When the tanks came onto the streets, for the last time, in a year-long experiment bringing the political forces of Egypt to a standstill and resurrecting - albeit to to partly joyous or at least gleeful cheers - the order of old overthrown in the Tahrir Square revolution, the greater narrative of Arab and Middle Eastern liberation and Arab modernity (whatever its contents) to a close, months before what may euphemistically be reminisced as the "incident" at Ghouta. This was the moment the Arab Spring jumped, or rebounded into stark winter. In both cases, the pronounced torch of liberty flickered but failed to act, or even to starkly blaze in face of foes, presumed or proclaimed.
But asides the question of Western constitutional democracy, its hypocrisy and potency beyond its borders, the Egyptian force of change - which had, for a time, incorporated elements of the powerful armed forces, of Suleiman and Tantawi - had starkly refuted the grapes of change itself, arrested the order of the new as it had the old, and turned the tide of history. Before long the wheel arguably levelled by the Freedom and Justice administration had been turned to creek and linger over its former pilots and manifold supporters, a cry of triumph and exultation turned to terror. Within two years of sham trials and increasing repression, legal and extrajudicial, the sentence of the rope was imposed on both Muhammeds, Morsi and Badie. The question that might have been asked, by the brave as well as by the pious, was whether this was indeed an arrested revolution, or the a reaction more pure and vitriolic than the one posed by the brotherhood and the political project derailed and dismantled in 2013. The longed-for democratic struggle posed and accomplished not through weeks of turmoil but decades of suffering, want and pain; catalysed or usurped, and now maligned and eroded into the waves of normalcy.
The consequences on what might brashly be referred to as the micro-scale, while previously well known and predictable, are now sordidly known. And where one did once did not have, without limitations the freedom to object, to think and speak as one saw fit (and while the reasonable intents of the regime were far worse) one now has surveillance and the most openly brutal means to silence dissent. The only different feature of the el-Sisi regiment, asides from the absence of the very dislikable figure of Mubarak and the predictable generational shift, is its pocketed image of chaos about to erupt, should this order of old rupture again in favour of the new. For we who have seen its face, and like it not, may foreswear our hopes and aspirations, at least for a while, if not outrightly place them in the hands of this old order.
For new, this order is certainly not. The long history of military intervention, stronger in Egypt and entirely predominant until the outburst of 2011, is looming over its future and its most ambitious project since the Suez canal nationalisation, if not perhaps so secure. And whereas the old order could rely on revolutionary rhetoric, the catalyst of a new, Arab state under Egyptian leadership, as well as legion social benefits and subsidies, the new has capitalised on a regiment of hard stick, soft speech, and a carrot retracted. The fear of the order vanquished is its prime quality, one whose
This at least, el-Sisi knows. The structural change forcing ancient theses and syntheses to transform - under the old African crocodile's older axiom of "adapt or die" - has come to Egypt as well, and may cast the need for thrift, for sacrifice and violence in the face of impending chaos worse than the 2011-13 abnormalities, of fulfilling a promise unkept rather than consummated by the spirit of Tahrir and its bestial issue, as sufficiently needed to warrant its survival, at least among the half of the public predisposed against the alternatives to this modernity. At least for now.
The people's Pharaoh and his servant. What might have come - in democratic terms - from the 2012 upheaval and triumph at the polls by the vessel of the Ikhwan in its homeland, we may not know. But whereas el-Sisi may be denounced as having supported both Scylla and Charybdis for as long as convenient, the crushing of the nascent Islamist state has corroded both the Brotherhood's democratic aspirations and hopes for a Western alliance, previously sustained by the bond and, eventually wavering, support of its army.
But like many things sweet and sour, this may not be forever. The presumed end of el-Sisi's mandate in 2022, unlikely to be duplicated further but almost certain to be extended through a younger face - if not that of Gamal Mubarak, the primeval fear of the 2011 protests - in an attempt to establish the transition. Beyond the ambitious project of reestablishing a new capital, great in ambition but limited in its capacity of truly relieving homelessness and joblessness (these twin evils of the Arab world, as well as much elsewhere) little has been proposed, less likely to be launched let alone concluded to effect. Unlike its south-eastern neighbour by a few miles, there is not even the shadow of a plausible plan for diversifying economy and society, even in the eleventh hour.
Unbeknownst, if not unknown, to the protestors rocking streets to the sound of the gavel, demographics may serve the Brotherhood as well in the long term. While counter-terrorism efforts and tacit overtures with Israel, Russia and Syria and the activities of organisations like the Islamic State, now hardly a commune, in the Sinai may have proven effective to mantle the dismemberment of opposition groups, maybe even assuage the immediate despair that a Libyan situation would entail, it will - in the words of Ranier Maria Rilke - not feed the hungry, or clothe the shivering, or repay Egypt's surmounting debt, sure to outlast el-Sisi even if the Brotherhood does not. The continued repression of Islamists, parliamentary and paramilitary, taken to the furthest heights (or depths) in Syria, has not assured their destruction, and its ability to capitalise in the moderate-authoritarian repressive state in Egypt - if history is a guide, quite excellent - provides a legion of opportunity.
