doctoratd'Etaten Science Politique,Universitede Droit,d'Economieet de Sciences d'Aix-Marseille, 1984, p. 346. HenryMunson,Jr., is assistantprofessorof anthropology at the University of Maineat Orono.
THE MIDDLEEAST JOURNAL,VOLUME40, NO. 2, SPRING1986.
267
The Association of Islamic Youth, generally viewed as one of the most radical militant Islamic groups in Morocco, is fragmented into at least five factions, one of which began publishinga review called al-Mujahid("Fighter of Jihad")in 1981.This review is publishedin Belgiumand clandestinelydistributed in Morocco. The editorialin the first issue of al-Mujahidwas entitled "Join the Fight, RevolutionaryMuslimYouth" and included the following passages:
. . . our present and our future are caught between the hammer of American and the anvil of its agentsrepresentedby the corruptmonarchical imperialism regime and those who supportit.... Your review appears in these circumstancesin order to be, God willing, in the vanguardof an authenticIslamicrevolutionin Morocco, a revolutionthat enlightens the horizonof this countryand liberatesits people to bringthem back to the Islam of and of those amonghis people who have known how to follow him-not Muhammad the Islam of the merchantsof oil and the agents of the Americans.3
Somewhatless radicalin tone than al-Mujahidis al-Jamd'a ("The Group"), which was published intermittentlyin Marrakeshby Morocco's most famous militantIslamic ideologist, Abd al-SlamYasin, from 1979through1983.But even in al-Jama'a, condemnationof foreigndominationand social injusticeare among
the principal themes that recur in every issue. In the following passage from his essay Da'wa ila Allah ("Call to God"), which was publishedin al-Jamd'ain 1979,
Yasin echoes Sayyid Qutb of Egypt in referringto the capitalist West and the communist East as "the two camps of al-jahiliyya." The term al-jahiliyya is
ordinarily understood to refer to the period of spiritual "ignorance" that prevailed in Arabia before the appearance of Islam. But Yasin, like Sayyid Qutb (and like most Islamic militants of the 1970s and 1980s) uses this term to refer to all non-Islamic social and political structures. Our small countriesare dividedby belongingto one or the other of the two camps of al-jahiliyya. And they align themselves seeking protectionfor their interests and because of the compulsionof politicalandeconomicconstraintsandthe attractiveness of deceptive lures. In this manner,the dominantpower-one or the other of the two superpowers-takes control. And thus it is that our little countries act, to various degrees, accordingto the wishes of theirjahili patron....4
Yasin also refersto social inequityin Moroccoin termsthat reflectfamiliarity with the rhetoric of Marxistpolemic:
. . .The poor oppressed people groan under the weight of the injustice of the oppressorclass . . ., the call of Islamis a call of love, but there is no love unless social
3. Zouhaier Dhaouadi et Amr Ibrahim, "Documents," Peuples Mediterraneens,No. 21
(1982): 57-58. 4. al-Jama'a, No. 2 (1979): 48.
268
are careandsecurity health foreducation, andin opportunities in wealth distinctions erased.5 statementsin the It is true that the vaguely radicalsocial and anti-imperialist militant Islamic literature tend to be coupled with others that have a more "fundamentalist" ring to them. For example, Yasin has written that "God honored and strengthenedthe Arabs with Islam as Umar said. And when they looked for honor and strengthin other places, they became lowly and contemptible."6 This is in the spirit of Jerry Falwell's assertion that "God promoted Americato a greatnessthat no other nationhas ever enjoyedbecause her heritage
is one of a republic governed by laws predicated on the Bible.
. .
. When we as a
country again acknowledgeGod as our Creatorand Jesus Christas the Savior of mankind,we will be able to turn this nation around economically as well as in every other way."7 In both cases, a returnto the laws of God is seen as the key to social, economic and political progress. And in both cases, religious and nationalidentity are seen as inseparable. But the fact remainsthat to label all Islamic militantsas "fundamentalists" would be to obscure the central role of resentment of foreign dominationand social inequityin the militantIslamicliterature.It would also obscure the fact that many militantsinterpretIslam in a mannerthat reflects the influenceof Marxist thought.Phrases such as "the poor oppressedpeople groanbeneaththe weight of the injustice of the oppressor class" are not frequently encountered in the homilies of the ReverendFalwell. Anotherproblemwith calling Islamic militants "fundamentalists" is that many Muslims regard this as the imposition of a Christian/Western category upon Islam. As for the currentlyfashionablealternative of "Islamists" (from the Arabic Islamiyyunand the French Islamistes), it seems a clumsy neologism, and I therefore refer to those Muslims actively committedto the goal of a strictlyIslamicstate and society as "Islamicmilitants." STUDENTS UNIVERSITY Now that we have seen some samplesof militantIslamicrhetoricin Morocco, in a better position to understandthe social origins of those Moroccans are we who have been active in, or sympatheticto, the militantIslamic movement in Morocco since the early 1970s.And the firstpoint to be emphasizedin this respect is that university and high school students have constituted the overwhelming majorityof the activists in this movement.Abd al-SlamYasin wrote in the second issue of al-Jama'a that the signs of the Islamic resurgencewere apparent"in the zeal of the young people of the umma [the Islamic community]for purity Cand
