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Egyptian football’s pious turn

Posted by KhaledDiab on February 4th, 2010 | 0 comments

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The national team is increasingly flaunting its Muslim religiosity. Where does that leave Christian, let alone secular Egyptians?

4 February 2010

I am a big fan of Egypt's football team, and I have a jersey with six stars sitting in my closet that I take out proudly on days of decisive games to show support for them. The stars symbolise every African cup Egypt has won since 1957, when it claimed its first. I hope that Egypt will be able to add a seventh title to its impressive record by winning the cup in the tournament currently underway.

But I'm facing a real moral dilemma here. The national team of Egypt is starting to symbolise everything I stand against, namely homogeneity and intolerance. Should I keep rooting for my team despite the fact that it has taken an uncomfortable ideological diversion? Or should I keep my beliefs separate from my team affiliation?

My quandary is rooted in a statement by Hassan Shehata, the Egyptian national coach, who said that his squad selection is not only based on skills and competence, but also on piety. Also, the team's nickname is gradually changing from the Pharaohs to Montakhab el-Sagedeen (literally the team of prostrators). Sogood, or prostration, is an Islamic religious act used to express gratitude for God after achieving something. After scoring any goal, the entire Egyptian soccer team put their faces against the ground to show their thankfulness.

"Without [piety], we will never select any player regardless of his potential. I always strive to make sure that those who wear the Egypt jersey are on good terms with God," Hassan Shehata said, according to AP. Al-Shorouk also quoted Shehata saying that striker Mido, who once had a ponytail and dated Miss Belgium 2000, Joke van de Velde, was dismissed because he did not live up to the manager's pious ideals.

This will soon result in a situation where only practicing Muslims identify strongly with the team. Secular Muslims and religious minorities will feel indifferent at best. The team currently doesn't have a Christian player, in a country where at least 10% of the population are Christians. Hany Ramzy, one of the best defenders in the history of Egyptian football, was a Coptic Christian. However, the next time this happens, the Christian player will feel like an outcast if religious players, like Ahmed Fathy, force everyone to kneel after scoring a goal.

This phenomenon is just one small part of a bigger problem. Egypt is turning rapidly into a homogeneous society, where you need to be male, Muslim, physically able, young and from a middle-class urban area in order not to feel alienated.

I don't believe the phenomenon is just about religious beliefs. It is as much about sticking more than ever to traditional values to protect the fabric of society against cultural attacks from outside. It's a characteristic of weak societies to perceive anything foreign as a threat, including principles of equality, tolerance and justice.

This article will also be considered by some as one more evil attempt to impose western ideas on our pious eastern society, but diversity and tolerance should not only be western values but universal ones.

This column appeared in The Guardian Unlimited’s Comment is Free section on 29 January 2010. Read the related discussion.

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Should America fear a democratic Egypt?

Posted by KhaledDiab on January 14th, 2010 | 6 comments

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Osama Diab

The depiction of Egypt as a country of religious fanatics who await a breeze of freedom to turn Egypt into a radical regime is far from accurate.

14 January 2010

A senior Muslim Brotherhood leader Abdel Moniem Aboul Fotouh, who is known for his moderation, recently said that the party is not as popular as people think.

“If there was a real partisan life in Egypt and the wheel of democracy started turning and election were held without fraud, the brotherhood won’t come to power and won’t get more than 25% of the seats and not 90% like some people think. Egypt is not just the Muslim Brotherhood,” Aboul Fotouh told al-Shorouk newspaper.

This comes in stark contrast to how the Islamist group is typically viewed in the media, especially the Western media, as the most powerful political alternative to the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP). It is a little ironic how the media thinks the brotherhood is more powerful than some of its members, such as Aboul Fotouh, do.

The conviction that the Muslim Brotherhood is Egypt’s most serious and organised opposition movement is relatively new and is closely linked to their 2005 parliamentary success. The brotherhood managed to win 20% of the seats.

This took place just a few months after former US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice openly embarrassed the regime’s undemocratic practices. "Throughout the Middle East, the fear of free choices can no longer justify the denial of liberty," Rice said. "It is time to abandon the excuses that are made to avoid the hard work of democracy."

