Entrepreneurs in politics: the case of Morocco

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Entrepreneurs in politics  the case of Morocco
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• Introduction 
• From State and business to Entrepreneurs in
  politics ?
• Entrepreneurs ?
• Formation of a social category following
  specific processes (privatization, economic
  liberalization, reform of business law, etc.) and
  a new frame of representation.
• 1990s in Morocco In media, political and
  sociological analysis, Entrepreneurs came into
  the state, when the twilight of the State
  bourgeoisie or the parasite bourgeoisie is
  predicted.
• This category (more than group or class) is
  related to economic liberalism and expresses one
  of the main aims of the reform the rise of an
  absent middle class autonomous from the State
  and the administration, and able to invest and to
  product, in a context where the gospel of state
  interventionism is converted into that of
  liberalism
• Are the entrepreneurs the new defenders of the
  throne in the context of Moroccan structural
  adjustment (since 1983) and economic
  liberalization (UE free trade agreement 2000 / US
  free trade agreement 2004) ?

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• From State to politics ( and policies)
• State-centered approach in the MENA
• The state-centered approach used to view the
  State as more or less autonomous vis-à-vis the
  Society, thanks to its exogenous rents
• After the independence, because the State was a
  developer or a demiurge
• In the wake of the financial crisis, because it
  was seen as tutelary and predatory
• This feeds into the neo-patrimonial scheme,
  which put tend to qualify the public character
  of State
• We are the State personalization and
  appropriation of public action (and public goods)
• They are the State they a special group,
  with specific and non collective interests.
• Entering into the black box of the State by
  questioning politics and policies
• What transformations in politics in the context
  of economic liberalization ? Elites structures,
  coalitions, winners and losers of reforms,
  interest groups, etc.
• What transformation in policies ? How are public
  and private references articulated, incl.
  centralized and decentralized political
  processes, economic and political interests, when
  requirements for development seem to compete with
  the logics of representation ?
• Looking at the readjustment of professional
  relationships and social policies
• Examining the process of decentralizing the
  development

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• 1/ Privatizations in Morocco
• A textbook case ?
• A path dependence a State capitalism
  tinted with liberal options
• State capitalism and Neo-Patrimonialism the
  multiple roles of the Palace
• Examples of the intricate relations between
  public and private affairs
• - The Omnium Nord Africain (ONA), mainly held by
  the Kings family
• - The trajectory of former Prime Minister M.
  Karim Lamrani, president of the Office chérifien
  des Phosphates, the main State-owned firm, and
  CEO of large private corporations as well.
• The thesis of the ex nihilo emergence of social
  groups and its limitations
• After independence, contrary to other countries
  in the region, no land reform dismantled the old
  land bourgeoisie Hassan II look for their
  support in front of nationalist urban elites.
• Throughout the 20th century, parallel with the
  emergence of a private group developed under the
  umbrella of the State, an old merchant
  bourgeoisie remained and diversified its
  activities, as wall as invested political
  responsibilities.

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• B- Morocco a unique perspective on liberal
  reform in the region considering both the
  specificity of its privatization program and its
  level of achievement.
• In the beginning of the 1990s, R. Springborg,
  among others, anticipated a great social
  transformation, in the wake of liberalization 
• the way thus has been clearly ideologically and
  politically for a resurgence of the bourgeoisie.
  The new orthodoxy of development, which calls for
  exported growth under private sector auspices,
  champions bourgeois entrepreneurialism.
• But contrary to what was predicted, the
  important cession and sales of public enterprises
  to Moroccan or foreign investors did not give
  rise to a new middle class.
• Privatization list concerns the most important
  economic sectors of the country hotel or firms
  in difficulties but also the main companies in
  the sector of finance, banking and insurance,
  mining and cement, transportations, etc. not to
  mention the cession of telecoms, water and
  electricity supply, etc.
• Except the foreign investment, few Moroccan
  privileged groups benefited from the program, and
  mainly ONA, close to the Palace.
• The concentration of capitals with the help of
  privatization has multiple reasons
• Arbitrary, discretionary and clientelistic
  practices in the process
• More mechanical effects of the credit and
  financial structures.

