Egypt’s Transition to
Democracy One Year
On: Recommendations
for U.S. Policy
Life for most Egyptians has deteriorated one year after the
overthrow of President Mubarak following mass popular
protests in January and February. The economy is
approaching a crisis, and lawlessness and insecurity have
spread throughout the country. Yet Egyptians remain
optimistic about their revolution and hopeful that a new
civilian government will begin to deliver on promises of
change. The U.S. government’s role in Egypt’s uncertain
transition is controversial; it is often mischaracterized in
public discourse, not least by Egyptian officials. The U.S.
government needs to focus more on delivering a clear
message about its policies and goals in Egypt and in
ensuring that it is received by the newly empowered
Egyptian public.
Introduction
As Egyptians celebrate the first anniversary of the popular
uprising that ended the thirty-year rule of President
Mubarak on February 11, 2011, U.S. policy makers are
faced with a confusing situation. Egypt’s democratic
transition has seen free parliamentary elections in which
tens of millions of voters participated peacefully, but the
outcome has fueled concerns over the role of the
parliament as a guarantor of the rights and freedoms of all
Egyptians. Specifically, activists are addressing new
developments, such as the majority of seats in parliament
that will be held by political parties rooted in political Islam;
the very poor showing of secular, liberal parties
associated with organizing the popular protests of a year
ago; the emergence of the extreme anti-democratic Salafi
movement as an electoral force with almost 25 % of the
parliamentary seats; and the low representation in
parliament of women and religious minorities.
These concerns are compounded by the fact that one of
the major tasks of the new parliament is to appoint a 100
member committee to prepare a new constitution that will
be adopted by referendum in a few months’ time.
Concerns over the composition of the new parliament are
just one among many pressing human rights issues in
Egypt. The ruling military junta, the Supreme Council of
the Armed Forces (SCAF), has had a calamitous year in
charge, vacillating between accommodating the demands
of protesters to protecting the interests and privileges the
military has accumulated in the course of 60 years of
military-backed dictatorial rule. At times, such as in
November when it sought to impose so called “supraconstitutional
principles” that would have ensured a
continuing preeminent role for the military over Egypt’s
political system, it has appeared to be backing away from
its pledge to step away from politics after the election of a
civilian government. In power, the military has
exacerbated sectarian tensions between the majority
Muslim community and the Christian minority, even using
state television to incite members of the public to attack
Christian protesters in October; it has tried thousands of
civilians in military courts that do not provide a fair trial; it
has tortured detainees, including subjecting women to
sexual assaults through so-called virginity tests; and it has
killed scores of protesters, a death toll that escalated in
the last quarter of 2011.
Independent civil society, especially human rights
nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), have come
under unprecedented attack from the authorities in recent
weeks. On December 29 and 30, public prosecutors
backed by the security forces raided the offices of twelve
NGOs in the Cairo area, including three American
organizations, two German and seven Egyptian groups,
seizing computers and files and placing wax seals on their
doors. The government accused the groups of
destabilizing the country by receiving foreign funding to
foment protests, playing into popular suspicions that
foreign forces were conspiring to harm the interests of the
country. Some groups were accused of operating without
required permits.
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In addition, dozens of other groups were ordered to
respond to questioning by prosecutors and to submit their
bank account details for official inspection. Over 400
groups and individuals, comprising most of the leading
figures in Egypt’s human rights and democracy
movement, are said to be targets in a wide-ranging,
continuing investigation. These attacks, accompanied by
hostile, defamatory statements from government officials
and in the government-controlled media, have created a
hostile environment for NGO activity. This is interfering
with the ability of some targeted NGOs to carry out their
usual work, because they have to respond to
investigators, provide information, attend interrogations,
and prepare legal defenses for their activities. The attacks
are having a chilling effect on human rights and
democracy promotion in general.
The attacks on independent civil society organizations
recall the tactics of the Mubarak regime, by seeking to
distract public attention from national problems and
government failings by scapegoating civil society
organizations backed by international financial support as
agents of hostile foreign forces.
