open space 106 reflections on (counter) revolutionary processes in Egypt Nadje Al-Ali When journalists or friends ask me about the gendered impact of the various revolutionary processes in the region, usually a variation of ‘But how are the women affected by it all?’, I realise that my answer tends to overstretch people’s attention span. I increasingly find it difficult to reply in sound bites. It is challenging to get across the complex and contradictory ways in which the (counter) revolutionary processes and political transformations have affected women, men and gender norms and relations over the past years. Given the diverse historical trajectories and current developments, it is crucial, I think, that we look more closely at specific contexts, rather than engage in sweeping generalisations about gender and revolutions in the Middle East. The situation in Syria, with the largely militarised uprising and an incredibly violent crackdown by the regime, is dramatically different from processes in Egypt and Tunisia. Bahrain, Yemen or Libya are also radically distinct political, economic and social contexts. I also recognise that my thoughts about recent developments in Egypt are informed by my research and activism in relation to Iraq. For a long time now, I have spent time and energy as an academic and as an activist arguing against the ‘culturalisation’ of gender-related issues— particularly with reference to gender-based violence in the Iraqi context. For years, I have felt compelled to say and write: it is not about ‘their culture’, but it is about political economies. It is about authoritarian dictatorships and conservative patriarchal interpretations and practices. It is about foreign interventions and invasions. I believe in intersectionality; that is, that the struggle for women’s rights intersects with the struggle against other inequalities, which, in Iraq, translates into the struggles against imperialism, authoritarianism and, crucially as well, sectarianism. Being based in London, my feminism certainly also intersects with the struggle against racism and Islamophobia. While making these connections, I have tried not to become an apologist in terms of systematic human and women’s rights abuses in Iraq and elsewhere. Yet I have to admit that I am personally frustrated by my own feminist review 106 2014 (122–128) © 2014 Feminist Review. 0141-7789/14 www.feminist-review.com

constant compulsion to fight Islamophobia and racism and, in that process, sometimes gloss over forms of gender-based violence, the political marginalisation of women and extremely socially conservative attitudes towards women and gender relations that do of course need to be analysed by reference to foreign interventions and authoritarian regimes, but surely cannot be reduced to them. This sentiment is not very popular among many progressive academics and activists based in western contexts, but has certainly shaped the way in which I have been perceiving and reacting to events unfolding in Egypt. My interest in Egypt stems from the time I lived in Cairo during the 1990s, when I studied for an MA, got involved in the Egyptian women’s movement and also carried out fieldwork for my PhD thesis on the meanings of secularism in the context of Egyptian women’s rights activism. Clearly, women’s rights activism and the wider political context have changed greatly since my time living in Cairo. I also find myself not recognising the city that Valeria Dessi, one of my current PhD students, is describing in her fieldwork notes as she is trying to make sense of the social and political spaces and places in flux at this historical juncture, studying the relations between on- and off-line feminist activism. However annoying and frustrating the constant low-level, largely verbal harassment of women on the streets of Cairo was during the 1990s, I felt safe to live on my own, regularly walked late at night and got into any taxi without hesitation. That is not the case for Valeria, who finds it hard to venture out on her own, even during the day. Like most Egyptian women these days, she dresses modestly and sensibly, yet still needs to constantly think about her personal security, and that of her friends.

beyond sexual harassment

1 Caspini, M. (2013) ‘Actor dressed as woman feels Egypt’s sexual harassment’, Christian Science Monitor, 17 May, http://www.csmonitor .com/World/Making-adifference/Change-Agent/ 2013/0517/Actordressed-as-woman-feelsEgypt-s-sexualharassment, last accessed 22 July 2013.

The surge and intensity of sexual harassment has increasingly received attention within academia and the international media, but has also gained centre stage in Egypt. In May 2013, Egyptian TV broadcasted a programme in which a young male actor, dressed up as a woman, walked the streets of Cairo, being verbally and physically harassed by men of different class backgrounds, whether he was dressed as a veiled or an unveiled woman.1,2 The programme was shown after Egyptian women’s and human rights activists had been focusing on the issue of sexual harassment for several months. However, despite the epidemic and severity of incidences, we should be wary of interpreting such developments as a straightforward backlash against women’s rights, or even more specifically as sexual harassment. A focus on harassment itself evokes a mixed picture as the widespread mobilisation, campaigning and advocacy against harassment is unprecedented, and has allowed for a previously sensitive issue to be addressed publicly by Egyptian women and, I should stress, many men. This stands in clear contrast to the way in which any gender-based violence was previously considered a taboo Nadje Al-Ali

