WPR
by Ellen Laipson
There is a strong consensus among counterterrorism experts in the Maghreb and the Sahel that comprehensive and integrated approaches are needed to confront the threat from al-Qaida, the so-called Islamic State (ISIS) and their regional affiliates and rivals. Military force is necessary but not sufficient to deal a significant blow to this all-consuming threat:
Everything from educational reform to inclusive economic growth is on the policy table. One of the trickiest components of such a comprehensive approach is what governments can do to nurture peaceful practices in Islam, and tolerance between Muslims and followers of other faiths.
Morocco has some ideas. Though still not a member of the African Union due to the Western Sahara dispute, Morocco sees itself as a major player in the Sahel and sub-Saharan Africa. As part of an effort to facilitate information-sharing and promote coordination in the fight against terror, a Moroccan nongovernmental organization, the Moroccan Center for Strategic Studies, convenes an Arab-African conference each year. Last week’s Marrakech Security Forum was the seventh of these annual events.
As always when security officials and political analysts gather to discuss the terrorist threat in Africa, there was little debate last week about the need for multiple policy initiatives that tackle the full suite of issues, from the recruitment supply chain to the recuperation of territory under extremist control to the treatment of foreign fighters returning home. The necessary responses draw on the national security assets of each country, but also on the essential functions of good government. Education and jobs are the best long-term antidotes to the lure of terrorism, but experts also concede that governments have to decide how far they can go in trying to regulate or reform religious institutions and practices that have been complicit in radicalization.
Because terrorism is by its nature a transnational problem, it cannot be solved within sovereign national borders, particularly in Africa, where borders are often poorly delineated and controlled. The movement of terrorist recruiters and fighters—who are often integrated in various illicit economic networks, from wildlife crime to smuggling and trafficking of arms, drugs and consumer goods—requires cross-border cooperation. Western governments tend to organize their efforts in the Arab and African worlds as two separate domains, but the North-South linkages—between Algeria and Mali, for example—require the ability to transcend bureaucratic divisions.
Morocco is able to go further than other countries in setting norms and providing incentives to support the state’s role in religion.
In fact, it’s not unreasonable to think that the problem has migrated from North to South. After all, it was Algeria’s elections in 1992, disrupted by the military when it became clear the Islamic Front (FIS) would win, that led to the radicalization of the country’s Islamists. That provoked a decade-long civil war during which Algerian extremists often found safe haven in the ungoverned spaces of the Sahel. They also targeted the region’s weaker states, such as Mauritania, to build their credibility and military prowess. In Africa, the evolution of political Islam into more radical forms has also been underway for decades, but it was clearly stimulated and exacerbated by events in the Arab world.
Disaffected Arabs from each of the Maghreb states also joined the global fight in Afghanistan and later in Iraq and Syria, bringing back to Northern Africa the experience and belief in a pan-Muslim struggle. Libya’s more recent collapse as a functioning state added to the lethal mix, sending arms and fighters to Sahel states that were poorly equipped to prevent these flows.
So how can these states cope with the religious dimension of this struggle? Morocco is promoting a robust set of measures that bring the state into more active management of Islam, to counter the lure of the ISIS message of Muslim unity, dignity and purity. At last week’s conference, the head of Morocco’s Islamic scholars’ association gave a spirited presentation promoting the Maliki tradition, in particular, among the various schools of Islam. The Maliki approach to Muslim jurisprudence allows for taking into account the context of contemporary society in some interpretations of scripture, in contrast to the absolutist approach of Salafis, who have inspired al-Qaida and the Islamic State. Morocco also incorporates the lighter spiritual practices of Sufism into its practice of Islam, in order to provide a more joyful spirit that gives hope to young Muslims, rather than a strict set of rules that often defer happiness.
Morocco has the distinct advantage of a monarchy that claims direct lineage to the Prophet Muhammad, and thus brings religious legitimacy to its political leadership. That, combined with the broad acceptance of the monarchy, allows Morocco to go further than other countries in setting norms and providing incentives to support the state’s role in religion. Some Arab states make imams state employees, and already monitor Friday sermons. But the Moroccan government has no qualms about setting guidelines for imams and taking measures to censure those who stray, or in shaping public perceptions about Islam and its relationship to government authority.
That would not be suitable for states that opted for secular definitions of state authority at independence, where a general disinterest if not disdain for religion was common among modernist post-independence leaders. In Mali, for example, the secular state essentially left traditional Islam to self-govern, not realizing that the country’s Tuareg separatists would forge an alliance of convenience with radical Islamists that ultimately led to a French military intervention in the north of the country in 2012.
Morocco’s efforts to provide a positive model of a partnership between the state and religious institutions is worthy of consideration by neighboring states. There are valid reasons why some governments may not be able to take all the same steps to manage and control the religious activities of their citizens. But it is clear that, given the misuse of religion by terrorist groups and other extremists, it has become a public policy issue that demands attention.
Ellen Laipson served as president and chief executive officer of the Stimson Center from 2002 to October 2015. She now is president emeritus and distinguished fellow. Her WPR column, Measured Response, appears every Tuesday.