This is not the only way in which the SCAF’s rule has
come to resemble the old regime, causing some
Egyptians to question whether the uprising brought about
any real changes. The SCAF has portrayed itself as a
force for order and social peace, meanwhile, perhaps in
order to underline the threats against which it purports to
be a guardian, it has presided over a deterioration in
public security that has added an unpleasant new edge of
insecurity to Egyptian life. For decades President Mubarak
assured his people and Egypt’s western allies that he
stood as a bulwark against extremism and disorder, while
stifling the development of independent democratic
institutions that are the only lasting guarantees for such
stability. The SCAF has shown little inclination to progress
from this destructive manner of rule, closing down media
outlets that criticized it, targeting independent critics,
including bloggers, maintaining sweeping powers to detain
without charge or trial, and resisting accountability for its
actions.
Under the 2012 appropriations law that passed Congress
at the end of 2011, the State Department is required to
certify that the Egyptian government is meeting certain
human rights conditions: "supporting the transition to
civilian government including holding free and fair
elections; implementing policies to protect freedom of
expression, association and religion; and due process of
law,” before $1.3 billion of foreign assistance can be
released to the Egyptian government.
Any honest assessment of the events of the last year in
Egypt would necessarily find that the Egyptian authorities
have fallen short of meeting these conditions in several
areas. It remains far from clear that the ruling military
council is fully committed to a transfer of power to civilian
rule; freedom of expression, association, and religion have
all come under attack at different times, and more
importantly, measures to better protect these rights in the
future have not been implemented; and due process of
law has been undermined by unfair trial of thousands of
civilians by military courts.
The framework of conditionality provides broad guidelines
for the Egyptian authorities, and for U.S. policy makers in
discussing and seeking to advance Egypt’s transition to
democracy. Better protection for basic rights and
freedoms, such as those stipulated in the law, are key
indicators of whether political change in Egypt is
producing democratic progress or not.
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The Views of Human Rights
and Democracy Activists
It is impossible to generalize the range of views expressed
by activists from diverse backgrounds, engaged in
different types of activism. However, there are some
common concerns:
There is a broadly shared realization that after a year
of post-revolutionary drift, Egypt’s new political
landscape will crystalize in the next few months. This
has brought forth two competing emotions: optimism
and uncertainty. Optimism, because one of the main
goals of the uprising – the handover of power to an
elected civilian government – is close at hand;
uncertainty because the outcome of the election was
not predicted, especially the very poor showing for
secular liberal forces who were prominent in the
protest movement.
Most human rights and democracy activists are
supportive of the SCAF getting out of power as quickly
as possible, despite misgivings about what an
Islamist-dominated parliament might mean for civil
liberties and personal freedoms. As one activist
explained, “The Brotherhood may limit basic rights
and freedoms, but the SCAF threaten our very
existence.” In practice, the debate over whether to
compress the timetable for a handover to civilian rule
is probably redundant. There is not much time
between now and the beginning of July when the
formal handover of power to a new civilian president is
scheduled to take place, especially given the many
intermediate steps that will take place, including the
adoption of a new constitution, before the presidential
election in June.
What will be important is the degree of the residual
powers of the military under the new system. While it
is expected, and even conceded by some, that the
military will retain control over issues relating to
foreign policy, including regional security issues like
Israeli-Palestinian peace, there are demands for
greater transparency in the military budget, including
provision for parliamentary oversight, and especially
for accountability for recent incidents where members
of the armed forces are implicated in the killing of
protesters. Several activists mentioned that former
President Mubarak and former Minister of the Interior
Habib al-Adly face a possible death sentence for their
alleged involvement in ordering the killing of
protesters at the time of the uprising last year. It is,
therefore, hardly consistent to let the SCAF evade
accountability for their actions. These demands for
greater accountability and transparency, taken up by
some of the youth protest movements, are likely to
find some support in the parliament and will be a
source of tension with the military leadership as it
shifts its position within the political system at the end
of June.
No democracy or human rights activists see the SCAF
as any kind of guardian of secular or liberal values.
Since the SCAF has been in power, they have killed
Christian protesters and incited the people against
Christians; directed the timetable and format of the
transition process in ways that have favored the
Islamists and the Muslim Brotherhood, in particular;
done nothing to strengthen democratic institutions,
and have undermined freedom of the press, attacked
civil society, and used the judiciary for political ends. A
common perception among activists is that the SCAF
and the Muslim Brotherhood, the backer of the largest
parliamentary party, the Freedom and Justice Party,
have formed or are working towards an
accommodation to protect their particular interests
and priorities, and this relationship will work to the
detriment of human rights and democracy.
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The U.S. government is widely seen as an
unconditional supporter of the military and its
continuing role in politics. Activists do not understand
why there has not been more criticism of the SCAF.