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subject. I remember an incident during my time living in Cairo in the 1990s when a feminist organisation, the New Woman’s Research Centre, had caused an uproar by having written a research and policy paper on gender-based violence. At the time, the group was harshly criticised, even by some fellow feminists, for trying to impose western issues and problems on Egyptian society. In the late 1990s and the decade running up to the toppling of the Mubarak regime, incidences of gang rape and sexual harassment increasingly entered women’s rights activism, as well as public and media discussions. However, in post-Mubarak Egypt, sexual harassment and rape are not only talked about publicly but are at the core of much mobilising. What is also remarkable is how sexual harassment and its counterpart, women’s security and ability to move safely in public spaces and participate in political activities, is not anymore perceived to be a diversion from the wider revolutionary struggle for greater equality and social justice, as was initially the case.3 Nowadays, those parties, groups and individuals who see themselves as holding on to the spirit of the revolution view the fight against harassment as central to their wider demands and visions for a new society. It is heartening to see the large number of men of different generations in solidarity, although young men seem to be particularly involved in anti-harassment campaigns, such as Harassmap, Operation Anti-Sexual Harassment (OpAntiSH) and Tahrir Bodyguard. Yet, discourses about harassment differ greatly, ranging from conservative protection discourses (propagated by President Morsi and conservative strands of the media and political landscape) to the prevailing analysis of feminists and progressive political forces focusing on ‘the authorities’ as the source of attacks on women. Here, accusations range from blaming the police, the military, remnants of the former regime and the Muslim Brotherhood.4,5 Whoever the main culprits are behind sexual harassment, some of what we witness in Egypt today is clearly planned and instigated. On 25 January 2013, the second anniversary of Egypt’s revolution, at least nineteen women were sexually assaulted by gangs of men. These attacks were similar to previous assaults during protests: large numbers of men move jointly through crowds, working in a systematic and orchestrated way, surrounding individual women, first in a U shape, then fully encircling a woman in several lines of men. Victims report feeling confused by some men speaking about protection while closing in on them and attacking them in a most brutal manner, including stripping off their clothes and raping them with objects and fingers.6 OpAntiSH, a coalition of female and male activists who work jointly with several individual activists and organisations, issued a statement expressing its disappointment with revolutionary groups and political parties who failed to secure the Square for female protesters.7 The focus on the patterns of attacks, their systematic and apparently orchestrated nature and the question of instigators, stands in contrast to the sensationalist 124

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2 Gaballa, A. (2013) ‘Man dresses as woman to experience Egypt’s sexual harassment’, Aswat Misriya, 6 May, http://en .aswatmasriya.com/news/ view.aspx?id=01cb45cfe7ea-49e0-9a109a03bc32b3db, last accessed 22 July 2013.

3 Sholkamy, H. (2011) ‘From Tahrir Square to my Kitchen’, Open Democracy, 14 March, http://www .opendemocracy.net/ 5050/hania-sholkamy/ from-tahrir-square-tomy-kitchen, last accessed 22 July 2013.

4 Tadros, M. (2013) ‘Politically motivated sexual assault: the story no one wants to hear’, The Guardian Blog, 11 March, http://www.guardian.co .uk/global-development/ poverty-matters/2013/ mar/11/politicallymotivated-sexualassault-egypt, last accessed 22 July 2013. 5 Wright, B. (2013) ‘Dr Hoda El Sadda stands up to sexual harassment’, Cairo West, 6 March, http://www .cairowestmag.com/? p=1346, last accessed 22 July 2013. 6 Sayed, D. (2013) ‘Terror in Tahrir’, Egypt Independent, 2 March, http://www.guardian.co .uk/global-development/ poverty-matters/2013/

mar/11/politicallymotivated-sexualassault-egypt, last accessed 22 July 2013. 7 Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (2013) ‘Operation Anti-Sexual Harassment/Assault condemns the attacks on women in Tahrir Square on Friday January 25th, the failure of political groups to secure the square and unprofessional media conduct’, http://eipr.org/ en/pressrelease/2013/01/ 29/1612, last accessed 22 July 2013. 8 El-Tahawy, M. (2012) ‘Why do they hate us?, Foreign Policy, May/June 2012, http://www .foreignpolicy.com/ articles/2012/04/23/ why_do_they_hate_us, last accessed 22 July 2013. 9 Seikaly, S. and Mikdashi, M. (2012) ‘Let’s talk about sex’, Jadaliyya, 25 April, http://www .jadaliyya.com/pages/ index/5233/lets-talkabout-sex, last accessed 22 July 2013. 10 Malik, N. (2012) ‘Do Arab men hate Arab women? It’s not that simple!’, Comment is Free, The Guardian, 25 April, http://www.guardian.co .uk/commentisfree/2012/ apr/25/arab-menwomen-mona-eltahawy? newsfeed=true, last accessed 22 July 2013.

