Via The Arabist, I found this primer on the new Egyptian constitution, by one Zaid Al-Ali at Open Democracy. Very thorough, and plausibly seeking to lay out the good news and the bad, from a broadly liberal perspective. The summation:
Altogether, in comparison with Egypt’s constitutional traditions, the new text is not the disaster that its detractors claim it is… It is also clear that Egypt’s constitutional reform is far from over. The coming parliamentary elections will determine not only how the text will be applied, but also its prospects for surviving the coming period.
Regarding the Islamist content:
…but the elections brought an Islamic majority to parliament and a president who is affiliated to the Muslim Brotherhood, which considers that religion is the answer. Their beliefs were translated into specific constitutional provisions which some in the opposition camp have alleged establish a religious state in violation of a commitment to maintain the existence of a “civil state” (see below). A close reading of the new constitution does not support that allegation, although there is some worrying wording that is in need of more clarity. In summary however, the constitution builds on the notion that Egypt is a religiously inspired state, but does not actually establish a religious state per se.
Reflecting the author’s liberal orientation and comparative-constitutionalist chops:
…constitutions in many post-revolutionary societies are often used to promote and defend values that are not always necessarily in line with the majority’s values. Strong constitutional protections can often spearhead a positive change in society… A case in point is the abolition of the death penalty in South Africa despite the fact that it was and remains very popular in many circles.
One particular devil in the details:
The final draft however overturned whatever progress might have been made by explicitly stating that civilians can be tried by military courts for crimes that “harm the armed forces” (article 198).
There’s more about the worrisome process for drafting and establishing the constitution, and about presidential powers. RTWT.
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I’m not very familiar with the field of Comparative Constitutionalism (a sensible professor I met at Skidmore College, Beau Breslin, has some books on the subject I mean to get to eventually), but articles like this make one understand its importance, and why Americans studying their own Constitution might benefit from it as well. And incidentally, one of the best defenses of our Constitution from the criticisms typically brought against it is a single chapter penned by our Jim Ceaser, at the end of his still-100% essential Liberal Democracy and Political Science.
December 28th, 2012 | 2:42 pm
[...] Via The Arabist, I found this primer on the new Egyptian constitution, by one Zaid Al-Ali at Open Democracy. Very thorough, and plausibly seeking to lay out the good news Source: Postmodern Conservative [...]
December 28th, 2012 | 8:25 pm
I find it cute that you’re still pretending there’s any doubt at all about how the little game being played in Egypt will end…
December 28th, 2012 | 9:17 pm
Thanks, Carl, for the fair and balanced analysis. Hard to keep one’s balance in the maestrom of the moment. And you’re right: Jim’s book continues to illumine (I assume you have in mind his discussion of the cultural preconditions of establishing a viable liberal democracy, a hybrid regime that needs constant “supervision”?)
December 28th, 2012 | 11:38 pm
Brian, perhaps you will be proven right.
But it isn’t so clear right now…and the fact that this is the nation’s first constitution that has gone through some of the processes of representative democracy is one worth celebrating. Tentatively.
As for the notion that it shows you that some of the Muslim Brothers are ready to give Islam-grounded Constitutional Democracy a sustained try, I remain very skeptical about the numbers of that “some” and their capacity for political endurance.
But how can I, or the Obama administration for that matter, dismiss the idea altogether?
Since many Egyptians, liberal-secularist, Christian, and Muslim, take it seriously?
Since even if Morsi in his heart of hearts rejects it, is an Islamism or death sort of Muslim, he may still have to hew to it, given the way he sees that his apparently anti-constitutional pronouncements have brought the nation to the brink of civil war?
I am a Christian and regard Islam as a heresy. Bad consequences flowing from it do not surprise me. Nor is it’s long history of violence towards Christians, even when comparatively considered in the light of the violence and humiliation European imperialism inflicted upon Muslims circa 1798-1950, forgotten by me. Nor do I ignore the continuing body-count in places like Nigeria.
