Political Opportunities and Strategic Choices of the Muslim Sisterhood in Egypt

A dissertation submitted to the Graduate School

of the University of Cincinnati

in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of

Doctor of Philosophy

in the Department of Political Science

of the College of Arts and Sciences

Anwar Mhajne

M.A. University of Cincinnati May 2013

Committee Chair: Laura Jenkins, Ph.D.

Abstract

How did political opportunity structures (POS) shape Islamist women’s political participation in Egypt? How did Islamist women’s political organizing and framing strategies, in turn, reshape their political opportunities? I answer these questions by using interviews, social media, and news articles to examine the mobilizing strategies of the Muslim Sisterhood in Egypt between 2010 and 2017. This study discusses the intersection of religion, gender, civil society, and the state in Egypt. This dissertation contributes to the still minimal amount of gender- sensitive analysis of POS and its relationship to Islamist women’s activism in the Middle East. It is unique in that it applies a theoretical framework that views the POS as both gendered and dynamic rather than fixed. This dynamism is apparent in the shifting alliances between military, secular-liberal political parties, and Islamists in two mediums: civil society (informal) and the government (formal). I look at politics in Egypt as a game of three players: the military, the

Islamists, and the secular-liberal political parties. These players aim to influence and eventually control the government and to utilize civil society as a medium for organizing when the government is closed. The nature of alliances between these various players and their relationship with the international system affects the POS. In constructing the POS in terms of alliances between various groups, I reveal the role of agents as an integral part of that structure.

Additionally, I show that structure is not fixed and that the relationship between structure and agency goes both ways: agency affects structure and structure shapes agency. To address the response of the Muslim Sisterhood to the change in the POS, the dissertation examines the mobilizing mediums the Sisters’ utilize and their framing strategies. This sheds light on how the activities of the Muslim Sisterhood impact political elites’ backing for the movement’s agendas.

Acknowledgments

This dissertation is a product of five years of research, writing, and rewriting as well as constant feedback from colleagues, friends, and family members who volunteered their time to improve my work. I would like to extend my thanks to all of them.

I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my committee chair Professor Laura Dudley Jenkins for the thorough and constructive feedback on my work. Without her guidance and persistent help, this dissertation would not have been possible.

I would like to thank my dissertation committee members, Professor Anne Sisson Runyan and Professor Rina Williams, whose feedback and guidance was instrumental for the completion of this project.

I am highly indebted to the Department of Political Science and the Taft Research Center and the University of Cincinnati for the various awards and fellowships to fund my travel to conduct my fieldwork, attend conferences, and undertake my research.

I am grateful to my interviewees who trusted me with their experiences and connected me to others. Their stories, insights, and experiences were essential to the completion of this dissertation.

Finally, I would like to thank my fiancé Dean Howell as well as my dear friend and colleague Greg Saxton for being a major source of support during the dissertation process.

iii

List of Acronyms

CEDAW Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women

CEWLA Center for Egyptian Women's Legal Assistance

CSA Civil Society Associations

CSW Commission on the Status of Women

ECWR Egyptian Center for Women’s Rights

FJP Freedom and Justice Party

MB Muslim Brotherhood

MS Muslim Sisterhood

NDP National Democratic Party

NCCM National Council for Childhood and Motherhood

NCW National Council for Women

PA People’s Assembly

PSL Personal Status Law

POS political opportunity structure

RCEW Revolutionary Coalition for Egyptian Women

SCAF Supreme Council of Armed Forces

UDHR Universal Declaration of Human Rights

WS Women Secretaries

Table of Content

Abstract…………………………………………………………………………………………………i

Acknowledgments...……………………………………………………………………………...... iii

List of Acronyms ………………………………………………………………………………...... iv

List of Tables …………………………………………………………………………………...... vii

List of Figures ……………………………………………………………………………………....viii

Introduction ……………………………………………………………………………………………1 Terminology …………………………………………………………………………………..5 Historical Context ………………………………………………………………………...... 8 Hypotheses…………………………………………………………………………………...15 Methodology and Assessment of Evidence …………………………………………...... 18 Chapters ……………………………………………………………………………………...20

Chapter One: Political Opportunity Structure, Gender, and Islamist Women’s Activism…………...24 Responses to the Critique of POS……………………………………………………………31 Framing and Mobilizing Structure…………………………………………………………...37 POS and Gender……………………………………………………………………………...40

Chapter Two: A Qualitative Strategic Model for Studying the Political Opportunity Structure in Egypt………………………………………………………………………………………………….51 The Qualitative Strategic Model……………………………………………………………..55 Why Civil Society?...... 57 Why is the International Context Important?...... 66 Between 1952 until 1980………………………………………………...... 69 The Game Between 1980 and 2011……………………………………...... 75 The Game During the Uprisings (1/25/2011- 2/11/2011)…………………………...79 The Political Game after January 25 Uprisings (2/11/2011- 1/15/2018)...... 83 First Stage…………………………………………………………...84 Second Stage.………………………………………………………..86 Third Stage………………………………………………………….87 Fourth Stage…………………………………………………………88 Fifth Stage…………………………………………………………...89 Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………………90

Chapter Three: Mapping the Structural Context of the Sisterhood in Egypt………………………...92 Women’s Issues and Islam from Gamal Abdel Nasser Until the Uprisings (1954-2011)…...93 Historical Context of State Feminism in Egypt and the 1971 Constitution……...... 95 Personal Status Law………………………………………………………………...100 CEDAW………………………………………………………………………...... 101 Quotas………………………………………………………………………………102 The Evolution of Islamists’ Position on Women’s Issues During Hosni Mubarak’s Rule…104 Women’s Issues and Islam During Mohammad Morsi’s Era………………………………111

Constitutions………………………………………………………………………..116 Neoliberalism and International Treaties…………………………………………..120 Women’s Issues and Islam After Mohammad Morsi’s Era………………………..123 Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………………………..130

Chapter Four: The Sisters’ Organizing Strategies…………………………………………………..133 Egyptian Women’s Movement in a Historical Context…………………………………….139 Muslim Sisters Activism Until the 2011 Uprisings………………………………………...141 Activism During the Uprising and President Mohammad Morsi’s Government (1/2011- 7/2013)………………………………………………………………………………….147 Activism During President Abdel Fatah el-Sisi (7/2013- 1/2018)………………………….154 Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………………..162

Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………………………..164 Future Research……………………………………………………………………………..175

Bibliography………………………………………………………………………………………...178

List of Tables

Table Page

Table1: Military-MB Relations After the January 25 Uprisings………………………...83

Table 2: The Political Game and the Sisters’ Organizing Strategies…………………...133

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List of Figures

Figure Page

Figure 1: The Vertical Structure of the Brotherhood …………………………………...10

Figure 2: The Horizontal Structure of the Brotherhood ………………………………...11

viii

Introduction

How did political opportunity structures (POS), broadly defined as those political aspects that affect the possibilities for social movements to effectively mobilize for change, shape

Islamist women’s political participation and become reshaped by Islamist women’s political organizing and framing strategies in turn? I attempt to answer this question by examining the

Muslim Sisterhood’s organizing strategies in Egypt between 2010 and 2017. Egypt is an ideal site for examining the interaction between the Sisterhood’s social and political organizing and changing POS because, in just a short period (2011-2014), Egypt went through various transitions with women actively involved in the resistance movement throughout and, briefly, in the elected government. I compare the Sisters framing strategies and mediums of organizing before, during, and after the uprisings.

Since the revolution of January 25, 2011, Egypt has gone through multiple regime transitions. These transitions are a result of shifting elite alliances. After the resignation of

President Hosni Mubarak, the head of the authoritarian regime that controlled Egypt from 1981-

2011, Egyptians held their first democratic elections, in which they elected the Muslim

Brotherhood (MB), led by President Mohamed Morsi. This democratically elected regime lasted only two years before the military took control of the government, installing President Abdel

Fattah el-Sisi and imprisoning the Brotherhood’s members. During times of unrest between 2010 and 2017, members of the Muslim Sisterhood (MS), the women’s wing of the MB, were active in the popular resistance movement. However, during the brief institutionalization of the Morsi regime, they were also active in the formal political medium. Thus, their activism spanned the formal and/or informal political mediums depending on the openings or closures of the political system.

The Sisterhood’s organizing during the various transitions in Egypt between 2010 and

2017 provides a significant case for addressing the gap in the literature on women’s organizing and its interactions with shifting POS. The POS literature, as currently theorized, does not pay sufficient attention to how the gendered institutions of these structures and the shifts in these structures affect women's ability to act politically. Most mainstream literature does not consider women’s participation and interaction with institutions during transitions toward, or away from, democracy. Nor does it consider “the gendered nature of those processes” (Waylen 2003, 157).

Earlier feminist works on Latin America, Eastern Europe, and South Africa from a gendered lens

“privilege the action of women’s social movements and women’s mobilization without always giving sufficient consideration to their interaction with different institutions” (Waylen 2003,

157). Additionally, “[T]he literature on Latin America or southern Europe in the 1980s refers to contexts in which societies shifted from a military right-wing, often socially conservative social order, to a leftish or leftish-centrist political paradigm, thereby enabling progressive social rights for men and women to emerge fairly automatically on the political agenda in the post- authoritarian transition” (Johansson-Nogués 2013, 395). However, “[T]he situation after the

Arab Spring is rather that the authoritarian regimes had alleged leftish/liberal socioeconomic ambitions” but “the new political forces of the transition appear instead to lean toward a much more socially conservative social order” (Johansson-Nogués 2013, 395).

Women’s movements often use various strategic methods of framing, alliances, and actions that change according to the political environment. Framing is a process that mediates between opportunity, organization, and action. It describes the shared meanings and definitions that people bring to their situations (McAdam et al.1996, 5). As Mona Tajali (2015) notes, women’s groups strategically frame their demands “in a way that garners the most support

among the public and yields the most pressure on the male elites” (565). She adds, “[W]omen activists strategically choose among the available discursive frames to demand a seat at the table, or may even shift their organizing and framing tactics depending on the larger political and social contexts of their countries” (Tajali 2015, 565). Therefore, in analyzing women’s activism, it is necessary to look more broadly at how their political framing and medium of organizing interact with and shape the political context.

Additionally, little scholarly work has been written on the MS and its activities. The MS has been marginalized and portrayed as followers of the MB rather than active agents who believe in the MB cause and advocate for it intentionally and actively. It is true that the

Sisterhood is not a separate organization from the MB; rather, as I explain later in the

Introduction, it is a division in the MB. However, this division operates and functions differently depending on the political context. As I show in Chapter Three, this division has a constant evolving role in the movement and sometimes operates as an independent entity such as in the case of their organizing after the ousting of the MB government in 2013. The evolving nature of the activism of the MS in the movement and beyond it to promote the MB’s cause has, as I show in the subsequent chapters, contributed to the survival of the MB and enhanced women’s perceptions of their role as political and social actors. By focusing on their activities, I will expand and enrich the existing literature on Islamist women’s activism in countries such as Iran,

Morocco, and Turkey. I will also illustrate how Islamist women’s political actions are heightened or diminished in different political contexts.

This dissertation contributes to the still minimal amount of gender-sensitive analysis of

POS and its relationship to Islamist women’s activism in the Middle East. Further, this dissertation is unique in that it applies a theoretical framework that views POS as both gendered

and dynamic rather than fixed. It reveals how a lack of gender analysis of POS can mask certain important political processes in various countries in the Middle East, such as Morocco, Tunisia, and Jordan, and applies a theoretical framework that views the POS as dynamic. In the case of

Egypt, this dynamism is apparent in the shifting alliances between military, secular-liberal political parties, and Islamists in two mediums: The informal political medium, civil society, and the formal medium, or the government.

This dissertation examines how the shift in alliances has resulted in political opening for and backlash against the MS according to the nature of the alliance. I see politics in Egypt as a game of three players1 who aspire to control the government: the military, the Islamists, and the secular-liberal political parties. These players aim to influence and eventually control the government and utilize civil society as medium for organizing when the government is closed.

The nature of alliances between these various players and their relationship with the international system affects the POS as well. The players are not equal in power, but they all play a significant role in Egyptian politics. For example, to gain control of the government, the secular-liberal parties or the Islamists must make a pact with the military. As I detail in Chapter

Two, this has been the case since the 1950s when the military became the strongest player in

Egyptian politics. After two players negotiate a pact, they install a “representative” government.

The alliance between any two players does not necessarily mean a backlash against the rest of the players will occur. However, Islamists (mainly members of the MB) have been mostly marginalized by the other players since the movements’ formation in 1928. Beyond the roles of formal political actors, however, and consistent with POS analysis, civil society organizing

1 Although, in this dissertation, I am describing the interactions among these players as a game, I am not engaging in predictive mathematical game theory even though I see these players as “rational actors” seeking to optimize their interests. Instead I am drawing upon qualitative game theory, which I discuss more in-depth in Chapter Three.

generally, and in Egypt specifically, can influence the outcome of the pact by delegitimizing the government chosen by the alliance to represent the pact. In constructing the structure in terms of alliances between various groups, I reveal the role of agents as one of its integral parts.

Additionally, I show that the structure is not fixed and that the relationship between structure and agency goes both ways: agency affects structure and structure shapes agency.

To address the response of the MS to changes in POS, this dissertation examines the mobilizing mediums the Sisters’ utilize and their framing strategies. I shed light on how the activities of the MS impact political elites’ backing for the movement’s agendas. In this case study, I examine how the effectiveness of their mobilizations and framing strategies depend upon

POS, which I define as the type of alliances between or among three players: the military,

Islamists, and secular-liberal political parties in two mediums—civil society and the government.

These different configurations result in openings for and backlash against certain groups. These openings and closings impact the Sisters’ framing strategies and medium of organizing. Each alliance’s attempt to project a particular image to the international community, as well as domestic struggles between Islamists and non-Islamists over who represents true Islam, influences their positions on rights, specifically women’s rights, thus influencing the political openings for and backlash against individual groups.

Terminology

The term Islamists refers to individuals who call for governance that is compatible with, and derives its vision from, Shari’a (Tadros 2016). This term is different from Muslim, which refers to people who follow Islam but do not particularly support an Islamist political project

(Tadros 2016). It is also to different from Islamic, “which refers to matters associated with the values and practices of Islam” (Tadros 2016, 21). Al-Anani defines Islamic identity (2016) as

“the cognitive code of values, symbols, norms, rituals, idioms, and emotions that Islamist movements employ to forge individuals’ worldview, behaviors, and attitudes—their identity”

(44).

Egyptian Islamists are mainly represented by the Muslim Brotherhood (MB or

Brotherhood or Brothers), including the MS division, because they are one of the most well- financed and organized religious groups in Egypt. However, they also include Salafists. Salafism is an ultra-conservative Islamist movement that follows a literal interpretation of the Quran.

After the January 25 revolution, the Salafists formed the Nour Party, which participated in the

2012 elections. Since the MB is the largest, most organized and well financed Islamist group in

Egypt, I mainly use the MB to represent the Islamists. However, there are sections in the dissertation, such as in Chapter Three, where I make clear distinctions between the members of the Islamist groups, to shed light on how the interaction between them shaped the MB’s political decisions and their positions on women’s issues and women’s rights.

I often use the abbreviation MB to refer to the Egyptian MB in general, including its female branch, and not solely the MB’s male leadership. I mainly use the MB as a general term for men and women when I talk about the relationship of the movement to the government and how that relationship influenced the MB’s position on women’s roles in the movement and politics the first two chapters. In Chapters Three and Four, however, I use the Muslim Sisterhood

(MS or Sisterhood or Sisters) in places where it is necessary to shed light on the role of women in the movement and politics in Egypt. I do so to highlight their contribution to social and political life as well as to write women into the history and present status of the movement.

Women members of the Brotherhood were essential to the survival of the MB and the increase in its popularity among Egyptians despite government repression against the movement

since its founding. This group played an instrumental role in securing support for the

Brotherhood during national parliamentary elections (2005, 2009, and 2012). The women’s

“access to people via mosques (in particular the women’s section of the mosques), the welfare organizations and access to homes, created a constituency and mobilized them to support the

Brotherhood” (Tadros 2011, 92). Additionally, female members of the Brotherhood helped recruit women’s votes for the Brotherhood. According to a study on women in the parliamentary elections of 2005 conducted by Blaydes and Tarouti (2009), women have proven to be highly effective political recruiters for MB candidates.

The term secular parties in the Arab world refers to “a broad range of political organizations that vary in their political orientation from liberal positions to vaguely socialist programs” (Ottaway & Hamzawy 2007, 1). Using the term “secular party” in the context of the

Middle East and North Africa is relative because certain parties, which eschew political platforms inspired by religious values, “would object to the ‘secular’ label for fear that it could be mistaken as connoting a rejection of Islamic culture and values” (Boduszyñski et al. 2015,

126). These parties define themselves “at least in part as the Islamists’ rivals” (Boduszyñski et al.

2015, 126). Hamid (2014) states that by defining themselves in opposition to the Islamists, secular parties helped the Egyptian regime “gain support from the international community—and many secularists at home—as the lesser of two evils” (142).

In this dissertation, I use the term secular-liberal political parties to describe non-

Islamists. It mainly refers to parties such as the Wafd Party and Tagammu Party (Boduszyñski et al. 2015). Other parties that existed before the uprisings include The Democratic Front Party,

The Reform and Development Party, and The Communist Party as well as new(er) ones such as the Free Egyptians, the Social Democrats, the Tomorrow (al-Ghad) Party, the Constitution

(Doustour) Party, and others. A liberal orientation could be traced back to the first major secular party in Egypt, the original Wafd, which was founded in 1919 (Tavana 2011; Boduszyñski et al.

2015). The party was “liberal in its secularism and opposition to the monarchy and British rule, but it was a formation of Cairo-centered notables rather than an internally democratic organization with a broad-based membership” (Boduszyñski et al. 2015, 127).

Medium of organizing refers to formal and informal institutional spaces where women activists can organize and strategize in order to promote their agenda in the particular time being examined. As I describe in Chapter Two, the main mediums I focus on are civil society and the government. I consider civil society to be an informal political medium for organizing, whereas the government is a formal political medium. Moreover, the international context encompasses

Egypt’s relationships with the U.S. and Israel. It also takes into consideration Egypt’s positions on the United Nations’ international agreements addressing human and women’s rights. As for the players, I only include those who hope to be in the government and to ultimately control it.

Historical Context

The MB first emerged in 1928 in Egypt as a social movement rather than a political party

(Tadros 2011; Weber 2012). A few years after founding the MB, Hassan Al- Banna, also founded the Sisterhood in 1932. Some view the establishment of the MS as a response by

Egyptian intellectuals at the time to calls for women’s liberation from a western perspective

(Abdel-Latif 2008, 2). Its members were primarily the female relatives of the Brothers. The group’s primary goal was to instill strong Islamic values among the women in the Egyptian community “through lectures and women-only gatherings” (Abdel-Latif 2008, 3). The role of the

Sisters “was limited to social work and preaching. They would organize religious lectures for girls and participate in community service work such as sheltering poor families and contributing

to the eradication of illiteracy” (Hamed 2012). The MS group was an independent entity from the

Brotherhood; however, it operated under the command of the Brotherhood’s Supreme Guide, who communicated with the Sisters through Sheikh Mahmoud al-Gohary. As Sheikh al-Gohary stated, “These were two different entities altogether, and they never congregated” (Abdel-Latif

2008, 3).

Due to the lack of female cadres, the activities of the group gradually faded until 1943 when a group of 120 women “who attended al-Banna’s weekly sermon formed the nucleus that revived the Muslim Sisters Group” (Abdel-Latif 2008, 3). The majority of these women were related by blood or marriage to the Brothers. This kinship trend has continued throughout the modern history of the Sisterhood, and it has enabled them to exert pressure on the Brotherhood to improve the Sisters’ status in the movement. Beyond familial relationships with the Brothers, however, Sisters were typically university graduates and attended mosques.

During the same year (1943), the Brotherhood formed a twelve-member executive committee to oversee the activities of the MS with Sheikh al-Gohary as the mediator between the group and al-Banna. The structure of the Sisters’ group consists of various committees, each dealing with a specific social issue. Examples of these committees are the educational committee, the social committee, the media committee, and the political committee (Abdel-Latif

2008). The administrative structure of the MB (the vertical structure) illustrated in Figure 1, consists of seven levels: usra (family or cell), shu’ba (division or branch), mantiqa (district), maktab idari (administrative office), Majlis al-shura (the Shura

Council), Maktab Al-Irshad (the Guidance Bureau), and al-murshid al-’am (the General Guide)

(Al-Anani 2016). The General Guide and the Guidance Bureau supervise the organization, control its structure, and have the final word over its decisions (Al-Anani 2016). The Sisters

have, for the most part, been excluded from these two offices. The Sisters are, however, included in the horizontal structure, as illustrated in Figure 2. The structure consists of three basic components: sections (aqsam), committees (lijan), and units (wahdat) (Al-Anani 2016). The main purpose of this structure is “to facilitate the work of the Guidance Bureau and Shura

Council and to enable them to achieve their assigned objectives” (Al-Anani 2016, 104). The

Sisters’ main purpose was to engage in social work and religious education of other women in the community. They did not influence the decision-making process in the governing and administrative components of the MB because members of the Sisters were not allowed to become a General Guide or to be elected for the Guidance Bureau.

Figure 1: The Vertical Structure of the Brotherhood (See Al-Anani 2016, 104)

Figure 2: The Horizontal Structure of the Brotherhood (See Al-Anani 2016, 105)

The MB expanded their activities to include political issues in the late 1940s after the first Arab-Israeli conflict (Weber 2012). The political activism of the MB resulted in the assassination of Hassan al-Banna in 1949. Over the following decades, the Brotherhood organized underground (Weber 2012, 186). The Islamists in Egypt had to navigate national and international constraints on their participation in formal politics. The MB in Egypt managed to navigate the authoritarian state’s restrictions on political activity by controlling formal syndicates such as professional associations including doctors, lawyers, and engineers, as well as university- based student associations across Egypt. The Muslim Sisters played an important role in these syndicates. The MB and their women members participated in an intensive campaign of ideological outreach to educated youth and “created new motivations for activism that

transcended the logic of self-preservation underlying dominant patterns of political abstention”

(Wickham 2002, 6).

The Muslim Sisters started taking on a supportive role for the Brotherhood in the 1950s.

This was due to a change in the political climate: the Egyptian government increased its intolerance of the MB. As I discuss in depth in Chapter Two, the military became a strong player in Egyptian politics after the Free Officers coup in 1952 led by Gamal Abdel Nasser, and has been playing a strong role in the government since then and throughout the period included in this study. After the coup of 1952, Gamal Abdel Nasser’s government imprisoned many high- ranking members of the Brotherhood. This threatened the continuity of the movement.

According to Jihan al-Halafawi, a senior activist, “[W]hat kept the movement from collapse at the time was the fact that women moved quickly to take on the job when men were imprisoned or sent into long exiles” (Abdel-Latif 2008, 4). The Sisters’ assistance to the Brotherhood and its activities was mainly constrained to providing “moral and financial support to the families of the detainees, a task that would remain one of the key undertakings of the women’s division as the movement continued to be the target of the state’s wrath” (Abdel-Latif 2008, 4). The backlash of the Egyptian state against the Brotherhood undermined and hindered the structure of the Sisters’ group. Its members had to shift their attention from improving their status in the Brotherhood to supporting the Brothers’ families and preserving the legacy of the Brotherhood.

The government backlash against the Brotherhood continued until the election of

President Anwar el-Sadat in 1970. As I elaborate further in Chapter Two, this government was the result of an alliance between secular-liberal political parties and the military. Anwar el-

Sadat’s government opened up the political space for the MB by releasing their leaders from prison and encouraging them to take control over trade and student union organizations from the

leftist and pro-Nasser groups. This opening was an attempt to challenge and reduce Anwar el-

Sadat’s Nasserist opponents.

The opening in political space during the Anwar el-Sadat years continued through the early part of President Hosni Mubarak’s government. During this period of alliance (1980-2011) between secular-liberal parties and the military there were instances of backlash against and opening for radical religious movements, such as the Brotherhood, who sought to increase their influence on the government. To counter the rise of Islamist groups, Hosni Mubarak attempted to contain Islamists by co-opting their agenda, resulting in a political opening for the Brotherhood.

Political opening is characterized by more freedom of personal and media expression; diversity of nongovernmental actors, expansion in the field of activities of existing NGOs; decline in state coercion in the form of arbitrary arrests, disappearance, and torture; and freer parliamentary elections (Brand 1998, 4). However, a political backlash followed when the Brotherhood did not adjust their agenda to fit with the government’s vision.

During Hosni Mubarak’s early years, the Brotherhood continued to expand its recruitment base, which included both men and women, and the MB increased in popularity among different segments of the Egyptian community “mainly through charitable work” (Abdel-

Latif 2008, 5). The Sisters’ group began to resume its social activities and charity work “during the mid-1980s and helped greatly to reinforce the image of the Brothers as an active social force”

(Abdel- Latif 2008, 5). However, from 1993 to 2010, due to the wave of violent attacks against government targets conducted by fringe Islamist groups, such as al-Jamaa al-Islamyia and another radical militant group, Tanzeem al-Jihad, there was a setback in the relations between the state and the movement (Abdel- Latif 2008). Even though the movement was officially outlawed, it was able to maneuver around state restrictions and engage in politics. The

Brotherhood confronted those restrictions by running independent candidates or allying with opposition parties.

In 1995, the movement secured only one seat in parliament. However, in the 2000 elections, they managed to secure 17 seats in Parliament, and in 2005 the Brotherhood gained an unprecedented 88 seats (Abdel- Latif 2008, 6). The results of the 2005 elections constituted a threat to Hosni Mubarak’s government, resulting in the government declaring the Brotherhood a

“security threat.” The government attacked hundreds of the movement’s senior members as well as its economic assets. The backlash caused the Sisters to shift their attention from conducting social projects to working on mobilizing political and financial support for the imprisoned

Brothers and their families. This backlash hindered the Sisters’ from developing their structures and projects. However, it also opened a space for women by enabling them to run as part of the

Brotherhood’s electoral list for the elections of 2000. In 2000, the MB nominated its first woman candidate, Jihan al-Halafawi (Khalaf 2012), Moreover, the Sisters “ran in the 2005 and 2010 parliamentary elections on behalf of the Muslim Brotherhood” (Hamed 2012).

On February 11, 2011, the revolution in Egypt forced Hosni Mubarak to resign. His resignation marked a period of expansive political opening for the Brotherhood, its women members, and various other political groups. This opening resulted in the election of the

Brotherhood on June 24, 2012. It was a result of the new alliance between the military and the

Islamists/Brotherhood. During this period, some women joined the frontlines of the protests, campaigned for the FJP, and held administrative and political positions in the FJP. The opening was short lived before it was met with another backlash. On July 3, 2013, Egyptian army chief

General Abdel Fattah el-Sisi led a coalition to remove the President of Egypt, Mohamed Morsi, from power and suspended the Egyptian constitution. As, I show in the subsequent chapters,

between 2011 and 2017, a period of multiple transitions, the Sisters, as female representatives of the MB, utilized different mediums and framings depending on their interactions with other players. During this period, they shifted between and worked in three different mediums- domestic civil society, international civil society, and the government. They also shifted between religious and international frames of women’s and human rights depending on the political context they operated in at the time.

In light of this narrative of the history of the Sisterhood, we can see why it is important to ask how the POS in Egypt between 2010 and 2017 shaped Islamist women’s political participation and become reshaped by Islamist women’s political organizing and framing strategies.

Hypotheses

I base the hypotheses presented below on my collection and analysis of social media posts and news articles on the Sisters’ organizing since 2011. Additionally, I rely on recent work on Islamic and Islamist women’s organizing for women’s rights in countries such as Turkey and

Iran. These cases are important for the analysis of the Sisterhood because they examine two types of regimes (one more secular and the other more religious) that are similar to the types of regimes that were in place in Egypt between 2010 and 2017. Moghadam and Gheytanchi state that in the cases of Turkey and Iran “the opening of political space permits nonviolent civil society actors such as women’s rights advocates to build their movements, launch campaigns for legal and policy reform, and engage with government. The closing of political space creates dissidents and leads to extrainstitutional activism and contention” (2010, 272). They add,

“[F]eminist groups may take advantage of a political opening to seek elite allies, including government officials, in support of their cause” (272). However, political backlash might “force

feminist groups to alter their strategy and seek societal and international support rather than governmental cooperation (272). Moreover, framing strategies are shaped by the political context but will also reflect broader societal and cultural values and norms (272).

In Mona Tajali’s study of Islamic women’s rights activism in Iran and Turkey, she observes that “Islamic women’s groups and organizations in Turkey, similar to their secular counterparts, are increasingly articulating their demands for women’s enhanced access to political leadership through international agreements and human rights conventions of the United

Nations and European Union” (Tajali 2015, 569). The Convention on the Elimination of all

Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), which Turkey has signed and ratified, has provided an important opportunity structure for Turkish women’s groups, from across the ideological spectrum, who utilized it as a tool to improve the state’s gender policies (Tajali 2015,

572). Tajali suggests that “many Islamic women’s rights activists in Turkey strategically frame their demands for head-scarfed women’s right to political representation in secular terms in an effort to appeal to secular sectors of society, while also pressuring pro-religious elites” (2015,

573).

When women activists are faced with a secular regime, they deploy a secular framework by leaning on international conventions such as CEDAW. However, when they are facing a religious regime, they deploy a religious framework by leaning on the more moderate interpretations of the Quran and Sharia. Based on this literature and my research to date, the

following are my hypotheses:

1. Changes in POS alter the nature of the Sisterhood’s political participation and their language and medium of organizing. When the Sisters have access to and the support of some members of the elite alliance, they utilize the formal political medium, the government, as their medium for organizing. They also attempt to promote an Islamist agenda for women’s rights. They attempt to reclaim women’s rights by redefining them from an Islamic perspective and attempting to pass legal changes to reflect their vision of women’s rights.

2. The Sisterhood’s political participation and modes of political organizing and framing, in turn, also change POS within regimes for particular women. The Sisters increase access for other Sisters and Islamist women to the formal political medium, government, and they implement their social and political vision. However, they restrict the access of secular women to the formal medium and challenge their secular social and political vision.

These hypotheses play out in three phases:

1. Between 2010 and February 11, 2011, the elite alliance was between the secular elites and the military. During this period of political backlash, the Sisters focused on social work and supportive roles in civil society. During the political opening of the Arab Spring, however, the Sisters focused on a supportive role in both the medium of government and civil society. The Sisters relied on a secular framing of their demands and activities. Their social work increased the support of some Egyptians for the Muslim Brothers and Sisters. This support resulted in their election to the government, after the ouster of Hosni Mubarak. Additionally, the Sisters’ alliance with secular civil society organizations helped shift elite alliances in the government.

2. Between February 11, 2011, and July 3, 2013, the elite alliance was between the Islamists (the Brotherhood) and the military. During this period of political opening, the Sisters organized in the government. The Sisters articulated their demands in a religious framework. Their access to the government increased Islamist women’s access to this medium and decreased secular women’s access.

3. Between June 24, 2012, and until December 2017, the elite alliance was between the liberal-secular political parties and the military. During this period of political backlash, the Sisters organized in civil society. The Sisters relied on secular framing of their demands and activities, focusing on socioeconomic and political rights. When the Sisters lost access to the government due to the change in elite alliances (the military coup and the mobilization of some civil society groups), the Sisters attempted to reframe their demands using the language of human including women’s rights, freedom, and democracy.

Methodology and Assessment of Evidence

To test the hypotheses presented above, I use qualitative content analysis of semi- structured interviews with sixteen members of the Egyptian MB and MS living in Turkey and in

Egypt and of documents and texts in English and Arabic from both traditional news outlets, such as newspapers and broadcast media, and social media like Facebook. I collected texts produced during the research period from both types of media sources such as IkwanWeb, Al-Ahram, and the Facebook page of Women Against the Coup. Hsieh and Shannon (2005) define qualitative content analysis “as a research method for the subjective interpretation of the content of text data through the systematic classification process of coding and identifying themes or patterns”

(1278). The goal of the content analysis is “to provide knowledge and understanding of the phenomenon under study” (Downe-Wamboldt, 1992, 314). Content analysis enables me to attain a condensed yet broad description of the Sisters’ organizing strategies during the periods of regime transition described earlier. In the analysis of the texts, I focus on three categories: the medium of organizing (government or civil society), women’s rights (any public mention or discussion of women’s issues), and human rights (any mention of political freedom, poverty, or education).

My sources for women’s organizing strategies (framing and medium) are news articles, videos, and social media posts, which include reports on and interviews with members of the

MS, as well as phone and in-person interviews I conducted with members of the Egyptian MB and MS. Most of my interviewees have been living in exile in Turkey since the military coup.

However, I also interviewed two activists who are currently in Egypt. These activists are urban, educated, middle-class individuals. A number of political and practical limitations prevented me from interviewing women from rural areas or lower class backgrounds. Indeed, a colleague of

mine was arrested on terrorism charges June 2018 while conducting research on the oppression in Egypt. Some may criticize this sampling strategy as introducing selection or class biases into my analysis, yet this is not actually problematic as my theoretical framework and analysis are focused on elite interactions and the visible activists in the MB and MS. I gained access to the men faster than the women. After establishing rapport with Amr Darrag, the head of the

Egyptian Institute for Strategic Studies in Istanbul, he put me in touch with other women activists living in Turkey.

I examine media content because it represents and influences the public. This is due to the evolution of the World Wide Web, which changed the Internet “into a collaborative framework where technological and social trends come together” (Al-Kabi et al. 2014, 182).

Moreover, the popularity of the web has “been accompanied with an increase in freely available online reviews and opinions about different topics, subjects, or entities” (Al-Kabi et al. 2014,

182). I rely on social media to collect data on the Sisters’ framing strategies and medium of organizing because it played a major role in the Arab Spring as a tool for communication and organizing (Howard et al. 2011; Lotan et al. 2011; Papacharissi & Oliveira 2012; Starbird &

Palen, 2012). Moreover, social media was a central platform for the Sisters campaigning during the 2012 elections.

Since my topic of research is very specific and has not been studied or addressed sufficiently, random sampling of news articles and newspapers would not have been appropriate for this project. Theoretical sampling is more suitable in this case. This sampling “necessitates building interpretative theories from the emerging data and selecting a new sample to examine and elaborate on this theory” (Marshal 1996, 523). Thus, since the Sisters are members of the

Brotherhood, I targeted the Brotherhood’s website (Ikhwanweb) and The Freedom and Justice

Party’s website. The Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) is the Political wing of the Brotherhood.

