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Dr. Anouar Boukhars is a professor of countering violent extremism and counterterrorism at the Africa Center for Strategic Studies, National Defense University. He also serves as associate professor of political science at McDaniel College. Boukhars is the author of Politics in Morocco: Executive Monarchy and Enlightened Authoritarianism (Routledge, 2010) and coauthor of Salafism in the Maghreb: Politics, Piety, and Militancy (Oxford University Press, 2019). He is also the coeditor of Perilous Desert: Insecurity in the Sahara (Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2013) and Perspectives on Western Sahara: Myths, Nationalisms and Geopolitics (Rowman and Littlefield, 2013).
In Disorder, They Thrive: How Rural Distress Fuels Militancy and Banditry in the Central Sahel
The central Sahel — Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger — is buffeted by three main forms of armed conflict that overlap and fuel each other: communal conflict, banditry, and violent extremism. These conflicts are partly rooted in a crisis of governance in rural areas, and are exacerbated by climate change, demographics, and internal and cross-border migration.
The Lesson from Morocco and Jordan: Reform or Perish
The basic legitimization of political authority and the specific logics of domination that have for decades regulated Arabs’ behavior and subjugated their life patterns are under siege in much of the Arab world. Only those regimes that still enjoy the historical prestige of traditional authority have so far managed to weather the assaults on the legitimacy of their rule.
