Challenges to U.S. Democracy Promotion in Morocco: the Credibility Deficit
by James Liddell

POMED Newsletter, February 2007

Democracy promotion organizations are increasingly encountering a backlash from the negative perceptions of U.S. policies in the Middle East. Although the Arab public was always skeptical of the Bush Administration’s democracy promotion agenda, it is only recently that this skepticism has begun to lead to tangible setbacks. In Morocco in particular, U.S. democracy promotion organizations have been met with widespread suspicion and organized opposition, to the point that they are having difficulty implementing their agendas.

Although U.S. democracy promotion organizations have been active for several years in Morocco, a series of events in the past year have dramatically changed public perceptions of their work. Today, such organizations are inextricably tied with the source of their funding—casting them as the subversive tentacles of Uncle Sam bent on manipulating the internal affairs of Morocco as part of America’s “Greater Middle East Project.” (Attajdid, March 7, 2006)

The event which shook the political landscape the most in Morocco in 2006 was a series of opinion polls carried out by the International Republican Institute (IRI) which showed the moderate Islamist Justice and Development Party (PJD) winning a plurality of votes in the 2007 parliamentary elections. Set in the background of other regional events, such as the U.S. occupation of Iraq and the Lebanese-Israeli war, the IRI polls were viewed as an unsolicited meddling of the United States in Morocco’s internal political affairs, equally unwelcome among the ailing socialist parties and the PJD. IRI’s affiliation with the “party of George Bush” is rarely omitted from the incessant disparagement of U.S. funded opinion polling. (La Tribune, January 11, 2007)

Around the same time that the first IRI poll was released, a grant by the Middle East Partnership Initiative (MEPI) to the Moroccan independent press was met with widespread resistance and perceived as a deliberate maneuver by the Bush Administration to buy influence with the Moroccan press. As one Moroccan activist proclaimed, the money was suspicious “in the context of a Greater Middle East Project of reforms endorsed by America to reformulate the Arab region in compliance to U.S. norms and interests.” (Attajdid, March 7, 2006)

Six months later, in early November, the leader of the National Syndicate of Moroccan Journalists joined five other NGOs in circulating a petition calling for a formal boycott of all U.S. Embassy activities. As the president of the Moroccan Association for Human Rights (one of the groups leading the boycott), Abdelhamid Amine, proclaimed, “How can we trust America’s democratic project while it has destroyed two progressive models of democracy in the Arab world: Hamas in Palestine and Lebanon?” (Attajdid, September 13, 2006) Since then, the PJD has declared its own boycott against all U.S. funded democracy promotion organizations. Despite years of working with and benefiting from such assistance, the PJD now routinely advertises its refusal to participate in U.S. funded political party training sessions and consultations.

Clearly, the United States is suffering from a severe credibility deficit which has permeated broad segments of society throughout the Middle East (and the rest of the world for that matter). Moreover, the glaring inconsistencies and perceived unjust nature of U.S. policy in the region means that many democracy promotion organizations sporting the American brand (and, yes, they will always check the label) will at best, be viewed with some degree of skepticism, and at worst, boycotted.

This isn’t to say that many political parties and local NGOs don’t continuously seek support and benefit from the assistance of U.S. aid organizations. Nor is it to say that these aid organizations aren’t making a difference in Morocco. However, to proceed with the debate on democracy promotion without recognizing the growing role that the United States’ diminished credibility is playing in impeding reform efforts is folly—especially as Congress is considering passing a major Advance Democracy Act which would inextricably link democracy promotion with U.S. foreign policy.

James Liddell is a program coordinator for POMED currently based in Rabat, where he is helping to plan a POMED conference in Morocco.