Additionally, I look at various Egyptian news sources such as Al Ahram Online, which is one of the most widely circulating Egyptian daily newspapers. For social media coverage, I examined

Facebook pages such as pages of Women Against the Coup, a women’s rights group run by members of the Sisterhood and Asma Shokr, a prominent Sister.

By examining news media and social media coverage of the MS, including their organizational and individual public online postings, I trace their changing strategies and emphases through the various phases of regime change described earlier. I also asked about these changes in the interviews I conducted when I was in Turkey in the winter of 2017. I assess and analyze the data collected by drawing on insights from comparative literature on Islamic and

Islamist women’s activism and political organizing in the Middle East (e.g. Iran, Turkey, and

Morocco), particularly on women’s religious versus secular framings of their arguments. I also utilize literature that addresses how POS affects the organizing of social movements in general and women’s movements in particular, predominantly the ways movements shift between formal politics and more informal activities in civil society. In particular, I compare the organizing of the Islamist women in relation to POS in Egypt with the organizing of Islamist women’s groups in Tunisia (Debuysere 2016; Gray 2012).

Chapters

Chapter One reviews literature on POS as well as literature on Islamist women’s activism. It explains the importance of gendering POS in order to understand the significant role the Sisterhood played in strengthening the support base among Egyptians for the MB. It also highlights how the Sisters used POS to increase their participation in the formal political medium, the government, as political candidates. The chapter suggests that in order to

understand how the MS interacted with shifting POS in Egypt between 2010 and 2017, we need to conceptualize POS to include political opportunities, mobilizing structures, and framing processes.

Chapter Two introduces a qualitative strategic model to address the conceptual problems with POS and the minimal attention given to gender and Middle East state-society relations in

POS studies. The qualitative strategic model looks at politics in Egypt between 2010 and 2017 as a political game. The model accounts for cultural, national, and international contexts. I use this model to analyze different alliances in Egypt. The actions of the players, as well as the nature of their alliances, do not operate in a vacuum. Rather, the international context shapes the balance of power between the different players and thus influences their alliances. In turn, it influences the strategic choices of the Muslim Sisters.

This chapter examines how the game created moments of political opening and backlash that shaped the Muslim Sisters’ strategic choices. These strategic choices are also influenced by the religious cultural context and international agreements (especially the ones dealing with women’s and human rights). There are three players in the game: the military, the Islamists

(mainly the MB), and the secular-liberal political parties. The players are not equal in power, but the game remains one in which each has significant chips. To gain control, the secular-liberal political parties or the Islamists must make a pact with the military. After two groups negotiate a pact, they install a “representative” government. In addition to attempting to control the government, these players utilize civil society as a medium of organizing whenever they are blocked from or marginalized in the formal political medium, the government. Since the

Sisterhood was not entirely integrated into the internal structure of the MB between 2010 until

2017, it strategically moved between these two mediums (government and civil society). By

examining the structure in terms of changing alliances between various groups, I reveal the role of agents, particularly leaders from each of the three “player” groups, as an integral part of the structure.

Chapter Three addresses how the shifts in alliances between 1954 and 2017 have influenced the structural context in which Egyptian women activists in general, and the MS in particular, have operated. Women’s issues have been at the center of the cooperation and contestation between Islamists and secular-liberal parties and civil society groups. The national context, which is influenced by the conflict between Islamists and non-Islamists, and the international context shaped the position of these players on women’s issues. The participation of the MB in the political game as members of civil society during Anwar el-Sadat and Hosni

Mubarak’s governments, as well as their strategic choice to cooperate with secular-liberal civil society groups, resulted in an ideological shift in the movement to a more moderate interpretation of women’s role in Islam. The strategic choices made in electoral and civic mediums to enable the MB to appeal to and cooperate with other ideological factions in Egyptian society have resulted in an ideological shift. The changes in their views towards women’s participation, however, were restricted to women’s roles in support of the political activities of the MB as opposed to affecting the MB’s internal leadership structure.

Chapter Four addresses the organizing activities of the MS in Egypt between 2010 and

2017. The Sisters’ decades of rising political consciousness and organizing experience during periods of opening and backlash against the MB provided them with the necessary skills that allowed them to play a stronger role within the organization and the resistance against Hosni

Mubarak’s and Abdel Fatah el-Sisi’s regimes. Socioeconomic rights and democracy were their

main framing focus before and during the uprisings. The main medium for their organizing was and once again is civil society.

Despite some constraints on the MS during the Morsi regime, women’s rights did become a central issue for the MB’s government due to the concerns of the liberals and the international community about the election of the MB. The activist Sisters tried to clarify and justify the FJP’s and MB’s position on women’s rights for non-Islamists and the Salafists, the more conservative

Islamists. After the military coup, human rights and especially women’s rights became the popular resistance frame of the MS both because of Abdel Fatah el-Sisi’s government’s imprisonment and torture of some of the MB’s members and the people associated with them and the greater political experience in advocating for women’s rights the MS gained when the

MB was in power. These results shed light on how a comprehensive understanding of Islamist women’s activism cannot be achieved without examining how their political framing and medium of organizing interact with and create the political context. This study reveals how a gendered analysis of POS can reveal significant political processes, on the one hand, how

Islamist women have been instrumental in bringing Islamist parties to power and, on the other hand, how Islamist women become vocal advocates for women’s and other human rights, both as a result of their increased formal political experience and in opposition to a semi-secular military regime.

Chapter One

Political Opportunity Structure, Gender, and Islamist Women’s Activism

In this chapter, I apply a gender lens to POS. This gender lens sheds light on the significant role the Sisterhood played in strengthening the Muslim Brotherhood’s (MB) support base among Egyptians. This was one of the factors that led to their success in the 2012 elections.

It also highlights how the Sisters used the POS to increase their participation in government as political candidates. To understand how the Muslim Sisters interacted with shifting POS in Egypt between 2010 and 2017, we need to conceptualize POS to include political opportunities, mobilizing structures, and framing processes. According to McAdam, McCarthy, and Zald

(1996), scholars from various theoretical backgrounds who study social movements focus on three factors. The first factor is political opportunities. This factor addresses the structure of political opportunities and limitations facing the movement (McAdam et. al. 1996, 2). The second factor is mobilizing structures, which includes the types of informal and formal organizations available to the protesters (McAdam, McCarthy, and Zald 1996, 2). The final factor is framing methods, which contains “the collective processes of interpretation, attribution, and social construction that mediate between opportunity and action” (McAdam, McCarthy, and

Zald 1996, 2). These factors do not stand alone; rather they interact with each other. As

McAdam, McCarthy, and Zald note, change “only becomes an ‘opportunity’ when defined as such by a group of actors sufficiently well organized to act on this shared definition of the situation” (1996, 8). Mobilizing structures and framing processes mediate the effect of political opportunities (McAdam, McCarthy, and Zald 1996, 11).

This chapter considers the literature addressing, and to some degree critiquing, these factors and illustrates how this dissertation contributes to this literature by applying its insights to

Middle East studies and making gender analysis central to the understanding of these factors.

While examining the literature on POS and its relationship to gender opportunity structures, I develop a theoretical framework that better reveals on how women interact with and try to shape political structures. I draw on and highlight some aspects of McAdam, McCarthy, and Zald’s

(1996) conceptualization of POS and framing processes, but bring a gender dimension to it. This chapter serves as a justification for the theoretical position the dissertation takes in the analyses of the data collected on the Muslim Sisterhood (MS). I will lay out the dissertations’ theoretical framework in Chapter Three.

The first scholar to apply the “political opportunity” framework explicitly was Eisinger

(1973) who attempted to examine why some US cities faced race riots in the 1960s while others did not. Eisinger found that cities with a combination of ‘open’ and ‘closed’ structures for citizen participation were most likely to experience protest (Eisinger 1973, 17). Eisinger defines closed structures as: “Where formal or informal power appears to be concentrated and where government is not responsive, the opportunities for people to get what they want or need through political action are limited” (1973, 12). On the other hand, open structures is a term that describes a situation where government institutions are “more responsive to an electorate by providing opportunities of formal representation for distinct segments of the population…or where the government is demonstrably responsive to citizen needs and demands” (Eisinger 1973,

12). The cities that had widespread institutional openings prevented rebellions “by inviting conventional means of political participation to redress grievances; cities without visible openings for participation repressed or discouraged dissident claimants to foreclose eruptions of protest” (Meyer 2004, 126). However, in cities with the most closed institutions, protests are also not likely. According to Eisinger, “protest will not flourish where its use finds neither tolerance

nor elicits favorable response” (1973, 28). As I show in Chapter Three, Egypt’s electoral authoritarian system and the various stages of opening and closing for the Brotherhood and other opposition groups eventually led to the mass protests in January 25, 2011.

Charles Tilly was one of the most prominent scholars giving the concept of POS visibility in sociology and political science. Tilly (1978) work built upon Eisinger’s (1973) work to develop a more inclusive theory of political opportunities. Tilly’s model includes five elements: interests, organization, mobilization, collective action, and opportunity. His work encouraged national comparisons and addressed changes in opportunities over time. He also argued “that opportunities would explain the more general process of choosing tactics from a spectrum of possibilities within a ‘repertoire of contention’” (Meyer 2004, 128). Tilly’s (1978) book From

Mobilization to Revolution introduced a systematic account about the role of political opportunities for contenders. Like Eisinger, he argues that there is a curvilinear relationship between the rate of protest and political openness. Tilly contends that protest happens when the government tolerates it and when protestors are not completely repressed. His model evolved into two approaches. The first one is a more dynamic approach, which emerged among American scholars (e.g., McAdam 2003; Tarrow 1989) and emphasized the more unstable features of political opportunities. These scholars look at “the openings of ‘windows of opportunities’ that may encourage collective actors to form or join social movements and carry [out] protest activities. Here, the focus is on explaining the emergence or development over time of a given movement or movement cycle based on changes in the institutionalized political system or the configuration of power” (Giugni 2011, 362). The second approach was prominent among

European scholars (e.g. Kitschelt 1986; Kriesi et al. 1995). It “looked at the more stable aspects of political opportunities, trying to account for cross-national differences in the forms, levels, and

outcomes of social movements and protest activities” (Giugni 2011, 362).

The dynamic approach is important to study the activism of the MS in the context of regime transition because it emphasizes the interactions between structure and agency. As

Korany and El-Mahdi (2012) note in their study of the Arab Spring, Middle East Studies needs to develop a model of analysis that combines agency and structure. They also state, “The Arab

Spring revealed that most of the new scholarly approaches [for studying the Middle East] remain deficient in fundamental, and indeed epistemological, ways” (Korany & El-Mahdi 2012, 16).

They add, “this epistemological deficiency is a firm conviction in the absolute primacy of

‘politics from above,’ ‘formal politics,’ and institutions at the expense- and even the exclusion- of ‘politics from below,’ ‘informational politics,’ and extra institutional dynamics” (Korany &

El-Mahdi 2012, 16). Korany and El-Mahdi claim that this explains why most Middle East scholars, “despite being specialists on the region, were surprised by what happened at the beginning of 2011” (2012, 17). They suggest that POS “addresses the nagging problem of agency versus structure and acts as a bridge between the two to emphasize the impact of the protester’s role in influencing the political result of the struggle” (Korany and El-Mahdi 2012,

20). The main proposition of POS is “that exogenous factors enhance or inhibit prospects for mobilization, for particular sorts of claims to be advanced rather than others, for particular strategies of influence to be exercised, and for movements to affect mainstream institutional politics and policy” (Meyer & Minkoff 2004, 1457-8). This approach focuses on the interaction of activist efforts and more mainstream institutional politics and is thus ideal for my study.

These approaches have led to multifaceted debates about how to best conceptualize POS.

Certain scholars have concentrated on large-scale structures, and others on structures that are proximate to particular actors. Some of these scholars “analyze cross-sectional variations in

political opportunity, while others look at how changes in political conflict and alliances trigger, channel and demobilize social movements” (Tarrow 1996, 42). One approach is relevant to this dissertation: group specific opportunities. Group-specific opportunities focus “on the opportunity structure of specific groups and how these change over time” (Tarrow 1996, 43). This approach holds that “[c]hanges in a group’s position in society affect its opportunities for collective action as well” (Tarrow 1996, 43). Such an approach dovetails with the changing opportunity structures for the MB and MS between 2010 and 2017. During the January 25 uprisings, there was a specific opening for the MB and subsequently for the MS because they were the most organized groups participating in the anti-Mubarak demonstration. Due to the fact that the MB was the only united leadership with financial resources and a large base of supporters, the MB was the only group the Egyptian military could negotiate with to broker a transition. The social work in rural areas particularly engaged in by the MS and the history of resistance on the part of both the MB and MS to the Mubarak government increased their popularity among Egyptians, which resulted in the elections of members of the MB and MS in 2012. This opening for the MB created an opening for the MS to participate in politics during and after the January 25 uprisings. It enabled the Sisterhood to be present in Tahrir Square and become an active part of the MB’s elected government in 2012. The Sisters’ participation in politics during the January 25 uprisings and its aftermath has increased women’s political consciousness and organizing. Women started demanding to be included and represented in the structure of the MB and the Freedom and

Justice Party (FJP), the political wing of the Brotherhood. This opening was specific for the group and not for other groups in the Egyptian society. The changes in the POS for this movement are a result of changing elite alignments in the Egyptian government, which, for a short period, changed the political opportunities for the MS.

In order to better illustrate these patterns, I take the more dynamic approach to POS that considers the state and social movements at the same time. The dynamic approach, as explained by the work of Kriesi (1991), Kriesi and Giugni (1990), and Kriesi et al. (1995), refers to steady

“but not necessarily formal, permanent, or national- signals to social or political actors, which either encourage or discourage them to use their internal sources to form social movements” (as cited in McAdam, McCarthy, and Zald 1996, 54). This approach reveals how even weak opponents can cash in on opportunities produced by others to challenge dominant rivals. Equally, as opportunities tighten, the strong get weaker and are forced to modify their organizing strategies (Tarrow 1996, 54). This dynamic concept of political opportunity “emphasizes not only formal structures like state institutions, but the conflict and alliance structures which provide resources and oppose constraints external to the group” (Tarrow 1996, 54). In the case of

Egypt, the shift in alliances between the military, the Islamists represented by the Brotherhood, and secular-liberal political parties has shaped the political opportunity structure for various groups including the MS. It has shaped their access to various mediums of organizing, such as civil society and the government, and shaped their demands and the framing of these demands.

In Chapter Three, I develop a dynamic POS model that accounts for the strategic choices of activists. McAdam, McCarthy, and Zald’s (1996) approach, which attempted to conceptualize a dynamic definition of POS that accounts for structure and agency, inspires this model. Their approach holds that there are four dimensions that shape POS. The first is “the relative openness or closure of the institutionalized political system” (McAdam, McCarthy, and Zald 1996, 10). As

Eisinger (1973) contends, demonstrations are most likely to happen “in systems characterized by a mix of open and closed factors” (15). The second dimension is the “stability of the broad set of elite alignments that typically undergird a polity” (McAdam, McCarthy, and Zald 1996, 10). The

likelihood of new coalitions developing in the government inspires protestors “to try to exercise marginal power and may induce elites to seek support from outside the polity” (Tarrow 1996,

55). The third is the presence of elite allies. Elite allies can play multiple roles such as “a friend in court, as guarantors against brutal repression, or as acceptable negotiators on behalf of constituencies” (Tarrow 1996, 55). Protesting groups create political opportunities for groups and elites within the system. Their actions can also provide the grounds for repression. Elites might take advantage of the opportunity generated by contenders to declare themselves as the representatives and protectors of the people (Tarrow 1996, 60). The final dimension is “the state’s capacity and propensity for repression” (McAdam, McCarthy, and Zald 1996, 10). A change in any of these four dimensions signals a shift in POS for groups to organize.

In the Egyptian case, I focus on the second dimension. Shifts in elite alignments were one of the most noticeable and important changes in these four elements. As Sidney Tarrow suggests,

“divisions among elites not only provide incentives for resource-poor groups to take the risk of collective action; they also encourage portions of the elite to seize the role of ‘tribute of the people’ to increase their own political influence” (1996, 56). These unstable dimensions portray

“movement outcomes as involving structures which shape and channel activity while, in turn, movements act as agents that help to shape the political space in which they operate” (Gamson and Meyer 1996, 289). As I illustrate in the next chapter, the weakening of the alliance between the military and the secular-liberal political parties accompanied by a unified social movement resulted in the opening for the Islamists to form an alliance with the military and take control of the government. The Islamists, mainly referring to the Brotherhood, portrayed themselves during the uprisings and the subsequent elections (2012) as the tribute of the masses that took to the streets on January 25.

Some scholars have introduced various definitions of political opportunity that move beyond the traditional definition. Specifically, they introduced four new additions to the concept:

“discursive opportunities, specific opportunities, perceived opportunities, and the shift from conditions to mechanisms in the study of social movements and contentious politics” (Giugni

2011, 364). On one hand, scholars of “discursive opportunities” see that the access of actors to the institutionalized political system affects their mobilization opportunities. On the other hand, the discursive side is linked to the “public visibility and resonance as well as the political legitimacy of certain actors, identities, and claims” (Giugni 2011, 364). The concept of “specific opportunities” suggests that some political opportunities are unique to certain movements. The concept of “perceived opportunities” acknowledges “that opportunities must be perceived in order to be seized” (Giugni 2011, 364; See also Banaszak 1996; Gamson and Meyer 1996;

Kurzman 1996; McAdam et al. 1996). Advocates of the final approach suggest moving “away from the search for the conditions that favor or prevent challengers to mobilize and focus instead on the processes and mechanisms underlying their mobilization. Specifically, they suggest distinguishing between cognitive, relational, and environmental mechanisms” (Giugni 2011,

365). For examining women’s activism, the concept of the discursive opportunity structure is the most useful. Women activists are more likely to get support for their demands from political elites and society when their framing of these demands resonates with the discursive opportunities of their context at the time (Tajali 2015).

Responses to the Critique of POS

The concept of POS has some critics. Goodwin and Jasper (2012) claim that the term

“political opportunity structure” is too vague to be a useful analytical tool. They argue that no concept should combine “both opportunity, which implies something happening in the short

term, and structure, which implies aspects of a context that are slow to change” (Goodwin &

Jasper 2012, 229). They contend that this term could be used to describes two different approaches to POS. The first approach examines short-term variations in political contexts and the second looks at stable aspects of political contexts (Goodwin & Jasper 2012). Instead of using the term political opportunity structure, Goodwin and Jasper suggest the use of political contexts (2012). They claim that this term is not confusing because “it does not indicate either long-or short-term aspects of situations, or, more important, both; and it leaves up to the scholar to define these contexts - what they are expected to influence and why” (Goodwin & Jasper

2012, 231). For my analysis, I find the term political opportunity structure as defined by

McAdam, McCarthy, and Zald (1996) more useful, and less vague, than political context. In my analysis, I do not attempt to trace the emergence of a social movement, but rather the strategic organizing decisions (framing and medium of organizing) made by the Sisterhood and how they interacted with shifting alliances in the government. This shift in alliances, even though it was temporary, enabled the Sisterhood to access the political system.

Another flaw of some POS research relates to how scholars who use this concept have not sufficiently explained what they mean by structure. Also, the variables selected by some scholars to explain the structure “are not bound together by an overarching principle or theory”

(Rucht 1996, 189). Scholars use political opportunity frameworks to examine a wide-range of dependent variables such as social protest mobilization (e.g., Almeida & Stearns 1998, Tarrow

1989, Joppke 1993), tactics or strategies (e.g., Eisinger 1973, Jenkins & Eckert 1986, Cooper

1996, Minkoff 1997), formation of organizations (Clemens 1997, Minkoff 1995), and influence on public policy (Piven & Cloward 1977, Amenta & Zylan 1991). To prevent conceptual confusion, McAdam et al suggest that “it is critical that we be explicit about which dependent

variable we are seeking to explain and which dimensions of political opportunity are germane to that explanation” (1996, 31). I agree with McAdam et al. on the need to have a clear definition of what we mean by POS; however, I disagree with them on the use of the language of dependent

(DV) and independent variables (IV). I agree with Goodwin and Jasper (2012) who call for abandoning “multivariate models that try to specify independent and dependent variables” (17).

Instead of using such models, it is better to develop a strategic model such as those found in game theory that examines a series of actions and reactions. This allows us to see how POS changes according to the movements’ own choices and the actions they inspire in other players, such as members of the political elites and groups occupying the medium of civil society.

Using this strategic and dynamic model also addresses the inadequate attention of social movement scholars to “systematically studying the role that movements have played in reshaping the institutional structure and political alignments of a given polity” (McAdam 1996, 36).

Traditional POS literature focuses “on general elements in the political system, regardless of constituency” (Meyer & Minkoff 2004, 1461). However, “the sets of factors relevant to social protest vary across issues and constituencies” (Meyer & Minkoff 2004, 1461). Elements that provoke “mobilization for one movement or constituency may depress mobilization of another, and be completely irrelevant to a third” (Meyer & Minkoff 2004, 1461). The literature needs more attention to the relationship between context and action. Goldstone (1991) argues that some researchers “emphasize factors completely outside the control of activists, such as population growth” (as cited in Meyer & Minkoff 2004, 1463), while, as Kurzman (1996) notes, other researchers “suggest perceptions of opportunity are far more important to collective action than the actual strength of a regime” (as cited in Meyer & Minkoff 2004, 1463). Thus, studying POS in terms of game theory with various players allows the examination of how specific players in

social movements and the political system shape the POS.

I draw inspiration from the work of several scholars who have conducted qualitative game theory (e.g. Jasper 1997 & Ganz 2000). Jasper (1997) examines diverse examples of social movements going back to the nineteenth century in order develop an extensive understanding of social movements. His works reveals the shortcomings of traditional game theory and develops an expansive model of social movements that considers cultural and physiological factors in influencing strategic decisions. Ganz (2000) compares the organizing outcomes for two organizations: the United Farm Workers and the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee.

This case study examines a list of strategic choices made by the AWOC and the UFW during their activism. It brings attention to differences in the actors, their decisions, and how they interacted with their environment. Ganz argues that in static settings where rules, resources, and interests are set, traditional game theory might help us understand the strategic choices of actors.

However, in social movement contexts where the rules, resources, and interests are constantly changing, the strategic choices of actors in these settings can best be understood as a constant process of analyzing and adapting new conditions to one's goals.

Furthermore, movement scholars have studied the structure of political opportunities in terms of domestic political institutions and alignments and underrated the influence of international factors on structuring the domestic opportunities for the emergence of social movements. The international context, “and particularly the way in which it intrudes upon domestic politics in different states, is a critical and neglected component of the structure of political opportunity” (Meyer 2003, 18). State “institutions are nested in a larger international context, and […] the tightness or looseness of that nesting affects the range of possible alliances and policy options available within states” (Meyer 2003, 17). The international context delivers

assets and opportunities for protestors and the states they challenge (Tarrow 2001). This is due to the increasing transnational connections among activists and states (Ayres 2001; Caniglia 2001;

Keck and Sikkink 1998; Maney 2001; McAdam and Rucht 1993). There is a heightened movement of activists, ideas, and resources between different organizations and states.

Moreover, the participation of states in international agreements and alliances increasingly constrains domestic policy choices (Meyer 2003). Thus, it is imperative “to expand our notions of the structure of political opportunities to consider the effects of exogenous factors on the contests between movements and authorities” (Meyer 2003, 30). My study does this by considering the impact of Egypt-US-Israel relations on the alliance “game.”

Since the 1979 peace treaty between Egypt and Israel, the United States has been providing Egypt with significant military and economic assistance packages (Snider and Faris

2011, 50). For decades, the United States has devised its policies towards Egypt to maintain a good relationship with a strong ally in the region and one supportive of peace with Israel

(Wickham 2002; Snider and Faris 2011). Viewing the Middle East through the interests of Israel has inclined the United States to support Anwar el-Sadat and his successor, Hosni Mubarak,

“who for three decades suppressed legitimate political opposition at home and maintained the peace with Israel” (Gerges 2012, 161). The United States lessened its “rhetoric and its willingness to challenge the Egyptian government following gains for the MB in [the 2005] parliamentary elections, the victory of the Islamist group Hamas in Palestinian parliamentary elections, and the escalation of conflict in Iraq” (Snider and Faris 2011, 54). Playing on US fears of “radical Islamists” hijacking democratic reforms, “Mubarak branded his regime as a bulwark against Islamist extremism and trustworthy ally in the war on terror” (Gerges 2012, 161). The win of the MB in the parliamentary elections held in 2012 heightened US anxiety about

Islamists. To address this anxiety, the military-led Supreme Council of the Armed Forces reassured the United States by claiming to maintain the status quo that had been in place since the 1970s (Chikh-Ali 2012). The Egyptian military “regularly intervened in the process of amendments or changes to the constitution and even retained the power to nominate the cabinet”

(Chikh-Ali 2012, 30). This eventually destabilized the alliance of the military with the

Brotherhood and resulted in the military coup in 2013.

Scholars are divided on the extent to which advocates are conscious of alterations in political opportunity. Some authors such as Tarrow (1996, 1998) hold that activists are rational actors waiting for signals from the state and society to act collectively. Others such as Gamson and Meyer (1996) propose that protesters are usually optimistic about opportunities, “and do not necessarily calculate with any rigor the likely prospects for successfully mobilizing or generating policy reform; they just keep trying and sometimes succeed in engaging a broader public”

(Meyer & Minkoff 2004, 1463-4). Many scholars look at political opportunities “as objectively existent rather than socially constructed” (Rucht 1996, 189). In contrast, I side with scholars who consider the perception of opportunities to be contingent on the processes of framing and interpretation and thus discuss in my interviews with activists how they interpreted the changing political terrain in Egypt (Snow and Benford, 1988).

Strategic interventions by social movements can modify political opportunities (Rucht

1996, 189). Kurzman (1996) finds that during the Iranian Revolution of 1979 “protestors were concerned with prospects for success- they did not participate in large numbers until they felt success was at hand” (155). Most “Iranians believed the balance of forces shifted, not because of a changing state structure, but because of a changing opposition movement” (Kurzman 1996,

155). According to Goodwin and Jasper (2012), we can mediate between these two arguments by

recognizing that actors “interpret their surroundings-- and the openings these offer-- based on knowledge they have of what others have done” (24). They further claim that actors “react to other players’ actions in a certain context, not to the context itself” (Goodwin & Jasper 2012,

24). Indeed, actors do interpret opportunities based on the information they have of what actions the other players took. However, I disagree with Goodwin and Jasper’s argument that actors do not react to the context; the game between the various actors creates the context, so their actions are not separate from it.

To address how actors respond to the context and aim to influence it, it is important to rely on the concept of discursive opportunities developed by Koopmans and Statham (1999).

This concept sheds light on which social movement frames could mobilize support for the movement and its demands as well as convince elites to implement the movement's agenda. On the one hand, scholars of “discursive opportunities” see that the access of actors to the institutionalized political system affects their mobilization opportunities. On the other hand, the discursive side is linked to the “public visibility and resonance as well as the political legitimacy of certain actors, identities, and claims” (Giugni 2011, 364). In my POS model, I incorporate the discursive opportunity under framing.

Framing and Mobilizing Structure

To address how the MS organized and responded to openings in POS, I examine mobilizing structures and framing processes. Framing processes are the processes “[m]ediating between opportunity, organization, and action [and] are the shared meanings and definitions that people bring to the situation” (McAdam, McCarthy, & Zald 1996, 5). The most common definition of framing is David Snow’s (1986) original conception, which sees framing as a

“conscious strategic efforts by groups of people to fashion shared understandings of the world

and themselves that legitimate and motivate collective action” (as cited in McAdam, McCarthy,

& Zald 1996, 6). Strategic decisions made by social movements likely influence framing. Also,

“intense contestation between collective actors representing the movement, the state, and any existing countermovements” shape framing (McAdam, McCarthy, & Zald 1996, 16). Framing processes, for instance, could draw “on the cultural stock for images of what is an injustice, for what is a violation of what ought to be” (Zald 1996, 266). Strategic framing describes the “active process of framing and definition of ideology, of symbols, of iconic events by moral entrepreneurs” (Zald 1996, 269). Competitive processes of framing refer to the external and internal contest for defining the situation and how to address it. Members of “movements and countermovements have a stake in developing metaphors, images, and definitions of the situation” to garner support for their agenda (Zald 1996, 265). Snow and Benford (1992) argue that for a movement to be successful their organizing frames should be coherent with the "master frame" of the protest cycle. Thus, framing processes are an “essential aspect of social movement theory and entail actor agency, as movement activists strategically engage in interpretative action to label, identify, perceive, and articulate events in a way to assemble support for their cause”

(Tajali 2015, 568).

The Sisters framed their demands between 2010 and 2017 using the language of human rights, women’s rights, and socioeconomic rights, emphasizing one more than the other depending on the “master frame” at the time. For instance, socioeconomic rights and democracy were their focus during the uprisings. As I show in chapter three and four, women’s rights became a central issue due to the concerns of the liberals and the international community about the elections of the Brotherhood. After the military coup, human and women’s rights became the

popular frame because of Abdel Fatah el-Sisi’s government’s imprisonment and torture of some of the Brotherhood’s members and the people associated with them.

McAdam, McCarthy, and Zald define mobilizing structures as the “collective vehicles, informal as well as formal, through which people mobilize and engage in collective action”

(1996, 3). The informal structures incorporate “family units, friendship networks, voluntary associations, work units, and elements of the state structure itself” (McCarthy 1996, 141). They refer to various “social sites within people’s daily rounds where informal and less formal ties between people can serve as a solidarity and communication facilitating structures when and if they choose to go into dissent together” (McCarthy 1996, 143). This includes friendship networks, neighborhoods, work networks, activist networks, affinity groups and memory communities. The formal structures include churches, unions, professional associations, social movement organizations (SMOs), protest communities, and movement schools. The ways the movement chooses to go about pursuing “change have consequences for their ability to raise material resources and mobilize dissident efforts, as well as for society-wide legitimacy – all of which can directly affect the chances that their common efforts will succeed” (McCarthy 1996,

141). Challengers must identify the appropriate mobilizing structures and frame them as adequate for achieving the political goal they intend to achieve. These framings should target

“both internal – adherents and activists of the movement itself – as well as external [publics], including bystanders, opponents, and authorities” (McCarthy 1996, 149). Opponents and elites may devote great effort to directly constraining the use of mobilizing structures or indirectly doing so by delegitimizing those structures.

It is important to include within the notion of “mobilizing structure” both the formal and informal mediums because, as Wickham (2002) notes, to account for Islamic mobilization under

conditions that restrict their participation in the formal political medium, we must expand our understanding of POS to include resources and institutional spaces outside the state’s control.

Due to state control over formal political institutions, opposition groups “may seize opportunities for organization and outreach in ostensibly ‘nonpolitical’ settings beyond the state’s control”

(Wickham 2002, 12).

POS theory that only examines changes in formal political institutions and elites fails to explain the success of the MB in Egypt to mobilize support during periods of governmental backlash. Wickham (2002) contends that even though the political system stayed closed, new opportunities for Islamic organization emerged on the periphery. Organizing in the periphery enabled Islamist groups to avoid the censorship of “authoritarian elites and hence to serve as

‘safe’ sites of contact with potential recruits” (Wickham 2002, 13). Additionally, studying informal mediums for organizing illustrates how an authoritarian regime’s attempt at political liberalization, which it designed to preserve the power of incumbent elites, “can have the unintended effect of privileging opposition activity outside the formal party system, shifting the locus of political dynamism from the center to the periphery ‘by default’” (Wickham 2002,13).

As the next section shows, including framing and mobilizing structure in the conceptualization of POS is important for creating a conceptual model that is sensitive to gender dynamics of political activism.

POS and Gender

Scholarly approaches that focus on the power relations in society and their effect on politics, such as feminist (Connell 1990; MacKinnon 1989), class-based (Block 1977; Domhoff

1998), and critical race (Quadagno 1994) theories of the state, “offer a starting point for broader theories of the types of opportunity structures that may influence movement outcomes”

(McCammon et al. 2001, 51). These approaches hold that gender, economic class, and race relations in society influence politics. These approaches challenge traditional theories of POS, which do not pay sufficient attention to how the gendered institutions of the POS affect specifically women's ability to act politically. Most scholars do not consider how gender relations are implicated in the structure of political opportunities. Gender relations is a term that refers to how “men and women gain identities and power in relation to one another” (Calasanti

2010, 721). They are dynamic, constructed power relations embedded in social processes and institutionalized in social arenas (Glenn 1999; West & Fenstermaker 1995; Calasanti 2010;

McCALL 1992; Scott 1986; Harding 1986).

To make visible these gendered processes I rely on the term "gendered institutions." This term describes how gender influences the processes of power distribution in various sectors of society (Acker 1992; Folbre 1994; Goetz 1997; Staveren 2010). Formal gendered institutions are the “codified gendered social norms such as inheritance laws, property rights, or the fiscal system, with different effects for women and men” (Staveren 2010, 110). Informal gendered institutions are “the set of non-codified social norms and cultural practices that impact differently on men and women” (Staveren 2010, 110). The gendered rules embedded in these institutions, formal and informal, often negatively influence women's agency. The institutional structures of the state are ordered based on gendered hierarchies. Institutions such as the law, politics, religion, the academy, and the economy are historically masculinized.

Kenny (1996) asks, “What, then, does it mean to argue that political institutions are gendered?” (455). It implies that every individual within any given institution has a gender. The institution and others treat these individuals according to the common gendered expectations of what constitutes appropriate femininity and masculinity. Women will almost certainly have

fewer opportunities than men. Friedman notes, “The manifestation of gender relations within the political institutions characterizing different regimes, such as parties and the state, creates a unique set of opportunities and obstacles that condition women's political participation, which are further qualified by actors' gendered understanding of politics” (1998,88). Institutions also

“have gender, and institutions will mount enormous efforts to contain threats to the gendered identity of the institution” (Kenny 1996, 455). Martin and Knopoff (1997) explained how promoters of modern day bureaucracies relied on traditional gendered conceptions about women, femininity, and rationality to justify the exclusion of women’s participation and to glorify features and exercises correlated with men and masculinities. Other scholars “show how gender ideology and practices in eighteenth-century England made offspring the property of fathers and gave wives’ wealth to their husbands, fathers, or brothers” (Martin 2004, 1266). Kenny states,

“To say that an institution is gendered, then, is to recognize that constructions of masculinity and femininity are intertwined in the daily culture of an institution rather than existing out in society or fixed within individuals which they then bring whole to the institution” (Kenny 1996, 456).

