Non-governmental organizations operate under severe constraints in Egypt. Those that seek to advance human rights and social justice through legal, political, and economic direct action are frequently harassed and confronted by state institutions. Nonetheless, in the final years under President Hosni Mubarak, NGOs carved out space for autonomous action within the overarching security regime. And, with the January 2011 uprising, they anticipated significant opportunities to promote democratic openings and reform the security apparatus. However, the quick seizure of power by the armed forces -- followed by the brief, polarized period of electoral democracy -- complicated these efforts. And then the powerful reassertion of state control in July 2013 upended these expectations entirely. The proposed paper will focus on the multiple challenges that face NGOs since July 2013 in the context of the uber-nationalism and eliminationist rhetoric that not only sought to repress Islamist voices but also to close all public spaces -- whether political, religious, professional, cultural, economic, educational or personal. The government imposed heightened restrictions on the operation of NGOs - and particularly advocacy organizations that had registered as companies or law firms - reflecting the regime's hostility to any autonomous actors and also the security perspective that subjects NGOs to intense surveillance as agents of hostile forces. Despite the atmosphere of suspicion, human rights and advocacy organizations continue to voice alternative societal visions, assist marginalized individuals and communities to counter repression, and hold the government to account, whether by legal defense for detainees, campaigns against torture and imprisonment, support for workers' strikes, or widely-publicized research that illuminates difficulties facing individuals and groups outside the monolithic religious and personal discourse (e.g. Baha'i, atheists, homosexuals). This paper complements the other panelist, who focus on the illiberal currents within the intelligentsia, i.e. those who condone - or have been coopted into - the uber-nationalist and eliminationist discourse. This paper shows that there are still individuals and groups that seek to articulate and achieve the values and aims expressed before and during the January uprising. Their struggles prevent the monolithic rhetoric from silencing alternative voices and are likely to provide the most important basis for a reaffirmation of discourse and practice grounded in social justice. The research is based on years of interviews and contact with Egyptian human rights organizations and immersion into contemporaneous research and analysis by Egyptian and foreign scholars and activists.

This paper explores some of the media and political discourses that provided the necessary ammunition for anti-Muslim Brotherhood repression in Egypt. The paper argues that foundational myths propagated about Mohamed Morsi and the Muslim Brothers, from which Morsi hailed, were adopted wholesale by privately owned media outlets, likely leading many Egyptians to view the group with considerable suspicion. Dominant discourses addressed here include the Brotherhood’s alleged disloyalty to Egypt and their anti-revolutionary nature. Arguably, a lack of professionalism among Egyptian news outlets may have contributed to the discursive campaign against the Brotherhood. Many private news owners, many of whom were sympathetic to Egypt’s ancien regime, enthusiastically embraced anti-Brotherhood politicians and analysts, and news professionals uncritically adopted anti-Brotherhood narratives. Unsurprisingly given Egypt’s lack of professional journalism standards, little attempt was given to provide balance or critical voice. Importantly, a relative explosion of media freedom following the anti-Mubarak uprising facilitated the coverage, which was often hysterical and could, in most cases, proceed without fear of substantive consequences for news owners, editors, and journalists.

In the 1930s influential ‘secular’ Egyptian thinkers like Taha Husayn and Muhammad Husayn Haykal turned to religious themes and Islamic history as part of their intellectual and political agenda, prompting Western scholars to speak of a ‘crisis of orientation.’ This judgment was challenged by a later generation of scholars who rejected a strict religious-secular binary and argued for a deeper understanding of popular discourse. Egypt’s liberals, they insisted, were not abandoning core ideals – they were promoting them in ways that might be characterized as inclusive of religious reformism. This paper will explore the ideological roots of a new liberal ‘crisis of orientation’ – one in which liberal voices appear to have adopted a more myopic binary between secular and religious paths toward democratic politics, and in so doing have contributed (not solely but significantly) to the fracturing of the January 2011 coalition that brought down Hosni Mubarak and – for a time – Egypt’s autocratic regime, and contributed to the polarization the marked the period between January 2011 and June 2013, and that which has followed. I focus on two influential public voices of the ‘liberal’ opposition, the comic Bassem Youssef and writer Alaa al-Aswany. Each faced a new public sphere in which rules had changed and political grounds shifted. Youssef’s meteoric rise and fall is the story of a suddenly open media with unprecedented freedom to pillory the ruler – one who happened to be an Islamist. His comic-satirical oeuvre warrants critical examination in terms of his stand vis-à-vis an elected government (however popular it may or may not have been). Aswany, a dynamo of the emergent anti-Mubarak movement and ‘hero’ of Tahrir Square, has been posited inside – and especially outside – Egypt as a moral spokesperson for democracy. His championing of popular dissent against the Morsi government and later validation of the reassertion of military rule may well be a cautionary tale for those who seek to move Egypt forward towards a true pluralism. To understand the present liberal ‘crisis’ we must, I argue, look to opportunities found and lost, and the fears (founded or not) that drove a wedge between secular and religious oriented forces for change.

Most research on Egypt conducted after 2011 leads readers to the same question “What happened to Egypt’s revolution?” Answers abound in explaining why Egypt today looks more like an authoritarian regime than in the final years of the Mubarak regime. No single factor or theory suffices to explain the complex political, economic, and social forces intersecting over the past four tumultuous years in Egypt’s history. Indeed, scholars are likely to spend many years, if not decades, deconstructing the buildup to and aftermath of what is now coined the “January 25th Revolution.” This article examines the role of the Egyptian judiciary in facilitating and impeding the populist demands for “bread, freedom, and social justice.” The article challenges the dominant narrative portraying Egypt’s judiciary as a relatively independent institution that serves as a regional exemplar in terms of sophistication, competency, and commitment to rule of law. While boasting a long history, the Egyptian judiciary has experienced ebbs and flows in its overarching trend towards more independence from the executive branch. I argue that the state of the on January 25, 2011 was at a low point in its historical struggle for independence from the executive, and has only worsened since. Endogenous and exogenous factors caused large portions of Egypt’s judiciary to betray its historical pursuit to serve as a check on authoritarianism and a refuge for citizens seeking relief from government abuse. In the end, this article brings to the forefront the paradox of Egypt’s judiciary: it is both too independent and not independent enough.