Opportunity and Anxiety

As I write this, Hosni Mubarak’s resignation video plays on YouTube. It’s a surreal idea, imagining somehow that I can recline on my sofa with a laptop and witness an historic moment of regime change from a major US ally. And since I am watching it virtually as a “live” event, I can convince myself that I understand it. Later on, I might Tweet it or create a pithy Facebook status about it.

It is in the nature of such news, I suppose, that it offers us the impression (never the reality) of knowledge. I watch the protests, hear the pundits, read about the Obama administration’s responses, and weigh out what I end up believing. The more direct my video experience, the more the rhetorical suasion of the medium convinces me that I comprehend, 24/7, the story. But it is impression, illusion, like the vision of the philosopher who falls into the well while contemplating the stars, or like the hapless mall pedestrian who falls into the fountain while texting.

By this I do not mean to undermine the enormous strength and will of the Egyptian people to non-violently resist and insist upon democratic reform in a country ruled by a 30-year dictator who was largely supported by the international community. I mean only that the stories around them and their sequels are not fully read.

CNN and others have reported about Obama’s conundrum these past weeks. Does he support the people and their obvious calls for democracy or does he continue his support of a major US ally, even knowing that such support is hypocritical, that at several levels, Mubarak ran a corrupt government which denied the rights of his citizens? And if the US did not side with Mubarak, what about other friends of the United States who have similar records? There are many, and even now, we see protests resembling those in Egypt appearing across parts of the Middle East: Yemen, Jordan, Algeria, Syria, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Tunisia, and the Gaza Strip. Iran’s Khameini and others have called it a “Muslim awakening” similar to its own 1979 revolution (even while it shuts down internet access to prevent protests as home).

I don’t agree with Khameini’s analysis (I write as if I understand it, of course), but at least in one sense I have anxieties for Egypt’s opportunities. Regime change is never simple, never predictable, and we rarely get what we wish for. While Americans celebrate the resignation of Mubarak, we would do well to hold our collective breath for a minute, a tactic followed by the White House, it seems, as it responds slowly and cautiously. And while we’re waiting, a few quick historical reminders of populist regime changes:

• In Iraq in 1968, US support of the Baath Party coup brought Saddam Hussein to power.
• The US support of Afghan resistance in the 1980s also was training Al Qaeda.
• Democratic movements in India against British rule also spawned the division of India and Pakistan and 60 years of struggle and war between them.
• The Bolshevik revolution against czarist Russia birthed the Soviet Union.
• The popular Chinese Revolution brought to power Mao Tse-Tung.
• The Cuban Revolution supported by the US brought Fidel Castro to power.
• The 1979 Iranian Revolution overthrows the Shah and brings to power the Ayatollah Khomeini.
• A strong popular Islamic movement in Afghanistan in 1996 brought the Taliban to power.

Now, I know that for every example like these there are dozens of successful movements. And I also know that international political scholarship points to MSS and MDS frameworks to draw contrasts to Egypt as much as parallels. I also know there are many—assuredly small—extreme Muslim groups in Egypt (Muslim Brotherhood, for instance) and elsewhere (Hamas, Wahhabists, Salafiyyists) that are strategizing about their growth in light of these transitions.

I am also cautious about the sustainability of the Egyptian populist movement, not that it is ineffective but that it might have been too effective, accomplishing its goal in a mere 18 days, not enough time to build plausible or credible voices for new reformed leadership. India had its Gandhi, South Africa had its Mandela, and Myanmar has Aung San Suu Kyi. Who is the polarizing voice behind the Egyptian reform? Only more time will tell. For now, Egypt is in the hands of the military and Mubarak’s colleague and former vice-president Suleiman—not a reform at all, just yet, but a holding pattern.

Liberals in the US are fond of pointing accusatory fingers (and justifiably so) at the rulers of Saudi Arabia, for instance, and calling upon the US to renounce its affiliations or to force reforms. Maybe we should. But whatever we do in our zeal to support democracies in absolute terms, let’s be cautious. Egypt’s work is hardly over; it has barely opened the door to change, and the months and years before it may be as precarious as those of Iraq or Afghanistan, Nepal or Haiti. It may never devolve into a Somalia, but we must not expect the story to be over now, even though MSNBC and FOX will lose interest only days after CNN does.

I won’t be posting any congratulations just yet.