December 30th, 2008 by Tariq

Michael Allen at Democracy Digest highlights a new book on Egypt by Bruce K. Rutherford, “Egypt after Mubarak: Liberalism, Islam, and Democracy in the Arab World.” Read the first chapter here.

Outlining the tension, Allen says, “The current regime exhibits a growing contradiction: on one hand, it is a “classic example of stable authoritarianism“, controlling much of the media and political life, while suppressing opponents with legal and extra-legal instruments and monitoring and manipulating political parties and civil society groups; on the other hand, a vibrant judiciary, an assertive Judges’ Club, and a large and well-organized Islamist opposition are poised to take advantage of “a fundamental change in the character of Egyptian politics since the early 1990s”, namely the declining legitimacy and sustainability of the Nasserite statist order.”

Rutherford concludes, Egypt is “likely to remain a hybrid regime that contains some legal and institutional constraints on executive power, but which falls short of Western norms of democracy.”

Posted in Egypt, Muslim Brotherhood, Political Parties, Publications, Reform, Secularism |