Egypt: Revolution, regime change or just stress test?

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak is in a shaky position, after days of rioting on the streets of Egypt. Clearly, his people followed the example of the Tunisians. When Mubarak finally addressed the nation shortly after midnight on January 29 it was to put the blame on the government (his government) and to vaguely promise better conditions for the poorest among his citizens.

The Tunisian example probably led many observers to expect Mubarak to slip out the back door that night. That did not happen. But since January 27 he has an outspoken rival in the 2005 Nobel Peace Prize winner and former IEA chief, Mohamed ElBaradei, who just returned to Egypt. What can we expect from this challenge to an obviously authoritarian leadership? How do revolutions turn out once they have gotten “out of hand”, beyond the point of no return? At the time of writing this seems to be where Egypt is at.

In April 1917 Vladimir I. Lenin returned from exile in Switzerland, seeking the leadership of the Russian revolution, which until then had been off to a slow start under the bourgeois Kerensky regime that deposed the Tsar. Lenin and his comrades Trotsky, Stalin and others set off their own Bolshevik revolution half a year later and turned their country into the totalitarian Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), lasting 74 years. Though bad enough, this was not an isolated case.

In 1979 Ayatollah Khomeini returned from exile in France to an Iran in turmoil after the Shah had been deposed. From day one he made sure that moderate politicians – until then the most active in the reform process - would be weeded out from the new regime. Under Khomeini the Iranian Islamic Republic – a self-declared “theocracy” - was established in December 1979. As is well known, post-1979 Iran was and remains a totalitarian regime, irrespective of a few superficial vestiges of democracy such as a popularly elected parliament (with limited powers) and a president (with unconfirmed final authority).

Do these cases have something to say about Egypt 2011? Whether Mubarak is finished now or next summer is immaterial; he is effectively already gone. Could Mohamed ElBaradei’s return from exile signal the opening for a turn to a democratic regime, as the West would like to think, and as his own inclination would seem to indicate? Or could he fall by the wayside and mark just an interlude to a more authoritarian or perhaps even totalitarian/Islamist regime in Egypt, the way it happened in Iran and Russia? An Islamist state in Egypt would be a worst case for all concerned about Muslim extremism. Could it turn out that way?

Maybe – but probably not. Modern Egypt is a country with a strong, moderate Muslim political community, organized in the Muslim Brotherhood since the 1920s. The Brotherhood has long been banned and hence at the margin of politics, repeatedly bought off from attaining a more controlling place in Egyptian politics by whatever powers were ascendant. Their potential role under the new circumstances in Egypt is thus far uncertain, but their future ambition may remain modest like it has been before. That is, unless they have been waiting all along for an opening to reveal a previously hidden extremism. Be that as it may, the Brotherhood would anyhow require that the demands of the current popular protests are satisfied. 

This is where a moderate democrat like ElBaradei is potentially a key figure – and certainly not one to lead Egypt along the path to extremism. Yet, like Tunisia, the Egyptian system is without pointers to regime change. Should Mubarak manage to hang on for some time to come, the opening is still there for other actors - such as the army, for instance - to slip into the power vacuum and quietly take over. A strongly democratic leader (such as ElBaradei) backed by a broad popular movement (even if not genuinely democratic) like the Muslim Brotherhood, might be the way out of authoritarian dictatorship for Egypt. However, if and when the Brotherhood finds itself the legitimate governing party of Egypt, who knows what ideas might get into their heads. That is also where headaches come in for some of us.

To the West, an Egypt with the Suez Canal beyond Western political influence, is a huge strategic asset lost. No one in Western capitals will deny that. Will it mean back to another 1956? Or forward to a new kind of partnership? I’ll be as curious to know as you are.

Clamors for democracy where none existed before

I am not sure I would jump for joy if China were to go democratic overnight. Too much of everything there. But everybody should rejoice in the peaceful uprising of just 10 mill Tunisians. And let us all hope it stays peaceful, without losing sight of the aim of a democratic and stable system of government. A country with Tunisia’s advantages should have a decent chance at succeeding: a fairly well-educated population, advanced status of women, limited poverty. Yet the dangers are legion. The pool of qualified and untainted leaders is small. The opposition parties are (so far) weak and inexperienced. The trade unions are reasonably strong but without widespread membership. The Islamist movement in exile will presumably return and enter politics as well.

The demands for a new constitution and new elections are certainly justified, but will require a long process before they can be realized. Who writes the constitution? A constitutional assembly must first be elected that can draw up a proposal, which in turn must be ratified by the people in a referendum. Only once this is completed can ordinary elections be held. In the meantime people need to survive from day to day, and the country needs to be governed.

All of this will happen under the eyes of ordinary people under shabby governments all over the Middle East. It will unfold while the regimes in Algeria, Morocco, Libya, Jordan and Egypt are watching in suspense, and while Lebanon undergoes a severe political crisis of its own. A trigger or contagion cannot be ruled out.

Algeria’s aborted elections in 1991 are not forgotten. Won by the Islamist party in the first round – the second round canceled by the military – it triggered a decade of low-volume civil war, a slow-motion sequence of atrocities from both sides that wore Algerian society down. Although Tunisia is hopefully a different kind of case, that neighborhood memory hangs over current events like a cloud.

The Muslim world needs to prove it can go democratic, and perhaps this small Mahgreb country is the one that can deliver.

Political Asylum and Common Sense

All night - all year - I hear the patrol boat of the Guardia Civil, rumbling along the coast, back and forth, ceaselessly, over and over. The heavy diesel engine tells me Spain is on its guard. The refugees from African poverty are on their way. Several times a week the Guardia Civil rescues overloaded fishing boats with hopeful immigrants, 50 – 60 – 70 at a time, often pregnant women among them. Spain returns them all, except the pregnant women. Their children are allowed to be born Spanish citizens. Ever more pregnant women arrive.

Spain is both hospitable and tough on illegal immigrants. Most are now returned, by agreement with the governments of neighbouring African countries. But Africa is full of people who are full of hope. So is the Middle East. And South Asia. The poor majority of the world is looking for a better life.

This is not to raise a scare. Just understand that we cannot treat some of them as worthy of asylum because of political persecution, while the rest have to go back - or stay where they are. The worthy asylum seeker is an illusion of the current political majority in many European countries. The arrivals are practically all worthy of political asylum because of the conditions in their home countries. We just cannot take them all in. Our criteria are too open-ended to allow a fair screening to take place.

We need to accept that we have to treat them equally, and stop accepting any fairy tale told by those who happen to arrive. A Swedish immigration official described his practice in a TV interview today when asked how he evaluated his applicants: “You have to trust a human being.” As a humanitarian philosophy this is wonderful. As public policy – need I say more? There is no carrying capacity in all of Europe to keep all comers afloat on our welfare. It is their countries that have to be reformed, not ours.