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Following the 2011 popular uprising in Egypt that captured the attention of the world and
resulted in the overthrow of the dictator, President Mubarak, there was a lot of speculation about
the probability of a democratic Egypt. One of the major determinants of democracy is the
balance of power between genders. Gender inequality was a problem in Egypt before the 2011
revolution and continues to be, despite the significant role women played in the uprising.
Following the popular uprising in Egypt, women’s rights have not advanced; some even argue
that they have regressed.
The adult literacy rate in Egypt between 1997 and 2007 was 74.6 percent for males, but
only 57.8 percent for females.1 As a result of the recognition by the Egyptian government that
education is one of the most important mechanisms for the empowerment of women, access to
primary education has since become almost universal. However, in higher education, not only is
the percentage of female students lower than the percentage of males, but women “continue to
enroll in traditionally female areas of study such as humanities, education, and nursing.”2
Another major imbalance between men and women in Egypt is the difference in unemployment
rates. The unemployment rate is much higher for women than men; between 2009 and 2012, the
female unemployment rate rose from 23.4 percent to 27.1 percent, while that of males increased
from 5.0 percent to 7.0 percent.3 Not only was there a huge difference between these rates to
begin with, but the unemployment rate for women increased by almost 4 percent over the three
years, which is double the 2 percent increase of the male unemployment rate over the same three
years. Additionally, the World Bank reported in 2009 that the rates of youth unemployment,
Nagwa Megahed and Stephen Lack. “Colonial legacy, women’s rights and gender-educational inequality in the
Arab World with particular reference to Egypt and Tunisia.” International Review of Education 57 (2011): 409.
2
Ibid, 413.
3
World Bank. “Unemployment, male (% of male labor force)” (2011).
World Bank. “Unemployment, female (% of female labor force)” (2011).
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which includes ages 15-24, in Egypt was 40 percent for females versus 21 percent for males.4
Magdi et al. found that young women in Egypt are four times as likely to be unemployed as
young men.5 They also found that “the problem persists despite rising education levels” – less
than 25 percent of Egyptian women report being employed within five years of graduation. 6
The disparity between genders persists today, even though women significantly impacted
the popular overthrow of President Mubarak. During the 18-day uprising, “Egyptian women,
previously not engaged in any activism, took their demands massively to the streets, not in the
name of women emancipation, or women equality, but as an important part of the national
struggle against authoritarianism.”7 Many of the women who camped inside Tahrir Square
ensured the survival of the protesters; they delivered food and water and nursed wounded
people.8 They also did what they could to contribute to the success of the uprising, blocking the
entrances to the square and donating money, food, and their jewelry.9
Despite their significant participation in the revolution in unprecedented numbers, even at
times outnumbering male participants, women were not given the credit they deserved; “malebiased accounts of the activism that instigated and sustained the revolt against the regime until
Mubarak’s resignation have generally tended to ignore women’s full agency.”10 Al-Natour
asserts that “the key role women played in the revolution may have shaken the social power
4
Ibid.
Amin, Magdi, Ragui Assaad, Nazar al-Baharna, Kemal Dervis, Raj M. Desai, Navtej S. Dhillon, and Ahmed
Galal. After the Spring: Economic Transitions in the Arab World (Oxford University Press, 2012), 40.
6
Ibid, 55.
7
Nadine Sika and Yasmin Khodary. “One Step Forward, Two Steps Back? Egyptian Women within the Confines of
Authoritarianism.” Journal of International Women's Studies 13(5) (2012): 97.
8
Manal al-Natour. “The Role of Women in the Egyptian 25th January Revolution.” Journal of International
Women's Studies, 13(5) (2012): 70.
9
Ibid.
10
Mariz Tadros. The Muslim Brotherhood in Contemporary Egypt: Democracy Redefined Or Confined? (Routledge,
2012), 117.
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structure,” but “that key role was downplayed in the literature.”11 While the influential
participation of women may have affected their social power, the revolution was not followed by
any notable increase in political power. In fact, there were many negative consequences,
including a backlash against women’s rights that emerged “in the form of attempts to repeal the
laws pertaining to women that were introduced or amended by the Mubarak regime.”12
There are numerous examples of attacks on women’s rights following Mubarak’s
resignation. Although not one case of harassment was reported from Tahrir Square during the
uprising, which is surprising given Egypt’s high rate of street harassment of women, only a few
days after the revolution, reports of women being harassed in Tahrir emerged.13 Additionally,
according to Hafez, it was evident immediately following the uprising, when the Council of Wise
Men opened negotiations with the Supreme Military Council (SMC), that “women would not be
part of the political deliberations between various contending parties and the SMC in charge of
the country.”14 Many Egyptians argued that a group titled the “Council of Wise Men” failed to
represent both women and young people.
The results of the first parliamentary elections after the overthrow of Mubarak, held in
November 2011 and January 2012, delivered another blow to women’s rights. While the
elections had unprecedented public turnout, they resulted in less than 2 percent representation of
Al-Natour, “The Role of Women in the Egyptian 25th January Revolution.” 59.
Aliaa Dawoud. “Why Women are Losing Rights in Post-Revolutionary Egypt.” Journal of International Women's
Studies, 13(5) (2012): 160.
13
Sherine Hafez. “No longer a bargain: Women, masculinity, and the Egyptian uprising.” American Ethnologist
39(1) (2012): 40.
