Tan Wen Juan Karmaine

Year 2 BSc International Business

Brunel ID: 1321211

MG2137 International Relations

Trace the roots of conflict in Egypt. Which theory of International Relations can be applied to

understand this conflict? Justify your answer.

Introduction

This essay examines the conflict in Egypt from the perspective of the involved actors. The

root causes of the conflict are summarised in a chronological recount of the main events

comprising the bulk of the crisis, which has been used as a basis in structuring the analysis.

The situation in Egypt is one that is complex and multi-dimensional, in that it involves

several opposing factions and a long-established tradition of governance that constituted a

distinctive aspect of the identity and culture of Egypt. The information was gathered through

the cross-referencing various sources, and for which references are listed en bloc at the end of

the essay. Through the application of international relations theories, this essay is an attempt

to best explain how the conflict came to be, and why.

Root causes of the conflict

In 2011, a series of uprisings popularly known as the Arab Spring was the beginning of a

political revolution in the Middle East. For decades Egypt had been under military regime

and authoritarian rule. Former president Hosni Mubarak had been in power since 1980, and

his governance had diminished to one that was ideologically and morally corrupt. The Arab

Spring began with public outrage at the act of self-immolation of Mohamed Bouazizi in

protest against the authoritarian regime. Masses of Egyptians gathered in anti-government

protests, calling for Mubarak’s resignation; the young revolutionary liberals temporarily

aligned with the Muslim Brotherhood in pursuit of a common goal. The military, out of

loyalty to the people of Egypt, refused to intervene. President Mubarak was forced to step

down and hand over power to the military. Following his resignation, the Islamists called for

immediate elections for the next president. The military also had vested interest in having the

elections as soon as possible, as they controlled a substantial percentage of the economy

(with estimates at 5%-40%, although the exact amount of control they have is undetermined).

In contrast, the liberal front first wanted a constitution to be drafted before electing

parliament. With support from everyone but the liberals, the elections went ahead, with the

top two candidates emerging in the form of Mohamed Morsi of the Freedom and Justice

Party, the candidate of the Muslim Brotherhood, and Ahmed Shafik, an independent

candidate. Morsi was critical of the Mubarak regime and offered a new beginning as an

Islamic democracy. Ahmed Shafik, an independent candidate who had served as prime

minister of Egypt under Mubarak, was a secularist and promised to restore order. While

Islamists hailed Morsi's election with enthusiasm, many Coptic Christians and liberals were

not satisfied with either candidate. The elections were held, to a narrow Islamist victory, with

Morsi winning by a margin of 3.5%. Mohamed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood was

appointed the new president.

The liberal revolutionaries were unhappy with their lack of representation in the new

government (that they had helped to form). The military had ignored a great part of its people

due its own personal investment in the economy, and the U.S. government had chosen not to

intervene in Egypt’s political affairs, despite their commitment to democracy. During his

term, instead of enacting democratic change, Morsi continued the practice of veering on

dictatorship. In November 2012, he issued a decree stripping the judiciary of the right to

challenge his decisions, finally rescinding it in the face of popular public protests. Morsi also

appointed Islamist allies as regional leaders in 13 of Egypt's 27 governorships, most

controversially appointing a member of a former Islamist armed group linked to a massacre

of tourists in Luxor in 1997. The religious associations in government policy began to show

elements of a fascist theocracy - the Islamist-dominated constituent assembly had approved a

draft constitution that boosted the role of Islam and restricted freedom of speech and

assembly. The public approved it in a referendum, prompting extensive protest by secularists,

liberals, and Christians, whose concerns were essentially disregarded in the constitution.

Rebel groups organised a mass protest, backed by a petition signed by 22 million people

demanding that the Islamic leader step down. In July 2013, 10 million people were involved

in mass demonstrations in protest for Morsi’s removal. The Egyptian military, in the name of

upholding its allegiance to the people of Egypt, staged a military coup and removed Morsi

from office. In the days following the coup d’état, clashes between Morsi supporters, anti-

Morsi demonstrators and Egyptian security forces led to violent conflicts. In response to

months of political turmoil, the United States withheld a large part of the yearly

US$1.3billion that it pledges in aid to Egypt’s military, a move that was criticised by Egypt.

