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Why Did the Cairene Cross the Road?To help Americans understand how democracy works in the Middle East.

By Steven A. Cook
Posted Tuesday, July 17, 2007, at 12:55 PM ET
Illustration by Robert Neubecker. Click image to expand.

I owe my life to Umm Ahmad. Shortly after I moved to Cairo, a friend suggested I hire her to be my shaghaalah (maid). She did a great job of keeping Cairo's notorious dust under control, but that's not why she saved my life. After our first meeting, during which she took stock of my scant supplies, Umm Ahmad took me to a local shop to purchase a mop, broom, sponges, and a variety of cleaning fluids. On our trek back to my flat, as we walked the wrong way down what was supposed to be a one-way street in Cairo's Zamalek neighborhood, a bus careened toward us. Umm Ahmad motioned me out of the way as the bus came screaming past us. It came within no more than 2 inches of Umm Ahmad, but she didn't even flinch. She just kept walking. And so began my introduction in how to negotiate and, crucially, survive Cairo traffic.

To the uninitiated, Cairo traffic is ferocious and dangerous. (The July 17 New York Times described it as "chaos.") Yet Cairenes think nothing of walking in the street (unavoidable, given the dilapidated or nonexistent state of sidewalks in many areas), darting across four lanes of traffic, and wading into masses of oncoming cars, buses, and trucks. Although Egypt has its share of traffic deaths (about 6,000 per year, not too much more than Turkey—a country of roughly comparable population—which averages 4,500 traffic fatalities a year), most Cairenes seem fearless. After a few months, even I had no problem ambling through traffic along Cairo's central axes. Why? Well, I didn't go to Egyptian driving school, and I didn't study Cairo's traffic laws, because they don't matter much. Instead, like most Cairenes, I became habituated to the informal rules of the road. I eventually grew to learn—after quite a few near misses—when to cross a busy street, when to stay put, when a car would swerve, and when it wouldn't. As a result, Cairo traffic doesn't look so menacing to me anymore.

The point of all this is not simply to reminisce, but to point out one of the least understood but critically important factors that influence politics: informal institutions. These uncodified rules shape people's behaviors and expectations and contrast with formal institutions—such as constitutions, laws, decrees, and regulations—that also frame the way people think and act.

It goes without saying that informal institutions are not solely Middle Eastern phenomena. In the United States, advantages that accrue to those with access to "old boys' networks" and the often pernicious effect that money has on politics reflect the power of informal institutions. Understanding these uncodified, unwritten rules and norms helps provide an accurate and sophisticated understanding not only of the way Capitol Hill works but also how the Middle East works. Nevertheless, judging from the superficial initiatives and programs instituted by the current administration, the concept of informal institutions seems to be lost on the architects of the Bush strategy to promote change in the Arab world. Policy-makers failed to grasp how the uncodified rules of society often trump the formal institutions of Middle Eastern states.

If someone who grew up in a box were to one day emerge and read the constitutions of a variety of Middle Eastern states, this person would not be crazy (other than suffering the aftereffects of having grown up in a box) to believe that these countries were democratic. But Egypt, Algeria, Tunisia, and Syria—all countries with window-dressing constitutions—are far from democracies for two very important reasons. First, there is the problem of small print. In recent years, Arab governments have often trumpeted political reforms that are said to be ushering in a new era of more open politics. But when these measures are scrutinized carefully, it is abundantly clear they are "reforms" in name only. Consider, for example, Egypt's amended Political Parties Law, which the parliament passed in 2005 as part of the ruling National Democratic Party's "New Thinking and Priorities of Reform" campaign. The new law actually makes it harder for opposition parties to organize than the old, rather restrictive law did. This is not the kind of reform the Bush administration had in mind when it launched its "forward strategy of freedom" in the Middle East in 2003.

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Steven A. Cook is the Douglas Dillon fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and the author of Ruling But Not Governing: The Military and Political Development in Egypt, Algeria, and Turkey.
Illustration by Robert Neubecker.
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Remarks from the Fray:

Here is the rub: there is always a balance between formal and informal, de jure and de facto. Usually in a conflict one side holds one kind of power, the other the other kind.

Take Jim Crow, in which de facto informal power was favoring segregation and the outsiders were trying to enforce de jure desegregation.

Do we want a 'realist policy' that says "blacks will get treated like servants" and does nothing about it? That is, in fact, the equivalent of what the author seems to be suggesting.

No, we find what de jure leverage we can and try to change the situation.

Similarly, there are conservative causes in which there is an attempt to find de facto or de jure leverage to encourage abstinence before marriage and lower abortion rates, or lower divorce rates, or responsible drinking practices.

Perhaps the only handle we have in the middle east is de jure, so that's what we try, despite de facto informal resistance. It's not naive, and its not futile. In fact, acting like laws matter is part of what makes them matter. Sometimes, pretending is the first step to being.

--BenK

(To reply, click here.)

I agree that it's very important to understand how these informal systems shape, and will continue to shape, the state of Middle Eastern Politics.

But lets just take a moment and remember that we didn't exactly heed to the letter of our own constitution when we first wrote it. I believe the first modern Egyptian Constitution was ratified in 1956. That's not exceptionally young, but I should hope that a century or so from now, we can look back at these Middle-eastern documents and agree that they are more closely adhered to than they are in 2007.

Our own system of government had a great deal of informality in its beginnings, and it took generations to form a more perfect union. Heck, there's still a good deal of informal political meandering in any western democracy, and there probably always will be. But what matters is that when we take something to the courts, we demand that they uphold the letter of the written law of the land, as Formal and lifeless as it may seem. This trend has only grown stronger in western nations as time has gone by (our current administrations constitutional origami notwithstanding).

We should expect all countries to be in a relatively constant process of critical reform aimed at strengthening the rule of law, and the equitable distribution of justice. This may not always play well in informal circles, but it is foundation of any nation's stability, and a core principle of modernity.

--jwschmidt

(To reply, click here.)

Following up on the article, here is an interesting question (I am Cairene): Does a consensus-building approach to running society have to be codified into a document in order to make it legitimate?

Traditional societies, almost all have window-dressing constitutions and laws, usually relying on the "unwritten" laws and informal institutions. But I claim that these unwritten laws (a la English law), are or could be as democratic as any other so long as it makes sense to the people who play by its rules and as long as it is fair.

I claim that both existed in Egyptian society since Mohammed Ali's time (1805) up until may be the 1950s/60s, when grotesque corruption started to creep in. Hence, I also claim that Egyptians, along with their Middle Eastern Arab and Muslim peers, are very prone to democratic forms of governance, though not necessarily in the same form as it is understood, practiced, and implemented in the West.

If GWB or any US government wishes to spread democracy in the ME, it has to be according to the Middle Eastern understanding, historical practice, and means of implementation. Clearly, the first two rely heavily on Islamic code. Is that a problem? For whom is it a problem? If it is a problem for the West, why should the West resist this form of informal democracy? If it chooses to do so, does it have any *right* to do so?

--BigSky

(To reply, click here.)

(7/19)