But if Islam’s theological-political vector is to be reformed in a way that makes it less susceptible to Islamist interpretation, then we might be seeing the some of the first really practical signs of this in Egypt.
Lord knows if I were a Christian in Egypt (as is 10% of the population) that is what I’d be praying for.
December 29th, 2012 | 12:34 pm
[...] Egypt’s New Constitution – Carl Scott, PoMoCon [...]
December 29th, 2012 | 12:46 pm
Carl,
Maybe some sort of grounds (other than happy-talk from academic ideologues and the foreign policy establishment and P.R. from MB front groups) exist for your tentative optimism about developments in Egypt. I doubt it, but I don’t claim any expertise in this area. The shifting views and enthusiasms of the MB’s amateurish opponents in Egypt (some of whom maybe could be loosely be described as “liberal” in some sense) seem a poor guide to future events.
The questions that occurs to me is this: Aren’t we Americans misplacing our priorities by focusing on the prospects for “democracy” in places like Egypt? Shouldn’t our focus have been on transitioning Egypt from Mubarak (who was finished) to some sort of regime, whether or not democratic in any meaningful sense, that would be congruent with our interests in the region, while protecting Egyptian minorities and furthering Egypt’s development toward self-sufficiency (at present, it cannot pay for the food it imports)? Shouldn’t our unfortunate experiences in Iraq and Afghanistan have cured us of the inclination to try to stage-manage “transitions to democracy” in cultures vastly different from our own, particularly Islamic cultures? Shouldn’t we be more concerned with the future of liberal democracy here at home, where it seems that it can no longer be taken for granted in the long term?
Finally, you refer to “the violence and humiliation European imperialism inflicted upon Muslims circa 1798-1850.” Was the violence and humiliation you refer to any worse than the violence and humiliation Muslims had been inflicting on each other, and on other peoples, for the millennium-plus of Islamic history before 1798? Your reference seems to assume that the problems of the Islamic Middle East today are the fault of European imperialists who have been gone for generations. This may be the fashionable line in academia, but that does not make it true.
December 29th, 2012 | 6:06 pm
djf, I guess the British didn’t try to hook the Egyptian, Persian, and Indian Muslim populations onto opium the way they did with the Chinese, but that doesn’t mean other real violence and injustice wasn’t done. And the memories of those injustices remain a big part, for better and usually for worse, of the Arab identity, the modern Muslim identity, etc. I have a low respect for 80% of what comes out of academia under the rubric of “post-colonial studies,” but conservatives have to understand that the consciousness of the “West’s” crimes remain vivid ones in Egypt, India, Persia, China, Africa, etc. And many of those crimes were quite real and quite diametrically contradicted Christianity, and often liberal republicanism also. Apology-ism or white guilt should not frame our present foreign policy, but awareness of the continued anger over those crimes is simple prudence.
I’m completely with you in thinking that the ideal U.S. policy, once it was clear that Mubarak was toast, would have been to try to exert pressure in a way that would put a liberal government, even one less than fully democratic, in place.
Or as you put it, “…some sort of regime, whether or not democratic in any meaningful sense, that would be congruent with our interests in the region, while protecting Egyptian minorities…”
But let me quote you further: “Shouldn’t our unfortunate experiences…have cured us of the inclination to try to stage-manage “transitions to democracy” in cultures vastly different from our own, particularly Islamic cultures?”
There’s a slight contradiction in your wanting us to try to “stage manage” progress towards rule of law government in Egypt and yet warning us big time against “stage-managing” transitions to democracy. But with simply the first sort of “managing” or “influencing” in view, the problem is HOW. You’d think with Egypt receiving more of our financial aid than any other nation we’d have plenty of levers to pull, but in a revolutionary situation, or at least, in a situation of constitutional transition, wherein the authority itself is unclear, I think the Obama administration has been at a loss.
