Opinion Cairo’s missing links

Since then,a mountain of research has established that countries with strong underlying institutions have better odds of making it to democracy.

So I’ve been reading reports from the United Nations,the World Bank and other groups to see what they say about the strength of Egypt’s institutions. These reports give the impression that Egypt is a place where people are trying to lead normal,middle-class lives,but they are frustrated at every turn by overstaffed and lethargic bureaucracies.

For example,Egypt does a good job of getting kids to attend elementary school,high school and college. But the quality of the educational system is terrible,ranking 106th out of 131 nations in one measure. The UN Human Development Index,which is a broad measure of human capital and potential,ranks Egypt 101st out of 182 countries.

The quality of government agencies over all is a tad better. The World Bank Institute puts Egypt at around the 40th percentile when it comes to government effectiveness. Where it really lags is in measures of responsiveness and accountability. Egypt’s government agencies are among the least responsive on earth.

The government’s economic reform effort illustrates the strengths and weaknesses of the governing institutions. The World Bank gives Egypt high marks for its efforts to move from a centrally planned to a more market-oriented economy.

But corruption levels are around the global average,which is to say,corruption is rife. It takes 218 days to get a building permit to put up a warehouse,with all the attending bribes. The effort to privatise state-owned enterprises turned into an enrichment scheme for cronies of the regime. For example,only two families were allowed to bid for the state-run cinema company.

Over all,Egypt’s competitiveness is mediocre but not terrible. The World Economic Forum ranks Egypt 81st out of the 139 nations it evaluates. When you look inside the economic rankings,you see that Egypt does fine on many of the short-term decisions,like having a flexible wage structure,but it does horribly on long-term things.

Socially,the country seems stymied. Up until the recent rallies,Egypt has been a place where people have tried to build informal groups like unions and professional organisations,only to see the government move in to stifle or co-opt their efforts. Journalists have tried to create a space for a free press,but with only moderate success. (With 20 per cent of Egyptians going online,Egypt has one of the highest rates of Internet penetration in Africa.)

The biggest gap,by far,is political. The government has successfully prevented political parties from forming,with limited exceptions like the Muslim Brotherhood. Party-building is the country’s screaming need and should be the top priority for outside assistance.

Egypt is in much better shape than Iraq was under Saddam Hussein or Gaza was before Hamas took over. It’s a 40 per cent nation,mediocre in the world rankings,but not a basket case. Surveys showed that until about a week ago,Egyptians had extraordinarily low expectations for the future,among the lowest in the world.

But now things seem to be changing. And while you wouldn’t say that Egypt possesses the sort of human,social and institutional capital that will enable it to achieve miracles over the next few years,you’d have to say it has some decent underlying structures. And,if led wisely,it has a reasonable shot at joining the normal,demo-cratic world.

The New York Times