The Wall Street Journal has a symposium containing brief analyses of the developing situation in Egypt. Amr Bagisi, reporting from Cairo, writes that he sees two possible outcomes of the protests there and elsewhere in the country–neither of them positive:
First, the 1789 case—a win for the revolutionaries, as the massive anger that sparked the uprising is channeled into a Jacobin regime that hunts down its enemies mercilessly. It is a grave mistake to assume that the rage of the masses will be placated by the ousting of the tyrant.
Last night, one demonstrator told two friends of mine in downtown Cairo’s Tahrir Square that the next step will be to knock on the doors of suburban villas and ask the owners: Where did you get the money to afford these?
The second possibility is a reactionary scenario. If the ruling elite wins—meaning Mr. Mubarak’s cronies, if not Mr. Mubarak himself—the country will be ruled by a contract between the state and the frightened middle classes to make sure no similar uprising ever happens again. This is an angle that has been totally missing from Western media coverage, as far as I can tell without Internet access.
There is another force in the streets of Cairo besides the demonstrators. Equal, if not in numbers then certainly in influence, are the thousands of young men standing all night in front of their houses and stores to protect them from looting.
Last night, one demonstrator told two friends of mine in downtown Cairo’s Tahrir Square that the next step will be to knock on the doors of suburban villas and ask the owners: Where did you get the money to afford these?
The second possibility is a reactionary scenario. If the ruling elite wins—meaning Mr. Mubarak’s cronies, if not Mr. Mubarak himself—the country will be ruled by a contract between the state and the frightened middle classes to make sure no similar uprising ever happens again. This is an angle that has been totally missing from Western media coverage, as far as I can tell without Internet access.
There is another force in the streets of Cairo besides the demonstrators. Equal, if not in numbers then certainly in influence, are the thousands of young men standing all night in front of their houses and stores to protect them from looting.
Read the whole symposium here, which also includes perspectives from Ryan Crocker, the former U.S. ambassador to Pakistan and Iraq, and Francis Fukuyama.
