Nathan J. Brown, Shimaa Hatab, and Amr Adly, Lumbering State, Restless Society: Egypt in the Modern Era (New Texts Out Now)

Nathan J. Brown, Shimaa Hatab, and Amr Adly, Lumbering State, Restless Society: Egypt in the Modern Era (New Texts Out Now)

Nathan J. Brown, Shimaa Hatab, and Amr Adly, Lumbering State, Restless Society: Egypt in the Modern Era (New Texts Out Now)

By : Nathan J. Brown, Shimaa Hatab, and Amr Adly

Nathan J. Brown, Shimaa Hatab, and Amr Adly, Lumbering State, Restless Society: Egypt in the Modern Era (Columbia University Press, 2021).

Jadaliyya (J): What made you write this book? 

Nathan J. Brown, Shimaa Hatab, and Amr Adly (NB, SH & AA): We wanted to do two things: first, to contribute with a critical conceptual and theoretical book to the debate on modern Egypt, especially in the aftermath of the 2011 revolution, but without reducing Egyptian politics simply to a story of disappointed revolution. Second, we wanted to contribute to the emergence of truly transnational scholarly activity—and in particular to contribute to narrowing the gap between the English- and Arabic-speaking intelligentsia working on Egypt by integrating two Egyptian, Egypt-based young scholars into the team.

Egypt has not developed in a linear way nor is it the product of a single vision or project...

J: What particular topics, issues, and literatures does the book address? 

NB, SH & AA: The book provides an analytical comprehensive overview of modern Egypt’s politics, society, and economy. It primarily focuses on post-independence years. However, it does not shy away from going back to earlier modern times in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

The book is divided into three linked parts that focus primarily on politics, society, and economy, respectively. In each part we stress longer-standing and complex processes of transformation that shaped the state-society and -economy landscapes in contemporary Egypt. Our main argument is that Egypt has not developed in a linear way nor is it the product of a single vision or project—each of these spheres is characterized by deep contention. While we do discern a general trajectory—the emergence and the partial retreat of an extensive and intrusive state apparatus—the path is not always coherent either. Even at its most extensive, the state (and certainly no individual ruler) was by not a single actor driving the process of socio-economic transformation from above in an uncontested manner. Conversely, various social actors—as well as those within the state itself—had agency, and their responses to state interventions as well as their initiatives shaped much of the reality. 

We pursue this story in dialogue with a wide variety of literatures from political science, political sociology, and political economy. We did not confine our engagement to area studies. In fact, it was an explicit aim of ours to undermine any claim of uniqueness or exceptionalism to the Egyptian modernization trajectory by positioning Egypt in relation to the world. This resulted in a conscious and consistent comparison of Egypt with a variety of cases in Asia, Africa, Eastern Europe, and Latin America. The goal was not a systematic set of comparisons but an understanding of how processes in Egypt can be illuminated—and can illuminate—processes elsewhere. This brought us at times to be critical of the mainstream literature on Egypt that has drawn heavily on theories rooted in the liberal tradition—particularly but not exclusively in the economic realm.

But we do not view each of these realms as separate. One challenge in writing the book was to present our analysis in a clearly structured manner while acknowledging the interrelationships among politics, economy, and society. We also had to encounter the challenge of analyzing events since 2011 without giving our account a teleological focus (as if Egypt was always heading toward revolution or counterrevolution)—so we included a chapter in which we link the events of the past decade with our previous analysis.

Our potential conceptual contribution suggests new modalities to think Egypt’s multi-dimensional transformation away from another teleological model in which the arc of history bends slowly toward the happy twins of democratization and free market making. In all three parts, we propose a more nuanced and historicized approach to understanding Egypt, not as a unique case but as a variant among many in the global South.

J: How does this book connect to and/or depart from your previous work? 