5. Ibid., p. 49.
6. Ibid., p. 4.
7. Jerry Falwell, Listen America! (Garden City: Doubleday, 1980), pp. 16, 81.
269
manhoodand in the manifestationsof their Islam in the universities, schools, and mosques."8 And in an interview with ChristianeSouriauin June of 1980, Yasin declared:
The Islamic movement is located primarilyon university campuses; it is in the studentpopulationthatthe movementmanifestsitself the most vigorouslybecause the young people are badly educated, without a future, losing their leftist illusions and returningto Islam.9
High school students are also active in the movement. They have been especially prominentin the Association of Islamic Youth ever since its founding in 1972. Already in 1973-74, fistfights occurred between high school students In 1973, high belongingto this group and others of a secular leftist orientation.10 school students belongingto the Association of IslamicYouth beat and stabbeda 11 And in the high school teacherwho belongedto the Moroccancommunistparty. wake of the January 1984 riots, 71 Islamic militantswere arrested and charged with belonging to the by now outlawed Association of Islamic Youth as well as with distributing pamphlets"of Iranianinspiration."Accordingto their lawyers, most of these militantswere high school students.12 The importantrole of both universityand high school students in the Islamic movement is further reflected in the fact that most issues of Yasin's review al-Jama'a contained a special section in which Yasin published letters from students whose questions he tried to answer. And virtuallyall of the letters in the "Mail From Readers" (Barid al-Qurrd')and "Pulpit of the Women Believers" (Minbaral-Mu'minat)sections were also from students. Given the conspicuous role of students in the militantIslamic movement in Morocco, it should be noted that accordingto preliminaryresults of the latest Moroccan census, there were 984,707 secondary school students and 82,177 post-secondary school students in Septemberof 1982.13 According to this same census, the population of Morocco was 20.4 million in September of 1982, although some observers believe that the actual population was closer to 28 million.14 In either case, high school and post-high school students together constitutedno more than five per cent of the populationof Morocco in 1982. But this numericalinsignificancedoes not representpolitical insignificance.Students
8. al-Jama'a, No. 2 (1979):43. 9. Christiane Souriau, "Quelques donnees comparatives sur les institutions islamiques actuelles du Maghreb,"in C. Souriau,ed., Le Maghrebmusulman en 1979(Paris:Editionsdu Centre Nationalde la RechercheScientifique,1983),p. 378.
10. Tozy, Champ et contre champ, pp. 346-347. 11. Ibid.
12. Le Monde, August 2, 1984,p. 3.

13. al-Mamlaka al-Maghribiyya, al-Ihsa' al-'am lil-sukan wa al-sukna li-sanat 1982: al-natc"'ij al-awwaltyya hayakil al-sukan wa al-sukna 'ayyina 5% (Rabat: Mudiriyyat al-Ihsa', 1983), p. 20. 14. Ibid., p. 5; Richard B. Parker, North Africa: Regional Tensions and Strategic Concerns
(New York: Praeger,1984),p. 36.
270
in Morocco, as in most of the ThirdWorld,have been amongthe most politically active segments of society, whereas the numericallypreponderant segment of the population,the peasantry, has been politically quiescent since the late 1950s.'5 Students and recent university graduates have been among the leading activists in militantIslamic movements throughoutmost of the Islamic world in to findthatthis is true in Morocco.16 But the 1970sand 1980s,so it is not surprising it should be kept in mind that universitystudentsare also amongthe most active supporters of secular leftist groups and parties in Morocco, ranging from the social democraticUnion Socialiste des Forces Populairesto more radicalgroups such as Ila al-Amam (Forward!), and that the Islamic militants in Moroccan universities and schools have repeatedly clashed with Marxist students both There are, moreover, a great many Moroccan uniververbally and physically.17 sity students who are neither of a militant Marxist nor a militant Muslim orientation. The question then arises: what percentageof Moroccanuniversity students are active in, or sympathetic to, the militant Islamic movement? The same question arises with respect to high school students, but the little evidence we have concerns university rather than high school students, and we can only assume that high school student supportfor Islamic militancyprobablydoes not exceed that of university students. PERCENTAGEOF MOROCCANUNIVERSITY STUDENTSS YMPA THETIC TO MILITANTISLAM A 1976study of MoroccanstudentattitudestowardsIslam suggests that only three per cent of Moroccan university students were active in militant Islamic groups at that time.'8 Similarly,RichardParker,a formerAmericanambassador to Morocco, writes that a "knowledgeablesource in Rabat"(not the authorof the study cited above) estimatedin 1982that about three per cent of the studentbody of MuhammadV University in Rabat were involved in the 15 militant Islamic 19Six Moroccanprofessorsand studentswith whom we groups at that institution. discussed this questionin 1985suggestedthatfewer than 15per cent (andpossibly as few as three per cent) of all Moroccanuniversitystudentswere militantIslamic
15. See MarkA. Tessler, "Morocco:Institutional and Monarchical Pluralism Dominance,"in 1. W. Zartman,ed., Political Elites in Arab North Africa (New York and London:Longman, 1982). 16. See Saad Eddin Ibrahim,"Anatomyof Egypt's MilitantIslamicGroups:Methodological Note and PreliminaryFindings," InternationalJournal of Middle East Studies, Vol. 12 (1980): 439-440; and MohamedElbaki Hermassi, "La soci6td tunisienneau miroirislamiste," MaghrebMachrek,No. 103(January-March 1984):41-42. 17. Le Monde, July 12, 1984,p. 5. 18. Cited in Dale Eickelman, "Royal Authorityand Religious Legitimacy:Morocco's Elections, 1960-1984,"in M. Aronoff, ed., The Frailty of Authority:Political Anthropology,5 (New Brunswickand London:TransactionBooks, 1985),(p. 7 of manuscript). 19. Parker,North Africa, pp. 95-96.