For example, one activist says the SCAF’s
involvement in large-scale killing of protesters in the
past few months is “much worse than anything that
happened under Mubarak.” Many activists remain
skeptical that the United States will tolerate the
emergence of a democratic government in Egypt that
may be more critical of U.S. policies in the region.
While human rights activists generally welcome U.S.
support and pressure from U.S. policy makers when
violations occur – indeed, many activists are highly
sensitive to the tone, frequency, and level of
statements from U.S. officials relating to human rights
concerns, and highly critical when they deem them to
be insufficient – they are skeptical of the value of
public threats to condition or suspend U.S. aid, even
military assistance. Rather than conditioning aid,
activists would rather see the U.S. government being
much more transparent about its aid relationship with
Egypt, explaining which institutions receive it and the
purposes for which it is sent. This would make clear
that civil society receives a very small proportion of
the $1.3 billion annual aid sent by the United States
and, thereby, help to lessen the disproportionate
public concern, stoked by official misinformation.
Observations
Egypt is the cornerstone of the Arab Spring; a successful
democratic transition there, even if it is lengthy and
circuitous, would provide the United States with a
democratic partner in the heart of the Arab world with the
potential to transform the United States’ troubled
relationships in the region as a whole.
The U.S. government must choose between backing the
democratic transition, with all its uncertainties, or else
seeing Egypt drift into instability under a more brutal, less
competent form of authoritarianism. One positive outcome
of the SCAF’s troubled year in office is that any illusion
that the military could provide a guiding hand for Egypt’s
democratic transition has been stripped away. The only
way to advance democracy is by implementing the
democratic process and building safeguards for
democratic rights and freedoms as the process moves
forward. There is no option but to back the democratic
transition.
Support for Egypt’s economy must be a top priority, and
the prospects for a strong trade relationship between the
United States and Egypt are good. There is pent-up
demand and growth potential in Egypt that would be
unleashed by an end to political uncertainty and paralysis
– by bringing tourism close to normality, for example. The
economy is in a deep crisis, but improvements would be
quickly felt by the people, and would aid the transition.
Voters in the just-completed parliamentary elections made
their choices based on symbols and untested promises. It
would be a mistake to see the results of this first
experience of a contested election as a stable indicator of
the political aspirations and views of the Egyptian people
in the longer term. Egypt’s new government will have to
make tough policy choices, especially on the economy.
Future elections will be based on the actual record in
government of the ruling parties and will likely see a
realignment of parties on issues other than religion.
Egyptians are scheduled to go to the polls at least three
times in the next few months, to elect the upper house of
the parliament, the Maglis al-Shurra, to vote on proposed
constitutional amendments in a referendum, and to elect a
president in June. The presidential vote is likely to have
the highest participation rate ever for an Egyptian election.
Each of these elections represents an opportunity for the
authorities to improve the process and to stamp out
irregularities, such as partisan campaigning close to
polling stations that is forbidden by law, but was
widespread in the parliamentary elections.
The SCAF and the dominant Freedom and Justice Party
are moving towards a modus vivendi that will see an
effective division of labor with the military, which continues
to defend its own privileges and interests and maintains
control over security and foreign policy. The potential for
future conflicts between the SCAF and the Brotherhood is
apparent, though both sides have an interest in avoiding
them. There is a danger that this de facto accommodation
between Islamists and the military could proceed at the
expense of democracy and human rights.
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One activist observed that Egypt was still going through its
revolution. In her view, the transition would only begin
after the presidential election in June and the appointment
of a new government. This realistic assessment points to
the need for patience and sustained attention to
supporting Egypt’s transition from authoritarianism. The
transition will take years and there will be mistakes and
setbacks along the way. Nonetheless, the goal of a
democratic Egypt is worth the investment of time.
Recommendations
Recommendations for U.S. Policy
The role of the United States government in Egypt’s
transition is highly controversial, often misunderstood, and
manipulated for political gain by the government and other
factions. In this context, it is hard for the U.S. government
to communicate a clear message about its policies in
Egypt and even harder to have it understood by the
Egyptian public. Nonetheless, it is vital that the U.S.
government continue to engage proactively and creatively
in the information battle in Egypt, and to do so effectively
in Egypt’s expanded and more open media environment.