NB, SH & AA: Given that this book is a joint venture among three authors, it constituted both a continuity as well as a rupture with our earlier individual contributions. Each of us capitalized on our individual specialization and past experience on the one hand, while being willing to reconsider some past judgments we made on the other. We have tried to bring in fresh air to the debate on Egypt even if this meant taking a critical stance against some of our earlier works. For example, the economy section is critical of the predominant school stressing crony capitalism as the single most defining feature of Egypt’s economic transformation. Alternatively, it adopts and adapts the economic anthropology concept of “habitus” from Pierre Bourdieu’s work as an approach to the various societal forces that shaped Egypt’s economic order in the past three decades.

J: Who do you hope will read this book, and what sort of impact would you like it to have? 

NB, SH & AA: This is a book about Egypt. We hope it would interest students of Egypt and the Middle East and North Africa. Its arguments are cast in terms that should be accessible to undergraduates while still proving fresh analysis useful for graduate students. But we hope also to appeal to readers outside of a classroom setting—critical scholars and informed readers interested in reading an analytically and comprehensive book about the Arab world’s most populous country. We also hope that our book would have an impact on academia by inviting the rethinking of some of the main conceptual and theoretical assumptions about Egypt, the Middle East, and the global South more broadly.

J: What other projects are you working on now? 

NB, SH & AA: This was a joint work. It was the fruit of almost five long years of continuous effort of the three of us. We are hoping to build on this venture—and remain true to the transnational and bridging nature of the project—by writing a series of articles in Arabic that would convey the essence of the argument and findings to Arab readers and link it with the English-speaking intellectual space. We are also working on an abridged Arabic translation of the book.

J: What was the biggest surprise you encountered?

NB, SH & AA: How easy it was to write the book. Well, that is an exaggeration. Writing is never easy. But we have different areas of expertise, different styles of writing, and were trained in different ways. And Egypt is a complicated place with—as we show—much contentious terrain. We each took primary responsibility for a specific area, but we tried to write in a single voice, discussing the framework and major arguments. We succeeded, at least to our own satisfaction. We hope our readers agree.

 

Excerpt from the book (from Chapter One, pp. 9-12) 

CACOPHONOUS EGYPT 

Egyptians have often disagreed and struggled over how their country should be governed. Egypt can be confusing— and much analysis misses the mark— because there are many who claim to speak for the country. Analysts are often inclined to listen to a single source. We seek to remedy that by understanding Egypt as a complex state and society. 

Many times when Egypt is discussed, an analyst will refer to the country by the name of the leader. It is as if Egypt speaks with one voice and is a product of one will. “Al-Sisi’s Egypt” is authoritarian, “Sadat’s Egypt” made peace with Israel, and so on. It is not surprising that such shorthand is used. Egypt’s presidents are powerful figures, and they certainly claim to speak and act for all of Egyptian society. If one does a bit of historical digging— say, by looking back at Egyptian newspapers from the 1960s or 1970s— one would get the impression from the public record that the president’s word was uncontested and final. But we wish to present a far broader sample of Egyptian political voices.

And we run into another problem as well: basic terminology is often controversial. Those who argue about the best political direction for the country disagree about which terms should be used and what they mean. Words are connected to politics. 

When scholars use words like “authoritarian” or “revolution,” they often disagree on what they mean, but they generally justify their choices by the clarity offered by their favored definition. A clear definition of “revolution,” for instance, should serve the purpose of telling us what a revolution is and what it is not, so that we can explain why or when such events happen. But when the arguments are not just among scholars but among contending political forces, the choice of terms is connected not just to analytical clarity but to political values (of course, such values are a part of many scholarly writings as well).

So many of the terms we need to use are loaded, and some are especially loaded in the case of political debates among Egyptians. In Egypt today, the term “revolution” is generally applied by those who want to emphasize the strongly popular nature of a radical change. Was the 1919 revolt against the British a revolution? What about the 1952 overthrow of the monarchy? In Egypt, to refer to the events of 1919 as an “uprising” rather than “revolution” can be taken as a dismissal of the nationalist struggle against British imperialism; to refer to 1952 as a “coup” is to cast doubt on its claim to legitimacy. Likewise, if one refers to the events of 2013 as a “coup” rather than a “revolution” against the Muslim Brotherhood, which had won the previous year’s presidential elections, it is taken as a sharp declaration of one’s political inclinations. What is at issue is not simply a dictionary definition, but one’s political positions vis-à-vis these events. 

