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With the decline of party politics in Egypt, social activism is becoming increasingly relevant in the fight against the government’s new authoritarian policies and tactics. While Egypt’s ruling generals have developed a tight grip on power in virtually every sector of society, various activist groups have had at least some success in holding the government accountable for human rights abuses. It will take many more victories to counteract the entrenched repression, but these groups offer the best hope for changing Egypt’s current reality. 

The Struggle

• Since 2013, four anti-authoritarian platforms—led by young activists, professional associations, student groups, and workers and civil servants—have shaped social activism in Egypt.
• Spontaneous eruptions of popular anger have also become politically significant.
• In contrast, opposition parties have become less significant. Unable to carve out a stable, independent role in Egyptian politics, they are gradually turning to activist initiatives to exert some influence.
• Young activists remain committed to single human rights causes, primarily focused on extrajudicial killings, forced disappearances, or torture in places of custody.
• Certain professional associations—particularly the Syndicate of Doctors and Syndicate of Journalists—have ramped up their demands for autonomy and freedoms of expression and association.
• Students are challenging the security services’ interference in their affairs and the presence of government and private security forces on campuses.
• Workers and civil servants remain highly engaged, continuing to voice the economic and social demands of organized labor.
• Citizens have frequently taken to the streets to protest specific government policies and practices, as well as accumulating human rights abuses.

The Impact

• The government is using repression, undemocratic legal frameworks, and aggressive judicial tools to try to extinguish social activism. A large number of activists have been detained and arrested.
• Yet, the activism has restored pluralist politics to professional associations and increased popular awareness of the daily instances of repression.
• Labor activism has not been quashed, despite the banning of independent unions and the frequent referral of protesters to military courts; nor has the government’s renewed co-optation of the General Union of Egyptian Workers silenced the protesting of deteriorating economic and social conditions.
• The government’s tactics have also failed to vanquish student activism. Students continue to hold protests and have successfully mobilized against pro-government candidates in student union elections.
• The frequency of popular protests has resulted in a relatively effective push back against the impunity of police personnel implicated in human rights abuses.

Introduction

Egypt’s ruling generals are cracking down on civil society and secular opposition parties and severely inhibiting Islamist movements. The regime has empowered the security services to exercise outright repression and since 2013 has enacted numerous undemocratic laws with little resistance from a submissive legislature. Meanwhile, the media has propagated populist rhetoric that legitimates the unchecked power of the generals and ridicules demands for democratic alternatives.

In the face of this holistic repressive campaign, various pro-democracy politicians and opposition parties have grown demoralized and lost hope. For them, the current Egyptian reality offers few opportunities to effect democratic change and protect human rights. Thus, at first glance, it seems that the new authoritarian government has succeeded in equating the post-2011 brief democratic opening with chaos and the worsening of social and economic conditions. Egypt’s civil society appears to be dominated by the military establishment and overshadowed by the double-sided image of an authoritarian government and a powerless opposition—reflecting just how effective the crackdown on liberal, leftist, and Islamist parties has been.

Since 2013, popular protests spearheaded by young activists, professional associations, student groups, and the labor movement have been shaping Egypt’s reality.

However, this picture ignores another crucial narrative: the emergence of resilient and adaptable social activism. Since 2013, popular protests spearheaded by young activists, professional associations, student groups, and the labor movement have been shaping Egypt’s reality as much as individual initiatives taking on human rights abuses and police brutality. These actors are linked by the absence of ideology and partisan banners and by their resilience to authoritarian tools and tactics. They hold the promise of restoring a degree of openness in the public space and of reviving pluralist politics despite the generals’ stiff resistance.

The Limitations of Party Politics

Parties on the right and left have taken one of two positions since the 2013 coup: either endorse or condemn the policies of the new authoritarian government. Neither position has prevented the decline of the parties’ political roles.¹ Egyptian parties—facing a government that interferes systematically in elections to organize comfortable majorities and a security apparatus determined to restrict their outreach activities and to drown them in internal conflicts—have not been able to carve out a stable and independent space for their role in politics. The reality of marginalization has pushed some parties to deprioritize politics and move closer to collective actors such as student groups and the labor movement in the hopes of escaping the authoritarian grip. However, there too the government has limited the parties’ role using intimidation and prosecution.

Signs of Unwavering Support

Despite the current landscape, some political parties have opted to collaborate with the ruling generals to embed themselves in the legislative and executive branches of government. Their positions are not changing, even as the hegemony of the military establishment and security services is rising within the state apparatus and in key sectors of society. This trend is manifested most clearly in the ascendancy of the former minister of defense, Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, to the presidential office in 2014 and in the expansion of the army’s role in the economy.

