… You say you want a con-sti-tu-tion.
A new poll released by the International Peace Institute sheds some light on the pulse of the public in Egypt.
What caught my attention was that concerns about the economy are growing as those of “democracy” are declining.
The verdict is — at least with this poll, but there have been others (see here and here) — what good are liberal notions of free speech, electoral choice, the existence of a vibrant media culture etc. when the neo-liberal policies that were orthodoxy under Sadat and Mubarak remain in place. Or, what good’s a constitution or a newspaper with dissident commentators, if you ain’t got a job and enough money to feed the family.
A gloss of several economic, labor, and poverty statistics in Egypt bears out the why of this emphasis on the economy.
Food prices continue to rise, up nearly 19% this year compared to last, with key staples such as vegetables and bread rising 39% and 33%, respectfully. The unemployment rate is officially 11.9%, among young people it is 25%, which is significant when 75% of the population is under the age of 35. Twenty-two percent of Egyptians live below the poverty line, another 20% hover just above it.
Meanwhile, the US and the EU have dangled loan guarantees before Egypt’s transitional government. So, too, has the G20, World Bank, and IMF. The Egyptian government has promised to boost wages and is projected to run a budget deficit of 9% this year. Its a setting that could produce a re-entrenchment of privatization and austerity. Or, if Egypt’s dynamic labor movement increases its push for wage increases and robust public sector participation in the economy, a setting for some serious re-distribution of wealth from the top to the bottom.
There’s several signs that they later could prevail. But the G20 nations and the Bretton Woods institutions still know a thing or two about coercion.
That IPI most likely didn’t query the 4.5 million or so poor who are packed tightly into the slums on the outskirts of Cairo, only adding weight to its conclusions.
Base material grievances undergirded the January revolt and will likely continue to provoke widespread anxiety. And they won’t be resolved by re-writing the constitution, which is not to say that the outcome of the elections or the juridical framework of the political system are not crucial concerns. Only that they elide the core matter of the economy.
But liberals like laws and constitutions, not analyses of power and institutions.
