Harakat Mujtama’ al-Silm: Democratic learning in Algeria

Abstract

Abstract The article compares and contrasts the discourses and contexts of democracy in Algeria since the electoral processes of the late 1980s and early 1990s. The aim is to understand how rapidly changing acceptance of democratic norms is managed in media interaction and more formal academic expressions, linking this to new political and religious cultures that accepts democracy. This discussion provides opportunities for the study of moderate political Islam. Thus, the article looks at empirical evidence from Algeria’s Movement for Society and Peace’s (MSP) new forms of interpreting democracy and practicing it within this Islamist party that has had MPs in the National Assembly since the cessation of civil war in the late 1990s. The article argues that Algeria’s moderate Islamists appear to have undergone important transformations at the level of ideas and practices, specifically with respect to civic values. In so doing, this Islamist party has attempted to widen its political appeal to voters, through ideas that view democracy and Islam as compatible.