In this book, we will write as scholars and try to follow definitions that are precise— but we will note the political power and emotional meaning of certain words among those who study Egypt, and the even deeper disagreements in political discussions among rival camps in Egypt.

And we will try to avoid the tendency to view Egyptian politics as something that is projected from a single strong leader. In this we are not denying the centrality of the presidency to Egyptian political life. But neither are we starting exclusively there. Instead, our analysis incorporates Egyptian society by looking at politics from a variety of vantage points, not simply from the top down. Our leading characters, then, are not merely presidents but also bureaucrats, officers, judges, feminists, trade unionists, activists, investors, and farmers. We will ask not merely what the leader thinks and does but also how Egyptian state institutions have been built and now operate; how Egyptian society is organized and how social actors behave; and how the economy functions and economic policy is made. 

As we address these questions, we will be alert to some larger themes, ones far broader than the Egyptian political experience. We will be mindful of the fact that Egyptian politics has almost always been authoritarian, that its leaders are not fully accountable to any kind of democratic mechanism. In that way, the Egyptian political system resembles that of most other societies in world history, where authoritarianism (broadly defined) has been the rule and democracy the exception. But authoritarian systems, while they lack fully democratic checks on their rulers, still show great variety, and they evolve considerably over time.

Egypt, for instance, has some very strong institutions— the military, various internal security and intelligence services, the judiciary, and even the official Islamic religious establishment. Egyptians have shown varying signs of social activism and powerful groups have tried to affect official policy. Egypt also has had a series of elections— ones in which the opposition can often run (but generally is not allowed to win). It shares some of these features with certain systems but not others. We will compare Egypt to other authoritarian systems to see what is distinctive about Egypt and what it tells us about the varieties of authoritarianism. 

Similarly, Egyptian society has been organized in ways that have been heavily regulated by the state. At its height in the 1960s, state regulation became sufficiently rigorous and intense that it can be called “state corporatism” (a term we explore in more depth in chapter 4), a system in which almost all forms of organization, ranging from agricultural cooperatives to student unions, were controlled by the state or the sole political party at the time. But Egypt has also seen state controls that operate far more loosely, and even a recent mass uprising that brought the political order to its knees and left an indelible imprint on the society. We will compare the way that state and society interact in Egypt, keeping an eye on similar systems elsewhere.

And the Egyptian economy has also gone through phases of socialism and attempted liberalization. Yet even when Egypt’s rulers have used the language of economic liberalization, the state’s role has remained quite strong, formally as well as informally. Still, non-state structures, informal mechanisms of coordination, and networks of families, friends, and kin shaped much of Egypt’s variegated private sector. We will trace the role of important economic actors, both state and non-state. Some, like businessmen, will be familiar to anyone trying to understand economic policy making. But others, such as the military, will be a bit more unusual.

New Texts Out Now: Mandy Turner and Cherine Hussein, guest eds. "Israel-Palestine after Oslo: Mapping Transformations in a Time of Deepening Crisis." Special Issue of Conflict, Security & Development

Conflict, Security and Development, Volume 15, No. 5 (December 2015) Special issue: "Israel-Palestine after Oslo: Mapping Transformations in a Time of Deepening Crisis," Guest Editors: Mandy Turner and Cherine Hussein.

Jadaliyya (J): What made you compile this volume?

Mandy Turner (MT): Both the peace process and the two-state solution are dead. Despite more than twenty years of negotiations, Israel’s occupation, colonization and repression continue–and the political and geographical fragmentation of the Palestinian people is proceeding apace.

This is not news, nor is it surprising to any keen observer of the situation. But what is surprising–and thus requires explanation – is the resilience of the Oslo framework and paradigm: both objectively and subjectively. It operates objectively as a straitjacket by trapping Palestinians in economic and security arrangements that are designed to ensure stabilization and will not to lead to sovereignty or a just and sustainable solution. And it operates subjectively as a straitjacket by shutting out discussion of alternative ways of understanding the situation and ways out of the impasse. The persistence of this framework that is focused on conflict management and stabilization, is good for Israel but bad for Palestinians.

