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EGYPT: Which Way to Turn?

Egyptian capitalism is heavily dominated by the single-most important institution in the country, the military, which runs or controls all the major industrial ventures. The choice of Omar Suleiman and Ahmed Shafiq shows that the military's aim is to cut the losses by dropping Mubarak, and ushering in a government that would not challenge the status quo, says the author.

Had any observer of Middle Eastern politics presumed to predict in December last that 2011 would be a year of change in the Arab world, he would have been laughed out of court. A month since then, the ring would have gone out of the laughter. The fall of one long-serving dictator in Tunisia, the virtually certain departure of another in Egypt, promise of political reforms in Hashemite Jordan – these presage interesting times.

The Jasmine Revolution in Tunisia, the siege of the Tahrir Square in Cairo, and demonstrations on the streets of Yemen and Jordan demanding reform seem to have emboldened the Arab street to finally push for a change. Observers as much as the average man on the Arab street are eager to see the outcome of the developments particularly in Egypt: if it proves possible to install democracy by dislodging Hosni Mubarak, the aftershocks it might generate could prove fatal to many Arab regimes, in a manner similar to what had happened in 1989 in Eastern Europe. At a time when Egypt is poised to turn, and the rest of the Arab world is tempted to turn with Egypt, the general question seems to be “Which way to turn”?

For the international community, the answer to the question is simple – an orderly transition. Even as Egypt began to rumble in the wake of the departure of Zinedine ben Ali in Tunisia, Mubarak had desperately tried to harp on what the international community considered to be his principal selling point – that he stands between Egypt and spread of Islamic extremism. This argument (pivotal to the world’s overlooking Mubarak’s suppression of all forms of social and political dissent over the last three decades) found no takers, not even in Washington D.C.

The demonstrations in January 2011 swiftly attained such a critical mass that the military rejected the possibility of any crackdown.[1]  The writing on the wall became clear in Cairo when Mubarak’s biggest ally, USA, decided to write him off by soliciting an orderly departure, and working towards a transitional government, which could include even Islamist forces like the Muslim Brotherhood.[2]

The idea of ’orderly transition’ as enunciated by the international community (read, USA and its allies) is pretty straight-forward. Mubarak would hand over power to an interim arrangement headed by the newly-appointed Vice-President Omar Suleiman and Prime Minister Ahmed Shafiq, who would steer Egypt towards its scheduled presidential elections in September 2011 where neither Mubarak nor his son Gamal would be candidates; no reprisals would be instituted against the forces of opposition; emergency laws that Mubarak used to govern Egypt for years would be gradually repealed.

Such phasing out of the Mubarak regime, it is hoped, would propitiate the disgruntled masses in the streets of Cairo, Alexandria and Giza (the third largest city of Egypt), precluding any turbulent transfer of power that would jeopardise Egyptian economy, and disturb the investment climate in the country and the strategic environment of the region (particularly vis-à-vis Israel).

However, Mubarak is reluctant to step down before September, and after decades of repression under Mubarak the opposition is adamant in not settling for anything less. Still more significant is the insistence on part of the opposition that not merely Mubarak but the entire system he upheld should go. What does that imply and how does that square up with the notion of an orderly transition? 

The history of 20th century Egypt can be said to be a story of attempts by Egyptians to take control of their economy from foreign interests, and then compromising short of full control.[3]  The generation of middle class secular nationalists of the Wafd party had struggled against the British colonial power, only to compromise in the 1920s and 1930s by upholding an economic order where middle class domination came at the price of not challenging vested western interests.

Redressal of grievances against middle class domination came from the Free Officers of the military (of lower middle class origin) under Nasser, who toppled the regime headed by King Farouk in 1953. Nasser, to his credit, steered Egypt away from the ex-colonial orbit at the price even of a war (the Suez Crisis of 1956), but after his Arab socialist experiment failed, his successor President Sadat brought Egypt back into the industrial capitalist-fold in the 1970s. Mubarak has basically continued with the same balance in favour of capitalist forces, a trend reinforced by his liberalisation of the Egyptian economy in the early 1990s.[4] 

Egyptian capitalism, though, is heavily dominated by the single-most important institution in the country, the military, which runs or controls all the major industrial ventures in the country. The military has huge vested interests in the present order that date back to Nasser’s rise in 1953.

The choice of Omar Suleiman and Ahmed Shafiq is an expression of the determination of that the military to not relent; their aim is to cut the losses by dropping Mubarak, and ushering in a government that would not challenge the status quo. And because the Egyptian opposition senses this, they too are digging their heels – as evinced by the ever-increasing size of the demonstrations even after Mubarak’s departure has become as good as certain.[5]  Having scented blood, the opposition is likely to attempt to dismantle this entire military-industrial complex; and that is why fireworks should not be ruled out for Egypt in the short and medium terms.

The crucial question, of course, pertains to the character of the opposition. Early on in the course of the turmoil, Mubarak had indicated that the protests are being orchestrated by Islamists, presumably the Muslim Brotherhood. Attention was sought to be drawn in particular to the fact that the protests tended to intensify on the two Fridays, after the afternoon prayers, and to the very public displays of the religious character of the gatherings evinced by prayers in the Tahrir square itself.

