Disappointing analysis on Egypt on Q&A

I just finished watching Q&A, and of course Egypt came up - but late and briefly. But despite the presence of Gerard Henderson ("a historian" by his own description) who I don't like, but whose analysis is usually pretty reasoned; and Richo (who usually has an interesting take any every subject); there seemed to be no insight into the situation. (And as an aside I found Amanda Vanstone fairly genial, and as usual was annoyed by Catherine Deveny, who wouldn't even comment on NSW politics - so what hope did we have of anything intelligent on Egypt.)

Anyone seeing my google reader blog recommendations will have seen a number of posts that attempt to answer the question of whether Egypt will go the way of Iran, and have a broad based revolution co-opted by Islamic fundamentalists.

My reading of middle east watchers says that a number of important differences between the two countries mean that this is much less likely in Egypt. In short: it's  a majority Sunni country, and the Shiite allegiance/subservience to the clergy which plays a large role in Iran is not present in Egypt. Also, the powerbase of the anti-Shah forces in Iran - the bazaar - which was a small finance/business sector under pressure from big business is very different in Egypt, where its equivalent - the souk - is dependent on tourism for its living, and therefore anti-fundamentalist. This excellent article spells out these, and many more points of difference.

The other thing which frustrates me in the mainstream media is the blanket use of the term "islamists", which fails to distinguish between Islamic political parties which want to work inside a democratic system, fundementalist proponents of theocracy which want to replace/subvert it, and outright terrorists. What I infer from political blogs is that it's likely that the Moslem Brotherhood has been conveniently painted as extremist by the Moubarak regime simply because they are a possible viable political opposition, and not because they are violent radicals hell bent on the destruction of democracy/The West. In fact the leadership of the MB has been careful to distance itself from terrorist groups like al Qaida.

Now don't get me wrong - I would not like to live under a Moslem Brotherhood government (or any form of Islamic rule for that matter - they don't tend to treat us hommus-sexshuals, and our women friends very nicely). But I think the test of political parties in "real democracies" (and I have my problems with 2 party systems, which are usually used as exemplars of these, like the USA) is whether or not they hold free elections at regular intervals, as governed by a constitution, and will cede power if they lose an election. I think the aspiration to become like Turkey or Indonesia is more relevant here than any likelihood of following Iran or the USA... a strong secular military providing a safeguard against any political party refusing to leave when defeated at the polls. Note the word "aspiration". The Indonesian Military under Suharto looked a lot like Mubarak and the Egyptian Military now, and yet Indonesia has a functioning democracy in terms I set forth earlier, and Turkey has recently become more than a one-party dominated state. (Now they just have to fix corruption, and subject said military to the rule of law).

|<