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The politics of public land dispossession in Egypt: 1975–2011 and beyond

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 August 2020

Ziad Koussa
Ziad Koussa*
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science and International Affairs, University of Balamand, North Governorate, Lebanon
*
Email: ziad.koussa@fty.balamand.edu.lb
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Abstract

This article examines changes in the allocation of urban land in Egypt between 1975–2011 with the rise and incorporation of state authoritarianism and neoliberal economics in what I call ‘authoritarian neoliberalism’. Authoritarian neoliberalism in Egypt transferred ownership of urban lands from public wealth to an affluent class of local and foreign capitalists – often in a non-transparent fashion. The article focuses on the government's legally sanctioned practices of subsidisations, privatisations and evictions as they relate to what I call, inspired by David Harvey's formulation, the accumulation of wealth by dispossession. Dispossession of public urban land, I maintain, generated widespread resentment that played a vital, but inadequately discussed, role in the series of revolts that culminated in the 2011 uprising in Egypt. Social tensions engendered in this authoritarian neoliberal regime, I argue, endure under the administration of President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, who continues to transfer public urban lands, from lower to higher socioeconomic classes, at an even faster pace than his predecessor.

Keywords

Egyptneoliberalismaccumulation by dispossessionArab Uprising
Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Modern African Studies , Volume 58 , Issue 2 , June 2020 , pp. 235 - 255
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Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2020

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