“What Does Democracy Look Like? Rethinking Popular Sovereignty from the Arab East”

Susanna Ferguson, Smith College

In February 1919, a certain Muhammad Effendi al-?Amlawi in Alexandria wrote in to the question-and-answer section of prominent Cairo-based monthly, al-Muqtataf. “What,” al-?Amlawi demanded, “is the meaning of these words that are everywhere right now: democracy (al-dimuqra?iyya), socialism, aristocracy, Bolshevism, Soviet, and Spartacus?” Al-?Amlawi’s request for clarification was understandable. Like the other terms on his list, “democracy” as it appeared in the Arab press in 1919 was less a coherent, stable concept than a name for a set of problems, some shared across time and space, others unique to Egypt’s specific context. Democracy did not denote an established set of ideal attributes, but rather a series of contingent, historical arguments about how to organize politics in an era of popular sovereignty. This paper explores the semantic universe that Arabic-speakers writing in the Egyptian press cohered around al-dimuqra?iyya. It focuses on two periods of particularly vivid debate over democracy’s Arabic meanings. The first, 1906-1909, encompassed the Ottoman and Iranian Constitutional Revolutions, which reverberated strongly in Egypt. The second, 1919-1923, encompassed Egypt’s own 1919 independence revolution and its aftermath, when the drafting of the electoral law and the first election cycle raised serious concerns about how popular sovereignty would work. Through a reading of five of the most influential newspapers in Egypt, as well as reports from Egypt’s Ministry of Interior, I argue that in early 20th century Egypt, “democracy” named a clear set of problems: over the meaning and function of the party (al-?izb), representation (al-niyaba), and public safety and security (al-amn al-amm). These debates offer a reading of al-dimuqra?iyya as critical social theory from the Arab world, which can shed new light on other times and places by highlighting the essential role of political institutions and police, alongside individual rights and freedoms, in defining moments of democratic becoming.

No extended abstract or paper available

 Presented in Session 192. Critical Social Theory from the Global South