Egypt's Spring Revolution (2011-2013)

[Dayuhan]

Bread "scuffles" would be a more accurate description of what happened in 2008--riots implies far more substantial and widespread protests than actually occurred.

They were widely called riots at the time, though that might be considered overstatement. 7 dead is a fair scuffle, though.

Certainly the increase in food prices played a role, although in Egypt those prices increases were typically smaller than in many other countries because of subsidies. Youth unemployment was important too too, although again Egypt was not the worst country for this, nor had it grown much worse lately. Years of authoritarian regime played a role--although as you correctly note, that in itself is an inadequate explanation for revolt. In the Egyptian case, however, the deliberalization of parliamentary politics and a sense of an impending engineered hand-off to power to Gamal Mubarak exacerbated this, heightening discontent with the regime in general and (in the latter case) creating cracks within the Army. The creative use of ICTs certainly played a role.

Critically, Tunisia played a vital role by entirely changing people's perceptions of political opportunity structures. A very similar regime had just been overthrown through popular protest. The mukhabarat and other organs of state power had been shown to be less fearsome than had been previously believed.

Certainly Tunisia provided the spark, equally certainly economic conditions played a part in building the volatility that the spark ignited.

The whole bread conversation got pulled off track... I didn't originally cite it because it was "the cause", but because I see it as a significant factor in the aftermath, simply because it's a place where immediate policy can have an immediate impact. Tunisia may have been a major contributor to igniting Egypt, but it won't be a major concern for a new government, unless of course the military decides to hold onto power. Food prices and unemployment will be major concerns going forward: the populace doesn't just want freedom, it wants jobs and cheap bread.

All this matters for a specific reason. Given Egypt's enormous debt, government deficit, and trade balance, IMF assistance and loan restructuring will probably be needed. The IMF and other creditors typically insist on terminating subsidies as a condition for assistance. This is good economics and it is necessary in the long term, but politically it could be a real problem. Egyptians have been addicted to that subsidy for a long time, and if they are forced to go cold turkey things could get ugly. I'm hoping the US and EU will use their influence to push for a gradual withdrawal of subsidies rather than an abrupt termination. A major shock early on could badly destabilize what's likely to be a very fragile transition government, creating conditions that could generate a radical takeover or a military coup, which would in turn create conditions that Islamic radicals could and would exploit.

This article from 2008 gives a little rundown on events then, and a hint of the dimensions of the subsidy...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/e...ad-crisis.html

A 100 kilogram sack of subsidised flour is worth about $3.14. The same sack costs $377 on the black market.

When a subsidy of a staple need is that large, removing it in one swoop is going to cause all kinds of trouble, something that the beady-eyed economists in the IMF back office may not realize. Yes, it has to go, but I'd suggest taking it slow and easy... not that anyone cares what I suggest!

[Steve the Planner]

n an urban environment with a large number of economically marginal residents the price of food is always a key issue, and it's been a major concern for despots for a long time: one recalls the Roman emperors placating the masses with bread and circuses, and Marie Antoinette's infamous "let them eat cake".

Micro is what it's all about: urban insurrections involve a very small percentage of the population. Overall employment rates mean less than the ability to absorb young people coming into the labor force, and GDP growth has little impact on the ability of poor people to put food in their stomachs or the ability of the government to supply cheap food.

Food security and affordability are a major driver in all CENTCOM areas, and interplays with drought/weather patterns and urbanization/rural abandonment.

Urban systems are just plain complicated.

Lately, I have been fascinated with the structure of governments in these areas, from North Africa to Afghanistan.

All have governance systems built on the original Persian satraps, later appearing as Greece, then Roman provinces, all arranged in top down hierarchies from empire/nation, down to provinces, and in turn, down to districts and subdistricts, all inferior sub-entities under the empire/nation.

It's interesting to me that the later rulers/occupiers/dictators all kep[t the structure, assuring the subservience of sub-national government entities to the empire/nation.

Not that "form" must dictate result, any more than geography or climate does, it is a substantial influence.

Older systems of City-States (cities, towns and the regions associated with them) pre-dated the empire/nation satraps/provinces) and provided formats for numerous alternative and changeable affiliations within a framework that, in reality, was a lot closer to "democracy." No doubt, local rulers could be as bad as any, but they faced many obstacles to deep insanity, not to mention loss of local support, loss of revenues from trade, and loss of people (voting by feet).

I wonder how much the actual top-down structure of these empire/nation's governance systems will continue to minimize emergence of local and representative governance, whether in Iran, Iraq, or Egypt?

I have long suspected that, once we were gone, Iraqis would (and are) developing alternate systems of cities and regions that will, in the end, break the "eternal" mold of conquerors' governance systems.

What was one of their first big constitutional steps in Iraq? Article 123 that provides for regions and alternative systems and structures.

Absent structural changes, will most Egyptian aspirations be limited? Still under a system biased towards centralized controls, as our "provinces" plan for Iraq was?

[Surferbeetle]

Catherine Ashton discussed a potential role for the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development in the stabilization of Egypt during a recent op-ed in the Financial Times.

The Country Assessment from the ERBD's 2010 Transition Report, regarding Turkey, was interesting:

In 2009 a total of 106 privatisation deals were completed, including 52 small-scale hydropower plants, electricity distribution companies in 13 regions and infrastructure. Tenders were announced or completed for another eight distribution companies between November 2009 and August 2010. Privatisation also progressed in the transport sector, with two ports sold this year: Samsun and Bandirma. Further sales of state-owned ports, toll motorways and bridges are envisaged in the privatisation portfolio for 2010-11. In total, privatisation revenues amounted to US$ 2.3 billion in 2009 (0.4 per cent of GDP compared with a target of 0.5 per cent) and US$ 941 million for the period of January to July 2010 (the target for a year as a whole is 1.0 per cent of GDP). Foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows in 2009, which contracted by more than half compared with the previous year, were mainly directed at the electricity, gas and water supply sectors, in line with the government’s 2009-10 privatisation programme.

Efforts are under way to diversify Turkey’s energy sources. In May 2010 the government signed an agreement with Russia, estimated at US$ 20 billion, for a Russian firm to build and own a majority stake in Turkey’s first nuclear power plant. Another agreement valued at US$ 1 billion was signed with Iran to construct a new gas export pipeline from Iran via Turkey to Europe, with construction expected to take three years. Lastly, important progress has been made on the Nabucco pipeline, with a memorandum of understanding signed by Turkey and Azerbaijan in June 2010 to develop trade in natural gas.