271
activists. In other words, whateverthe precise percentageof Moroccanuniversity students actively involved in the militantIslamic movement, it appearsthat such students constitute a small minorityof a social group that itself includes only a. small minorityof Moroccans. It is importantto distinguish, however, between active involvement in the militantIslamic movementon the one handand passive or potentialsympathyfor its goals on the other. We can get some idea of the extent of the latter thanks to an extremely interestingsurvey conducted by MohamedTozy.20 In 1984Tozy undertooka survey of 400 Moroccanuniversity students using a questionnairedesignedto tap actualand potentialsupportfor Islamic militancy. Of the 400 students surveyed, 100were at the Faculty of Medicinein Casablanca. 100 were at the Faculty of Law in Casablanca,100 were at the National Institute of Statistical Studies and Applied Economics, and 100 were at the Institute of Information Sciences, i.e. "computer science." (The administrationof the Faculty of Science in Casablanca refusedto allow Tozy to survey studentstherepossibly because many science and engineering students are reputed to be sympathetic to the militant Islamic cause.)21All of the students surveyed usedl French as their languageof study and Tozy's questionnairewas in that language. Students did not have to give their names and this presumably encouraged students to answer without fear of reprisal, although it probably did not completely eliminatedistortiondue to such fear. Tozy's questionnaireincluded the question: "What does it mean to be a Muslim?" Fifteen per cent of the students answered that being a Muslim meant being "a believer and a militantin an Islamic groupin orderto make all Muslims Given that this is the definitionof a true Muslimt implementthe true religion.'"22 given by the influentialmilitantIslamic theorists MawlanaMawdudiof Pakistan and Sayyid Qutb of Egypt, both of whom are praisedby Abd al-SlamYasin, one might interpretthis answer as a manifestationof a militantIslamic orientation.23 Some students, however, may accept (or claim to accept) this conception of what it means to be a Muslimwithout thinkingof themselves as Muslims. Tozy asked a numberof other questions that give us furtherinsight into the extent of active and potential support for the militant Islamic movement in Morocco. For example, his questionnaireincluded the question: "Do you favor the mixing of men and women in public places?" (See Table I). MilitantMuslim activists, women as well as men, tend to oppose such mixing. Nadia Yasin, the daughterof Abd al-SlamYasin, for example, has suggested that "students have
20. Tozy, Champ et contre champ, pp. 241-261. 21. Ibid., pp. 217-219. 22. Ibid., pp. 249-250.
23. Mawlana Abul-'Ala Mawdudi, Fundamentalsof Islam (Lahore: Islamic Publications, 1976), pp. 22-23; Sayyid Qutb, Maalimfi al-Tariq(Beirut: Dar al-Quranal-Karim, 1978), p. 35;
al-Jama'a, No. 5 (1980): 4.
272
problems of all kinds because of co-education."24But only 11 per cent of the students answering Tozy's questionnairesaid they opposed the mixing of the sexes in public places. Tozy also asked the studentsif Morocco shouldfollow Tunisia'sexampleand make fasting during Ramadan voluntary. Fifty-eight per cent of the students rejected this idea (see Table I), and the overwhelming majority of students, On the other eighty-fiveper cent, said they themselves fasted duringRamadan.25 hand, only eight per cent of the students said they prayedthe five daily prayers.26 This disparity between the great majoritywho fast and the small minority who pray is a well-known phenomenonthat need not concern us for the moment.27 Whatis of special interestfor presentpurposesis that while so many studentsfast and opposed makingit voluntary,only 15per cent accepted the militantdefinition of a Muslim,and only 11per cent opposedthe mixingof the sexes in public places. This would appear to suggest that while a majority of Moroccan university studentscontinueto feel a strongsense of attachmentto the religionof Islam, only a small minorityof somewhere between 10 and 15 per cent endorse the militant conception of Islam as a political ideology. But Tozy's questionnaireincluded some other questions, the answers to which may give us a more accurate picture of potential university student supportfor Islamic militancy. The studentswere asked to respondto the statement"In orderto reconstruct the culturalidentity of Moroccans, the precepts of the Quranshould be emphasized." Sixty-two per cent of the students endorsed this statement, with only 19 per cent opposingit (see Table I). This endorsementdoes not necessarilytranslate into support for militantIslam, but it does at least suggest susceptibility to the militant Islamic view that a return to Islam represents a return to "cultural authenticity.'28 Among the other strikingresults of Tozy's survey, we find that: 38 per cent of the students endorsed the idea "that the sole way for Moroccans to free themselves is a sincere return to the Islamic values that prevailed during the Golden Age of their civilization," 54 per cent endorsed the idea that "the backwardnessof our society is due to our renunciationof the commandmentsof the true Islamic religion," and 40 per cent agreedwith the idea that Islam "can by itself organize all aspects of life." All of these ideas are among the principal shibboleths of militantIslam-in Morocco as elsewhere.29We find a somewhat
24. AbdulHasibCastineira,"An IslamicView of the Placeof Women,"Arabia,October1984,
p. 24. 25. Tozy, Champ et contre champ, pp. 249, 252. 26. Ibid., pp. 249, 253. 27. Henry Munson, Jr., The House of Si Abd Allah: The Oral History of a Moroccan Family
(New Haven and London:Yale UniversityPress, 1984),pp. 33-34. 28. See HenryMunson,Jr., "The IslamicRevivalin Morocco," in S. Hunter,ed., TheIslamic Revival (London:CroomHelm, in press).