This is, however, not the last and worst or tenth of the plagues possibly looming. Like the 2012 parliamentary elections, forces more on the fringe of Salafi preaching (if not outright violent) may grow in strength, and armed resistance may be precipitated if the breakdown is not only overseen by the current order, but reaches it. That Morsi, incompetent to the point of absurdity or self-harm, could not reform the military and bureaucracy enough (or smoothly enough) to wrestle them out of the Nasserist-technocrat stronghold so deeply rooted, or not without indulging their respective defensive habits and tendencies, is not a sign someone else may not succeed - or fail by use of more drastic measures the Islamist-democrat never thought to employ.
What would then better the course? Some reforms, while stark, will be necessary to transform the economy and end the system of subsidy currently needed, while unsustainable in the long term. The capital project will relieve the situation in Cairo, while diverting its economic pool. Five million homes is an ambitious goals, but a necessary expense asides the question of unsustainable debt. Sustainable, however, the ecology of the country is not, and transition to a post-petrol economy and past the likeable gas prices of OPEC and the Arab world would be painful, if easier than for Saudi Arabia. However, corruption remains endemic, and the infrastructure - if not quite so important in a country completely skewed to the Nile delta - is not inviting for foreign spending, prospects that will be rocked by the uncertain future in a negative loop of chaos as the grandmother of chaos. Unlike bin Salman, el-Sisi has no huge pool of trillions, but a population of soon to be 100 million. Corruption is more hard to tackle than homelessness, as it is not a question of want, but rather of dividing the spoils of success, and must be quietly steered alongside but never directly against the wind. And as his reign - supposedly constitutional, with political promises as well as a complete transformation of the economy and labour market - passes into its second term, the hour groweth late.
As in Syria, the minorities particularly attended have been granted different, and particular attention by the regime, in firm and mutual but uneasy matrimony. Should the order of old evaporate in giving birth to the new, it may be responsible for the further ostracism of the Egyptian Christendom, among the oldest. Of the Jewish community, once as strong as that of Baghdad, we know naught apart that their preferred butchers need only wait and see the coffins safely carried.
Information technology, biofuel, solar power, financial services - about to undergo an altercation of its own, which may shrink the opportunities - do not pose a likely lifeboat within grasp of Egypt, for now, the prospect of high-skilled migration limited to its possibly worse-fated brother states, as consequences of the tidal wave which will engulf it as well. Women must need be included in the workforce, and croplands rekindled and made more effective. In the end, the regime must provide multitude jobs or a basic income, somehow financed. Whether this could be accomplished via a national economy of the Nasserist model is a good argument, but given the predeliction of the Brotherhood - in its 2010s incarnation, that is - for internationalism, global economy and cooperation - it may in the end be the closure and call for autarky under a national emergency that will soften the blow. By then, however, it will likely be too late but for a genius.
Above all, this order - even benignly judged - lacks a prime quality needed in every order of the new, which is the ideological tenet. To quote the great Kristian Luuk, recently in referencing Cairo, The Vanquisher: Where are we going? The Pharaoh - once, recall, the term for a reign as well as the well-bearded deity-person to steer it - of President el-Sisi lacks a narrative, other than the negative of the need to suppress the forces invoking Allah (too loudly, or angrily) especially when coupled with calls to reform. This cannot last, and elements of the base of the regime may already be crackling. If not democracy, in leaving the rudder of the ship to the passengers, and the risks it knowingly entails, what? The Fourth Saudi state, if yet unestablished, knows what is wants, and what values it can compromise. Or let us say it has an idea.
For all this it may be inferred that the prime goal of the current order is its own sustaining, and its event horizon a neat five- or ten-year term, and paying less respects to the hard facts of the present than laggardly European governments. But with the dismantling of opposition parties only too successful, it is hard to grasp what opposition will harness the potency, and problems, of the old country. While the new military dictatorship has been established in the permanent sense, and while its ambitions may both incorporate regional stability, peace and even a new settlement in war-torn Libya (contentious and challenging as el-Sisi's proxy and vying client king may appear) may truly rival those of any leader since Nasser, and with the matching personal ambition and dignitas, the prospects are indeed looking as grim, or even as for stubborn Ramesses... not the second, but his counterpart in that old gruesome book of fiction. But with its coffers, human as well as monetary short of easy options, the re-development of constitutional liberties and a national dialogue, and eventually a free, ungoverned National Assembly being the closest, what else is there than being stubborn?
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