They know they can’t come out and say, “We want a government just like this” and expect Egyptians to fall in line. And I do think their polly-annish rhetorical stance about the Arab Spring and Islamic democracy hasn’t helped the Obama admin in deciding what it wants to push for, and in being taken seriously by the various parities. I also assume the Obama admin has sent back-channel signals to the MB, Morsi, the secularists, and the army, all for the sake of influencing things, that we won’t know about for some time. I certainly hope, for example, that we’ve been telling all parties that, “allow greater persecution of the Christian minority, and your aide is gone,” and likewise with a few demands about Israel and terrorist-harboring/aiding.
And remember, we didn’t ask for the Egyptians to try democracy. They demanded it themselves. So all American players, whether die-hard neo-cons, conservative critics of Iraq II, and even “Bush Lied People Died” Obama Democrats have to roll with that.
December 29th, 2012 | 6:40 pm
Excellent and thought provoking article. Especially gratifying are the informed comments (not this one!) which provide depth to the discussion.
December 29th, 2012 | 7:37 pm
Carl, I never said that Western imperialism was an innocent endeavor – just that it is doubtful that the West introduced into the Islamic world violence or injustice in greater measure than was present in that part of the world before 1798. In the case of Islamic countries, I think the West’s footprint was quite light compared with other parts of the world (e.g., the Belgian Congo and, as you mentioned, China). Also, Western imperialism was nothing unique in world history – the West was just playing by the same rules by which powerful governments had played since the beginning of civilization (re-read the Bible, if you doubt this). The former Western colonies, now that they are independent, have no compunction about continuing to play by these rules (see e.g. Turkey’s persecution of the Kurds, China’s annexation of Tibet – I could go on). The developing world is well aware of the now-conventional Western view that we owe them some sort of apology, and are quite adept at cynically taking advantage of this remorse. I see no reason to allow them to continue this racket, but I realize that mine is a minority view.
I did not say that we should not try to influence the power transition in Egypt. I think we should have used our influence with the Egyptian military to put in place an acceptable (i.e. non-MB) new government to replace Mubarak. This would not have involved trying to stage manage a transition to democracy – which is a much more difficult proposition. I do not think Egypt is anywhere near being ready for meaningful democracy, regardless of the slogans chanted by the crowds in Tahrir Square. In any event, I don’t think that it’s our job to try to facilitate the installation of nominally democratic governance everywhere a crowd of unrepresentative, 20-something yuppies start demonstrating for it.
December 29th, 2012 | 9:01 pm
“I certainly hope, for example, that we’ve been telling all parties that, “allow greater persecution of the Christian minority, and your aide is gone,” and likewise with a few demands about Israel and terrorist-harboring/aiding.”
The chances that this is happening are zero. Please tell me you know that your hopes are completely in vain.
To me, one of the most disheartening trends in post-Iraq US foreign policy is the complete jettisoning of moral concerns, by all sides. Having grown up on the right late in the Cold War, this is truly heartbreaking. Don’t take my cynicism up above as not caring, or that I’m any sort of isolationist of any sort. This issue is the main reason I can’t be a Paulnut, or tolerate conservative flavors like those on display at AmCon. I want the Arab world’s Walesa, Havel, Sharansky, etc., to know that the US stands with them. I know that the US coddling of Arab dictators sets an awful history, but we’re not even trying to make up for it even now.
Clinton at least had to make noises in 1992 about moral issues–his big foreign policy positions in that election, if you recall, were that Bush I had let Saddam off the hook, and that he hadn’t been forceful enough to the ChiComs after Tienanmen Square. I know Obama’s supporters would claim he has made similar noises, but his record is awful, awful, awful.
Liberal Egyptians are getting, and are going to get, completely steamrolled.
