6 PERSPECTIVES ON BUSINESS AND ECONOMICS | VOL 42 | 2024 in the black market, and the resultant revenues will revitalize the neglected border regions. This current situation also affects the security of sub-Saharan and Sahelian African nations, in that the elusiveness of an agreement between Morocco and Algeria has direct negative consequences for broader African security prospects (Boukhars, 2012). Addressing the Algerian problem A framework for security and trade resolutions already exists. The Arab Maghreb Union (AMU), formed in 1989 and made up of Algeria, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, and Tunisia, is the most promising organ for cooperation. Despite its existence and great potential, with the International Monetary Fund estimating that a revival of the AMU would establish a North African market of 100 million people, the AMU failed to overcome the regional rivalries, and its presidential council has not met since 1994, although the Tunisian and Mauritanian presidents demonstrated interest in reviving the bloc (Dursun, 2021; Elkins, 2020). However, the AMU’s website shows that the organization is still active in African politics, sending a delegation to the 44th Session of the Executive Council of the broader continent-wide African Union (AU) in February 2024 (AMU, 2024). As such, the possibility for economic reconciliation clearly still exists with the AMU’s framework, and the organization should be used by the UN as a means of establishing more substantial trade and security arrangements (Saddiki, 2020). The AMU is rooted in the postcolonial identities of the Maghreb states, thereby serving as common ground for the Morocco and Algeria to navigate their differences. Similarly, the use of the “Arab” identifier in the name must either be embraced or discarded in the face of rising support for “political Islam and politicized Berberism” (de Larramendi, 2008, p. 180). A discussion surrounding the Maghrebi identity can open a gateway for the Moroccan and Algerian governments to accept that the people they are supposed to represent are more similar than not, helping to ease tensions and promote collaboration between the governments of the two nations and their peoples. The Algerian civil war and accusations of Moroccan support for Algerian Islamists were major factors that halted the progress of the AMU in the 1990s, but the subsiding of the conflict allows for a more stable regional platform of negotiation. Ongoing instability in Libya presents a major challenge to the revival of the AMU, but a sign of success for the organization and for the revitalizing of Moroccan–Algerian relations might be to develop regionally focused economic and security solutions to the challenges of Islamic extremism, black-market trade, and governmental instability (de Larramendi, 2008). The Western Sahara problem The Western Sahara problem, although linked to the Algerian problem, presents a different set of security and governmental issues to Morocco. Similar to the issues of black-market trade along the Morocco–Algeria border, the buffer zone not covered by the Moroccan berm and the neighboring regions of Northern Mauritania and Southwestern Algeria have become havens for drug smugglers and weapons traffickers. Islamic extremist groups spreading northward from the Sahel region have formed connections with organized criminal elements and the Sahrawis living in the Tindouf refugee camps (Boukhars, 2012). A recent study found that poverty is the driving factor behind young Sahrawis breaking ranks with the Polisario strategy of nonviolence and most certainly creates incentives to engage in illegal dealings with criminals and extremist groups (Chikhi, 2017). According to Anouar Boukhars (2012, pp. 5–6), “Sahrawis are increasingly socially isolated, lack direction, and have no prospects in sight. They feel abandoned by their aging and out of touch leadership, and turning to criminal networks becomes a way of turning against a regime that has failed them and an international community that pays lip service to their sufferings”; thus, there is a sense that the time for a negotiated settlement between Morocco and the Sahrawis is running out. Extremist involvement in black-market trade and a proliferation of weapons from war-torn Libya and sub-Saharan Africa have increased instances of violence and criminal behavior among Sahrawis. Drug smuggling and kidnapping have proved highly lucrative and are potentially inspired by extremist tactics. The Polisario Front and the Algerians officially deny Sahrawi involvement in militant and criminal activity. In 2011, Moroccan security forces uncovered a cell of 27 men near the town of Amgala, part of the al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb. Thirty Kalashnikov rifles, several handguns, and two antitank rocket launchers were seized during the raid, illustrating both the severity of the arms smuggling issue and potential for significant escalation from knife attacks that occurred two months earlier, in November 2010, that saw 11 Moroccan security officers killed (Boukhars, 2012; Goodman & Mekhennet, 2011). While the Sahrawis are not particularly prone to religious extremism, the disaffection with the status quo and interactions with criminal and extremist ele-
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