Egypt and the Contradictions of Liberalism

The liberatory sentiment that stoked the Arab Spring and saw the ousting of long-time Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak seems a distant memory. Democratically elected president Mohammad Morsi lasted only a year before he was forced from power to be replaced by precisely the kind of authoritarianism protestors had been railing against in January 2011. Paradoxically, this turn of events was encouraged by the same liberal activists and intelligentsia who’d pushed for progressive reform under Mubarak.

This volume analyses how such a key contingent of Egyptian liberals came to develop outright illiberal tendencies. Interdisciplinary in scope, it brings together experts in Middle East studies, political science, philosophy, Islamic studies and law to address the failure of Egyptian liberalism in a holistic manner – from liberalism’s relationship with the state, to its role in cultivating civil society, to the role of Islam and secularism in the cultivation of liberalism. A work of impeccable scholarly rigour, Egypt and the Contradictions of Liberalism reveals the contemporary ramifications of the state of liberalism in Egypt.

Contents

1. Egyptian liberals, from revolution to counterrevolution

Daanish Faruqi and Dalia F. Fahmy

Section I: Liberalism and The Egyptian State

2. Egypt’s structural illiberalism: How a weak party system undermines participatory politics

Dalia F. Fahmy

3. Nasser’s comrades and Sadat’s brothers: Institutional legacies and the downfall of the Second Egyptian Republic

Hesham Sallam

4. (De)liberalizing judicial independence in Egypt

Sahar F. Aziz



Section II: Liberalism and Egyptian Civil Society

5. The authoritarian state’s power over civil society

Ann M. Lesch

6. Myth or reality?: The discursive construction of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt

Mohamad Elmasry

7. Student political activism in democratizing Egypt

Abdel-Fattah Mady



Section III: Islam, Secularism, and the State

8. Egypt’s secularized intelligentsia and the guardians of truth

Khaled Abou El Fadl

9. The truncated debate: Egyptian liberals, Islamists, and ideological statism

Ahmed Abdel Meguid and Daanish Faruqi



Section IV: Egyptian Liberals in Comparative Perspective Post-2013

10. Conflict and reconciliation: “Arab liberalism” in Syria and Egypt

Emran El-Badawi

11. Egypt’s new liberal crisis

Joel Gordon

12. Egyptian liberals and their anti-democratic deceptions: A contemporary sad narrative

Amr Hamzawy

Conclusion: Does liberalism have a future in Egypt?

Emad El-Din Shahin