But it wasn’t long before the US feared democracy in Egypt and backed away. A foreign policy article published this year commenting on Bush’s push for democracy in Egypt stated, “For a brief moment, the policy seemed to be showing results […] Unfortunately, as the deteriorating situation in Iraq drew away its attention, and when elections produced results that were not to its liking, the Bush administration essentially gave up on democracy in Egypt in 2006.”

Many political analysts believe that the brotherhood was ‘allowed’ to win that many seats. The regime perhaps wanted to send an indirect message to the Bush administration implying that it’s either us or them (in this case, the brotherhood). A fifth of the seats in parliament was the price Egypt was willing to pay in order to pass on the message.

For the same reason, Egypt’s government never ‘allowed’ a similar scenario to happen to liberal secular political parties that showed signs of popularity and could be to America’s liking. Ayman Nour, a popular liberal opposition figure that seemed like a favorable option to the Bush Administration, was thrown into jail for challenging Mubarak and achieving a considerable success as Mubarak’s runner up in the 2005 elections.

The brotherhood might not be really as popular as the media make us believe and is just used by the current regime to delay calls for democracy in Egypt. Studies and research on the popularity of political groups are usually conducted to serve political goals. Therefore, there are no reliable figures on how well-liked political groups really are. But there are signs, other than Aboul Fotouh’s statement, that it is not a foregone conclusion that the brotherhood will sweep up the votes if offered the opportunity to run in a fair election.

Now that the talk about who will succeed President Hosni Mubarak is more heated than ever, opposition groups have been trying to suggest qualified names to run for presidency. The point is to counter the belief of some that Egypt has no competent alternatives for the top seat outside the Mubarak family.

All the names suggested to rival the NDP’s candidate in the 2011 presidential elections did not include a single Islamist, which implies that even if some people are sympathetic toIslamist politicians, they don’t necessarily trust their ability to take control of the top job. Some might argue that the brotherhood decided not to offer a candidate, but most of the suggested name never expressed willingness to compete either.

Also, in a poll carried out by Zogbi International, 58% of Egyptians considered their primary identity to be citizens of their country, while 20% said Arab was their primary identity. Only 17% defined their primary identity as Muslim and 5% fell under the “not sure” category. Out of the six countries surveyed, only Egypt and Lebanon did not tick “Muslim” as their primary identity.

Above all, Egyptians are also more often than not very proud of their pre-Islamic and ancient Egyptian history. In Egypt, the number of shops, products and companies named after ancient Egyptian figures, such as Cleopatra, Sphinx, Nefertiti and Ramsis is striking, including the Egyptian football team – the Pharaohs.

Moreover, many of Egypt’s critical industries that contribute massively to the country’s GDP and employ tens of millions have a liberal bent, and people dependent on them might not feel secure about the future of their livelihoods under Islamic rule.
Such industries include the media and tourism sectors. For example, the Egyptian tourism sector represents 11.3% of Egypt’s GDP and 19.3% of the total investment made in foreign currencies, according to the Egyptian tourism ministry.
Egypt also has a thriving banking sector that dates back to 1856. Egypt, along with South Africa, has the biggest and most advanced financial markets on the continent. The concept of riba (lending with interest) is traditionally prohibited in Islam, which makes the whole concept of banking and investment undesirable if not forbidden in some Islamic schools.

In addition to its modern economy with a thriving business sector and a large tourism industry, the country has also long been the regional centre of the arts, culture and the media, as well as a melting pot for people from many different cultures and backgrounds throughout its history. With all these factors and a significant religious minority, no one can claim with any certainty that Egyptians will embrace Islamic rule with arms wide open.

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Faith in our children

Posted by KhaledDiab on November 27th, 2009 | 0 comments

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By Khaled Diab

Much as we’d like our children to hold the same things dear as we do, we should have enough faith in them to let them choose their own belief system.

27 November 2009

Our unborn child is so hip that he is fashionably late for his own birthday reception. Though he is already something of a globetrotter, he seems unwilling to wean himself off the five-star womb service to which he has grown accustomed.

Once our son finally decides to shine for his parents, he will be the biological embodiment of innocence, a clean sheet, unaware of the world or of his place in it. Our choices and decisions on his behalf will have potentially lifelong consequences. Even something as apparently straightforward as a name, especially given his mixed cultural background, will play a significant role in shaping his identity.

Although there are many things a child cannot choose or change, including the parents (s)he is lumbered with and where (s)he is born, one area that should certainly not be hereditary is faith. We are determined to leave the choice of belief systems to our son to make for himself, once he is old enough to do so.

