Egypt In The Time And Space Of Globalism

Arab Studies Quarterly (ASQ), Summer, 1999 by Raymond William Baker

With the earth and the life it supports imperiled by dangers beyond the capacities of the nation state and the world market, the most urgent task for the new century is to foster peaceful networks of transnational cooperation in the planetary and human interest. The best hope for a just world order, responsive to the claims of the environment and human rights, flows from enhanced prospects for democratic participation that might yet create a framework of accountability for an unchallenged superpower and unrestrained market forces. As the twentieth century draws to a close, this imperative defines my starting point in approaching Egyptian politics and all other issues of world politics. Driven by accelerated technological, financial, and informational flows, over which only the single superpower can exercise any control at all, globalism today means unchallenged American dominance.(1)

The dominant globalism of the U.S. hegemon and corporate capitalism dampens the hope for a global politics in the planetary and human interest. America's self-described commitments are to the free market and to democracy. It is now clear, however, that the tensions between these two goals will be resolved in favor of the market, with only a rhetorical nod to democracy, unless there is conscious intervention by democratic forces from below. The overriding political and moral obligation facing citizens around the world is to use the new conditions and means of connectivity to work with others who share a global consciousness on behalf of projects in the common interest, driven neither by the power calculus or the cash nexus. Transportation and communication networks have created an enabling space-time compression that makes what was once a utopian dream of responsible global citizenship an experienced reality. Computer networks, Howard Frederick explains, are making possible the emergence of a global civil society to speak for "the Common Good of Humankind by loosing the bonds of the marketplace and the strictures of government on the media of communications...." Around the globe, social forces that stand for peace, the environment, and human rights are struggling to bend globalism to humane and principled ends. In this effort they rely on the new communication networks that are transforming international relations by strengthening global civil society.(2)

Transnational social movements, leaning against nationalist and market pressures and organized around issues of peace, human rights, and the environment, have been most effective in advancing this goal of creating a global consciousness and a worldwide arena for citizen participation in which it might find expression. The prospects of interaction for a common good have been extended to ordinary citizens, both at the center of American power and in areas where that power is felt, like Egypt. In short, new forms of association and cooperation are energizing a grassroots globalism that does hold promise of creating flexible webs of connection from which actions for the sake of safeguarding the earth and the human species can spring. Around the globe, prophetic minorities with a global consciousness have spontaneously arisen, committed to the peaceful remaking of themselves, their own societies, and the global economic system originating in the "world revolution of Westernization."(3)

Such groups are the vanguards of grassroots globalism. In their ranks are those with Egyptian names and including those with identities shaped by their commitment to the universalistic values of Islam, interpreted for the late modern world. The creative, non-violent actions of these groups are local but with global import, related but not coordinated, and linked but not unified. These new transnational social movements are inventing a postmodern global consciousness and politics with the potential to act against the violence that has marred the revolution of Westernization. They are creating projects of peaceful cooperation that advance human well-being and the health of the globe, projects driven neither by the realism of the nation state system nor the bottom line of the world market. Theirs, to borrow Inglehart's phrase, is a "silent revolution" that breathes life into the notion of a transnational human social bond in the place and time of globalism.(4)

How does Egypt's political story play into this "silent revolution," if at all? What has been the impact of the strong American presence in Egypt for several decades now on the process of democratization? What contributions has the United States made to the strengthening of Egyptian civil society from which such movements might arise? What steps might the United States take today to advance that goal? Who are the partners in Egypt who might respond and take advantage to any such opening that the United States could strengthen? Do such partners include centrist Islamist forces?

Egyptians, whose consciousness has been awakened to needs more compelling than those of nationalism and consumerism, are initiating or making themselves available for collaborative political actions to address pressing issues of environmental degradation and failure to protect basic human rights and needs. For all the talk of the exceptionalism of the Islamic world, this hopeful trend has its Arab expressions, with some particularly promising manifestations in Egypt.