Even though cultural constructions of both masculinity and femininity are apparent in political institutions, the institutional structures, practices, discourses, and norms are mainly masculine

(Duerst-Lahti and Kelly 1995, Krook and Mackay 2010).

As feminists have shown, “it is impossible to understand women's political role without considering the profoundly gendered character of political practice. Only gender-sensitive analysis of opportunity structure is adequate to the task” (Friedman 1998, 128). In a patriarchal world, any contemporary political opportunity structure, which generally refers to “the ensemble of political institutions and actors conditioning social mobilization” (Friedman 1998, 88), is gendered. The manifestation of gender relations and its influence on the ordering of social

hierarchies within political institutions “creates a unique set of opportunities and obstacles that condition women's political participation, which are further qualified by actors' gendered understanding of politics” (Friedman 1998, 88).

McCammon et al. note in their study of the women’s suffrage movement in the US,

“formal political interests were intertwined with gendered expectations, often expectations about how women as voters would cast their ballots” (2001, 51). They explain, on the one hand, how changes in the political environment influenced the decision-makers’ attitudes towards women’s voting, which provided a gender specific opportunity for the suffrage movement. On the other hand, “changing gender relations also caused political decision-makers to alter their views about the proper roles for women in society, and these changing attitudes about gender – not changing attitudes about the political viability of a particular stance on suffrage – provided a gendered opportunity for suffrage success” (McCammon et al 2001, 51). McCammon et al. note, the

“political dynamics and changing gender relations both influenced whether political actors voted for suffrage, but through different mechanisms: one through changing political interests; the other through changing attitudes about women's roles in society” (McCammon et al. 2001, 51).

Therefore, focusing on POS without accounting for gender “is simply too narrow an approach to understanding the full range of opportunity structures that foster movement success”

(McCammon et al. 2001, 51).

In their study of women’s groups in the UK, France, and Germany, Poloni-Staudinger and Ortbals conclude, “although women’s groups often choose activities in response to changes in POS in a similar manner as other social groups, the gendered nature of POS continues to mute these relationships and disenfranchise women’s groups from more participatory forms of political action” (2011, 75). For the Sisters, gendered hierarchies have created some obstacles

for women. For instance, such hierarchies did not allow the Sisters to run for high positions in the Brotherhood’s internal structure. However, gendered relations have paved the way for more involvement of women in politics during the uprisings and its aftermath. For instance, as I will show in later chapters, because the Sisters view motherhood and family as the main role for women, many choose to stay at home and raise their kids instead of working outside the home, even though some of them have university degrees. Their flexible schedule during the day allowed them to be present and hold the fort in the revolutionary spaces when the men were at work.

Moghadam and Gheytanchi state, “Feminist activism may take place within a political environment that is either propitious or untoward, but how the movement evolves and succeeds in attaining its goals will depend upon the nature of the polity and the institutions available for feminist engagement” (2010, 268). Feminist activists in the Middle East and elsewhere have to

“walk a fine line between stressing the universality of women’s rights and the ideal of gender equality on the one hand, and asserting the religious and cultural legitimacy of their progressive visions on the other” (Moghadam & Gheytanchi 2010, 270). Therefore, a gender analysis is essential for “understanding patterns of activity among women’s groups” (Poloni-Staudinger &

Ortbals 2011, 75). Moghadam and Gheytanchi state that the “opening of political space permits nonviolent civil society actors such as women’s rights advocates to build their movements, launch campaigns for legal and policy reform, and engage with government. The closing of political space creates dissidents and leads to extrainstitutional activism and contention” (2010,

272). They add, “[F]eminist groups may take advantage of a political opening to seek elite allies, including government officials, in support of their cause” (Moghadam & Gheytanchi 2010, 272).

However, political backlash might “force feminist groups to alter their strategy and seek societal

and international support rather than governmental cooperation (Moghadam & Gheytanchi 2010,

272). The case of the Sisterhood seems to support Moghadam and Gheytanchi’s (2010) findings, as I will show. Thus, gender analysis of POS is essential for a fuller understanding of politics, social movements, and civil resistance.

A gender analysis of POS is also essential to explain why various groups in Egyptian society, including supporters of religious groups such as the MB, did not contest women’s participation in the public spaces of the uprisings. According to Friedman (1998), “[R]epression of traditional actors and institutions of politics under authoritarian rule makes men's opposition activities risky and difficult” (Friedman 1998, 88). Thus, opposition movements may decide to include more women to counter the limitation on participation of men imposed by the state.

Women’s association with the private sphere allows them to mobilize successfully through “their supposedly nonpolitical identity [which] disguises their political actions” (Friedman 1998, 89).

As I show in Chapter Four, in the case of Egypt, women were essential in the resistance movement during the different transitions between 2010 and 2017 because of what Paul Amar terms hyper-visibility. The term describes the “processes whereby racialized, sexualized subjects, or the marked bodies of subordinate classes, become intensely visible as objects of state, police and media gazes and as targets of fear and desire” (Amar 2011, 305). The hypervisibility of Egyptian women meant that when they participated publicly during January 25 uprisings they opened the POS, even if temporarily, for the demands of the protesters including their own. The deployment of women into the public spaces of protest was “politically powerful because the [Egyptian] state had invested so intensively in generating and hypervisibilizing women as subjects of piety, self- policing, moralization and cultural security” (Amar 2011, 309).

In this sense, when hypervisiblized women, who are marked by class and moral bearing as

respectable and thus worthy of state protection, stand up against the state, they undermine its strategy of hypervisibility and misrecognition of them. The presence of some women in demonstrations made it difficult for the state to portray the protesters as terrorists and not worthy of protection.

Women activists, like other activists, rely on cultural symbols and popular public rationales to frame their demands to strengthen and expand support for the movement's agenda

(McCammon et al. 2001, 57). However, to legitimize their participation in politics, women activists always have to negotiate their role in the public sphere as it relates to their assumed responsibilities in the private sphere. For instance, Kraditor (1965) notes that the suffragists began to emphasize "expediency arguments" more than “justice arguments." Justice arguments

“were based in liberal individualism—suffragists asserted that women deserved political rights equal to those of men because, like men, they were citizens” (McCammon et al. 2001, 57). These arguments were not that effective because they, according to Baker (1984), “challenged the widely-accepted boundary separating men's and women's spheres in that they attempted to redefine women's roles, particularly by defining women's participation in politics (or in the public sphere) as acceptable" (As cited in McCammon et al. 2001, 57). Expediency arguments or

"separate-spheres argument" highlighted that “state policies increasingly regulated the domestic sphere and that women could bring knowledge of the domestic sphere to the political”

(McCammon et al. 2001, 58). These arguments did not contest the traditional roles of women in the private sphere. They “simply pointed to the advantage of allowing women to help regulate the private sphere. Thus, political decision-makers should find these arguments more convincing than those based on justice” (McCammon et al. 2001, 58).

Insider and outsider strategies also resulted in the success of the suffragists. Insider strategies describe “the political activities that the suffragists engaged in to influence political

‘insiders,’ that is, state legislators” (McCammon et al. 2001, 58). Outsider strategies refer to

“tactics aimed at persuading the public of the movement's goals, and they target citizens or

‘outsiders’ to the polity” (McCammon et al. 2001, 59). Both the “separate spheres” strategy and the insider and outsider strategies apply in the Egyptian case as well. As my findings show, the

Sisters’ assumed domestic roles as mothers, wives, sisters, and daughters have helped them to mobilize women who also identified this way and gain legitimacy in the political sphere on these terms as they did not challenge the private/public divide. As I mentioned earlier, various

Egyptian women could participate because they did not work outside of the home and had a flexible schedule in the morning when their children were at school. Additionally, as I will also point out later, some of them mobilized as mothers and wives of the men arrested or killed by

Abdel Fatah el-Sisi’s regime. These traditional gender identities gave these women’s participation legitimacy.

In her study of Islamic women’s rights activism in Iran and Turkey, Tajali finds that these activists are “strategic in their framing processes as they articulate their demands according to the discursive opportunity structure that best suits their contexts and furthers their aims” (2015,

566). She adds, “[S]uch strategic framing denotes women’s agency, as they may choose a discursive frame that does not directly resonate with their core identity claim, but rather one that is more effective in garnering support and pressuring political elites” (Tajali 2015, 567). Tajali also finds that “[d]epending on their broader political and cultural contexts, Iranian and Turkish

Islamic women’s groups strategically choose to frame their demands either within the discourse of international human rights or that of the local regime” (2015, 569). She observes that “Islamic

women’s groups and organizations in Turkey, like their secular counterparts, are increasingly articulating their demands for women’s enhanced access to political leadership through international agreements and human rights conventions of the United Nations and European

Union” (Tajali 2015, 569).

The Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women

(CEDAW), which Turkey has signed and ratified, has provided an important opportunity structure for Turkish women’s groups from across the ideological spectrum who have utilized it as a tool to improve the state’s gender policies (Tajali 2015, 572). Tajali suggests that “many

Islamic women’s rights activists in Turkey strategically frame their demands for head-scarfed women’s right to political representation in secular terms in an effort to appeal to secular sectors of society, while also pressuring pro-religious elites” (2015, 573). Opportunities on the international level such as CEDAW, the EU integration process, and Turkey’s secular framework influence this framing (Tajali 2015, 573).

In contrast, “given Iran’s theocratic political context, women’s rights groups across the ideological spectrum, out of legal and tactical necessity, frame and justify their demands for women’s increased political representation in religious terms” (2015, 570). To appeal to Iranian ruling elites, various “Iranian women’s rights groups have increasingly framed their demands within a religious framework, while distancing themselves from the international community and its human rights agreements” (Tajali 2015, 576). Tajali’s work demonstrates how women’s framing strategies shift according to POS available at the time. When women activists are faced with a secular regime, they deploy a secular framework by leaning on international conventions such as CEDAW. However, when they are facing a religious regime, they deploy a religious framework by leaning on the more moderate interpretation of the Quran and Sharia Law. In their

experimental study, which addresses the influence of progressive reinterpretations of the Quran on public opinion about women’s role in public life in Egypt, Masoud et al. (2016) find “that

Islamic discourse, so often used to justify the political exclusion of women, can also be used to help empower them” (Masoud et al. 2016, 1).

The MS, even though it is not a secular or a feminist organization, is a good example of how the lack of gender analysis of POS can mask certain important political processes. When a gender-sensitive POS analysis is applied, the Sisters become visible, as does the importance of their agency and roles in shaping politics. These women become active agents in our understanding of political mobilization in the Middle East. There is not much scholarly work on the Sisterhood because scholars view them as synonymous or subsidiary to the Brotherhood.

Scholars and others do not consider the Sisters’ organizing activities as important as the activities of the MB. In contrast, because I apply a gender lens to POS in this case, based on these few examples of gender-sensitive POS in the literature, I argue and find that the Sisterhood played a significant role in strengthening the MB’s support base among Egyptians, contributing to their success in the 2012 elections. Additionally, the Sisters utilized the POS to carve out more space for their engagement in the formal political medium as political candidates, which has in turn positioned them to mobilize dissent against Abdel Fatah el-Sisi’s regime on the basis of protecting human (and women’s) rights.

This dissertation addresses the lack of gender-sensitive approach to POS and their relationship to Islamist women’s activism in the Middle East. It is unique in that it applies a theoretical framework that views the POS as both gendered and dynamic, rather than fixed. This dynamism can be found in the shifting alliances between military, the secular-liberal political parties, and Islamists. The international context shapes the balance of power between the players

and thus influences the alliances. Also, international agreements on human and women’s rights influence the strategies and language activists in general and women activists in particular use to frame their demands. The research project examines how the shift in alliances has resulted in both political opening for and backlash against the MS according to the nature of the alliance.

To address how the MS responded to the changes in the POS, the dissertation looks at the mobilizing mediums (the formal political medium represented by the government, and the informal political medium represented by civil society) the Sisters utilize and their framing strategies during the various shifts in alliances between 2010 and 2017. Applying mobilization and framing perspectives sheds light on how the MS’s acclivities impacted political elites’ backing for the movement’s agendas. The dynamic conceptualization of POS to include mobilizing and framing perspectives illustrates interaction between “the influences of agency

(the movement itself) and structure (the movement's context)” (McCammon et al. 2001, 57). It considers how the POS influenced the MS’s organizing strategies (mediums and framings) and how these strategies influenced the POS.

Chapter Two

A Qualitative Strategic Model for Studying the Political Opportunity Structure in Egypt

To address the conceptual problems with POS and the minimum attention to gender and

Middle East state-society relations in POS studies, I use a qualitative strategic model to illustrate the political game in Egypt between 2010 and 2017 and how it shaped the Muslim Sisters’ strategic choices. There are three groups of players in the game: the military, the Islamists

(mainly the Muslim Brotherhood (MB)), and the secular-liberal political parties. Since this chapter is trying to outline the general political context for all players, the MB is used to describe the Islamists, encompassing both the male and female members (Muslim Sisters) of the MB.

Careful consideration of the MS as a distinct entity in the next two chapters will show how they influenced and were influenced by the political context. The players are not equal in power, but the game remains one in which each has significant chips. To gain control, the secular-liberal political parties or the Islamists must make a pact with the military. As I explain in more details later in this chapter, the military has been playing a strong role in the government since the Free

Officers coup in 1952 and throughout the period included in this study. After two groups negotiate a pact, they install a “representative” government. In addition to attempting to control the government, these players utilize civil society as a medium of organizing whenever they are blocked from or marginalized in the government.

The purpose of this chapter is to outline how in the case of Egypt, the shift in alliances between the military, the MB, and secular-liberal political parties has shaped the political opportunity structure for various groups including the Muslim Sisterhood (MS). This model is context specific for Egypt and takes the cultural, national, and international contexts into consideration while analyzing the alliances. The actions of these groups of players and the nature

of alliances do not operate in a vacuum, rather they are influenced by international and regional contexts. The relationship between the US, Israel, and Egypt influences domestic alliances; religion influences the cultural context; and international agreements, especially the ones dealing with women’s and human rights, influence the strategic choices of activists in general and the

Muslim Sisters in particular, depending on the alliances in the government. For this analysis, civil society in Egypt is a strong medium for influencing the outcome of the pact when a majority of the groups operating within it are united. These groups do so by delegitimizing the government chosen by the alliance to represent the society through demonstrations and popular mobilization.

By examining the structure in terms of changing alliances between various groups, I reveal the role of agents, particularly leaders from each of the four “players,” as an integral part of the structure. Additionally, I show that structure is not fixed and that the relationship between structure and agency goes both ways: agency affects structure and structure shapes agency. Civil society and the international context are important for shaping the alliances in the Egyptian government and in turn affect the POS. Moreover, political power-sharing deals between Islamist and secular-liberal factions influenced women’s rights. These deals also became catalysts for the collective mobilization of civil society groups against the regime.

The Sisterhood is a member of the Islamists; thus, their organizing strategies cannot be understood without looking at the interaction between the MB, representing the Islamists, and the other players. The alliances shape the political context in which the Sisters operate by opening the government as platform for organizing or restricting the access of the MB and MS.

As I show in Chapter Four, the Sisters historically occupied civil society as their main medium for organizing, with occasional and minor activism in the government. However, during the MB

government in 2012, some Sisters moved from the MS, which remained part of civil society, to join the Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) in the government. During the coup and consequent backlash in 2013, the Sisters mainly relied on civil society as a medium for organizing; nevertheless, they expanded their civil society activism from the domestic level to the international level.

This qualitative strategic model was inspired by the call of Goodwin and Jasper (2012) to abandon models that use the language of independent and dependent variables to study strategic interactions and develop instead a model much like game theory. Game theory is “a mathematical system for analyzing and predicting how humans behave in strategic situations”

(Micklich 2014, 345). It looks at politics and social movements as comprised of players. The players face a variety of actions from which to choose, mediums that govern what interactions result in what outcomes, and the nature of the outcomes themselves (Jasper 2004). Game theory focuses on choices and dilemmas. Traditional game theory focuses “on a narrow set of games with clear endpoints and payoffs, as well as coherent, unified players capable of ordering their preferences” (Jasper 2004, 3). The model enables us “to follow long sequences of intentional and emotional actions by a number of players” (Goodwin & Jasper 2012, 17).

However, the model was critiqued, especially in the context of studying collective action.

Collective action is a large-scale version of the prisoner’s dilemma. Older collective action models inspired by the work of Olson (1965) define collective action as any action that provides a collective good (Oliver 1993). Olson contends that if the benefits of a collective good are shared with nonparticipants, rational individuals would prefer to “free ride” on the work of others. He also suggests that the free rider problem is exacerbated in larger groups because the benefits are divided over a larger number of individuals, and the participants’ contributions are

less noticeable. Therefore, Olson (1965) concludes that collective action is "irrational."

According to Oliver (1993), "the development of formal collective action theory begins with a critique of Olson” (274). Critics claim that “interdependence and coordination can change individual decisions even without private incentives, and that many collective goods can, in fact, be provided by a small number of individuals making large contributions through an appropriate technology (e.g. lobbying Congress)” (Oliver 1994, 274).

Wickham (2002) critiques “rational-actor” models because these models define movement participation as a form of goal seeking behavior by self-interested actors. This assumption cannot explain the participation of many Egyptian students and professionals in the activities of Islamist movement. Wickham (2002) explains, “In authoritarian settings, in which the risks associated with participating in an opposition movement are high and the prospects of effecting change are, at best, uncertain, the ‘rational’ response of the self-interested actor would appear to be a retreat into self-preserving silence” (14). However, this was not the case in Egypt, where despites the risks, citizens participated in opposition politics. They did so based on

“deeply held values, commitments, and beliefs” (Wickham 2002, 15). Rational-actor models of social movements do not consider situations in which “ideas—as much as if not more than interests— motivate political action” (Wickham 2002, 15). The social and cultural environment, which dictates prevailing values and norms, influences individuals’ choices. Movement leaders attempt to create frames that not only tap into preferences but also might “alter the preference- orderings of individuals through deliberate efforts at persuasion” (Wickham 2002, 15).

Islamists used Da’wa (the “call” to God) as a framework to promote “a new ethic of civic obligation demanding that every Muslim participate in the Islamic reform of society and state, regardless of the benefits and costs incurred by those involved” (Wickham 2002, 15).

Wickham’s work highlights the important of the cultural and religious context for creating effective framings to mobilize support for a certain cause. It shows why a strategic approach which addresses the structured medium and culture as well as its influence on players’ choices is essential for studying players’ actions. Jasper (2004) highlights Wickham’s argument, stating that “All strategic action is filtered through cultural understandings, but at the same time cultural meanings are used strategically to persuade audiences” (4). Therefore, it is important to examine the set of “goals, meanings, and feelings players have, rather than reducing them to a mathematically tractable minimum” (Jasper 2004, 4). To address the importance of the context in influencing the Muslim Sister’s framing strategies and medium of organizing, my qualitative model takes into consideration the international context, the cultural context, and the political context, which shifts per the nature of the alliance in the formal political medium (government).

The specificity of the model to Egypt allows us to see these distinct contexts influencing the players’ group strategic interactions.

The Qualitative Strategic Model

Due to the critiques, traditional game theory models have transformed from focusing solely on individual decisions to focusing on group structures and interactions. Collective action theorists view their “task as using formal tools to illuminate processes and dynamics within particular classes of collective action” (Oliver 1994, 276). These theorists consider the existence of a collective interest in the contexts within which they study collective action. However, they devote less theoretical attention “to the interest itself as causative, and more to the social and organizational processes that make action possible” (Oliver 1994, 276).

There are different models of collective actions, which operate on different levels: one individual, multiple individuals within one group, a single collectivity, and the strategic

interactions between multiple collectivities. The model focusing on one individual at a time examines how individuals will behave or contribute to some form of collective action. The more complex model examining the mutual action of multiple individuals within one collectivity, looks at “whether individuals will be willing and able to coordinate their actions into a single joint action” (Oliver 1994, 276). The models that focus on a single collectivity examine the decision process of group members for deciding which joint action should be taken. Finally, the models addressing strategic interactions between collectivities particularly look at the interactions “between movements and their opponents, usually conceived as states or regimes”

(Oliver 1994, 277). These models do not look at the interactions within groups to allow the consideration of bigger patterns of interactions and strategy. As the next chapter demonstrates in more detail, this study addresses this gap by shedding light on how interactions between rival groups could influence the interaction within certain groups, specifically regarding issues such as women’s roles.

Unlike traditional game theory, “behavioral game theory uses experimentation in contexts guided by game-theoretic precepts (e.g., prisoners’ dilemma scenarios) to explore relationships between context perceptions, and agents’ actual behavior” (Ferguson 2013, 8).

Behavioral game theory evades two central problems in game theory: refinement and selections

(Micklich 2014, 345). In this behavioral game, players can learn from their past decisions and alter their future moves accordingly (Micklich 2014). As the game progresses, the players change their strategies fitting to the anticipated moves of other players (Fundenberg and Levine,

1998). The qualitative strategic model I develop examines strategic interactions between various collectivities. It illustrates how most political opportunities are influenced by the players’ choices and interactions. In this model, structures are a result of previous choices and interactions

between these groups of players. This model gives a dynamic twist to POS by tracing groups of players’ reactions to each other. The membership in players’ groups vary from state actors to informal groups. The players’ groups are not equal in their political and financial influence. It is much easier for certain elites in the state “to mobilize resources and gather information than it is for protesters” (Goodwin & Jasper 2012, 20). In the Egyptian case, the players’ allowed to compete for access to the formal and informal mediums were allowed (or disallowed) by domestic and international factors. There are stable players’ groups and temporary ones. There are also some players’ groups who will shape the alliance in the formal political medium but do not compete to be part of that medium. My strategic model creates a more precise formulation for POS where distinguishable political elites and civil society organizations play a significant role in shaping POS.

This model was inspired by Samuel Tadros’s (2011) article “Egypt’s Muslim

Brotherhood after the Revolution.” In the article, Tadros looks at the political system in Egypt as having three groups of players: the Brotherhood, the secular-liberal political parties and the military. His article outlines the players and explains their role in Egyptian politics empirically.

However, he does not address theoretical implications for the game. My model places the players in a theoretical framework and adds civil society as a medium of organizing. Adding civil society as an important medium for political organizing addresses the lack of gender analysis in Tadros’ article and provides a more comprehensive understanding of the political dynamics in Egypt.

Why Civil Society?

Examining civil society as a significant medium for organizing and influencing politics is useful for addressing “a number of biases that obscure an understanding of women’s activism”

(Krause 2012, 2). Women and those “who use Islamic frameworks within their strategies”

remain marginalized in the study of state-society politics (Krause 2012, 2-3). This bias is a result of “viewing politics as the sole domain of formal institutions” (Krause 2012, 8). Paying attention to civil society is one way to include more women in analyses, but civil society literature on the

Middle East does not yet adequately address the activities of women (Krause 2012).

Tripp argues that popular definitions of civil society fail to acknowledge the importance of the family to civil society and to the public sphere (1998, 85). Adding civil society as an important medium for understanding the political game in Egypt reveals women’s political activities and influence, which extends from the household and the informal political medium to the formal political medium. The Sisterhood as an organization is part of civil society. However, for a time, some of its members became part of the state by joining the political party of the MB

(the FJP). I will examine various examples of that shift during the 2012 elections when the formal political medium was open for the FJP.

The medium of civil society is also useful for the analysis because since the 1980s

“ordinary citizens in the Middle East (from the Islamist-inspired urban poor to emancipated women concerned about personal status rights) have been drawn into political life to an unprecedented degree, and their engagement has been framed by the debate over civil society's boundaries” (Bellin 1994, 510). The term has resonated locally with various sectors of the

Egyptian society to promote their political project. States utilize the concept of civil society to

“promote their projects of mobilization and ‘modernization;’ Islamists use it to angle for a legal share of public space; and independent activists and intellectuals use it to expand the boundaries of individual liberty” (Bellin 1994, 509). More importantly, the 2011 uprisings in the Middle

East and North Africa proved that activism in the medium of civil society plays a significant role in shaping the political game in the Middle East (Hardig 2015; Krause 2012). The growing civil

society organizations and networks in Egypt were “crucial in rolling back state powers as seen through the 2011 revolution” (Krause 2012, 227).

Civil society as a medium holds a significant influence on politics. Ghannouchi (1991) notes that power is not exclusive to the state; civil society also exercises it. Civil society resistors can weaken the loyalty of security forces to the state by raising the political costs of attacks

(Nepstad 2013). Civil resisters may do that by ensuring that “any repressive action against the movement is televised globally” (Nepstad 2013, 339). They also can “raise the moral costs of regime loyalty by emphasizing the immorality of attacking unarmed protesters” (Nepstad 2013,

339). Additionally, they may rely on cultural norms associated with particular identities and bodies, such as women, to create an ethical dilemma for the security forces. For instance, in the

Arab uprisings of 2011, mothers utilized their motherhood to shame the security forces to try to keep them from attacking the protesters (Mhajne & Whetstone 2018). Demonstrators tried to convince the “troops that if they support the regime, they will go down on the wrong side of history” (Nepstad 2013, 339). Moreover, they underline the personal costs related to the troops’ loyalty to the contested regime. For instance, “If troops are not doing well under the current system, movement organizers can emphasize the gains that security forces might achieve in a new regime” (Nepstad 2013, 339). Lastly, protestors can decrease the costs of defection by

“physically protecting defectors from regime retaliation” (Nepstad 2013, 339).

Aili Tripp and other feminist scholars have critiqued traditional definitions of civil society for excluding the private sphere as a site of civic engagement (1998). Traditional conceptualizations of civil society, such as Edward Shils’ definition, hold that civil society is a separate entity from the state and the family. Shils defines civil society as “a part of society which has a life of its own, which is distinctly different from the state, and which is largely in

autonomy from it” (1991, 3). He adds, “Civil society lies beyond the boundaries of the family and clan and beyond the locality; it lies short of the state” (Shils 1991, 3). Civil society can serve to legitimize or challenge state institutions. As Shaw notes, “[T]he boundaries between civil society and the state are constantly negotiated in practice, as a consequence of social, cultural and political struggle” (1994, 649). These definitions are problematic because they place the family and women’s issues in the private sphere and categorize these issues as apolitical, therefore, masking women’s activities and organizing as not significant in shaping the political events in the public sphere (Krause 2012, 49). These definitions take the agency from women and render them invisible.

Some scholars attempted to address this issue by expanding the definition of civil society to include the private, reproductive sphere. In the context of the MENA region, there is a need for “recognition of the agency of women in their social context and how their actions can influence civil society, which needs to be included in the framework for studying civil society”

(Krause 2012, 15). To address this issue, Cohen and Arato (1994) include the family in their definition. They define civil society as “A sphere of social interaction between economy and state, composed above all of the intimate spheres (especially the family), the sphere of association (mainly voluntary ones), social movements, and forms of public communication”

(Cohen &Arato 1994, xi).

Traditional conceptions of civil society were also critiqued for excluding Islamists

(Ibrahim 1998, Clark 1994, Sullivan & Abdel-Kotob 1999, Cavatorta & Durac 2010, Krause

2012, Hardig 2014). Civil society in the MENA regions cannot be fully understood without the inclusion of Islamist groups. Cavatorta and Durac (2010) state that excluding Islamic and

Islamist groups and labeling them as uncivil fails to give a cohesive understanding of civil

society in the MENA region. It also does not “reflect the diverse approaches to civil society that

Arab political thought presents” (Cavatorta & Durac 2010, 2). In the aftermath of the War on

Terror, Islamic and Islamist-based associations “are not viewed as having any potential to contribute to civil society in the region” (Krause 2012, 51).

In the case of Egypt, this exclusion of Islamic and Islamist organizations ignores an important and efficient player in contesting the state and addressing the needs of various sectors of the Egyptian society (Schwedler 1995, Krause 2012). As Kandil (1999) points out, religious convictions, such as charity, that encourage women to participate in these initiatives and legitimizes their participation in civil society motivate different women’s voluntary initiatives.

Gannouchi (1999) and Crowe (2007) show that Islam strengthens civil engagement and involvement in societies in the MENA region. Crowe (2007) suggests that for an organization to be effective in developing civil society, they should take into consideration local values and structures. Moreover, as Hardig notes, Islamist movements should be taken seriously in the conceptualization of civil society because they “have emerged within the realm of civil society, anchoring themselves in the deep roots of faith, using the cultural significance of Islam in the region to gain legitimacy as an “organic” challenger to an artificial state” (2014, 1140). An example of such movements is the MB, which since 1971 has chosen peaceful means to pursue its goal of institutionalizing an Islamist socio-political order (Ibrahim 1998). The Brotherhood and its women’s branch, the MS, focused on “teaching, preaching and grassroots work in providing service” (Ibrahim 1998, 381). This helped the MB to found civil society organizations, and take over existing ones.

Another issue with older definitions of civil society is the clear separation between the political and civil spheres. Various scholars have challenged this dichotomy between civil

society and the state (see Troxel 1997; Antoun 2000). For these scholars, “civil society is a sector of society that fluidly intermingles with the state. As many scholars of the developing world, in general, have pointed out, survival tactics can be seen in patron-clientelism” (Krause 2012, 49).

For instance, in Egypt, Islamists have participated in the formal political medium, government, while at the same time keeping a strong presence in the informal political medium, civil society

(Momayezi 1997, Hardig 2014). Islamist groups strategically utilize both mediums for expanding and legitimizing their sociopolitical agenda. Additionally, this conceptual separation between the state and civil society is blurred in instances when certain civil associations rely on state’s “funding for its survival and closely follows a government agenda regarding setting its priorities” (Hardig 2014, 1133). To address this issue, Hardig (2014) suggests that we should view civil society as space, rather than a community.

Hardig contends, “When conceptualizing civil society as a space, rather than a community, we are well served by turning to Antonio Gramsci, who saw civil society not simply as the realm of non-state actors, but the site where ‘cultural hegemony’ is exerted by the state”

(Hardig 2014, 1134). He adds that this space is also “where counter-movements challenging the authenticity and legitimacy of the status quo are launched” (Hardig 2014, 1134). The space of civil society holds, at any given time, multiple narratives and counter-narratives embodied by different informal networks and associations-- “various Islamist narratives, secular-liberal narratives, anti-globalization narratives, and so on” (Hardig 2014, 1134). This diversity means that “constraints on counter-hegemonic movements will not only emanate from the state, but also from other non-state actors” (Hardig 2014, 1136).

In this dissertation, various organizations such as workers’ unions, human rights organizations, and women’s rights organizations as well as Islamists and political parties use

civil society as an organizing medium. It encompasses “informal social and political networks, ranging from local voluntary groups and ad hoc activists’ coalitions to nationally or internationally coordinated social movements” (Shaw 1994, 648). It also includes any political or social activities conducted in the private sphere that directly or indirectly influence the political context. Organizing in this medium in Egypt is effective in influencing the political opportunity structure (encouraging one type of alliance over the other) only if enough of its components are united to produce an influential social movement that can challenge the alliance in the formal political medium.

I view civil society as an influential medium of organizing in Egyptian politics for the various players. The players in Egyptian politics (military, Islamists, and secular-liberal elites) can utilize this medium efficiently by garnering support for their agenda from various civil society associations (CSA), overcoming the differences between secular and religious groups.

For example, one of the ways state actors attempt to keep this space under control is by negotiating, “entering the realm of civil society, and engaging with CSAs both through contention and cooperation” (Hardig 2014, 1134). For instance, in Egypt, the military “engaged in civil society to re-establish its cultural hegemony, reinforcing the broadly held ‘truth’ that ‘the army and the people are one’” (Hardig 2014, 1142). As a response, some civil society associations offered a counter-narrative. Their counter-narrative suggested that “the army was trying to maintain their infrastructure of economic and political power by exercising cultural hegemony in the space of civil society, ruling by both coercion…and by consent” (Hardig 2014,

1143). Considering the debates mentioned above on the limitation of traditional conceptions of civil society, I include Islamists and women (and Islamist women) within my definition of civil society and situate their activism within personal, local, national, and international contexts.

Civil society in this dissertation is an effective medium of organizing that various players utilize to gain control of the medium of formal politics or to push and gain support for their agenda. The players in the Egyptian political game rely on the government and civil society for organizing to varying degrees depending on the political opening for and backlash against their participation in the formal political medium. The MB and MS have a strong presence in civil society because they have been historically excluded from the formal political medium. Their presence resulted in the win of their political wing, the FJP, in the post-uprisings elections. By running for elections under a different name, the MB tried to distance its political project from the social aspect of their male and female wings. Some members of the Sisters decided to join the FJP and thus they moved from organizing as civil society members to organizing in the formal political medium.

Some prominent figures in the MB, such the Supreme Guide Mohammad Badie, used to oppose the idea of founding a party, partially because it conflicted with the group’s charity work and preaching efforts (Jadaliyya 2011). After the Uprisings of 2011 and the opening for the MB to run for elections, the separation between the movement’s social and religious efforts and its political ambition was necessary. This was necessary because the party wanted to separate itself from the MB’s religious ideology to appeal to the diverse groups in the Egyptian society.

Moreover, this separation allows social movements to function outside of formal politics, which allows them to increase and enhance the party and the movement’s support base regardless of what happens in formal politics. This originates in the fact that there is a relationship of mutual dependence between civil society and political parties.

Associations need access to parties to have a direct link to the policy-making process, while associations support parties during the elections. They support them by organizing strikes

or exercise other forms of pressure (Mexhuani and Rrahmani 2017). For instance, the MB spokesman, Walid Shalabi, told Jadaliyya, an independent Arab Studies Journal, that “The MB has a bigger role than the party. As a non-governmental [institution], the MB is working on developing numerous aspects of Egyptian society, through preaching for instance. By contrast, the FJP engages only in politics” (2011). However, it was hard to differentiate between the MB and its party because, in practice, the MB and the FJP do not behave like two separate entities.

For instance, “MB leaders gave explicit directives to their members not to join any party other than the FJP and those who chose to join other parties, such as the Egyptian Current, were reportedly expelled irrespective of their record inside the MB” (Jadaliyya 2011).