What Egyptians think about the United States colors their
support for values with which the United States is publicly
identified, including human rights and democracy. Further,
how the U.S. government’s actions in Egypt are perceived
will shape public attitudes throughout the region on
whether the United States supports authoritarianism or
democracy.
1. The U.S. government must continue: to make clear its
support for civilian, democratic rule in Egypt; to urge
the ruling military council to vacate the political scene
as soon as possible; and for the Egyptian military to
take its place in a democratic system, subject to
accountability, transparency, and civilian oversight.
2. Maintain pressure on Field Marshall Tantawi and the
SCAF to repeal the Emergency Law. Partial steps or
cosmetic reforms are inadequate, and should not be
disproportionately appreciated. For example, Field
Marshall Tantawi’s statement that the SCAF would lift
the State of Emergency to mark the anniversary of the
beginning of the uprising on January 25 was
undermined by the caveat that it would continue to be
used “against thugs.” “Thugs” is a broad term, and
retaining the law means that the authorities retain the
power to search and detain anyone indefinitely on
suspicion. The repeal of the Emergency Law, which
has been almost continually in force since 1958, will
take more than just a statement from the ruler, and
should be carefully followed by U.S. policy makers.
3. The NGO raids are a direct challenge to human rights
and democracy promotion policies. The U.S.
government must use this moment to:
a) negotiate a durable arrangement with the
Egyptian authorities that will ensure the longterm
stability and integrity of U.S. assistance to
independent human rights and democracy
organizations in Egypt;
b) press for reform in laws governing the
functioning of NGOs; and
c) continue to deliver a strong response at the
highest levels to Egyptian officials – as
President Obama recently did in a call to Field
Marshall Tantawi, and through other high-level
contacts by U.S. officials -- to ensure that the
Egyptian authorities make progress towards
meeting the conditions set forth in the 2012
appropriations law.
Official harassment of civil society, and especially
of human rights organizations, is the norm in
Egypt, and has been since at least 1995. The
Egyptian authorities know that Egyptian human
rights organizations have little popular support in
Egypt and that they, in fact, serve a useful
propaganda purpose for the government by
providing clear evidence of the existence of the
nefarious “hidden hand” of foreign interference that
is conveniently blamed in government statements
and the official media for many of Egypt’s
problems.
There is a clear divide between the U.S. and
Egyptian government positions on foreign funding
of Egyptian NGOs and it suits the Egyptian
government for this divide to remain unbridged,
since it enables the Egyptians to portray the United
States as interfering and disrespectful of Egyptian
A HUMAN RIGHTS FIRST BLUEPRINT: EGYPT’S TRANSITION TO DEMOCRACY ONE YEAR ON 5
sovereignty – a line of argument that is widely
believed and plays into the foreign interference
narrative noted above.
A Durable Agreement on U.S. Democracy and Human
Rights Assistance
The U.S. government should use the opportunity of the
transition to a new civilian government and the escalation
of tension caused by the recent raids and attacks on
NGOs to move the bilateral conversation beyond the
stalemate that is serving the interests of antidemocratic
elements within the Egyptian government. To do that:
a) U.S. policy makers should stress as often and as
positively as possible the readiness of the U.S.
government to work with the Egyptian government
to continue to provide support to independent civil
society organizations working to promote
universal values in Egypt in ways that will be
acceptable to both sides, and that comply with
international standards.
b) The U.S. government should propose
consultations involving the new parliament and,
eventually, the government appointed by the new
president, and other governments involved in
funding human rights and democracy
organizations in Egypt. These consultations would
be aimed at protecting the independence of civil
society organizations and ensuring their right to
receive necessary financial support for their work
from domestic and international sources.
c) In such consultations, U.S. policy makers could
propose the creation of a voluntary standards
body for civil society organizations in Egypt. This
would be a counterproposal to efforts by Egyptian
officials to create a General Union for Civil
Associations that would be government-controlled
and that NGOs would be obliged to belong to.
Such centralized control and compulsion is alien
to the idea of independent civil society
There would be some benefits for civil society in the
creation of an independent Egyptian institution that
could play a role in promoting best practices for
Egyptian NGOs, enhancing NGO transparency and
accountability, and could even assist international
(and domestic) donors in identifying grant recipients –
as long as such a body would never exercise
monopoly control over NGO support in Egypt. Such a
body may be similar in composition to a more
independent version of Egypt’s National Human
Rights Council, or may be conceived of like a
domestic-focused Egyptian version of the U.S.
