Islam and socialim: two sides of the same coin?

When Gamal Abdel Nasser won a coup d'etat in Egypt, no doubt in his wildest imagination would he have imagined that the reins of the country would eventually pass to Hosni Mubarak, much less what the country would become under his thirty year rule. Nasser's rule in Egypt swept socialism in Egypt, but also inspired similarly inclined regimes all over the region, not least in the neighbouring Syria where Baathism became an ideologic mirror image of Egypt's political and social regime.

Those were the days of USSR's glory in the Middle East: the era of proclaimed sufficiency, of industrial substitution and the promotion of "egalitarian"experiment à la Sovietique. But they were as numbered as Nasser's life and when he passed away in 1970s, the socialist experiment in Egypt, one of the most populous countries in the Middle East, was buried with him. Sadat, Minister of State under Nasser, to a great surprise of the latter's admirers, did a U-turn from his predecessor's politics, by concluding peace with Israel and downgrading the relationship with the all powerful Soviet Union. 

The price of his decisions and the political whirlwind that resulted in the arrival of Hosni Mubarak on the throne of Egypt is well known. Mubarak's arrival resulted in a fair degree of continuity from Sadat's foreign policy, notably in terms of the peace treaty with Israel and on further rapprochement with the United States at the expense of the USSR. Over the next few decades, the Egyptian economy was operated by the ruling apparatus, as a quasi-oligarchical, quasi-capitalist regime. 

At a closer look, it showed the vestiges of both post-Soviet re-organisation towards market economy - concentration of economic power in the hands of the few - and some crippled version of social democracy through, for example, handouts to the poor through a very inefficient subsidy system. In the five years prior to the demise of Mubarak, Egypt was an active privatiser and an active promoter of foreign investment which was seen by the government as a key mechanism from brining greater know how in the country, while helping to create employment. We all know how that story ended. The word privatisation in Egypt now is all but blasphemy, and not without reason.

At the same time, the rule of Sadat and Mubarak also coincided with a feature common to communist regimes, that is, repression of religious rights. The Soviet Union has been a stellar model of this, wiping out centuries of religious practice among its subjects in one broad sweep and all but erasing any evidence of worship in the country. While the current Putin government is clearly in bed with the orthodox church, this cheap gimmick is hardly confusing seasoned political observers of Russia. Putin needs the church as much as the nobles needed it in the middle ages to keep the population believing and obedient. 

Not only in the USSR has communism proven difficult to conjugate with religion. In the Middle East, both Nasser and Assad - inspired by the promise of equal right and power to the "peasants" - also snubbed religion. Interestingly, while Mubarak basically rejected most of Nasser's political orientations, he obediently followed his steps when it came to the rejection of religion in political circles and arguably much further. Islamist parties, notably the Muslim Brootherhood, who advocated greater social equality and greater role for religion were driven under and out for decades, despite their allegedly similar social objectives. 

But history has a tendency to play dirty tricks. Neither Nasser, nor Sadat, not Mubarak could imagine that they would be followed by Morsi. A common thread in the very distant politics of Nasser and Morsi is that as socialists and and islamists, they promote egalitarian ideals and promise power and economic re-distribution towards the less advantaged. And while it would be easy to argue that all politicians tend to campaign on these type of slogans due to their easy marketability with the masses, the reality is more nuanced than that. Mubarak,  for example, had never seriously stressed social equality, even if could not renege on bread and cooking oil subsidies, lest the country explode in a wide-scale revolt as it did during the 2008 food crisis. 

Beyond the Middle East, in continental Europe, the most socialist-oriented government, leaving aside the Scandinavian social-democratic republics, is arguably in France. France has ironically also been aiming to promote and preserve at all costs its "liacité" model, which presumes no religious representation in politics and discourages religious displays in public life more generally. The new French president, Francois Hollande, currently riding the wave of popular disillusionment with his incompetence, won the recent elections by a tiny margin entirely based on his promise of greater equality and "power to the people". He is actively delivering on the promise to wipe out "the rich" in France, who are indeed following his instructions and are leaving the country like rats from a sinking ship. 

There is a certain similarity between François Hollande and Mohammed Morsi. Both have campaigned on unrealistic promises and by encouraging outrange at "excess" by popular masses further by pointing a finger at the abuses of their predecessor. Both have promised equality. Both have promised a quick change. And change they have delivered, but what kind of change? While there are some clear differences of conviction and style between Morsi and Hollande, the change they have delivered so far can be best characterised as stagnation. 

They have not been able to deliver on their "social" promises because they revert to the historically-proven bankrupt ideology that beyond the inspired pages of Karl Marx has not materialised in a successful economic order anywhere in the world. Their world order pretends that the economy is a third wheel in a bicycle that they can pedal on two wheels. Morsi has imagined that Egypt can make do without foreign investors and that unemployment can be plugged by governmental jobs. Hollande, also a fan of creating jobs by presidential decrees instead of encouraging foreign companies to come to France or at least French companies not to leave, thinks he lives in an autarchy. 

Both are delusional. With or without religion, they seem to have arrived at similar outcomes. The next few months, in both countries will be interesting to watch, for entirely different reasons. But one theme that will have to be common to both, lest the countries follow the path of Greece and declare bankruptcy, is the return to the politics of their predecessors: a welcome wave to the businesses and yes, the "rich" that run them. In the irony of this world then, is that social democracy and islamic democracy might just have the same economic outcomes.