29. Ibid.
273
TABLE I The Views of 400 Moroccan UniversityStudents ConcerningIslam in 1984 Per Cent Yes Do you favor the mixing of men and women in public places? Do you think that Morocco should follow the Tunisianexample and make fasting during Ramadanvoluntaryso as to increase productivity? In order to reconstructthe culturalidentity of Moroccansthe precepts of the Quran shouldbe emphasized. Moroccansshould reject Western culture because it is not compatiblewith their authenticculturalvalues. Do you think that the sole way for Moroccansto free themselves [s'emanciper/ is a sincere returnto the Islamic values that prevailedduringthe Golden Age of their civilization? The backwardnessof our society is due to our renunciation(improperimplementation) of the commandmentsof the true Islamic religion. Can the implementation of the rules of our religionhelp us overcome underdevelopment? Islam is Din and Dunya and can by itself organizeall aspects of life. Do you favor the re-establishment of Islamic law as the sole legal system? Do you think religion should play a part in politics? 84 No 11 Don't Know 4 No Answer 1
28
54
11
62
19
11
28
58
38
39
14
10
54
30
11
46 40 32 43
32 27 49 45
15 25 12 7
7 8 8 6
torat d' Etaten SciencePolitique, de Droit,d'Economie & et des Sciences Universit6 d'Aix-Marseille, 1984),pp. 248, 250-52.
Source:MohamedTozy, Champet contre champpolitico-religieux au Maroc (Th6sepour le Doc-
lower percentage, 32 per cent endorsing the more concrete militant Islamic goal of "the re-establishment of Islamic law as the sole legal system." But even this 274
lower percentage would appearto indicate that almost a third of all the students in Moroccan universitiesfavor a strictly Islamic legal code. Tozy himself contends that 10 per cent of the students surveyed were "of a militantIslamic sensibility," with at least 75 per cent susceptible to discourse of a generally(but not necessarily militantly)Islamic character.30 And it is certainly essential to distinguish between relatively traditionalIslamic piety on the one hand and a commitmentto militantIslamic ideology on the other. The former is unquestionablyfar more common than the latter-among all strataof Moroccan society. But the fact remains that 32 per cent of the students surveyed by Tozy of Islamiclaw as the sole legal code and 38 said they favored the re-establishment per cent endorsed the idea that "the sole way for Moroccansto free themselves is a sincere returnto the Islamic values that prevailedduringthe Golden Age" of Islam. In the light of these percentagesand many of the others discussed above, it would seem fair to say that although fewer than 15 per cent of Moroccan university students appearto be actively involved in the militantIslamic movement, a far greaternumberare sympatheticto much of what the militantIslamic activists are saying.3' THE SOCIALBACKGROUNDOF MILITANT ISLAMICSTUDENTS We do not have much evidence concerningthe crucialquestion of the social backgroundof militantIslamic studentsin Morocco. However, it is probablysafe to assume that most of them do not come fromthe poorest strata.In recent studies of the popularquartersof Tangier,it was found that the childrenof the urbanpoor rarely complete secondary school, many being forced to leave school at an early age to work as apprentices.32We should also note that 65 per cent of all Moroccans aged ten or over were illiterateaccordingto the census of September 1982, with that figurereaching82 per cent in the ruralareas as opposed to 44 per In other words, secondary school and university students in cent in the urban.33 Morocco (as in most of the Third World) are a relatively privileged minority whose parentsdid not requiretheir laborat an early age. This obviously does not mean that such parents are necessarily wealthy,just that they are not poor. A numberof Moroccan scholars have suggested that most Islamic militants are from devoutly religious families of the "traditional"middle class or petite
30. Tozy, Champet contre champ, pp. 243, 247. 31. MarkTessler has correctlyemphasized,in a personalcommunication, that sympathywith some of the generalthemes of militantIslam shouldnot be construedas supportfor the goals of the militant Islamic movement as a whole. But such sympathy does suggest a susceptibility to the movement'sideology that could eventuallybecome support. 32. See Munson, The House of Si Abd Allah, pp. 121-124, 130;Henry Munson,Jr. and Jack LeCamus,"Dradib:a PopularQuarter of Tangier"[inArabic],to appearin Abhath:Majallatal-Ulum al-Ijtimaiyya (Rabat). 33. al-Mamlaka al-Maghribiyya, al-Ihsa' al-'am, p. 17.
