PEOPLE'S DEMOCRATIC
REPUBLIC OF ALGERIA

• Official name: Al Jumhuriyah al Jaza'iriyah ad Dimuqratiyah ash Sha'biyah (People's Democratic Republic of Algeria)
• Location: North Africa
• International organisations: African Union, Arab League, Non-Aligned Movement, Organisation of Islamic Conference, Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries, United Nations
• Borders: Libya, Mali, Mauritania, Morocco, Niger, Tunisia, Western Sahara (Moroccan occupied)
• Coastline: Mediterranean Sea
• Land area: 2,381,740 Km2
• Population: 34,900,000
• Annual GDP (PPP) per capita: US$7,000 (2009 CIA estimate). World ranking: 100.
• Ethnicity: Most Algerians are of mixed Berber and Arab descent. There is a small European minority.
• Languages: Arabic is the official language and is nearly universally understood. About 15% speak Berber languages as their first language. French is widely used in business and communications.
• Religion: Islam is the state religion and 99% of the population are Sunni Moslems. There are very small Christian and Jewish minorities.
• Form of government: Formally, a presidential democratic republic. In practice, an authoritarian regime dominated by the military and security forces. Algeria is divided into 48 provinces.
• Capital: Algiers (al Jaza'ir)
• Constitution: The current Algerian Constitution dates from 19 November 1976, but was extensively revised in 1989 and in 1996.
• Head of state: The President, elected by direct universal suffrage for a five-year term. The Constitution makes the President the effective head of the government.
• Head of government: The Prime Minister, appointed by the President. In theory the Prime Minister is accountable to the legislature but in the current circumstances he is accountable to the President.
• Legislature: Algeria has a bicameral legislature. The National People's Assembly (al-Majlis al-Sha'abi al-Watani) has 380 members, elected for five-year terms from multi-member constitituencies by proportional representation. Eight seats are reserved for Algerians abroad. The National Council (al-Majlis al-Umma) has 144 members, 96 elected by communal councils and 48 appointed by the President.
• Electoral authority: Algerian elections are conducted by the Interior Ministry.
• Freedom House 2011 rating: Political Rights 6, Civil Liberties 5
• Transparency International Corruption Index: 29% (105 of 178 countries rated)
• Reporters Without Borders Press Freedom 2010 Index: 52.7% (133 of 178 countries rated)
• Heritage Foundation Economic Freedom 2010 Index: 52.4% (132 of 179 countries rated)

Political history

Algeria was a province of the Ottoman Empire from the 16th century until it was seized by the French in 1830. France saw the coastal areas as suitable for European settlement and by the 1950s there were a million French settlers, ruling in feudal fashion over the Arab population. The interior was never entirely pacified.

Arab nationalism began to be felt after World War I, and the Arab population was given limited representation in the French National Assembly. The Popular Front government elected in France in 1936 proposed to give the Arab Algerians full equality, but this was frustrated by the settlers and the French conservatives. After World War II General de Gaulle again promised the Arabs equality, but again this promise was frustrated. The National Liberation Front began armed resistance to French rule in 1954.

The Algerian War was extremely bloody and involved torture and massacres by both sides. By 1958 the failure of successive French governments to defeat the FLN led to a settler rebellion, backed by the French army, which threatened to spill over into a coup d'etat in France. De Gaulle returned to power on a platform of "Algerie Francaise," but instead sold the settlers out and negotiated with the FLN. Algeria became independent in June 1962 and all the settlers emigrated.

The FLN soon proved to be doctrinaire socialists and incompetent rulers, and Algeria was saved from bankruptcy only by its great oil wealth. The independence leader Ahmed ben Bella was removed from power in 1965 and Houari Boumedienne set up a dictatorship which lasted until his death in 1978.

In 1991 President Chadli Bendjedid promised free elections, but when the Islamic Salvation Front led in the first round, the army stepped in and the elections were cancelled. Chadli then resigned, the army took power, and the Islamist movement resorted to armed resistance, leading to a very violent civil war that lasted through the 1990s.

Since 1994 the army has been trying to extricate itself from the consequences of its own folly by an erratic policy of concessions and repression. Reasonably fair elections have been held regularly since 1994, but opposition parties have usually boycotted them, turnout has been very low, and the Islamist parties remain illegal. Since the election of President Abdelaziz Bouteflika in 1999 the level of violence has declined, although islamist groups such as Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb continue to stage terrorist attacks. In 2008 Bouteflika amended the constitution to allow himself to run for a third term. He was re-elected in 2009 with only token opposition.

President Bouteflika's National Liberation Front continues to dominate Algerian politics. Other significant legal parties are the National Rally for Democracy (RND), the Movement of Society for Peace (MSP), and the Workers' Party (PT).

Freedom House's 2011 report on Algeria says: "Algeria is not an electoral democracy. However, parliamentary elections are more democratic than those in many other states in the region. The military and intelligence services still play an important role in politics despite fluctuations in their prominence in recent years... High levels of corruption still plague Algeria's business and public sectors... There are an array of restrictions on press freedom, but the situation has improved since the peak of the civil war in the mid-1990s... The police disperse peaceful assemblies, and the government generally discourages demonstrations featuring clear or implicit criticism of the authorities... The judiciary is susceptible to government pressure. International human rights activists have accused the security forces of practicing torture."

Updated October 2011