December 29th, 2012 | 9:45 pm
No, Islamic countries cannot be allowed to wave the red sheet of post colonialism because it in effect rewards them for a cognitive dissonance that must instead be confronted. It’s especially weird to see from a religious site because it adopts the view that the rise of radical Islam is inspired purely by rage or need for a dolorifuge. In reality, radical Islam harkens back precisely to those golden ages the previous poster references. The age of Islamic imperialism and domination. The rise of radical Islam is in effect a body building course for the Islamic body politic not a response to trauma. Your position is a lot like saying sure Hitler was wrong in his conclusions, but you have to admit the stab in the back theory is plausible.
December 30th, 2012 | 10:20 am
djf, there’s a lot to what you say. You and I are closer on this than perhaps appears. I just suspect that the possibility of the Egyptian military being able to push for a better, more constitutional, version of the Mubarak regime, even had it known it had tenacious and focused Obama admin support for this, wasn’t really there.
But now, we have a process that’s unfolded. In the name of democracy. In the name of constitutionalism. That’s what we have to deal with now. Brian may be right about the fate of Egyptian liberals, but meantime, don’t we have an obligation to do what we can to fight against that? And don’t American conservatives have an obligation to stand with those liberals even if they judge their cause to be “premature?” I don’t see why a stance of, “We think you should have hesitated more to totally de-legitimize Mubarak, but we will nonetheless do what little we can to aide you and the cause of constitutionalism now,” would be contradictory. It would have the benefit, for American conservatives, at least, of being a more generous, less doom-ful, and less of a damn-Obama-coming-and-going, stance. It would also face and thus learn about the reality of an Egyptian constitution that really might take hold long-term, and which meantime becomes a primary political battleground there.
December 30th, 2012 | 10:25 am
Oh, and thanks, Will!
December 30th, 2012 | 10:38 pm
Carl, I think you may misunderstand the Obama administration’s goals with regard to Egypt. Based on the administration’s actions since coming into office, it appears to my inexpert eye that Obama’s goal is to empower the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and anywhere else he can. The rhetoric about “democracy” and “human rights” is just window dressing, about as meaningful as Obama’s self-description as a “centrist” and “pragmatist.” This interpretation seems to best explain what Obama has been doing in the Middle East for the last 4 years. I see no reason to believe that Obama has the slightest interest in helping the liberals and Christians against the Muslim Brotherhood. I also doubt that Obama cares a whit about helping Egypt to achieve a functioning economy; he seems to be happy to go on sending them care packages of aid. I do not see why American conservatives to support the administration in these destructive endeavors.
December 31st, 2012 | 8:31 am
Well, I part ways with you there djf…I certainly do not think that about Obama, and would be utterly shocked to find otherwise. I can recite chapter and verse about why the man really was (and might remain) a democratic socialist, but this stuff about his having a crypto-Muslim agenda is very far-fetched.
December 31st, 2012 | 1:07 pm
In light of what Obama has done in Egypt, Syria, and Libya, his coddling of Pakistan, his fawning over the Islamist thug who governs Turkey (reportedly, his favorite foreign leader), his movement toward legitimation of Hamas, and his utter indifference to the Iranian opposition to the mullahs (not the MB, of course, but another form of Islamism), I do not think my surmise is at all outlandish. Indeed, I think my conclusion is dictated by application of Occam’s razor. To be clear, I am not saying that Obama is a “Muslim” or that he believes that Islam has some special moral validity not shared with other religions, but he does seem to view the Islamists (other than Al Queda and, to some extent, the Taliban) as the expression of the authentic “will of the people” in the Islamic world and, therefore, a force entitled to the support of the US as part of its commitment to “democratic values” (as reinterpreted by New Left academics over the last 50 years, a reinterpretation that has by now infiltrated America’s diplomatic, corporate, media and military elites).
Again, I don’t claim expertise in this area. For an example of someone who is a scholar in this field and essentially shares this interpretation of the Obama administration’s behavior, see the writings of Barry Rubin (available at PJ Media, among other places on the Web). I assume that you will find that Rubin’s an outlook far different from whatever is an offer in The Arabist.
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