Some may argue that there is no point in contemplating alternatives to address the political vacuum Egypt is experiencing, as long as there is no political will for reform. The prevailing belief among both the elite and the general public is that the starting point for implementing any alternatives is the availability of political will, a clear reference to the will of the President of the Republic as the head of the authority dominating state institutions and the public sphere, including the political arena. Scholars specializing in Egyptian affairs perceive the difficulty of achieving democratic transformation in Egypt, as the ruling elites are hesitant to allow it, and there is a clear reluctance on the part of the authority to resolve Egypt’s main political problem, represented in the lack of a reliable political life or what is called a political backing, and the reliance on alternative mechanisms to create public satisfaction with policies under the banner of supporting the “popular base.” Behind this reluctance lies the fundamental dilemma that the main obstacle to any potential reform project is that the authority responsible for implementing political reform sees itself as the primary target of any reform process that would impose constraints on its broad powers.
This dilemma is as old as the modern state in Egypt, not a product of today or this moment. This situation is largely responsible for the sharp shifts in the political orientations of the ruling authority in Egypt, from the monarchy to the republic in 1952, and from a quasi-liberal system (1923-1952) to an authoritarian system that entrenched itself after the March 1954 crisis, suppressing forces advocating democracy. This system itself witnessed sharp shifts from socialism in the 1960s to policies of economic liberalization and the market since the 1970s.
Given this situation, the question arises: can any other forces, whether political or social, propose a reform project or program with the potential to persist independently of the dominant authority, regardless of the issue of implementing that project or program? In other words, have the elites formed an image of an alternative Egypt in their minds and political imagination? Has this image been built based on real information and data that could serve as a starting point from the current situation and think about what can be realistically achieved? Or does it rely on an idealistic and normative perception of what should be, regardless of the realism of that imagined image?
To date, there appear to be no indicators of such a possibility, due to structural reasons related to the problematic relationship between the state and society, a relationship that distinguishes Egypt from other societies due to ecological, historical, and cultural factors. Political scientists who have addressed this issue agree on the historical imbalance of this relationship in favor of the authority managing a central state that controls sources of social power. They believe that this authority is continuously capable of subjecting society to its will and subduing it, relying on the state’s legitimate right to monopolize coercive tools, represented in military and security institutions, by controlling the distribution of central economic resources and imposing non-democratic mechanisms. Furthermore, it monopolizes the political sphere, shaping it according to the interests of those in power. This situation solidified after the nationalization of political life following the Free Officers’ seizure of power in the summer of 1952, the overthrow of the monarchy, and the 1953 decision to dissolve political parties, which were accused of corrupting political life. This situation has also been fueled by the prevailing political culture and general culture, which reject the concept of political parties, viewing them as divisive within society due to competition for power and governance, favoring narrow private interests over the public interest, a situation that severely impacts the political parties as the main component of political society.
State-Society Relationship: The Egyptian Specificity
To understand this main dilemma, an analytical approach is needed to investigate the continuous structure across extended historical periods and to analyze the accumulations that support this structure and the efforts to dismantle and escape from this situation. The focus should primarily be on analyzing the relationship between the state, as a concept and institutional arrangements, and society and the dynamics of its social forces, examining how the sharp shifts that the authority has resorted to throughout its extended history have released social forces while also negating the accumulations associated with these shifts, which would have changed the relationship in favor of society, preserving its situation. Although the sources of power, as a social concept, are fundamentally rooted in society, historical patterns indicate the state’s control over the distribution and redistribution of sources of power among social forces, one such pattern known as the Eastern despotism or the Asiatic mode of production.
Social and economic history studies on Egypt indicate that this history revolves around a dominant central authority. Many Egyptian and foreign researchers tend to classify the Egyptian case within what is known as the Asiatic mode of production, according to studies by the late Egyptian Marxist thinker Ahmad Sadiq Saad, or from the perspective of Eastern despotism, which has dominated the view of philosophers and thinkers in Europe towards the East since Aristotle and continues to this day.
