The upheavals of 2011, the so-called “Arab Spring,” happened when many MENA countries faced difficult economic conditions. In most cases, however, conditions worsened in the aftermath and threatened both economic viability and political stability. In the Maghreb, Tunisia and Libya were greatly affected by the Arab spring, with more serious economic consequences. The spring did not affect Algeria and Morocco as much, where protest was more limited and cannily contained. However, other developments put the two countries at risk, notably northern Morocco’s 2016 hirak and Algeria’s 2019 hirak, compounded by the fallout of the pandemic. These and other recent events have brought to the fore longstanding structural deficiencies in the region’s political and economic systems and in state-society relations. All Maghrebi countries remain, to varying degrees, resistant to democratic change, deficient in economic and human development, and lacking in political legitimacy. This paper will focus primarily on the economic deficiencies and their dynamic interactions with the nature of the political systems and the question of political legitimacy. It will focus on the last 10 years and the central Maghreb—namely Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia-- which have faced common challenges and unique conditions and developments. The main question is whether their key problem resides more in the economic system and the management of its intermittent crises or more in the political system, political culture, and the institutional setting. The paper will argue for a return to economic analysis as an essential, even over-riding, element of any analytical framework. This argument is inspired by the recurrent social upheavals in these countries in times of dire economic conditions for a large segment of society, in which economic failures keep provoking political upheaval, after which governments undervalue economic solutions. Through this paper, the author revisits an argument made at the turn of the new millennium which found that when the economic basis of legitimacy is dangerously weakened by an economic crisis, a new legitimacy base is sought in the political sphere by way of inconsequential political reforms and inclusion of the tolerated political opposition without addressing the economic causes and triggers. Inversely, when the political system falters, distributive policies are used temporarily to restore social peace and maintain the status quo until the next crisis hits. The paper will analyze extant macro- and micro-economic data, supplemented by interviews with key political and economic leaders and stakeholders, and will explore relevant political economy approaches and theories.