Egypt’s post-revolutionary environment—and especially its constitutional process—has touched off debates within the country and confusion outside of it regarding the role of the Islamic sharia in the emerging legal and political order.
The rapid developments over the past month have shown that legal and constitutional loopholes have the potential to seriously undermine Egypt’s democratic transition.
With its impressive electoral victory the Muslim Brotherhood must start setting its foreign policy, economic, and cultural priorities. With the Salafis entering the political arena for the first time, the Brotherhood Party may be forced to choose between competing with them for the Islamist base and reassuring non-Islamist political forces at home and abroad.
After Egypt’s first round of elections, the FJP and the Brotherhood have shown a great deal of political acumen in not embracing an alliance with the Salafis. It is crucial that secular parties show equal acumen by cooperating with the FJP.
Early polling in Egypt suggests that Islamist movements are receiving the bulk of the vote, but both the country and the Muslim Brotherhood might be better served by an outcome like Tunisia’s, where Islamists have political strength but must still reach out to others to get anything done.
In a video Q & A, Dr. Hamdi Hassan, a Member of the People’s Assembly representing the Muslim Brotherhood, discusses his the Brotherhood’s decision to participate in the parliamentary elections.
The overall political climate in Egypt and the internal Brotherhood context are likely to sap the group’s organizational and mobilizational capacities and it seems increasingly likely that the Brotherhood will have a weaker showing in the upcoming elections than it did in 2005.
The official campaign platform for 2010 parliamentary elections of the Muslim Brotherhood.
Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood spokesman Essam al-Arian explains the movement’s strategy toward fall 2010 People’s Assembly elections and the 2011 presidential race. The Brotherhood ran 12 candidates in the June 1, 2010 Shura Council elections, none of whom won a seat.
