Cleft Capitalism: The Social Origins of Failed Market Making in Egypt (Stanford Studies in Middle Eastern and Islamic Societies and Cultures)

Egypt has undergone significant economic liberalization under the auspices of the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, USAID, and the European Commission. Yet after more than four decades of economic reform, the Egyptian economy still fails to meet popular expectations for inclusive growth, better standards of living, and high-quality employment. While many analysts point to cronyism and corruption, Amr Adly finds the root causes of this stagnation in the underlying social and political conditions of economic development. __Cleft Capitalism__ offers a new explanation for why market-based development can fail to meet expectations: small businesses in Egypt are not growing into medium and larger businesses. The practical outcome of this missing middle syndrome is the continuous erosion of the economic and social privileges once enjoyed by the middle classes and unionized labor, without creating enough winners from market making. This in turn set the stage for alienation, discontent, and, finally, revolt. With this book, Adly uncovers both an institutional explanation for Egypt's failed market making, and sheds light on the key factors of arrested economic development across the Global South. "Over the course of four decades, the Egyptian economy underwent consistent and comprehensive economic liberalization, privatization of state-owned enterprises, deregulation. Yet the Egyptian economy today still experiences low-growth, declining total investment rates, and high un- and under-employment. The private sector has never become globally competitive. There are few beneficiaries to the economic transformations begun under Sadat and continued by Mubarak, and most Egyptians, notably public-sector workers and the urban and rural middle classes, claim losses through these efforts. The 2011 uprising highlighted that these efforts at transformation failed not only economically, but politically as well. This book explores how and why 40 years of economic reform efforts largely failed. Amr Adly argues the fault lies in cleft capitalism: the perpetuation of initial size differences in enterprises, through limits on available land and capital (finance), that constrain any opportunities for growth and expansion"-- Provided by publisher