In this dissertation, I examine how the Sisterhood has moved strategically from utilizing civil society for their activism to utilizing the government. As I discussed in the Introduction, since the Sisterhood was not entirely integrated into the internal structure of the Brotherhood between 2010 and 2017, it strategically moved between these two mediums (state and civil society). During periods of political backlash against the Brotherhood (by Hosni Mubarak and the military), they joined the lines of civil society. They operated in the informal political medium, focusing on social welfare. However, when the Sisterhood gained full access to the formal political medium due to the Islamists’ alliance with the military, the Sisterhood used the formal political medium to organize. When the backlash happened after the military coup in

2013, the Sisters attempted to join the parts of civil society that were against the coup (both secular and religious organizations). In this period, civil society was divided between groups who were for and against the coup.

In the next section, I will explain why the international context is important for the political game in Egypt. Then I outline the political game in Egypt in relation to the players, as

well as the international relationships, specifically to the US. Since this chapter addresses the political context for all players and not the MS specifically, the next section does not address the influence of the international context for the Sisters’ position in the MB and their organizing strategies. However, I address that in more detail in Chapters Three and Four.

Why is the International Context Important?

Examining the international context of the players is important because Egypt became a close ally of the United States during Anwar el-Sadat’s regime. Both countries formalized their ties by signing the Camp David peace agreement with Israel in 1978. The agreement included an

“annex with provisions for more than five billion dollars in military and economic aid to the two signatories” (Zoubir & Zunes 2016, 291). Originally, the financial aid from the United States was designated to be a onetime payment to Israel and Egypt for agreeing to sign the peace agreement. However, the United States has kept issuing sizable military and economic assistance packages to the Israel and Egypt governments. According to Zoubir and Zunes (2016), “[S]ince

1978, Egypt has received approximately $1.2 billion annually in military assistance” (292). US interest in preserving the peace treaty with Israel, ensuring the free flow of oil from the Persian

Gulf, containing “rogue” regimes like Saddam Hussein’s Iraq in the past and, today, the clerical regime in Iran, and counterterrorism have shaped the US response to the January 25 uprisings in

Egypt (Byman 2013; Zoubir & White 2016).

It took the US several weeks to support the demonstrations and call for the resignation of

Hosni Mubarak (Byman 2013; Heydemann 2014; Zoubir & Zunes 2016). At the beginning of the uprisings, the US government initially came to Hosni Mubarak’s defense. When “[a]sked whether the United States still supported Hosni Mubarak, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said that Egypt remained a ‘close and important ally’” (Zoubir & Zunes 2016, 293). The

uncertainty about the foreign policy preferences of the regime coming after Hosni Mubarak caused the US hesitation to support the uprisings. However, on January 30, 2011, five days after the start of the demonstrations, the US sided with the protestors and urged the regime not to use large-scale repression to stop the protests (Heydemann 2014; Zoubir and Zunes 2016). The fact that any repression of protestors with US- made weapons would damage the image of the United

States in the region resulted in this decision. After the election of Mohammad Morsi in 2013, the

US and Israel feared that the “new Muslim Brotherhood government might abrogate the peace treaty or turn against Israel, and several statements by Brotherhood leaders fanned these fears, though, for the most part, the Brotherhood has tried to reassure international audiences” (Byman

2013, 295). However, the US and Israel counted on the Egyptian military to protect the peace treaty with Israel (Byman 2013; Zoubir & Zunes 2016). The election of Morsi did not result in a significant crisis in US-Egyptian relations even though Morsi’s government restricted the work of US-funded democracy promoting NGOs. However, the Morsi presidency raised US concerns.

Economic and political chaos afflicted it, and, according to Jamal (2012), Morsi’s attempt to expand his authority strengthened US concerns about Islamist parties’ commitment to democracy.

When the interests of the military and the Brotherhood deviated after the election of

Mohamad Morsi: “the [Supreme Council of Armed Forces] (SCAF) sought to ensure its economic interests and its position above the law and politics, while the Brotherhood sought power to rule Egypt and thereby legitimize its Islamist agenda” (Kurtzer & Svenstrup 2012, 45).

The SCAF removed Mohamed Morsi from power and suspended the Egyptian constitution on

July 3, 2013. Following the overthrow of Morsi, the Obama administration and Congress debated whether the Egyptian military’s removal of Morsi constituted a coup. This debate was important

because “[u]nder US law, labeling military intervention a coup would have triggered a complete suspension of foreign military assistance (FMA)” (Heydemann 2014, 303). According to CNN, the Obama administration “decided not to make a formal determination as to whether the ouster of Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi by the military was a coup” (2013). As a response to the coup, the Obama administration implemented a modest and temporary freeze on military assistance to Egypt (Gordon & Landler 2013). The administration withheld “the delivery of several big-ticket items, including Apache attack helicopters, Harpoon missiles, M1-A1 tank parts, and F-16 warplanes, as well as $260 million for the general Egyptian budget” (Gordon &

Landler 2013). The US withheld aid “pending credible progress toward an inclusive, democratically elected civilian government through free and fair elections” (Rayman 2013).

However, the U.S. would “still provide funding for Egypt to secure its borders, fight terrorism, and ensure security in the Sinai” (Rayman 2013). The limitations on aid did not last for long.

Dunne & Carothers (2014) note, “[W]ithin months… and despite growing evidence of authoritarian regression on the part of Egypt’s new government, Congress permitted aid to resume at its pre-coup levels of $1.5bn per year” (As cited in Heydemann 2014, 303).

The US did not condemn the coup or label it as such because, before the uprisings, Egypt was an important US ally in opposing Iranian influence. However, after the election of Morsi,

“Egypt appeared to shift to a less confrontational approach, allowing, for example, Iranian warships to transit the Suez Canal” (Byman 2013, 301). Also, considering the tension in the relationship between Saudi Arabia and the MB, “the US decision to help push Hosni Mubarak out of office infuriated the Saudi leadership who believed, with considerable justification, that the United States was abandoning a long-time ally” (Byman 2013,294). The relationship with

Saudi Arabia is important for the US because “Saudi has often provided additional oil to the market at the US request and otherwise striven for price stability” (Byman 2013, 294).

The international context, particularly US policy, has been most influential on the first player in my game analysis, the Egyptian military, including their role in the government of

Egypt and their response to the January 25th uprisings.

The Game Between the Military, Islamists, and Secular-Liberal Political Parties

Between 1952 until 1980

The relationship between the MB, Gamal Abdel Nasser’s government (military), and secular-liberal political parties resulted in the political game in Egypt and the primacy of the military. After the Free Officers’ Revolution of 1952, Gamal Abdel Nasser’s secular, socialist, and nationalist regime became hostile to liberalism and dismantled the Wafd Party and other liberal political organizations (Boduszyñski et al. 2015). However, the military government’s relationship to the MB and MS can be divided into two stages. The first stage was between July

1952 and March 1954. It marked a period of “coalition and conciliation between the Brotherhood and the Free Officers [(FO)]” (Aly & Wenner 1982, 342). The Free Officers was a small military group led by Gamal Abdel Nasser that overthrew King Faruq on 23 July 1952. The Brotherhood supported the toppling of King Faruq. The MB coordinated closely with the Free Officers. They maintained “law and order as well as popular support for the army’s role during the ‘revolution’ of 23 July 1952, itself” (Karam 1997, 57). At that time, the regime released all the Brothers whom the old regime had imprisoned, and “after the promulgation of the law banning political activities on January 16, 1953, the officers authorized the Brotherhood to continue its activities under the pretext that it was an association with religious aims” (Aly & Wenner 1982, 342).

The second stage was between 1954 and 1970. This stage was marked by tension in the relationship between the Brotherhood and Gamal Abdel Nasser’s government. Although

“members of the Brotherhood were invited by the FO’s then revolutionary council to take over three ministries, the invitation was contingent on the FO’s acceptance of the people put forward by some of the Brotherhood members” (Karam 1997, 57). Moreover, there was an internal division among the MB members on joining Gamal Abdel Nasser’s government (Karam 1997).

In 1954, Gamal Abdel Nasser cracked down on the Brotherhood and executed six of its members. Moreover, “the Supreme Guide (then as now Hasan al-Hudaybi) was condemned to labor for life and more than 800 Brothers were given long prison sentences while many thousands were imprisoned without trial” (Aly & Wenner 1982, 342). During the second stage,

Islamist narratives started gaining popularity in Egypt, especially after the defeat of Egypt in the

Six Days War (1967) against Israel.

On June 5, 1967, the Israeli Defense Forces “destroyed much of Egypt's air force and defenses, and ground forces succeeded over the following days in defeating the Egyptian army and occupying the Gaza Strip and the Sinai Peninsula” (Harb 2003, 281). This defeat put into question the competency of Gamal Abdel Nasser’s regime and paved the way for rising support for Islamists. This defeat led to the questioning of the secular and nationalist values held by

Gamal Abdel Nasser’s regime. The Brotherhood framed Islam as the only substitute for secular ideologies such as socialism and Arab nationalism (Aly & Wenner 1982; Tessler& Jolene 1996).

The Brotherhood also framed the defeat as “an effective condemnation of the secular social, economic, political, and intellectual characteristics of the regime- all of which ignored or violated the principles of shari'a” (Aly & Wenner 1982, 345).

Moreover, the defeat made the military realize “that its public image, as well as its military preparedness, had been adversely affected by its involvement in the daily governing of the country” (Tadros 2011, 9). After the Six Days War, the Egyptian military decided to pull out from the public eye while sustaining exclusive control over the country (Tadros 2011, 10). Most states in the Middle East began portraying a more civilian image of themselves to their population by replacing “the military uniforms with civilian suits” (Kamrava 2000, 78). This strategy “was part of a deliberate move to deemphasize the state's military genesis while keeping intact its overall institutional structure” (Kamrava 2000, 78). It increased the number of state functions over which officer-politicians have control (Kamrava 2000, 80). Officer-politicians

“now frequently also control key bureaucratic institutions, dominate the official political party and even the legislature, and have placed themselves as the ultimate articulators of the state's ideology” (Kamrava 2000, 80). This diffusion “of the state and its functions has been cemented through an expansive economic network that has turned the armed forces into a formidable, at times insurmountable financial and industrial force” (Kamrava 2000, 81). For instance, on top of

“expanding military industry and its role as a veteran arms producer, the Egyptian military is economically active in the agricultural sector, in civilian industries, and in the national infrastructure” (Kamrava 2000, 80). Authoritarian incumbents allowed the broad access of the military to the economy and its significant influence as a tool to stabilize their regimes by preventing military coups and gaining the loyalty of the military to the regime. This name of this strategy is “coup-proofing.” The term describes the “actions of authoritarian incumbents to prevent militaries from assuming power” (Albrecht 2015, 39). The military then became the strongest player in the political game in Egypt.

Moreover, Gamal Abdel Nasser attempted to implement “ambitious programs of state-led development, attempting to simultaneously generate rapid economic growth, improved living standards, and high levels of political and ideological conformity” (Wickham 2002, 11). The

Gamal Abdel Nasser regime’s ambitions eventually outpaced its institutional resources and capacities resulting in a fiscal crisis and growing pressures for reform. This “contributed to the rise of a frustrated stratum of educated, underemployed youth ‘available’ for mobilization by opposition groups” (Wickham 2002, 12). The Brotherhood and the MS were able to mobilize these frustrated youths to support their agenda. This led Gamal Abdel Nasser’s government to imprison many high-ranking female members of the Brotherhood. This threatened the continuity of the movement. According to Jihan al-Halafawi, a senior activist, “[W]hat kept the movement from collapse at the time was the fact that women moved quickly to take on the job when men were imprisoned or sent into long exiles” (Abdel-Latif 2008, 4).

The Sisters’ assistance to the Brotherhood and its activities was mainly constrained to providing “moral and financial support to the families of the detainees, a task that would remain one of the key undertakings of the women’s division as the movement continued to be the target of the state wrath” (Abdel-Latif 2008, 4). The backlash of the Egyptian state against the

Brotherhood undermined and hindered the structure of the Sisters’ group. Its members had to shift their attention from improving their status in the Brotherhood to supporting the families of the Brothers and preserving the legacy of the Brotherhood. The government backlash against the

Brotherhood continued until the election of Anwar el-Sadat in 1970.

Anwar el-Sadat (1970 -1981) initiated a limited political opening for secular-liberal parties and the MB and MS (Morsy 2014; Boduszyñski et al. 2015). The Wafd party re-emerged in 1977 as the New Wafd and the Tagammu Party emerged during that period. These parties and

other opposition parties that emerged eventually formed ties to the regime and the military

(Boduszyñski et al. 2015). Anwar el-Sadat allowed these parties to exist because they were meant to highlight Anwar el-Sadat and his ruling party as tolerant (Boduszyñski et al. 2015).

Ottaway and Hamzawy (2007) clarify that various secular parties look “to governments for protection against the rise of Islamists, even as they try to curb the power of those governments”

(3). These parties at least “know what the restrictions are, and although they do not like them, they usually learn to live with them. But they do not know what to expect from potential Islamist parties” (Ottaway & Hamzawy 2007, 3).

The Brotherhood resumed its public activities under Anwar el-Sadat (Aly & Wenner

1982; Tadros 2011; Weber 2012). This was part of a strategy to strengthen the Islamist movement in Egypt to contain and challenge the influence of the remnants of Nasserism (Aly &

Wenner 1982; Tadros 2011; Weber 2012). Anwar el-Sadat opted to use Islam to neutralize the

Nasserists because he was afraid that they would be able to block his new position (Aly &

Wenner 1982; Tessler & Jolene 1996). Anwar el-Sadat found a tactical ally in the Brotherhood.

He freed “the Brothers from prison, including the Supreme Guide, Hasan al-Hudaybi. Moreover, in the preparatory work for his own, new Constitution for Egypt, he invited their participation in the drafting of relevant articles and sections” (Aly & Wenner 1982, 348). The “peaceful coexistence” between the Brotherhood and the Egyptian government lasted between 1970 and

1978. Later (1978 to 1981), confrontation after the Iranian revolution marked the relationship.

The uprisings gave the Brotherhood the perception establishing an Islamic state in Egypt was possible. However, to Anwar el-Sadat, the Iranian Revolution “represented the dangers of

Islamic fundamentalism, especially to his own government” (Aly & Wenner 1982, 355).

Additionally, the Brotherhood had an issue with Anwar el-Sadat’s liberation program for women

(Aly & Wenner 1982). In the summer of 1979, Anwar el-Sadat declared “a new set of laws concerning the status of women: (1) at least 30 representatives in the National Assembly had to be women, and (2) new restrictions limited divorce and made polygamy nearly impossible” (Aly

& Wenner 1982, 356). However, one of the most important reasons for the conflict between

Anwar el-Sadat and the Brotherhood was the peace treaty with Israel. The Brotherhood tried to block any peaceful resolution to the conflict, “since, in their terms, it is a religious confrontation between Islam and Judaism. The only possible solution is a jihad which will rescue lost Islamic territory” (Aly & Wenner 1982, 356).

During the political opening for the Brotherhood under Anwar el-Sadat’s rule, the

Brotherhood increased their access to and control over professional associations and syndicates

(Abed-Kotob 1995, 329). They gathered “resources and created opportunities for opposition activism outside the formal political channels controlled by the authoritarian state” (Wickham

2002,6). The Brotherhood expanded its control of the professional associations of doctors, engineers, lawyers, and pharmacists. These inroads were “all significant indicators of political participation at the grassroots, or civil society, level” (Abed-Kotob 1995, 329). This gave the

Brotherhood a chance to reach out to the educated sector of the Egyptian society by expressing their opinions at professional conferences and meetings held by associations and universities

(Abed-Kotob 1995, 329). During this opening, the Brotherhood continued to expand the base of its supporters, which included both men and women, and increased its popularity among different segments of the Egyptian community mainly through charitable work (Abdel- Latif

2008). The Sisters began to resume their social activities and charity work “during the mid-1980s and helped greatly to reinforce the image of the Brothers as an active social force” (Abdel- Latif

2008, 5).

The nature of the political opening for the Brotherhood in Anwar el-Sadat’s era was changed in the 1980s when some members of the Brotherhood’s most radical branch assassinated Anwar el-Sadat in 1981 (Weber 2012, Tadros 2011). The branch, which is known as the Islamic Group (al-Jama ́ah al-Islamiyya), “had evolved towards terrorism following the

Camp David Accords” (Weber 2012, 187). The assassination of Anwar el-Sadat brought Hosni

Mubarak to power in the same year.

The Game Between 1980 and 2011

During the thirty years of Hosni Mubarak’s rule, the Brotherhood was under siege

(Wickham 2011). An estimated “35,000 Brotherhood leaders were arrested during the period of

Mubarak’s rule” (Wickham 2011, 211). However, the extent of this siege changed according to the political climate. The MB’s relationship with the government under the Hosni Mubarak’s regime underwent three phases (Rashwan 2006; Tadros 2011).

The first phase lasted between 1981 and 1988. A leniency and tolerance towards the

Brotherhood and other groups characterized this phase. After the assassination of Anwar el-

Sadat, Hosni Mubarak decided to carry on with and economic liberalization (Rubin 2010; Zahid

2010). This “enabled the Brotherhood to build a populist base, especially through its much needed social services and benefits that were extended to a population that did not share in the wealth accumulated by a small class of entrepreneurs under the open market economy” (Tadros

2011). Contention between the Brotherhood and Hosni Mubarak’s government marked the second phase, which lasted from 1988 to 1992. This was due to the government’s realization of the expanded activities and membership of the MB and the movement’s failure to denounce terrorist attacks on tourists and government symbols conducted by Islamist extremist groups

(Rashwan 2006, Tadros 2011).

During the final phase, from 1992 until 2011, hostility and repression characterized the relationship between the movement and the government. The increase of terrorism incidents by

Islamist radicals targeting the Coptic community, security forces, and tourists caused this repression (Rubin 2010). The government detained senior members of the movement. Despite the government’s backlash, the government permitted the movement to participate and be active in the political process (Abed-Kotob 1995; Choubaky 2006; Tadros 2011). Some of the Brothers ran for office as independent candidates of different approved parties (Weber 2012). Despite the government’s repression, the expansion of the Brotherhood’s social influence and popularity continued because, “as Mubarak's power became stronger and more corrupt, shifting toward foreign diplomacy, Egyptian society was neglected to an ever greater degree” (Weber 2012,

187). Even though the movement was officially outlawed, it was able to maneuver around state restrictions and engage in politics. The Brotherhood confronted those restrictions by running their candidates as independent or allying with oppositional parties.

In 1995, the movement secured only one seat. However, in the 2000 elections, they managed to secure 17 seats in Parliament, and in 2005 the Brotherhood secured an unprecedented 88 seats (Abdel- Latif 2008, 6). The results of the 2005 elections constituted a threat to Hosni Mubarak’s government, resulting in the government declaring the Brotherhood a

“security threat.” The government attacked hundreds of the movement’s senior members as well as its economic assets. Due to the backlash by Hosni Mubarak’s government against the MB, the

Sisterhood became politicized. The backlash caused the Sisters to shift their attention from conducting social projects to working on mobilizing support for the imprisoned Brothers and their families. This backlash hindered the Sisters from developing their own structures, projects, and status within the Brotherhood. However, it also opened a space for women in the

Brotherhood’s electoral campaign for the elections of 2000.

In 2000, the MB nominated its first woman candidate, Jihan al-Halafawi (Khalaf 2012).

She ran for a seat in the People’s Assembly (PA), a response to the government accusation that the MB was an extremist religious organization (Bradley 2010). Moreover, the Sisters “ran in the

2005 and 2010 parliamentary elections on behalf of the Muslim Brotherhood” (Hamed 2012). As

I explain in Chapter Three, having female candidates was one of the strategies used by the

Brothers to create a moderate image for the movement to counter the government’s accusations and increase the support for the movement by the average Egyptian citizen. However, the Sisters utilized this opportunity to gain more political participation and involvement in the formal and informal political mediums.

Late in Hosni Mubarak’s rule, there was a wider opening for secular opposition parties to resume activities, which resulted in the emergence of more than twenty parties, most of them non-Islamist, by 2010 (Boduszyñski et al. 2015). However, this opening came with restrictions.

For instance, “secular parties encountered severe roadblocks when they attempted to register.

Even the registered parties were unable to organize and campaign freely, while the regime used repression and manipulation to minimize the opposition vote” (Boduszyñski 2015, 127-8).

These parties did not attempt to compete with Hosni Mubarak’s ruling National

Democratic Party (NDP). Instead, they competed “with one another and with MB candidates running as independents for minimal parliamentary representation” (Boduszyñski 2015, 128).

Throughout the Hosni Mubarak era, secular parties contributed to their own weakness due to their aging leaders and decaying structures, which “held no appeal for younger, liberal-minded

Egyptians, who began forming their opposition groups” (Boduszyñski 2015, 128). To deal with this lack of popularity among the Egyptian masses, New Wafd often “lined up behind the NDP

and struck deals with the regime in exchange for a few parliamentary seats” (Boduszyñski 2015,

128). This history helps explain the secular parties’ loss to the MB in the elections after the ouster of Hosni Mubarak in 2011. Like other secular parties, the Free Egyptians Party (FEP) lost because it has “failed to build a grassroots organization and is tainted by links between some of its leaders and the Mubarak regime” (Boduszyñski 2015, 129).

As for the military, in the 1980s, to guarantee the officers’ loyalty, Hosni Mubarak, the head of the liberal governing party, and his minister of defense, Abd al-Halim Abu Ghazala, forged an agreement giving the military control over an economic empire that is worth about 10 to 15 percent of annual GDP (Springborg 1987; Harb 2003; Marshall & Stacher 2012; Sayigh

2012; Bou Nassif 2013, Albrecht 2015). Military-owned economic initiatives have included both military (arms manufacturing) and civilian goods (drinking water, household items, chemicals…etc.) (Albrecht 2015, 46). The military in Egypt owns a big portion of lands in the country and has investments in agriculture and tourism (Frisch 2013, Albrecht 2015). The formation and consolidation of the military economy stabilized the civilian regime and strengthened its grip on the country’s political order. This lasted until the economic policy of the civilian government “clashed with the interests of the officers’ economic engagement” (Albrecht

2015, 46).

The military establishment started distancing itself from the civilian elites a decade before the January 25 uprisings due to disagreement on socio-economic developments (Albrecht

2015, 46). The officers pushed for an “etatist economic order and called for distributive politics and social justice as core elements in economic decision-making” (Albrecht 2015, 46). The military keenly resisted development activities such as the privatization of banks and public enterprises (Albrecht 2015, 46). The rise of Gamal Mubarak, the son of Hosni Mubarak,

represented the economic reforms the DNP pushed for. Instead of serving in the military, “Gamal

Mubarak worked in London at the Bank of America and then in a private equity firm he helped found” (Frisch 2013,187). Gamal came back to Egypt in 1995 and in 2002, Hosni Mubarak appointed him “to head the Policies Secretariat, a board made up of businessmen and liberal economists” (Frisch 2013, 187). Various people viewed this move “as a grooming process of the heir-to-be after Mubarak’s death or retirement” (Frisch 2013, 187). Gamal and his privatization agenda threatened the interest of the Egyptian military (Albercht & Bishara 2011, Droz-Vincent

2011, Goldstone 2011, Nepstad 2013, Frisch 2013). Therefore, the military had a strong economic incentive to side with the protestors in Tahrir Square (Droz-Vincent 2011, Goldstone

2011, Nepstad 2013). The threats of Gamal's policies to the military’s interests partially shaped the domestic context and resulted in the military’s decision to side with the protestors during the

January 25 uprisings and then shift alliances during the subsequent elections.

The Game During the Uprisings (1/25/2011- 2/11/2011)

The January 25 uprisings in Egypt resulted in the end of Hosni Mubarak’s regime and opened the door for new political actors such as the MB. The subsequent elections gave the

Brotherhood and their political party, the FJP, which was founded after the uprisings, control over the National Assembly and the office of the presidency when Mohamed Morsi became the new President. The opening in the political space resulted in changes in Islamist politics and discourses by the MB and MS (Al- Anani 2012). For instance, they shifted from using religious rhetoric to using the language of political rights. The Islamists “did not promise paradise as a reward for those who would vote for them but rather pledged to improve the economy, fight corruption and attract foreign direct investment (FDI)” (Al-Anani 2012,468).

At the beginning of the January 25 protest in Egypt, secular-liberal political parties and the MB refrained from participating in the uprisings. However, when the demonstrations kept gaining momentum and support from the Egyptian people, some of the secular-liberal parties finally joined the uprisings. These parties, with their outdated leadership and hierarchical elitist structures, held little to no appeal for the protestors. Additionally, many of these secular-liberal parties, such as Egypt’s New Wafd Party, had been to varying degrees coopted by or even complicit with Hosni Mubarak’s regime (Boduszyñski et al. 2015).

Similarly, the Islamists did not want to participate in the uprisings initially because if they failed, their involvement would increase the government backlash against them. However, as the number of protestors increased and spread into the streets of Cairo, Alexandria, Suez and elsewhere, the Brotherhood mobilized its members extensively during the “Day of Rage” on

Friday, January 28, 2011 (Wickham 2011; Stein 2012). The younger members of the

Brotherhood “played a key role in forming alliances and coordinating protests with secular democracy activists” (Wickham 2011, 212). During the demonstrations, Brotherhood members refrained from using religious symbols and the slogan “Islam is the Solution,” and instead they raised the Egyptian flag “as a powerful visual symbol of patriotism and national unity”

(Wickham 2011, 212).

Islamists, after the January 25 uprisings, took a pragmatic and realist stance, rather than an ideological one, on foreign policy and relations with Western countries like the United States.

During their time in the government, the leaders of the FJP were heavily involved in dialogue and discussion with foreign ambassadors and governments “to re-build the relationship between the MB and western countries after decades of misunderstanding” (Al-Anani 2012, 472). This shift occurred because mainstream Islamist groups are cognizant of the importance of

international opinion. They realize that “a great deal is at stake- hundreds of millions of dollars of Western assistance, loans from international financial institutions, and trade and investment”

(Hamid 2012, 44). Islamists were aware that a withdrawal of Western support could undermine

“the prospects for a successful transition” (Hamid 2012, 44).

In the Arab Spring in general, and the Egyptian uprisings in particular, the military’s response to the protest played a crucial role in deciding the results of the events (Barany 2012;

Bellin 2012; Makara 2013). The militaries of these countries have comprised an essential part of the authoritarian regimes’ infrastructure and contributed to their stability. The military has become the “final guarantor of power” (Brooks 1998, 18) for authoritarian incumbents to stabilize their regime against domestic and international challengers. In these countries,

“repressive dictators have consistently had some of the world’s largest standing armies per capita, and have used them to suppress dissent” (Albertus & Menaldo 2012, 153).

In Egypt, the assumption was that “Mubarak’s close association with the military has rendered Egypt ‘coup-proof’” (Cook 2007, 139). However, the military’s intervention to oust

Hosni Mubarak on 11 February 2011 and Mohammed Morsi on 3 July 2013, proves that this assumption was not entirely true. Therefore, a reconsideration of the role of the military in influencing politics in Egypt is required (Albrecht 2015, 39). These two major incidents of military intervention in political affairs suggest the military’s main goal was to maintain the

“political regime established by the Free Officers’ coup in 1952” (Albrecht 2015, 42). However, the removal of Hosni Mubarak, the disbanding of the National Democratic Party (DNP) and the suspension of the constitution marked the lack of loyalty to Mubarak’s regime (Albrecht 2015).

Moreover, Hosni Mubarak boosted the dominance of the police force “at the expense of the military, perhaps because Mubarak feared the Army’s opposition to his plans to hand over power

to his son Gamal” (Frisch 2013, 183). Hosni Mubarak also limited the access of the military to the President (Frisch 2013, 183). Two people from the civilian government: Habib al- ‘Adli, the veteran Minister of Interior, and ‘Umar Sulayman, the veteran director of the Egyptian

Intelligence Services had more access to the office of the President than Marshal Tantawi, the veteran Minister of Defense and Military Production (Frisch 2013,183). Hosni Mubarak invested more in the police force and internal security because the peace treaty with Israel secured

Egypt’s western borders and there was no threat on the northern and southern borders because of weak neighbors (Frisch 2013, 183). However, “this investment in strengthening the Central

Security Forces, the principal arm of the regime against internal dissent, failed dismally in protecting the regime in the face of massive demonstrations that broke out on 25 January 2011”

(Frisch 2013,183). Despite Hosni Mubarak’s attempts to weaken the military, it continued to be an active player in Egyptian politics. As Frisch (2013) notes, the Egyptian “Army is not only privileged; it is also costly and large” (186).

These factors could shed light on why the Egyptian military on 25 January 2011 sided with the protesters and not Hosni Mubarak’s incumbency. As Hashim (2011) notes, “The military’s reluctance to save the regime from a people’s revolution was the prime factor in the regime’s relatively quick downfall. Had it chosen to take the president’s side, the outcome could have been violent” (116-117). Additionally, as the military “witnessed escalating civilian demonstrations, global media coverage of the uprising, and declining international support, they may have concluded that Hosni Mubarak’s days were limited” (Nepstad 2013, 343). This follows

Kou’s (2000) argument that the military’s perception of regime fragility increases the chances of military defection. Moreover, since the military institution sided with civil society demonstrations, there was no other entity capable of punishing the defectors. In other words, “the

Egyptian military’s decision to side with the nonviolent movement was shaped by economic motivations, the perception of regime fragility, and the belief that defectors would not be punished” (Nepstad 2013, 343).

The Political Game after the January 25 Uprisings (2011-2017)

Date

March-December 2011 This was a period of cooperation between the military and

the MB; tension between MB and secular-liberal parties

and non-Islamist fractions of civil society.

January- June 2012 This was a period of controlled conflict between the

military and the MB; tension between the MB and

secular-liberal parties and non-Islamist fractions of civil

society.

July-August 2012 This was a period of conflict between the military and the

MB; tension between the MB and secular-liberal parties

and non-Islamist fractions of civil society.

August-November 2012 This was a period of conflict between the Brotherhood,

the military and the secular-liberal political parties as well

as with the non-Islamist fractions of civil society.

December 2012-July 2013 This was a period of open confrontation. The military

removed Mohammad Morsi by force in July 3rd, 2013.

Table1: Military-MB Relations After the January 25 Uprisings

After the resignation of Hosni Mubarak in 2011, the primary goal of Egyptian officers was to safeguard their interests (Bou Nassif 2013, 529). The division of Egypt’s political scene after the 2011 uprisings, “pitting the Muslim Brothers against their secularist elites, enhanced the officers’ position in the correlation of power between the military and civilian actors” (Bou

Nassif 2013, 529). Soon after the resignation of Hosni Mubarak, “A military junta consisting of the 19-member Supreme Council of Armed Forces” was formed (Albercht & Bishara 2011, 15).

The relations between the military, the MB, and the other players between 2011 and 2013 went through five stages (Ashour 2015).

First Stage

The first stage was from March until December 2011, a period of cooperation between the MB, MS and the military. The Brotherhood, despite protests from youth and activists, supported amendments to the constitution that the military introduced in February 2011. The

SCAF appointed a seven-member committee in February and March 2011, which introduced 11 amendments to the 1971 constitution (Ashour 2015). The committee included Sobhy Saleh, who was a renowned lawyer from the MB. The amendments “included shortening the presidential term, creating a two-term limit, expanding the pool of potential presidential candidates and restricting the application of emergency law” (Kurtzer & Svenstrup 2012,45). The final constitutional declaration of March 30, 2011 “added 51… articles to a constitutional declaration that enhanced its powers. The MB and most of the ‘yes’ voters did not oppose these changes”

(Ashour 2015, 12). Both the military and the Brotherhood came out with a win. The Democratic

Alliance dominated by the FJP won 235 seats in Egypt’s first free elections (Ashour 2015). The

SCAF, at least for a short period, was not alarmed by the gain of the MB in the elections

“because its March 2011 constitutional declaration limited the mandate of elected institutions”

(Ashour 2015). This period was marked by an opening in the formal and informal mediums for the Muslim Sisters. Their political activities increased compared to Hosni Mubarak’s era. The

FJP held trainings for women to help them run for office and engage in politics. As I discuss in the next chapter, they assigned six women to serve on the Constituent Assembly committee, which was responsible for the drafting of the 2012 constitution.

During the first stage, other parties and coalitions struggling in the parliamentary elections and referendums were not content with the cooperation between the Brotherhood and the military. One of these coalitions, the Islamist Alliance, consists of mostly Salafists parties who broke away from the Democratic Alliance, including the Nour Party, the Asala

(Authenticity) Party, the Salafists Current, and the Construction and Development Party. Another coalition in the opposition was the Egyptian Bloc, which consists of secular-liberal parties

“dominated by the Free Egyptians Party led by billionaire Naguib Sawiris. It also includes the

Egyptian Social Democratic Party (liberal), and the Tagammu Party (socialist)” (Sharp 2012,

501). The opposition also included the Revolution Continues coalition, which “consists of

Socialist Popular Alliance Party, the Egyptian Socialist Party, Egypt Freedom, Equality and

Development, the Egyptian Current (a liberal off-shoot of MB), and the Revolution Youth

Coalition” (Sharp 2012, 501). Finally, it included the New Wafd, which “had been part of the

Democratic Alliance but broke off after disagreements with the Brotherhood over the allocation of seats on their unified list” (Sharp 2012, 501). Some members of the opposition persistently tried “to ally themselves with the military, calling for the prolonging of SCAF’s rule, as well as demanding the disbanding of elected institutions via various methods, including legal appeals and outright calls for a military coup” (Ashour 2015,13). This strategy paid off to some extent for some of these parties and coalitions. For instance, the Social Democratic Party “won only 16

seats (3.1 percent) in the parliamentary elections, but after the 2013 coup, the junta appointed two of the party’s founders and leading figures, Hazem al-Beblawi and Ziad Bahaa Al-Din, as prime minister and deputy prime minister” (Ashour 2015,13). Both “publicly defended a wave of repression and exclusion against their political rivals” (Ashour 2015, 13). This division among the various entities of the opposition on the future of the country and the legitimacy of the MB as a representative of the demands of Egyptians reflected the division in the Egyptian civil society.

Civil society was divided between supporters and critics of the MB.

Second Stage

The second stage of relations between the MB and the SCAF occurred between January and June 2012. During this stage, Egypt had its first elections after the uprisings. Ashour (2015) characterized it as a phase of the controlled conflict. In June 2012, the SCAF issued a decision to dissolve the lower house of parliament following a constitutional court ruling that “one-third of the seats in the Islamist-dominated parliament were invalid” (Al Jazeera 2012). This decision entrusted all legislative authority in the SCAF a few days “before Egypt’s first civilian president was scheduled to take office on June 30, 2012” (Ashour 2015, 13). This decision passed without much criticism nationally and internationally. The MB did not mobilize its supporters because they won the parliamentary elections and the presidency. At the same time, “the majority of the losers in the electoral process had been calling for the dissolution and cheered when it happened”

(Ashour 2015, 13). As I show in the next two chapters focusing specifically on the Sisterhood, the opening in the formal political medium (government) and informal medium (civil society) for the Muslim Sisters continued until the fifth stage. Between February 2011 and June 2013,

Sisters’ activism expanded. Egyptian women were in the forefront of the 2011 protests, which marked a new opportunity for them to engage in politics and the MB’s organizational structure.