In this, we agree with the message of Ariane Sherine's 'Please don't label me' campaign, though this is something Katleen and I have had an understanding about for many years, in the context of the hypothetical 'what if' games we're so fond of.

This is partly due to our belief in freedom of choice, and there is no domain so personal as the belief system one subscribes to. We also do not wish to deprive him of the beautiful aspects of his triple heritage – secular humanist, Muslim and Christian.

In addition, since we are both of a sceptical bent, reject dogma and accept the possibility that we may be wrong in our evolving beliefs, we think it is only sensible that our child should reach its own conclusions. Until that time, he will not be exposed to the overtly ritualistic or liturgical aspects of religion, except as an outside observer: no church or mosque, no Bible or Qur'an, no circumcision or communion.

Despite our rejection of organised religion, we will raise our son to appreciate the power of faith and attempt to give him a balanced appreciation of both the beauty and ugliness of religion and its role in shaping human civilisation.

That's not to say we will actually go out of our way to educate him about religion, not least because we're not that interested in it. As Katleen rightly asserts, we will approach the topic from a cultural perspective and try to discuss and contextualise what exposure he has to religion as and when it occurs.

But certain things will be harder in practice than in theory. It is inevitable that our own views and biases will be conveyed to our son. Perhaps understandably given our own convictions, we will wish him to grow up to be an adult for whom religion is inconsequential, except on an intellectual and cultural level, and who respects our common humanity above all else. But if he decides to embrace a faith, we will also be happy that he has found his own path, as long as he is tolerant of other world views.

Another major challenge will be society. In spite of our best efforts not to label our child, there is no guarantee that others will not go ahead and do so anyway – or try to introduce him by stealth to their chosen faith.

Although Europe has largely moved away from the assumption that a child is born into a faith, some may presume on the strength of his surname and possibly his appearance (if his North African side shows through strongly in his features) that he is a Muslim, and even discriminate against him on that basis.

Education is also a concern, and we will have to monitor carefully his schools activities – especially if he ends up in a "Catholic" school – to ensure that he receives no religious instruction.

In the Arab world, it is widely believed, among both Muslims and Christians, that faith is hereditary – an issue I addressed in this article – and so many will also make unwelcome assumptions.

This won't be a problem with immediate family and is also no longer an issue with the Egyptian bureaucracy. Luckily, earlier this year, Egyptians got the right to leave the religion field blank in their ID cards.

And when our son comes of age, it will be up to him and no one else to decide which faith ticks his box.

This column appeared in The Guardian Unlimited’s Comment is Free section on 26 November 2009. Read the related discussion.

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The audacity to dream

Posted by KhaledDiab on July 6th, 2009 | 0 comments

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By Khaled Diab

If we suspend scepticism and take up Barack Obama’s invitation to dream of change, what Middle East can the audacity of hope help to forge?

November 2008

Since Barack Obama’s victory, I have been somewhat at odds with myself. The realist and sceptic tells me that, despite the euphoria, it may well be back to business more or less as usual once the president elect actually takes office.

Still, the dreamer and romantic urges me to savour the symbolism of Obama’s victory, with the way it has energised US voters and inspired people around the world, and allow myself the luxury of dreaming that change really can happen. This leads me to wonder about my native Middle East, one of the world’s most troubled regions, and what kind of change there could I and would I believe in.

The most immediate dream I have – and one that is probably shared by most of the region – is to dispel the spectre of conflict which has destroyed Iraq and locked Israelis and Palestinians in a spiralling death dance. Although there is much more to the Middle East than the wars and disputes that grab the headlines, the threat of the spread of conflict – to Iran, Syria and Lebanon – or the shadow ongoing conflicts cast on the entire region has a massive destabilising effect.

Peace will encourage stability, and stability will trigger change and progress. But what change does the Middle East need?

Well, the region is a diverse and complex place, and there is no general panacea. But to take up Obama’s challenge for people to have the audacity to hope, I will suspend my disbelief and allow myself the luxury to flesh out my own Middle Eastern dream.

The Middle East I dream of is one of greater equality and empowerment, where the fruits of economic development are shared more equally among citizens, where people have more power to make a difference and where governments better reflect the will of their people.

