My feature on the labor movement, in the British Socialist Review, is now available online:
The mass demonstrations and strikes that have swept Egypt over the last year have transformed the opposition movement. For decades Egyptians lived in fear of the regime – opposition activists were rounded up, imprisoned and tortured, and strikers gunned down – now this has changed. The two days of rioting in the textile mill town of Mahalla al-Kubra recently have shaken the regime. The Mahalla intifada – as it is now called – is part of a wider phenomenon engulfing the country. We are living in an era of growing militancy.
Today’s protests have their roots in the movement in solidarity with the second Palestinian Intifada that erupted in 2000. This triggered the biggest demonstrations in the capital, Cairo, and nationally, since the 1977 bread riots. That rebellion was brutally crushed, but its shadow continues to haunt the US backed regime of Hosni Mubarak. Young students were at the heart of the pro-Palestinian demonstrations. One of the slogans raised during the period was “The road to Jerusalem passes through Cairo.” These protests spilled over into protests against the regime. People started to ask, “Why is our government not doing enough to help Palestinians? Why is the regime supplying energy to Israel?” (Egypt is Israel’s main gas supplier.)
These small protests then developed into an anti Iraq war movement that resulted in two days of mass protests of up to 50,000 in Cairo during 2003. Protesters burned pictures of Mubarak alongside those of Western flags. The government responded with mass arrests. The anti-war protests broke the taboo surrounding criticisms of the regime. Workers were suffering in the factories, but also seeing television pictures of the protests in downtown Cairo. This has had a revolutionising impact on people’s psyche and given them more confidence to move later.
Everything changed on 7 December 2006. Egypt’s prime minister Ahmad Nazif – a neoliberal and big supporter of structural adjustment programmes – promised public sector workers a bonus to cover rising prices of basic commodities. When the government stalled payment of these bonuses, workers in Mahalla struck for three days demanding he make good his promise. The majority of garment workers in the company are women. They shamed the men into action and together they occupied the factory. The police attempted to put the factory under siege, but failed to break the strike. The victory in Mahalla triggered the biggest and most sustained wave of strikes in Egypt since the end of the Second World War. Mahalla always sets the tone for working class politics in Egypt. If Mahalla is on the rise the labor movement will be on the rise. If it loses this means a downturn in the movement.
And here’s a link to another feature in the US International Socialist Review. Spread the word (and the image) shabab.