ABSTRACT
Between the mid-1980s and 2006 Algeria went through a failed political liberalisation process and reversal into authoritarianism, a protracted economic slump leading to a massive fall in living standards, and a decadelong conflict between the army and Islamist guerrillas which claimed some 150,000 lives. During this same period, the country also experienced a sustained multiplication of voluntary associations and grassroots groups which, according to official figures, today make Algeria one of the most ‘association dense’ countries in the Middle East and North Africa.1
Despite the puzzling concomitance of protracted wide-scale violence, political turmoil and associative growth, there is to this day a striking lack of information about and in-depth analysis of Algeria’s associational life, which leaves it as one of the most elusive elements of the country’s recent political trajectory. This study aims to fill the gap.2
