International Conference on “Mecca” of Revolution: Algerian Foreign Policy and the Non-Aligned Movement

Tue, 21 Jan 2025 10:01:00 +0000

The Algerian revolutionary war (1954-1962) left enduring legacies. Not only the hundreds of thousands of casualties, but also a strong belief in the fundamental principles and values of resistance and liberty and above all the right of peoples to self-determination. Along with other countries of what became known as the “Third World”, Algeria funded, trained and defended revolutionary movements all over the world. Amilcar Cabral, the Guinean revolutionary, once said in Algiers “Christians go to the Vatican, Muslims go to Mecca, and revolutionaries go to Algiers.”

But the Algerian contribution was just accelerating a movement that had started long before. Forty-six years had lapsed between the 1927 Brussels conference at which the League against Imperialism was formed and the Fourth Summit of the Non-Aligned Movement held in Algiers in 1973. When Algerian president Houari Boumediene tabled his proposal for a New International Economic Order (NIEO), the struggle was already focused on “economic development” rather than merely political formations. This meant demands for a radical change in the terms of trade and in the income distribution prevailing between the former colonizers and the liberated nations.

Today the issues raised by Boumediene’s proposal have yet to be resolved. The emergence of the so-called BRICS platform as well as other South-South cooperation frameworks appears to have retained much of the Algiers legacy. At the same time slow growth in capital accumulation, accompanied by the pressure for new imperial arrangements, create new, serious challenges to another core NAM value, non-interference in a nation’s internal affairs. Already several historic NAM members have ceased to exist as states, destroyed by civil war and foreign intervention. The principles of Non-Alignment assume the integrity of the nation-state but that assumption can no longer be taken for granted.

The topicality of the analysis and the strategies to be followed for a new world order are too obvious to be justified. It also seems obvious that Algeria's heritage is a privileged starting point for taking stock and establishing new South-South networks.

The aim of this international colloquium is therefore to update accumulated knowledge and historically evaluate political developments which, since decolonisation, have coloured the experience of a large mass of the earth's population, propelling them along new routes.

This conference aims to bring scholars and researchers together to probe in the following tracks:

Track 1: Impact of the Algerian Revolution on the 20^th century Revolutionary Movements

Track 2: Algerian Foreign Policy in the International Political Context

Track 3: From the Asian Awakening to the Belt and Road Initiative

Track 4: Pan-Arabism, Pan-Africanism and national revolutions

Track 5: Traditional Colonizing Powers and the Role of the new emerging powers

Track 6: Political Parties – the balance between socialism, nationalism and religion

Track 7: The Mass Media Industries (including “new” and “social” media) and the Revolutionary Ideals

Track 8: Literary Representations and the Championing of Rebel Heroes

Track 9: Survivability of the Revolutionary Vision in Toda‎y’s World

DEADLINES

• for Abstracts: 15^th March 2025

• for Validation and Notification of Acceptance: 30^th March 2025

• Conference Date: 5^th-6^th May 2025

Venue: Algiers …..

Format:

The conference is going to be convened through a hybrid format (in-person and online). The tracks are designed for paper lecturing and open discussions. The Organizing Board will select participations based on the suitability of the contributions for each track.

Some of the materials will be also selected in order to edit a special issue of African Studia on the Conference’s subject.

Guideline for Proposals

Maximum length of the paper abstracts: 2000 characters, including spaces

Working Languages: Arabic – English – French

Abstracts should be sent to the following email addresses:

ceaup@letras.up.pt

aty_mourad@uni-guelma.dz

Colóquio Argélia e os países não alinhados - Call

International Conference on “Mecca” of Revolution: Algerian Foreign Policy and the Non-Aligned Movement