12 | R
OBERT
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frighten secularists and Copts
into political quiescence, to serve as a
firewall against jihadists, to provide some Islamic legitimacy to his rule, to
demonstrate his democratic credentials and to cause the US to temper its
support for democratisation.
Given this organisational character and history, combined with
repeated tactical alliances with regimes, it would hardly be surprising if
MB veterans believed the path to power lay directly through intra-state
politics rather than through elections. Although
the history of tactical
alliances has not included an outcome in which the MB has gotten the
better of its ally, this in the minds of MB leaders would not necessarily
discredit the approach. No strategy other than revolution is truly viable in
non-democratic, unyielding systems and the MB is not a revolutionary
organisation. Indeed, it manifests the organic conservatism of its
membership, which is predominantly comprised of the petit bourgeoisie
and one that is increasingly rural and traditional.
17
Moreover, the signs of
regime decay are palpable, especially in aging Mubarak’s Egypt. Any new
president there will
need to connect to the street, and MB veterans no
doubt nurture the hope that they will provide just that service and maybe,
just maybe, while so doing, become the real power in the land. And if the
MB were to come even close to calling the shots in Egypt, its power in the
Arab world would be multiplied many times over. Why then, many MB
veterans must ask, should they risk this possibility for quixotic ventures
predicated on the assumption that regimes can be induced to liberalise?
Better to wait, to bide one’s time until the path
to state power is opened by
the fracturing of the incumbent elite. In this calculation, elections can serve
the purpose of demonstrating one’s popularity and organisational muscle,
but they can never be the only key to power.
The MB leadership’s wait and see approach, if indeed that is what it
is, is not necessarily in conflict with the emerging trend of quietist Islam,
whether in its Salafist, Sufi,
dawah salafi or other variant. Unless they are
mobilised by leaderships that are more radical, the
MB can claim to speak
on behalf of these quietist Muslims. Their very presence emphasises the
Islamisation of society and consequently legitimates the basic MB message.
17
On the shift of MB membership from urban to rural Egypt, see H. Tammam,
“MB Goes Rural”,
Al-Ahram Weekly, 17-24 October 2008 (retrieved from
http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/print/2008/919/op13.htm
).
I
S THE
EU
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RADICALISATION
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So at least this component of the apparent fragmentation of Islamism does
not pose a vital threat to the MB.
Similarly, the younger generation of moderate Islamists who have
adopted IT as their key political tool may ultimately not render the MB old
guard irrelevant as some have prophesised. The Facebookiyyin Islamists
are a captivating new force and in today’s desert of Arab politics, they
appear particularly promising, but the odds against their inducing systemic
reform and then filling liberated political space are long. Regimes are
catching up technically with the IT political provocateurs and nowhere
have governments been forced to surrender the street to them.
Youth has
energy, but probably not much staying power, so again the MB old guard
may well ride out this challenge and indeed benefit from it as well.
Political Islam, in sum, is in ferment because its path to power has
been blocked. Neither ballots nor bullets have changed the status quo. The
promise of achieving political success through democratic means has been
dashed on the bulwarks of authoritarianism. Jihadists have alienated
potential Islamist constituencies to say nothing of other Arab citizens.
Hizbullah and Hamas remain locked into their national liberation
struggles, but they are not mobilising imitators elsewhere despite the
admiration they inspire. Islamist violence in Algeria, Lebanon and Yemen
is
worrying, but thus far not of critical importance in either those countries
or elsewhere. The key battlegrounds remain the political institutions and
processes of Arab nation states, and everywhere those grounds are tilted in
favour of regimes. Hence, political despair and discontent are causing
Islamists to innovate, to seek new ways of achieving their political goals.
Notwithstanding the plethora of such new efforts, their prospects remain
limited. It seems that the status quo is set to continue,
which raises the
question of why an external actor, such as the EU, should intervene directly
or indirectly to alter it.
One answer is that the MB old guard may well be correct. While
Islamism is fragmenting, so too are the regimes. Having forsaken
liberalisation in favour of the iron fist over the last decade, many Arab
regimes have created doubts within their own ranks. The growing power of
internal security forces and decay of civilian political institutions,
including
parliaments, legal/judicial systems, local governments, political parties,
unions and so on, has engendered resentments and worries even among
the beneficiaries of these systems. Nowhere on the horizon can a transition
to democracy be perceived, while almost everywhere it is easy to see a
further entrenchment of authoritarianism. The present global economic