Some political parties have opted to collaborate with the ruling generals to embed themselves in the legislative and executive branches of government.

Notable among these groups are the New Wafd Party, the Free Egyptians Party, the Congress Party, the Egyptian Social Democratic Party, the Nation’s Future Party, the Democratic Front, and the National Progressive Unionist Party. The Wafd and Social Democratic parties led the formation of the first cabinet after the 2013 coup and enjoyed strong representation in the Constituent Assembly tasked with amending the country’s constitution. Other parties, including the Free Egyptians, Nation’s Future, and Congress parties, have endorsed governmental policies without equivocation and have been rewarded with parliamentary representation.

In the 2015 parliamentary elections, the pro-authoritarian parties nominated candidates and won seats in the House of Representatives.² The Free Egyptians Party gained sixty-five seats, while the Nation’s Future and Wafd parties won fifty-three and thirty-five seats, respectively. Smaller parties also won seats: for example, twelve seats went to the Congress Party, four seats to the Social Democratic Party, and one seat to the Unionist Party.³ Although the security services promoted non-party-affiliated candidates and made sure they earned a majority of the seats, the pro-authoritarian parties, apart from the Social Democratic Party, have not faltered in their support for the ruling generals.

These parties also continue to tout the government’s populist rhetoric.⁴ They describe the 2013 coup as a revolution against Islamist fascism, deny the role of the military establishment and security services in human rights abuses, and frequently blame the Muslim Brotherhood—and less frequently pro-democracy groups—for sowing the seeds of violence and instability in Egypt.⁵ The leftist Unionist Party, for example, issued a statement in June 2015 lauding the 2013 coup:

[It] was an unprecedented popular revolution that aimed to save the Egyptian society and the nation from the terrorist Muslim Brotherhood and to end the rule of the Brotherhood’s Guidance Office. It saved Egypt from conspiracies (put forward by domestic, regional, and international enemies) to break up the state and destroy the nation’s army. It saved Egypt from the terrorist militias of the Muslim Brotherhood that violently tried to tear our society along sectarian, religious, and ideological dividing lines.⁶

The liberal-leaning Free Egyptians Party has employed similar rhetoric to mythologize the coup as a revolution and to portray the ruling generals as saviors and modernizers.⁷ The party stated that it was necessary to maintain the 2013 revolutionary spirit to “carry out the more important revolution: the revolution of work, production, knowledge, and social revolution and the revolution in religious discourse.”⁸ In various other statements, it frequently used the government’s assertions that Egypt was on the path to a democratic transition and that the creation of a modern civil state and the emancipation of politics from religion were in sight.⁹ The party has even accused the Muslim Brotherhood of being driven by fascists and supporting terrorism, while claiming that the military establishment and security services are being unjustly implicated in human rights abuses.¹⁰

Signs of Opposition

While some parties have shown unwavering support, others have opposed the generals from the beginning or have switched to emerging opposition platforms over time. Several liberal and leftist parties have distanced themselves from the new authoritarian government as of early 2017, after initially siding with the generals as they performed the 2013 coup and remaining silent about their crackdown on voices of dissent and pro-democracy groups.

While some parties have shown unwavering support, others have opposed the generals from the beginning or have switched to emerging opposition platforms over time.

For example, the Constitution Party participated extensively in the immediate post-coup power arrangement. Mohamed ElBaradei, the party’s founder, was appointed vice president on July 9, 2013.¹¹ Other key figures participated in the first cabinet after the coup and in the Constituent Assembly.¹² However, ElBaradei resigned on August 14, 2013, in protest of the forced dispersal and mass killing of Muslim Brotherhood supporters during their sit-ins. He accused the government of violating basic human rights and shedding blood instead of searching for political solutions to the Islamist opposition to the coup. Since the founder’s resignation, party leaders have gradually begun to oppose the ruling generals and their new authoritarian tactics.

