Egypt’s Constitution Conundrum: The Good, the Bad, and the Unruly in Cairo
Mohamed Morsi is trying to consolidate his grip on power in Egypt. The American educated Morsi claims his intention is to shepherd Egypt into the 21st century maintaining the country’s Muslim character while at the same time guaranteeing democratic institutions, equal access for minority populations to those institutions and improving a moribund economy in large part controlled by by the military.
Then there is the matter of Egypt’s influence in the Muslim world. With Shia Iran is momentum which is most influential in the region. Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf States, intimidated by Iran are counting on Egypt to keep that nation in check. They are counting on Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood to wave the Sunni flag and stand up to Iran
All this makes liberals in Egypt very nervous. They see Morsi as a new Mubarak- imperial, dictatorial and keeping his Muslim Brotherhood agenda under wraps. This opinion was reinforced by Morsi’s attempt to rewrite the Egyptian Constitution which would give him virtually unlimited power, protection from prosecution and most importantly, implementation of the MB’s Salafist version of sharia law. This is an important distinction. Most Egyptians would approve of sharia elements in their legal systems. However, the Salafist version of sharia (a much more stringent form) is very controversial.
The MB can be brutish and is not beyond buying votes or intimidating their their opponents. They want citizens with less influence and involvement with government, preferring instead the trappings and images of democracy. Hamas for example, is the classic example of what a MB led government looks like.
The Arab Spring heralded a new, tumultuous beginning for Egypt. Of what is not yet clear.
The final draft of Egypt’s proposed new constitution, completed in late November, was produced in such a flurry of political maneuvering, threats, and shrill rhetoric that commentators and citizens alike are still trying to understand its implications. From a liberal democratic perspective, there is much to like in the document, especially compared with the one it is replacing. For example, the drafters not only specified a long list of freedoms, as their predecessors did, but also made the wording more difficult for officials to wiggle around. But the document includes just as much that causes concern. It postpones answering the question of civilian oversight of the military until the next constitution is written, years from now. And there are gaping holes and ambiguities that only politics can fill in.
And that is the critical point so often missed: political context always shapes the meaning of constitutional texts. The Arab world’s experience with apparently democratic constitutional provisions confirms the rule. Democracy has failed in the Arab world not because governments have routinely violated their countries’ highest laws (although they have occasionally cheated) but, rather, because their constitutions’ democratic promises have generally been as vague as possible and were left to parliaments to flesh out through regular statutes. European countries first developed that system to ensure that popularly elected bodies, not kings, would define basic rights. When Arab regimes copied the practice — for example, many of them proclaimed freedom of the press but explained that the freedom would be “defined by law” — the effect was that rulers could pledge all kinds of rights and let rubber-stamp parliaments rob them of all meaning.
It is thus important to view the new Egyptian constitution as a political document — a product of specific circumstances that will not merely shape a future set of circumstances but also function within them.