Egyptian Nationalism Under British Occupation

Egyptian nationalism carries with it certain images of the 1950s Free Officer's coup d'etat or the collusion of Anwar Sedat with the Nazis during WWII. Yet the roots of Egyptian nationalism go much, much deeper than these high-profile events would suggest. When legal reform was announced in 1884, it was heralded by the British tutelary regime as evidence of its effectiveness in (in Lord Kitchener's words) "bringing law and order" to Egypt. But in truth, the reforms had begun in 1879, three years before Admiral Seymour quelled the riots of Alexandria with the guns of the warships under his command. In the above example, we see the crux of the argument of this paper; that the two overlapping layers of nationalism, seen and unseen, were at work in Egypt as early as the years preceding the invasion and subjugation of Egypt by British troops and administrators. The purpose of this paper is to examine the ways -visible and invisible - in which Egyptian nationalism was expressed by both the Egyptian politicians and the Egyptian public. The first half of the paper will lay the groundwork by focusing on the concrete ways in which British, and to a larger extent Western, influence was resisted by Egyptians in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, namely through strikes, riots, assassinations, resignations and other high-profile "events" and "actions". The latter half of the paper will delve deeper into how those who were largely disenfranchised in their own land were able to frustrate the attempts by the British to tighten their imperial grasp upon the land, particularly by investigating corruption, graft, litigiousness, legal reform and the role of lawyers and judges in the nationalist movement.

The opening salvo of the invasion of Egypt by the British has long been attributed to Admiral Seymour, of the Royal Navy. As to exactly why Seymour was riding anchor within ship's guns' range of Alexandria in July 1882, an entire book itself can be written. Thus we will have to content ourselves with the fact that Egyptian debt to European (particularly French and English banks) was quickly spinning out of control as was anti-Western sentiment in Egypt, and worries about the security of the Suez canal coupled with the British governments' desire to disabuse France of the notion that the Mediterranean was a French lake all served as important factors for involvement in Egyptian affairs. Admiral Seymour would later fade into the background of Anglo-Egyptian relations after his ascension to peerage in the House of Lords shortly after, but other luminaries such as Evelyn Baring Lord Cromer, Lord Kitchener and the infamous Earl Arthur James Balfour would quickly become involved in the "Egyptian question" soon enough. As has already been indicated, Egyptian society was already chafing under the weight of the Anglo-French agreement to financial control of Egypt since 1879, which led to the explosion of riots by 1882 that Seymour was so fortuitously present for. Despite the best British efforts, however, it was not the last uprising to be quelled. In what A. G. Hopkins refers to as "the quicksand of Egypt"[1] would in actuality solidify, and radicalize, Egyptian nationalism by offering a common, external enemy for the population to focus upon.

Ahmed Arabi Pasha, leader of the anti-European riots of 1882 - riots Lord Cromer would refer to as "a revolt against mis-government"[2] in Egypt, would soon turn his intelligence and charisma against the British. He was able to capitalize on Egyptian fear of the growing control of the "foreigner" and moved to drive the British from his homeland. His appeal, and the appeal of his successors after he was captured, was able to expand beyond the Muslim/Arab population, uniting Turks, Copts, and other minorities into a "national", Egyptian identity. Initially, protests were attempted through the "proper" channels, namely elected Egyptian representatives to the Khedive. The structure of the government was such however, that these elected representatives could voice their opinions, advise and suggest, but lacked actual power to propose, influence or veto any legislation. In fact, any representative who voiced his opinion too vocally could, and often was, dismissed summarily by the Khedive, often after being pressured to by British "advisors". Unable to work within the system, moderate nationalist forces began to attempt to bypass the "advisors" by appealing directly to world leaders. In 1909, a telegram was sent to Mr. Asquith, then Prime Minister, requesting that the British withdraw their forces, advisors and administrators from Egypt, asserting that Egypt was ready to govern itself responsibly and ending with a warning not to waste the opportunity for future Egyptian good will.[3] The letter was blatantly ignored, and many of the politicians who had signed it were summarily dismissed from their posts, with a select few being imprisoned on charges ranging from corruption to malingering.[4] Latent anti-British sentiment began to rise to the surface as the nationalist movement began to fragment into moderate and various radical segments, the latter advocating violence while the former argued for change through peaceful political means.

