Egyptian Debunking

There is a lot of foofera going on about why the Egyptians are revolting after 30 years of Hosni Mubarak Rule.  The principal message is that Egyptians are tired of their poverty - the autocratic Mubarak and his family have looted the country so on and so forth.  This is the common refrain of westerners when they are confronted with a crisis of legitimacy in a less developed country.  The problem isn't that the Egyptians aren't relatively poor because they are, or that the Mubaraks aren't corrupt. The problem is that those facts don't explain why these events are happening now.  According to Wikipedia and the CIA Factbook, when Hosni Mubarak took over per capita real Egyptian GDP was around $1,350.  Today? $6,200 per capita.  Real output has risen over 4.5 times - if the US government had done as well.....well lets just say we wouldn't be in the pickle we are now.

Indeed Tunisia also had a record of successful autocratic rule as has currently shaky Jordan.  And all of these countries have had more success in freeing their economies and accelerating growth in the last ten years.  Government has gotten better and has enabled the economy to deliver more.  So why are they blowing up now?

Rising expectations.  Really poor countries have very few educated and informed citizens and therefore are relatively easy to control - intimidate the intelligensia, coopt the merchants, control the army and you've got yourself a nice little autocracy with your own plane, designer uniforms and those cool sunglasses they all wear.  But start getting a largish, prosperous middle class chock full of education, and independence and you set off a storm of rising expectations.  Couple that with a media revolution which has made satellite TV and internet ubiquitous in the Arab world and you have all the ingredients for an "envy" revolution.  Egyptians are no longer looking at how well they are doing this year vs. ten years ago, they are looking at how well they are doing versus other nations.  And they feel humiliated.  This need to not only be more prosperous than last year but to have pride in one's nation is what is driving the demands for change. The old autocrats have become embarrassing and therefore have outlived their usefulness.

But what is or at least should be frightening to Egyptians, Tunisians and Jordanians is the very real possibility that by throwing out 'old but dirty faithful' they will get something worse.

Just ask the Iranians.