The Arab Spring refers to a series of uprisings, armed rebellions, and prodemocracy protests that occurred in North Africa and the Middle East against entrenched authoritarianism that characterized the regimes of the region from 2011. It began in Tunisia after a jobless youth set himself on fire in response to his country’s economic stagnation and corruption. It then spread to Egypt, Libya, Bahrain, Yemen, and Syria. In these six countries, either the despotic rulers were toppled or major riots, insurgencies, and civil wars occurred (Lynch, The New Arab Wars: Uprisings and Anarchy in the Middle East n.d). Other countries such as Iraq, Lebanon, Oman, Morocco, Algeria, Kuwait, and Sudan witnessed sustained demonstrations and riots in the streets. Palestine, Western Sahara, Djibouti, Saudi Arabia, and Mauritania experienced minor protests. In Egypt, the overthrow of Hosni Mubarak was necessitated by the social and political environment in which the protestors operated.
After the ouster of Ben Ali in Tunisia, young Egyptians were inspired to organize themselves through social media. This culminated in huge crowds across different areas of Egypt on January 25, 2011. The Egyptian authorities reacted by violently cracking down on the protestors as well as offering some concessions but all these failed to quell the surging crowds. Hosni Mubarak’s regime used the country’s security forces and the army to mete brute force against the demonstrators but this did not stop the protests (Lynch n.d). The military then announced their withdrawal from the streets and joined calls for the removal of the country’s long-serving president. This dealt a massive blow to Mubarak who had ruled Egypt for 29 years. After losing the military support, he was left with no option than to cede power.
Within Egypt’s social cycles, there were loud cries about the issues of widening the gap between the rich and the poor. The country’s wealth was unequally distributed, where a small group of elites hold massive wealth and money at the expense of the majority. More than 32.5% of the Egyptian population was living below the poverty line before the protests. The unemployment rate, especially among the youth was rampant in the country. The revolution was inspired by massive hopes and expectations that this situation would change. Social media was also a significant environment upon which the Egyptian revolution operated (El-Farahaty 2019). Young people mobilized themselves and gathered on the streets. Facebook was particularly used to organize protestors and spread information on their next course of action. The government reacted by blocking Facebook and Twitter first before shutting down the internet completely. On January 28. 2011, all mobile phone networks and all the 4 national ISPs in Egypt were shut down. However, the blockage of the internet did not stop the protestors but rather intensified civil disobedience.
Grievances that Led to the Egyptian Arab Spring
Hosni Mubarak had ruled Egypt for close to 30 years through a one-party dictatorship. However, in his last decade in office, Mubarak’s health started to decline. He had not appointed a vice-president and his son Gama Mubarak was increasingly becoming powerful. There were fears among the Egyptians that Gama would inherit power from his father in 2011 (Mamdani 2011). This did not go down well with many Egyptians who thought that they had had enough of the Mubarak regime. The protestors were also angered by the existing emergency law that legitimized censorship, extended the powers of the police, obliterated habeas corpus, and suspended constitutional rights. This law also limited political activities such as demonstrations, which were considered non-governmental (Soffiantini 2020). Mubarak’s government used this law to suppress opposition and jail activists especially from the Muslim Brotherhood movement under the guise of fighting terrorism.
Mubarak’s regime had also been accused of widespread police brutality. There were numerous accusations made against the country’s security forces by citizens. The plainclothes police used excessive force and tortured their victims using crude weapons once in detention. Amateur videos appeared online showing the police sodomizing their victims using bottles and beating others to death (El-Mahdi and Marfleet 2009). These horrific incidences galvanized the protestors to fully participate in the revolution. In addition, Mubarak had won many elections through fraud where competitors’ voters were intimidated and threatened with death. In some of the elections, he was the only candidate after threatening or imprisoning any aspirant from the opposition. This is what happened in 2005 when he imprisoned Ayman Nour for challenging him for the presidency (Masoud 2021). These actions kept many Egyptians away from the ballot and made them lose trust in their country’s political and electoral system.
Although Mubarak had done well to improve the country’s economy by carrying out key economic reforms to increase the GDP and attract foreign investment, the average Egyptian did not see the benefits of these. They suffered high rates of unemployment and poor living conditions. The elites in Mubarak’s government were accused of massive corruption and fraud at the expense of the common man. Ministers who were close to Mubarak did business with the state and emerged as powerful billionaires (Hussein 2021). These actions angered many Egyptians forcing them to pour into the streets when the revolution happened.