The Oslo peace paradigm–of a track-one, elite-level, negotiated two-state solution–is therefore in crisis. And yet it is entirely possible that the current situation could continue for a while longer–particularly given the endorsement and support it enjoys from the major Western donors and the “international community,” as well as the fact that there has been no attempt to develop an alternative. The immediate short-term future is therefore bleak.

Guided by these observations, this special issue sought to undertake two tasks. The first task was to analyze the perceptions underpinning the Oslo framework and paradigm as well as some of the transformations instituted by its implementation: why is it so resilient, what has it created? The second task, which follows on from the first, was then to ask: how can we reframe our understanding of what is happening, what are some potential alternatives, and who is arguing and mobilizing for them?

These questions and themes grew out of a number of conversations with early-career scholars – some based at the Kenyon Institute in East Jerusalem, and some based in the occupied Palestinian territory and elsewhere. These conversations led to two interlinked panels at the International Studies Association annual convention in Toronto, Canada, in March 2014. To have two panels accepted on “conflict transformation and resistance in Palestine” at such a conventional international relations conference with (at the time unknown) early-career scholars is no mean feat. The large and engaged audience we received at these panels – with some very established names coming along (one of whom contributed to this special issue) – convinced us that this new stream of scholars and scholarship should have an outlet.  

J: What particular topics, issues, and literatures do the articles address?

MT: The first half of the special issue analyzes how certain problematic assumptions shaped the Oslo framework, and how the Oslo framework in turn shaped the political, economic and territorial landscape.

Virginia Tilley’s article focuses on the paradigm of conflict resolution upon which the Oslo Accords were based, and calls for a re-evaluation of what she argues are the two interlinked central principles underpinning its worldview: internationally accepted notions of Israeli sovereignty; and the internationally accepted idea that the “conflict” is essentially one between two peoples–the “Palestinian people” and the “Jewish people”. Through her critical interrogation of these two “common sense” principles, Tilley proposes that the “conflict” be reinterpreted as an example of settler colonialism, and, as a result of this, recommends an alternative conflict resolution model based on a paradigm shift away from an ethno-nationalist division of the polity towards a civic model of the nation.

Tariq Dana unpacks another central plank of the Oslo paradigm–that of promoting economic relations between Israel and the OPT. He analyses this through the prism of “economic peace” (particularly the recent revival of theories of “capitalist peace”), whose underlying assumptions are predicated on the perceived superiority of economic approaches over political approaches to resolving conflict. Dana argues that there is a symbiosis between Israeli strategies of “economic peace” and recent Palestinian “statebuilding strategies” (referred to as Fayyadism), and that both operate as a form of pacification and control because economic cooperation leaves the colonial relationship unchallenged.

The political landscape in the OPT has been transformed by the Oslo paradigm, particularly by the creation of the Palestinian Authority (PA). Alaa Tartir therefore analyses the basis, agenda and trajectory of the PA, particularly its post-2007 state building strategy. By focusing on the issue of local legitimacy and accountability, and based on fieldwork in two sites in the occupied West Bank (Balata and Jenin refugee camps), Tartir concludes that the main impact of the creation of the PA on ordinary people’s lives has been the strengthening of authoritarian control and the hijacking of any meaningful visions of Palestinian liberation.

The origin of the administrative division between the West Bank and Gaza Strip is the focus of Tareq Baconi’s article. He charts how Hamas’s initial opposition to the Oslo Accords and the PA was transformed over time, leading to its participation (and success) in the 2006 legislative elections. Baconi argues that it was the perceived demise of the peace process following the collapse of the Camp David discussions that facilitated this change. But this set Hamas on a collision course with Israel and the international community, which ultimately led to the conflict between Hamas and Fateh, and the administrative division, which continues to exist.

The special issue thereafter focuses, in the second section, on alternatives and resistance to Oslo’s transformations.