275
bourgeoisie of shopkeepers, artisans, low level bureaucrats and prosperous peasants (the lattertwo categoriesoverlapextensively in ruralareas). The men of this traditionalmiddleclass (especiallythose in the cities) have typicallyhad some exposure to Islamic education, if only the memorizationof the Quran,while the women are generally illiterate.This is, at any rate, the patternwe have found in 34 the villages of northwesternMorocco and in the popularquartersof Tangier. And we do know of several Islamic militantsfrom this kind of social background. However, some of the universitystudentsattractedto militantIslam are frorn quite well-to-do families. For example, in an article in Jeune Afrique, Mohamed Selhamidescribes a 19 year old IslamicmilitantnamedJawad. When interviewed by Selhamiin 1979,Jawadwas a studentat the Facultyof Law in Casablanca.His fatherwas a high level officialin a constructioncompanyand lived in the affluent Anotheractivist, who has a university suburbanquarterof Oasis in Casablanca.35 degree in Islamic law, is the daughterof the presidentof the League of Ulama of Rabat-Sal'.36(Women students and graduates are quite active in Morocco s militant Islamic groups.) It is also significantthat some of the students whose letters appearedin Yasin's review al-Jamd'a have the familynamesof some of the most prominentFassi families of the Moroccan elite. Of course bearing such a name does not automaticallymean that one's immediatefamily is wealthy and influential.But it does suggest that at least some of one's close relatives are. So we are not yet in a position to make any generalizationsabout the social origins of Morocco's militantIslamic students except that they are by and large not from the poorest strata of Moroccan society. AND OTHERCIVILSERVANTSOF THE "NEW MIDDLE TEACHERS CLASS" I have thus far focused exclusively on Moroccanstudents, who do constitute the bulk of the activists in the militant Islamic movement. But the movement appeals to other segments of what we may refer to as the "new middle class" of Morocco in the broad sense of people who are neither extremely rich nor extremely poor and who have had considerableexposure to Western culture-usuallyin basically secularpublic schools. For example,teachers and bureaucrats in the Ministryof Education(which still functions primarilyin French) are often active in the Islamic movement (as they are in Morocco's secular Left). Abd al-KarimMuti', the founderof the Association of Islamic Youth, was an inspector in the Ministry of Education before fleeing Morocco in 1975.37Abd
34. See Munson, The House of Si Abd Allah; and Munsonand LeCamus, "Dradib." 35. MohamedSelhami,"Les 'freres'marocains,"Jeune Afrique,No. 990-991 (December26, 1979-January 2, 1980):35-36. 36. Le Monde, July 12, 1984, p. 5. 37. Remy Leveau, "Reaction de l'Islam officiel au renouveauislamiqueau Maroc," in 'C.
276
al-SlamYasin, who is unquestionablyMorocco's most importantmilitantIslamic theorist, served over 30 years as an inspectorand administrator in the Ministryof Of five close associates of Yasin arrestedin April 1984, four were Education.38 in the Ministryof Education. One of them teachers or high level administrators was the directorof secondaryschools in Marrakech,anotherwas a teacher in the teacher training school in that city, while two others were secondary school teachers. The fifth man arrested was described by Le Monde as a "businessman."39 I have also encountered or heard of a number of militant Islamic schoolteachers in Tangierand other cities and towns of northernMorocco. in the Ministryof It is thus clear that schoolteachersas well as administrators Education have been conspicuously active in Morocco's militantIslamic movement. But just as it would be a serious mistake to assume that all or even most Moroccan students are Islamic militants, the same holds true with respect to Morocco's schoolteachers,manyof whom remainof a secularleftist orientation.40 It would also be a mistake to assume that civil servants of a militantIslamic orientationare found only in the Ministryof Education.The governmentremains the principal employer of university graduates, including those of a militant Islamic orientation,4'and there are low level civil servants sympathetic to the militant Islamic movement sprinkled throughout the lower echelons of the But the numberof bureaucratsactively involvedin thie Moroccanadministration. movement appearsto be infinitesimal.
ISLAMICB UREAUCRAT:THE THE SOCIALORIGINSOF A MILITANT CASE OF ABD AL-SLAM YASIN As in the case of Morocco's militantIslamic students, we do not know much about the social origins of the militantIslamic civil servants of Morocco. We do have, however, some information concerningthe social originsof Morocco's most famous militantIslamic bureaucrat-Abd al-Slam Yasin. Born in 1928, Yasin claims to be the son of a Berber-speakingpeasant of sharifiandescent (i.e. a putative patrilinealdescendant of the Prophet Muhammad).42After memorizing the Quran, Yasin studied with some ulama at a institute"-for how long he does not say.43He then studiedFrench on "'religious
Souriau, ed., Le Maghreb musulman en 1979 (Paris: Editions du CNRS, 1983), pp. 211-212. 38. al-Jamc'a, No. 2 (1979): 123.
39. Le Monde, May 3, 1984,p. 3.

40. See Jean-Francois C1lment and Jim Paul, "Trade Unions and Moroccan Politics, MERIP Reports, No. 127 (October 1984): 22-24. 41. R6my Leveau, "Apercu de l'evolution du systeme politique marocain depuis vingt ans," Maghreb-Machrek, No. 106 (October-December 1984): 20. 42. Tozy, Champ et contre champ, p. 386. 43. Ibid.
277
his own. He speaks French fluently and has written a book in that language entitled La revolutiona 1'heurede I'Islam.44 Yasin was already an inspector of primary education at the time of what he refers to as Morocco's "spurious independence"in 1956,and later served in a variety of administrative positions in the Ministry of Education until forced to retire because of his militant Islamic
views.45
So we see that, accordingto his own account, Yasin had no formaleducation of a secular characterwhereas most of his youthfulsupportersare the productsof Morocco's secular school system.46 But it should be remembered that the Moroccan public school system has only developed since independence, and despite his lack of a formal secular education, Yasin spent much of his life workingas an inspector and administrator in this system. Moreover, as he likes to remind his readers by means of references to Descartes, Montesquieu, Hegel, Marx, and Lenin, Yasin is familiar with the Westernthoughtthat he now rejects-at least no less so than the average student in a Moroccanpublic school.47It is also of interest that Yasin's daughterNadia, who has a university degree in law, claims that before becoming an Islamic militant,Yasin (and his wife) wanted their childrento study at a French school in Morocco-alongside the children of the westernized Moroccan elite.48 (Nadia Yasin herself, before becoming an Islamic militant, regularly wore jeans and T-shirts.)49Thus, despite the fact that Abd al-Slam Yasin's educational backgroundmay differsomewhatfromthat of the youngermilitants,like most activists in the militantIslamic movement, he has had considerableexposure to secular education and Western culture.
