Street Vending in Downtown Rabat: In Resistance to Imported Urban Models

Abstract

AbstractIn recent years street vending has become a major feature of the public space in downtown Rabat, Morocco’s capital city. Home to the Parliament and governmental institutions, downtown Rabat holds a powerful political symbolism in the collective representation of its inhabitants. Street vending is thus considered an intruder activity that must be banned from the area. However, history describes the downtown as a commercial zone where open-air markets—called Souks—were held regularly alongside brick-and-mortar shops before the advent of The French Protectorate in 1912, which transformed it into a “European zone” with a new “modern-formal” economy, pushing the local population to dwell in informal settlements and live from informal economy on the outskirts of the city. Through a historical analysis of the evolution of the downtown’s public space use induced by the French urban laws and models, and perpetuated by the Moroccan policies after independence, this chapter argues that itinerant trade belongs to the downtown as a central function and key element of its urban dynamics that has been disrupted by alien policies. This study makes an original contribution by evaluating the impact of colonial urban policies on urban informality in the Moroccan context. Results suggest that street vending, now considered as misappropriation of space by authorities, could be considered as a form of resistance to imported planning models and that efficient urban interventions depend on an in-depth understanding of rooted local urban design.