Years later, after the Great War, flush with the promise of self-determination as professed by President Woodrow Wilson, once again moderate nationalists attempted to attend the Versailles negotiations, but were denied passports by the British administrators. On 6 Mar 1918, Saad Pasha Zaghul, the leading Egyptian politician, and his associates were summoned before British military officials and told on no uncertain terms that they were not to press the issue of independence further, including attempting to attend the peace talks in France. News of the denial of their exit, however, was no secret to the populace and soon sparked a moderate-led protest in the streets of Cairo. The British reaction can best be described as overreaction and underestimation as the streets of Cairo erupted into violent rioting after the British arrested, deported and imprisoned Saad Pasha Zaghul and four of his associates following the moderate-led protest. The British, according to Carman, had woefully underestimated the appeal of nationalism to the Egyptians "Apparently it [the British government] looked upon the nationalist movement as a shallow affair headed by a small group of discontented politicians" for within a few days, the riots had spread to the rest of Egypt, sparking open revolt. In reaction, the British government rushed General Allenby, who had made his name by directing the insurgent efforts of the Arabs against the Turks through T.E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia), to "exercise supreme authority in all matters military and civil" in Egypt.[5] His first move was to release Saad Pasha Zaghul and reinstate him in order to quell the riots, but after a few days' celebration, the rioting resumed and Zaghul resigned, unable to affect the radical crowds any further. The radicalized potential of the Egyptian nationalist movement had been tapped, and it was quite difficult for Allenby to put the genie back in the bottle, only wresting control back from the radicals after imposing almost draconian martial law. Though the restrictions served to quell the outward violence, the Egyptian public and politicians had already become adept at frustrating the British through subtler means. In essence, Allenby had managed only to stamp out the open flames of nationalism, but he, like his predecessors, were incapable of circumventing the other form Egyptian resistance: corruption and litigiousness.

This paper had opened with the example of the legal reforms that were lauded by the British in 1884, and that the reforms had already been taking shape by 1879. What was not mentioned was the model upon which the laws were based: French Napoleonic code. [6] Though this seems a minor point, it is a subtly important choice, for the Egyptians were well aware that tensions had emerged between the French and British over the administration of Egypt's debt, and saw in the previous decades the expansion of French rule in North Africa, particularly in the case of Tunisia.[7] The British had considered action to invade Egypt as early as 1879, but the Zulu war in South Africa postponed the plans for invasion. Given that the Egyptians were acutely aware of the possibility of British military action, the choice of the Napoleonic code was logical; it offered to the West the image of a modernizing and responsible government, while at the same time putting the Egyptian people on the same footing as the British in the legal arena. As further evidence of the deliberateness of this choice, when the British wrote into the constitution of Egypt a provision for the appointment of "European Judges" to the Mixed and National courts of Egypt, the Egyptians sought not British help, but Belgian! The reasoning for this choice, Brown asserts is two-fold; first, Belgium had no real interest in that particular region of Africa at the time and thus could be relied upon to act in a more impartial manner than say French or British judges and second, the Belgian judges had the desired expertise in the Napoleonic code so as to ensure its success in the face of British attempts to "anglicize" the legal system.[8] Egyptian judges and lawyers were trained in Napoleonic code both at home and in Belgium, returning with expertise that the British generally lacked. Moreover, the Egyptian bar association became a haven for nationalist sympathizers, particularly of the Wafd party. As a result, not only were British attempts at Anglicization, most notably by William Brunyate during World War I, frustrated, but often their attempts at legal recourse were derailed, forcing the British to sidestep the courts in order to find "justice" and thus further alienate the populace. For example, when Commander of the Egyptian army and governor-general of Sudan Lee Stack was assassinated, most of those accused were acquitted in a trial in the Mixed Courts. The Mixed Courts, so called because they had jurisdiction over incidents that involved Egyptians and foreigners, were the most difficult for the British to infiltrate because of the incorporation of certain Islamic shari'a legal elements, but were not the sole reason for discontent.