I dream of societies that have the self-confidence to look to the future, and take assured strides into the unknown, rather than fixating on the past, whether in terms of glories or grievances. I desire societies that put more trust in innovation, and less in tradition, and where change is something to be striven for and not just emulated. I wish people would realise just how inappropriate, counterproductive and indecorous it is for them to let religion out on to the streets to make a nuisance of itself and intimidate others, when its rightful place should be at home and in the heart, where it can engage in private affairs with the faithful.

I hope that the failed dream of pan-Arabism can be resurrected in a more inclusive form to build a loose trans-national union between all the peoples of the region: Arabs, Persians, Turks, Israelis, etc. I aspire to a future in which national and ethnic identity become less important and more blurred, so that a non-Muslim can become the leader of a Muslim majority country, or a non-Jew the prime minister of Israel.

These prospects seem like fantasy at the moment, but, after much blood, sweat and suffering, what was once deemed impossible, sometimes does become possible. Pre-Obama who would’ve thought that America could overcome the legacy of slavery and segregation to elect a president with some African blood? Who would’ve thought apartheid or Soviet communism would end so suddenly and unceremoniously? In the wake of the Second World War, who would have thought that a borderless union in which Germany and France are the strongest allies would have emerged out of the wreckage?

Since Obama triggered this train of thought and since we shouldn’t get too carried away with dreaming, let’s start with the United States. What can America do to improve the Middle East?

There are hopes that, under Obama’s tutelage, America will become more positively and benignly engaged in the region. My wishes are rather different. Instead of wanting America to play a more positive role, I merely wish for it to play less of a negative one.

Given America’s own aversion to foreign meddling in its affairs and the clear evidence that the most enduring change is that which comes from within, why do so many Americans believe that other countries need or welcome American interference?

The major difference America can truly make is to withdraw from Iraq and offer Iraqis support through international mechanisms to clean up the mess the American invasion has caused. In addition, the best way the United States can serve the cause of political reform and peace in the Middle East is to phase out its support for authoritarian and semi-authoritarian regimes that oppress their own citizens or other peoples, such as Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Israel.

Left to its own devices, the shaky regime of the ageing Hosni Mubarak in Egypt would soon buckle to growing grassroots pressure for reform. Similarly, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict would sooner be resolved if Israel did not benefit from such excessive American largesse and almost unconditional support.

Nevertheless, the outlook of the Pax Americana empire is unlikely to change all that much, and the United States is likely to continue to believe that its narrow imperial interests are served by continued support for forces that are ultimately not in the interests of the Middle East and its people.

Of course, America, whose citizens possess a strong and admirable sense of idealism, can make a positive contribution to the region and the world by mobilising the US’s significant ‘soft power’ in concert with the international community and through multilateral mechanisms. This can help meet global challenges and create a sense that there is an international order that no one stands above or outside, even a superpower. Luckily, this is something Obama is more likely to do than his predecessors.

This column appeared in The Guardian Unlimited’s Comment is Free section on 30 November 2008. Read the related discussion.

This is an archive piece that was migrated to this website from Diabolic Digest

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Secularism in a veil

Posted by KhaledDiab on June 27th, 2009 | 0 comments

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By Khaled Diab

An outward appearance of Islamism disguises the increasingly secular reality of some Arab and Muslim societies.

April 2009

In a series of recent articles, Brian Whitaker explored the role of Islam in Arab politics, the decline of secularism and what can be done to reinvigorate it. He describes how "the decline of Muslim secularism reflects the rise of Islamism and the more generalised religious revival that has swept across the Middle East since the 1960s".

I agree with the basic outline of this analysis, but would hazard to say that secularism is far from dead. It continues to make gains, albeit disguised for modesty's sake under an Islamic veil or pious beard.

In fact, there has been a trend over the past century which has seen many Muslim societies go from thinly veiling their traditional Islamic character in modern western cultural clothes, to dressing up their internalised modernism and increasingly secular reality in a reassuring and personalised Islamic garb.

The Secular party (later known as al-Wafd or Delegation) Whitaker refers to in his article, which was established in the interwar years to guide the struggle for Egyptian independence, provides an interesting case in point. He observes that today no one "would be foolhardy enough to set up a political party with such a name or platform".

Perhaps many Arab and Muslim secularists, on the back foot, do shy away from an overtly secular label nowadays. But, with the exception of the Muslim Brotherhood, pretty much all the main parties in Egypt – left, right and centrist – are secular in nature.

