PDF Dosyası - Ankara Üniversitesi Kitaplar Veritabanı

to come in other Arab countries, it just as obviously connot be ignored asa possible harbinger.The plaudits from the International Monetary Fund and other Westreninstitutions that Egypt came to enjoy for its commitment to economicliberalization by the late 1990s should not obscure the fact that those no wproviding the accolades had long been singing a totally different tune.Egypt's first moves toward liberalizing the command economy erectedunder Gamal Abdel Nasser came under Anwar Sadat in the early 1970s,together with the country's overall redirection of foreign policy. Althoughstrenuously applauded and encouraged by the West, it was notlong before international proponents of neoliberal economics voiced frustrationöver the pace of Egyption economic reform. Throughout most ofthe 1980s and early 1990s, the regime of Hosni Mubarak came under increasingpublic criticism from the World Bank, the IMF and the Americanembassy in Cairo for footdragging and a lack of will in effecting keymeasures required by structural adjustment.Such accusations vvere routinely dismissed by Egyptian spokesmen,who argued that vvhile the regime's commitment to liberalization vvas unshaken,the pace of reform vvas dictated by the regime's better understandingof Egypt's national life. In the mid-1990s, hovvever—and particularlyafter a nevv cabinet took offıce in early 1996~a much publicizedinvigoration of Egyptian liberalization occurred. Privatization moved forvvardat an unprecedented speed, the Cairo stock exchange blossomed,greater efforts vvere made, and vvith some success, to attract foreign investment.The private sector responded enthusiastically and the internationalcommunity began to sing Egypt's praises as an example of successfuleconomic reformer.Of interest here is not an appraisal of the economic effectiveness ofEgypt's long drive to liberalization, for that is stili highly debatable 3 . Instead,the political developments that have accompanied Egypt's economicliberalization are important in this context. By the late 1990s, thesehave begun to crystallize into broadly identifiable patterns that do notbode vvell for those hoping that economic liberalization vvill be accompaniedby political liberalization-that is, "democratization" or the movementtovvard a more inclusive and participatory political system.Put briefly, Egypt's slovv process of economic liberalization has resultedin a limited expansion of political participation, a process throughvvhich the bureaucratic old guard of Egypt's dominant political party has3. It must be noted that even this applies particularly to both the scope and significanceof the heightened drive tovvard liberalization that has characterized the country sincethe mid-1990s. Although there is no gainsaying the fact that the pace of Egypt's economicreform increased sharply relatively to earlier years, it is by no means clear thatthe private sector is on the vvay to becoming the majör engine of economic grovvth.595