While both schools agree that non-European societies, particularly in the ancient world, Asia and Africa, “are enslaved by a despotic ruling class residing in central cities,” Karl Marx attempted, through his theory presented in his 1850 book A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy, to offer a social-economic explanation for this unique and distinct social-economic organization and governance, differing from the dominant Orientalist view. Marx does not attribute this phenomenon to particular characteristics of the people in these societies but rather to the highly centralized social and political organization. He and his companion Friedrich Engels, in their studies on colonialism, especially in India and Algeria, and to some extent in Egypt, predicted that the expansion of European capitalism in the ancient world would lead to the dismantling of this model.
Conversely, Orientalists, Arabists, and scholars specializing in the study of Arab societies rule out the dismantling of this model. The failure of the Arab uprisings in 2011 and the success of authoritarian regimes in consolidating their authority and solidifying their positions, sometimes with broad popular support, gave renewed momentum to the idea of Eastern despotism among many Western scholars who believe the issue is related to the nature of these peoples and that there is no escape from it. There are many Arab studies that have also attempted to explain the phenomenon of despotism, starting with the famous study by Abdul Rahman Al-Kawakibi, Characteristics of Despotism, passing through the book How Nations Lose Immunity to Tyranny, published in 2001, which was prepared by a team based on dialogues between three Arab intellectuals about the essay “On Voluntary Servitude,” and the book The Arab Spring: Revolutions of Deliverance from Despotism, published in 2013 under the supervision of the Arab Network for the Study of Democracy, which presented case studies of several Arab countries, including Egypt, for which three of these studies were dedicated. These studies all concluded that the Arab region is excluded from the democratic waves that have swept the world, North and South, East and West. These books serve as models for addressing the problem of despotism in the Arab world and the stubborn resistance to democratic transformation in Egypt and Arab countries.
The central idea in the first book is the idea of “voluntary servitude,” discussed by the French philosopher and judge Etienne de La Boetie in the latter half of the 16th century, published only in 1835, and the first Arabic translation of which appeared in one of the chapters of this book, while Dar al-Saqi published another Arabic translation of this treatise in 2016. The main idea in this treatise, which addressed the phenomenon of mass submission and the glorification of a tyrant who may lack talent, authority, and power except what the masses themselves granted him, is the impossibility of enslaving a nation unless it harbors a hidden willingness for it. This treatise emerged at the time of the establishment of absolute monarchies in Europe and the rise of the state that the English thinker Thomas Hobbes described in his book Leviathan (1651) as the beast. Hobbes saw the state as necessary to end civil war or what he called “the war of all against all,” as a mechanism to organize social conflict, yet he considered society, according to Hobbes and other social contract theories that sought to offer a modern and civil interpretation of authority, separate from divine rights theories that rulers relied on for long periods.
This was not the case in the Arab-Islamic historical experience, where the concept of the state was mainly based on military power or coercive force. The historian Ibn Khaldun—founder of the science of civilization—offered a theory based on the concept of “asabiyyah” (group solidarity) to explain the succession of states or the rise and fall of states within this context. The modern state in Egypt, established by Muhammad Ali, which was a response to the shock of modernity felt by Egyptians during the French campaign, underwent powerful influences that injected into it patterns of governance set during the British colonial period, which relied on military force and security apparatuses to subdue populations under occupation. The tragedy of the imbalance between the modern state and society is most apparent in societies that lack strong tribal or clan organizations to provide mechanisms for balancing state authority over individuals. Looking back over extended time periods, one can observe the continuity of the primary mechanism of Eastern despotism in which the ruling class confiscates the surplus of society, despite the change in social organization with the emergence of the modern state and the reforms it introduced, allowing for a degree of social differentiation. However, this differentiation remains largely controlled by state policies and orientations, as theories of political clientelism indicate.
Despite the fact that the modern state project introduced modifications to this formula, especially after the reforms introduced by Said Pasha (1822–1863), who ruled Egypt between 1854 and 1863, following Abbas Hilmi I, who took over after his father Muhammad Ali, and granted Egyptian peasants the right to own land under the law issued on August 5, 1858. These laws abolished the poll tax and reduced the duration of military service to one year, paving the way for the radical social and political transformations Egypt later witnessed, despite rulers’ tendencies towards authoritarianism and subjecting society to their authority. While the political system in Europe evolved due to the growth of cities and the emergence of social classes that possessed wealth and gained political privileges allowing them to monitor public spending in return for the taxes they paid, strengthening society’s stance against the state and its institutions that became dependent on society to finance its expenditures, this development did not happen in Egypt, where society remained weak in facing the state and its authority, despite Egyptians’ struggle since the 1919 revolution for constitutional governance that would impose restrictions on the ruler’s powers.