After the revolution, the Sisters increased their political engagement during parliamentary elections for the People’s Assembly, the lower house of the formerly bicameral Parliament of Egypt in December 2011 and the Shura Council, the upper house of the formerly bicameral

Parliament of Egypt in February 2012. During this period of political opening, the Sisters expanded their activism and efforts to mobilize support for the MB. The Sisters actively carved a space for themselves in the movement. According to Dina Zakaria, some young Sisters chose to participate in the 2011 demonstrations against the instructions of the leaders of the Brotherhood

(Interview 1/13/2017).2 The Sisters also began to publicly ask for greater representation and more roles in the MB’s structure.

Third Stage

The third stage, characterized by conflict between Mohammad Morsi and the SCAF, played out between July and August 2012. After taking office, Mohammad Morsi recalled the formerly dissolved parliament on July 8, 2012, without consulting the SCAF. Additionally, he announced that parliamentary elections would be held within 60 days of the official finalization of a new constitution (MacFarlane 2012). These moves enabled Mohammad Morsi to take the legislative authority from the hands of the military and return it back to parliament (MacFarlane

2012). They show how Mohammad Morsi attempted “to limit the supra-powers of the military through reconciliatory – as opposed to aggressive – measures” (MacFarlane 2012, 44).

Mohammad Morsi’s attempt to restrict the power of SCAF took another turn on August 12,

2012, when he issued decrees removing “Tantawy, his deputy (General Sami Anan), and the heads of the General Intelligence Apparatus (Murad Mowafi), Presidential Guard (Muhammad

Nagib Abdel-Salam), Military Police (Hamdy Badin), Cairo Security Directorate (Mohsen

2 Interview conducted by author in English, Istanbul, 2017. 87

Murad), and Central Security Forces (Emad Al-Wakil) from their positions” (Ashour 2015, 13).

Moreover, Mohammad Morsi issued an addition to Egypt’s governing March 2011 interim constitution terminating the SCAF’s June constitutional declaration. The June declaration had placed the military beyond civilian control, gave the SCAF a legislative role, and allowed the military to have control of the process of writing a new constitution (MacFarlane 2012, 45).

These attempts to limit the authority of the military over Egyptian politics “increased Morsi’s support among some of the relatively weak and decentralized revolutionary [civil society] youth groups” (Ashour 2015, 14). However, the stronger and more centralized actors in the armed and judicial institutions, as well as some of the secular-liberal political parties and non-Islamist civil society groups were quite alarmed (Ashour 2015).

Fourth Stage

In the fourth stage, between August and November 2012, Mohammad Morsi started losing the support of some of his secular-liberal political parties. The loss of support was due to disagreements on cabinet appointments, constitutional assembly tensions over articles, “and the polarizing political narrative employed by the Islamist forces, as well as the deep mistrust between the MB/ FJP and its former allies” (Ashour 2015,14). Mohammad Morsi’s constitutional declaration of November 2012 increased the tension even more (Ashour 2015).

This declaration awarded Mohammad Morsi total executive control and allowed him “to bypass judicial procedures to ensure the text was put to a public vote without further debate” (Kingsley

2015). The declaration mobilized the non-Islamist factions of civil society. It led to clashes between the MB’s supporters and the liberals outside the presidential palace. This division in civil society and the attack of the secular-liberal parties against the Islamists strengthened the military, which “became a powerful ‘arbiter’ between increasingly polarized political forces.

Mohamed ElBaradei, for example, would refuse to meet with the elected president, but would instead ask to meet with the defense minister” (Ashour 2015, 15).

Fifth Stage

Finally, after December 2012, the relationship between the military and the MB became one marked by open confrontation eventually leading to Mohammad Morsi’s removal by the military on July 3rd, 2013. Leading to this coup was the empowerment of the military as the primary guardian for Egyptian politics by secular parties headed by people such as ElBaradei coupled with wide demonstrations by various civil society groups calling for the ouster of

President Mohammed Morsi (Patrick 2013). The support for the military gave Egypt’s leading liberal, Mohamed ElBaradei and other liberals power in the few months after the ouster of

Mohammad Morsi. ElBaradei “was appointed vice-president, and was allowed to pick the prime minister, Hazem el-Beblawi, an economics professor from Aboul Ghar’s social democratic party” (Kingsley 2015). During the presidential elections in May 2014, various secular parties supported General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, the head of the Egyptian armed forces, for president.

These parties included the Arab Democratic Nasserist Party, the New Wafd Party, and the

Tagammu Party.

The ousting of Mohammad Morsi marked the beginning of a political backlash against the MS and Brotherhood. As explained in more detail in the next chapters, the Sisters’ activities focused on protesting the coup in public spaces. Some secular civil society groups joined the

Sisters because they were against the military takeover even though they did not support

Mohammad Morsi. The Sisters also started organizing and supporting the imprisoned Brothers and their families. In the fifth stage and its aftermath, their work centered on monitoring and

reporting human rights abuses in Egypt in general and against the imprisoned Brotherhood members in particular.

Conclusion

By conceptualizing POS in terms of alliances between various groups, I show that the relationship between structure and agency goes both ways: agency affects structure and structure shapes agency. To address the lack of consideration for and the minimum attention to gender and

Middle East state-society relations in POS studies, this chapter introduced civil society as an essential medium for organizing in the Egyptian political game. There are three groups of players in the game: the military, the Islamists (mainly MB), and the secular-liberal political parties. I use the MB interchangeably with Islamists, encompassing both the male and female members

(MS) of the MB. It also outlined the interactions between the three players and how they utilized the government and civil society as a medium for promoting their agenda. These interactions are important for understanding the political contexts in which the MS had to adapt their organizing strategies and which influenced the mediums of their organizing.

As I show in Chapter Four, the changing political alliances have shaped the Muslim

Sisters’ access to various mediums of organizing and influenced their demands and the framing of these demands. Between 2010 and 2017, the Sisters framed their demands using the language of human rights and women’s rights, emphasizing one more than the other depending on the

“master frame” at the time. Moreover, the Sisters’ activism has historically been concentrated in the civil society medium during times of political backlash against the MB. However, they extended their activism and participation in politics to the government whenever there was an opening and tolerance for their organizing by the type of alliance shaping the government.

The next chapter examines how the different alliances between the military, Islamist, and secular-liberal parties influenced women’s rights and the position of the MS in the MB. In

Chapter Four I demonstrate how these alliances influenced the strategic actions of the MS.

Chapter Three

Mapping the Structural Context of the Sisterhood in Egypt

This chapter provides a historical background on the influences of alliances before the uprising on Egyptian women’s activism. It also addresses how the shifts in alliances between

2010 and 2017 have influenced the structural context in which Egyptian women activists in general, and the Muslim Sisters in particular, have been operating. It examines the openings and constraints for women’s participation that the formal structures of the government and the

Muslim Brotherhood (MB) imposed on them, while Chapter Four will examine the Sisters’ responses (in terms of framing and mediums of organizing). This chapter maps out the articles addressing women’s issues in the three constitutions in place between 2010 and 2017. It also examines some of the laws the various Egyptian governments passed addressing women’s issues, such as the Personal Status Law (PSL) and the quota laws. The chapter traces the Islamist and secular arguments for and against the passing of the constitutional articles and laws. It shows how the gender policies passed during the Hosni Mubarak and Anwar el-Sadat eras resulted in an evolution in the Islamists’ discourse on women’s participation in political and social life in

Egypt. Additionally, the chapter situates the Sisters’ access to the formal and informal mediums as well as the limits to their activism within the larger debate on women’s rights and how that influenced their role in the MB.

To map this context, the chapter relies on the three constitutions, the yearly reports on

Egyptian women’s status produced by the Egyptian Center for Women’s Rights (ECWR), the

Brotherhood’s election platforms, and secondary sources (scholars’ and journalists’ accounts of the changing state of women’s rights), as well as the interviews I conducted in Turkey with members of the Muslim Sisterhood (MS) and MB. I divided the chapter into three sections. The

first section gives an analysis of women’s issues under the period of alliance between the military and secular-liberal political parties, which resulted in Hosni Mubarak’s government; this alliance broke during the uprisings. It examines the 1971 constitution, which was in place until

February 11, 2011, as well as some of the laws related to women. It also covers the historical progression of the MB’s approaches to women’s issues, including Egyptian women in general and the Muslim Sisters in particular. The next section examines the 2012 constitution and the laws related to women’s issues. It covers the views on and debates about these rights between the secularists and Islamists. This period witnessed an alliance between the military and Islamists.

The army suspended the 2012 constitution on July 3, 2013. The third section examines the 2014 constitution, which remains in effect today. An alliance between the secular-liberal political parties and the military shaped this period. While primarily mapping the domestic context, the chapter considers the international context in which the various players are embedded.

Women’s Issues and Islam from Gamal Abdel Nasser Until the Uprisings (1954-2011)

The government in Egypt from the time the Free Officers took control until the end of

Hosni Mubarak’s presidency is a result of the alliance between the secular-liberal political parties and the military. The government attempted to project a liberal image of itself to the West by ratifying various international treaties such as the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (of 1976), ratified in 1982, and the Convention on the Elimination of All

Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), ratified in 1981. This is due to Egypt’s reliance on international aid, especially from the US, after 1967. This plays a major role in the state’s formal stance on women’s rights.

Tadros (2016) notes that conversations on women’s issues in Egypt under Hosni

Mubarak happened in an environment where an authoritarian regime controlled civic

engagement and religion became the normative framework for this engagement. Additionally,

“the national women’s machineries claimed representation of Egyptian women’s voices and interests” (Tadros 2016, 67). These elements rose due to a “complex power struggle encompassing global, national, and local actors” (Tadros 2016, 67). Moreover, the state coopted women’s issues under the platform of national women’s machineries to counter the growing influence of Islamists and their popularity in Egypt. By projecting a liberal image, Hosni

Mubarak’s government labeled itself as moderate by following a progressive interpretation of

Islam compared to Islamists who constructed Islam as against women’s rights, the West, and democracy. In addition to the international aspect, the domestic struggle with Islamists over who is the legitimate representative of Islam shaped Hosni Mubarak’s government stance on women’s issues. Thus, international and domestic dimensions influenced the Hosni Mubarak regime’s framing of women’s rights and how they were translated into laws and policies.

This international and domestic dynamic also applies to the MB and its views of women’s political participation. The MB had to adjust according to the policies implemented by the state, such as legislative quotas for women and the ratification of international agreements such as CEDAW to cater to the international community and the liberal factions of Egyptian society. The adjustment of the MB to the state’s policies towards women was a way to challenge the state’s attempts to portray the MB as an extremist group. The MB also had to compete with the Salafists, the most conservative Islamists, over who was the true representative of Islam. As I detail below, the strategic interaction of the MB with the state and other domestic groups such as the Salafists influenced the access of non-Islamist women and Islamist women to the formal and informal political mediums to varying degrees. As I will show in Chapter Four on framing, it also shaped the way women framed their demands. Moreover, the adoption of the policies of

economic liberalization influenced women’s issues.

Historical Context of State Feminism in Egypt and the 1971 Constitution

Gamal Abdel Nasser’s welfare state (1956-1970), which emerged in the 1950s, contributed to the emergence of state feminism in Egypt. The Scandinavian welfare states inspired the concept of state feminism. It refers to “ambitious state programs that introduce important changes to the reproductive and productive roles of women” (Hatem 1992, 231). As

Hatem (1992) notes, “the welfare state offered explicit commitment to public equality for women. It contributed to the development of state feminism as a legal, economic, and ideological strategy to introduce changes to Egyptian society and its gender relations” (231). State feminism served as a tool to increase “the political legitimacy of Abdel Nasser's regime and its progressive credentials” (Hatem 1992, 231). The welfare state in Egypt retreated due to the economic crisis in the 1970s “as part of the shift to a market economy where Egyptian, regional, and international capital played a leading developmental role” (Hatem 1992, 233).

The retreat of the welfare state and Anwar el-Sadat’s (1970-1981) support of the

Islamists early in his regime (due to their challenge to the Nasserite student leadership in different student unions elections) strengthened the Islamist narrative in Egypt. The Islamists had a voluntarist and individualist developmental vision, which was “focused on self-help solutions that were compatible with the privatization ideals” of the new economic policies adopted by

Anwar el-Sadat (Hatem 1992, 234). But the cooperation between Islamists and Anwar el-Sadat’s government did not last for long (1971-1977). The signing of the Camp David Accords in 1978 strengthened the Islamists and the opposition who were against the treaty with Israel. Women’s issues during both the cooperation and contestation periods between the government and

Islamists took center stage in the relationship between Islamists and Anwar el-Sadat’s regime. As

Hatem states, “gender issues were used by the state, and by its foes and its allies to distinguish themselves from one another and to score ideological and political victories” (1992, 240).

Since Anwar el-Sadat’s era, there has been a confrontation between multiple actors over who has the authority to represent Egyptian women’s issues and how to address them. As I mentioned in Chapter Two, Anwar el-Sadat relied on Islamization of discourse to give his government legitimacy and authenticity. Tadros (2016) notes that for the past twenty years, there has been an “intensification of the political struggle between Islamist opposition groups and the

Egyptian government over who represents Islam and are the most faithful custodians of its precepts” (68). In the context of Egypt, both Islamists and secular movements and parties still viewed religion as the main point of reference on women’s rights. They only differed in their interpretation and implementation of the texts. There was also a struggle among Islamists who held different interpretations of Islam, especially between the ultra-conservative Salafists movements, and the MB, over who represented the true Islam. The Salafists movement did not consider the MB religious enough.

Because of the Islamization of space, politics, and social norms in the 1970s, the

Egyptian government since Anwar el-Sadat had to tackle various legal issues “if demands of women’s groups are to be met on the one hand, and Islamic political agendas are to be satisfied on the other” (Karam 1997, 141). The Egyptian government, since the 1970s, “when seeking to advocate gender reforms, was keen to frame its calls as deriving from Islam and supported by

Muslim scholars” (Tadros 2016, 76). This has led many feminists to increasingly frame their demands in religious terms to accommodate the Islamization of society (Tadros 2016).

Moreover, Islamization increased the Muslim Sisters’ access to public space to advocate for an

Islamist platform (Tadros 2016). At the center of the debates in Egypt since Anwar el-Sadat

about women and Islam are the Constitution, PSL, the Convention on the Elimination of

Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), and legislative quotas for women.

Anwar el-Sadat’s cooptation of women’s rights started with the 1971 constitution. By

“cooptation” I mean the state’s adaptation and promotion of women’s rights and issues as a strategic tool to preserve its stability. This constitution marked a return to conservative cultural and religious values. It strengthened the Islamist discourse, especially on issues related to women and minorities (Hatem 2000). Article 2 particularly strengthened the Islamist narrative in its discussion of the relationship between religion and the state. It stipulated that Sharia is the principal source of legislation. Addressing Islam as the religion of the state was not new, but the stipulation that Sharia was the principal source of legislation marked a change from the previous

Egyptian constitutions. This “gave religion a new visible and divisive public role” (Hatem 2000).

This constitution relied on Sharia “as a reference point for women’s role in society” (Hatem

2000). It did, however, touch on “women’s rights to equality, non-discrimination, and endorsement of the State’s obligation to foster working women and support her in assuming her various and several roles in taking care of her family and in performance of her productive work in society” (Al Agati 2012, 12).

The 1971 constitution discussed the concept of equality in Articles 8 and 40, while it addressed the state’s obligation to help women in their roles in the family in Articles 10 and 11.

Article 8 stated that “The State shall guarantee equality of opportunity to all citizens.” Yet,

Article 40 neglected to list sex or gender when contending that “All citizens are equal before the law. They have equal rights and duties without discrimination between them due to race, ethnic origin, language, religion or creed.” Instead, Article 10 stated that “The State shall guarantee the protection of motherhood and childhood, take care of children and youth and provide suitable

conditions for the development of their talents.” Finally, Article 11 held that “The State shall guarantee the proper coordination between the duties of woman towards the family and her work in the society, considering her equal status with men in the fields of political, social, cultural and economic life without violation of the rules of Islamic jurisprudence [Sharia].” This article assured the compatibility of woman’s responsibilities to her family with her role in society and emphasizes the role of the state in supporting women to reconcile their roles in the family and in society. Article 11 utilized Sharia in a restrictive way because it made women’s equality with men vulnerable to more conservative readings of Islamic law.

The cooptation of women’s rights by the state and women’s vulnerability to the negotiations and contentions between the Islamists and the ruling party continued throughout

Hosni Mubarak’s regime. International pressure, especially from the US to democratize, and internal pressure to Islamicize due to the rise of the Islamists and the popularity of their agenda shaped the political context in Egypt at the beginning of the twentieth century. This led the regime to tolerate some activism in controlled democratic spaces such as associations (Tadros

2016). The ruling NDP was involved to varying extents in other women’s associations in Egypt.

The party either directly controlled these associations, or they were “indirectly controlled via the

Law of Association (Law 32 of 1964) in one way or another” (Karam 1997, 104). The associations had to be registered with the “General Department of Women’s Affairs of the

Ministry of Social Affairs, which supervises their activities and deals with the implementation of the above-mentioned law” (Karam 1997, 104). Farkhanda Hasan, the head of the Women

Secretariat (WS) in the NDP, states that WS’s main goal was to increase women’s political participation by holding conferences and seminars to “raise the awareness of society and the women themselves” (Karam 1997, 105).

In 1991, Hosni Mubarak’s government banned autonomous feminist political organizations (Karam 1997). Between 2000 and 2010, the women’s agenda became part of the state’s agenda through the formation of national women’s machineries, the National Council for

Childhood and Motherhood (NCCM) and the National Council for Women (NCW), which the

First Lady headed. The First Lady, Suzanne Mubarak, had the power to appoint one-third of the board of members of these organizations and to change them every three years (Tadros 2016).

These women’s apparatuses “relied on a combination of state funds and Western donor support”

(Tadros 2016, 15). They “marginalized the role of feminist groups in civil society and pursued state feminism at the service of the ruling regime and made possible through the support of foreign donors” (Tadros 2016, 84). The NCW reduced political empowerment “to a set of technical inputs involving training and networking” (Tadros 2016, 89). It did not attempt to empower women from opposition parties or those who actively challenged the NDP.

Due to the NCW’s reliance on foreign donors, “the monitoring mechanisms were upwardly rather than downwardly accountable” (Tadros 2016, 88). Foreign funding “played a critical role in enabling the NCW to make women’s empowerment a project compatible with the ruling authoritarian regime” (Tadros 2016, 90). These governments used the funding to create

“many concrete small projects that are not seen as threatening by most Arab regimes and are even welcomed by them as means to demonstrate their willingness to democratize and modernize” (Marina Ottaway 2004, 3). Women affiliated with the national women’s machineries tended to exert direct influence on the policy-making process more than any other feminist or

Islamist activists. However, the Islamists had populist influence on gender issues through their nationwide access to mosques, which became spaces for recruitment and mobilization. The

Muslim Sisters through their “access to people via mosques (in particular the women’s section of

the mosques), the welfare organizations and access to homes, created a constituency and mobilized them to support the Brotherhood” (Tadros 2011, 92).

Personal Status Law

During Anwar el-Sadat’s regime, the lack of independent women’s organizations put women’s issues under the control of the state. Anwar el-Sadat strengthened the influence of middle-class women aligned with the regime in the government and used them to justify his national and international agendas (Hatem 1992). He created women’s organizations supportive of the regime and expanded them at the advent of the UN decade for women in 1975 (Hatem

1992). To counter the Islamist challenge for state authority, First Lady Jihan el-Sadat started a campaign to reform the PSL.

These laws addressed issues related to marriage, divorce, and the custody of children.

While “all other Egyptian laws are civil laws- styled after French civil laws- the only law that is quite explicitly based on the Sharia is the PSL” (Karam 1997, 141). The 1970s witnessed heightened pressure by feminist organizations on Anwar el-Sadat’s government to reform PSL.

Eventually in 1979, after support from Jihan el-Sadat, the First Lady, presidential decree no. 44 issued a new PSL. Hatem (1992) suggests that “[P]olitically, the change of the law offered a way of undermining the power and legitimacy of Islamist groups among women” (242). Moreover, the state tried “to distinguish its social character from that of the Islamists and to begin the mobilization of a distinct internal and international base of support” (Hatem 1992, 242). It was a tool to set up “a secular anti-Islamist bloc (of men and women) in a new coalition with the state”

(Hatem 1992, 242). On the international level, the reformed PSL would help the regime garner economic and political support from the West, especially from the United States. The MB and

Al-Azhar, the main center of Sunni religious learning in Egypt, opposed the new law because in

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their view it contradicted Sharia. For instance, they opposed compelling a man to “notify his wife of divorce via court (rather than relying only on verbal proclamation of her being divorced) on grounds that it is not mandated in the Sharia” (Tadros 2014, 124). Another reform of the PSL occurred in 2000 under Hosni Mubarak’s regime. Like the reforms in the 70s, the reformed law faced opposition from the MB, the Wafd Party, Al-Azhar and various other entities. The PSL of

2000 granted women more rights, such as being able to unilaterally divorce their husband. The

Brothers, instead, argued that “a woman should only be allowed to pursue khul’ [divorce] with her husband’s permission” (Tadros 2014, 125). In accordance with the male MB’s argument, the

Sisters also believed that the PSL was problematic because it makes divorce “too easy” thus risking the sanctity of the family as the main unit of society (Gray 2012).

CEDAW

Hosni Mubarak’s government signed CEDAW in 1980 and ratified it in 1981 with reservations on Articles 2, 4, 9 (II), and 29 (II). The United Nations (UN) General Assembly adopted CEDAW in 1979, and it has been in effect since 1981 following the receipt of the required 20 ratifications. CEDAW is an international treaty that ensures women’s complete equality with men with no distinction, exclusion or restriction based on sex in political, civil, economic, social, and cultural fields (Al Agati 2012, 13). Egypt’s compliance with Article 2 was conditional on its compatibility with the Islamic Sharia (Tadros 2016). The Egyptian government had a reservation on Article 6 because the article committed Egypt “to equity rather than equality in accordance with Islamic tenets” (Tadros 2016, 123). In 2004, Egypt removed its reservations on Article 9. This article is concerned with “granting women the nationality of their children irrespective of the nationality of their spouses” (Tadros 2016, 123). Egypt’s reservations on

Article 29 stem from the fact it subjects Egypt to international mechanisms calling it to account

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for violation of CEDAW (Tadros 2016). Despite the Egyptians’ reservations on certain articles due to their contradictions with Sharia, Hosni Mubarak’s government faced sharp critiques for ratifying the treaty from Islamists and other entities in Egypt. The Muslim Sisters were one of the critics of the ratification. Hoda Abd el Moneim, a prominent Sister, one of the strongest voices against the ratification of CEDAW and reforms in PSL, supported the critiques of the ratification of CEDAW by arguing that they were a “manifestation of the negative impact of

Egyptian government bowing to Western pressure” (Tadros 2014, 145).

Quotas

In 2009, Egypt passed a women’s quota law, which Hosni Mubarak’s ruling party, the

NDP, initiated. The law guaranteed “64 reserved seats for women in the parliament to be elected in specified electoral districts” (Ben Shitrit 2016, 793). Ben Shitrit (2016) contends that regimes adopt quotas for various reasons extending “from the impact of international norms, pressures from donors, internal mobilization by women’s movements, the desire to appear modern and enhance democratic credentials, and often in the case of the Middle East and Africa, conflict with an Islamist opposition” (Ben Shitrit 2016, 793). The spread of quota laws in the Middle East and elsewhere since the mid-1990s is the main factor influencing the rates of women’s political representation (Dahlerup 2013; Kang 2009; Krook 2009; Tripp and Kang 2008; Ben Shitrit

2016). However, the utility of quotas for women’s meaningful participation is still highly debated.

The arguments addressing the advantage of quotas hold “that quotas, by bringing more women to the political sphere, promote the substantive representation of women’s interests”

(Ben Shitrit 2016, 782). They also hold that quotas have a symbolic effect by demonstrating

“that women are fit and able to govern and so contribute to countering women’s historical

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exclusion from politics” (Ben Shitrit 2016, 782). Ben Shitrit (2016) adds to the previous argument by emphasizing the symbolic effect of quotas in the Middle East context. She claims that “quotas, even in their most flawed form, in fact contribute to a transformation in attitudes toward women’s role in the political sphere” (Ben Shitrit 2016, 782). Ben Shitrit illustrates how even though Islamist parties criticize quota policies, “when they compete in electoral frameworks that stipulate a women’s quota, they not only nominate women as candidates, but also extensively labor to convince their supporters and potential voters that women are fit and able political leaders” (Ben Shitrit 2016, 782). Thus, quotas make Islamists change the discourse on women’s representation by reframing the inclusion of women. They do so by arguing that their own decisions to appoint women stem from Islamic principles that support women’s political participation rather than Western-imposed quotas (Shitrit 2016).

Various foreign and domestic entities criticized the 2009 quota system because they saw it as benefiting only women associated with the ruling NDP (Bradley 2010; Hill 2010; Topol

2010; Ben Shitrit 2016). The quota system was supposed to enhance all women’s opportunities for claiming political office. Yet its focus on individual candidates rather than party proportional lists was mainly beneficial for female candidates supported by the National Democratic Party.

Elections to Egypt's People’s Assembly during Hosni Mubarak’s role used a nationwide single- member district system in which two winners were chosen from each district. Fareeda el Naqash, feminist and head of the women’s committee in el Tagammu, argued that this “allows for individual use of finances, thuggery, and violence to garner personal support, whereas a party proportional list system would encourage the citizens not to vote for a person but for a political party program” (Tadros 2010, 94). In this sense, the quota became a useful instrument in the hands of the ruling party to create more seats in the parliament for the NDP and another site of

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contestation between the government and the Brotherhood. When the MB nominated 15 female candidates (ECWR 2010), the government undermined some of its candidates. For instance, the

Brotherhood claimed that security services in Assuit cut off power at the location where Wafaa

Mashhour, MB candidate for the women’s seat in Assiut in 2010 elections, was holding a conference that aimed at raising awareness of the roles of women’s participation in political life

(Ikhwanweb 2010). It is not surprising that in the election of 2010, the NDP won 95 percent of the seats and took 56 (out of 65) of the women’s quota seats. The independent female candidates got only 8 seats and one female candidate was appointed (ECWR 2010).

Even though the Egyptian state during the reigns of Hosni Mubarak and Anwar el-Sadat coopted gender issues and Islamists were resistant to various policies imposed by the state to address women’s issues, these policies resulted in an evolution in the Islamists’ discourse on women’s participation in political and social life in Egypt. They also created an opening for the

Sisters participation in the formal political medium and resulted in some Muslim Sisters, such as

Jihan al-Halafawi, running for office in 2000, 2005, and 2010. In the next section, I address the evolution of Islamist discourse on women’s political participation.

The Evolution of Islamists’ Position on Women’s Issues During Hosni Mubarak’s Rule

The evolution in Islamist thinking on women’s political participation happened due to

Islamists’ strategic adaptation to their environment, including electoral politics (Schwedler 2006;

Wickham 2013; Tadros 2016). This participation in electoral politics led to ideological and practical changes in the MB and other Islamist organizations (Ben Shitrit 2013; El-Ghobashy

2005; Langohr 2001; Schwedler 2011). The MB’s participation in electoral politics during periods of opening since the 1980s (under Hosni Mubarak) transformed the organization and its discourse on women (El-Ghobashy 2005; Ben Shitrit 2016). As I show later in this chapter, the

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participation of the MB in the political game as members of civil society during Anwar el-Sadat and Hosni Mubarak’s governments, as well as their strategic choice to cooperate with secular- liberal civil society groups, resulted in an ideological shift in the movement to a more moderate interpretation of women’s role in Islam.

Williams argues that “Whereas both religious and nationalist ideologies tend to pull the role of women inwards toward the private sphere, electoral politics would pull them outward and into the public sphere” (2013, 544). She adds that the democratic system (in the context of India) provides religious nationalist political parties “an electoral incentive to mobilize women as potential voters and try to win their votes, even as the ideological underpinnings of religious nationalism seek to constrain the role of women to the private sphere” (Williams 2013, 544).

Even though the Egyptian system is semi-authoritarian, Williams’ argument could be applied to the context of the MB and other Islamist movements. Islamists decided to include women as candidates for a variety of reasons, such as countering the competition from secular-liberal political parties (Talhami 1996; Jad 2011), increasing the support for Islamists during elections

(Abdellatif & Ottaway, 2007), and opposing the state’s repression (Talhami 1996; Bauer 2015).

Islamist parties in electoral authoritarian regimes “adapt to fend off state repression and maintain their organizational existence” (El-Ghobashy 2005, 391).

The MB responded to political opening and closure (impacting their participation in politics as well as the participation of women) during the regimes of Anwar el- Sadat and Hosni

Mubarak (see Chapter Two) by adjusting its ideology. The changes in the MB position on women’s issues were a result of an ideological shift among the younger generation in the 1980s.

This ideological change was possible due to the younger generation’s increased interaction with non-Islamists in associations of lawyers, doctors, and students, among others. As I mentioned

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earlier, the MB increased its control over these associations under Anwar el-Sadat’s government.

The younger generation lobbied for change “in the Brotherhood’s traditional positions on such issues as the legitimate scope of political and ideological pluralism and the rights of women and

Coptic Christians” (Wickham 2013, 68). Several middle-generation leaders, “criticized the

Brotherhood’s traditional views on women, including the idea that women’s participation in society should be limited to their roles as wives and mothers and that they should be confined to the home” (Wickham 2013,68). For them, these “’backward’ attitudes violated the egalitarian spirit of Islam and contravened the example set by the Prophet Muhammad, who had treated women with respect” (Wickham 2013, 68). Such activists relied on new interpretations of Islam advanced by theologians such as al-Qaradawi (Wickham 2013).

Efforts to reform the Brotherhood’s traditional discourse and practice resulted in the issuance in 1994 of the statement, “The Muslim Woman in Muslim Society and Shura and Party

Pluralism.” The statement marked a progression point in the Brotherhood’s discourse on women

(El-Ghobashy 2005; Wickham 2013). While emphasizing women’s important roles in the household, it endorsed their right to work, vote, and to run as candidates in legislative elections, but not run for a position as head of state (Wickham 2013, 69). This document may have been published as an initial step to the MB’s plan to field a female candidate during the 2000 elections

(Abdel-Latif & Ottaway 2007).

The 1994 document also emerged in a decade that witnessed the rise of Islamic feminism and related calls for the reinterpretation of Islam. The document engaged in a reinterpretation of some Quranic verses, such as Quranic verse 4:34. This verse specifies men’s qawamah, which describes the leadership role men play in the family and their responsibility for the protection and maintenance of women, in an attempt to justify the shift in their view on women. The 1994

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statement restricts qawamah to marital issues. The statement explains, “The boundaries of men’s qawamah over their wives is restricted to marital partnership only and it is a qawamah of sincerity and mercifulness and consultation in return for responsibilities born by the husband”

(Muslim Brotherhood 1994). This is progress from their earlier position in a fatwa of 1981, which holds that the principle of qawamah applies to both the domestic and the public spheres

(Tadros 2014). The 1994 statement tried to address traditional objections to granting women their political rights, especially the concern that women’s political roles would interfere with their familial duties. For example, the statement explained that because candidates in many elected position should be around forty, most women around that age have already completed the task of raising children.

These efforts continued in the issuance of an official statement in 2006 addressing women’s roles in politics and the workforce and the 2007 MB party platform. The 2006 statement dealt with the stance of the MB on the permissibility of work for women outside of the home. According to the statement:

These characteristics, duties, and rights which have been allocated to women by Allah are in balance with the duties she has towards her husband and her children. These duties must be given precedence over other responsibilities and they are necessary for the stability of the family which is the basic cell of the society and the cause for its cohesion, strength, and efficiency. However, the husband has a right to permit his wife to work. This right is to be regulated by an agreement between the husband and the wife. Such rights should not be regulated by law and the authorities should not interfere with them except in some rare cases (Muslim Brotherhood 2006).

Even though this statement is still problematic because it attempts to regulate women’s work and conditions it to the approval of the husband, it is a shift toward validating those women working

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outside the home, at a time when many middle class women associated with the MB and MS did not.

The party platform of 2007 addresses the question of women’s roles and right to work by framing the argument in terms of complementarity of roles. The 2007 platform acknowledges the importance of women in the workforce if it does not interfere with their “natural” roles as mothers. There should be a balance between both roles. Additionally, “the language used in both the official stances and the political thought of the Muslim Brotherhood scholars… indicates that women’s work is not regarded as a matter of personal choice and entitlement, rather emanating out of personal economic need or society’s need for female labour to cater for a female audience” (Tadros 2016, 144). The statement states:

The role of women in the family is founded on the premise that she holds the primary/ main responsibility for raising the new generation . . . consequently we believe in the importance of finding balance in the roles of women and reviving her role in the family and public life without imposing on her duties which conflict with her nature or with her role in the family. We believe that the roles that women [should] espouse are an outcome of a social consensus built on the Islamic civilizational terms of reference (marja‘iyya). (Muslim Brotherhood 2007, 103)

The statement still prohibited women from being head of state. It says:

For our part, we believe that the responsibilities required of the head of state, and these are responsibilities of wellaya (governance) and leadership of the army which are considered responsibilities that should not be imposed on women to shoulder because they conflict with her nature and her other social and human roles (2007, 103)

Some leaders challenged this position inside of the MB. As a result, a “debate within the

MB ensued, and a handful of politically renowned figures such as Gamal Heshmat, Abdel

Moneim Aboul Fotouh and Essam El Erian came out to say that they do believe a woman may

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lead” (Tadros 2014, 151). However, these moderates were sidelined and the position of the MB did not change on the issue from the 1994 statement.

Since Hasan al-Banna founded the MB, the movement has “transformed into a flexible political party that is highly responsive to the unforgiving calculus of electoral politics” (El-

Ghobashy 2005, 390). The case of the MB confirms the significant influence of the electoral process on the ideology of Islamist groups. This transformation happened due to the interaction of these parties with other parties, citizens, and the state to maximize their electoral victory (El-

Ghobashy 2005).