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• Regimes have been quite adept at maintaining
  patronage coalitions and determining the
  mechanisms by which public and external resources
  are divvied up. The most they deregulate the
  most they re-regulate by determining precisely
  who can most easily benefit from change and join
  distributional coalition to tap profits in the
  market (B. Dillman).

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• 2/ Readjusting public-private sector
  relationships and reorganizing policies and
  politics
• In the context of privatization, the entry into
  politics of Moroccan entrepreneurs shows the
  ambivalence of the formation of new actors in the
  market and in the public action.
• Their commitment into politics during the 1990s
  took two major directions
• institutionalization of a corporatist system of
  representation and participation in social
  negotiations
• Investment in the political market

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• A/ Institutionnalization of a professional
  association
• A voice
• During liberalization, new narratives appear
  that used to combine
• - a narrative about the entrepreneurship
• - a narrative from entrepreneurs some people
  speak in the name of corporate interests.
• An association The  Confédération générale des
  enterprises du Maroc (CGEM)
• Created in the 1940s, CGEM became a real and
  apparently powerful corporatist organization
• In 1994, a new unexpected team took over
  control
• The team started a two-pronged process
• reform of the association, especially in terms of
  representativeness
• institutionalization as a social partner
• For the first time in Morocco, employers (CGEM)
  are represented in the social negotiations and
  sign agreements with Labor unions.
• The (fragile) triangularization of negotiation
  broke the history of face-to-face with the
  government and of labor confrontation.
• The development of the association consolidated
  and strengthened the existence of
   entrepreneurs  whose the new and atypical
  leaders pretended to be the  spokesman .

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• Two consequences
• In a context of social troubles and rapid
  transformation of labor market, social conflicts
  are transferred from the public and political
  arena into the private enterprise.
• After long years of bargaining, a new labor code
  is adopted in 2003 (just after the attacks at
  Casablanca and the national elections in 2002
  where PJD demonstrated its strength).
• gtEmployers and labor unions are in a position to
  establish norms. They gained a certain autonomy
  in negotiations.

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• A political issue
• See World Bank, Unlocking the employment
  potential in Middle East and North Africa
  toward a new social contract ?
• What about the transformation of the social
  contract in the region and especially the
  authoritarian pact based on the capacity of the
  State to redistribute and to employ young and
  graduate people ?
• What about the embryonic social protection ?
• gt in the case of Morocco, the State is on the
  tightrope but does not withdraw.
• Ex The National initiative for human
  development.
• The State has relinquished its interventions,
  esp. with respect to granting large loans to
  private sectors and NGOs, but keeps control of
  economic management and of social regulation.

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• B/ The electoral adventure and the
  technocratization of government
  economization and depolitization of public
  affairs ?
• In the context of liberalization and
  privatization, employers and heads of companies
  have been involved in local and national
  political competitions (in 1997 and 2002)
• In the two chambers they now account for the
  bulk of MPs.
• Among the candidates who have been elected, they
  are over-represented as a socio-professional
  category.
• It is a conservative elite, elected in the south
  and in the trade-center towns
• Two kinds of factors
• Huge financial means compare to others both to
  campaign and, sometimes, to buy votes
• The economization of politics entrepreneurial
  and economic abilities and skills seemed to be
  helpful and legitimized to manage a political
  career or to invest public action.

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• This kind of economization of politics can be
  also examined in the trend to appoint
  technocrats from the direction of public or
  private company to national or local political
  responsibilities.
• Example 1 the present Prime minister is a
  businessman close to the CGEM, former chancellor.
  He has been appointed Minister of the Interior
  (2001) then Prime Minister (2002) when leaders of
  political party were quarrelling for the Prime
  ministry.
• Example 2 In the name of decentralizing
  development, the technowalis prefets have
  been appointed in 2001 at the head of the
  regions prefectures in a context of
  decentralization reforms 2003 reform where
  elected mayors could expected more autonomy.

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• Conclusion
• Paradoxes of privatization
• Complexity of the reshaping of  public  and
   private 
• Consequences at the level of public action
• Marginalization of the representatives ?
• Shifts in terms of rights and duty
• What kind of territorial equity and continuity
  (espacially as regards the  decentralization of
  development  and the request of  civil
  society )
• What kind of social and political of citizenship
  ?