Arab world, third world, backward societies, under-developed countries, unchanging realities: a political status quo whose legitimacy few of us could question until very recently when the riots of the Arab spring broke out and took the world unawares. A migrant from Morocco describes where unrest takes root and what soil renders the growing of freedom inevitable. Hady Hayat, the major character of this novel, begins his struggle in Morocco, his native land, and when he fails, he turns to Europe but finds little to pin hopes upon.

Based on the author's fieldwork and readings of media, government reports, and historical and contemporary records, this book explores how Muslim migrants in Europe contribute to a changing European landscape, focusing on Muslim Moroccan migrants.

First volume in the new series CeMIS Migration and Intercultural Studies Moroccans are one of the largest and most debated migrant groups in Belgium. Moroccan Migration in Belgium analyses diverse facets of this community from a multidisciplinary perspective and addresses the most relevant and some underexposed topics in the rapidly developing field of migration studies. Combining various academic disciplines and different research methods, the book offers a panoramic introspection into the dynamic nature of migration studies in general and Moroccan studies in particular. The contributions of established academics and young researchers will not only appeal to scientific peers working on this domain, but also to teachers, social workers, policy advisors and other interested people who work from close or afar with this minority group. Contributors Chaïma Ahaddour (KU Leuven), Goedele Baeke (KU Leuven), Anna Berbers (University of Amsterdam), Bert Broeckaert (KU Leuven), Frank Caestecker (Ghent University), Noel Clycq (University of Antwerp), Sam De Schutter (Leiden University), Leen d’Haenens (KU Leuven), Emilien Dupont (Ghent University), Karim Ettourki (KADOC-KU Leuven), Nadia Fadil (KU Leuven), Idesbald Goddeeris (KU Leuven), Mieke Groeninck (KU Leuven), Philip Hermans (KU Leuven), Jürgen Jaspers (Université Libre de Bruxelles), Norah Karrouche (Erasmus University Rotterdam), Joyce Koeman (KU Leuven), Iman Lechkar (Vrije Universiteit Brussel/KU Leuven), François Levrau (University of Antwerp), John Lievens (Ghent University), Rilke Mahieu (University of Antwerp), Albert Martens (KU Leuven), Karel Neels (University of Antwerp), Wim Peumans (University of the Witwatersrand), Christiane Timmerman (University of Antwerp), Layla Van den Berg (University of Antwerp), Stef Van den Branden (KU Leuven), Bart Van de Putte (Ghent University), Nicolas Van Puymbroeck (University of Antwerp), Jonas Wood (University of Antwerp)

This open access book studies the migration aspirations and trajectories of people living in two regions in Morocco that are highly affected by environmental change or emigration, namely Tangier and Tinghir, as well as the migration trajectories of immigrants coming from these regions currently living in Belgium. This book departs from the development of a new theoretical framework on the relationship between environmental changes and migration that can be applied to the Moroccan case. Qualitative research conducted in both countries demonstrate how the interplay between migration and environmental factors is not as straightforward as it seems, due to its wider social, political, economic, demographic and environmental context. Findings show how existing cultures of migration, remittances, views on nature and discourses on climate change create distinct abilities, capacities and aspirations to migrate due to environmental changes. The results illustrate how migration and environmental factors evolve gradually and mutually influence each other. In doing so, this book offers new insights in the ways migration can be seen as an adaptation strategy to deal with environmental change in Morocco.

Over the 20th century, Morocco has become one of the world’s major emigration countries. But since 2000, growing immigration and settlement of migrants from sub-Saharan Africa, the Middle East, and Europe confronts Morocco with an entirely new set of social, cultural, political and legal issues. This book explores how continued emigration and increasing immigration is transforming contemporary Moroccan society, with a particular emphasis on the way the Moroccan state is dealing with shifting migratory realities. The authors of this collective volume embark on a dialogue between theory and empirical research, showcasing how contemporary migration theories help understanding recent trends in Moroccan migration, and, vice-versa, how the specific Moroccan case enriches migration theory. This perspective helps to overcome the still predominant Western-centric research view that artificially divide the world into ‘receiving’ and ‘sending’ countries and largely disregards the dynamics of and experiences with migration in countries in the Global South. This book was previously published as a special issue of The Journal of North African Studies.

In Home and Migrant Identity in Dialogical Life Stories of Moroccan and Turkish Dutch, Femke J. Stock explores the multivoiced life stories of Dutch adults of Moroccan and Turkish descent. Focusing on stories about ‘home’, this book deals with social relationships and being oneself, countries and houses, discrimination and Islamophobia, family and religion, and how these feature in personal narratives. Through microanalysis of case study material using Dialogical Self Theory, this book formulates and substantiates clear insights into descendants of migrants’ roots and routes, their sense of home, and their ambivalent processes of (dis)identification and belonging. Showing how religion plays a relatively marginal role in personal narratives, it provides an antidote to the widespread tendency to address and study Muslims almost exclusively in terms of their religious identity.

Since the advent of the reign of Mohammed VI in 1999, Morocco has deployed a new continental foreign policy. The Kingdom aspires to be recognized as an emerging African power in its identity as well as in its space of projection. In order to meet these ambitions, the diplomatic apparatus is developing and modernizing, while a singular role identity is emerging around the notion of the "golden mean". This study presents, on an empirical level, the conditions of the elaboration and conduct of this Africa policy, and analyzes, on a theoretical level, the evolution of the Moroccan role identity in the international system.

Every summer for almost forty years, tens of thousands of Moroccan emigrants from as far away as Norway and Germany have descended on the duty-free smugglers' cove/migrant frontier boomtown of Nador, Morocco. David McMurray investigates the local effects of the multiple linkages between Nador and international commodity circuits, and analyzes the profound effect on everyday life of the free flow of bodies, ideas, and commodities into and out of the region. Combining immigration and population statistics with street-level ethnography, In and Out of Morocco covers a wide range of topics, including the origin and nature of immigrant nostalgia, the historical evolution of the music of migration in the region, and the influence of migrant wealth on the social distinctions in Nador. Groundbreaking in its attention to the performative aspects of life in a smuggling border zone, the book also analyzes the way in which both migration and smuggling have affected local structures of feeling by contributing to the spread of hyperconsumption. The result is a rare and revealing inquiry into how the global culture is lived locally.

Questions persist about post-migrant generations and their sense of belonging in one homeland or another. As descendants of migrants, ‘second’ and further generations often struggle to establish an unproblematic belonging in/to a resident homeland, as the place where they live and work but are often categorized as ‘outsiders’. Simultaneously, because of improving access to travel, they can also maintain a physical presence in an ancestral homeland. However, their encounters there may also problematize their sense of belonging. During their summertime visits to Morocco, the European-Moroccan participants in this ethnography repeatedly find themselves negotiating a sense of belonging in the ‘homeland’. This book analyzes how these negotiations take place in order to investigate how the categories of ‘diasporic’ and ‘Moroccan’ become shaped by the interactional encounters observed. In the setting of Morocco, where trajectories to and from Europe have colored several centuries of history, this book provides a framework to explore how migration and return become incorporated into contemporary ‘Moroccanness’.

Close to 3 million people who were born in Morocco lived in OECD countries in 2010/11. To assess the potential that this group represents for the Moroccan economy, this review looks at the distribution of Moroccan emigrants over OECD countries, as well as their age, sex, and educational attainment.