National Endowment for Democracy, that could take
funds from public and private sources and direct them
to independent NGOs under the supervision of an
independent board of directors.
Such an idea will require extensive input from
Egyptian civil society groups. One of its prime benefits
is that it would provide a way for the U.S. government
to indicate that it is not opposed to Egyptian
involvement in the oversight of foreign funds going to
Egyptian NGOs, thereby responding to one of the
Egyptian government’s main objections. The U.S.
government could, nevertheless, maintain a principled
opposition to government control over the work of
NGOs that strips them of independence, and to the
Egyptian government exercising a veto over U.S.
foreign assistance in the fields of democracy and
human rights. It could also provide vulnerable
Egyptian NGOs with much-needed local legitimacy
and official validation that would make it more difficult
for the authorities to defame and demonize them.
Legal Reform
d) U.S. officials should call for the revision of the
Law on Associations and Foundations (Law 84
of 2002), to free independent NGOs from
stifling government interference and
burdensome registration requirements.
Recently proposed amendments to the law do
not meet these requirements. They recycle a
repressive law announced by former Prime
Minister Abdelaziz Hegazy in March 2010, and
are inappropriate in the context of a new
democratizing Egypt.
4. The U.S. government should take advantage of the
new political conditions in Egypt to stimulate domestic
support for civil society human rights and democracypromotion
activities. The U.S. government can play a
role in encouraging Egyptian civil society
organizations to seek domestic financial support and
A HUMAN RIGHTS FIRST BLUEPRINT: EGYPT’S TRANSITION TO DEMOCRACY ONE YEAR ON 6
can offer training and capacity-building in this area; it
can encourage the Egyptian government to facilitate
the support of human rights and democracy-promotion
groups by local donors, and it can encourage wealthy
Egyptians and private Egyptian companies to extend
their philanthropy to independent human rights and
democracy-promotion groups that are a vital part of
any democratic society.
Human rights and democracy-promotion groups in
Egypt are damaged by the public perception that they
are influenced by foreign interests, fueled by the fact
that they receive almost all their funding from foreign
donors. Under the Mubarak regime it was impossible
for private individuals or business interests to support
human rights and democracy-promotion organizations
without running a substantial risk of becoming the
victims of government reprisals. A healthy Egyptian
civil society should be rooted in Egyptian society and
should meet increasing amounts of its needs from
local donors.
5. The United States should respond to widespread
demands in Egyptian society for greater transparency
in U.S. foreign assistance to Egypt.
As one NGO leader explained, “I don’t know why the
U.S. ambassador doesn’t give a press conference to
explain all the foreign aid the U.S. gives in Egypt in all
sectors, explain the benefits to the U.S. and to Egypt.”
Greater transparency can be achieved in many ways:
The embassy website should provide more
information in Arabic about U.S. foreign
assistance, its primary recipients by sector, its
purposes, and its benefits, in terms of Egyptian
and U.S. national interests.
The embassy should provide information about
the very large sums of foreign assistance,
amounting to tens of billions of dollars, provided to
Egypt over the last 30 years.
The ambassador and visiting U.S. officials should
be much more visible in the Egyptian media,
describing the foreign assistance program in all its
aspects, and should be proactive in correcting
distortions and misrepresentations that may
appear in the local media from time to time.
Many sectors of Egyptian society, including the
military and many government agencies, as well as
religious and charitable institutions of different kinds,
receive extensive financial support from international
sources. These sources include governmental aid
from Europe, North America, and other parts of the
developed world, but also large sums of donations to
religious institutions from private sources in the
Arabian Gulf. That U.S. foreign assistance to Egypt is
part of a much greater whole of foreign assistance
from many sources, and that assistance directed to
human rights and democracy organizations is a small
fraction of total U.S. assistance to Egypt, are not well
understood by many Egyptians. Greater transparency
and clear messaging can help to push back the weight
of disinformation and thereby support the
development of independent civil society groups.
6. The U.S. embassy in Cairo should mark this moment
of transition by embarking on a new approach of
closer engagement with independent human rights
and democracy-promotion organizations in Egypt.
Embassy staff should be in regular contact with
human rights activists in Cairo and throughout the
country. Where activists and organizations face
harassment and threats, clear public support from the
United States sends an important message of support
for the vital work of civil society activists in building a
democratic society in Egypt.
RED ARMY BOYZ
