Change In Egypt Research Articles

Egypt: A Short History (review)

Reviewed by: Egypt: A Short History Paul Sedra Egypt: A Short History. By Robert L. Tignor. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2010. 363 pp. $29.95 (cloth). Princeton University Press could hardly have found a more distinguished and respected scholar to condense centuries of Egyptian history into a single volume. Robert Tignor, the Rosengarten Professor [End Page 419] of Modern and Contemporary History at Princeton University, has authored such seminal works on modern Egypt as Modernization and British Colonial Rule in Egypt, 1882-1914 (1966), State, Private Enterprise, and Economic Change in Egypt, 1918-1952 (1984), and Egyptian Textiles and British Capital, 1930-1956 (1989). However, rather than confine himself to the modern history with which he is intimately familiar, Tignor has wandered much further afield and taken on the daunting task of surveying not simply centuries, but indeed millennia of Egyptian history. In only 320 pages of text he ranges from the beginnings of human habitation in the Nile Valley to contemporary projects aiming to expand habitation beyond the Nile and into the desert. Conscious of the pitfalls that invariably accompany so broad a periodization, few scholars have taken on the task of making the diverse cultures of ancient, Greco-Roman, Christian, Islamic, and modern Egypt accessible through a single volume. Yet, according to Tignor, this reluctance has led to a lamentable state of affairs—that specialists in these areas of Egyptian history remain unfamiliar with the cutting-edge work undertaken by their counterparts concerned with disparate periods. As Tignor explains, "Egyptologists find it difficult to converse with modernists" (p. 3). The languages, skills, and networks required of scholars in Egyptology are starkly different from those required of scholars in modern Egyptian history, to say nothing of the methodological concerns and analytical frameworks that dominate their respective works. Accordingly, one of the audiences Tignor has in mind with this work are scholars of Egypt seeking a brief and readable introduction to those parts of Egyptian history that, by virtue of professional boundaries, have thus far eluded them. Perhaps more important, though, the work is directed at those entirely unfamiliar with Egypt, seeking expert advice about how to place the monuments they observe on vacation in proper historical context. And to this end, Tignor has performed an invaluable service for visitors to the country. What is arguably most appealing about Egypt: A Short History as a guide for tourists is the seamless manner in which the author brings past and present together in productive and revealing ways. Modern Egypt is not given short shrift, as is so often the case in works directed at tourists. Rather, Tignor makes wise and careful note of the ways in which parts of the past resonate for contemporary Egyptians, and emphasizes how visitors and locals may perceive the Egyptian past in starkly different ways. What will make this book a delightful read for specialists and nonspecialists alike is the lively style with which it is written, to say nothing [End Page 420] of the profound level of familiarity, affection, and—indeed—intimacy evinced by the anecdotes Tignor recounts. This is no dry summary of facts and dates, but a distinctly personal account of a scholar's passion for and engagement with his subject, namely, Egyptians. The body of the text is divided into twelve chapters and a conclusion organized chronologically. Despite this relatively strict chronological approach, Tignor allows for thematic digressions into such issues as the cosmologies of the ancients, the lives of peasants and women through Egyptian history, the position of Egypt within the broader Islamic world, and the architecture of downtown Cairo. The only caution that seems appropriate is that this would not serve well as an undergraduate textbook—nor is the author claiming such. The broad periodization that makes this book distinctly useful for visitors to Egypt makes it rather less useful for coursework. Understandably, temporal breadth comes at a cost in terms of scholarly depth. Given my own focus on the modern period, I have drawn examples of such from the book's final five chapters. The account of the rise of the British occupation in Egypt, at the end of chapter 9, gives precious little coverage to how...