POTENTIALSUPPORTFOR MILITANT ISLAMFROM MORE TRADITIONAL SOCIALSTRATA But although most militant Islamic activists in Morocco are relatively westernized and secularlyeducated, there are other more traditionaland usually less educated Moroccans who are also sympatheticto the idea of a return to a strictly Islamic society. We may consider, for example, the following statements by a poor peddlerof Tangier,whose educationconsisted of the memorizationof most of the Quran, and who once worked for the Istiqlal party and later for the
44. Abd al-Slam Yasin, La Revolution a 1'heurede l'Islam (Marseille: L'Imprimeriedu College, 1981). 45. al-Jama'a, No. 2 (1979):123. 46. Leveau, "Apercu," p. 22; Tozy, Champet contre champ, pp. 217-219. 47. al-Jama'a, No. 2 (1979):22, 24-25. 48. Castineira,"An IslamicView of the Place of Women," p. 24. 49. Ibid.
278
This man was also a laborer in leftist Union Nationale des Forces Populaires.50 Europe for nine years.
Why did God allow the Christiansto rule over the house of Islam? Why did God allow the Jews to take Palestine and holy Jerusalem?Why does God allow the Christiansto live like sultans in our land while we are like slaves in their land? This is God's punishment.And this is God's test. Muslimshave left the path (kharjumnin al-triq)of Islam. Young people do not pray. The rich do not pray. Muslimgirls bare their bodies like Christianwomen. And they walk hand in hand with their lovers on the bulivar[the BoulevardPasteur,the mainstreet of Tangier].The rich Muslimdoes not fast duringRamadan.And he drinkswine and whiskey. And he asks why it is that domination the house of Islamis like a toy in the handsof the Christian.The Christian God.51 is the wrath of
Elsewhere in TheHouse of SiAbd Allah, this same peddlersays: "Now the Fassis [the elite from Fez] rule as the Christiansused to. They have villas, cars, and servants. But those of us who toil for a mouthfulof bread have gained nothing since independence." 52 Althoughthis peddler's rhetoricis somewhat more traditionalthan Yasin's, he clearly shares Yasin's view that a returnto Islam is necessary in order to free Morocco from foreign domination, to create a just social order, and to force Moroccansto conformto what he regardsas the immutablelaws of God. And we have heard ideas similarto those of this peddlerexpressed by Moroccanfactory workers who work in Europe, as well as by shopkeepersand various blue collar workers in Tangier-all of them at least marginallyliterate. The basic logic of militantIslam, namelythat if Muslimsreturnto Islam, God will solve all their problems, is deeply rooted in both the orthodox and, less And people like Yasin are obviously, in the popular Islamic imagination.53 articulating widespread social and nationalistic grievances as well as moral outrageprovokedby the violationof rules of conductperceived as being of divine origin and immutablyvalid. One might therefore expect the militant Islamic movement to have wideand less privilegedstrataof Morocco, spread supportamong the more traditional e.g. the shopkeepers,the workingclass, the urbanpoor and the peasantry.If such supportexists, however, it has not manifesteditself in overt political action. For in December of 1983, the people example, since Yasin's arrestand imprisonment who have protested and demanded his release have reportedly been mostly
50. The bulk of the members of the UNFP joined the new Union Socialiste des Forces Populairesin the early 1970s. 51. Munson, TheHouse of Si Abd Allah, p. 68. 52. Ibid., p. 86. 53. Castineira,"An IslamicView of the Placeof Women,"p. 24. The assertionthat most of the demonstratorsare students and other educated middle class Moroccans is based upon personal from a numberof Moroccans. communications
279
students and other educated middle class Moroccans.53Although Yasin is the most prominentleader and theorist of the militantIslamicmovementin Morocco, his arrest did not cause any riots or demonstrationsin the popular quartersof Moroccan cities, let alone the countryside. In fact, our conversations and correspondencewith Moroccansof various social backgroundslead us to believe that most people in the popularquartersand villages of Morocco have never even heard of Yasin. Speaking of his review al-Jama'a, which he published from 1979 through 1983,Yasin has conceded that it never had mass appealbecause most Moroccans could not read it and could not affordthe five dirhams($1.28 in 1980)that each issue cost.54Only 3,000 copies of each issue of al-Jama'a were printeduntil the final ban on publicationin 1983,55 and yet this was the most widely read militant Islamic review in Morocco. This low figure cannot be accounted for solely by Morocco's illiteracyrate. Le Matindu Sahara, a daily newspaperthat reflects the government's views, had a circulation of 70,000 in 1983.56 Al-Alam, the daily paper of the Istiqlal party, had a circulationof 50,000 in this same year, while the daily paperof the Union Socialiste des Forces Populaires,had a al-Muharrir, circulationof 17,000.57 It is no doubt true that fear of the governmentled some Moroccans to avoid readingal-Jama'a. But it is also true that this review's low circulationreflects the fact that only an infinitesimal minorityof Moroccans,most of them students, have been actively involved in Morocco's militant Islamic movement. We do know that some of the many high school studentsinvolved in the riots of January1984were Islamicmilitants(while many others were of a secularleftist orientation), but we have no evidence indicating that this was true of the And it is unemployed and underemployedurban poor who also participated.58 clear that Islamic militantswere no more in control of the events of January1984 than anyone else was. They were patently incapable of transformingthese eruptionsof discontent, which were provokedby an increase in a fee paid by high school students and increased food prices, into a full-fledgedrevolution. As for Iranianclaims to have organizedthe riots, they should be takenjust as seriously as King Hasan II's contention that the riots were the result of a "Communist,
ZionistandKhomeinist" plot.59
54. al-Jamd'a, No. 1 (1979):44; Souriau,"Quelquesdonnees comparatives,"p. 378. 57. Ibid. 58. JimPaul, "Statesof Emergency: The Riotsin TunisiaandMorocco,"MERIPReports,No. 127 (October 1984):3-6; and David Seddon, "Winterof Discontent:EconomicCrisis in Tunisiaand Morocco," MERIPReports, No. 127 (October1984):7-16. Simon & Schuster, 1985),pp. 198-199;Le Monde, January26, 1984,p. 4 and January28, 1984,p. 6; El Pais, January24, 1984,p. 2.