Talking about the inclusion of women without examining women’s involvement in the movement, including both their own strategies and their impact on ideological changes, could lead to the dismissal of women’s agency. As I show in Chapter Four, Islamist women’s participation in the electoral process and social work has shaped their perception of their agency and their role in the movement and political life. Changes in the political context during Hosni

Mubarak’s government increased and influenced Islamist women’s participation and their methods of organizing. The quota system Hosni Mubarak put in place and the increased activities of MB members in syndicates (civil society) with other ideological groups shaped the role the MS play in the movement. For example, the Sisters’ participation in political elections and voter mobilization on behalf of the MB during that period allowed them to start demanding higher participation in the activities of the movement (Biagini 2017). Hosni Mubarak’s repression of the MB and the threat to their survival triggered a pause of the gender structure usually in place in the Islamist movement (Shitrit, 2016). This allowed “women to expand their influence and leadership in areas from which they had traditionally been excluded” (Biagini

2017, 40). The 1994 statement increased the Sisters’ political participation. It resulted in the

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candidacies of Jihan al-Halafawi in the 2000 election and Dr. Makarem al-Diri in the 2005 election. The MB intended to field between 14 to 21 women on their party list in 2005 (Farag

2013). However, due to the restrictions imposed by security officials on MB candidates, and the opposition from the female candidates’ family members, the MB reduced the number of their candidates to just one woman who was to run in Cairo (Abdel-Latif 2008). This is a testament to the difficulty the MB faced in promoting female candidates and creating a culture among their more conservative followers to accept women in political roles. Both candidates, al-Halafawi and al-Diri, lost the parliamentary elections. The MB claimed that this loss was due to fraudulent elections. The Brotherhood followed the 1994 statement with another statement dealing with women’s rights and political participation in 2006 and the draft of the MB political platform in

2007, which speaks to women’s roles in politics and the workforce. More women ran for office in 2010, “when the MB attempted to make use of the female quota system in existence at that time in order to boost its numbers in Parliament” (Biagini 2017, 42).

Moreover, electoral politics combined with international obligations were reasons why the MB attempted to include women as candidates. The inclusion of women came as a response to multiple attempts of the Hosni Mubarak regime to coopt women’s issues and make instrumental use of women’s groups to portray Egypt as a modern promoter of women’s rights and to highlight the Islamists as backward. To counter the image (portrayed by Hosni Mubarak) of the Brotherhood as extremists and to reassure the US and other Western powers, the MB and its political wing focused on recruiting women to run on their party list and even provided political training for the Sisters to help them run for office. For example, after the introduction of the quota law, the MB, despite being an aggressive critic of the quota, assigned 13 women out of

130 candidates to compete for the 14 percent reserved seats for women in the 2010 elections

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(Shitrit 2016, 795).

To justify the decision to include women on their party list, “MB publications began to devote significant attention to religious justifications of women’s representation” (Shitrit 2016,

795). For example, Dr. Abd al-Rahman al-Bir, a deputy in the society’s Guidance Bureau, declared his disapproval of the arguments against women’s running for parliamentary elections because being a parliamentarian is not equivalent to holding the highest executive position.

Finally, he stated that “since MB women candidates compete against secular women who are in consort with foreign currents that want to corrupt Muslim societies by corrupting women” religious voters should support MB women (Ikhwan Online 2010). The strategic decision to accommodate the quota system and use it to the MB’s advantage required the MB to start shaping public ideology and perceptions of women’s roles in politics and thus shape the position of their members.

However, these changes did not result in the expansion of women’s roles within the structure of the Brotherhood. The adaptation was happening on the electoral level and not in the internal hierarchy of the MB. As I show later in this chapter, the changes to accommodate more women in leadership positions at the internal level only happened after the military coup in 2013 due to the unprecedented backlash against the MB and the experiences some of the Muslim

Sisters had during the political opening.

Women’s Issues and Islam During Mohammad Morsi’s Era

An alliance between the military and the MB marked the period when Mohammed Morsi was briefly in power. During the January 25 uprisings, the MB emerged as the only established alternative to the military regime with a set agenda, financial resources, and widespread support due to their years of activism and social services. This opened the formal and informal political

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mediums for the MB and resulted in the establishment of the Freedom and Justice Party (FJP).

The party had “close to nine thousand founding members, of whom approximately 80% were affiliated with the Brotherhood” (Wickham 2013, 174). About a thousand of these founding members were women (Wickham 2013). Interviews of voters conducted by Wickham and others showed that the MB’s social service projects in poor areas played a key role in voters’ support of their political party. The Sisters’ social activism and charity work were important factors in increasing the support base for the MB. In one of the interviews, a 48-year-old mother of five told Wickham (2013), “One of the biggest costs for a mother is afterschool lessons. The public schools are very bad, and the only hope for our children is in private lessons, which are extremely expensive. No one can afford them without being a millionaire. God bless the

Brotherhood for helping us with these, and for providing our children with better futures” (251).

In the 2012 election,3 secular parties like the Wafd and other parties formed after the uprisings captured only about 20 percent of the seats in parliament (Wickham 2013). Only nine women won seats due to the elimination of the women’s quota called for by the MB, select liberal entities, and youth coalitions. Four out of the nine were from the Wafd Party, and one from the Reform and Development Party and the other four were from the FJP (Tadros 2016).

These FJP women were middle-aged, highly educated women who were related to key MB figures. The Supreme Council of Armed Forces (SCAF) appointed three additional women. This increased the number of women to 12 bringing the percentage of seats occupied by women to

3 Under Egypt’s electoral system before the uprisings, seats were contested by a two-round system in two-member districts, and 10 were appointed by the president. However, after the uprisings the system became more complex. During the first elections after the uprisings, “two-thirds of the 498 lower house seats were picked by proportional representation, using lists drawn up by parties or alliances. Each list was required to include at least one woman candidate and adopt a specific symbol to help the illiterate. Seats were allocated proportionally based on a party’s showing in each of 46 districts. The remaining third, or 166 seats, in the lower house were open to individuals, who may or may not have party affiliations, two from each of 83 districts.” (see https://www.reuters.com/article/us- egypt-election-system/qa-how-does-egypts-parliamentary-election-system-work-idUSTRE7AR0VE20111128)

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2.3% in total (Wickham 2013). A requirement in the Constitutional Declaration of March 2011 required political parties to include at least one woman on their list. This requirement replaced the quota law. Most parties relegated women candidates to the bottom of their list, making their elections less likely (Wickham 2013, Tadros 2016). The MB challenged the quota law for women because there was no quota for Copts or for youth, which, they argued, contradicted the emphasis in the constitution on equality for all citizens (Tadros 2016).

The post-uprisings period provides a good opportunity to test the argument and excuses made by MB members that the political repression of Hosni Mubarak’s government prevented them from including qualified women in leadership positions and in the structure of the MB. As

Tadros (2014) notes, “In the absence of a political pretext to absolve the Brotherhood of their responsibility towards activist women, their real commitment to women assuming political leadership would be tested” (Tadros 2014, 131). As a result, the MB faced pressure to nominate women in the post-uprisings parliamentary elections and grant them greater visibility in the public sphere (Tadros 2016). The post-uprisings period until the military coup (7/3/2013) shows an increase in political activities by the Muslim Sisters, “but no openings in formal leadership positions (either in the Shura Council or the Supreme Guide or even on a lower administrative level of the mainstream movement)” (Tadros 2014, 131). Many members of the MB and the MS, especially after the uprisings, believe women are important for the movement’s success; however, they still emphasize the importance of women’s role in the family. For example, Dina

Zakaria stated, “…and all men confessed, it happened in Raba’a, that most of the men on the stage […] said that we realize that [… the] Egyptian woman is […stronger] than men and now

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we believe that [she] proved that […she is] not only partners in the revolution, but […is a leader] of the situation” (Interview 01/13/2017).4

Despite the lower percentage of women in the parliament compared to 2010, conversations regarding women’s role in the MB and FJP became prominent. For instance, at a meeting for the MB in 2011, the issue of the structure of the MS was raised. Additionally, on

July 2, 2011, the MS held a conference titled “Women from the Revolution to Renaissance.” The conference addressed the new role of women within the FJP and the future political climate.

Among the attendees were the Supreme Guide, Bad’i, Khayrat al Shatter, the Deputy Guide, members of the Guidance Bureau, and about 2,500 Sisters. Bad’i declared in the conference, “No one can deny women’s role in the success of the revolution whether with their participation or supporting their husbands and sons” (Daily News Egypt 2011). He added, “The role of women in this critical moment is as important as their role in supporting the revolution” (Daily News Egypt

2011). Al-Shater referred to what he saw as previous obstacles for women under Hosni Mubarak.

He stated, “In the past, we wanted to protect women from security crackdowns so we distanced them from leadership positions, but now, there will be no barriers to women’s participation in political life except religious ones” (Daily News Egypt 2011). Moreover, Al- Shater referenced culture as an obstacle to women’s political participation. Even though this conference did not offer any major structural change in relation to expanding women’s roles in the MB’s internal structure, it shed light on the centrality of women and their issues in the political discourse after the uprisings inside of the MB in particular and Egyptian society in general. It also marks a point when female members of the MB started to publicly express their desire for a greater recognition of their leadership. Dr. Makarem al-Diri, the MB's candidate in the 2005 parliament, stressed

4 Interview conducted by author in English, Istanbul, 2017. 114

during the conference the importance of promoting women at the political, religious, and social levels as well as activating their role in public work (Al-Sharif 2011).

After the Egyptian uprisings, the Muslim Sisters utilized the political opening to increase their participation in Egyptian social, political, and economic life. As I discuss in more detail in

Chapter Four, the opening gave the Muslim Sisters more spaces for political participation and assumption of leadership roles in the formal medium as members of the FJP. Women helped found the party. They served on various committees and were assigned several political positions in the government. As Tadros notes, “The political party [the FJP] in effect opened opportunities that were blocked within the internal party structure” (Tadros 2016, 172). During this period of opening, which allowed the Muslim Sisters to engage in formal political spaces, they played a key role in transforming the social base of the MB into a political constituency (Tadros 2016).

With the opening of political space between February 2011 and June 2013, the Sisters’ political engagement expanded even further, both through public activism and within the MB structure.

Sisters served in the FJP’s secretariats across Egypt on women’s political awareness and media relations committees, and began to achieve some more notable leadership positions. For example, after the presidential elections in June 2012, Omayma Kamel was appointed a member of the Constituent Assembly delegated with the responsibility of drawing up the constitution and was also a presidential aide to Mohammad Morsi. Moreover, Dina Zakaria was appointed as the spokeswoman for the FJP. As of 2012, the MB allowed women to be elected as heads of their regional women committees. These committees communicated directly with the Guidance

Bureau, positions held previously by men exclusively. However, women held no senior positions in the FJP or the MB, and Sabah Al-Sakkari, a member of the party’s secretariat who ran for its chairmanship in 2012, failed to obtain the required number of signatures to run in elections.

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Constitutions

In the post-uprisings period, Egypt had two constitutions within 13 months, the 2012 and

2014 constitutions. The first one was supported by Mohammad Morsi and was approved in

December 2012 and lasted as long as Mohammad Morsi’s tenure (Aljazeera 2014). During the drafting of the 2012 constitution, debates over women’s rights became prominent among various political factions and civil society organizations. Political power-sharing deals between Islamist and non-Islamist factions influenced the debates on women’s rights in the constitution. These debates also became catalysts for the collective mobilization of civil society groups against the regime. Women’s rights issues prompted various groups to try to influence the drafting of the constitution.

Since the beginning of the formulation of the Constituent Assembly and until the drafting of the constitution, several initiatives and organizations presented proposals concerning “the participation of women in drafting the constitution, taking gender into account in drafting the constitution, and the rights of women that should be stipulated in the constitution” (Al Agati

2012, 4). A group of Egyptian feminist coalitions presented these initiatives. They are entitled:

"the Feminist Coalition of NGOs Document, Document of Equality in Rights and Liberties, the

Document of the Egyptian Woman and the Revolution Constitution, in addition to a paper from the Women and the Constitution working group" (Al Agati 2012, 17). The coalitions were composed of feminist organizations, the Egyptian Feminist Union, the Women and Memory

Working Group, the Center for Egyptian Women's Legal Assistance (CEWLA) (Al Agati 2012,

18). The documents include “the Al-Azhar Document, the Egyptian National Council, the

National Accord Statement, the Al Bradei and Hisham Al Bastawisi Documents, and the

Democratic Coalition Document to address the demands of Egyptian women in the new

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constitution” (Al Agati 2012, 18). The Feminist Coalition’s initiative focused on several international agreements they argued should be considered while drafting the constitution. The initiatives of the Feminist Coalition and the ‘Women and the Constitution’ “stipulate the respect for civil, political, social, economic, cultural, and environmental rights referred to in human rights charters” (Al Agati 2012, 18). This also relied on “the commitment of the state to all treaties related to women's rights and regarding the banning of promulgation of national legislation that violates the terms and conditions of these international agreements and charters”

(Al Agati 2012, 18).

The Feminist Coalition also called for the Constituent Assembly to guarantee the presence of “female, feminist, and human rights representatives in the assembly to ensure a women's rights vision in the Egyptian constitution” (Al Agati 2012, 21). It was historically unprecedented for women to participate in the drafting of an Egyptian constitution; in 2012 only eight out of the hundred Constituent Assembly members were women. They were 1) Iman

Qandil, Assistant Secretary General of Al Wasat Party and the head of the Women's Secretariat in the Party; 2) Shahira Halim Dous, a member of Al Wafd Party; 3) Suad Kamel Rezq, Dean of the Faculty of Administration and Information Systems in the French University in Cairo; 4)

Manal Mamdouh El-Tiby, a representative of Al Noba region; 5) Amani Abul-Fadl, an MB leader; 6) Omaima Kamel Abdel-Hai Al Salamoni, a professor of public health and Social

Medicine and Presidential Advisor on the Affairs of Women, who was also one of the leaders of the FJP; 7) Manal Mohammed El-Shorbagi, a professor of political science at The American

University in Cairo; 8) Huda Mohammed Anwar, a physician, and member of the MB (Al Agati

2012, 31-2). Manal El-Tiby, Shahira Halim Dous, and Suad Rezq resigned from the Constituent

Assembly, bringing the number of women to five, four of which were affiliated with the FJP. El-

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Tiby “objected to the Chapter of Rights and Liberties” (Al Agati 2012, 32). Dous “objected to the method of management of the assembly” (Al Agati 2012, 32). Rezq “resigned again after returning at the end of the assembly’s work due to dissatisfaction with the product itself” (Al

Agati 2012, 32).

The efforts of secular women’s rights activists to include women’s issues and influence the draft of the constitution were shut down for various reasons. For instance, when women’s rights activists asked that the constitution should include a minimum age for marriage, the women affiliated with the FJP on the Constituent Assembly rejected their proposal claiming that marriage age is a matter that is best considered in legislation rather than in the constitution

(Tadros 2016). The low number of non-Islamists in the Constituent Assembly and other committees as well as the lack of Sisters who were willing to listen to the demands of women’s rights activists influenced the likelihood of incorporating these demands in the drafting of the constitution. Despite the initiatives presented by secular women’s rights activists to the

Constituent Assembly, there are no articles in the constitution that specifically address or mention women’s rights and commitment to international agreements. In addition, the 2012 constitution stipulated the concept of equality between women and men, but it did not address the types of discrimination women face based on gender (Al Agati 2012, 39). There is also no reference to “direct or indirect protection mechanisms for women to address sex-based discrimination as a whole through, for example, criminalization or establishment of oversight agencies” (Al Agati 2012, 39).

The articles in the final draft constitution that dealt with women’s issues and status are

Article 33, which affirmed the equality of all citizens before the law; Article 73, which addressed the protection of women from exploitation, violence, and trafficking; Article 10, which

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emphasized the centrality of the Egyptian family, guaranteed maternal and child services free of charge and guaranteed the reconciliation between the duties of a woman toward her family and her work as well as the protection of divorced women and widows; and Article 6, which prohibited the creation of a political party that discriminates between citizens on the basis of gender, origin or religion.

There was a big debate over Article 68 from an initial draft of the constitution, which stipulated that “the state is committed to taking all measures to establish equality between men and women in political, cultural, economic, and social life and all other fields as long as it does not violate the provisions of the Sharia.” The Islamists argued that the inclusion of the Sharia in the article was “to acknowledge that in matters such as inheritance and divorce, equality between men and women is not absolute” (Tadros 2016, 215). However, the non-Islamist groups argued that the addition of Sharia to the original article in the 1971 constitution was to deny “women all kinds of rights, including those associated with leadership, under the pretext that women cannot rule over men according to some Islamic interpretation” (Tadros 2016, 216). The clause was eventually removed from the constitution to appease the Salafists who thought the article gives women too many personal freedoms and fails to protect traditional social mores, as defined by the Salafists, as well as to soften “the fears of women’s rights activists” (Tadros 2016, 216).

Even though the 2012 constitution addressed women’s issues in certain areas similarly to previous constitutions, various international entities critiqued it for its violations of women’s rights (McLarney 2013). For instance, “reports by Time, NPR, Amnesty International, Human

Rights Watch, the Wilson Center, and the United Nations questioned the compatibility of the

Islamist government with women’s rights” (McLarney 2013). Article 10 was critiqued for being

“an Islamist bid to relegate women to the home and force them to be mothers” (McLarney 2013).

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Yet, Article 10’s protection of the family is like the 1956 Constitution (Article 18) and the 1971 constitution (Article 10). Both Article 10 from the 2012 constitution and Article 8 from the 1956 constitution are derived from Articles 16 and 25 from the Universal Declaration of Human

Rights (UDHR), which was agreed upon before the Free Officers’ Revolution in 1952

(McLarney 2013). For instance, Article 16 of the UDHR asks for the protection of the family, as a “natural and fundamental group unit of society.”

These debates on women’s rights and its compatibility with Sharia in the formal medium resulted in the attempts by members of the MS and MB in the government to explain their positions on women’s rights and women’s issues in a way that allowed them to negotiate with the concerned secular-liberal factions within civil society and government as well as with

Islamists holding more conservative views on women’s issues, such as the Salafists. They also tried to frame women’s rights in a way that avoided labeling their political party as against women’s rights in the international arena.

Neoliberalism and International Treaties

Another factor that shaped Mohammad Morsi’s government and the MB’s view on women’s rights was their commitment to privatization and structural adjustment policies. These policies forced Mohammad Morsi’s government to attempt to comply with international treaties and the peace treaty with Israel as it “sought out bigger and better agreements with the IMF (a

$4.8 billion loan proposed in November 2012)” (McLarney 2013). The FJP’s Nahda

[Renaissance] Project, Mohammad Morsi’s electoral program, addressed the government’s views on neoliberal expansion in a section on “Transforming into a Developmental Economy.” As in the 1980s and 1990s, women’s participation in the workforce was important for the success of this neoliberal vision. The Nahda Project relied on neoliberal economic prescriptions for

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women’s equality with men by emphasizing their complementary role in the labor force and the importance of “finding a gendered balance between work in the family and outside the family, in the household economy and in ‘private enterprise,’ in private and in public” (McLarney 2013).

The project called for “supporting and empowering the Egyptian woman and facilitating (ifsah) the path to her social and political participation in the priorities of national work and development, growing from our belief that women are equal to men in position and status, commensurate in work and importance.” It also asserted, “we strive toward empowering the

Egyptian woman in practice and not just in words, and toward eliminating the obstacles that block her from fruitful participation in all domains of life, particularly those domains that help women to realize a balance between her contributions to home and family and to society.”

Similar to Hosni Mubarak’s government, the MB attempted to control gender issues by creating state institutions responsible for addressing women’s rights. The MB did so by creating

“a select corps of women whose agenda was congruent with that of the Muslim Brotherhood, even if they were not organizationally part of the movement” (Tadros 2016, 226). They also co-opted the Center for Sociological and Criminological Studies, “one of the institutions close to the state so that it would be compliant with the Brotherhood’s political agenda on gender matters” (Tadros 2016, 226). Various factions of Egyptian society, after the uprisings, attacked the national women’s machinery, specifically the National Council for Women (NCW), due to its close ties to the old regime. These secular liberal factions viewed this machinery as a symbol of the corruption of the regime, and the MB and other Islamists viewed it as a “symbol of the regime’s import of Western imperialist values to ruin Egyptian Muslim families” (Tadros 2016,

183). Camillia Helmy, a member of the FJP, supported the NCW’s demolition because it contributed to the corruption of the Egyptian family and society. She viewed the NCW as a

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foreign entity that supported laws dismantling the family and increasing divorce rates (el Agouz

2012). The FJP replaced the NCW with the National Council for Family Affairs, which framed women’s rights in terms of “protecting motherhood” and “supporting the family” (Tadros 2016,

183). However, the military junta announced it was re-establishing the NCW in 2012, one year after it was dissolved. The Secretariat of NCW stated that this decision was a strong message and response to claims raised abroad that the Egyptian uprisings have led to the marginalization of the role of women (Make Every Woman Count 2012).

A state of controversy surrounded the “agreed conclusions” on the elimination of all forms of violence against women and girls issued by the United Nations at the 57th session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW), which the UN held on March 2013. These conclusions restated principles emphasized in CEDAW and strengthened the zero-tolerance policy toward gender-based violence in the home and in public. The MB, Salafists, and the

Building and Development Party, an Islamist party, denounced the document as contradicting

Islam because it addresses issues such as abortion, contraceptives, and gay rights (ECWR 2013,

14). Hisham al-Nagar from the Building and Development Party “said that the document includes items that would seriously dismantle the structure of the Egyptian family and tear its fabric” (ECWR 2013, 14). Additionally, Major General Adel Afifi, a member of the Human

Rights committee in the Shura Council considered the document as “Apostasy in Islam.”

Salafists described the document as “corrupt” (ECWR 2013, 14). Mohammad Morsi delegated to

El Sharkawy the task of delivering the official speech to the UN, where she relied on “cultural specificity” arguments to justify Egypt’s reservations on the agreed conclusions. El Sharkawy argued balancing “between the values shared by humanity, and the cultural and social particularities of countries and peoples” (Tolmany 2013) challenges gender-based violence. Soon

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after the CSW session, Mohammad Morsi announced a new initiative at a conference in the presidential palace dedicated to improving the status of Egyptian women according to this position. The Center for Sociological and Criminological Studies would lead the initiative and not NCW. This step undermined the NCW as the key national institution for addressing women’s issues in Egypt (Tadros 2016, 226).

Thus, the MB’s relationship with Egyptian women was complicated, and their commitment to women’s rights were challenged further when youth groups started protesting both the military and the MB. The state-owned and affiliated broadcast media and press began a vilification campaign against the youth and women who were protesting Mohammad Morsi’s government. Islamists questioned the morality of women protestors. Women activists who participated in street protests against Morsi faced high rates of sexual harassment during those days. Nazra for Feminist Studies, a group that aims to build an Egyptian feminist movement, estimated that there were 101 incidents of sexual assault in the protest spaces between June 28 and July 3, 2013 (Nazra for Feminist Studies 2013).

Women’s Issues and Islam After Mohammad Morsi’s Era

After ousting Mohammad Morsi, on July 3, 2013, a Constitutional Declaration was issued which tasked a 10-member committee, composed of six top judges and four constitutional law professors, with amending the 2012 Constitution (Sabry 2013). The committee lacked female judges or experts (ECWR 2013, 5). After the 10-member committee finished its task, the

Interim President, Judge Adly Mansour, announced the formation of the 50-member committee for the amendment of the constitution on September 2013. The committee’s main task was to revise the disputed articles of the 2012 constitution and draft new ones. They were also tasked with liaising with the 10-member Committee, which drafted the initial amendment suggestions.

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Amr Moussa, the former Secretary-General of the Arab League, headed the 50-member committee and the committee’s speaker was Mohamed Salmawy. This committee had only 10 percent women (ECWR 2013). The women who participated in this committee as main members were Abla Mohieldin, an adviser at the Ministry of Industry, Mervat Tallawy as representative of

NCW, Azza Ashmawi as representative of the NCCM, Mona Zol-Faqar as representative for the

National Council for Human Rights, and Hoda el-Sadda, a feminist activist and a professor of

English and Comparative Literature at Cairo University (ECWR 2013). There were other women who participated as auxiliary members. They are Nihad Abol-Qomsan, Nihad Abol-Qomsan,

Mohga Ghalib Abdul Rahman, Maha Abu Bakr, Amena Nosseir, Leila Takla, and Safaa Zaki

Murad. These committees did not include women revolutionary leaders, farmers, or workers. It also did not include women of Islamist orientation (Tadros 2016). The Constitution of 2014 was passed in a referendum in January 2014.

The 2014 constitution is similar in some ways to the 2012 constitution in that they both were based on the 1971 constitution. Even though these constitutions are similar in various ways, they differ in others. The 2014 constitution addressed women’s rights and human rights in more depth than the previous two constitutions (1971 and 2012). These issues were addressed in articles 6, 11,180, 19, 53, 9, 89, 25, 80, 93 (ECWR 2013). The 2014 constitution, for the first time, prohibits “sex trafficking and other forms of human trafficking.” Both the 1971 and 2012 constitutions state that “the principles of Sharia are the principal source of legislation.” The 2014 charter, however, eliminates an article which sought to define the principals of Sharia, “language which many feared would be used to impose a specific vision of Islamic law” (Aljazeera 2014).

Even though conservatives could use this article to undermine the idea of unqualified rights, a large segment of the Constituent Assembly would have resisted the removal of Sharia as the

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principal source of legislation. Additionally, to satisfy the Salafists, “the preamble stated that it will be up to the Supreme Constitutional Court to determine the interpretation of the Sharia”

(Tadros 2016, 261).

The 2012 constitution called women “the sisters of men.” The 2014 constitution emphasized the equality between women and men. This constitution allowed women to pass their nationality to their children. It specifically addressed the state’s obligation “to eliminate any kind of discrimination against women and guarantee proper representation of women in the

Parliament” (ECWR 2013, 8). It gave women the right to hold public office and be appointed in the judiciary. It implemented 25 percent quotas for women in local councils (ECWR 2013). It declared the state’s commitment to the elimination of all kinds of discrimination against women, and even established a commission for confronting this discrimination (ECWR 2013, 8). More importantly, it emphasized the state’s commitment to all human rights agreements signed by it.

This is instrumental for women’s rights in view of Egypt’s ratification of the CEDAW (Tadros

2016). Even though the constitution acknowledges women’s rights to be judges, Egypt’s state council refused, without any explanation, to appoint women as judges (ECWR 2014). However, in 2015, 26 female judges were appointed in several primary courts. This is a result of civil society groups’ efforts in calling for women’s right to be judges (ECWR 2015). Additionally, by

2015 the number of women in the parliament was 89 (14.9%); 75 were elected and 14 appointed out of a total of 596. This makes the representation of women in the 2015 Egyptian Parliament the highest in Egyptian history.

Despite these progressive articles and Abdel Fatah el-Sisi’s emphasis in his first speech on the importance of Egyptian women in the executive authority, the new cabinet included only four women ministers out of 34 Ministries (ECWR 2014). Three of these female ministers were

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already part of the cabinet prior to Abdel Fatah el-Sisi’s inauguration. The only newly appointed woman was Naglaa Al Ahwani, Minister of International Cooperation (ECWR 2014). Many activists opposed the constitution “for empowering the army and others were disappointed that there was no mention of a quota for women in parliamentary elections” (Pratt 2015). To garner women’s support and to secure his own power, Abdel Fatah el-Sisi enacted a temporary quota law for the 2015 parliamentary elections, Law n.46. According to the law, “there are currently two 45-seat closed lists proportional to the population density of the district, and two 15-seat closed lists on the national level” (Shalaby 2016, 181). The law stipulated that “female MPs should occupy a minimum of 21 seats of the 45-seat closed list and a minimum of seven seats in the 15-seat lists” (Shalaby 2016, 181). This secured women a minimum of 56 seats out of the

120 closed-list seats on top of those candidates directly elected (Shalaby 2016). Additionally, on

December 2014, Abdel Fatah el-Sisi declared women would be assigned 14 of the 27 seats directly appointed by the president. This secured women a total of 70 (12 percent) seats in the

House of Representatives in addition to the seats they won in the direct elections (Shalaby 2016).

Even though Abdel Fatah el-Sisi’s government said that the situation for women would be better under his government than it was under Mohammad Morsi, violence against women and girls by actors such as the security forces and family members has been prevalent in Egypt under his regime (Amnesty International 2015). The initiatives implemented by the current government to address the issue have been tokenistic to show the government’s support for women’s issues without providing substantial solutions to the issue. Their initiatives “have lacked the mandate, staff or resources to get the job done” (Amnesty International 2015, 12). The military-run state has also participated in incidents of violence against female protestors who supported Mohammad Morsi and others who opposed the military rule such as revolutionaries,

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politicians and human rights groups (Pratt 2015). In November 2013, the government passed a law banning public protests. Following the law, the security forces arrested various non-Islamist activists, “including high profile revolutionary figures, such as Alaa Abdel-Fattah, Ahmed

Maher, Ahmed Douma and Mahinoor Masry, as well as other women activists such as Yara

Sallam and Sana Seif” (Pratt 2015). Security forces also targeted Islamist women. Incidents of violence against female protestors during the violent dispersals of Mohammad Morsi’s supporters by security forces were reported (Amnesty International 2015, 54). Women arrested by the state were subject to violence in the form of beatings, harassment and sexual assaults

(Amnesty International 2015).

The president of the NCW, Mervat Tellawi, supported the violent dispersals of pro-

Mohamad Morsi sit-ins. She stripped his women supporters of their agency by implying that the

MB used women as “human shields.” According to Amnesty International, this “casts a shadow on the institution’s defense of all women’s rights to freedom of expression and assembly, regardless of their political affiliations” (2015, 20). Tellawi, who oversaw the drafting of a repressive NGO law during her tenure as Minister of Social Affairs under Hosni Mubarak, has been appointed as the spokeswoman for women’s issues after the military coup. Ironically, the

NSW is developing a national strategy for addressing violence against women. Also ironic is the fact UN Women funds this initiative (Amnesty International). Women’s rights organizations such as Nazra for Feminist Studies criticized the initiative for its lack of transparency and inclusivity (Nazra 2014).

Abdel Fatah el-Sisi’s government has cracked down on independent NGOs. The government passed in 2014 a law necessitating that all civil society organizations register with the Ministry of Social Solidarity and Justice (Pratt 2015, Amnesty International 2015). Abdel

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Fatah el-Sisi also amended the Penal Code so individuals receiving funding from a foreign country to harm national interests would be sentenced to life in prison and a fine no less than half a million Egyptian pounds (Pratt 2015). This law mostly affects human rights and women rights organizations addressing taboo issues. They were accused of “tarnishing Egypt’s reputation” because they shed light on the government’s rights violations and rely on funding from abroad to sustain their activities (Pratt 2015).

Some feminists, such as Professor Mervat Hatem, have pointed out that the military coup and Abdel Fatah el-Sisi’s gender policies restored the old configuration of state control over gender politics. As Hatem (2013) argues, Abdel Fatah el-Sisi returned to “classic, Mubarak-style tokenism” by appointing women aligned with his party (11). This top-down approach to gender issues coopted the NCW and undermined any chance of its independence. Abdel Fatah el-Sisi’s policies deemed women who support his regime as worthy of the state’s protection. Yet, “the

Islamist and secular women activists arrested for protesting against Abdel Fatah el-Sisi’s regime are subjected to numerous rights violations including sexual violence at the hands of security officers and police” (Pratt 2015). The gender policies and state machineries did not extend to

Islamist women, especially members of the MB and FJP. These women were excluded from the drafting of the constitution. They were also arrested and killed (to a lesser degree than men) while demonstrating against the coup. The visibility of the Sisters as activists in public political life has made them targets of the state. Many secular women supported the ousting of

Mohammad Morsi (Hatem 2013). This “contributed to the return of the Mubarak-era discourse pitting secularists who claim to be liberal but in fact support military rule against Islamists”

(Hatem 2013,11).

Since the military coup, there is a backlash against the Muslim Sisters and the MB. Abdel

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Fatah el-Sisi’s government designated them as a terrorist group and completely blocked their participation in the formal political medium. However, the MS is taking on more leadership roles in the movement as they “attempt to rescue its members from regime repression, while guaranteeing the survival of the MB” (Biagini 2017, 38). They are utilizing their organizing experience to promote their cause in Egypt and in exile. After the coup, the Muslim Sisters played an important role in the Rabia al- Adawiyaa mosque and al-Nahda Square sit-ins and their dispersals. Women showed up in large numbers with their families. They talked to international media outlets about their demands. They also stood in the front lines between male protestors and security forces; thus they were the first victims of killing in the clashes. As stated earlier, secular commentators condemned the killings without condemning the security forces and Abdel

Fatah el-Sisi. Instead, they blamed the MB for using women as shields. The NWC also blamed the MB for the killing of Islamist women. These arguments were aiming to delegitimize and sideline the activism of the Sisters as well as portray them as followers of the MB rather than independent agents.

The Muslim Sisters participated in these sit-ins against the instructions of the MB. They made an active choice to be present in the demonstration spaces and make their voices heard. For instance, as Dina Zakaria, previously the spokeswoman for FJP, explained, “[When] the military coup […] took place, […] everyone […made] a decision. What shall they do? So, women at that time took the decision that they are part of everything. No one can tell them to stay at home because they are under threat. We were insisting on participating…[They] took the decision by

[themselves] that [they] will get down to the street to call for [their] rights” (Interview 01/13/

2017).5

5 Interview conducted by author in English, Istanbul, 2017. 129

The imprisonment of more than 50,000 members of the MB, including its senior leadership, gave more room for the Sisters’ engagement in the organization. They have emerged as some of the main leaders in the struggle between the MB and the military government. In exile, some of the MS are active in promoting their cause abroad and have founded and worked in various organizations such as Human Rights Monitor, Insan, and Women Against the Military

Coup. As I will show in the next chapter, women were not only responding to the structure and decisions made by male members of the MB, they were also actively engaged and carved a space for themselves in the movement. In this sense, according to Biagini (2017), the backlash against the MB and the MS in the formal medium opened the space for women “to increase their leadership and influence in the movement as a whole, including the Guidance Bureau” (40).

However, this is not the full story; the political engagement of the MS during the political opening in 2011 and 2012 gave the Sisters more experience in political and social organizing.

