The end of the world as we know it comes slowly. One day, everyone started using an iPhone, and Blackberries faded out of existence; one day the dodo walked and squawked through the forests of Mauritius, and one day it simply didn’t anymore. One day, authoritarians ruled every major state or empire [1]; one day, those states faded from prominence, while democracies took their place.
World-defining change comes by degrees. The same way democracy dawned slow and bleary [2], golden rays skimming by degrees across trees beneath which dodos once nested, it will end, and it will be because some people make it happen and other people let it.
Case in point: in the last several years, young adults in countries suffering from severe economic inequality and authoritarian oppression have fought for freedom.
In some cases, they have been successful, and the sun of democracy has actually shone brighter and purer over these countries. Though Nepal’s democracy is still extremely unstable, its interim government, led by the duly-elected Sushila Karki, has pledged to combat corruption and political violence [3]. Bangladesh, whose Generation Z contingent initiated the international movement that swept across Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and North Africa, has also installed a new government and is continuing to relentlessly protest for political progress [4].
But the failure that still pains my heart, though I know no easy way out of it, is the one that took place in Morocco in the fall of 2025.
I spent the semester in Rabat, ostensibly studying the Arabic language, but really moonlighting as a journalist documenting the Moroccan iteration of the Generation Z protests. I visited protests where heavily-armed security forces dragged peaceful, lawful demonstrators into unmarked vans [5]; I reported on protester injuries resulting from police violence. I also spoke with many Moroccan members of Generation Z who had either participated in the protests, even to the extent of being jailed for their efforts, or supported them. But that last group was easy to find—everyone I met supported them [6].
And yet, after weeks of rallies, viral social media campaigns [7], international attention and support, and enough anger (and enough government-manufactured rage bait) to fuel protests that disabled major cities across Morocco and swept up people from all demographics and walks of life—
The movement just fizzled.
The streets emptied and the chants died away. Signs were laid to rest; cameras went home. Those who had once dared to believe in the transformative power of protest returned to cafés and classrooms, upset and angry that the authoritarians still ruled. However, they looked for someone else to fix it.
In particular, they looked at the king: Hassan II, the current King of Morocco, who cherishes an ancestral tie to Muhammad that has long justified his complete control of Moroccan politics [8].
In conversations I had with many people, including members of Gen Z and people who had actually been jailed for protesting, I heard frequent refrains not to Hassan II, but to elected officials, whom the former had the power to remove from office; because criticizing the king is taboo, Moroccans fastidiously blamed only elected officials. I also heard frequent excuses: my host mother, rageful over the injustice she saw on TV, nevertheless called Hassan II meskeen (poor thing) and blamed his inaction on his chronic illness [9], though that fall he made frequent public appearances.
Other times, I asked people what they simply planned to do if Hassan II and elected officials didn’t listen to the protests. What would they do then?
Some said that they would keep peacefully protesting. Others just said—Ma k-na’rifsh. I don’t know. And then they went back to their poverty-stricken homes, sitting just miles from the king’s mansion. So the protests ended quietly. Not with the bang of violence, arrests, or overthrow, but with a vengeful whimper.
I sympathize with Moroccans. I am not in their place, nor do I think I would necessarily be a change-maker if I was. From my privileged position, I can and will not pass judgment on their exhaustion, the fear of retaliation, or on the weight of centuries-old political structures that seem immovable. Especially when consequence strikes at individuals—for example, protesters injured by security officers, or students doxxed and rendered unemployable after arrests went on their records. Furthermore, Morocco does not seem so authoritarian when compared with its neighbors. Algeria and Tunisia’s stabs at democracy have often collapsed into upheaval and bloodshed [12]. In contrast, Morocco is unique among North Africa for its stability and wealth [10]. In many ways, the credit may go to its monarchy [11].
But Moroccan justice-seekers face defeat by attrition.
No amount of my sympathy, no amount of justified exhaustion, and no amount of guns leveled at citizens can replace the necessity of persistence or erase the systemic injustices still plaguing their political, social, and economic spheres.
Democracy here had its moment when the King, generations before Hassan II, invested some of his power into a Parliamentary system [13]; now democracy fades as that same Parliament fills up with the King’s friends, corrupt businessmen who contract with themselves [14], rig voting systems [14], and throw dissenters into jail.
Democracy sets like the sun as the energy that filled Moroccan streets dissipates. It sets because the King is slowly, incrementally letting it die; it sets because the people are obscured by authoritarianism. And their history will record that democracy died not with a bang, but with a whimper.
It is not too late for Moroccans to reverse the trend. But it may take persistence that transcends semesters, seasons, and in some cases, laws.