Besieged citizenship
By Samir Morcos
On the eve of the 1984 parliamentary elections, I wrote an article warning of the dangers of dealing with the Copts as an electoral group; as though they were a single, homogeneous bloc with compatible interests. Doing so would mean splitting the nation into a majority and minority on a religious basis. Years have passed and we find that the citizenship status of Copts is assigned as their being a minority sect of "non-Muslim citizens". Reluctance to address the concerns of Copts, on the one hand, is compounded by the rise of the Islamist current on the other. Despite respected scholarly efforts to bolster the concept of citizenship, the Islamic current has returned to speaking of "non-Muslim citizens".
International events -- principally foreign intervention -- have allowed the suggestion of sanctions, as well as domestic confusion. This is what I warned of in my study of American law concerning religious freedom in the world (in my book Protection and Punishment: The West and the Religious Issue in the Middle East ). The Western view proposes the idea of rights from the perspective of punishment, meaning that the guarantor of the provision of rights is the discretion to impose sanctions. This view doesn't realise that it motivates increased disunion.
This has resulted in each group retreating to primary forms of organisation in order to gain their rights in isolation from others, rather than integrating together in one national group whereby everyone struggles against poverty, unemployment and other problems that don't differentiate between one Egyptian and another. Thus citizenship has been besieged by notions of "minority" and "sect" that may achieve some rights but that will not achieve citizenship, which guarantees rights for everyone without distinction on the basis of colour, religion, sex, social standing or wealth.
Breaking the siege on citizenship begins with a careful understanding of what it means, and of shared efforts among all to achieve it. The result would be that any Egyptian would stand in solidarity with his Egyptian partner whenever oppressed, regardless of any differences between them, and that everyone would stand together against everything that creates disunity and tension. In doing so they would move towards a national, modern, strong, law-based state -- towards a single nation for all citizens.
This week's Soapbox speaker is head of the secretariat of Al-Masri Institute for Citizenship and Dialogue.
Al-Ahram Weekly Online : Located at: http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2007/858/op7.htm