The National Courts, which had been influenced by British interference to a much greater degree than the Mixed Courts, still stymied the British from time to time. By as early as 1886, Evelyn Baring had complained that "the delay which constantly occurs, in the Native Courts, in dealing with cases in which natives are charged with offenses against British soldiers" was worsening to the point that special, extra-legal tribunals were convened in matters involving the British military. The most famous tribunal case, of course, is the Dinshway incident, in which a troop of pigeon-hunting British officers clashed with the villagers, resulting in the hanging of several villagers and the flogging of many others.[9] Such outrages sparked many of the riots mentioned above, but further served to motivate the native population in other ways. Since the British were willing to abuse the legal system, or even bypass it outright, there was no motivation for the native population to play by the rules. In fact, as early as the 1890's, a movement was forwarded, and enacted in a de facto manner, of making Arabic the one and only official language of the courts, requiring the British administrators and judges to either learn the language or be at the mercy of translators. This led to imperial officials complaining that their instructions were often "misunderstood, contaminated, or abused by the local population or by unscrupulous lawyers and incompetent judges."[10] Moreover, witnesses to crimes had no incentive to comply with the law regarding perjury, mostly because there was little desire to assist the British, but also because there was a strong coercive force against testifying within the native communities. Lawyers and judges, as noted above, were also complicit in delaying British judiciary proceedings, often by putting forth and hearing a multitude of civil cases to the mixed courts. By 1920, over 500,000 cases were filed in civil and shari'a courts alone. The end result was a system which used the court cases as a bargaining tool, requiring graft and influence - even from British imperial agents - allowed those who had little or no influence in the political structure to affect their world and gain at least some agency over their situation.[11] To many of the Egyptians, the "morally correct" thing to do, namely to abide by the spirit of the laws as well as the letter, paid no dividends for them. Indeed, as Johnston notes, "Moralistic analyses also suffer, at times, from an a priori assumption that corruption is a bad thing (or that "legitimate" policies are inherently preferable to those produced corruptly) and tend to blame corruption for a disproportionate share of a society's problems."[12]

To many Egyptians, resistance to Western encroachment into their society was a matter of course, as resistance in any native population to an alien invader would be. The forms of resistance took two distinct forms and presented their own particular problems for the British. The first, that of open hostilities, is far easier to note in reports and official document, as well as to "put down" for it is something concrete, with leaders, a target and a resolution of sorts. Admiral Seymour's guns could fire upon buildings and General Allenby could set curfews and regulate a society's movements. The second form is more problematic, for it plays upon the prejudices of the British occupational force. "Fortunately, England had a 'special aptitude' for 'governing or directing more backward nations'."[13] This statement sums up just why it was so difficult for the British to end the indirect resistance of legal reform and corruption; it presupposes that the native population is inferior and thus too stupid. Once the Egyptians had learned how to operate in the British blind spot, it was increasingly easy to force their hand, as in the case of Dinshway, though it is doubtful that the nationalists intended to goad the British into murder. Egypt, Brown asserts, is not alone in this type of resistance and points to administrators in Burma and India leveling the same charges against their native populations' proclivity to lie and litigate. Resistance, it seems, takes many forms and not all of them can be quelled with the barrel of a gun.

[1] Hopkins, A.G. "The Victorians and Africa: A Reconsideration of the Occupation of Egypt, 1882" in The Journal of African History, Vol. 27, No. 2 (1986) Pp 363 - 391

[2] Carman, Harry J. quoting Lord Cromer in "England and the Egyptian Problem" in Political Science Quarterly Vol. 36, No. 1, (Mar. 1921) Pp. 51 - 78

[3] James Jankowski Nasser's Egypt, Arab Nationalism, and the United Arab Republic (Boulder: Lynne Reinner Publishers, 2002), see also Carman "England and the Egyptian Problem"

[4] Jankowski Pg. 152, see also Carman Pg. 65, See also Hopkins pg. 378

[5] Carman, Pg. 71

[6] Brown, Nathan J. "Retrospective: Law and Imperialism: Egypt in Comparative Perspective" in Law & Society Review Vol. 29, No. 1 (1995) Pp. 103 - 126; Pg. 106

[7] Hopkins Pg. 376

[8] Brown, Pg. 110

[9] Brown, Pp. 110 - 111, See also Carman Pg. 57

[10] Brown 120

[11] Johnston, Michael "The Political Consequences of Corruption: A Reassessment" in Comparative Politics Vol. 18, No. 4 (Jul. 1986) Pp 459 - 457, Pg. 459

[12] Johnston, Pg. 459

[13] Hopkins, Pg. 367