In essence, the conflict was caused by clashes between four main factions: Mubarak - the

former president from the old regime, Morsi and his Islamist supporters, the pro-democracy

liberal group, and the Egyptian military. The next section is an analysis of the conflict

through the lens of three theories – realism, liberalism and social constructivism.

Theoretical explanations of the crisis

Realism

From a realist perspective, fundamentally, people have a pessimistic view of human nature, a

desire to dominate others in search of power and to act in their own self-interest. This is

demonstrated at the individual level by the former presidents of Egypt themselves. Mubarak

led an oppressive, authoritarian regime of corruption; living in wealth with his official elite

while half of Egypt lived below the poverty line. Morsi, who was part of the Muslim

Brotherhood, attempted to impose religious Islamist ideology in government policy.

Consumed by their personal desire for power and wealth, each acted in his own interests

during their term in office, to the detriment of the people. Realism also asserts that it is

impossible to eradicate this instinct for power and that history continues in a cycle - when

Mubarak was forcibly resigned, the Egyptian people celebrated in hopes for a better future of

governance, only to have Mubarak replaced by Islamist Morsi, who was equally unproductive

at implementing democracy and social justice for all. As demonstrated by the presidents of

Egypt, politics is rooted in a permanent and unchanging human nature, which in essence is

self-centred, self-regarding and self-interested (Morgenthau 1985:4).

Liberalism

The crisis can also be understood through a liberal perspective. At the core of liberalism is

optimism about human progress, cooperation, freedom and peace. The Egyptians freed

themselves from authoritarian rule and succeeded in getting Mubarak out of office through

mass demonstration, in the pursuit of the liberal values of human progress, freedom and

democracy. A strand of liberalism relevant to the crisis is sociological liberalism, which

claims that international relations is not singularly about relationships between states; it is

also about transnational relations - relations between people, groups and organizations

belonging to different countries. James Rosenau defines transnationalism as “the processes

whereby international relations conducted by governments have been supplemented by

relations among private individuals, groups, and societies that can and do have important

consequences for the course of events” (Rosenau 1980:1). Individuals are considered as

reasonable and ethical subjects which “generated rights and institutions” so that “liberalism

calls for freedom […], freedom of conscience, a free press and free speech, equality under the

law” (Doyle, 1996, 4) Liberalism therefore starts with individuals and groups that act in both

domestic and transnational society and which are thus the principal actors in the international

system. New communications technologies such as social media have resulted in increased

accessibility to alternative viewpoints to traditional media. This means that transnational

forces play an increasingly substantial role in shaping the values and beliefs of the

individuals, the people and thus the state on the whole.

The Arab Spring was triggered by one man’s act of resistance of self-immolation against the

corrupt government in Tunisia, a small country that was more educated than the Arab norm

and with strong links to Europe (BBC, 2013). High levels of media attention were given to

the story in the Middle East as well as the Western world, and the resulting public outrage

served as the fuel for the demonstrations. Tim Eaton writes in his article (Internet Activism

and the Egyptian Uprisings: Transforming Online Dissent into the Offline World, Eaton,

2013): ‘“Through the spread of information online, internet activists were able to establish

networks of resistance within Egyptian political society...Perpetual connectivity of activists

enabled them to have access to an infinite number of networks of trust and multiply the

impact of social protest…Internet activism made political action easier, faster and more

universal in Egypt.” In this new technological age, individuals now have greater access to

resources that allow them to seek out alternative information, question pre-supposed beliefs

and establish mass networks to share these viewpoints and create change on a mass level. In

the span of years, two presidents were both forced out of office by the military in response to

public demonstrations. Rosenau emphasises the growing importance of the individual’s role,

arguing that ‘the revolution of information technologies has made it possible for citizens and

politicians literally to ‘see’ the aggregation of micro actions into macro outcome…Leaders

are increasingly becoming followers because individuals are becoming increasingly aware

that their actions can have consequences” (Rosenau 1992: 275) It is evident in this case that

the people of Egypt were principally responsible for the course of events – it was the people

who were the instigators in both overthrows of power. The mass uprisings in turn stemmed

from each individual’s desire for the implementation of the liberal ideals of democracy and

freedom. It is important to note that social media was not the cause of the protests, but merely

a tool used for communication and rallying. It can be concluded that the underlying sentiment

and aspiration for democracy already existed: “Insurgent politics conducted through internet

activism multiplied the impact of social protest in Egypt. Yet revolutions do not come out of

thin air, or for that matter, cyberspace: there would have been no revolution without a cause

to bind Egyptians together” (Eaton, 2013, p. 19) The question is, how did the underlying

sentiment for democracy lead to the uprisings in the Middle East? This brings us to the next

approach: social constructivism.

