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The Mirage of the Nation-State in Algeria

By Malika Rebai Maamri

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Published 31 March 2027

About this book

Positions post-independence Algeria as a critical case for re-evaluating dominant theories of statehood in the Global South

  • Reinterprets post-independence Algeria through a longitudinal, insider-focused analysis, with sustained attention to both political developments and social dynamics
  • Situates the Hirak movement and recent political crises within broader theoretical frameworks, including rentier state theory, authoritarian resilience and postcolonial governance
  • Offers a critical, comparative analysis of Abdelmadjid Tebboune’s “New Algeria,” highlighting the structural constraints and ideological narratives that continue to shape reform and limit transformation
  • Combines insights from political science, history and sociology to advance a new conceptualisation of state failure as institutional persistence without effective governance

Algeria reveals a central paradox of postcolonial politics: the persistence of the nation-state ideal alongside a deep failure to realise it in practice. This book reinterprets state failure, arguing that in the Algerian case, it should not be equated with collapse but understood as a structural condition in which institutions endure while failing to fulfil core political and social functions.

Focusing on Algeria’s trajectory from independence, this book examines the forces that have constrained institution-building, including elite fragmentation, rent-based governance and enduring deficits of legitimacy, accountability and the rule of law. It also probes the relationship between state power and citizenship, questioning whether rights can be meaningfully exercised when the state does not guarantee their protection.

By positioning Algeria as a case of non-collapsed state failure, the book offers a new lens on governance and the limits of the nation-state in postcolonial contexts.

Table of contents

Introduction: The Curse of the Algerian Nation-State

Part One. The Rhizome State
Chapter 1. Clientelistic Politics
Chapter 2. The Politics of the Lame Leviathan

Part Two. Algeria’s New Sultans
Chapter 3. Abdelaziz Bouteflika’s Sultanic Regime
Chapter 4. The Hidden Costs of Said’s Grabbing Hand

Part Three. The Hirak or Demokrasi dan Reformasi Movement
Chapter 5. “The Mandate of Shame”
Chapter 6. “Justice as [Un] Fairness” (Rawls)

Part Four. Tebboune’s “New Algeria”: Catalyst for Change?
Chapter 7. Tebboune’s Depersonalisation of Power
Chapter 8. Synopsis of Tebboune’s New Algeria

Conclusion: Hope against Hope
Select Bibliography

About the author

Malika Rebai Maamri

Malika Rebai Maamri is a professor and interdisciplinary researcher whose work spans politics, sociology, history, and literature. Her research focuses on postcolonial studies, identity, social justice, and democratic transformation, with particular attention to Algeria and the wider Global South. She holds a PhD jointly supervised by the University of Essex (UK) and the University of Bouzaréah (Algiers). She was a visiting fellow in the Cambridge/Africa research programme on Citizenship, Belonging, and Political Community in Africa at the Centre of African Studies, University of Cambridge, where she remains a collaborative member.
She had been awarded a government scholarship to complete her doctoral research in the UK, along with several grants from her institution, École nationale supérieure des sciences politiques, in Algiers, as well as the Joseph Conrad Society (London), of which she was a long-standing member.
She is the editor of Mapping Forgiveness and co-editor of A Journey through Forgiveness (Inter-Disciplinary Press, Oxford), and has published widely in international journals and edited volumes. She is also the author of The State of Algeria: The Politics of a Postcolonial Legacy (I.B. Tauris, 2016).