International media has particularly highlighted the possible role the Muslim Brotherhood might play in the post-Mubarak era. Speculation has tended to run riot particularly about how the Brotherhood’d advent might impact freedom of women, the demand for imposition of Shari’ah law in Egypt and finally on Egypt’s relations with Israel.[6]  One may be excused for thinking that efforts are on to ensure that Egyptian people get adequately scared to keep the Brotherhood beyond the reaches of power.

A few things need be clarified.

The Brotherhood has repeatedly protested that it is neither at the forefront of the protests nor is aspiring to hijack the leadership of the opposition. There is little reason to dispute either. Asef Bayat, a renowned sociologist, had observed some time back that Egypt is witnessing a veritable social revolution cast in the language of Islam.[7] 

This social revolution is being led by the various Islamist charitable and social organisations that have served to perform such public services among the urban lower and lower-middle classes, which are characteristically provided by the modern state.

The Brotherhood is perhaps the most organised of these forces, but not only does it not represent the majority of the Egyptians, it also does not represent the majority of those displaying an Islamist agenda. Further, since the 1980s, the Brotherhood has publicly eschewed any political ambition, and even though it admits to working towards an Islamist social agenda, it is committed to doing so only if the majority of Egyptians so choose.

Indeed, there is a good possibility of the Islamists influencing the post-Mubarak dispensation, which is not the same as the Brotherhood doing so. Either way, one of the central features of the Islamist agenda has tended to be to interrogate and attempt to circumscribe the effects of unbridled capitalism, and if Islamists get a berth in the post-Mubarak order, that agenda might have to be accommodated.

However, the opposition to Mubarak, triggered off in the main by urban educated middle and lower-middle class youth (making up almost 30% of the total unemployed Egyptians) are not necessarily beholden to the Islamist camp – evinced by a large number of protesters not participating in the prayers at Tahrir square. The nationalist Wafd and a number of other Islamist and secularist political platforms representing Egypt’s middle class may choose to minimise the lower-middle class Islamist agenda – hence the trajectory of the forthcoming regime is likely to be hotly contested.

Regardless of whether Egypt actually takes a turn towards democracy, Islamist or secular, post-Mubarak Egypt would be radically different from the situation hitherto. Gone are the days when state’s control over information could effectively stifle dissent.

The media revolution manifested by Al-Jazeera, beaming images of the demonstrations on a daily basis around the Arab world, sustained the region’s interest in the matter through almost three weeks now. Add to that the role Facebook and Twitter played in sustaining the mobilisation of an amorphous opposition without any single political or organisational banner, behind a resolute agenda and you have a heady mix that can scare the living daylights out of any authoritarian regime.

News of any crackdown could not have been successfully suppressed in this age of information revolution where something as basic as a mobile phone can relay visual images literally around the world, let alone the domestic circuit. The Mubarak regime did actually shutdown net connectivity for some days, but a shutdown could not be prolonged without hurting the regime and the economy even more. It would not be an exaggeration to argue that Mubarak’s authoritarianism cracked partly because he failed to control information anymore.

Washington is particularly concerned that Egypt is not engulfed by turmoil similar to the one that Iran saw in 1979. It is imperative for the USA that Egypt witnesses a steady transition, lest it ushers in a very radical Islamic revolution that could use the emotive issue of Palestine by turning on the heat upon Israel. Should that happen, Israel would be exposed to strategic threat on its western border for the first time since the 1973 war. Coming at a time when another strategic threat seems to loom in the form of Iran under President Ahmedinejad, the region could be engulfed in greater turmoil.

The White House is being advised by think-tanks like the Brookings to soft-pedal its involvement in Cairo, and allow the Egyptians to decide their own future perhaps for the first time in its recent history. Whether President Obama would be audacious enough to vindicate such hopeful suggestion is likely to condition the turn Egypt makes in the near future.

– Kingshuk Chatterjee

     Assistant Professor, Department of History, Calcutta University

 



Sources

[1].  David D. Kirkpatrick, “Mubarak’s Grip on Power is Shaken” The New York Times, January 31, 2011.

[2]. David D. Kirkpatrick and David E. Sanger, “Egypt Officials Seek to Nudge Mubarak Out,” The New York Times, February 4, 2011.

[3]. Useful account of this process can be found in Arthur Goldschmidt, Modern Egypt: the Formation of a Nation State, (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2004)

[4]. See Robert Springborg, Mubarak’s Egypt: Fragmentation of a Political Order, (Boulder, CO; Westview Press, 1989).

[5].  Anthony Shahid, “Discontented Within Egypt Face Power of Old Elites,” The New York Times, February 4, 2011.

[6] See for instance Daniel Byman, Egypt 2012: What if the Muslim Brotherhood Comes to Power? ” http:www.brookings.edu/opinions/2011/0204_egypt_protests-byman.aspx

[7]  See Asef Bayat, Making Islam Democratic: Social Movements and the Post-Islamist Turn, (Stanford, CA, Stanford University Press, 2007).

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