Social Constructivism

The focus of social constructivism is on human awareness or consciousness and its place in

world affairs. Many IR theories have a material focus, which is centered on the distribution of

material power and defines balances of power between states and explains the behavior of

states. Social constructivism, in contrast, emphasizes the importance of social dimensions and

gives more meaning to norms, language, rules and identities (Barnett, 2011:151-153) Social

constructivism, therefore, traces the roots of the crisis to the change of ideas. For

constructivists, it is the very interaction with others that ‘create and instantiate one structure

of identities and interests rather than another’ (Wendt 1992: 394). It can be argued that the

Arab Spring would not have taken place without the social interaction necessary to constitute

the shift in ideological beliefs. Through interaction on online channels and social networks,

Western ideals of human rights, freedom and democracy spread to the Middle East and

discredited the established structure of authoritarianism. The availability of new

communication technologies was a considerable factor in leading to a greater awareness of

human rights and alternative systems of government - when the structure of the state prevents

individuals from creating change in the public sphere, they “turn to grassroots mobilization

through new social movements” (El-Mahdi, 2012:64). As Toby Dodge wrote: “The demands

for full citizenship, for the recognition of individual political rights, were a powerful unifying

theme across the Arab revolutions” (Dodge, 2012). In other words, their normative beliefs

about the legitimacy of an authoritarian government were put into question. This paradigm

shift in consciousness amongst the Egyptian people was at the heart of the crisis; it was this

transformation in beliefs and ideas that were paramount in the initiation of the revolution. As

Martha Finnemore argues, our identities and interests are defined by international forces -

that is, by the norms of behaviour entrenched in international society (Finnemore, 1996). Due

to the growing influence of international organisations and the global prevalence of the

Internet, an international humanitarian standard of social conduct, norms and behaviour is

gradually emerging. In the information age, human consciousness has rapidly evolved into an

ever-growing and interconnected global consciousness. Following the overthrow of Morsi,

protests erupted in response, ranging from Tunisia, Pakistan, Syria and Turkey, to Indonesia

and Malaysia, as well as France and the United States (Globalpost 2013): “Since the Egyptian

Army overthrew the democratically-elected Egyptian president, Mohamed Morsi, on July 3,

the world has kept close watch. Officially, governments are denouncing violence while tacitly

taking sides. As violence swells in Egypt, and the death toll rises, global protests are

growing.” As domestic and international media around the world are becoming progressively

intertwined, situations in countries do not happen in an isolated vacuum, but are instead part

of a global network of interconnection. It is this developing interconnected-ness of human

ideas, thoughts and consciousness that is at the root of the crisis, and which mainstream IR

theories fail to take into account when analysing the conflict in Egypt: “If the international

system were solely based on, for example, realist perspectives, where changes in the system

depend on the egoist states and their utilitarian policies, the act of desperation by Mohamed

Bouazizi in the winter of 2010 (The Economist, 2011) would probably either have never

happened or not have become a catalyst for the Arab Spring” (Hartmann, 2013).

It is evident that social constructivism explains another dimension of the crisis in Egypt in a

way that realism and liberalism do not. The situation is Egypt is neither fully the realist

interpretation of recurrent autocracy, nor simply the idealistic liberal view of the marked

progress of democracy. Constructivist theory looks at the various perspectives and the

conflicting motives of different factions, which is indispensable when attempting to fully

comprehend a situation as multi-faceted as the uprisings in the Middle East. When viewed

through the perspective of realism or liberalism, the roots of the crisis appears to be primarily

domestic or regional – local actors acting in accordance with established liberal and realist

views. But when we look closer, the local actors were influenced by thoughts and ideas that

have their origins in the Western world. In place of static, black-and-white generalizations

about human behaviour, the theory of social constructivism compels us to examine human

motives in the context of the situation, and paints a picture of a fluid, dynamic,

interconnected world of causality – the high level of media attention on one man’s act against

an autocratic regime and resulting global prominence of the case spread a wave of awareness

of Western ideals that had a cataclysmic effect on the Middle East.