Revolution Without Reform? A Critique of Egypt's Election Laws

This paper compares the laws before and after the revolution to determine whether the changes implemented are sufficient to produce the structural reforms Egyptians demand. This paper concludes that Egyptian elections processes and institutions remain insufficiently transparent, fail to produce results reflecting the diversity within Egyptian society, and fail to offer all Egyptians, especially women and religious minorities, an equal opportunity to actively participate in governance of their country.The paper critically assesses recent changes in Egypt’s electoral regime and considers whether Egypt had a revolution without reform. The thesis is twofold. First, the limited reforms made to election laws post-revolution are insufficient to produce the sustainable and meaningful democracy sought by Egyptians. Existing post-revolution laws fail to create transparent and independent processes that facilitate a level playing field among candidates and voter confidence in election outcomes. Second, the post-revolution amendments worsen prospects for Egyptian women and Coptic Christians to be elected to office, thereby further marginalizing them in the public sphere. Such adverse consequences are troubling in light of the significant contributions women and Egyptian Coptic Christians made to the revolution. In this early stage of the post-revolutionary phase, there is reason for cautious optimism. While Egyptian election laws have been amended for the better since the revolution, more legislative reforms are needed to ensure that future elections are fair, free, and accessible to all Egyptians. Sound election laws are the bedrock of a democracy insofar as they ensure that a dominant party does not extend its rule against the will of the people. As witnessed with the National Democratic Party (NDP) under the Mubarak regime, laws can be manipulated to guarantee certain electoral outcomes benefitting the dominant party. In the end, Egypt is at the initial stages of a protracted transition from entrenched authoritarianism to democracy uniquely tailored to Egyptian cultural and religious norms. One year after its historic revolution, Egyptians have made great strides toward that common goal. Whether post-revolution reforms will be structural and produce a complete upheaval of a corrupt political system, as called for by most Egyptians, or merely superficial changes under the false guise of reform will determine the success of this transition. While it is still too soon to predict the outcome, one thing is quite clear - future political leaders who seek to impose authoritarianism do so at their own peril.

The Autumn of Dictatorship: Fiscal Crisis and Political Change in Egypt under Mubarak. By Samer Soliman. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2011. 224p. $80.00 cloth, $22.95 paper.

The Autumn of Dictatorship: Fiscal Crisis and Political Change in Egypt under Mubarak. By Samer Soliman. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2011. 224p. $80.00 cloth, $22.95 paper.

Change in the Middle East: A Case of Egypt

The change in Egypt is a result of three factors: the autocratic rule of the Mubarak regime being challenged by globalization; the imbalance between economic growth and social development which cre...

Adaptation of Sea Level Rise in Nile Delta Due to Climate Change

Nile Delta is vulnerable due to the impact of climate change and related sea level rise. Due to low elevation in the Nile delta region, Egypt is considered one of the top five countries expected to be mostly impacted with a 1 m sea level rise resulting from global warming. Egypt is ranked as the fifth in the world concerning the impact on the total urban areas, Egypt’s GDP would be significantly impacted, and Egypt’s natural resources such as coastal zone, water resources, water quality, agricultural land, livestock and fisheries maybe subjected to vulnerability. Also, Egypt may face environmental crises such as shore erosion, salt-water intrusion, and soil salinity. Egypt should realize the threats from climate change, formulate policies that will minimize the risks and to take action. Adaptation to climate change in Egypt is a major issue from the perspectives of water resources development, food production, and rural population stabilization. Egypt should adapt a vulnerability index to identify the most endangered regions. A multi-criterion analysis in ranking the effectiveness of adaptation strategy using fuzzy decision making is proposed. The decision-making process involves determining the set of alternatives, evaluating alternatives, and comparison between alternatives. The model is suitable in evaluating situations that deal with ambiguity and vagueness, involve subjectivity, and imprecise information. Using fuzzy decision making technique enables maximum benefit from practical know-how, take into account several variables and perform “weighted merging” of influencing into variables.

