A local approach to the UDMA: local-level politics during the decade of political parties, 1946–56

This essay considers the local political and historical anthropology of a political party – the UDMA (Union Démocratique du Manifeste algérien). It describes how the experience of ‘doing politics’ in a single city nuances, or contradicts, conventional narratives of the party's place in the history of Algerian nationalism. In particular, it shows that the reputation of the party (among former activists, in collective memory, in historiography) is rooted in one local experience (that of Constantine) rather than others (for example, Oran). Furthermore, examining local experiences illuminates power relations within the party as well as Algeria's broader political development during the decade of political parties (1946–56). It allows analysis of what appears at the national level to be progressive disaffection for the party system, often described as a passive phenomenon, by instead identifying the locally active agency exercised in party politics' apparent ‘running out of steam’. Rather than being a moribund era, this was a period of intense activity, discussion and action. The essay thus reappraises both this decade in the Algerian political experience and the place of politics in Algerian history.