Cherine Hussein’s article charts the re-emergence of the single-state idea in opposition to the processes of separation unleashed ideologically and practically that were codified in the Oslo Accords. Analysing it as both a movement of resistance and as a political alternative to Oslo, while recognizing that it is currently largely a movement of intellectuals (particularly of diaspora Palestinians and Israelis), Hussein takes seriously its claim to be a more just and liberating alternative to the two-state solution.

My article highlights the work of a small but dedicated group of anti-Zionist Jewish-Israeli activists involved in two groups: Zochrot and Boycott from Within. Both groups emerged in the post-Second Intifada period, which was marked by deep disillusionment with the Oslo paradigm. This article unpacks the alternative – albeit marginalized – analysis, solution and route to peace proposed by these groups through the application of three concepts: hegemony, counter-hegemony and praxis. The solution, argue the activists, lies in Israel-Palestine going through a process of de-Zionization and decolonization, and the process of achieving this lies in actions in solidarity with Palestinians.

This type of solidarity action is the focus of the final article by Suzanne Morrison, who analyses the “We Divest” campaign, which is the largest divestment campaign in the US and forms part of the wider Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement. Through attention to their activities and language, Morrison shows how “We Divest”, with its networked, decentralized, grassroots and horizontal structure, represents a new way of challenging Israel’s occupation and the suppression of Palestinian rights.

The two parts of the special issue are symbiotic: the critique and alternative perspectives analyzed in part two are responses to the issues and problems identified in part one.

J: How does this volume connect to and/or depart from your previous work?

MT: My work focuses on the political economy of donor intervention (which falls under the rubric of “peacebuilding”) in the OPT, particularly a critique of the Oslo peace paradigm and framework. This is a product of my broader conceptual and historical interest in the sociology of intervention as a method of capitalist expansion and imperial control (as explored in “The Politics of International Intervention: the Tyranny of Peace”, co-edited with Florian Kuhn, Routledge, 2016), and how post-conflict peacebuilding and development agendas are part of this (as explored in “Whose Peace: Critical Perspectives on the Political Economy of Peacebuilding”, co-edited with Michael Pugh and Neil Cooper (PalgraveMacmillan, 2008).  

My first book on Palestine (co-edited with Omar Shweiki), Decolonizing Palestinian Political Economy: De-development and Beyond (PalgraveMacmillan, 2014), was a collection of essays by experts in their field, of the political-economic experience of different sections of the Palestinian community. The book, however, aimed to reunite these individual experiences into one historical political-economy narrative of a people experiencing a common theme of dispossession, disenfranchisement and disarticulation. It was guided by the desire to critically assess the utility of the concept of de-development to different sectors and issues–and had a foreword by Sara Roy, the scholar who coined the term, and who was involved in the workshop from which the book emerged.

This co-edited special issue (with Cherine Hussein, who, at the time of the issue construction, was the deputy director of the Kenyon Institute) was therefore the next logical step in my research on Palestine, although my article on Jewish-Israeli anti-Zionists did constitute a slight departure from my usual focus.

J: Who do you hope will read this volume, and what sort of impact would you like it to have?

MT: I would imagine the main audience will be those whose research and political interests lie in Palestine Studies. It is difficult, given the structure of academic publishing – which has become ever more corporate and money grabbing – for research outputs such as this to be accessed by the general public. Only those with access to academic libraries are sure to be able to read it – and this is a travesty, in my opinion. To counteract this commodification of knowledge, we should all provide free access to our outputs through online open source websites such as academia.edu, etc. If academic research is going to have an impact beyond merely providing more material for teaching and background reading for yet more research (which is inaccessible to the general public) then this is essential. Websites such as Jadaliyya are therefore incredibly important.

Having said all that, I am under no illusions about the potential for ANY research on Israel-Palestine to contribute to changing the dynamics of the situation. However, as a collection of excellent analyses conducted by mostly early-career scholars in the field of Palestine studies, I am hopeful that their interesting and new perspectives will be read and digested. 

J: What other projects are you working on now?

MT: I am currently working on an edited volume provisionally entitled From the River to the Sea: Disintegration, Reintegration and Domination in Israel and Palestine. This book is the culmination of a two-year research project funded by the British Academy, which analyzed the impacts of the past twenty years of the Oslo peace framework and paradigm as processes of disintegration, reintegration and domination – and how they have created a new socio-economic and political landscape, which requires new agendas and frameworks. I am also working on a new research project with Tariq Dana at Birzeit University on capital and class in the occupied West Bank.

