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Reconstructing Rural Egypt: Ahmed Hussein and the History of Egyptian Development
Amy J. Johnson's book provides the rich and untold story of the architect behind Egypt's inspired and highly successful social reform policies.
The Rural Social Centers of the German-educated Ahmed Hussein were the cornerstones of his project initiatives, and these centers integrated social services through complete community participation. His programs flourished and were used as models for rural development projects worldwide. After the 1952 revolution, Hussein's influence waned, and he refused to participate in Gamal Abd el-Nasir's development schemes. Abd el-Nasr's eventual obliteration of Hussein's reform projects led to Hussein's resignation. Although he never again became involved in public life, Hussein created a school of thought in Egypt that endures today. Johnson chronicles current efforts of several organizations to revive Hussein's methods and reform agenda.
The Rural Social Centers of the German-educated Ahmed Hussein were the cornerstones of his project initiatives, and these centers integrated social services through complete community participation. His programs flourished and were used as models for rural development projects worldwide. After the 1952 revolution, Hussein's influence waned, and he refused to participate in Gamal Abd el-Nasir's development schemes. Abd el-Nasr's eventual obliteration of Hussein's reform projects led to Hussein's resignation. Although he never again became involved in public life, Hussein created a school of thought in Egypt that endures today. Johnson chronicles current efforts of several organizations to revive Hussein's methods and reform agenda.
304 pages, Hardcover
First published November 1, 2003
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March 8, 2016
Amy Johnson’s Reconstructing Rural Egypt is a political biography of Ahmed Hussein, a prominent Egyptian rural reformer who had a relatively brief tenure in civil and diplomatic service. Given the title, one might presume that the work engages an analysis of reforms in the countryside, but this is only the case for about half of the book. The rest chronicles Hussein’s life, from his upbringing and educational background through his five years of service as Egypt’s ambassador to the United States. If there is any overarching theme or argument, it comes in the conclusion as the notion that Hussein’s ideas on rural reform survived his death and have been influential in policies up to the present day.
Johnson’s first chapter outlines Hussein’s early life through the completion of his PhD thesis in Germany, which contained three ideas that would influence his future career: “a focus on community identity and cooperation, reliance on local experts, and the importance of access to credit and advanced agricultural technologies”. As an upper class individual, he was not particularly enamored with rural areas, but it was his very discomfort and recognition of its poverty that spurred him to expand the cooperative system, because he felt that it would be beneficial to the nation. Egypt had had experience with the cooperative system in the past, but these experiments had failed due to a lack of knowledgeable experts to keep them running and a focus on rapid expansion that made such programs successful in the short term, but unsustainable in the long run. Hussein returned to Egypt at a particularly anti-liberal period in Egypt’s history, but nonetheless embarked upon programs of rural reform in his capacities as civil inspector and university professor. His first six-year program, the Rural Social Centers, demonstrated the benefits of consistent educational and health reform and earned him recognition as an effective rural social reformer.
The author argues that although historians have seen reforms in the pre-revolutionary period as shallow, self-serving prestige projects, real progress was made at times, including with Hussein’s programs. Her third and most extensive chapter chronicles the impact of the government’s realization, after 1936, that the government needed to engage social reform in order to avoid violent dissent. Although a Ministry for Social Affairs was established in 1939, the onset of World War II deepened the existing problems and led to more social unrest. Thus the palace, the Wafd, and the Muslim Brotherhood were all interested in changes in the rural realm in order to build their political prestige by engaging the debate, although many of their solutions were too superficial and short-term to engender real change. Hussein’s proposals, on the other hand, were notably “moderate and gradual”, and his Rural Social Centers model had already demonstrated a meaningful, if limited impact. This meant that he was able to keep the program alive during the conflict, despite economic difficulties, and convince those in high positions to support and expand the project. Johnson’s detailed analysis of the model leads her to uncover progress in education and health, particularly for women, but also to note that obstacles such as the lack of land reform, population growth, and jurisdictional issues between ministries were obstacles to the full realization of the program’s impact.