Other parties have found themselves in similar situations, most notably the left-leaning Socialist People’s Alliance Party and the Nasserist Dignity Party. Along with several smaller liberal and leftist parties, they coalesced to form a platform named the Democratic Current.¹³ Since late 2013, the Democratic Current has grown more vocal in its opposition. It has issued several statements to condemn the passing of undemocratic laws, such as the Protest Law and the Terrorism Law, and to call on the government to end human rights abuses, including torture, forced disappearances, and the referral of civilians to military trials.¹⁴ In the 2014 presidential election, the Democratic Current refused to support Sisi and instead backed Hamdeen Sabahy, a leftist political veteran and a founding member of the Dignity Party.¹⁵

The opposing platform has pushed back against the government’s repression, condemning the detention for political purposes of scores of young Egyptians, the involvement of the security services in torture, and the use of excessive force against peaceful demonstrators and protesting workers.¹⁶ It has supported independent nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) facing rising pressure from the government—including forced closures and the banning of various activists from travel.¹⁷ And it has stood in solidarity with workers’ groups and members of professional associations defending the freedoms of association and expression.¹⁸

As a result of its efforts, the Democratic Current continues to garner the support of other disenchanted parties, such as the Social Democratic Party.¹⁹ This party repositioned itself after severe internal tensions and resignations en masse, led by the party’s foremost pro-authoritarian members.²⁰ The opposition also includes parties that did not endorse the 2013 coup from the beginning. As the ruling generals were ascending to power in 2013 and 2014, these parties moved from reserved opposition to full-fledged rejection. The Strong Egypt Party, with semi-liberal and semi-religious leanings, emerged in this context, as did the Bread and Freedom Party that has garnered the support of young leftist activists and students.²¹ Both parties boycotted the 2014 presidential and 2015 parliamentary elections because of the government’s systematic interference that undermined any democratic potential. They have also criticized the government’s involvement in human rights abuses and collaborated with young activist protesters, student groups, professional associations, and the labor movement.²²

In a formal political arena controlled by the military establishment and security services, making critical statements about official policies has become the opposition’s primary tool. Some independent parliamentarians, as well as the few parliamentarians representing the Democratic Current and the Social Democratic Party, have used their seats to establish a parliamentary coalition that has become an opposing voice in the House of Representatives.²³ Yet, the sweeping pro-government majority has sustained the rubber-stamp character of Parliament and has ensured that the body’s legislative and oversight roles remain limited.²⁴ The government’s tight grip on power continues to successfully marginalize political parties and quell their opposition efforts.

Little Challenge to the Authoritarian Surge

The growing opposition of some liberal and leftist parties has not prevented the generals from closing the pubic space or mocking formal politics. Statements condemning undemocratic laws have not forced the government to change its position.²⁵ Similarly, increased criticism of human rights abuses has not discouraged the security services from conducting wide-scale repression.²⁶ The Democratic Current and other opposing political parties have been unable to stymie the oppression of independent NGOs, professional associations, and organized labor. In other words, the actions of opposition parties have not elicited any real change in the policies that the government has implemented since 2013, nor in the power arrangement that emerged to subjugate citizens and society to the domination of the military establishment and security services.²⁷

The growing opposition of some liberal and leftist parties has not prevented the generals from closing the pubic space or mocking formal politics.

In fact, the government’s response has been to implement even harsher policies. For example, in 2016, members of the Syndicate of Doctors publicly protested repeated police attacks on physicians and nurses administering medical support in public hospitals.²⁸ To demonstrate solidarity and support, representatives of various opposition parties attended a general assembly held by the syndicate.²⁹ Immediately after the meeting, citing the politicization of the doctors’ protests (through party involvement), the government moved legally and judicially to crush the syndicate.³⁰

Similar events unfolded in the spring of 2016. The Syndicate of Journalists was at the core of peaceful protests against a maritime border agreement signed between Egypt and Saudi Arabia, based on which the Egyptian government recognized Saudi Arabia’s sovereignty over the Egyptian-administered Red Sea islands of Tiran and Sanafir. The agreement sparked popular protests, led by young activists and various liberal and leftist opposition parties that for the first time since the 2013 coup seemed willing to confront the government. The syndicate’s headquarters became the geographical focal point for the opposition.³¹ In response, and once again citing the politicization of the syndicate’s role by the opposition parties, the government ordered the security services to encircle the syndicate for several days and to close all roads leading to it. Security forces arrested journalists participating in the protests, accused the elected board of the syndicate of inciting violence, and drummed up litigation against three members of the elected board.³²

Aware of the limitations imposed on their roles in the public space and in formal politics, opposition parties have sought new outreach activities. Some parties, especially the Strong Egypt and Bread and Freedom parties, have attempted to organize loyal student groups. Other parties, such as those part of the Democratic Current, have focused their actions on preparing candidates for the municipal elections scheduled for 2017, articulating bold plans to contest the presidential elections in 2018, and highlighting the ongoing economic and social failures of the ruling generals as well as their human rights abuses.³³

However, even these activities have not altered the structural weakness of opposition parties. Targeted constituencies—such as young activists, students, and the urban middle class, particularly affected by the deteriorating living conditions in Egypt—have lost their trust in parties and party politics. Contributing factors have been (1) the flip-flopping of some parties between legitimating the 2013 coup and later rejecting the policies of the generals, (2) the initial silence of several opposition parties regarding human rights abuses, and (3) the continued failure of all opposition parties to articulate concrete policy platforms that offer sound solutions for the country’s economic and social problems.

