Interview with Dr. Saad Eddin Ibrahim Daniel Benaim

The Fletcher School Online Journal for issues related to Southwest Asia and Islamic Civilization Spring 2006 Interview with Dr. Saad Eddin Ibrahim Daniel Benaim In the weeks leading up to Egypt's No. You can’t have democracy without being Presidential election, I had the opportunity to inclusive of everybody, so long as people are interview Dr. Saad Eddin Ibrahim. Dr. Ibrahim is respectful of the rules of the game. perhaps Egypt's best-known dissident intellectual and the Founder and Chairman of the Ibn Khaldun One critic worried that you were describing Center for Development Studies in Cairo, where I the Islamists that you wish for, rather than those was a Summer Fellow in 2005. In June 2000, Dr. that you see. How would you integrate the Ibrahim and two dozen of his associates were Muslim Brotherhood into Egyptian politics while arrested and jailed on charges ranging from assuring that they play by the rules of the game? defrauding the European Union to disseminating Isn’t there a danger that the process would be information harmful to Egypt's interests. After a irreversible? three-year ordeal during which Dr. Ibrahim (62 years old at the time) was sentenced to seven years The Egyptian Constitution includes all kinds of hard labor--all charges against him were of built-in safeguards. I suggested the armed forces dismissed by Egypt's highest court and he was and the constitution serve as the safeguards of released from prison in 2003. Sitting in his office in pluralism, of civil government, and of regular old a beautiful Islamic villa in Cairo's Mokattam democratic aims. Should anyone tamper with Heights, Dr. Ibrahim reflected on the prospects for them, Islamists or otherwise, these institutions democratization in Egypt and on his unique role in should have the right to interfere and remove that Egyptian politics. obstacle or threat. People have said that one of the major A Turkish model? problems with the United States’ Middle East policy is a failure to predict and account for An improved Turkish model. I’m suggesting change. Are the US and Western governments an armed and a civilian institution as guardians. ready to deal with the possibility of religious To force things, you need physical force, but you parties taking major roles across the region? also need the moral and legal authority of the Egyptian constitutions. Religious parties have already taken control in Turkey, and I don’t see any reason why they Should civil-military reform, then, take a cannot do it here. We are telling policymakers to backseat to other kinds of reform in Egypt? be ready. I am telling everybody to get ready, Some, like Steve Cook, see the military’s role in because if we don’t open the process to religious politics as an essential bulwark of authoritarian parties, then we will be beholden to the autocrats. rule across the Middle East. And if the autocrats continue, they will be the greatest help to the theocrats, who are their mirror Daniel Benaim, Fletcher MALD 2006, is Editor-in-Chief image. of al Nakhlah. His writing has appeared in The International Herald Tribune, The Boston Globe, Is democracy in Egypt possible without the The Nation, The American Prospect Online, and The Muslim Brotherhood? New York Post. Most recently, he was a summer fellow at the Ibn Khaldun Center for Development Studies in Cairo. © The Fletcher School – Al Nakhlah – Tufts University 160 Packard Avenue – Medford, MA 02155-7082 USA – Tel: +1.617.627.3700 2 Al Nakhlah They already have a role in politics, but it is Egyptians are indeed more concerned about social de facto. I want to make it explicit, transparent, and and economic issues. For example, they are very have demarcation lines instead of the diffuse much interested in the issue of corruption, which is influence they have now on the entire political life really beginning to impact their lives. And, through the Presidency whether the level of corruption is accurately and the intelligence perceived or exaggerated, it is definitely on their Religious parties have agencies. minds. Nowadays, there is a lot of political already taken control in campaigning for the presidency and for Is the military ready parliament, where many of the candidates have Turkey, and I don’t see for a non-military focused on corruption as the number one issue in any reason why they president? their campaigns. cannot do so in Egypt. I think they could be We are telling made ready. After all, Part of your role in Egyptian politics has the top echelon of the been to act as a provocateur, raising difficult policymakers to be military have had questions and getting under the regime’s skin. Do ready. I am telling Western training in you take a special pleasure in that? everybody to get ready, countries like the United States, England, and These roles are usually thrust on people. because if we don’t France, and they have Rarely do public figures or public intellectuals open the process to seen models of a military choose their roles. They may choose their mission under civilian control. If or they may know their objective, but as an actor in religious parties, then it is done with care, public life, often it’s a convergence of events, we will be beholden to without removing their biography, and environment. These three privileges, then it is together usually determine your position and the autocrats possible. After all, that’s trajectory in public life. That is basically what has the way it was before happened with me. The fact that I have spent the 1952. 1960s in America, in the heyday of activism—the antiwar movement, the civil rights movement, the Critics of your work have often argued that women’s movement, the Egyptians simply aren’t interested in democracy. environmental I don’t necessarily try movement—all of these Well, I don’t agree that Egyptians aren’t great movements of the to be a provocateur. interested. Without polling and scientific methods 1960s and early 1970s What I do is raise to electoral politics, it is very hard for anyone to were part of my make concrete claims about the interest of upbringing and my issues that nobody Egyptians in democracy or in anything else. But youth. And of course I else would raise, not to we have many proxy indicators--for example a ten- was also very active country survey from 1980 indicating that as many student, both in American be provocative but to as sixteen percent of Egyptians put democracy as politics and in Arab be a conscience for my their highest priority. That’s just one example, and politics. I was President of admittedly it’s a dated survey, but if some 25 years the Arab students of society, for my country, ago that many Egyptians indicated this sentiment, North America and these for my time then surely more would think so now. are roles that, again, I found not by design but Where does the lack of political freedom fit by the thrust of events and by interest. Being a into the overall constellation of problems faced social scientist, being young and in America at the by Egyptians today? time, I became interested. All of this has much to do with my agenda in Egypt and what I came to be Twenty-five years ago, democracy came as here, both in my own perception and in other fourth or fifth place in terms of what concerns people’s perception. I don’t necessarily try to be a people, in terms of what was really important to provocateur. What I do is raise issues that nobody people. Today, I would assume that social and else would raise, not to be provocative but to be a economic issues will still rank very high conscience for my society, for my country, for my domestically. Regionally, the Palestinian question time. If people consider that to be provocative— will still be number one, likely followed by Iraq and sometimes my family shares this view—I and the Sudan in terms of Egyptians’ concerns. don’t. These things come to me very But, by and large, the overwhelming majority of spontaneously and without design. © The Fletcher School – Al Nakhlah – Tufts University Spring 2006 – Interview 3 Well, you give anybody the benefit of the You recently withdrew your candidacy for doubt. And I did. I had also met with and advised Egyptian president, along with a few other President Sadat, including a trip to his house a few reform-minded candidates, because you didn’t weeks before his death. I was actually performing consider it a fair contest. Do such protest boycotts a mission abroad for him when he was represent an effective strategy of opposition? assassinated. With Mubarak, I had known him when he was Vice As a matter of principle I’m against boycotts. President [1975-1981] I don’t see red lines. I But if there’s a boycott, it has to be active. You through his wife, declare it, and then you make sure it will achieve Suzanne, who was my speak my mind against something. That’s what I’m trying to do. I student. She did her M.A. anything, on any withdrew, and then I made a case. Even though I with me. And frequently withdrew and made my case, and others did the as Vice President, he subject. I will not say same thing, we are still going to monitor the would ask for memos and anything I do not elections.

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