Economic liberalisation policies and (non-Islamic) market coalition in Egypt

This article analyses the implementation of Egyptian economic liberalisation and examines its impact on the formation of a non-Islamic market coalition in Egypt. It argues that the way the Egyptian state implemented economic opening - characterised by political corruption and lack of transparency - worked against the integration of micro-, small, and medium-sized Islamic business groups with the market in the peripheral quarters during the Mubarak era. In the absence of the integration between Islamic business groups and the market reforms, economic liberalisation policies sharpened class struggles which had empowered ideological rigidity in favour of state-centric economic policies within political Islam in Egypt.