14
Ibid, 38.
11
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women in both Upper and Lower Houses of Parliament and only 3 of the 26 ministries in the
2012 Ministerial Council were women.15
The biggest negative impact on women’s rights came from the Muslim Brotherhood.
After the revolution, the organization laid out its plan for Egypt’s future in two documents: the
FJP Election Program for the 2011 parliamentary elections and the Nahda or Renaissance
Project, which became Morsi’s electoral platform in 2012.16 The Election Program “affirmed
women’s rights, but with qualifications that could be understood to limit them based on Islamic
and/or Egyptian cultural norms” and “called for the elimination of national rights organizations
(National Council for Women and National Council for Childhood and Motherhood)” on the
basis that they were “intelligence arms of international players.”17 On July 2, 2011, a conference
with the theme ‘Women from the revolution to renaissance’ was organized by the newly
established Sisterhood of the Brotherhood and attended by the Supreme Guide of the Muslim
Brotherhood, other members of the leadership, and about 2,500 sisters.18 However, the
conference “was a grand event without offering any major structural change either in relation to
broadening their roles or their positioning in the Muslim Brotherhood internal organizational
hierarchy.”19 In effect, the Sisterhood provides the male-dominated organization with the means
to advance their mission without any intention of establishing women in meaningful leadership
roles.
Sika and Khodary, “One Step Forward, Two Steps Back? Egyptian Women within the Confines of
Authoritarianism,” 98.
16
Jeffrey T Kenney. “The New Politics of Movement Activism: The Society of Muslim Brothers After Egypt’s
Arab Spring.” Nova Religio: The Journal of Alternative and Emergent Religions 16(3) (2013): 100.
17
Ibid.
18
Tadros, The Muslim Brotherhood in Contemporary Egypt: Democracy Redefined Or Confined? 119.
19
Ibid.
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Scholars have many different explanations for the lack of progress in women’s rights
following the 2011 uprising. These include, but are not limited to, a sense of insecurity and
emasculation felt by many young Egyptian men, a rejection of Western ideals, the resurgence of
Islamic principles, and the association of women’s rights with the extremely unpopular Mubarak
family.
The Mubarak regime instituted a condition of dis-regulation to advance its control of the
people; young men became targets of “random state violence, torture, and humiliation” and were
denied education, health care, and government jobs.20 In doing so, the government instilled
feelings of helplessness and dependency on the state in many Egyptians, particularly the
Egyptian youth. Hafez attributes male animosity towards the empowerment of women as a
result of this. He explains that “the more that men are subordinated, denied patriarchal benefits,
and associated with females, the more extreme their gender differentiation from females will be.
Hence, women become easily targeted victims who compensate them for their loss of patriarchal
benefits and their emasculation.”21 Sika finds the same causal relationship, stating that “the
dichotomy between a woman’s power and a man’s vulnerability is essential to understanding the
forces at work.”22
In an ethnocentric approach, Megahed and Lack propose that the Western perception of
Muslim women as victims of oppression, forced to hide behind the veil secluded from the world,
have reinforced opposition to the advancement of gender equality in Egypt.23 They also believe
that opposition to gender-related reforms is partly due to the resurgence of fundamentalist
Hafez, “No longer a bargain: Women, masculinity, and the Egyptian uprising,” 39.
Ibid, 40.
22
Nadine Sika. “The Role of Women in the Arab World: Toward a New Wave of Democratization, or an Ebbing
Wave Toward Authoritarianism?” Journal of International Women's Studies 13(5) (2012): 2.
23
Megahed and Lack, “Colonial legacy, women’s rights and gender-educational inequality in the Arab World with
particular reference to Egypt and Tunisia,” 414.
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Islamic principles. Coleman also argues that “women’s rights face several challenges, including
politically empowered Islamist parties that contest existing laws on religious grounds and
popular inertia against increasing women’s participation in public leadership roles.”24
It has also been suggested that some of the resistance to women’s rights movements is
attributed to the association of women’s rights with the Mubarak family. The former first lady,
Suzanne Mubarak, was the acting president of the National Council for Women (NCW), which
was established in 2000 by Presidential decree.25 Therefore, many citizens viewed it as closely
affiliated with the regime. The NCW had strong legislative powers granted to it in the Egyptian
Constitution, as well as a mandate that granted it the power to significantly influence laws
pertaining to women; thus, the first lady, as the president of the organization, had the ability to
change laws.26 In addition, over the radio and on television, men voiced their complaints that the
Mubarak regime was, through this affiliation, taking away rights from men and giving them to
women.27 Dawoud argues that the media’s role in linking women’s rights to the Mubaraks “led
to societal dissent while the regime lasted, and after it was ousted dissent escalated into an
outright backlash against women’s rights.”28
Although some observers around the world were poised for Egypt’s transition to a
democracy immediately following President Mubarak’s resignation in 2011, the history of
gender imbalance and the continued resistance to movement toward gender equality, caused by
the combination of many factors, indicate that the democratization of Egypt is not a current
reality.
24
Isobel Coleman. "Women and the Arab revolts." Brow J. World Affairs 18 (2011): 215.
Dawoud, “Why Women are Losing Rights in Post-Revolutionary Egypt,” 161.
26
Ibid, 162.
27
Ibid, 166.
28
Ibid, 165.
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