In 1950 Hussein was invited to join the new Wafd cabinet as Minister of Social Affairs and he introduced a program of rural reform that involved three components: “a program of limited land reform and reclamation, the establishment of a minimum agricultural wage, and the regulation of the relationship between landowners and their tenant farmers”. The first focused on the creation of more arable land through reclamation and better distribution of already arable land, but bureaucratic and political obstacles limited the project’s success. The minimum wage law Hussein drafted, meanwhile, was never passed, although he was able to mandate the provision of basic social services. Finally, he was able to enact new labor laws that helped improve the conditions of agricultural workers. When it became clear, in 1951, that the Wafd was not interested in genuine reform, however, Hussein resigned from his position for the official reason of deleterious party interference in his programs, which earned him widespread public support and praise. His governmental projects made little progress thereafter, which was ultimately a factor of the Wafd’s disinterest, but he continued to work on private initiatives, in addition to serving with a United Nations mission involved in examining global community development schemes in rural areas.
Hussein was initially supportive of the revolutionary regime, but his enthusiasm diminished as the Revolutionary Command Council transformed his Rural Social Centers model to the point where it was unrecognizable and ineffective. This was done, according to the author, because the government wanted to highlight a signature land reform project of their own to earn support, yet also distance themselves from the old order. Hussein thus declined an offer to serve in a post-1952 ministry, because he knew that he would not be able to act independently or apolitically. Gamal Abdul Nasser, meanwhile, was seeking an ambassador to the United States who could improve Egypt’s image abroad and believed that Hussein’s international recognition and reputation, as well as his personal characteristics, would be suited ideally for this task. Thus, despite Hussein’s lack of diplomatic experience, he was asked to fulfill this role, which Hussein accepted out of a sense of duty and a belief that the appointment would be temporary. Hussein generally disagreed with Nasser, but he had to represent his policies anyways, which revolved around three major issues during his five year tenure: the Czechoslovakian arms purchase, the Aswan High Dam funding, and the nationalization of the Suez Canal. Although he was successful in improving Egypt’s image to the Americans, particularly as his wife Aziza played a key role in representing a progressive liberal woman, his frequent disagreements with Gamal Abdul Nasser led to his resignation from government service in 1958 and his departure from public life.
As mentioned above, Johnson’s work concludes with a narrative of what little is known about Hussein’s life after departing from the public eye and a look at how his rural reform policies have been adopted by future governments, albeit ineffectively and in a way that repeated the very mistakes of the past that Hussein attempted to rectify. Overall, Reconstructing Rural Egypt is well-researched and well-written, making it an accessible and interesting read, but does not overcome the inherent limits of political biography in that it focuses heavily on the influence of a charismatic figure and has difficulty engaging a broader significance. While it is not impossible for a particular genre to escape its intrinsic boundaries, this work does not accomplish that. Nonetheless, I would recommend it to field specialists as a different perspective to several key periods and aspects of modern Egyptian history, as it has personal and social flare even as it discusses a high political perspective.
Johnson’s first chapter outlines Hussein’s early life through the completion of his PhD thesis in Germany, which contained three ideas that would influence his future career: “a focus on community identity and cooperation, reliance on local experts, and the importance of access to credit and advanced agricultural technologies”. As an upper class individual, he was not particularly enamored with rural areas, but it was his very discomfort and recognition of its poverty that spurred him to expand the cooperative system, because he felt that it would be beneficial to the nation. Egypt had had experience with the cooperative system in the past, but these experiments had failed due to a lack of knowledgeable experts to keep them running and a focus on rapid expansion that made such programs successful in the short term, but unsustainable in the long run. Hussein returned to Egypt at a particularly anti-liberal period in Egypt’s history, but nonetheless embarked upon programs of rural reform in his capacities as civil inspector and university professor. His first six-year program, the Rural Social Centers, demonstrated the benefits of consistent educational and health reform and earned him recognition as an effective rural social reformer.