However, the original Wafd and Egypt's experiment with 'liberal democracy', viewed from nearly a century on, represent a deceptive mirage of modernity and secularism. The Wafd, and most of the other parties, were aristocratic and elitist in nature and had little connection with common people, while the Egyptian parliament was more like a 'salon democracy' because its power was massively curtailed by the British, on the one side, and the king, on the other.

In fact, most of the politicians of the time who enjoyed democratic or popular appeal were exiled by the British to places such as Malta or Ceylon, or were sidelined or removed through palace intrigues. Nevertheless, many Egyptians, inspired by the Europhile thinkers of the so-called Egyptian renaissance, continued to believe in the liberating possibilities of democracy and secularism. The failure of this toothless democratic experiment to empower the Egyptian people planted the seedsofa widespread cynicism: today, these abstractions are seen as little more than hollow words bandied about by imperial powers or self-serving political elites.

Despite these inauspicious beginnings, modern secularism was to see its star soar in the 1950s and 1960s before it began to fizzle out in the late 1970s. Egypt's revolutionary president Gamal Abdel Nasser did more than any other person both to give Arab secularism mass appeal and sow the seeds of its demise. His personal charisma, progressive ideas, unwavering belief in modernity and desire for social justice propelled socialism and secularism out of the wings of Egyptian and Arab politics and straight on to centre stage.

However, his and his successors' failure to hand over power to the people, their corruption, their failure to deliver on their promises and their ruthless persecution of the secular opposition empowered the Islamists and wonthem many converts, especially following the crushing defeat of 1967. In addition, despite being aggressively secular, the post-revolutionary Egyptian regime preferred to ignore or repress, rather than challenge, the ideas of the Islamic reactionary rearguard, which gave Islamists a powerful weapon.

Although the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist groups have, since the late 1970s, Islamised the political landscape, they have also been secularised by the die-hard socialists and liberals who refused to roll over. In addition, the secular ideas of the past few decades have put down deep roots in society that the Islamists are incapable of reversing.

The more progressive wing of the Brotherhood is gradually evolving into something akin to the Christian Democrat tradition in Europe: conservative and culturally Islamic, but increasingly pluralistic. A small sign of the changing times is that the Brotherhood not only takes the presence of women in the public arena more or less for granted, something it was once adamantly opposed to, it even fields some female candidates in parliamentary elections.

There are growing signs that the appeal of Islamism is on the wane, as Egyptians realise that the Muslim Brotherhood, beyond declaring that the Quran is their "constitution" and "Islam is the solution", have no real political programme of their own. In addition, the ugly reality of the modern theocracies and their failure to revive the 'golden age' of Islam are shattering many people's illusions about political Islam.

The struggle between 'secularism' and 'Islamism', which is almost as old as Islam itself, has been a long and bitter one, and has revolved around challenging the omnipotent temporal power of the caliph, sultan, king or president from the clashing vantage point of rationality and faith.

This conflict's modern vestige was personifed memorably by the Egyptian Nobel laureate Naguib Mahfouz in his Cairo trilogy as the standoff between two radical brothers, Ahmed (the communist) and Abdel-Moneim (the Muslim Brother), both of whom wind up in jail for opposing the tyranny of the status quo.

In my next piece, I will consider ways of advancing progressive secularism and overcoming the powerful "God veto" of religious conservatives.

This column appeared in The Guardian Unlimited’s Comment is Free section on 16 April 2009. Read the related discussion.

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The Middle East must look to the future

Posted by KhaledDiab on June 26th, 2009 | 0 comments

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By Khaled Diab

A secular society confines religion to the spiritual sphere where it belongs, and leaves worldly affairs to human resourcefulness.

April 2009

In my previous piece on Arab secularism, both overt and veiled, I promised to consider ways of advancing progressive secularism in the Arab world.

The question of bringing the Arab and Muslim worlds into the 'modern age' has occupied some of the greatest minds of the past two centuries. It has been approached by natives of the region and foreigners, by friends and foes, by those with an honest desire for reform and those with their own agenda.

Some may question why Arab and Muslim societies need to secularise, while others will argue it is a doomed project because Islam and secularism are apparently incompatible beasts.

