Political and Social Inter-mediation in Algeria

Inter-mediation or State-Citizen Confrontation

In reference to the various reports of all security departments, which relate on a daily basis through the Algerian media, the situation subsequent to long entrenched and deep morality corrosion ought to be considered without pre-conceived ideas so as to concretely respond to its challenges. The time is counted for any Political and Social Inter-mediation in Algeria; the country has a break of three years, but it is possible only through the development of a clear strategy.  It is in fact before the urgency of a renewal of the Central and Local governance models through Political and Social Inter-mediation that the responsibility lies.

1.- Avoiding any reference to organic intellectuals at the orders, as per Gramsci, philosopher, counterproductive for the regime itself, the reestablishment of the State must enter the actual trends of Algerian society in mutation. The strengthening of the rule of law becomes more urgent when we know that the democratization of institutions and empowerment will encourage the emergence of new identities that are believed to be dead and that require control of a State and a strong power of its legitimacy and credibility of its jurisdiction. The rebuilding of the State, not to say its foundation as a civilian entity, that is to be through a profound change in the social function of politics. It is the standard of the right which takes up its place to legitimize the real status of national citizenship. From my point of view, the passage from the State of “support” for the State of justice is a major political gamble, because it implies everything simply a new social contract between the nation and the State.

2.- Algeria cannot go back to itself but only if all false privileges are banished and criteria of competence, loyalty and innovation are reinstated as gateways to success and social promotion. Competence is not synonymous with positions in informal hierarchy or a positioning in the perception of a rentier annuity, it is self-sufficient and its effectiveness and legitimacy are true especially in the relevance of ideas and the positive symbolism that it anchors in the bodies and social actors. Otherwise, large fractures could be coming and the reestablishment of the State would not exceed a vain temptation to perpetuate a regime which is no longer able to achieve the aspirations of an Algeria linked to modernity while preserving its authenticity. The reestablishment of the State cannot be limited to a technical reorganisation (change of Government or Ministers) but through new governance, full transparency and clarity without nuance in political practice, social economic and especially in the communication in order to mobilize opinion. It is no longer possible to continue, thanks to an artificial financial ease, to spend lavishly, import instead produce local as off local or foreign wealth creation enterprises.

3.- Good governance is a matter of intelligent and real and not fictitious legitimacy. This involves asking the strategic issue of the future role of the State heavily influenced by the effects of globalization in the economic and social development through real decentralization. The requirements of a State strong off its righteousness and its right, if these were a vital tool for national cohesion and the fate of the nation should not overshadow the needs of autonomy of local authorities which must be restructured based on anthropological history and not according to the ephemeral electioneering or volatile clientelistic needs. Cohesion of these spaces and their involvement in the management of their interests and their respective territorialities could then lead to a dynamic of positive competition thus rendering control of all regions specific and above all away from the largely outdated political centrality. The autonomy of local authorities does not mean autonomy of government but an act that strengthens good governance, reinforced by a role for civil society and local authorities in order to transform the Commons “Providence” into “Common Enterprise”.

4.- This implies that all various components of society and stakeholders in the economic, social and cultural life, are without exception, involved in the decision-making process that engages the configuration of Algeria’s image of tomorrow that will gradually move away of the spectrum of exclusion, marginalization and all negative attitudes which hamper any social cohesion. Citizen’s empowerment and commitment within the decision-making process which involves the future generations, is a way for the State, to mark its willingness to justice and restore its credibility by giving a positive meaning to its role of regulator and arbiter of social demand (1). The reforms of the functioning of the Algerian society would involve analysing the dialectical relations between segments of the production of the hydrocarbon based rentier economy and its redistribution through a sclerosis financial system, the winners of tomorrow are not necessarily those of today. And especially avoid that when the value of the hydrocarbons revenue if increasing, reforms are not hampered by passive redistribution of the rentier annuity for an ephemeral social peace with a concentration of national income for the benefit of a rentier minority.

In summary, in the face of a world in perpetual movement, as per its foreign policy, economic, defence, related actions, with the latest events in the Middle East, in the Sahel, and right on its borders, arises for Algeria the urgency of the strategies of adaptation and international and regional coordination, in order to act effectively on major events. This new challenge for Algeria, strategic actor for the stability of the Mediterranean region and African (2), exceeds in importance and magnitude the challenges it has faced so far. Faced with this situation as geostrategic and internal complex, Algerians want to live their differences in communion and not in confrontation. Algeria going currently through this phase of its history is in need of a critical and just look to be on location on what has already been accomplished and what it will accomplish again for the exclusive benefit of a homeland which has need to meet and gather all his children around the same ambition and one hope: a harmonious development reconciling economic efficiency and a deep social justice.

Notes :

(1) Refer interview with Prof. Abderrahmane Mebtoul of December 28, 2016 by the American American Herald Tribune ” Any Destabilization of Algeria would have Geo-strategic implications on all the Mediterranean and African Space ” on MENA-Forum of Guildford, UK  in English and reproduced on the international site Oximity (www.oximity.com) with translations on the following international websites – www.dworaczek-bendome.org – www.mohsenabdelmoumen.wordpress.com – www.elafkarelwataniya.blogspot.com – www.djazairess.com/fr/search  – www.palestine-solidarite.org also in contributions on the international magazine The Africas (Geneva-Dakar-Paris) 06/01/2017. In “Who wants to destabilize the Algeria?”- and on Twitter and Facebook.

(2) Study of Professor Abderrahmane Mebtoul, published in the International French Institute (IFRI) of Paris, France “Maghreb-Europe cooperation the geo-strategic challenges” (November 2011) – chapter III -“The strategy of NATO the geostrategic challenges in the Mediterranean”.