Social, Cultural, or Political Ideology of the Egyptian Arab Spring
The social, cultural, and political spheres played a significant role in the Arab Spring in Egypt. The social ideology capitalized on exploiting the country’s dominant social values for its social revolution. The cultural ideology entailed the systems thinking that was held by many Egyptians for social revolution. On the other hand, the political ideology revolved around the old political system that many protestors strongly felt should be changed. The country witnessed a significant deterioration of community services such as water infrastructure, health and hygiene services, education, traffic services as well as water and sewage services. These states of events transformed the society where people lived in a state of lawlessness and chaos (Ghanem 2016). There was a general feeling among the population that the state was not concerned about their social welfare.
It should also be noted that before the uprising, Egypt held an outstanding leadership position within the entire Middle East. However, this position was weakened by President Mubarak who neglected several strategic issues that were related to the country’s national security. For instance, when some states upstream of River Nile sought to draw water from the river, there were fears among the citizens that the volumes of the River would be drastically reduced. This was postulated to negatively affect the country’s economy since it entirely relied on the river. Egyptians, thus, expected their president to act decisively but he failed to do so (Echevarría and García-Enríquez 2020). This is despite the fact that Egypt was protected by the historic Nile treaty, which the upstream countries such as Egypt and Sudan brazenly violated.
The open rigging of the 2010 parliamentary elections, in which the National Democratic Party got more than 95% of the Assembly seat angered many Egyptians. The Muslim Brotherhood opposition party was excluded from participating in the poles. In parliament, the opposition benches were almost empty. Ideologically, Egyptians felt that the state had abused their rights to elect their representatives. However, the abuse of Egyptians’ rights did not stop at the elections. Young Egyptians were at the mercy of the police who spared no effort to brutalize them at will. On January 6, 2010, a young Egyptian known as Khalid Mohammed Said was tortured to death by the police. His death caused a stir and uproar among many Egyptians who reacted by organizing civil disobedience to condemn the police for murdering the young man.
The cultural ideology of the uprising was primarily demonstrated by the religious relationship between Christians and Muslims in Egypt. Historically, the members of these religions have lived side-by-side in a peaceful co-existence. This was, however, brought to test on the New Year of 2011 when a terrorist attack targeted at the Saints Church left 25 people dead and 97 others seriously injured. Egyptians of all faith felt that they had been hit by the terror attack. As a result, Muslims joined Christians in staging a protest against the Egyptian police and Mubarak’s regime. It later emerged that the terrorist attack had been planned by the Ministry of Interior, which was bent on eliminating Islamists, incites to hatred, and political Islam. These galvanized Egyptians against a common cultural ideology of religious unity irrespective of one’s faith (Hassan and Shalaby 2018). It was the Muslims and Christians on one side and the State on the other side.
The deep sectarian divisions that resulted from the government’s crackdown on Islamic political groups gave rise to anti-government movements in the country. The common theme across the country was to push for human rights and dignity. The social, cultural, and political crises in Egypt opened floodgates for uninhibited and real challenges to the Mubarak regime (Devarajan and Ianchovichina 2018). It is from these crises that civil society groups and activists learned how to hold the government to account even if it meant exposing themselves to personal risks.
Success and Failures
Although the Arab Spring had some of its successes such as the toppling of Hosni Mubarak’s regime, it is not lost to many that it terribly failed. Today, the country is being ruled by a new dictator, worse than Mubarak. It appears that the Egyptian revolutionaries were only concerned with bringing down Hosni Mubarak but did not have a concrete plan on who was to take over in his absence. There was no credible political organization and the protestors messed by placing their faith in change, Facebook, and hope instead of real politics (Kienle 2012). The failure of the liberals opened a window for the Muslim Brotherhood, which established an extremist Islamist regime. However, the Brotherhood too failed due to its pursuit of myopic and trial agendas that led to the alienation of the public.
The military exploited the failure of the liberals and the incompetence of the Muslim Brotherhood and took power. This contracted what the Arab Spring was meant to deliver and how it enlightened the youthful protestors to stand up and speak against evil dictatorship. Nonetheless, the ruling regime learned some lessons from the toppled Mubarak government. Mubarak had filled the government with his loyalist, which drew much hatred from the public.
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