tone of Channel 4’s documentary: Egypt—Sex, Mobs and Revolution, aired in December 2012. The documentary addressed the issue of harassment, suggesting that Egyptian men had turned into uncontrolled sex-craved mobs. It made for very uncomfortable viewing, especially in my living room in London, knowing exactly how much of the British public would interpret the documentary. It was feeding right into stereotypes of violent Muslim men oppressing their women. It reminded me of Mona El-Tahawy’s controversial and problematic article entitled ‘Why do they hate us?’, published in Foreign Policy in April 2012.8 There were lots of things wrong in El Tahawy’s article, which appeared to blame Middle Eastern men as a group for the oppression and discriminatory practices against Middle Eastern women as a group. I do not want to rehearse the excellent critiques of this piece provided earlier, pointing to the historically rooted and structural injustices and forms of oppression, such as colonialism, capitalism, authoritarianism, patriarchy and neoliberalism, affecting all women and men in the region.9,10 Yet, despite my own reservations about the packaging, content and tone of El-Tahawy’s article, I felt uncomfortable with the lack of serious attempts to look inward, name and confront those attitudes, norms, practices and relations that cannot be simply explained away by external and structural patterns, forces and processes. Both the documentary and El-Tahawy’s article clearly lacked nuance and complexity, beyond the idea of women being the victims of men’s violence and oppression as part of systematic and structural male dominance. But—and this is the sticking point for me—I have been increasingly wondering whether there is not more going on than simply state- or police-orchestrated harassment and violence. Verbal and physical sexual harassment of women has been going on for decades and is currently happening away from the most visible places, such as in side streets, at workplaces, in schools, as well as in homes. At the same time, I have also been wondering whether a narrow focus on harassment and gang attacks on women might be short-sighted and problematic in the long run. To my mind, we need to investigate the potential connections between the orchestrated sexual harassment of women on the streets and a wider normalisation of violence, whether in terms of the torture of men and women at the hands of the authorities, widespread executions in Egyptian prisons, and extra-juridical punishments and executions. Yet, I also think it is important to look beyond the systematic gang attacks and tackle wider forms of sexual harassment, linking it to domestic violence, marital rape, female genital mutilation and honour-based crimes and killings. In addition to ‘looking inward’—and many Egyptian feminists have already made this connection for many years—we need a more long-term and holistic strategy against harassment that includes a campaign for a fairer economic redistribution, against neo-liberal economic policies, and, crucially as well, a campaign against the systematic marginalisation of women in decisionmaking processes, both within governmental institutions and many opposition and dissident contexts. Nadje Al-Ali

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r e s h a p i n g o f ge n d e r no r m s a n d re l a t i o n s Recognising the danger of reducing complex phenomena to a ‘crisis in masculinity’, or feeding into international security discourses and naturalising class-based thuggery as Amar (2011) cautions us against, I still think that we need to think more deeply and productively about contestations of masculinities and femininities at this particular historical juncture in Egypt. The large presence of men in solidarity with women is clearly a sign of changing times and for men evidence that they are beginning to make connections that they did not before. On the other hand, elements of the military, some political parties, the police and secret services, deploy and make use of thuggish violent masculinities to assert their authority and intimidate women and men who resist. Yet, there are many other processes going on that require closer scrutiny, such as the celebrated militancy of ultras (anarchic football fans who have been fighting elements of the police and security services during protests); the increase in social conservatism with its stress on family values and cohesion; the increased Islamisation of public and political discourses; and the ongoing extreme gap in access to resources, employment and political decision-making. I recognise that masculinities and femininities are constantly in crisis, meaning that they are contested, polarised and struggled over, and that these crises have a lot to do with political economies. In the Egyptian context, the impact of structural adjustment and neo-liberal policies cannot be overstated. As Pratt (2013: 2–3) has been arguing, the intensification of neo-liberal economic reforms has ‘largely dismantled “ideal” gender relations for working and lower middle class families, but at the expense of the sustainability of social reproduction, thereby creating nostalgia for “traditional” gender relations’, in addition to ‘the securitization of authoritarian regimes (that is, the increasing reliance by regimes upon coercion), often provoking feelings of emasculation among the victims of security forces’. When talking to Egyptian men and women of low income and middle classes, the nostalgia for a glorified past in which men could be ‘real men’ and women could be ‘real women’ often becomes apparent. I would like to add though that while the level and intensity of contestation over masculinities and femininities has risen considerably, so have the possibilities of reimagining boundaries. This might seem contradictory and paradoxical given the overall shift towards more conservative gender norms and relations driven not only by Islamist political constituencies but many ordinary people as well. Within that hardening of boundaries and norms, within this conservative shift, though, there are openings that profoundly challenge hegemonic gender norms. I agree with Kandiyoti11 that we cannot simply explain away as patriarchy and misogyny the honing in on women’s dress codes, their mobility, their sexuality, their presence during protests, actually the honing in on the fact that they are political actors. The context is radically different, and has been getting there for some time. 126

