ABSTRACT
Following the Arab Spring, Egypt and Tunisia face very difficult economic situations that risk affecting the economic viability of their political transitions. Morocco and Algeria, meanwhile, have both experienced rioting and there is growing uncertainty as to how their economic policies might evolve in the future. This is especially so in Morocco, where tough economic decisions are almost as urgent as in Tunisia and Egypt. Libya faces the distinct challenge of managing its resource wealth from a ground-zero institutional setting. Mauritania is following a different political economy path and will therefore not be analyzed here. From the point of view of political economy, a crucial point is whether the wave of popular revolts that overthrew the incumbent regimes will consolidate into economically viable liberal democracies, and in what economic direction Algeria and Morocco will move since to date they have been spared the enormous fiscal cost of regime change. In other words, the question is whether democratization can be maintained (or continue to be pursued) under current political economy conditions, with the full array of economic structures, institutions, interests and preferences of the various players in society at play.
