# Project of Arab kingdom in Algeria

The project of the Arab Kingdom of Algeria was a political project led by Napoleon III and Ismaÿl Urbain aimed at transforming Algeria, then a recent French conquest, into an associated "Arab kingdom". This project was born between 1860 and 1870, following Napoleon III's trip to Algeria in 1860.

## History

Following Napoleon III's trip to Algeria in 1860, he and Ismaÿl Urbain worked to transform Algeria, then a recent French conquest, into an associated "Arab kingdom". The concept of neo-Arabism was thus launched by Napoleon III who envisaged the creation of an "Arab Kingdom" extending from Algiers to Baghdad. It was also a way of putting an end to the administrative uncertainty of the conquest of Algeria. The Arab offices were put to use in particular by a policy of de-Berberization and the generalization of the teaching of written Arabic. The failure of the Saint-Simonian expedition in Egypt (1833) transferred its projects of futuristic development to Algeria. In the 1860s, Algeria maintained the French taste for exoticism, especially among wealthy people and intellectuals. During the conquest of Algeria by France, the little-known population was described as "Turkish" or "Moorish", but as the conquest progressed, it was increasingly referred to as "Arab".
As part of the Napoleonic project, the "natives" were transformed into Arabs in language. Napoleon III's policy will have detractors, especially in colonial circles, such as Warnier who put forward for their demonstration that the population is composed of 500,000 Arabs at most, 1,200,000 Arabized Berbers and 1 million Berber-speaking Berbers in the 19th century in Algeria. Another project for the constitution of a similar Arab kingdom is also proposed in Syria by General Fleury with Ismaÿl Urbain as intermediary to Emir Abdelkader in 1865, however he declines this proposal. The policy of the Arab kingdom, motivated by Ismaÿl Urbain, and the Saint-Simonians, wants to constitute a kingdom associated with France, with its own Arab identity. The Emperor Napoleon would be the sovereign of both the French and the "Arabs". In this context, some measures are taken in favor of the natives such as the Sénatus-consulte of 1863, which aims to protect tribal rights with a reorganization of their lands in the face of the economic advance of colonization. However, some settlers oppose these provisions, which are considered too favorable for the natives. However, in Eastern Kabylia, this policy leads to the destruction of the tribal framework, the lands of zaouia or those of "melk" (private) status are qualified as lands of "arch" status (tribal) which results in a dispossession of the communities. The "neo-djemaa" instituted by this law is a negation of the traditional djemaa, in addition to promoting a policy of linguistic Arabization of the region of Eastern Kabylia (from Jijel to Skikda): Berber-speaking in the 19th century, it is Arabic-speaking in the 20th century.

## Consequences

This policy of the "Arab kingdom" gives a Jacobin conception of Algeria, for the first time it gives a centralized definition around a single identity, Arabic and a single language, classical Arabic, and repressing the Berber languages and dialectal Arabic. Napoleon III shows his attachment to an "Arab dream", which involves reforms such as the imperial decree of April 21, 1866 concerning the teaching of the Arabic language in primary and secondary schools. These bilingual schools will see their number fall from the Third Republic (1871) where the place of the Arabic language will be more marginal. This episode of centralization of an identity of Algeria around an Arabic reference influences the post-independence linguistic and educational policy to found a new identity based on the legitimacy of the postulate: "one religion and one language": Arabic and Islam. In a process of "identity reappropriation", the first president Ben Bella declared on July 5, 1963, one year after Independence: "We are Arabs, ten million Arabs... There is no future for this country except in Arabism". This speech aroused the anger of the Berbers because ethno-sociocultural plurality was denied and diversity was perceived as a seed of division threatening national identity. References to Berberness, Frenchness, or even Algerianness were considered "a formidable desire to sow division". Arabic unilingualism was thus based on the eradication of all other languages in Algeria, but this attempt at linguicide - in line with colonial standardization - was thwarted by the mobilization of Berber speakers, which culminated in the Berber Spring of 1980. The project of an Arab kingdom in Algeria was also accompanied by a growing interest of France in the affairs of the Mashriq at the end of the 19th century, particularly around the question of Christian minorities. The project of an Arab kingdom in Algeria, as well as the Eastern policy towards the Ottoman provinces, is one of the sources of the "Arab policy" of French diplomacy. The English also followed this French policy with interest so as not to give it free rein with the Arab populations. The East thus became the theater of the Franco-English "Great Game". De Gaulle himself would praise the project of an Arab Kingdom in a confidence to Alain Peyrefitte, on December 10, 1960, reported by the deputy Jean de Broglie. De Gaulle states in a quote that the project of an Arab kingdom was more than an Algerian policy, but an Arab policy. This policy would have allowed France to become the protector of Muslim interests from Mauritania to the Euphrates. The project was taken up by the pan-Arab ideology of the 1940s, notably Ba'athist and Nasserist. Neo-Arabism was consolidated with the formation of the Arab League, an organization bringing together 22 Arabic-speaking countries and created in 1945.