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As part of restricting public space and cracking down on civil society and opposition political parties, Egypt’s new authoritarian regime has tried to manage social activism through repression, undemocratic legal frameworks, and aggressive judicial tools. It has intensified its efforts to intimidate professional associations, student groups, and labor activists, and has also expanded its targets to include young human rights advocates and citizens who have publicly stood against police brutality. Egypt’s ruling generals may not be embattled yet, but, with the crackdown on civil society and the decline of party politics, these activist groups currently offer the greatest hope for changing the tide. This study examines the four main anti-authoritarian platforms that have shaped social activism in Egypt since 2013: 1) single-cause initiatives that are opposing human rights abuses and advocating for the rights and freedoms of the victims;2) professional associations that are defending freedoms of expression and association;3) student groups that are challenging the systematic interference of the security services in their affairs and the permanent presence of security forces on campuses; and 4) the labor movement that is galvanized by deteriorating economic and social conditions and by the government’s repression of labor activists. In addition, this chapter highlights how spontaneous eruptions of popular anger in response to human rights abuses have become politically significant.

Soon after the 2013 military coup, state-sponsored violence and human rights abuses have begun to shake Egyptian society. The regime of president Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has attempted to rationalize them, claiming that this is the only path to save the most populous Middle Eastern country from civil unrest, terrorism, and economic decay. Al-Sisi, the former army chief during the 2013 coup, initially portrayed his ascendency to power as the only way to restore security and end the threat of terrorism. Egypt’s generals have also recognized that they cannot rely only on the promise of restoring security to justify ending of the democratic opening (2011–2013) and their heavy-handed ruling techniques. Therefore, they have also been using a web of alternative narratives to justify their approach and have been spreading these narratives using security-controlled public and private media institutions. Conspiracy theories, defamation campaigns, and hate speech against voices of dissent have assumed central positions in this web. Increasingly, Egypt’s generals have come to depend on notions of religious and nationalistic populism to tighten their grip on many aspects of societal life—under the pretense that they are ruling on behalf of ordinary citizens and attending to their needs.

The military coup was staged in the summer of 2013. In the intervening period, Egypt’s ruling generals have succeeded in handcuffing the public space and bringing back fear as an everyday feature of life in a country that is still in dire straits. By various repressive measures, civilians have learned to fear the consequences of free expression and peaceful opposition. To this end as well, Egypt’s ruling generals have also adapted legal and legislative tools to persecute political enemies and eradicate the existence of autonomous civil society organizations. However, far less attention has been paid to the details surrounding the legal and legislative tools utilized by Egypt’s generals, and even less to the concerning implications these tools carry regarding notions of justice and the populace’s faith in the neutrality of public institutions. A thorough explanation and analysis are necessary to understand fully the functioning of the new authoritarianism. It is also of paramount importance to highlight the fact it is impossible to search for ways to restore a democratic transition in Egypt without a structured thinking about how to dismantle the legal and legislative framework of the new authoritarianism.

The relationship between religion and politics complicated efforts to develop a constitutional and legal framework for the post-revolution Egyptian state. During different stages of the transitional phase, this led to results that are dangerously misaligned with the principles of democracy and citizenship. During the period between 2011 and 2013, several constitutional and legal results emerged. New laws on the exercise of political rights, election procedures and political parties did not stipulate a ban on the use of religion for political, electoral, or partisan purposes. This provided a legal loophole for the use of religious slogans in politics and prevented the imposition of penalties on groups exploiting religious spaces for electoral campaigning and other political purposes. This situation is contradictory to inclusive, citizenship-based politics. It also leaves society vulnerable to serious risks related to political and partisan affiliations as well as to electoral behavior based on religious identity instead of ideas and goals common to all citizens, regardless of religion. In addition to the contradictions between the constitutional and legal results of the transitional phase and the principles of democracy and citizenship resulting from the mixing of religion and politics in post-revolution Egypt, another set of political contradictions resulted from the ongoing use of religion in politics by conflicting groups. These contradictions, among other factors, prevented the success of efforts to foster democracy, citizenship and power devolution.

