Aftermath of Revolution. By Michael Albertus and Victor Menaldo. New York Times, February 14, 2013.
(See Morsi and Egypt here.)
Albertus and Menaldo:
Less
perniciously, fits and starts may prolong the transition period and present
opportunities for “spoilers” to derail progress. The infighting in Libya is an
example. Lastly, the adoption of nominally democratic institutions may fail to
benefit the majority of citizens and even foster one-party rule, an outcome
South Africa faces today.
The
more promising cases from the Arab Spring, such as Tunisia and Egypt, fall into
this last category. In both countries, a mix of formerly powerful elites and
ascendant new elites are scrambling to game the political structure to protect
their interests, meanwhile tabling policies that could otherwise benefit the
majority of citizens.
In
Egypt, the military has won immunity from prosecution and autonomy over its
budget, while Morsi has at times reverted to Mubarak-era emergency rule to
quell popular unrest. In Tunisia, the security apparatus under former dictator
Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali remains entrenched in the government, while Ennahda has
selectively repressed protests as it turns a blind eye to crimes perpetrated by
hard-line Islamists against Tunisia’s secular middle class.
To
avoid reversion to autocracy or stalled, impartial democracy, a country in
Tunisia’s or Egypt’s circumstances must steer between the Scylla of outsized
influence by erstwhile autocratic incumbents and the Charybdis of unconstrained
new actors who seek to lock in newfound power.
As
with all revolutions, to remain on a trajectory toward democracy requires
continued popular pressure on all those with the capacity to hijack democratic
aspirations. This suggests that street protests in these countries are far from
over. In the long term, this instability may pay off in the form of democracy.
