Egypt

Thesis

The Free Officers’ overthrow of King Farouk in 1952 was a coup d’etat that led to a total revolution.

Link to Website:

https://sites.google.com/a/oxy.edu/egypt-take-2/post-revolution-anwar-sadat-s-regime

Summary

The historical context surrounding the revolution is crucial in understanding the motivations and reasoning behind many of the revolutionary events. After completion of the Suez Canal, the Egyptians owed quite a bit of debt to European Banks. They were forced to sell shares of the Suez Canal to Britain and France in 1875, which marks the beginning of British influence over Egypt. In 1882, in an attempt to free Egypt from its British controlled authoritarian regime–led by Khedive Tewfiq–Colonel Ahmed al Urabi staged an unsuccessful revolt. This revolt actually escalated British intervention in Egypt, and Britain officially began to occupy the country in order to support Khedive’s state. In 1914, at the beginning of World War I, Egypt became a British Protectorate, which created unease amongst the Egyptian population who rejected the British rule.  This resulted in years of attempted revolts against the British government that led to the creation of the Free Officers Movement (FOM). The FOM was a politically motivated organization that consisted of officers from the Egyptian Military. Despite the fact that Egypt’s military had been given autonomy in the year of 1936 it was still very much under British control, and even fought in the Israel/Palestine conflict with British troops. This knowledge of the British military system lead the Free Officers Movement–with help from a large majority of the Egyptian army–to stage a coup against Egypt’s regime. On July 26, 1952 King Farok finally relinquished power over to the Egyptian army, and in 1954 Gamal Abder Nasser comes into power and completely changes Egypt’s former political, economic and social structures.

There is a significant amount of social change in the power dynamics of Egypt post revolution, seen most prominently through the lenses of the feminism movement in Egypt, the cultural and religious distinctions in Egyptian society, and finally the labor movement. Prior to Nasser coming to power, feminism in Egypt had made huge strides in gender equity within the social and political realms of the time thanks to the beginning of the Egyptian feminism movement. The feminist movement was highly westernized, since the women were not only fighting against gender stigma but racial stigma perpetrated on behalf of the British. Muslim women were portrayed as lacking civility, and almost undeserving of basic human rights; the movement took on a western form to help shape it’s own image as deserving of such rights. This period was characterized by protests and marches, often led by the women of the Egyptian elite, for equal civil rights within Egypt. While Nasser granted women greater civil rights, such as the right to vote and run for political office, the movement was stagnant after his rise to power. Islam within the Egyptian state followed a similar trajectory, gaining political clout before Nasser’s rise to power through different organizations, one being the Muslim Brotherhood. Nasser himself planned to implement an Arab-socialist agenda, however he did not support the use of religion as a political structure. Instead, he wanted to use politics to influence religion, and did this by taking control of the Islamic university within Egypt named Al-Azher. The Jewish minorities in Egypt, however, faced much racial and religious prejudice once Nasser came into power, largely as a result of their stigmatization from racial tensions during the Suez Canal War of 1956 and the Israel/Egypt War of 1967. By the 1970’s almost 45,000 Jewish citizens had emigrated out of Egypt, which left the small percentage of the population facing intense amounts of discrimination. A similar exodus was seen within the Coptic population of Egypt, with almost 85,000 having emigrated out by 1970. They too faced massive discrimination in Egypt once this population had left. Both groups suffered from Nasser’s attempt to “Nationalize” Egypt and destroy the religious, ethnic, and social constructs of the past. Finally, the labor movement took a big step toward increasing mobility and social equality between socioeconomic classes. Unionization was encouraged under Nasser, and many pro-labor laws were passed, while the formally privatized economy began to become more public.

Under Nasser, the economy began to adjust to a more developmentalist state, which also resulted in an authoritarian contract between Nasser and the Egyptian people. Prior to Nasser, a lot of focus on the Egyptian economy was centered on the ownership of the Suez Canal. However Nasser shifted focus away from the Suez Canal and into the construction of the Aswan High dam. Nasser also refrained from aligning himself with any of the world superpowers, and instead chose to accept loans and aid from any world superpower that chose to stimulate big infrastructure projects within Egypt. The Aswan High dam was quite the technological feat, and was supposed to remedy different natural problems–such as river bed flooding–and provide electricity for a large majority of the population. Finished in 1970, the High dam epitomized Nasser’s plight to build the Egyptian economy and legitimize Egypt as a force to be reckoned with. Land ownership was also a problem in the pre-revolution Egyptian economy. Nasser set out to readjust the land ownership–previously 94% of the population owned merely 34% of the land–so as to make it a fairer system that benefitted Egypt’s lower socioeconomic class. Finally, the nationalization of the Suez Canal was certainly a gutsy feat on Nasser’s behalf, and resulted in a multi-Nation conflict over possession of this high profitable strip of canal. However he was triumphant in his quest to nationalize this area, and gained quite a bit of respect from the international community because of his action.

After Nasser’s death in 1970, Egypt became susceptible to a complete change in government structure. The regime’s that followed Nasser’s implemented policies such as infitah, or the opening, which opened up Egypt to the global market. After gaining so much ground on a domestic front, Egypt’s economy took a hit from this globalization and was susceptible to neo-liberal influence over its economy.

There are a lot of parallels between Egypt’s past revolutions and the one’s occurring in the present. Through our understanding of Egypt’s history we are able to make better sense of the current revolution.