What role do mainstream Islamist movements play in Arab politics? With their popular messages and broad social base, would their incorporation as normal political actors be the best hope for democratization or democracy’s bane? For too long, we have tried to answer such questions solely by speculating about the true intentions of the movements and their leaders. Islamists in the Arab world are increasingly asked about their true intentions. To hear them tell it, leaders of Islamist movements in the Arab world are democrats without democracy: they are firmly committed to the outcome of clean and fair electoral processes. It is rulers and regimes that should be pressed on their democratic commitments, not their oppositions.

The first wave of academic writings on Islamists emerged in the Arab world after the war of June 1967 and the subsequent resurfacing of religious ideologies and religiously inspired social and political movements. Examples in this first wave include works by the Syrian philosopher Sadiq Jalal al-ʿAzm, the Egyptian philosopher Hassan Hanafi, and the Moroccan historian ʿAbdullah al-ʿArawi. These writings advanced three insights. First, the rise of “religious movements,” “religious currents,” and “religious ideologies”—the term islāmī or Islamist was yet to be coined—was seen by some writers as a serious challenge to the legitimacy of the secular state and the secular idea of Pan-Arabism. Second, other writers accused Arab ruling establishments in modernizing countries—the reference was primarily to post-1967 Egypt—of using religious currents and ideologies to enhance the state's popularity and legitimacy in times of crisis. Third, Wahhabism and petrodollars were held responsible by some for the resurfacing of religious currents and their increased appeal in the contest with secular ideas. Most of the writings of the first wave were Egypt centered and were clearly inspired by an antireligious sentiment that saw religious movements and currents as representing an existential threat to secular modernization and progress.

Why have human rights been marginalized in the Arab world? How do we gauge the relevance of human rights in the region, given the political, social, and economic context? What are the practical and theoretical obstacles to the implementation of these rights? Human Rights in the Arab World: Independent Voices offers perspectives from those at the forefront of research on human rights and Islam, globalization, transnational advocacy, and the politics of key states such as Egypt, Morocco, and Yemen. Some chapters provide essential historical background to current political realities, while others consider ways to confront this region's practical and theoretical challenges to human rights. By placing the question of human rights in the often tragic context of Arab politics, the very real stakes are made clear.

Der 11. September loste im arabischen Raum erneut eine Debatte uber das Verhaltnis zum Westen aus. Der einhelligen Verurteilung der Terroranschlage und der anfanglichen Welle der Solidaritat mit den USA folgten die Suche nach den Grunden der islamistischen Gewalt sowie eine Auseinandersetzung mit der Bedrohung einiger arabischer und islamischer Lander im Rahmen der Anti-Terror-Kampagne. In zahlreichen Publikationen greifen arabische Intellektuelle in ihren aktuellen Beitragen zunehmend auf altere Positionen und ideologisch gepragte Erklarungsmuster zuruck, die sich in den 90er Jahren im Kontext der Globalisierungsdebatte artikulieren liesen.

Der 11. September 2001 loste im arabischen Raum erneut eine Debatte uber das Verhaltnis zum Westen aus. Der einhelligen Verurteilung der Terroranschlage und der anfanglichen Welle der Solidaritat mit den USA folgten die Suche nach den Grunden der islamistischen Gewalt sowie eine Auseinandersetzung mit der Bedrohung einiger arabischer und islamischer Lander im Rahmen der Anti-Terror-Kampagne. In zahlreichen Pressepublikationen greifen arabische Intellektuelle in ihren aktuellen Beitragen zunehmend auf altere Positionen und ideologisch gepragte Erklarungsmuster zuruck, die sich in den 90er Jahren im Kontext der Globalisierungsdebatte artikulieren liesen.