The Dilemma of Authoritarian Local Governance in Egypt

Abstract

Examines how centralised authoritarian regimes upgrade their system of local governance

• Offers a comprehensive understanding of the way that the Egyptian authoritarian regime has upgraded its system of local governance since Nasser

• Uses a neo-intuitionalist approach to develop a theoretical definition to understand the process of the authoritarian upgrading of the system of local governance

• Maps out the motivations for the process of authoritarian upgrading of local governance, as well as its benefits for authoritarianism

• Analyses of the role of the state ruling party, focusing on the changing relationships between the local state and the Arab Socialist Union (1962-1978) and the former National Democratic Party (1978-2011)

• Includes a microanalysis based on extensive fieldwork in Kerdasa, a city and an administrative centre located in the south-west of the Giza Governorate in the Greater Cairo peri-urban fringe

The authoritarian upgrading process in Egypt has enabled the regime to have a more effective dominance in local politics and to enhance its political control. However, its strategies failed to overcome the weakness of system mobilisation functions, which reflected the authoritarian dilemma of bridging the macro (the national) and the micro (the local). Drawing on extensive fieldwork, Hani Awad explores the formal and informal decentralisation strategies employed under three regimes (Nasser, Sadat and Mubarak) to upgrade the Egyptian system of local governance without giving up power or democratising local governments.