Well, it is my conviction that secularism is the bedrock of enlightenment because it confines religion to the individual spiritual sphere where it belongs, and leaves the ever-shifting reality of worldly affairs to human resourcefulness. The compelling proof of this is that Europe and the west's success has been largely secular, as was the Muslim world's before that, by the standards of the time. So, what can be done to speed up the train of secularisation and modernisation?

The Guardian's Brian Whitaker explores this question thoroughly in his new book – which I was interviewed for and had the pleasure of reading and commenting on in pre-publication – and in a series of articles for Comment is free.

"The Middle East will only be convinced by Islamic arguments for a secular state," he argues. "Secularists have to be prepared to engage with religious arguments – something they are often reluctant to do."

Since enduring reform comes from within and is usually gradual and incremental; this has also been my position. In self-defined 'Islamic' states, especially those with a vibrant political landscape and nascent democratic institutions, such as Iran, this can empower reformers. While in Arab and Muslim states which are already secular, Islamic arguments for secularism can help steal the thunder of the Islamists and neutralise them intellectually.

This also broadly corresponds with what generations of Muslim reformers have attempted, beginning with the 'Islamic modernists'. The founder of that movement, Muhammad Abdu, sought to "liberate thought from the shackles of imitation/tradition [taqlid]" and to prove that "religion must be accounted a friend to science". Abdu lamented the closing of the gates of ijtihad and that through this manner of reasoned (re)interpretation Islamic morality and law could be adapted to suit the modern world.

However, placing secularism in an Islamic shell is not enough. It needs to regain its credibility by delivering concrete results. Many Arab and Muslim societies seem to be caught between the rock of repressive regimes, often with western backing, and the hard place of the Islamists, who are likely to take authoritarianism to a new level if they gain power.

Secular opposition needs to find a way of offering a viable alternative to the Muslim Brotherhood and other mainstream Islamists in the eyes of the disenchanted. There are early signs of this occurring in places like Egypt where secularists have been regrouping in recent years.

As Whitaker points out in his book, one of the key appeals of the Muslim Brotherhood is not so much their religious identity but their promise – whether honest or not – to stamp out corruption and restore the rule of law. To highlight that Islamism is not the only show in town, secularists need to demonstrate that their efforts to promote democratic freedom and limit the political powers of leaders is driven by a desire to protect the dignity and rights of the individual.

Dressing secularism up in Islamic garments is a useful stepping stone, but will eventually come up against the brick wall of what I term the "God veto" on issues where religious and cultural beliefs are too strong to be reasoned with effectively. A good example of this is the status of women.

In Egypt, for example, although the legal, social and economic status of women has improved significantly over the past century, efforts to create true equality are often derailed or watered down, as occurred during the revamping of the country's personal status laws, by an unholy alliance between religious and conservative circles.

There are also limitations on the ideological plane. Muhammad Abdu's back to fundamentals "salafiyya" was interpreted by secular reformers as an opportunity to jettison Islam's historical baggage and create a new, modern future-oriented society. However, by the likes of Hassan al-Banna, the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, it was interpreted as an invitation to re-create the "glorious" past of the "pious ancestors".

To overcome this kind of inertia requires a society not to seek guidance from the past but from the future, and this requires the culture to shift away from the tendency to 'emulate' – whether the Islamic past or the western present – and move towards 'innovation', a challenge many ancient societies in decline have faced in the modern age.

Contemporary western societies possess both the confidence and resources to future-orient their perspectives. I don't believe it is an accident that the west's "golden age" has coincided with its domination of the global trading system, and the Middle East's terminal decline coincided with the loss of its monopoly on east-west trade.

Today, the pursuit of knowledge and development is such a resource intensive undertaking that, what had been in the mid-18th century a relatively small qualitative gap, has widened to almost unbridgeable proportions. Most Arab and Muslim societies, as well as many other developing countries, are trapped in a vicious cycle of poverty, domestic and global inequality, ignorance, and systematic disadvantage in the global balance of economic and political power.

To overcome this requires reform in every sphere, from decent education to political freedom, not to mention efforts to promote equality not just between individuals within a society, but between countries in the global trading and political system.

This column appeared in The Guardian Unlimited’s Comment is Free section on 21 April 2009. Read the related discussion.

This is an archive piece that was migrated to this website from Diabolic Digest

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Egyptian football’s pious turn

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Should America fear a democratic Egypt?

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Faith in our children

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The audacity to dream

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