These experiences, as I show in the next chapter, formed their response to the coup.

Additionally, their visibility in the formal medium made them targets (to a lesser degree than men) of the state and thus made it hard for the MB leaders to simply ignore the women’s demands and ask them to go back to their homes.

Conclusion

Women’s issues have been at the center of the cooperation and contestation between

Islamists and secular-liberal parties and civil society groups. The national context, which is influenced by the conflict between Islamists and non-Islamists, and the international context shaped the position of these players on women’s issues. Anwar el-Sadat and Hosni Mubarak’s attempts to appease the international community and portray a secular image of their regimes resulted in the ratification of multiple international agreements such as CEDAW, reforming the

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PSL, as well as resulted in the passage of a quota law in 2009 and the cooptation of women’s rights by the state. The cooptation came also as an attempt to neutralize the influence of the

Islamists, who were gaining moral authority and shaping the discourse on morality in Egyptian society by gaining the support of secular-liberal groups. Despite this cooptation of women’s issues and Islamists’ rejections of various policies related to women imposed by the state, these policies resulted in an evolution in the Islamists’ discourse on women’s participation in politics in Egypt. It also created an opening for the Sisters participation in the formal political medium and resulted in some Muslim Sisters running for office in 2000, 2005, and 2010.

The participation of the MB in the political game as members of civil society during

Anwar el-Sadat and Hosni Mubarak’s governments, as well as their strategic choice to cooperate with secular-liberal civil society groups, resulted in an ideological shift in the movement to a more moderate interpretation of women’s role in Islam. The strategic choices made in electoral and civic mediums enabled the MB to appeal to and cooperate with other ideological fractions in

Egyptian society, resulted in their own ideological shift. The changes in their views towards women’s participation were restricted to their role in the political activities of the MB and not in its internal structure. The MB still excluded women from the structure of the movement, but allowed them to run as candidates on the MB’s behalf. This was the case until the military coup.

The unprecedented backlash and imprisonment of MB members and the experience of the Sisters in the formal and informal mediums opened the door for more involvement of women in the internal structure of the movement in Egypt and in exile.

The political context has influenced the position of the MS in the MB and their organizing strategies. The political opening and closure influenced by the varying political alliances shaped the medium of organizing and framing used by the Sisters. Their experience

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organizing historically in civil society and then in the government has strengthened the Sisters’ position in the MB and the movement’s view of women’s position in politics in general. Some of the Sisters utilized their organizing experience in civil society to gain access to and support for their candidacy in the formal medium. The opening gave the Muslim Sisters more spaces for political participation and assumption of leadership roles in the formal medium as members of the FJP. In the next chapter, I examine some of the Sister’s accounts of and response to these changes in more details.

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Chapter Four

The Sisters’ Organizing Strategies

This chapter addresses the organizing activities of the Muslim Sisters in Egypt between

2010 and 2017. It examines how political opening and backlash influenced how the Sisters framed their demands and their medium of organizing. It also sheds light on how their activism is slowly assisting the Muslim Sisters to carve out more sustainable spaces for their participation within the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) and in national as well as international politics in the post- coup environment. The Sisters’ decades of political consciousness and organizing experience during periods of opening and backlash against the MB provided them with the necessary skills that allowed them to play a stronger role within the organization and the resistance against the current Egyptian regime. The table below summarizes the organizing strategies of the Sisters under three different regimes.

Government POS: The Context Muslim Sisters

Created by the Alliance

1980- 1/25/2011 Alliance between 1) Backlash 1) The Sisters were the military and the against the MB mainly part of civil Hosni Mubarak secular-liberal 2) Cooptation of society. political parties. women’s rights 2) Focus on preaching (quotas, PSL, and social work. national 3) A small number of women’s women ran for machineries, office in 2000, CEDAW) 2005, & 2010 4) Frame: The women focused on social issues such as education

1/25/2011- Alliance 1) Opening for all 1) The Sisters were an between the groups active part of civil 7/3/2013 military and 2) The FJP was society, and were the Islamists. founded visible in Tahrir

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Mohammad Morsi 3) International Square. and domestic 2) Some Sisters moved pressure on the from civil society to MB the government as members of the Freedom and Justice Party (FJP). 3) Initial framing around freedom and social justice. 4) In later debates, Women’s rights become a major topic in the debate between them and secular-liberal groups. 5) Later framing: Women’s rights and religion

7/3/3013- Alliance between 1) Backlash 1) The Sisterhood the military and the against the moved to fully 1/18/2018 secular-liberal movement; being part of civil political parties. 50,000 were society as either Abdel Fatah el- imprisoned. members of the MB 2) Closure of the or organizing Sisi government as independently in an organizing women’s groups medium for 2) Politicization of Islamists. women’s rights 3) Frame:Women’s rights and human rights from an international perspective

Table 2: The Political Game and the Sisters’ Organizing Strategies

The case of the Egyptian Muslim Sisters reveals how a comprehensive understanding of

Islamist women’s activism cannot be achieved without examining how their political framing and mediums of organizing (formal and informal) interact with the political context. This analysis reveals how a lack of gender analysis of POS can mask certain important political

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processes. Specific POS may facilitate or impede women’s movements’ organizing. Women’s movements, like other social movements, take advantage of political changes and adapt their strategies appropriately (see Banaszak 1996; Miethe 1999; Sawyers & Meyer 1999). Women’s movements also may be in certain contexts better positioned to challenge the government or other organizations (Beckwith 2000). The literature on POS suggests that political opportunities under specific conditions may be gendered in ways that advantage female actors over male actors, and privilege movements that employ specifically gendered discourses (Beckwith 1998;

Berkovitch & Moghadam 1999; Katzenstein 1995, 1998). In addition, “the range of available responses by the state and other actors may also be gendered insofar as they may feel constrained in using their full capacity to repress women’s collective action” (Beckwith 2000, 448). In their research on Islamist parties in Jordan and Yemen in 1989 and 1990, Clark and Schwedler (2003) claim that women took advantage of structural openings created by shifting divisions within each party, which resulted in the increase of women’s participation in Islamist parties.

In revolutionary moments and their aftermath, women ally with other parties and organizations to promote their demands. Beckwith (2000) notes that feminist and secular movements specifically ally with leftwing parties to advance their political goals in three situations: “(1) new constitutional arrangements seem likely or are formally under consideration;

(2) an alternation in power between governing and opposition parties is likely, or when a party realignment is anticipated; and (3) in revolutionary periods” (448). As I illustrated in the previous chapters, the uprisings in Egypt were a result of divisions among political elites, breaking of old alliances, and the emergence of new ones. As I show in greater detail below, the

Muslim Sisters allied with civil society when the formal political medium was closed for their participation and tried to appeal to leftist political parties and other political factions in the

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government when the formal political medium was open for their participation. The Sisters mobilized in great numbers during the uprisings. They also mobilized during the constitutional redrafting period, when, as I show in the previous chapter, they had to respond to secular political parties on women’s issues. According to Beckwith (2000), the redrafting period allows women “to engage not only in the direct campaign to shape a new or revised constitution but, in doing so, to craft changes that shift the political opportunity structure for future campaign purposes” (448).

It has been established in the literature (see Nelson & Chowdhury1994) that despite women’s increased activism during revolutionary struggles, their inclusion and implementation of their demands do not increase in the post-revolutionary period. Yet the case of the Muslim

Sisters proves contradictory to this point. The Sisters’ decades of firsthand experience in organizing for the MB and serving in its government allowed them to become prominent players within the organization and the opposition against the current Egyptian regime. The Sisters’ visibility in public political life during the uprisings and the MB government as well as their leading role in the opposition against Abdel Fattah el-Sisi has made them targets of the state

(albeit to a lesser degree than men), which made it harder for MB leaders to ignore women's demands for a larger role in the organization and its structure. In an interview I conducted with

Dina Zakaria (1/13/2017)6, she explained: "When the military coup took place, women took the decision to be part of the resistance. No one can tell [women] to stay at home because they are under threat.” Women’s political activism after the coup led the Egyptian MB in exile in Turkey to consider drafting bylaws in January 2017 to set a quota for women’s participation in the movement’s Shura Council, which functions as both an executive board and a parliament.

6 Interview conducted by author in English, Istanbul, 2017. 136

Moreover, last year, the Egyptian Brotherhood elected the first female member of its Shura

Council in Turkey. This visibility of their political and social activism, as well as the state's targeting of the Sisters, has made it impossible for the MB's male leadership to ignore women activists as equal players.

The range of political opportunities available to women’s movements varies depending on the cultural context and presents women activists with strategic choices between autonomy and involvement (Petkovic & Moghadam 1999; Randall & Waylen 1998). The state is an important structural and discursive medium for women’s movements. As Amrita Basu states,

“Women’s movements tend to be weak where state control permeates civil society and strong where state control is or has been relaxed” (1995, 2). Waylen argues that “women’s movements

[are] most successful in their efforts to influence state policy when operating from the background of autonomous movements” (Waylen 1996, 137) and declares a “unanimity among many activists and commentators that engagement in the conventional political system can only occur within the context of an autonomous movement” (Waylen 1996). Being autonomous might prevent the state from coopting women’s movements. However, this might result in the exclusion of women from policy-making. After the coup, which resulted in the closure of the government as a medium of organizing, some members of the Muslim Sisterhood (MS) founded

Women Against the Coup (WAC), an independent women’s organization which focuses on violence against women as a central issue for sustaining the support for their mobilization. They are using this organization to shame the Egyptian government by relying on the global discourse of human and women rights. This independent organization is amplifying the importance and relevance of the Sisterhood to the MB.

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For women activists to utilize POS effectively, women’s movements need to employ gender frames positioning them more favorably within state contexts (Beckwith 1998b), or employ discursive politics to shift or to shape their political opportunities and their success

(Hartenstein 1998). The interplay between women’s rights, Islam, and democracy influences the framing of women’s rights in the Middle East. As stated in the previous chapter, the regimes of

Gamal Abdel Nasser, Anwar el-Sadat and Hosni Mubarak were actively engaged in constructing gender through their policies and legal provisions. Two contradictory elements influenced these regimes’ policies: (a) domestic confrontation with the Islamists, and (b) transnational pressure to adhere to global gendered regimes. The conflict with Islamists pressured Hosni Mubarak’s regime “to legislate and implement more conservative laws and policies on women and the family, and to minimize its support for women's political participation” (Al-Ali 2000, 218).

Moreover, international bodies “have increased their influence during the past decade, heightening the sense of obligation for the Egyptian state to adhere to UN conventions concerning women's rights” (Al-Ali 2000, 218).

The internal divisions in the Egyptian government and its links and obligations to international organizations are main factors shaping secular and religious women activists' relations to the state. Women must negotiate between these two forces to design the most effective way to achieve their goals. These forces shape women activist’s framing. At times, they strategically adopt Islamist frames of reference, but international institutions and agencies also influence their framing and goals. Undoubtedly, “local players, such as Egyptian women activists, do not merely adopt international agendas but selectively appropriate global issues and reinterpret them to suit their own needs and priorities” (Al-Ali 2000, 219).

Before analyzing the Sisters’ activism and framing, the next section provides historical

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background on Egyptian women’s movements, and the section after that situates the Sisters’ activism within that history.

Egyptian Women’s Movements in Historical Context

Contrary to conventional representations of Middle Eastern Islamist women as passive victims and followers of patriarchal oppression, this activism of Muslim women is not new. It builds on the activism of women in the region for over a century to challenge both state authority as well as prevailing gender ideologies and oppressive practices shaping their everyday lives (Al-

Ali 2003, 217). The women’s movement in Egypt emerged under British colonial rule and gained public recognition through their active participation alongside men in the Egyptian revolution against the British between 1919 and 1922. The women mobilized under the national leadership headed by the Waved Party (Talhami 1996). The women in the forefront of this mobilization were related to the male members of the national leadership (Talhami 1996). The women’s movement was purely nationalist, and emphasized such issues as “the exiling of the revolt’s male leadership, denial of Egypt’s request to attend the Versailles Peace Conference, refusal to end the British protectorate in Egypt, and the violent suppression of the people’s revolt” (Talhami 1996,10). Egyptians acknowledged women’s efforts because of “their organization of massive all-women’s demonstrations, the most memorable occurring on March

20, 1919, and January 16, 1920. These demonstrations resulted in some casualties whose names became part of the lore and legend of Egypt’s women’s movement” (Talhami 1996, 10).

After independence, male politicians ignored women’s demands and did not grant them rights. Thus, women activists resorted to informal networks of activism, such as Huda Sha’rawi’s founding of the Egyptian Feminist Union in 1924, Zaynab al-Ghazali’s founding of the Muslim

Women’s Society in 1936, or Doria Shafiq’s founding of the Daughters of the Nile Union (Bint

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al-Nil) in 1948. However, several these organizations were co-opted and linked with the state through Gamal Abdel Nasser’s state feminism, when legislation was passed to put all civil society organizations under state control. During Gamal Abdel Nasser’s regime, women gained the right to vote and subsequently the right to run for election. The women elected for office were mainly associated with the ruling party and protected its interests.

The disappointment of secular women’s activists “with secular authoritarianism and the consequences of Islamic revivalism inspired Muslim women intellectuals in Egypt and elsewhere in the 1980s to embark on a third way between Islamic orthodoxy and secular emancipation”

(Casanova 2017, 117). This middle path is referred to as Islamic feminism, which emerged in the

1990s and aspires to challenge patriarchal interpretations of the Quran and Haddith with more moderate interpretations to promote women’s equality in an Islamic context. Islamic feminists take a more progressive approach than Al-Ghazali (founder of the Muslim Women’s Society).

Islamic feminism emerged due to women, both secularists and religious, concerned “by the imposition and spread of a conservative reading of Islam by Islamist movements,” who “found the need to respond in a progressive Islamic voice” (Badran 2005, 9). This was coupled with

“national discourses of the need and significance of the active participation and work of all citizens” (Badran 2005, 9). Moreover, in the late twentieth century, women in the Middle East became more educated and gained “access to education to the highest levels in the religious sciences” (Badran 2005, 9). Women were thus well-equipped to respond to and navigate the rise of conservative readings of Islam with the help of “electronic technology that circulated information and ideas freely and rapidly through cyberspace, creating an unprecedented simultaneity of local and global production” (Badran 2005, 9).

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Muslim Sisters Activism Until the 2011 Uprisings

The pre-World War II Egyptian feminist movement provided training and organizational experience to the future leader of the women of the MB (Talhami 1996). Labibeh Ahmad had a long history of semi-secularist feminist activism before joining the MB and founding the MS in

1933 (Talhami 1996). Her transition to Islamic activism “appears to have been motivated by the vast array of social services that the Brotherhood offered to poor residents of the major cities”

(Talhami 1996, 47). While Ahmad avoided political activity, Zaynab al-Ghazali, who was a member of the Egyptian Feminist Union and later formed the Muslim Women’s Society, did not shy away from it on behalf of the Brotherhood. She was responsible “for the subsequent activity of numerous female members of the brotherhood leadership” (Talhami 1996, 50).

During the backlash against the Brotherhood in the 1950s, al-Ghazzali organized a network of women who kept an open communication channel between imprisoned Brothers

(Talhami 1996). She also traced recently released Brothers to rebuild the Brotherhood (Talhami

1996). She opened her house to young men from all over Egypt as a site for organizing to rebuild the movement. Al-Ghazzali claimed all her efforts, which were mostly educational in nature, would take approximately 13 years to yield any results (Talhami 1996). These efforts rendered al-Ghazzali indispensable to the MB. She might have been “the third most important leader after al-Hudhaybi and Qutub, especially during the second wave of prosecutions, when by 1965

Gamal Abdel Nasser’s jails had swallowed up large numbers of brothers, including Qutub”

(Talhami 1996, 51). However, her efforts and influential role in restructuring the MB made her a target of government prosecution. Her own imprisonment followed, where she experienced similar treatment to the imprisoned brothers (Talhami 1996).

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The MS was initially limited to social work, such as sheltering poor families, preaching, and organizing religious lectures for girls. The organization’s main goal was to educate women on religion and their duties and rights as Muslim women. Their educational efforts also emphasized the importance of raising pious children (Talhami 1996). By 1935 they created a

“system of home visits to women by experienced female workers to reach those not permitted to attend public meetings. Leaflets and publications addressing women exclusively were also produced” (Talhami 1996, 47). However, when the Brotherhood secured an unprecedented 88 seats in the 2005 elections, Hosni Mubarak’s government declared the Brotherhood a “security threat,” leading the Sisters to shift their attention to mobilizing political and financial support for the imprisoned Brothers and their families. Moreover, twenty-one Sisters were nominated in

2005 in the initial list of candidates; however, only one woman received enough votes to become a member of the parliament. Fifteen Sisters also ran as independents in the 2010 parliamentary elections on behalf of the Brotherhood (ECWR 2010).

Part of the Brotherhood’s strength can be attributed to the Sisters. The Sisters increased the support for the MB through their access as women to people via mosques and welfare organizations (Tadros 2011). The domestic roles of the women activists in the MB as mothers, wives, sisters, and daughters have helped them mobilize some women, especially because

Egyptian society values the institution of the family, with motherhood at its center. Some of the

Sisters mobilized as mothers and wives of the men who the security forces arrested or killed.

These identities gave these women’s participation legitimacy while also preserving the movement and its structure under the Hosni Mubarak regime. Their gender also enabled the

Sisters to mobilize with less fear of the state. Arresting and attacking women had been a red line

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for Hosni Mubarak’s government (Interviews 2017),7 as the state had historically associated women with the nation (Mhajne and Whetstone 2018). An attack on women, regardless of their political affiliation, is considered to be culturally taboo in Egypt and at times even viewed as an attack on Egypt itself (Mhajne and Whetstone 2018). An example of such an event is the instance in which a police officer attacked a woman during the revolution of 2011, revealing her blue bra in the process. The Hosni Mubarak regime avoided imprisoning women by using other tactics. For example, in the 2000 elections, when Jihan al-Halafawi, a senior woman activist in

Alexandria, ran against the ruling party's candidate, the state tried hard to pressure her to withdraw from the race by arresting her husband, who was also a Brotherhood member and her campaign manager. Security officials offered to release her husband in exchange for her withdrawal from the elections.

During Hosni Mubarak’s regime, the Sister’s used the language of socioeconomic rights and freedom to formulate their demands and activities in the formal and informal political medium. The platform of Sisters who were candidates did not emphasise any gender-specific rights on the social or political level. It did not stray away from focusing on social issues.

Candidates such as Wafaa Mashhour and Makarem al- Deiri emphasized Islamic education as their main priority. When asked about her priorities if she won, al- Deiri noted,

Education will always be my main interest. We want educational reform on an Islamic basis. The government wants teaching to be a rote, mechanistic job, not to be carried out by people with their own ideas and convictions (Hazou 2005).

The Sisters hold similar views on women’s rights as the Brotherhood. Correspondingly, most of the Sisters argue that women and men have equal rights but different roles, especially when it comes to the family (Abdel- Latif 2008). They all seem to agree that Islam grants women

7 Personal interviews conducted by author with Amr Darrag (conducted in English), Dina Zakaria (conducted in English), and Asmaa Shokr (conducted in Arabic), Istanbul, 2017. 143

an important position; however, some feel that the MB's interpretations conform to the view of the Egyptian conservative society and are therefore less empowering for women. For instance, in an interview with Ikwanweb, Makarem al-Deiri, a 55-year-old professor of Arabic literature at

Al Azhar University who ran for elections in 2005, she stated,

I’m definitely not for absolute equality. I am for equilibrium. We ask for equilibrium as a simple result of biological variations. The wife gets pregnant and delivers babies, so we can’t very well ask her to go out and provide for her family in the same way a man would. Furthermore, if the wife is adamant about having her own job and work, this would cause instability in the Muslim household. That doesn’t mean that women shouldn’t have their own money. Islam grants to women a private financial account, and husbands have no right to draw from it unless their wives agree (Abdel- Latif 2008).

Heba Raouf, a self-identified Egyptian Islamist scholar of political theory and women’s rights activist, is a well-known Egyptian Islamic feminist (even though she might not identify this way) associated with the MB. She expressed Islamic feminist sentiment in an interview with

Karim El-Gawhary (2011),

I declare myself an Islamist, but this doesn’t mean that I accept the dominant discourse about women inside the Islamist movement. My studies focus on the need for a new interpretation of Quran and Sunna. We should benefit from the fiqh and the contributions of previous generations of Islamic scholars. This doesn’t mean that we have to stick to their interpretations of Islamic sources while we ignore the sociology of knowledge (100).

She continues:

I am mainly refusing the public-private dichotomy that is dominant in Western and Islamic thought. This dichotomy gives either privacy-for example family life- the priority, or the contrary. In my opinion, Islam doesn’t embody such a Polaristic perception. Private is political, not in the feminist aggressive sense but rather in the Islamic sense of solidarity and the importance of social infrastructure and grassroots politics. Social movements cannot be understood in an Islamic social system without analyzing the extended family as a political and economic unit (El-Gawhary 2011, 100).

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Due to their experience in the formal and informal political medium, the Sisters started forming more ambitious demands for inclusion within the structure of the Brotherhood itself which consists of the Supreme Guide, Maktab al-Irshaad (the Guidance Bureau), Majlis al-Shura

(Consultative Council), and the administrative bureaus (al-makaatib al-Idariyyah). The nomination of al-Halafawi fortified activists to question their marginal status in the movement and seek a place in the Brotherhood structures. The activists demands varied from requesting women gain more control over the administration of the Sisterhood’s Division, to fighting for women membership in the Shura Council and the Guidance Bureau (Abdel- Latif 2008).

Halafawi is among the Sisters who have been asking for official positions for women in the

Brotherhood (Khalaf 2012). Activists such as 35-year-old Rasha Ahmed wrote a letter to the

Brothers’ Supreme Guide in 2007 questioning women’s status in the movement. The title of the letter was “A letter to the Supreme Guide.” She wrote: “No one can deny the Sisters played a key role in bringing the Brotherhood's candidates to parliament … If the Sisters carry out difficult roles like the men, why don’t they have an equal right to choose the officials in the group?”

(Gehad 2013).

The writings of Sisters and their calls for an end to the marginalization of women show women in the movement are aware of their subordinate status and are trying to improve it. Their efforts to change their role as women were and continue to be focused on their representation inside the Brotherhood and not in the general formal political medium. They think that change occurs gradually from inside of the organization and place the blame on state security as opposed to the ideology of the Brotherhood for their limited participation. Thus, activists are not willing to go as far as to sacrifice the movement’s cohesion and unity to obtain those rights. Not surprisingly, most of the activists interviewed by Omayma Abdel- Latif in 2008 agreed that for

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the Sisterhood to evolve, “the Sisters’ division must be integrated into the main structure of the movemen. Second, women must be represented in all decision-making bodies” (Abdel- Latif

2008, 10). The Sisters are not asking to remain an independent entity within the Brotherhood that is represented in the various decision-making units. The hierarchal separation between the women’s division and the main structure of the Brotherhood, which does not directly connect the

Sisterhood’s division to or involve it in the formal governing structures of the MB, is viewed by the more conservative Sisters as “’a deliberate policy’ to protect Sisters from repressive policies and harassment by security agencies” (Abdel- Latif 2008,11). For instance, when al- Deiri was asked why the Brotherhood has only a few female leaders, she stated,

Women in the organization dedicate themselves mostly to social work, like reform, missionary and pedagogical work. Harassment from state security has been the main reason they haven’t been able to do these sorts of things in the public eye. One really positive experience was in 2000, when the organization nominated Jihan Al Halafawy for the parliamentary elections in Alexandria. True, it was a painful experience because of fraud and other sorts of harassment, but it was a great example for aspiring women (Hazou 2005).

The status of women activists in the MB movement is not static. The struggle of women activists to carve a place inside the movement’s power structures reflects a close interaction between structure and agency. The activism from within the Sisterhood to promote their structural representation within the Brotherhood, combined with the political environment, has allowed for women to gain more public political roles as candidates and political activists. Their entrance into political elections in 2000, 2005 and 2010 (even though none of the women candidates made it to the general assembly) has been facilitated by the Brotherhood's wish to contest political power in Egypt in the strongest possible way and by the successful activism which women have demonstrated at the grassroots level.

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The Sisters focused their attention in this period on mobilizing popular support for the

Islamist cause through social charity projects and worked towards navigating the limited political space given to the Islamist group within the formal and informal political mediums. Their focus during the moment of opening after the ouster of Hosni Mubarak 2011 was to gain more representation of Islamists in the government and more visibility among Egyptians. In addition, they focused on maintaining the structure and cohesion of the movement through times of government backlash against these groups. The Sisters did not focus on women’s rights as a central issue. Instead they focused on education and economic issues. Inspired by Islamic feminism, they developed a definition of women’s rights based on the reinterpretation of the

Quran.

Activism During the Uprising and President Mohammad Morsi’s Government (1/2011-7/2013)

Sisters participated in the events of the January 25 uprisings. They were responsible for the security of the Square, by stationing themselves at security checkpoints and patting down female entrants (Farag 2013). They provided activists with food, shelter, medical supplies, and aid. They also assisted the protestors in countering acts of thuggery, by providing ammunition in the form of rubble and blocks of stones that they carried and transported in their Abaya (Farag 2013).

Other Sisters, such as the editor for the Al-Azhar Journal Sout alAzhar, helped “by setting up several units and offices around the Square as outlets for both the protests and news agencies to exchange information, images, and general news to ensure the most comprehensive story was

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spread globally through the several mediums available today” (Farag 2013, 231). Their engagement and visibility in the public spaces of the revolution as well as their rich history of welfare work helped the Sisters to mobilize Egyptians to support the FJP. The years the Sisters spent focusing on social welfare and building connections with various fractions of the Egyptian society provided them with skills in outreach and constituency building. Huda Abdel Al-

Mona’eim, a Muslim Sister self-identified as a constitutional, administrative and appeal lawyer states,

I want to tell you, that we, the members of the MB and MS had a big role before the revolution in public service alongside preaching. They provided services to all sectors of society regardless of age, class, or religion. They took care of girls from a young age, they took care of professional women as well as stay at home moms. So, the Sisters played a big role in public service before the revolution as part of their role in the Brotherhood. When we joined the revolution on January 25th, we took the streets with the people, not like they say, we were there and participated, and we didn’t know it was a revolution. We thought it was a demonstration like any other demonstration, and then you know what happened in the 18 days that we were there (Interview 02/06/2017).8

These skills enabled the Sisters in 2011 to transform their strong social base into a political constituency. While some argued that the inclusion of women was a strategic move by the MB to gain support during elections, the Sisters actively carved a space for themselves in the movement, utilizing this opportunity for their own benefit. Some young Sisters chose to participate in the 2011 demonstrations against the instructions of the leaders of the Brotherhood

(Interview with Dina Zakaria, 1/13/2017).9 With the opening of the political space for Islamists between February 2011 and June 2013, the political engagement of MS activists expanded even further, both through public activism and within the MB structure. As noted earlier, the MB’s political party, The FJP was formed after the uprising and consisted of members from the MS

8 Author conducted the interview in Arabic over the phone and translated the interview to English, 2017. 9 Interview conducted by author in English, Istanbul, 2017. 148

and MB. This period was marked by an opening in the formal and informal mediums for the

Muslim Sisters, and their political activities increased compared to the Hosni Mubarak era.

Having access to the political party allowed the Sisters to move between civil society and the

Islamist political elites by joining the party. For those who joined the party, their work became mainly dedicated to gaining political office and consolidating FJP representation. The party instructed its members not to be involved in MB and MS structures and activities. As Asma

Shokr states, “as long as I worked with FJP I couldn’t conduct any work with the movement and the Sisterhood. They were separate” (Interview 1/27/2017).10 They had to dedicate themselves to the party. They ran for office, won elections, and held high positions in Morsi’s government.

These positions included the spokesperson for the party and the advisor for the president. At the same time, however, the Sisters began to publicly ask for greater representation and more roles in the MB’s structure.

A July 2011 conference on “Women from the revolution to renaissance”—which 2,500

Sisters as well as prominent members of the MB attended, including Supreme Guide Mohamed

Badie, Deputy Guide Khairat al-Shater, and members of the Guidance Bureau—recommended enhancing women’s political representation in syndicates and political parties. The MB followed up by giving them access to leadership positions in the FJP’s administrative units across the country, starting in Alexandria, Fayoum, and on the 6th of October in Cairo, focusing on women's political awareness and media relations committees (Tadros 2017). They began to ascend to higher leadership positions. For example, after the presidential elections in June

2012, the FJP leadership appointed Omayma Kamel to be a member of the Constituent Assembly delegated with drawing up the constitution, and she also served as a presidential aide to President

10 Interview conducted in Arabic and translated to English by author, Istanbul, 2017. 149

Mohamed Morsi (Tadros 2017). Moreover, the FJP leadership appointed Dina Zakaria as the spokeswoman for the FJP. As of 2012, the MB allowed women to be elected as heads of the regional women's committees. These committees communicated directly with the Guidance

Bureau, the highest decision-making body within the movement. Previously, only men held such positions. However, women still did not hold any senior positions in the FJP or the MB. Sabah

Al-Sakkari, a member of the party's secretariat who ran for the FJP chairmanship in

2012, failed to obtain the required number of signatures to run in elections (Suleiman 2014).

Al-Sakkari denied accusations that the purpose of her candidacy was to enhance the image of the Brotherhood as a movement with a moderate view towards women. Al-Sakkari added in an interview with Al Arabiya, “I will never accept that the party or the group uses me like a decoration so that people can say the Freedom and Justice was the first party to nominate a woman for chairmanship because this is against my principles” (Al Arabiya 2012). She refused to be viewed as a tool to convey an image of tolerance. Sakkari noted, “We have a political role and we are serving the country through the party exactly like men do. Women in the party are strong and will never allow anyone to strip them of their rights” (Al Arabiya 2012). Unlike previous election platforms, which did not address women’s roles in politics, Sakkari stressed,

“In my platform, I pay special attention to women and youths, whom I believe should get the chance to occupy the highest positions in the party. Women in particular are very important since the progress of any society is closely related to them” (Al Arabiya 2012). When she was asked about her opinion on allowing women to run for presidency, she responded “what [Muslim scholars] all agreed on is that a woman cannot be a Caliph, but there is nothing to prove that she cannot rule over one state within the Muslim nation” (Al Arabiya 2012). She stated that she would run for the presidency of Egypt if members of the Freedom and Justice party approved her

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nomination. Despite her moderate views towards women assuming the presidency and her optimism about women’s roles in the FJP and the MB, she said that she “would never run for or assume any position without telling my husband, but in this case, I consult him rather than seek his permission as long as he initially approved my work in politics” (Al Arabiya 2012).

The statements of Al-Sakkari show how women’s issues and rights became central not only to the Brothers, but also to the Sisters during their campaign and after the elections. It also demonstrates the view of women’s rights the Sisters hold. The Sisters asked for more political representation for women in politics. However, various Sisters supported “the insertion of a conditionality on women’s rights within the constitution, and were the most vehement opponents of the insertion of any article that would expand women’s rights in relation to bodily integrity”

(Tadros 2014, 21). Additionally, the Sisters rejected the proposal of “an article setting a minimum age of marriage for women as well as any constitutional clause that would condemn all forms of violence against women, arguing that both could be potentially tackled through legislation and did not have to be mentioned in the constitution” (Tadros 2014, 21).

For example, the prominent Sister Aza Al-Garf is one of only nine women elected to

Egypt’s lower house of parliament (out of 498 elected deputies) in the country’s first free elections in more than half a century. She confirmed Sakkari’s view that the FJP and

Brotherhood are supportive of the Sisters. She pointed out: “The FJP equally supported its female candidates funding them and campaigning for them with as much vigor as it did its male candidates. Women in the Muslim Brotherhood have had an active role since the group's establishment over 80 years ago” (Ikhwanweb 2012). She also said, “Women should have a practical role in all organizations; after all they interact daily with most of the community's elements” (Ikhwanweb 2012). However, when it came to women’s social issues not related to

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political representation, Al- Garf took some controversial stands. She talked about constriction of

Egypt’s already strict divorce laws (Egypt Independent 2012), rolling back the ban on female genital mutilation, and reportedly denying that sexual harassment exists in Egypt (Bohn 2012).

Al-Garf explained, "The principle itself — ‘a woman can divorce her husband’ — is not what I disagree with. In the time of the Prophet, women could get divorced, but I don’t want 7 million divorced women on the street" (Topol 2012). She continued, “It [divorce] is in the Quran the most despised halal. Divorce affects the woman’s psychology, and it disintegrates family and ruins the children’s future…It is only when there is no possible solution that divorce should happen, but we should not seek it” (Topol 2012). When asked about FGM she replied, “We have enough problems more pressing than this…I think it’s mainly been magnified to something unnecessary. Even when it comes to religion it’s highly debatable. People are entitled to do what suits them. We have much more pressing problems that don’t give us the luxury of dealing with this” (Topol 2012). Al-Garf responded to the question of why a year after the revolution women still cannot vote in the MB by saying, “When we take Egypt toward stability, hopefully this development will cover the whole segment of the country, including the Brotherhood. Inshallah”

(Topol 2012).

Another example of the Sisters unique understanding of and position on women’s issues is Dr. Omayma Kamel. She is one of FJP’s newly elected members in Cairo's ninth division.

Kamel complimented women by stating that “History has proven that the women of Egypt have succeeded throughout the years in outstandingly performing their roles and leaving their mark”

(Ikhwanweb 2012). She added: “Methods should be explored to expand the females' role in

Egypt and existing problems should be tackled including education and health issues to help women improve further their status” (Ikhwanweb 2012). She continued, “Once these issues are

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solved women will be well equipped to protect their children and families. They will also have an effective role in the state's institutions” (Ikhwanweb 2012). Moreover, Dr. Kamel suggested that the high divorce rates during the first year of marriage is mainly a result of the wife’s immaturity as well as poverty and unemployment. Therefore, the program is to develop girls' education significantly to achieve stability in new households and secure the future for women and their children. Kamel’s statements illustrate the centrality of women’s role in the family. The priority for women is to focus on protecting their families, and they are even blamed for the high rates of divorce because they are “immature.”

Additionally, Asmaa El-Erian, 21, the daughter of a MB leader, Essam El-Erian promoted Sharia Law. She said, “The Islamic Sharia does not conflict with freedom and democracy” (Alexander 2011). El-Erian’s also stated she envisions greater participation of women in politics. However, she supported the Brotherhood’s position that the presidency should strictly be a male position. She justified her position by saying that “men are more strict and firm” (Alexander 2011). She rejected the demands of some activists to end a man’s freedom to have four wives because “God has allowed polygamy…Maybe many people don’t prefer it, but it is not religiously forbidden” (Alexander 2011).