Perhaps realizing the parties’ incapacity to effect change and loss of constituency support, Egypt’s ruling generals have focused more on cracking down on Islamist movements, independent NGOs, and other emerging activist groups.

Perhaps realizing the parties’ incapacity to effect change and loss of constituency support, Egypt’s ruling generals have focused more on cracking down on Islamist movements, independent NGOs, and other emerging activist groups.³⁴ Only a few cases of detention and a limited number of arrest warrants have been reported in relation to members of opposition parties. Also, party leaders have not faced the ongoing defamation campaign from the government-controlled public and private media.

The Splintering of Islamist Movements

Different Islamist movements have exhibited different trajectories since 2013. Some have experienced the full brunt of government-sponsored repression because of their opposition to the authoritarian power arrangement. Others have sided with the government and accepted co-optation to avoid being targeted. While opposition Islamists have been forcefully pushed out of politics, co-opted Islamists have held on to what slivers of legitimacy and spaces for activity they can find. However, the splintering of Islamist movements has resulted in a tangible decline in their political significance.

The Muslim Brotherhood has been one of the regime’s prime targets. In the summer of 2013, the Brotherhood was at the core of what the government called “enemies of the nation.”³⁵ Several Brotherhood leaders were arrested either a few hours before the coup or in its immediate aftermath. The Brotherhood’s protest sit-ins—which were organized following the coup to demand the return of the former elected president, Mohamed Morsi—were forcefully dispersed by the military and security forces.³⁶ As of early 2017, arrests of the Brotherhood’s rank and file have continued in large numbers.³⁷ The security services have been systematically involved in human rights abuses, including the extrajudicial killing of Brotherhood members, the torture of some prisoners and detainees, and the neglect of the medical needs of others in custody.³⁸

The government has also used various legal and judicial instruments to repress the Muslim Brotherhood. In September 2013, a court ordered that the movement be banned and its financial assets be frozen.³⁹ In December 2013, the government declared the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organization, mandating its dissolution and again calling for the freezing of its financial assets.⁴⁰ In August 2014, the administrative court system revoked the license of the Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party and mandated its dissolution.⁴¹

All this has been unfolding in a public space void of freedom of expression and injected with government-backed hate speech and hostility toward the Muslim Brotherhood.⁴² Charges of undermining Egypt’s stability, sabotaging the national economy, and disrupting developmental efforts have been leveled against the Brotherhood.⁴³ The government has also intentionally conflated the Brotherhood’s agenda with that of jihadist groups to stigmatize the movement with labels of extremism and terrorism.⁴⁴

In part as a result of this, the Muslim Brotherhood’s political significance has declined. Its exclusion from formal politics, the ban of the movement and its party, and the government-sponsored branding of the movement as a terrorist entity have shaken its popular base.

In addition, the Brotherhood’s organizational capacities have weakened considerably due to various fissures within the movement between the elders and the youth, the pragmatic doves and the ideological hawks, and the nonviolent and violent factions.⁴⁵ In particular, the elders have used their financial influence to retain control over the movement and, in doing so, have alienated the young and middle-aged rank and file.⁴⁶ Young leaders have gradually become more forceful in their opposition to the elders.⁴⁷ A key issue of contestation is the use of violence, which some young leaders regard as a legitimate tool in the struggle against the new authoritarian tactics.⁴⁸ The result has been the emergence of violent splinter groups within the Brotherhood, such as the Revolutionary Punishment Movement and the Egypt Arms Movement.⁴⁹ Due to the sustained and systematic government repression of the Muslim Brotherhood, the probability of internal conflicts and defections within the movement will continue to rise.⁵⁰

Due to the sustained and systematic government repression of the Muslim Brotherhood, the probability of internal conflicts and defections within the movement will continue to rise.

Other opposition groups in the Islamist spectrum have exhibited similar trends. Al-Jamaa al-Islamiya (the Islamic Group) and its political party, Construction and Development, along with the Center Party have faced internal conflicts and defections of young members—some of which have become more amenable to radical ideas and toying with violence as a legitimate tool.⁵¹

However, neither the Muslim Brotherhood nor other opposition Islamist groups have completely disintegrated. Some of their mobilization and organizational capacities have remained intact. Between 2013 and 2016, Brotherhood members carried out different protest activities across the country to demand either the release of their imprisoned leaders or to voice economic, social, and political concerns.⁵² As of early 2017, the Brotherhood has continued to mobilize some of its members to participate in popular protests against the government’s economic policies.⁵³ Also, the fact that mass resignation of the Brotherhood’s and other opposition Islamists’ rank and file has not happened since 2013 testifies to the continued presence of some organizational capacities.⁵⁴ Sweeping generalizations regarding the total eradication of opposition Islamists are misplaced.