The autumn of dictatorship: fiscal crisis and political change in Egypt under Mubarak

The autumn of dictatorship: fiscal crisis and political change in Egypt under Mubarak

EDITORIAL FOREWORD

The first three articles in this issue, grouped under the subtitle “Insurgency, State Formation, Counterinsurgency,” all deal with historical aspects of nationalism and state-building in the 20th century and resonate with contemporary politics in the Arab world. Starting with Egypt, Omnia El Shakry looks at how student demonstrations in 1935 and 1936 helped usher in the “figure of youth as an insurgent subject of politics.” This discourse placed youth at the vanguard of nationalist struggle and social change in Egypt “but only insofar as they could enact a non-antagonistic conception of politics grounded in national unity.” It also foreshadowed the emergence of a discourse of adolescent psychology in the 1940s, in which adolescence was “reconfigured as a psychological stage of social adjustment, sexual repression, and existential anomie.” Given the emphasis on the role of youth in the 2011 uprisings in Arab states, the article has potential theoretical implications for analyses of current events and discourse.

The chance for change in the Arab world: Egypt's uprising

As the largest Arab country, Egypt has always played a crucial role in the politics of the Arab world; however, the internal political dynamics of Egypt have until the January 2011 uprising hardly attracted a glance from international observers. This article gives an overview of the political arena and the various political forces at play in post-Mubarak Egypt. With many unpredictable variables currently at play in Egyptian politics, the result of the elections scheduled for November 2011 will likely surprise many, both within the country and beyond. The article also looks at what impact the political changes in Egypt may have had on the relationship between Egypt and Israel. There have been increasingly frequent demands within Egypt to revise the Camp David accords—but not at the expense of war with Israel. While Israel is unlikely to accept any calls to revise the peace treaty, Arab public opinion has become newly relevant for policy-makers and Israel will have to make corresponding adjustments to its regional security strategy.

Commentary: The impact of social networking tools on political change in Egypt’s “Revolution 2.0”

Social networking is a new driving force that has a significant global impact on political change. Few research studies have been published on the impact of social networking related to political change. This commentary discusses the impacts of social networking tools on the recent political changes in the eighteen-day Egyptian “Revolution 2.0” of 2011. We discuss a number of factors related to social networking that predisposed the people of Egypt to rise up in a revolt that stunned many observers, given its speed and dramatic outcome. Social network-related factors appear to have had a positive impact on Egyptians’ attitudes toward social change, which, in turn, supported their individual and aggregate behavior, leading to the revolution.

The Contest between Secular and Islamist Movements in Egypt 1936–1945 Study in Naguib Mahfouz's Sugar Street

35 *Farid Al_Salim earned his PhD in History in 2007 from the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville,AR. In 2008,he joined the History Department at Kansas State University in Manhattan, Kansas and he he became member of the Security Studies faculty. Dr Al Salim research interest centered on social and economic history of the Middle East with main focus on Greater Syria and Egypt. Journal of South Asian and Middle Eastern Studies Vol. XXXIV, No.4, Summer 2011 The Contest between Secular and Islamist Movements in Egypt 1936-1945 Study in Naguib Mahfouz’s Sugar Street Farid Al-Salim* Sugar Street is set in Cairo; and the action takes place from the 1930’s to after the end of World War II. It is one of the most famous novels concerning that period in the Middle East, and is considered to be a major work of Egyptian literature. Sugar Street is the third and final book in the Cairo Trilogy, which traces the life of a middle-class Egyptian family from 1919 to just after the end of the Second World War. The preceding books are Palace Walk and Palace of Desire. All of these books are named after streets in the old section of Cairo: in Sugar Street, the home of the head of the family is located on Sugar Street, which is the closest street to a bridge over the Nile River linking the old and new parts of Cairo In Sugar Street, Naguib Mahfouz has three objectives. He is telling a story, voicing a call to revolution and showing a situation. The first level of the novel is that it is the story of an Egyptian family. The life of the Abd alJawad family is full of intermarriages, disputes, tragedies and hopes. This is, however, only the most superficial aspect of the novel. 36 1 Matti Moosa. The Early Novels of Naguib Mahfouz: Image of Modern Egypt. (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 1994), 255-256 2 Muhammad Mustafa Badawi. Modern Arabic Drama in Egypt. (Cambridge; New York: Cambridge University Press, 1987), 47 Naguib Mahfouz presents his views on everything from religion and politics to marriage, life and death in such a manner that the state censors at the time of publication, 1952, would not be able to accuse of being antigovernment . He says things that are not necessarily easy for people to hear, regardless of whether these things are right or wrong. This was a political risk for Mr. Mahfouz. He almost lost his life at the hand of a Muslim fanatic in 1994. In Sugar Street, the author described the rapid social changes in Egypt during the late 1930 and the World War II period-- tremendous upheavals in family structure, in women’s roles, in politics, and in the lives of the characters. Mahfouz shows us Egyptian colonial society in all its complexity. The characters get out more – the center of gravity shifts to new homes, new neighborhoods, universities, newspaper offices, and the public space in general. All of this brilliantly shows the significant social changes that occurred in Egypt over this period. Sugar Street is a call to the Egyptian people to unite, resolve their internal differences and fight against the foreign and domestic enemies of Egypt. These enemies include foreign powers which controlled or attempted to control Egypt such as the British, the Germans, the French and the Italians. By domestic enemies, Mahfouz means Muslim Brotherhood who wanted to turn Egypt again into an Islamic state, some of the nationalist groups which wanted power in order to oppress the Egyptian people, and the monarchy and aristocracy which wanted to maintain power.1 ( I ) Historical Background Throughout the period extending between 1516 and 1798, the Ottoman empire adopted a policy of total impenetrability to European influence in its heartland territories like Egypt and Syria, which resulted not only in the isolation of these regions but also in their cultural, scientific and intellectual deterioration.2 The emergence of secularism in the Middle East dates back to the first major post-Renaissance European military intervention in the region known as Napoleon’s campaign on Egypt and which took place in 1798. The Egyptians in particular came...

