Let’s start with the obvious: if there are gains in our country in terms of rights and freedoms, they are largely due to the action of Moroccan civil society. Since the early 1980s, human rights associations and the feminist movement have been at the forefront of activism to put these issues at the heart of public debate. They succeeded in a magnificent “Gramscian” operation by making the adversary, in this case the Moroccan State, adopt their own speeches and vocabulary.
The feminist movement, which interests us here, has fought hard to improve the situation of Moroccan women. The activism of its members has contributed to changing mentalities and legislation in favor of gender equality. The women (and men) who led this struggle had to confront the conservatism of society, the virulence of their adversaries who cloaked themselves in religious discourse, but also the condescension of their own comrades in political parties, who considered the question of women’s rights as secondary and superfluous. They stood their ground and were right to do so. History has proven them right.
The feminist movement in Morocco suffers from the same ills as the left-wing parties from which it emerged: an inability to renew its ideas, its vocabulary and its way of doing things.
Abdellah Tourabi
But this movement is currently in decline. For several years he has been experiencing a slow agony, interspersed with fleeting and occasional jolts. Behind this situation, there is first of all an obsolescence of speech and software. The feminist movement suffers from the same ills as the left-wing parties from which it emerged: an inability to renew its ideas, its vocabulary and its way of doing things. The words are repeated, the slogans are the same, and have been for almost half a century. By focusing mainly on legal reforms, notably on the Moudawana, this movement became devitalized as the State responded favorably to its demands.
The reform of the Family Code in 2004 was the moment of glory of this movement and the consecration of its fight, but also its swan song and the beginning of its decline. He was unable to follow the changes in Moroccan society, but also to learn and draw inspiration from the evolution of feminist thought and action in other countries. Apart from a few young organizations and scattered individuals, the feminist movement has remained fixed in its way of approaching issues such as sexual violence, consent, masculinity, etc.
-The collapse of Islamism paradoxically contributed to the decline of the feminist movement
Abdellah Tourabi
With a mode of action based on the idea that everything is resolved through institutional advocacyvertical reforms and political and intellectual inter-self. Formerly at the forefront of the debate of ideas and courageously present in the public space (demonstrations, marches, petitions, debates, etc.), the action of this movement now consists of folkloric communiqués and, every March 8, ghostly apparitions.
The collapse of Islamism paradoxically contributed to the decline of the feminist movement. A sort of apathy has taken hold of the feminist camp, in the absence of an intellectually and politically stimulating opponent. It is not insignificant that these two currents appeared almost simultaneously in Morocco and that they designated each other, from the start, as ideological adversaries. They then had crossed lives, allowing one to feed on the presence of the other. Their decline is also simultaneous!
Finally, there is the difficult ability to bring out new figures who embody feminism in Morocco. With a few rare exceptions, this movement has remained linked to the traditional prototype of the left activist, resulting from the glorious and honorable struggles of the 1980s and 1990s, but to the outdated discourse and outdated analysis. Moroccan society has changed, for better and for worse, regarding the issue of women’s rights. New issues and threats have emerged, the defense of male domination is metamorphosing and adopting different arguments, making it necessary to renew ideas and faces within Moroccan feminism. A change that we all need, women and men of this country.
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