Excerpt from the Editor’s Note 

[Note: This issue was published in Dec. 2015]

Initially perceived to have inaugurated a new era of hope in the search for peace and justice in Palestine-Israel, the Oslo peace paradigm of a track one, elite-level, negotiated two-state solution is in crisis today, if not completely at an end.

While the major Western donors and the ‘international community’ continue to publicly endorse the Oslo peace paradigm, Israeli and Palestinian political elites have both stepped away from it. The Israeli government has adopted what appears to be an outright rejection of the internationally-accepted end-goal of negotiations, i.e. the emergence of a Palestinian state based on the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital. In March 2015, in the final days of his re-election campaign, Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, visited the Jewish settlement of Har Homa in Palestinian East Jerusalem, which is regarded as illegal under international law. Reminding its inhabitants that it was him and his Likud government that had established the settlement in 1997 as part of the Israeli state’s vision of a unified indivisible Jerusalem, he promised to expand the construction of settlements in East Jerusalem if re-elected. And in an interview with Israeli news site, NRG, Netanyahu vowed that the prospects of a Palestinian state were non-existent as long as he remained in office. Holding on to the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt), he argued, was necessary to ensure Israel’s security in the context of regional instability and Islamic extremism. It is widely acknowledged that Netanyahu’s emphasis on Israel’s security—against both external and internal enemies—gave him a surprise win in an election he was widely expected to lose.

Despite attempts to backtrack under recognition that the US and European states are critical of this turn in official Israeli state policy, Netanyahu’s promise to bury the two-state solution in favour of a policy of further annexation has become the Israeli government’s official intent, and has been enthusiastically endorsed by leading ministers and key advisers.

[…]

The Palestinian Authority (PA) based in the West Bank also appears to have rejected a key principle of the Oslo peace paradigm—that of bilateral negotiations under the supervision of the US. Despite a herculean effort by US Secretary of State, John Kerry, to bring the two parties to the negotiating table, in response to the lack of movement towards final status issues and continued settlement expansion (amongst other issues), the Palestinian political elite have withdrawn from negotiations and resumed attempts to ‘internationalise the struggle’ by seeking membership of international organisations such as the United Nations (UN), and signing international treaties such as the Rome Statute, the founding treaty of the International Criminal Court. This change of direction is part of a rethink in the PA and PLO’s strategy rooted in wider discussions and debates. The publication of a document by the Palestine Strategy Study Group (PSSG) in August 2008, the production of which involved many members of the Palestinian political elite (and whose recommendations were studiously discussed at the highest levels of the PA and PLO), showed widespread discontent with the bilateral negotiations framework and suggested ways in which Palestinians could ‘regain the initiative’.

[…]

And yet despite these changes in official Palestinian and Israeli political strategies that signal a deepening of the crisis, donors and the ‘international community’ are reluctant to accept the failure of the Oslo peace paradigm. This political myopia has meant the persistence of a framework that is increasingly divorced from the possibility of a just and sustainable peace. It is also acting as an ideological straitjacket by shutting out alternative interpretations. This special issue seeks a way out of this political and intellectual dead end. In pursuit of this, our various contributions undertake what we regard to be two key tasks: first, to critically analyse the perceptions underpinning the Oslo paradigm and the transformations instituted by its implementation; and second, to assess some alternative ways of understanding the situation rooted in new strategies of resistance that have emerged in the context of these transformations in the post-Oslo landscape.

[…]

Taken as a whole, the articles in this special issue aim to ignite conversations on the conflict that are not based within abstracted debates that centre upon the peace process itself—but that begin from within the realities and geographies of both the continually transforming land of Palestine-Israel and the voices, struggles, worldviews and imaginings of the future of the people who presently inhabit it. For it is by highlighting these transformations, and from within these points of beginning, that we believe more hopeful pathways for alternative ways forward can be collectively imagined, articulated, debated and built.