Issue No. 601
Opinion
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29 August - 4 Sept. 2002 Issue No. 601 Opinion |
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 | Recommend this page | ||
Four versions of July
Four distinct visions of the July Revolution emerged during the recent golden jubilee celebrations, none of which takes full account of its achievements and failures or managed to assimilate the lessons to be learned.The fourth -- by far the most widespread account -- serves to perpetuate the notion that, while it does not exclude errors and shortcomings, present-day political reality is a logical conclusion of the revolution, and hence is both positive and inevitable. This latter view ignores the implications of American-Israeli plans for Palestine, Iraq and the Arab world in general.
A summary of the four visions nonetheless crystallises the political content of the golden jubilee discourse in its entirety, offering food for thought, if not any kind of action.
The first account holds that the revolution was no more than a military coup -- as totalitarian as it was regressive -- that ended democracy as well as cultural, political and economic liberalism, compromising human rights and cutting short the kind of liberal development underway prior to its outbreak. In short, it is an absolute condemnation of July.
The second account stresses the socialist orientation of what it sees as a national revolution, lamenting the reduced scope of that orientation but pointing out that it lives on in several aspects of contemporary life.
The third account views the revolution as a national, anti-imperial movement that benefits from, without fully adopting, "scientific" socialism, striving to unite socialist and capitalist strains, initially through authoritarian means. The revolution, according to this account, ended with Sadat, who perpetuated what remains, in effect, a counter-revolution even if it employed the same discourse as that of July. But it remains the fourth, perhaps most disappointing account -- that the revolution lives on -- that explains the need to celebrate in the first place.
This week's Soapbox speaker is a veteran activist and literary critic.
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