59. Robin Wright, Sacred Rage: The Crusade of Modern Islam (New York: Linden Press/ 55. Tozy, Champ et contre champ, p. 394. 56. The Middle East and North Africa 1983-84 (London: Europa Publications, 1983), p. 516.
280
THEPOPULAR PREACHERS But while the militant Islamic movement as represented by Abd al-Slam Yasin and groups such as the Association of Islamic Youth has been unable to mobilize much supportoutside the schools and universitiesof Morocco, there is anothermore "populist" facet of this movementrepresentedby urbanpreachers such as Shaykh al-Zimzimiof Tangier.60 The Shaykh al-Zimzimi,who is an old man, is venerated by Moroccans of virtually all social backgroundsin Tangier. People from all over the city attend Fridayprayersat his mosque-primarily to hear his fiery sermons, which are tape recorded and distributedin a mannerreminiscentof the distributionof the tapes of Shaykh Kishk in Egypt and the Ayatollah Khomeini in Iran. (The tapes of Shaykh Kishk himself are also very popularin Morocco.61) Here is an excerpt from one of al-Zimzimi'staped sermons:
Some say that the Fridaysermon shouldbe limitedto mattersof ritual(prayerand fasting)in the mistakenbelief that Islamcan be classed with Christianity,which does not transgressthe limits of the church.They do not know that Islamintervenesin the affairs of society from A to Z [sic]. . . . The preacher must therefore speak of everything that concerns the Muslims. Otherwise he would be a traitor.... Ihe ignoramusesof our time hate the honest preacher. .. . For these ignoramuses,the good preacheris he who speaks of the price of eggs and vegetablesand discusses the fashions and trivia of the time. We refuse to be an inspector of prices so that the government will like us; that is not what God has commanded us, we are not hypocrites... 62
This is relativelymildrhetoriccomparedto that of the Association of Islamic Youth and other comparablegroups, but a young man from Tangierassures us condemnthe governmentand the kingin far stronger that he has heardal-Zimzimi terms than those cited above. He contends, for example, that he has heard al-Zimzimirefer to the king as Amiral-kha'intn,"Commander of the traitors," as of the Believers." opposed to his officialtitle of Amiral-mu'mintn,"Commander same man have seen And this claims to policemenforce al-Zimzimiout of young his mosque in the middle of a sermon because of derogatoryremarkshe made about the king. This same source also says, however, that after having been repeatedlyjailed for his sermons, al-Zimzimihas become less openly critical of the king and the governmentin recent years. There are other preachers like al-Zimzimi in Casablanca, including alZimzimi's own son;63there are probablysome comparablemen in other cities of
60. Tozy, Champ et contre champ, pp. 280-302.
61. Bruno Etienne, "La Moelle de la predication:essai sur le pr6ne politique dans l'Islam
contemporain," Revue franqaise de science politique, Vol. 33, No. 4 (August 1983): 707-708. 62. Tozy, Champ et contre champ, pp. 296-297.
63. al-Jamd'a, No. 5 (1980):109.
281
Morocco. These preachersare in a muchbetter position to mobilize oppositionto the governmentthan are the more radicalstudentgroups. Theirdiscourse is more than that of the studentmilitants.Like Yasin, they authenticand more traditional are articulatingwidespreadgrievances in terms of many of the basic motifs an(d symbols of popularIslam. And they are speakingin mosques where many people listen ratherthan writingin journals that few people read. But it is not clear how many of these preachersare seriously committed to revolutionaryas opposed to reformistgoals. They would undoubtedlysupporta in the nameof "a returnto the Islamof the Prophet coup or revolutionundertaken have but Muhammad," they yet to demonstratea willingness or an ability to initiate such a coup or revolution themselves. This is presumably why the governmentpermitsthem to preach, whereas Abd al-SlamYasin and the leaders of the Association of Islamic Youth are in jail or exile. It should be emphasizedthat preacherslike al-Zimzimi are not representative of Morocco's ulama as a whole, most of whom say pretty much what the In 1980,the governmentinducedthe country'sleading governmenttells them to.M4 ulama to issue a legal decree (fatwa) condemningKhomeini for some allegedl,y Since then, Morocco's Islamic militants(who often refer to heretical remarks.65 Iranas a model Moroccansshould emulate)have frequentlyexcoriatedthe ulama for serving the king ratherthan God.66 THEPEASANTR Y, THE URBANPOOR, AND THEBARAKAOF THE KING It has often been said that a major obstacle facing the militant Islamic movement in Morocco is the thoroughly Islamic character of the Moroccan monarchy. More specifically, it is said that the king is venerated because of the tremendousbaraka, or "blessedness," he is believed to possess by virtue of his descent from the Prophet Muhammadand his role as "Commander of the Believers."67 There is no question but that this traditionalconception of the monarch remains widespread among peasants and those urban poor who have recently migratedto cities from their natal villages. These two groups constitute the bulk of the population (and of the army) of Morocco.68Thus, belief in the king's barakaon the part of peasants and some of the urbanpoor certainly does remainan importantcomponentof Morocco's political order.
