The work analyses the ties of key trends of economic development of the North African countries with modernization and globalization processes in the late XX - early XXI century. The state of national economies, progress and results of market reforms define and - in a sense - dictate the course, opportunities and limits of modernization processes in social and political life of the North African countries. This influence has complex and, in many aspects, mediated and controversial nature. The crisis that developed in the North African countries at the turn of decades had complex nature which points directly at relevant demand in progressive reforming of key social areas. Nearly all countries of North Africa in the short and medium-term perspective will feel the consequences of relatively low or modest growth rates of the periods of now fallen regimes and of the political upheavals of 2010s. The unfinished political modernization - along with other factors - keeps inhibiting various processes of economic upgrade. First of all this inhibition affects forming of sustainable foundations for the modern market economy - creative businessmen of large, medium and small scale, sustainable independent court procedures in economics which would conform both to the international law and the conventional practices of governing the investment law.