The author argues that although historians have seen reforms in the pre-revolutionary period as shallow, self-serving prestige projects, real progress was made at times, including with Hussein’s programs. Her third and most extensive chapter chronicles the impact of the government’s realization, after 1936, that the government needed to engage social reform in order to avoid violent dissent. Although a Ministry for Social Affairs was established in 1939, the onset of World War II deepened the existing problems and led to more social unrest. Thus the palace, the Wafd, and the Muslim Brotherhood were all interested in changes in the rural realm in order to build their political prestige by engaging the debate, although many of their solutions were too superficial and short-term to engender real change. Hussein’s proposals, on the other hand, were notably “moderate and gradual”, and his Rural Social Centers model had already demonstrated a meaningful, if limited impact. This meant that he was able to keep the program alive during the conflict, despite economic difficulties, and convince those in high positions to support and expand the project. Johnson’s detailed analysis of the model leads her to uncover progress in education and health, particularly for women, but also to note that obstacles such as the lack of land reform, population growth, and jurisdictional issues between ministries were obstacles to the full realization of the program’s impact.
In 1950 Hussein was invited to join the new Wafd cabinet as Minister of Social Affairs and he introduced a program of rural reform that involved three components: “a program of limited land reform and reclamation, the establishment of a minimum agricultural wage, and the regulation of the relationship between landowners and their tenant farmers”. The first focused on the creation of more arable land through reclamation and better distribution of already arable land, but bureaucratic and political obstacles limited the project’s success. The minimum wage law Hussein drafted, meanwhile, was never passed, although he was able to mandate the provision of basic social services. Finally, he was able to enact new labor laws that helped improve the conditions of agricultural workers. When it became clear, in 1951, that the Wafd was not interested in genuine reform, however, Hussein resigned from his position for the official reason of deleterious party interference in his programs, which earned him widespread public support and praise. His governmental projects made little progress thereafter, which was ultimately a factor of the Wafd’s disinterest, but he continued to work on private initiatives, in addition to serving with a United Nations mission involved in examining global community development schemes in rural areas.
Hussein was initially supportive of the revolutionary regime, but his enthusiasm diminished as the Revolutionary Command Council transformed his Rural Social Centers model to the point where it was unrecognizable and ineffective. This was done, according to the author, because the government wanted to highlight a signature land reform project of their own to earn support, yet also distance themselves from the old order. Hussein thus declined an offer to serve in a post-1952 ministry, because he knew that he would not be able to act independently or apolitically. Gamal Abdul Nasser, meanwhile, was seeking an ambassador to the United States who could improve Egypt’s image abroad and believed that Hussein’s international recognition and reputation, as well as his personal characteristics, would be suited ideally for this task. Thus, despite Hussein’s lack of diplomatic experience, he was asked to fulfill this role, which Hussein accepted out of a sense of duty and a belief that the appointment would be temporary. Hussein generally disagreed with Nasser, but he had to represent his policies anyways, which revolved around three major issues during his five year tenure: the Czechoslovakian arms purchase, the Aswan High Dam funding, and the nationalization of the Suez Canal. Although he was successful in improving Egypt’s image to the Americans, particularly as his wife Aziza played a key role in representing a progressive liberal woman, his frequent disagreements with Gamal Abdul Nasser led to his resignation from government service in 1958 and his departure from public life.
As mentioned above, Johnson’s work concludes with a narrative of what little is known about Hussein’s life after departing from the public eye and a look at how his rural reform policies have been adopted by future governments, albeit ineffectively and in a way that repeated the very mistakes of the past that Hussein attempted to rectify. Overall, Reconstructing Rural Egypt is well-researched and well-written, making it an accessible and interesting read, but does not overcome the inherent limits of political biography in that it focuses heavily on the influence of a charismatic figure and has difficulty engaging a broader significance. While it is not impossible for a particular genre to escape its intrinsic boundaries, this work does not accomplish that. Nonetheless, I would recommend it to field specialists as a different perspective to several key periods and aspects of modern Egyptian history, as it has personal and social flare even as it discusses a high political perspective.
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