64. Donna Lee Bowen, "Religionand the PoliticalOrderin Morocco,"MERAForum,Vol. 5, No. 3 (Fall 1981):19-20. 65. Souriau,"Quelquesdonnees comparatives,"pp. 365-367. 66. al-Jami'a, No. 7 (1980-81):81-82, 86-87. 67. See Henry Munson,Jr., "Geertzon Religion:the Theoryand the Practice," Religion (in press) and "CliffordGeertz et l'etude de l'Islam au Maroc," in J. C. Vatin, ed., L'Anthropologie americainedu Maghreb(Paris:Editionsdu CNRS, in press). 68. al-Mamlaka al-Ihsa' al-'am, p. 5. al-Maghribiyya,
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But the power of this conception has been seriously eroded in the cities. As noted above, Shaykhal-Zimzimiand other popularpreachersare said to vilify the king quite regularly (especially in private). Moreover, many of the slogans chanted and the graffitiwritten duringthe riots of January1984attackedthe king V [the formerkingwho personally,e.g. "Down with HasanII," and "Muhammad but are who was our (It is common to find father, you, you?"69 died in 1961] extreme antipathytoward the present king Hasan II coupled with a reverential attitude toward his father MuhammadV-who played an importantrole in the strugglefor independence.) Among urbanyoung people in particular,the traditionalconceptions of the monarchas being in some sense sacred are usually dismissed as al-khrayif,i.e. "fairy tales." And we have found this to be true among blue collar workers with no more than an elementaryschool educationas well as amongsecondary school and university students. We have also heard older, Islamically educated merchants ridicule the idea that the king is anythingbut a man like any other-in private of course. In short, while the idea that the king is in some sense holy still carries great urbanpoor and the soldiersrecruited weight amongpeasants, the more traditional from these social groups, this notion is taken less and less seriously by urban Moroccans(especially the youngerones) with at least several years of education. It is also worth noting that the militantIslamic movements of the 1970s and 1980s have been incapable of mobilizing mass support in virtually all Muslim countries except Iran. But few if any of the rulersof these countriesderive much legitimacy from the belief that they are imbued with sacredness. A more basic obstacle confronting the militant Islamic movement in most of these other countries, as in Morocco, is the sharpcontrastbetween the ideologized Islam of those Islamic militantsmost committedto revolutionand Islam as it is understood by most Muslims.70
CONCLUSION Most of the activists of the militantIslamic movementin Morocco since the early 1970s have been high school and university students and other "middle class" Moroccans with considerable exposure to Western culture and secular education. But even on the university campuses of Morocco, fewer than 15 per cent of the studentsappearto be actively involved in the movementat the present
69. Jean-Francois Cldment,"Strategiesrepressiveset techniquesdu maintiende l'ordre:les revoltes urbainesde janvier 1984au Maroc"(to appearin a book publishedby Harmattan in 1986),p. 57. 70. See Henry Munson,Jr., "The Ideologization of Islam," paperpresentedat the December 1984meetingof the AmericanAnthropological Associationin Washington.
283
time, althougha far greaternumberare receptive to at least some of the principal themes of militantIslamic ideology. The militant Islamic movement has been unable to attract and mobilize significantnumbersof Moroccansoutside the schools and universities. In fact, as one militant observed in a letter printed in al-Jama'a, most Moroccans do not As an organizedl even know that there is an Islamic movementin their country.71 political force, Morocco's highly fragmentedmilitantIslamic movement is impotent at the present time. But the fact remainsthat some vaguely militantpreacherssympatheticto the malleable notions of an Islamic state and society are expressing widespread grievances in a religious idiom that is highly appealingto the great majorityof Moroccan Muslims. At the same time, hostility towards the king on the part of literate young Moroccans in the cities, i.e. the most politically conscious and active people in Moroccansociety, is extremelywidespread.Given the severity of the present economic crisis (as manifestedby the riots of June 1981and Januar,y 1984)and the thoroughlyIslamic world view of the great majorityof Moroccans, it would be a mistake to assume that militant Islam will remain as politically impotent as it now appearsto be. While most of Morocco's many militantIslamic groupswill probablyremain ineffective student debating societies bogged down in their own internecine
squabbles, militant Islam in its more populist forms remains a tremendously
powerfulmode of politicaldiscourse. Whoeveroverthrowsthe presentregimewill inevitably have to justify the eliminationof the monarchyin terms of a returnto a more righteousand egalitarianIslam similarto that depicted by people like Abd al-SlamYasin and Shaykh al-Zimzimi.
71. al-Jama'a, No. 7 (1980-81):88.
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Munson - The Social Base of Islamic Militancy in Morocco

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The Social Base of Islamic Militancy in Morocco Author(s): Henry Munson, Jr. Source: Middle East Journal, Vol.

THE SOCIALBASE OF ISLAMIC MILITANCYIN MOROCCO Henry Munson, Jr.

THE MIDDLEEAST JOURNAL,VOLUME40, NO. 2, SPRING1986.

(1982): 57-58. 4. al-Jama'a, No. 2 (1979): 48.

12. Le Monde, August 2, 1984,p. 3.

(New York: Praeger,1984),p. 36.

Source:MohamedTozy, Champet contre champpolitico-religieux au Maroc (Th6sepour le Doc-

39. Le Monde, May 3, 1984,p. 3.

63. al-Jamd'a, No. 5 (1980):109.

71. al-Jama'a, No. 7 (1980-81):88.

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