How does the challenge of generating and sustaining economic growth limit the inclusivity and directions of democratic transitions? Based on the case study of post-2011 Egypt, this paper reconsiders dominant theoretical understandings of the relationship between democratic transitions and neo-liberal economic reform. Following the collapse of the USSR, many scholars correlated the emergence of democracy with economic liberalization in post-Soviet states. Based on interviews from relevant leaders in the US and Egypt, primary documents including Egypt’s Closing Account of the General Budget, and material acquired from international financial institutions, this paper argues elites from both the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces as well as around the newly elected Brotherhood president pursue economic policies that exclude popular social forces. This continues to enable crony capitalism and is producing more continuity than change in the government’s practices. Specifically, the paper examines how ties between transnational actors and those that oversee and distribute capital accumulation in Egypt help define and maintain an exclusivist political arena. Thus, it explores this topic by using the elites’ reform discourse, economic indicators from the state budget, and foreign direct investment to examine the changes and continuities in Egypt since Mubarak’s resignation. Therefore, elements that will be considered in this paper include examining economic growth in the context of declining revenue injections, the effect of the unaccountable “officers’ economy” on the economy, and the relationship between domestic power wielders and international actors and the ways in which this shapes the practice of contentious politics. By examining political transitions through a lens of political economy, we gain the capacity to explain lingering continuities and a lack of reform such as in the security sector or in the field of education. More than path dependent, explaining transitions through a political economy approach exposes the crevasse between what elites are trying to do and how it produces resistance to these plans. Thus, such research findings become crucial for explaining the ongoing processes of political change in transitional settings because of how it defines and redefines incumbency and opposition. This paper seeks to contribute to the established debates on the political economy of transitions by adding a prominent case from the Arab world.