Although Egypt moved from a monarchy to a republic after 1952, the situation did not change; rather, the state’s authority over society was reinforced with profound changes introduced into the governance, economy, and society. Scholars specializing in this field believe that the presidents following Nasser did not change the Nasserite model, although they introduced some changes to the framework of the state and its relationship with the economy and society. Robert Springborg, one of the most prominent Western researchers interested in Egyptian affairs, observes that the new republic that President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi aspires to will be more authoritarian, aligning with the new global wave leaning towards totalitarianism, driven by widespread public distrust in the Arab world in democracy’s ability to achieve stability and economic prosperity.
This continuity of the undemocratic political system relies on a conservative social base that political development scholars have termed the “second stratum,” which consists primarily of rural middle classes. A study conducted by American political scientist Leonard Binder on Egypt noted that Egyptian political parties have relied on a social base underpinning political work since the emergence of political organizations in the late 1870s, before the Urabi Revolution. This stratum or social class has persisted with its basic characteristics to this day. This is the segment on which the state relies to govern and form political parties loyal to the authority. It is the necessary intermediary without which the ruling class cannot govern or impose its authority, and the internal dynamics within this stratum reinforce the existing pattern of governance and authority through a patron-client relationship. The change in the patron type often leads to superficial changes in the pattern of governance without altering its authoritarian essence, meaning the ruling authority monopolizes the redistribution of revenues and resources within society. Although this stratum forms a political community, it is mainly responsible for the absence of politics and political practice, depriving society of its organizational and political resources, and the development of Egypt’s political system depends largely on how this authority is managed.
Recommended Reading: Stuck or Entrenched: Transition to Democracy Under Sisi’s Recent Rule
Rebuilding the Political Society
But is it possible to rebuild the political sphere in Egypt without rebuilding the political society? Here, another issue no less critical than the public’s lack of trust in democracy emerges: a significant segment of intellectuals, social actors, and activists distrust political parties, with some even claiming that political parties have no future, instead asserting that the future belongs to civil society organizations. This notion has led to a blurring of the line between the concepts of society and political society. Dr. Saad Eddin Ibrahim, one of the prominent theorists of civil society in Egypt and the Arab world, went as far as considering political parties as part of civil society organizations, overlooking a key difference between civil society organizations—which include professional associations, charities, and private nonprofit organizations—and political parties, which aim and compete for power, a fundamental component of the political party definition. In my view, this stance is due to the state of political parties in Egypt and other Arab countries with restricted party pluralism, where the dominant party is either formed by or under the control of the authority, pushing some political parties to abandon the competition for power, both practically and theoretically.
However, the authority’s dominance over the political sphere is not the sole reason for the state of political parties in Egypt. One main reason for the structural weakness and political ineffectiveness of political parties is their lack of social bases. These parties were not formed to defend specific social interests; even accusations against pre-July 1952 parties of pursuing private interests at the expense of the public good struck a blow to the idea of linking politics to interests, paralyzing political life. This paralysis was not solely due to the new authority in Egypt but also because political parties emerged representing the rising middle classes, mainly from an expanded state bureaucracy, following Egypt’s nominal independence in 1922. The political culture of this class harbors an aversion to division and disagreement, viewing national work as a singular path with one doctrine, further reinforced by a religious perspective that discourages division and pluralism and advocates unity of thought, goals, and positions. Despite the 1953 decision to dissolve parties, Egypt’s new rulers relied on cadres from parties like Young Egypt, which became the Socialist Egypt Party, the old National Party, communist and leftist organizations, and the Muslim Brotherhood (after subduing them) in governance and experiments with single-party political organization, from the National Union to the Arab Socialist Union.
