What is Poverty? Egypt as an example of the exploitation of the World Bank.

MA Sultan - محمد سلطان

The arguments about defining poverty have been always on the rise according to the dire situation or high pace of globalization. On one side, poverty was looked at merely from the economic perspective in terms of the income or possession, and defined it as where the individual lacks access to resources. I think poverty is more complicated than that because following the same methodology would mean that poverty in the Scandinavian countries would mean not having a cell phone or not following up with the high standards of living in these societies. On the other hand, some development scholars counter argued that poverty in it is broader sense is a multifaceted definition. It is more about the interconnection and interdependence of the political, economic, and social factors. In general, the poor countries are kept trapped in poverty because of three main challenges, namely, the bad structure or institutions, the culture and religion inclination towards poverty, and the geographic obstacles such natural disasters and tropical disorders. So, how is that could be related to or drew upon for the Egyptian dilemma?

Initially, the second factor does not exist in the Egyptian dilemma since the Egyptian culture or religion has been always the first motive to work. For example, the Egyptian proverb says: "The sun does not rise on the dead", meaning that those who sleep until the sun rise are like the dead people, both do not work or seek betterment. However, I would argue that Egyptian culture is a bit lenient with the idea of fighting corruption. For example, most of the bribery acts in the governmental buildings are looked at as 'Ikramiyah' or an act of gratitude and encouragement for the officer to finish the work. Analyzing the culture from another perspective, another disease in the Egyptian culture is kind of looking down at certain sects in the society such us the upper Egyptian people or low-income sects. As for the third factor, Egypt is privileged by being located at one river, two seas and one of the most fertile soils in the world along with an amazing climate and fabulous heritage and natural wealth. Therefore, the problem mainly lies in the second factor - the structure factor. Before digging deeply in the problem I want to clarify that this factor does also include corruption and ignorance. Accordingly, the problem in Egypt concerning the institutions is as the following:

First of all, The Egyptian institutions are very poorly managed and I would say self-sabotaging. For example, as an Egyptian, I see the ministers take decisions that contradict each other, so one day the government decides to renovate and fix the high ways, the following day the minster of electricity or water decided to have constructions or diggings on the same road that was just renovated. Even the same problem could be noticed when the national budget is discussed. It is always that the allocation of money is not scientifically studied and the five-year-plan is a matter of the bureaucratic methodology. The lack of coordination between the institutions that leads to the spontaneous self-destructing strategies does not emerge out of the horizon, but corruption does add to it intensively.

Second of all, whenever there is a dysfunction in the institutions it always corruption that backs it. Starting by the economic sector, the vast majority of the highly influencing companies in Egypt are either by the ruling regime or by the close circle, the winning coalition that supports the regime. Unsurprisingly, Mubarak's sons are still held accountable for the manipulation of stocks case after the 25^th of Jan revolution which exposed how corruption has grown in the society. Legally speaking, I have a taken a course in the Egyptian law in which I learned that even the term 'corruption' is limited to the act of bribery in article 103. The last example I would like to use about corruption is the Egyptian treaty with Saudi Arabia concerning declaring the island of 'Sanafeir and Tiran' as belonging to the Saudi side. Historically speaking, Egypt has been fiercely fighting, in the domestic and international arena, for proving the belonging and sovereignty of Egypt over the aforementioned islands. All the sudden, Egypt gave up its long call over the lands, and this is a red flag to depict how much corruption is present in the institution level. Such event denotes to the idea that it is either corruption did exist and manipulated the masses to hold on a dream that is not theirs or it a new act of betrayal by giving up the lands in exchange for political or economic support.

Having said that, the accumulation of the very poor institutions accompanied with the vicious governance, ignorance, and corruption led to the dire contemporary status quo. On a side note, it worthy of mentioning that the causes of corruption is not only domestically driven. In other words, the exploitative strategies by the World Bank and the IMF played a crucial role by incorporating the neoliberal approach based on the readjustment programs that caused many countries, including Egypt, not only to loan from the bank on a very austerity-based approach that accounted for exacerbating the problem the accumulation of loans instead of eliminating poverty.

It is note-worthy that poverty is an outcome, yet a reason for corruption. However, the Rational Choice School has argued that the three points keeping the countries poor are not what the real causes, but rather they are what let these countries stay poor or getting poorer. Such school argues that the poor countries tend to have more kids because it means having more labor or helping hands which contradicts the rational choice for the people on a collective level. Therefore, any other symptom, like the level of corruption or institutional dysfunction, does only feed into the continuation of poverty.

Building upon what has been said, the solution for the Egyptian dilemma should start by envisaging poverty out of the economic restrictions and constraints. The first successful step should be taken towards the investment in human beings, empowering the women and improving human security. Once the humans are well treated and respected, this will lead to demand of good governance from its simple form- based on justice, democracy, well planned public policies and sustainable development- till the advanced form of governance where the public sector compete domestically and worldwide. Accomplishing these factors will help in having a balance between the selectors and the winning coalition which consequently will account for holding the leader accountable for each and every decision made for the sake of the country. On a more domestic level, I think the think tanks and the most educated people should refrain from just criticizing and put more concentration on solving the problems and coming up with new ways to alleviate the obstacles.

The last element in the solution strategy that I want to mention is the collective cooperation regionally. I'd like to start by stating the fact that since Sykes-Picot almost all the Arab countries began to lose the sense of altruism towards other sister countries, whereas in the times of need, like during the war of 1973, Saudi Arabia supported Egypt in the war wholeheartedly and internationally. In return for that, the Egyptians have been always known as the human power that assisted the Gulf countries throughout their development. Taking into consideration the dimension of international relations starting from the Marshal Plan till the Decisive Storm Coalition, I would draw upon that by saying the cooperation between the countries is must for getting out of the poverty trap. Yet, the major obstacle that Egypt might face is the external intervention in its sovereignty due to the monetary supply or fund.