The impossible sustainability of a Moroccan coastline between the State voluntarism and geographical reality Cover Image

L'impossible durabilité d'un littoral marocain entre le volontarisme étatique et la réalité géographique
The impossible sustainability of a Moroccan coastline between the State voluntarism and geographical reality

Author(s): Abdelkader Mohaine
Subject(s): Regional Geography, Environmental Geography, Public Administration
Published by: Editura Universităţii »Alexandru Ioan Cuza« din Iaşi
Keywords: coastline; vulnerability; depopulation; voluntarism; sustainability;

Summary/Abstract: This article questions the proactive policy of the Moroccan state towards a desert coastline, located in the middle of the country (in longitude) more than twice as large as Luxembourg and with strong individuality. It questions the various State’s attempts to integrate it into the national economy. Long marginalized due to its difficult physical conditions, this space suddenly became highly strategic in view of recent regional geopolitics such as the recovery of Western Sahara and especially the return of Morocco to the African scene, without forgetting the proximity of the Canary Islands which it faces. Its geography has made it a space of secular nomadism devoid of stable and permanent actors. To remedy this situation, the State is trying, through political programs and agricultural strategies, to gradually settle populations and change their way of life. In the hope of attracting new development actors, the State tries, as best as it can, to give it an image of viable space, even if this means skilfully arranging its demographic data on which planning actions depend. Also, the State is striving to make this space liveable by setting up infrastructures, which have proved to be exclusive from the coastline, and grandiose tourist projects totally in compatible with the desert nature of this space. The nature and consistency of these projects which are struggling to start will undoubtedly have repercussions which will be everything for this natural environment except sustainable. The repeated failures of its various attempts seem to predict the impossibility of its sustainable development.

  • Issue Year: 47/2019
  • Issue No: 2
  • Page Range: 177-198
  • Page Count: 22
  • Language: French