The Kifaya Generation

Abstract

In this paper, I aim to shed light on the lived experiences of young opposition activists in today’s Egypt. I discuss the emergence of youth-based action groups, such as Youth for Change, since the beginning of 2000s and argue that much of their grievances have to do with wider predicaments and uncertainties that Egyptian youth face in their everyday lives. The activists’ main political assets, however, pertain to a simultaneous engagement on the street—as the physical realm for public dissidence—and the internet—as the primary means and compensation for political communication in authoritarian settings. I suggest, although with reservations, that the activists’ collective actions are better viewed as ‘submerged networks’ rather than through the conventional analytical prisms of civil society and social movement. Furthermore, I argue that while the young activists assume a degree of autonomous political action from the various structures of the existing political establishment, they operate on the margins of larger processes of contentious politics and, at the same time, their social interactions continue to be structured by the prevailing social norms.
 Keywords: youth, social movements, political agency, generation, Egypt