Anarchism in Morocco

Morocco was largely stateless until the establishment of the independent Amazigh kingdom of Mauritania in the 3rd century BCE, but was eventually incorporated into the Roman Empire.

The Muslim conquest of the Maghreb took place throughout the later 7th century CE, bringing Morocco under the rule of the Umayyad Caliphate and converting the indigenous Amazigh tribes to Islam, though they still retained their customary laws.

Morocco subsequently passed out of the caliphate's control and fragmented into a collection of small, independent Berber states such as Berghwata, Sijilmassa and Nekor.

These tribes organized federations from the bottom-up, in opposition to the central government, in which neighborhood representatives and village committees coordinated day-to-day affairs.

[6] In August 1936, Joan Garcia i Oliver met with the Egyptian teacher Marcelo Argila and sent him to Geneva in order to contact Moroccan nationalists.

Meanwhile, Pierre Besnard, secretary of the International Workers' Association (IWA), also proposed a plan to break Abd el-Krim out of his captivity on Réunion, but this too required a declaration of independence for Spanish Morocco to be secured.

Republican propaganda urged men to enlist in order to prevent Spanish women from being "despoiled by the Moors", in a move which was criticized by the anarcha-feminist Mujeres Libres.

Guy-Virgile Martin was among the anarchist activists with a presence in the North African press, working as a teacher in Morocco, where he experienced the country's independence from France.