During the second week of October 1988, Algeria witnessed the worst riots in its postindependence history. From the coastal cities to the oases in the Sahara, desperate Algerians went on a rampage and destroyed whatever looked to them as representative of the regime: city halls and police stations, courts and party offices, government stores and travel agencies. The damage to property was immense and came at a time when this country, which should be rich, is undergoing a severe economic crisis due partly to falling oil prices, but chiefly to government mismanagement. The personal toll was high as well. Some 200-250 persons were said to have been shot dead (many more, according to the outlawed Human Rights Committee of Algiers).
The Algerian "October Revolt" has dumbfounded many Western analysts. The magnitude and full significance of this upheaval seem not to have been properly recognized. France, as the colonial mother country, is, of course, in a privileged position to understand events in Algeria better than most. There was unanimity in the French media that "things will never be the same" after the second "Battle of Algiers." (The reference is to the famous Battle of Algiers between the French army and the FLN--National Liberation Front). However, even the analyses coming out of Paris betrayed utter surprise.
What happened in Algeria is, in one sense, a recurrent phenomenon in much of Northern Africa, namely, sporadic "bread revolts," such as those that shook Tunisia in 1983-84 and Morocco in 1981 and in 1984. On another level, the riots recall a familiar theme, one of an oppressive regime finally liberalizing itself, bit by bit. Many Algerians tended to interpret this patchwork liberalization as a sign that the monster has grown old and sick. The government's loosening of its grip was not interpreted as benevolence but as weakness. This impression was fostered, moreover, by opposition parties that incited people to deal a last and fatal blow to the overaged regime.
The FLN bureaucracy
The most critical problem facing Algeria today is the country's sociopolitical system, which is modeled on the Soviet pattern. The military dictator Col. Houari Boumedienne, who ruled Algeria during most of its postindependence period, has often been given credit for the nation's seeming acceptance of Arab-Islamism. Such an acceptance, at least, was the image he encouraged. Most Algerians, however, see him differently. They blame the late colonel for aligning the country too closely with the Soviet bloc and liken his attempts at industrialization to those of Stalin, only worse. During his tenure, Algerians suffered "socialist" austerity, but without reaping the benefits of their sacrifices. And they saw no improvement is sight, neither short- nor long-term. Now, 26 years after independence, the living standard is at an all time low. Despite the decline, some of Boumedienne's close associates have become millionaires.
During Boumedienne's dictatorship, Algeria became a closed country after the pattern of the Soviet bloc states. When President Bendjedid Chadli finally reopened the border with Tunisia and, in 1988, with Morocco, masses of Algerians poured into these neighboring countries in order to find food clothes, and other products unavailable at home. What they had known all along was confirmed: People in neighboring countries, although equally poor, are much better off than the Algerians. Those
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