From Monarchy to Republic: Continuity and Change in Egypt’s Cold War Politics, 1943–56

From Monarchy to Republic: Continuity and Change in Egypt’s Cold War Politics, 1943–56

Political Change in Egypt The Middle East : The Political Changes of the 1970s

Political Change in Egypt The Middle East : The Political Changes of the 1970s

A Small Nation Goes to War: Israel's Cabinet Authorization of the 1956 War

The Suez War had long term ramifications for Israel’s status in the Middle East and for its relations with the U.S., Europe, and the USSR. This article is a first segment in the examination of the interplay between military and diplomatic means deployed by Israel in its quest to consolidate the gains of the 1948 war and secure its sovereignty. It provides a detailed analysis of the Israeli cabinet deliberations as it reached the decision to authorize war. The article examines the cabinet’s opinions on the language of the motion to go to war, the list of casus belli offered, the secret agreement with France and Britain which precipitated the war, considerations of possible complications, the theory of war and peace, the likelihood of regime change in Egypt, and the preparedness of the home front. It raises the question of the relevance of the comparative size and strength of a nation as it ponders the option of launching a war.

Environment in Jeopardy: Consequences of climate change in Egypt

Egypt is at risk to the possessions of global warming and potentially facing catastrophic consequences in sea level rise (SLR), water scar­city, agriculture and food insufficiency, loss of biodiversity and habitats and new pressures on human health and national economy. To confront these adverse impacts, the Prime Minister re-established in 2007 a National Climate Change Committee consists of scientists and experts from different ministries and relevant bodies responsible to manage climate in Egypt and to set a strategy to adapt to potential global changes. Key words: Environment, sea level rise, water scarcity, agriculture and food Insufficiency, biodiversity and human health.

The impact of external actors on the distribution of power in the Middle East: the case of Egypt

Both formally and rhetorically, the policy position of the United States and the European Union is to support movement towards democratic political change in the Middle East. This article examines the democracy-promotion polices of both actors in relation to Egypt, with particular reference to the political changes that have taken place in that country since 2005. It concludes that, far from promoting democratic change in Egypt, Western policies have had the apparently paradoxical, and unintended, effect of supporting the entrenchment of an authoritarian political order, and offers an analysis of how and why this is so.

