After reading Timothy Garton Ash's article "The Truth About Dictatorship" I began thinking about the recent sentencing of Hosni Mubarak. The former president and his Interior Minister Habib al-Adly were sentenced to life in jail as opposed to death. Mubarak and his sons were also cleared of corruption charges and a number of Security Chiefs were also acquitted. This has, understandably, upset many Egyptians with some calling for renewed protests (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-18330411). Was it the right decision not to execute Mubarak and his collaborators? Is this the correct way with dealing with the past? Was there any alternatives? Ash asks similar questions in his article. He focuses primarily on Germany and the similarities and differences between it's reconciliation with it's Nazi and Communist past as well as the experiences of other post-Communist states.
Ash notes that there is no 'easy generalizations about how to deal with a difficult past'. He does however identify three main paths: trials, purges, or history lessons (as well as rehabilitation, compensation and restitution for the victims). Key to how any potential step forward is achieved is the nature and extent of the preceding dictatorship. Ash uses the distinction between the 'deep' repression of Latin America and the 'broad' oppression of Communist Central Europe. In Latin America there was a clear distinction between 'them' and 'us' - those who were clearly victims and those who carried out the crimes. In contrast the 'broad' repression of Central Europe involved a 'far larger number of people exerting less violence or explicit pressure on a much larger number'. Many were on both sides. Therefore there was no clear line between 'them' and 'us'. No-one was simply a victim but everyone was in some measure co-responsible. Therefore, according to Czech leader Vaclav Havel 'if everyone should be put on trial then no-one should'. Trials did however go ahead in much of Central Europe to varying degrees of success.
If we assume Egypt had comparably under Mubarak 'deep' repression as Latin America had during the mid to late 20th century should Egypt follow similar paths of restitution? Chile, in the post-Pinochet years, developed the so called 'truth commission' in order to deal with it's violent past. The point of this commission was not only to find out as much as possible of the truth about the past dictatorship but have this truth proclaimed and publicly exposed. Could the same method be used in Egypt?
This brings me back to my original question. Should Mubarak and his collaborators be executed and those who perpetrated violence against political dissidents be punished? Or is it more beneficial for Egypt as a whole that a system of reconciliation and 'truth-seeking' is developed to deal with past injustices?
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ReplyDeleteI feel that due to the army having had such a major role in both the previous Mubarak regime, and the current temporary regime; this has caused the perpetrators of violence from the former regime like Mubarak & co to go unpunished to the extent many of the public wanted. How much good will the execution of Mubarak & co really do for the future of Egypt, I doubt it will help at all merely cause further antagonisms between the army and public. However what I think these new protests do suggest is the deep suspicion and acknowledgement from the Egyptian people that very little has changed since Mubarak's overthrow. It seems this verdict has due to the acknowledgement of little change, reignited the calls for renewed protest en masse, I remember reading in a BBC report that one of the opposition leaders and a election favourite has called for the 'revolution to continue' in response to these events. It will be very interesting in the coming days/weeks to see how the regime responds this time.
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