In conclusion, the crisis in Egypt is, in actuality, a model of how a change in ideas came to

result in the transformation of structure. As Anthony Giddens (1984) observed, the

relationship between structures and actors involves inter-subjective understanding and

meaning. Actors are constrained by structures, but can also transform structures by thinking

about them and acting on them in new ways. It is the underlying human factors that are at the

root of the crisis, the intangible shift of thoughts and ideas and the ensuing upheaval of the

existing system, and which makes social constructivism an important theory in explaining

modern occurrences in the international system. As Wendt (1992) summarises succinctly,

“Anarchy is what states make of it.”

References

Summary of conflict:

1. Almanar.com.lb. 2013. The Arab Spring: The Root Causes?. [online] Available at:

http://www.almanar.com.lb/english/adetails.php?eid=45439&cid=31&fromval=1

2. Eaton, T. 2013. Internet Activism and the Egyptian Uprisings: Transforming Online Dissent Into the

Offline World. Westminster Papers in Communication and Culture, 9 (2), Available at:

http://www.westminster.ac.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0004/220675/WPCC-vol9-issue2.pdf.

3. GlobalPost. 2013. The world is picking sides in Egypt's conflict (PHOTOS). [online] Available at:

http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/middle-east/egypt/130823/world-protests-egypt-sisi-

morsi-muslim-brotherhood

4. Irdiplomacy.ir. 2013. The Muslim Brotherhood from an International Relations Perspective. [online]

Available at:

http://www.irdiplomacy.ir/en/page/1910889/The+Muslim+Brotherhood+from+an+International+Relati

ons+Perspective.html

5. Los Angeles Times Articles. 2013. In the Arab world, U.S. is low on leverage. [online] Available at:

http://articles.latimes.com/2013/aug/10/opinion/la-oe-mcmanus-column-egypt-and-foreign-aid-

20130811

6. Nytimes.com. 2013. Log In - The New York Times. [online] Available at:

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/11/opinion/aswani-egypts-two-front-war-for-democracy.html?_r=0

7. Open.salon.com. 2013. What Are American Interests In Egyptian Turmoil's Outcome? - Don Rich -

Open Salon. [online] Available at:

http://open.salon.com/blog/don_rich/2013/07/08/what_are_american_interests_in_egyptian_turmoils_o

utcome

8. Staff, C. 2013. Egypt explained: 6 key questions. [online] Available at:

http://edition.cnn.com/2013/08/02/world/africa/egypt-explained

In-text:

9. Barnett, M. (2011) Social Constructivism. In: Baylis, J. and Smith, S. eds. (2011) The Globalization of

World Politics. 1st ed. New York: Oxford University Press.

10. BBC News (2013) Tunisia profile. [online] Available at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-

14107241

11. Dodge, T.  (2012) The Middle East after the Arab Spring. [online] Available at:

http://www2.lse.ac.uk/IDEAS/publications/reports/pdf/SR011/FINAL_LSE_IDEAS__ConclusionsThe

MiddleEastAfterTheArabSpring_Dodge.pdf 

12. Doyle, Michael: ‘Kant, Liberal Legacies, and Foreign Affairs’, in Brown, Michael; Lynn-Jones, Sean;

Miller, Steven [eds], Debating the Democratic Peace, Cambridge: The MIT Press, 1996.

13. Eaton, T. 2013. The role of social media in the Arab uprisings - past and present. [report] Westminster

Papers in Communication and Culture, p. 19.

14. El-Mahdi, K. (2012) Arab Spring in Egypt: Revolution and Beyond. Cairo: The American University in

Cairo Press

15. Finnemore, M. 1996. National interests in international society. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press.

16. Giddens, A. 1984. The constitution of society. Berkeley: University of California Press.

17. Hartmann, S. 2013. Can Constructivism Explain the Arab Spring?. [online] Available at: http://www.e-

ir.info/2013/06/19/can-constructivism-explain-the-arab-spring/

18. Morgenthau, H. 1967. Politics among nations. New York: Knopf.

19. Rosenau, J. 1971. The scientific study of foreign policy. New York: Free Press.

20. Rosenau, P. 1992. Post-modernism and the social sciences. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.

21. The Economist (2011) A golden opportunity?. [online] Available at:

http://www.economist.com/node/18486089

22. Wendt, A. (1992) Anarchy is what states make of it: the social construction of power politics.