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11 Kandiyoti, D. (2013) ‘Fear and fury: women and post-revolutionary violence’, Open Democracy, 14 January, http://www

.opendemocracy.net/ 5050/deniz-kandiyoti/ fear-and-fury-womenand-post-revolutionaryviolence, last accessed 22 July 2013.

Kandiyoti introduces the term ‘masculinist restoration’ to signal that when patriarchy as usual no longer feels secure, it requires a higher level of coercion and the deployment of more varied ideological state apparatuses to ensure its reproduction. To my mind, these rather desperate attempts by the state to reinstate more clear-cut gender norms and relations play right into the insecurities, frustrations and anger of men outside of the political elite who feel challenged by women’s aspirations, activism, disobedience and desires. What I am suggesting here is for us to move beyond our overly myopic oppositional accounts that position and constrain us in ways that force a series of knee-jerk reactions. Clearly, we have to be nuanced and historicise any oppressive attitudes and practices, whether gender based or not. There is no doubt that elements of the Egyptian authorities are using violence, including sexual violence, that is, harassment and rape, in a targeted manner to intimidate women and assert control. Yet, this form of gender-based violence does not exist in a vacuum and both research and activism need to address the continuum of sexual and wider gender-based violence. Long-term, Egyptian feminists are challenged to intervene in debates and policymaking to address the increase in poverty, the inadequate redistribution of wealth and resources, high unemployment rates and neo-liberal economic policies. At the same time, I see that one of the biggest dilemmas for me personally, but I suspect also for other feminists inside Egypt, is to avoid the extremely unhelpful rhetoric of ‘male mob violence’ while actively addressing widespread lawlessness, a normalisation of violence, and misogynistic attitudes and practices.

author biography Nadje Al-Ali is Professor of Gender Studies at the Centre for Gender Studies, SOAS, University of London. Her main research interests revolve around gender theory; feminist activism; women and gender in the Middle East; transnational migration and diaspora mobilisation; war, conflict and reconstruction; art & cultural studies; and food. Her publications include: What kind of Liberation? Women and the Occupation of Iraq (University of California Press, 2009, co-authored with Nicola Pratt); Women and War in the Middle East: Transnational Perspectives (Zed Books, 2009, co-edited with Nicola Pratt); Iraqi Women: Untold Stories from 1948 to the Present (Zed Books, 2007); New Approaches to Migration (ed., Routledge, 2002, with Khalid Koser); Secularism, Gender and the State in the Middle East (Cambridge University Press, 2000); and Gender Writing—Writing Gender (The American University in Cairo Press, 1994), as well as numerous book chapters and journal articles. Her most recent book (co-edited with Deborah al-Najjar) is entitled We are Iraqis: Aesthetics & Politics in a Time of War (Syracuse University Press). Professor Al-Ali was President of the Association of Middle East Women’s Studies (AMEWS) from 2009 to 2011. Recently, she has been elected to the Board of the Middle East Studies Association (MESA). She is also a member of the Feminist Nadje Al-Ali

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Review Collective and a founding member of Act Together: Women’s Action for Iraq (www.acttogether.org). She is currently involved in several projects with Iraqi academics and women’s rights activists with the aim to facilitate the introduction of women and gender studies and increase evidence-based research capacity in Iraq.

references Amar, P. (2011) ‘Turning the gendered politics of the security state inside out?’ International Feminist Journal of Politics, Vol. 13, No. 3: 299–328. Pratt, N. (2013) ‘Rethinking gender in the Arab Spring’ AMEWS E-Bulletin, February, No. 2: 1–3. doi:10.1057/fr.2013.35

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