Meanwhile, Islamist movements that chose in 2013 to support the coup and side with the generals have also lost political significance and presence in society. And they are in no better position than the Islamist opposition to counter this erosion.

Pro-government Salafis did not face the fate of the Brotherhood and other Islamists that chose to defy the will of the new regime.⁵⁵ They avoided being banned and were given stakes in the post-2013 power arrangement. For example, after the Alexandrian Salafi Missionary Group and its political party, al-Nur, assisted the military establishment and security services in preparing for the 2013 coup,⁵⁶ they were included in the Constituent Assembly and allowed to have access to the government-controlled media.⁵⁷

The Salafi group and its party endorsed the former minister of defense for president in 2014.⁵⁸ In return, they were free to field candidates in the 2015 parliamentary elections. These pro-government Salafis expected to gain a significant number of seats in the legislature, but that expectation proved to be misguided. The regime’s need for Salafi support has declined as its crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood has ramped up and the government has gained more control over official religious institutions.⁵⁹ As a result, al-Nur was given only twelve seats in the House of Representatives.⁶⁰ This is in stark contrast to the 2012 parliamentary elections, in which the party landed nearly 111 seats.⁶¹

Against the backdrop of declining party politics and the inability of both pro-government and opposition parties to influence government policies, other collective actors have advanced to articulate democratic demands and contest the unchecked power of the ruling generals. Egypt’s political reality has been shaped by the activism of these actors and by their resilience when faced with authoritarian tools and tactics.

Freedom for the Brave and Other Single-Cause Initiatives

Since 2013, young activists, students, and human rights groups have taken the helm of numerous advocacy initiatives. They often lack organizational capabilities and remain committed to a single cause related to human rights abuses, such as extrajudicial killings, forced disappearances, or torture in places of custody. In aiming to raise citizens’ awareness and mobilize them to demand an end to human rights abuses, these initiatives have to navigate a social and political environment in which large segments of the population are either resigned and less interested in standing up for the victims of abuses or simply fearful of being targeted themselves by an increasingly repressive government. This represents a significant departure from the pre–2013 coup environment in which similar advocacy initiatives were able to mobilize citizens with less fear.

For example, before the 2011 revolution, the We Are All Khaled Said Facebook page was instrumental in drawing public attention to the death of the young Alexandrian Khaled Said at the hands of the security services. It focused on two demands: ending torture and holding accountable the security officials implicated in acts of torture. The page administrators called for the popular protests on January 25, 2011, that culminated in the revolution.⁶² In the fall of 2011, the Maspero Youth Union was formed to demand justice and accountability for Egypt’s Coptic Christians after army and police forces killed dozens of them during a rally to protest increased sectarian violence and attacks on churches.⁶³ The union’s activism has sustained public awareness about the incident and challenged the government’s attempts to erase the memory. However, army and police officers implicated in the Maspero killing have yet to be held accountable.⁶⁴

In post-2013 Egypt, Freedom for the Brave represents the most significant example of a single-cause initiative.⁶⁵ A group of lawyers, young activists, students, and journalists launched the initiative in 2014 to support victims of political detention and prisoners of conscience and to improve conditions in prisons and other places of custody. The group formed primarily in response to the mass arrest of more than 1,000 citizens by the security services on the third anniversary of the 2011 revolution.⁶⁶ The press statement announcing the initiative refers to its members’ determination to carry out “vigils and marches to demand the release of all political detainees and prisoners,” including those victims affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist movements whose involvement in acts of violence or terrorism remains unsubstantiated.⁶⁷ Since 2014, Freedom for the Brave has spearheaded attempts to shed light on human rights abuses committed against young activists, students, and members of the Muslim Brotherhood.

In particular, Freedom for the Brave has been a champion for the rights of victims of forced disappearances. The group has documented several cases of both forced disappearances and police detention without judicial investigations. The reports have been informed by direct contact with victims’ families and information provided by human rights and legal assistance organizations.⁶⁸

Freedom for the Brave has also been attempting to raise public awareness about the gravity of human rights abuses and the deteriorating conditions for prisoners and detainees. For example, in February 2014, the group launched a campaign called Support Them, in which interested citizen