Political parties, such as the Wafd Party and some naturally fragmented leftist organizations, continued to resist the dissolution decision, relying on diverse social bases, but these parties and the Muslim Brotherhood were not allowed legal presence. However, after transitioning to a multi-party system in 1976, which relied mainly on the Socialist Union organization, permitting three platforms representing the right, left, and center while the authority controlled the center platform, the Wafd Party succeeded in returning to the political scene based on a court ruling in 1978 after the Party Affairs Committee rejected its license. Meanwhile, communist and leftist parties refusing to merge into the National Democratic Unionist Gathering, which inherited the leftist platform, and the Muslim Brotherhood remained barred from legality until 2011, which witnessed a surge in the number of parties and political organizations, estimated at over 100, most of which formed following the January 25 Revolution. However, these parties remained politically ineffective, with limited influence, partly due to their lack of a clear political ideology, except for communist, socialist, leftist organizations, and the Muslim Brotherhood, which possess clear political ideologies. These parties also lack organizational mechanisms enabling them to fulfill their primary mission of building political cadres capable of managing public affairs.
The general partisan scene suffers from fragmentation due to the policies of President Hosni Mubarak, who inherited a multi-party system aimed at fragmenting and dispersing parties to prevent a unified opposition from challenging him. These policies resulted in a large number of ineffective parties, most of which are merely names and offices with a party head. Analyzing Egypt’s political forces map may be helpful in assessing the current state of the political community and offering suggestions for its improvement, which may necessarily require strengthening political parties as the foundational blocks of the political community. However, the social and cultural transformations witnessed by Egyptian society since the 1970s due to economic liberalization policies and the migration of Egyptian labor to the Gulf states, along with the accompanying cultural and social influences, have altered the base of the social networks on which the authority relies. These networks have been strongly influenced by political Islam, in both its modern and organized form represented by the Muslim Brotherhood and its traditional and conservative wing, increasingly inclined towards various Salafi currents. The contradiction between the politically Western-oriented system, adopting open economic and social policies, and its traditional political base, not offset by its alliance with the emerging political elite, reflected the peak of socio-economic and political contradictions in Egypt, manifested in the political polarization plaguing Egyptian political life between the authority, dominated by the military establishment, on one hand, and the Muslim Brotherhood with its extensive social base on the other.
The Muslim Brotherhood poses a dual challenge to the political authority and civil parties, which Western observers classify as secular parties. More accurately, these are parties whose political references are non-religious and are not inclined to overuse religion in their public political discourse. This issue lies in the effectiveness represented by the Muslim Brotherhood through a wide network of social support in the health and education sectors, in addition to other forms of social support, as well as employing religious rhetoric and other advocacy methods. Attempts to integrate the Muslim Brotherhood into political life, beginning with the short-lived electoral alliance formed between the Brotherhood and the New Wafd Party in the 1984 elections, which quickly dissolved due to differing orientations and priorities, then through the Islamic Alliance formed to contest the 1987 elections with the Labour Party and the Liberal Party, allowed the Brotherhood to hone its political tools and expand its role on the partisan map. However, the Brotherhood did not establish its political party until after 2011.
The Brotherhood quickly invested its position in controlling the People’s Assembly and winning the presidential election, but entered into a conflict with its main opposition partners who had supported it against a candidate affiliated with Mubarak’s regime, and then clashed with the authority, leading to its ouster in 2013. This introduced Egypt to a new era under a president with little confidence in politics or politicians and their methods, further complicating Egypt’s political scene amid restrictive practices on political activity and effectiveness due to economic policies that only increase levels of social tension—a situation that heightens the risk of repercussions from potential social explosions in the absence of political engagement.
The government’s inability to issue a local governance bill that would allow for the election of local councils is a manifestation of Egypt’s political crisis and contradictions. However, the bigger problem is that the parties to this crisis, primarily the political authority, are part of the problem and unwilling to be part of the solution. The two-year-old national dialogue has made no progress toward a new formula that would rebuild the political sphere, and the authority circumvents this essential and pressing demand with initiatives lacking any components for implementation, which the disillusioned majority of citizens perceive only as palliatives they cannot afford to reject. This situation requires a new national dialogue with a structure different from the dialogue structure set by a group of technocrats. We need a national political dialogue grounded in practical starting points, focusing on the achievable rather than indulging in idealistic visions disconnected from reality. A dialogue that results in a general understanding of society’s priorities, a real assessment of available resources, and planning for realistic, actionable programs within those resources. The starting point may be a serious discussion of the vision put forward by Egypt’s Civil Movement parties for resolving the crisis. This dialogue could start with these parties, and engaging in a critical evaluation of what these parties have proposed may be an indispensable prelude to its success.