Farm land-use change in Egypt’s peri-urban regions : the stakeholders’ role

Farm land-use change in Egypt’s peri-urban regions : the stakeholders’ role

Egyptian reforms post-2005 and the politics of succession: implications and consequences for the future Egyptian reform process

Egyptian economic reforms have been an on-going process since the Egyptian government adopted liberal market reforms in 1991 (Kienle 2001, 2004), influenced by a number of internal socio-economic factors, including growing levels of poverty, heightened inflation, high levels of corruption and rising levels of unemployment, in particular among new university graduates. These factors were exerting heavy pressure on a highly bureaucratic and inefficient state (Bayat 1997). However, the ensuing economic reforms resulted in tightened fiscal and monetary polices, and a subsequent increased and heightened socio-economic crisis in Egypt, which the Egyptian government attempted to control by imposing increasingly authoritarian measures, with political de-liberalization evident in both urban and rural areas (Kienle 2001). This led, at the turn of the millennium, to a period of failed economic reforms and increased levels of authoritarianism, which coincided with the political rise of the president’s son, Gamal Mubarak, whose economic and business credentials have led to optimism concerning the possibility of future reform and change in Egypt. This paper examines the electoral promises made by Hosni Mubarak in the 2005 presidential elections and the ensuing economic and political implications for the political succession in Egypt, leading to conclusions about the future processes of economic and political reform in Egypt and the impact upon them of the political succession

Ruling but not governing: the military and political development in Egypt, Algeria, and Turkey

Ruling But Not Governing highlights the critical role that the military plays in the stability of the Egyptian, Algerian, and, until recently, Turkish political systems. This in-depth study demonstrates that while the soldiers and materiel of Middle Eastern militaries form the obvious outer perimeter of regime protection, it is actually the less apparent, multilayered institutional legacies of military domination that play the decisive role in regime maintenance. Steven A. Cook uncovers the complex and nuanced character of the military's interest in maintaining a facade of democracy. He explores how an authoritarian elite hijack seemingly democratic practices such as elections, multiparty politics, and a relatively freer press as part of a strategy to ensure the durability of authoritarian systems. Using Turkey's recent reforms as a point of departure, the study also explores ways external political actors can improve the likelihood of political change in Egypt and Algeria. Ruling But Not Governing provides valuable insight into the political dynamics that perpetuate authoritarian regimes and offers novel ways to promote democratic change.

Determinants of accounting choices in Egypt

In recent years, Egypt has been developing rapidly from a socialist to a fully developed market‐based economy. One may expect that this economic transition towards a more capitalist orientation will influence the country’s cultural and socio‐economic environment, and consequently the behaviour of its corporate managers. The increasing separation of ownership and control of capital could be expected to increase agency problems associated with managerial decisions. In these circumstances, it should be interesting to identify whether ‘positive accounting’ hypotheses would apply in such an environment. Therefore, this paper examines the relevance to financial reporting in Egypt of some established positive accounting theory hypotheses in addition to a new hypothesis related to taxation. The evidence of the study is consistent with the validity of the conventional ‘bonus’ and ‘debt’ hypotheses and the new ‘taxation’ hypothesis. These conclusions are also consistent with recent empirical studies of cultural and socio‐economic change in Egypt.

Fertility change in Egypt

This work focuses on Egypt a country that notwithstanding its advanced stage of sociodemographic transition has shown near stagnation in the reduction of fertility levels in the last decade. The progression from second to third birth is a crucial component in fertility change since the reduction especially of third and higher-order births maintains the fertility decline. For this reason the study aims at analyzing the main determinants of the third-birth intensities of Egyptian two-child mothers applying an event-history analysis to the 2000 Egyptian Demographic and Health Survey. The studys results show that fertility differentials among the countrys social groups continue to persist. Moreover the difficult change in the fertility of women with high educational standards seems to be responsible for the stalling fertility decline during recent years. The analysis however has demonstrated that within the framework of the ongoing process of modernization in the country even the most laggard groups of women showed a decrease in third-birth intensity during the 1990s. The study also reveals that the preference for at least one son in the family on the progression to the third child is weakening among women who have completed secondary education. (authors)