The attempt to address and frame women’s rights in a religious framework is not new or specific to Egypt. In the context of Tunisia, Islamist women’s rights activists speak about women’s rights in a language that blends piety and choice, religiosity and rights (Bayat 2007;

Debuysere 2016). They “develop a different and original paradigm for women’s rights derived from Islamic principles, based on the centrality of the family and the concept of complementarity

(instead of full equality) between the sexes” (Debuysere 2016, 229). Islamist women were reluctant during the MB’s government to accept all clauses of the main international conventions

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on women’s rights. Certain clauses, often those dealing with equality in marriage and family relations (e.g. article 16), of the CEDAW raise questions in Islamist circles.

The change in the political opportunity structure—the discontinuity of the alliance between the military and the secular-liberal political parties—during the revolution required the movement to frame their project in a way that would win the support of the military and other moderate factions. The MB clearly needed the Sisterhood in the post-revolution climate. Putting women at the forefront of the movement created a more moderate image and silenced its critics.

This strategy opened the political medium for the Sisters. The Sisters became vocal on issues regarding their representation in the Brotherhood and in the government. The Sisters’ views on women’s role in politics and society became a central issue for the Sisters shortly before the elections and continued until the military coup against the FJP. For these women, the only form of women rights worth fighting for is the one that guarantees rights within an Islamist framework, and without defying any of the norms set forth by Islamic jurisprudence. In the case of Egypt, Islamist women seek to better implement Islamic Sharia within the Egyptian society, towards a more Islamic state and society.

Activism During President Abdel Fatah el-Sisi Regime (7/2013- 1/2018)

The current period, which began in June 2013, has been marked by an alliance between the military and secular-liberal political parties. Between August and November 2012, Morsi started losing the support of some leftist and liberal factions within civil society, which eventually led to Morsi’s ouster by the military on July 3rd, 2013. What led to this coup was the empowerment of the military as the primary guardian of Egyptian politics by secular parties headed by people such as Mohamed ElBaradei. This was coupled with wide demonstrations by various civil society groups calling for the ouster of President Mohammad Morsi. During the

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presidential elections in May 2014, various secular-liberal political parties supported Abdel

Fattah el-Sisi for president. The 2013 military coup left civil society divided between groups who were for and against the coup. It also has resulted in organizational and ideological divisions within the Brotherhood over the best response to government’s repression. It has divided the

Brotherhood into two factions: the old leadership who adopted a more accommodating position toward addressing regime repression to allow bargaining and reconciliation versus the young revolutionary members who have embraced a confrontational and revolutionary approach. This ideological difference also divided the Sisters, although in lesser numbers. Most of the women activists sided with the old guard or took a neutral position regarding the division. For example,

Asmaa Shokr, stated that “she was not supportive of the division, even though she wanted changes to the group's old approach” (Mhajne 2018).

Following the backlash against the MB due to the military coup in Egypt in July

2013, more than 50,000 members of the MB movement have been imprisoned, including the senior leadership. These vacancies created a political opening for the women activists in the movement and have pushed them to play a bigger role within the organization, building upon decades of political and organizing experiences that have been enriched by the movement's short-lived experience as a political party - the FJP- in Egypt in 2011-2012 (Farag 2013).

As a response to the backlash and closure of the formal political space for the Sisters’ activism, they mainly focused on organizing as members of civil society. The violent crackdown on Islamists in post-military coup Egypt paradoxically contributed to the empowerment and activism of the Egyptian Muslim Sisters. Since the military crackdown, the Brotherhood has progressively started depending on mobilizing women. Moreover, the leadership of the

Brotherhood issued a few statements that utilized the attacks on women’s bodies and the concept

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of honor attached to those bodies to criticize the military and its liberal supporters. For instance, the Brotherhood issued a statement on December 28, 2013 commenting on the security forces’ violent attacks against women protesters in the following way:

On December 26, 2013, a number of officers gathered around a veiled (female) student at Al-Azhar University, repeatedly kicking and brutally beating her with sticks, and then dragged her by her clothes and arrested her. On December 27, 2013, we saw a dozen soldiers and officers surround a girl in Nasr City, then drag her on the ground. They then tossed her into a police transport vehicle, arresting and detaining her. We say now what we said then, that this lynching is a criminal act executed by a gang of coup thugs who lost all chivalric sense of honor. The girl committed no crime. She simply came out to express her views and exercise her constitutional right to peaceful demonstration…All these are religious, moral and social crimes completely condemned by our Egyptian religious oriental society that respects values of chastity and honor, and where women are respected, protected and held in the highest regard…We wonder: Where is the National Council for Women as women are subjected to all these abuses and violations? Or does this Council serve only liberal women? (Ikhwanweb 2013)

In another statement issued on March 9th, 2014, the Brotherhood declared:

More stunning is the National Council for Women's and human rights organizations' deafening silence as they witness women arrested, beaten, lynched, dragged on asphalt, jailed, judged unjustly, and even murdered, although they, earlier-on, filled the world with deafening screams and strident vociferation with regard to topics far less important than those evident abuses…Now, on the International Women's Day, hundreds of our daughters, sisters and wives are killed, imprisoned, or being detained, locked away awaiting trials, with no-one interested in investigating those murders and other violations against Egyptian women. Their killers and abusers may have even been honored and promoted, rewarded for abandoning all their humanity, honor and chivalry… The revolutionary men and women of Egypt will not rest or sleep until they free those women and girls, even before the men. They will also liberate the whole country from the junta's repressive regime and their criminal coup. They will liberate the people from the large prison in which they all now live. They will exact retribution on their oppressors. (Ikhwanweb 2014)

In these statements the Brotherhood commented on the silence of the National Council for Women. They attributed this silence to the bias the Council has towards serving only liberal women. They also used honor multiple times in their statements to shame security forces and to legitimize and recruit more people to join the Brotherhood’s opposition to the military coup.

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Hoda abdel Moniem abdul-Aziz, a woman leader in the Freedom and Justice Party, commented that the more oppressive the police crackdown, the more women will respond: “Our blood is on the street, members of our organization have been killed. We went through the worst.

We are not afraid of the police as long as we stick to our principles” (Ketchley & Biggs 2014).

Indeed, female Morsi supporters have played an active role in ongoing demonstrations against the military ouster of the democratically elected president. For instance, in November 2013 an

Egyptian court sentenced 21 female Morsi supporters to 11 years in jail each; however, the sentence was suspended later (Ketchley & Biggs 2014). Additionally, Huda abdel Moniem led a coalition, Revolutionary Coalition for Egyptian Women (RCEW), comprised of nine Egyptian anti-coup women's groups that aims to end the "military coup" (World Bulletin 2014). Huda

Abdel-Moneim indicated that “The alliance aims to encourage more activity by women in resisting the military coup” (World Bulletin 2014). According to the coalition’s founding statement, "The coalition aims to mobilize women in the upcoming period to resist the coup and provide them with a unique experience fighting injustice” (World Bulletin 2014). Moreover, the alliance would attempt to document human rights violations against women (World Bulletin

2014). The group had a significant presence in the pro-Morsi protests camps at Rabaa Al-

Adawiya and Nahda Square, with hundreds of women joining the demonstrations (Al Bawaba

2013). Muslim Sisters like Wafaa Hefny who is a 47-year-old university instructor were present when the security forces began to disperse a sit-in by supporters of Brotherhood President

Mohamed Morsi at Rabaa Al-Adawiya on 14 August 2013 (Gehad 2013). After the arrest of the

Brotherhood leadership, the granddaughter of Brotherhood founder al-Banna became one of the movement's few influential figures. As part of her activism, Hefny organized “clandestine meetings where they can use social media, write film scripts and design anti-government logos”

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(World Bulletin 2014). She also tried to shame men in the security forces who mistreated imprisoned women members of the Brotherhood. Hefny said, “We harass these security men who rape. We send messages to them and write on their houses. We say, ‘your father or son did this’ and this will pressure them to stop” (World Bulletin 2014). Hefny, with other female members of the Brotherhood participated in the pro-Morsi sit-ins. Their activities in “the sit-ins varied from cooking Eid’s (post-Ramadan Islamic celebration) biscuits, putting up decorations, coming up with a garbage collection system to providing moral support for victims, volunteering in field-hospitals, and going out in marches” (Gehad 2013). Moreover, the RCEW drew attention to the gendered violence of the military regime and used gendered language to delegitimize the

SCAF and appeal to secular groups that allied with the military. For instance, in December 15,

2014 RCEW issued a statement saying,

Monday (Dec 15, 2014) marks the anniversary of the Cabinet building clashes, where security apparatuses committed many violations against girls and women of Egypt. The images of the "lynched" girl, the peaceful protester dragged on the ground by heavily armed policemen, are still remembered by every Egyptian and every revolutionary who came out demanding freedom four years ago… Let us not forget, it was the military council which lay the seeds of the coup, assaulted the "lynched" girl, violated the sanctity of Egyptian girls for the first time with the so-called virginity tests of female activists and revolutionaries, inside a military prison, and then went on to use sniper fire to terrorize and kill girls, and shamefully arrested girls and women – all of which are heinous crimes we are still suffering now (Ikhwanweb 2014).

Centering gender and gendered violence as a central concern continued in a statement issued by Hoda Abdel-Moneim, spokeswoman for RCEW in January 24, 2015 condemning the military junta and the coup killing of “Sondos Reda Abu-Bakr, a 17 years old peaceful female demonstrator, when junta forces attacked a non-violent anti-coup march in Asafra district in

Alexandria” (Ikhwanweb 2014). She continues, “In fact, every day – as we witness more junta and coup crimes against girls and women of Egypt, everyone appreciates the greatness and

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nobility of the legitimate elected President, whose message to the people of Egypt empowered and promoted respect for women. This prompts everyone to support President Morsi and endeavor to restore the legitimacy he symbolizes, whatever the price” (Ikhwanweb 2014).

The reason behind the very active participation of the Muslim Sisters is the fear the MB

“will be pushed underground once again, inhibiting their newly established voice” (Jones 2013).

This is apparent in the statement of Hager El Saway who is an assistant lecturer of dental radiology at Cairo University and a member of the Brotherhood (Jones 2013). Barakat suggested MB “women weren’t seen as women before the revolution because they were afraid of politically participating and being arrested…Women—especially very conservative women— didn’t go out. Now, women in niqabs stand in demonstrations alongside men” (Jones 2013).

Being on the streets, however, has had a cost for the women, with many killed, injured, or arrested. The growing mobilizations of the MB's women activists against the state has led to their targeting on 19 July 2013, when security forces killed three women activists in Mansoura who participated in an anti-government demonstration. A report by the Front for the Defence of

Egyptian Protesters (FDEP), an independent group of volunteer activists and lawyers, listed the names of 24 women it says have been killed since 14 August 2013. Sixteen of them died in the

Rabaa Al-Adawiya dispersal. Among them was Asmaa El-Beltagy, 17, daughter of leading

Brotherhood figure Mohamed El-Beltagy, currently detained facing charges of inciting violence

(Gehad 2013). The cost that women have paid for their participation “has led some to demand a bigger long-term role within the wider Muslim Brotherhood group” (Kingsley 2014). For example, Fatima, a member of the Brotherhood, proposed, “It can't be like before, when we were blindly loyal…We are getting detained, we're getting attacked in the streets – so we must have some say” (Kingsley 2014). Additionally, Sarah Kamal, a designer in her 20s and a Muslim

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Sister, addressed the implication of the massacre of Rabaa Al-Adawiya on the Sisterhood. She said,

It made us rethink our whole way of thinking – both externally and internally…We're against the arrests [of leaders], but it's in our interests for us to work without leadership, because it gives us space to think without the old routine…When we come again, God willing, the old way of working won't work…We shouldn't just have orders without consultation. And I think the youth movement will be the main force of power (Kingsley 2014).

With most Brotherhood leaders in jail or exile, women have been placed in the center of the organization’s battle for survival. A Muslim Sister stated, “The men are mostly absent so without women there are no protests…This is the truth and they have admitted it several times.

They say without you it won’t work” (Noueihed 2014). She added, “This group started sitting directly with the official in charge of women in the Guidance Bureau. This is present now as a link between base and summit... They are treating women now as the ones who can take the pulse of what can and cannot be done. This is an excellent step for women” (Noueihed 2014).

Since the crackdowns, women activities have focused on the local level. The need to organize locally has allowed an unprecedented level of decentralization in the hierarchical group, giving women and youth followers a new freedom to act.

In addition to physical repression, the Muslim Sisters have been the target of smear campaigns. As noted earlier, the National Council for Women (NWC), and other institutions with government ties have criticized women's participation in the Rabaa sit-ins, accusing the

Brotherhood of "using women and children as human shields" (Ahram Online 2013), to discredit the Muslim Sisters' activism following President Morsi's overthrow by both denying their agency and accusing them of using terrorist tactics. An article in the pro-government Egyptian daily Youm 7 accused the Sisters of "organizing terrorist attacks" in Egypt (Abdel Rady &Salama

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2015). The Sisters were also accused of the assassination of Attorney-General Hisham Barakat.

According to another report, the women's organization allegedly "receives assignments from abroad through social media, and it communicates this information to the imprisoned Muslim

Brotherhood officials who then give coded orders to carry out the terror attacks" (Harris 2015).

After the coup, many women activists moved from organizing politically as members of the FJP to organizing independently, including working to document and highlight human rights violations. For example, during the Rabaa sit-ins, women activists founded the Women Against the Coup (WAC), the first of several women-only resistance movements established following the 2013 coup and crackdown on the movement. It remains the most active organization for women's mobilization across Egypt. Initially, women would take part in demonstrations, talk to media outlets about the violence inflicted by the regime against the protestors, and report to human rights organizations such as Human Rights Watch on these violations. For example, Asmaa Shokr, the spokeswoman of the organization abroad, has been speaking to national and international outlets on the human rights abuses of Abdel Fatah el-Sisi’s regime against women.

Eventually, in July 2016, the Cairo Court of Urgent Matters banned Women Against the

Coup's activities inside Egypt (Aswat Masriya 2016). Now, the organization is operating from abroad, and some of its founders, such as Asmaa Shokr, live in exile in Turkey with their families. Since this relocation, they have organized women-only marches in Egypt (Rifai 2013) and in exile (Ali 2017). Such women activists made violence against women a central theme for sustaining the support for their mobilization. Women activists affiliated with the MB began providing data on cases of violence against women (see Al-Islam 2016) as early as November

2013 (see Alquds Newspaper 2013). Additionally, to increase the impact of their activism and

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role in the opposition, they allied with prominent leftist organizations that resisted the coup, such as the Hisham Mubarak Law Centre, which provided the activists with training in international human rights (Malky 2015).

Women activists have also reached out to international human rights organizations, such as Human Rights Monitor and Insaniya. Their main work abroad focuses on communicating the reports of human rights abuses against the opposition in Egypt, which is significantly comprised of the MB and their supporters, to the wider international community through interviews with media outlets, sharing their reports with international NGOs such as Amnesty International and on social media outlets such as Facebook and YouTube. The data for such reports is being collected by women who are still in Egypt. Moreover, Asmaa Shokr stated in a phone interview with me (11/2017) that they are considering registering their WAC organization with the United

Nations and they want to expand its work to cover women’s issues beyond Egypt.

Conclusion

The Sisters’ decades of political consciousness and organizing experience during periods of opening and backlash against the MB provided them with the necessary skills which allowed them to play a stronger role within the organization and the resistance against the current

Egyptian regime. Socioeconomic rights and democracy were their main framing focus before and during the uprisings. However, women’s rights became a central issue due to the concerns of the liberals and the international community about the elections of the MB. After the military coup, human rights and women’s rights became the popular frame because of Abdel Fatah el-

Sisi’s government’s imprisonment and torture of some of the MB’s members and the people associated with them. The activism of the Sisters did not go unnoticed by the male members of the MB. This visibility of their political and social activism, as well as the state's targeting of the

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Sisters, has made it difficult for the MB’s male leadership to disregard women activists as equal partners. This led the Egyptian MB in Turkey to consider drafting bylaws in January 2017 to set a quota for women’s participation in the movement’s Shura Council, which functions as both an executive board and a parliament. In 2017, the Brotherhood elected the first female member of its Shura Council in Turkey. These results highlight the shift in framing and medium of organizing Islamist women use to promote their activism and gain the most positive results within the current political context. This shift was guided by the dominant frame/language of rights at the moment as well as opening and backlash in government and civil society. The pragmatic strategies of Islamist women in the MB have been crucial for its survival during periods of backlash. The organizing experience women have gained promoting the MB’s work and preserving its structure, coupled with being less targeted for imprisonment, has enabled the

Sisters to have greater public voice domestically and internationally. It also led them to push for more representation in the movement itself and to force the MB to take them more seriously.

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Conclusion

How do political opportunity structures (POS) shape Islamist women’s political participation in Egypt? How do Islamist women’s political organizing and framing strategies, in turn, reshape their political opportunities? I answered these questions by analyzing interviews, social media posts of relevant groups, and news articles published on Ikwanwebsite and other websites as sources of data on the organizing strategies of the Muslim Sisterhood (MS) in Egypt between 2010 and 2017. The findings in this dissertation help to fill the gap in political science literature regarding women’s participation during periods of significant political transition. It does so by applying a theoretical framework to POS that views it as both dynamic and gendered, as opposed to the more traditional fixed understandings of the concept. This alternative lens sheds light on the importance of alliances in shaping structural opportunities. These alliances influence activists’ access to resources as well as the nature of obstacles they encounter. The game of alliances between the three main players in Egyptian politics (the military, the secular- liberals, and the Islamists) has impacted the political organizing strategies of the MS. These alliances have affected not only their medium of organizing but also the way they framed their demands.

My theoretical model accounts for cultural, national, and international contexts. The cultural, national, and international contexts shape the balance of power between the different players and thus influence their alliances as well as their strategic choices. The religious and cultural context influences the framing used by activists especially to legitimate women’s and human rights issues within a particular political faction or ruling regime. For example, in an interview with CNN, Manal Ismail, a member of the FJP, insisted that Sharia guarantees women's rights. She stated, "Justice, freedom, and equality for all are the principles advocated by

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Sharia" (Amin 2011); thereby attempting to justify the Morsi regime as consonant with women’s rights among its followers and in the eyes of the international community.

The international context became more influential on the framing of MS activists after the military coup of 2013. During this period, Islamist women of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) in Egypt have used international agreements on human and women’s rights to frame their demands and to maximize their gains. The statements issued by Women Against the Coup are the main example of using women’s rights as a framing strategy for resistance against Abdel

Fatah el-Sisi’s government. In a statement in November of 2017 that was accompanied by presentations at conferences and media appearances, the group made the following pronouncements:

They concluded their statement with a call for women’s and human rights organizations to expose Abdel Fatah el-Sisi’s rights violations against Egyptian women.

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The POS model discussed in depth in Chapter Two of this dissertation views politics in

Egypt in terms of alliances between the military, the Islamists, and the secular-liberal political parties. Since the Free Officer Coup of 1952, cooperating with the military became of paramount importance for the two other players in order to create an alliance with the potential of achieving governmental control. The alliances influence activists’ access to two mediums for their political activities: government and civil society. Alliances in Egyptian politics produced political openings for and backlash against the MS. The Sisters’ responses to changes in the POS included shifting their activism between the two mobilizing mediums (government and civil society).

Historically, the Sisters mainly organized in the medium of civil society, with a few exceptions of activism within the government. This changed in 2012, during the MB government, as some prominent Sisters such as Asma Shukr expanded their activism as governmental actors. After the backlash in 2013, the Sisters went back to organizing through civil society; however, they also

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expanded their activism to international civil society. Thus, the trajectory of their activism, in terms of the political mediums in which they were most active, shifted several times from 2010-

17:

Civil society domesticallyà Civil society + Governmentà Civil Society domestically +

internationally

Their framing strategies, in terms of the ways they articulated their demands and to whom, also changed during significant regime shifts between 2010 and 2017:

Religion (charity) à Women’s rights from a religious perspective à Women’s rights

and human rights from an international perspective

To highlight the varying influences of different alliances between the military, Islamists, and secular-liberal parties introduced in Chapter Two, Chapter Three examined women’s issues under the three alliances that formed between 2010 and 2017. Islamists, secular-liberal elites, and civil society groups have each modified their views regarding women’s issues based on the political climate and cultural contexts. This domestic interaction between the players did not occur in isolation; rather it was influenced by the larger international context in which these players operated. For example, Hosni Mubarak attempted to project a secular image of his government to the international community and secular players in Egyptian politics by reforming domestic laws related to the family and women, as well as ratifying international agreements on gender.

The MB’s participation in politics since Gamal Abdel Nasser’s era (1950s) prompted them to act strategically in forging alliances with various opposition groups, including secular civil society organizations active in student and professional associations, in the political system.

Modernizing their position on women’s issues in society and politics was essential for the MB to

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ally with any of the other political players in Egypt. This shift in position regarding women enabled the MB to appeal to and collaborate with other ideological segments in Egyptian society.

The MB issued its first statement on women as voters and candidates in 1994 declaring that women could run as candidates. However, this statement still excluded women from the structure of the movement. This did not drastically change until the military coup in July 2013.

The door for more involvement of women in the internal structure of the movement in Egypt and in exile had been opened due to the unprecedented backlash by Abdel Fatah el-Sisi’s government after the military coup in 2013 against the MB members as well as the expanding experience of the Sisters in the formal and informal mediums.

The influence of alliances on the MS’s strategic organizing, and how that helped women carve out more spaces for themselves in the MB and in politics, was highlighted in Chapter Four.

As the chapter shows in detail, the period between 1980 until 2011 was marked by an alliance between the military and secular-liberal political parties. During this period of backlash against the MB, the Sisters joined the lines of civil society. They operated in the informal political medium, focusing on social welfare. When the government was blocked for the MB and MS, the

Sisters organized mainly in domestic civil society institutions. Though the MS initially limited its activities to social work, such as sheltering poor families, they increasingly focused on mobilizing political and financial support for imprisoned Brothers deemed a “security threat” by the Hosni Mubarak regime. The Sisters also played an instrumental role in running media campaigns for the MB during national parliamentary elections in 2005 and 2010, building on women’s access to people via mosques and welfare organizations. The position of women in the

MB began to marginally evolve during this period due to ideological changes within the

Brotherhood. To neutralize the influence of the Islamists who were gaining moral authority and

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shaping the discourse on morality in Egyptian society, Hosni Mubarak coopted women’s issues to gain the support of secular groups. As a response to this strategy and an attempt to gain votes during parliamentary elections after 1995, the MB changed their position on women’s political participation. However, this transformation restricted the Sisters’ roles to the political activities of the MB and did not include them in the internal hierarchy of the MB, which remained male.

An interview I conducted with a prominent Sister, who referred to herself only as Mai, illustrated the role of the Sisters under the Hosni Mubarak regime until the uprisings:

In relation to the movement inside Egypt, and the role of women under Mubarak’s rule, the women participated in the activities and practices of the movement, but they were banned organizationally due to the security situation under Mubarak. But they participated in all syndicates, activities and services without publicly declaring their ties to the movement because of the security grip. At the beginning of the revolution, the women went down to the squares and there were lots of martyrs in the January revolution. They participated in the protests and slept in the squares, all Egyptian squares and in Tahrir square. During the January revolution, women were the ones organizing and taking care of the needs of the squares and field hospitals. They were also present during the Battle of the Camels11 challenging thuggery and supporting the men. And many women brought their kids to the squares and slept there. And they had an important role in educating the masses in the different streets on the importance of the revolution and importance of supporting it until it succeeds (Interview 1/20/2017).12

The period between February 2011 and June 2013 was marked by an alliance between the military and the MB. After the January 25 uprisings, the MB emerged as the only established alternative to the previous regime because they had a set agenda, financial resources, and widespread support due to their years of activism and social service provision. Their political party, the Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) was formed by the MB after the uprising and consisted of members from the MS and MB. Access to the political party allowed the Sisters to

11 In February 2011, pro-Mubarak thugs on horses and camels attacked protesters in Tahrir Square (See http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/33470.aspx).

12 Author conducted the interview in Arabic over the phone and translated the interview to English, 2017. 169

move between civil society and the Islamist political elites through membership. After joining the party, their work became more formally political as women ran for elections and held high positions in Morsi’s government. This period was marked by an opening in the formal and informal medium for the Muslim Sisters, and their political activities increased compared to the

Hosni Mubarak era. The FJP held training sessions for women to help them run for office and engage in politics, and the Sisterhood used the formal political medium, the government, to organize. With the opening of political space, the Sisters’ political engagement expanded even further, both publicly and within the MB structure. Sisters held positions in the FJP’s secretariats across Egypt on women’s political awareness and media relations committees as they began to achieve some more notable leadership positions. As of 2012, the MB allowed women to be elected as heads of their regional women’s committees, which communicate directly with the

Guidance Bureau (the movement’s highest leadership and administration body) positions that were previously held only by men. However, women held no senior positions in the FJP or the

MB. Women’s rights became a central issue due to the concerns of the liberals and the international community about the national election of the FJP under the MB. Socioeconomic rights and democracy were the Sisters’ main framing focus before and during the uprisings.

However, Islamist women from the MB had to explain their position on women’s rights as it relates to religion and international agreements. Mai describes this period as follows:

Women participated in parliamentary elections as founding and participating members in the drafting of the 2012 constitution. And then under Morsi’s government, some women served as his advisors, members of the People’s Assembly, ministers, in every leadership, service, and executive centers. They were also in the administrative committee and the founding of the structure of the party (Interview 1/20/2017).13

13 Author conducted the interview in Arabic over the phone and translated the interview to English, 2017. 170

The current period, which began in June 2013, has been marked by an alliance between the military and secular-liberal political parties. Between August and November 2012, Morsi started losing the support of some leftist and liberal factions within civil society, which eventually led to Morsi’s ouster by the military on July 3rd, 2013. Leading up to this coup was the empowerment of the military as the primary guardian of Egyptian politics by secular parties headed by people such as Mohamed ElBaradei. This was coupled with widespread demonstrations by various civil society groups calling for the ouster of President Mohammed

Morsi. During the presidential elections in May 2014, various secular-liberal political parties supported Abdel Fattah el-Sisi for president. The 2013 military coup left civil society divided between groups who were for and against the coup.

Following the backlash, the Muslim Sisters joined civil society groups opposing the coup.

The Sisterhood founded Women Against the Coup (WAC), the first of several women-only resistance movements established. This group remains the most active organization for women’s mobilization across Egypt to this day. The Sisters made violence against women a central issue for sustaining the support for their mobilization. They started providing data on cases of violence against women as early as November 2013. Their main work abroad focuses on communicating reports of human rights abuses in Egypt against the opposition to international human rights organizations such as Human Rights Watch. After the military coup, human rights and women’s rights, as described in international agreements, became the popular frame due largely to Abdel

Fatah el-Sisi’s government imprisoning and torturing members of the MB and the people with whom they associated. The Sisters expanded their activism internationally to connect to international human rights NGOs and even considered registering their WAC organization with the United Nations. As Mai explains this period:

171

And after the coup, the women had a major role in the squares by educating the crowds and rejecting the coup. The number of female martyrs a day before the evacuation of Raba’a is a great example of the important role they played. The number of women who were in Raba’a, Al-Nahda, and Almanashiya is also a great example. And then after the coup, the work was mainly based on women due to the situation and the number of men detainees inside of detention centers. The women established various movements against the coup, such as women against the coup inside and outside of Egypt and there are others like it. And now the women are still fighting against the coup either by playing a role inside of detention centers, or by supporting their husband, or son, or brother in detention centers, or by spreading awareness among the different sectors of society, or by media, or by communication tools. After three years of the coup, women are still in the squares (Interview 1/20/2017).14

The Sisters’ activism made it hard for the MB leaders to ignore the women’s demands, prompting the Egyptian MB living in exile in Turkey to elect the first female member of its

Shura Council during its most elections in 2017.

The progression in women’s political activism and their role in the MB shows that different political contexts shaped Islamist women’s organizing strategies. Similarly, these strategies have opened the space for Islamist women in the MB and made them visible as important political actors in the Egyptian society. The political opening and closure influenced by the alliances shaped the Sisters’ medium of organizing and the way they framed their demands. The Sisters’ choices impacted the political trajectory of the Islamists and allowed them to play new roles in the Egyptian government (albeit briefly) and, eventually, in the MB’s internal governance structures. Thus, their agency dynamically impacted the political opportunity structures they continue to contend with. As these results suggest, examining women’s decisions about political framing and mediums of organizing is essential for achieving a more comprehensive understanding of their activism. Certain political processes, such as how the context interacts with women’s activism, can be masked without considering the gendered and

14 Author conducted the interview in Arabic over the phone and translated the interview to English, 2017. 172

dynamic nature of POS. For instance, not examining civil society as a legitimate medium for political organizing by Islamists will mask how the efforts of Islamist women in civil society shape their strategic thinking and their perception of their role as activists. On how their activities in civil society helped the Muslim Sisters and the MB in the elections after the uprisings, Asma Shokr notes,

It helped them get close to the people by forming multiple relationships. At the same time, we knew that our interaction with people will familiarize them with us and you can see its result in the love of people for us before the coup and before the demonization campaign by Sisi (Interview 1/15/2018).15

The POS model in this dissertation demonstrates that the relationship between structure and agency is dynamic in that they both influence one another. Some of the prominent activists in the MS, such as Asma Shokr and Dina Zakaria, noticed an increase in women’s political roles in the movement and a change in women’s political consciousness. There is a realization among the Sisters that their role in the MB is evolving and anticipation of the future. The Sisters’ decades of political consciousness and organizing experience during periods of opening and backlash against the MB provided them with the necessary skills that allowed them to play a stronger role within the organization and the resistance against the current Egyptian regime.

Their involvement made various men affiliated with the MB realize that women are essential for any revival efforts of the movement after the coup. As Amar El-Beltagy, the son of leading

Brotherhood figure Mohamed El-Beltagy, claimed in an interview I conducted with him in

Istanbul, “Now Muslim Brotherhood women are participating in more than a half of their activities, if there is a revival of the movement or a new Brotherhood, women will have to be

15 Author conducted the interview in Arabic over the phone and translated the interview to English, 2017. 173

at the heart of it, much more than before” (Interview 1/11/2017).16

The findings of this dissertation add to a growing body of literature shedding light on the agency of Muslim women by examining their social and political choices aimed at carving out more spaces for their participation in social, economic, and political systems (See Sered 1992,

Abu-Lughod 1993, and Mahmood 1998 & 2005). Mahmood’s Politics of Piety (2005) is one of the iconic works on Muslim women’s agency in Egypt and the Middle East and North Africa.

Mahmood views human agency as not beyond the realms of resistance, power, or domination, but rather as a “capacity for action that historically specific relations of subordination enable and create” (Mahmood 2005, 27). Mahmood problematizes prior analyses of women's involvement in religious movements by showing that women can use social constraints for emancipatory ends. Women’s efforts in Islamic movements pave the way for new ways of expressing women's interests within the structures of these movements. Similarly, my work shows that even though the Muslim Sisters advocate an Islamist agenda, which is presumably oppressive to women, the

Sisters are carving more leadership spaces for themselves in the MB. They are doing so by reinterpreting the religious texts and engaging in political activism to promote the MB publicly, regardless of the security risks. Despite the various restrictions on their participation as Islamists and as women, the Sisters strategically engaged with the POS, asserting their agency and creating wider openings in the structure of the movement for their political participation. The

Sisters’ work evolved from merely focusing on social work and preaching to becoming members of the MB’s political party and later becoming leaders of the resistance movement against Abdel

Fatah el-Sisi’s regime, challenging violence against women and allying with international human rights groups in the process. Moreover, as the following stirring commentary by Dina Zakaria

16 Author conducted the interview in Arabic and translated it to English, Istanbul, 2017. 174

suggests, the Sisters’ political and gender consciousness forged through their activist trajectory has and continues to contribute to Egyptian feminist consciousness and activism more generally, which speaks to the necessity of seeing Islamist women as both political and feminist actors

So, women at that time took the decision that they are a part of everything. No one can tell them to stay at home because they are under threat. They insisted on participating regardless of if their husbands, their brothers, their family or other people who knew them told them to stay at home because they are in danger. The woman took the decision by herself that she will get down to the street to call for her right. So, and all men confessed, it happened in Raba’a, that most of the men on the stage, they said that we realize that women, Egyptian women are strong, they are even stronger than men and they proved that they are not only partners in the revolution, but they are the leaders of the situation (Interview 1/13/2017).17

Future Research

Due to the richness of the case of the Egyptian MS in Egypt and the limited scholarly work written on these women, the dissertation focuses in its entirety on them. Generalizing about

Islamist women’s strategic political organizing and its relationship with the POS, particularly in the Arab world, will require the study of more cases in the Middle East and North African

(MENA) region. Further study is needed on POS with a gender lens, especially about Islamist women within the MENA region, where Islamist women promote and sustain Islamist movements, groups, and parties but also are claiming their own spaces and power within these and the body politic in ways that advance women’s rights. A comparative study of organizations such as Ennahda in Tunisia, Justice and Development Party (JDP) in Morocco, the Gulenist movement and AKP in Turkey, Hamas in the Palestinian territories, the Northern Branch of the

Islamic Movement in Israel, and the MB in Jordan would expand our understanding of Islamist women’s political organizing and their role in shaping MENA politics, including women’s and feminist politics in the region.

17 Interview conducted by author in English, Istanbul, 2017. 175

Most of these movements and parties are influenced by the MB in Egypt. Ennahda, for example, is important because after the elections in 2011, Ennahda’s women occupied senior leadership positions in the assembly, including the chair of the constitutional committee on rights and freedoms. However, women lack representation in leadership positions in the party. In

Morocco, women have been included on the party list of the JDP, the leading party following the

Arab revolutions. In addition to being influenced by the MB, the JDP is also influenced by the

AKP in Turkey, which promotes women’s participation in various levels of electoral politics and society. The MB in Jordan has engaged women in their political and ideological agenda in various ways. This study of the MS’s political trajectory provides not only analysis of one of the most established Islamist women’s organizations but also a theoretical and methodological framework that can be applied in other settings in the MENA region to reveal how and how significantly Islamist women’s political activism within and beyond Islamist movements and regimes are not just shaped by but are also re-shaping political alliances, organizing strategies, and most especially gender politics.

176

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