Abstract: This talk explores the local dynamics of transformation in Egypt since 2011. Based on extensive fieldwork in Egypt it offers a “state analysis from below” and argues that in order to understand the dynamics of Egypt’s turbulent tranformations and current authoritarian contraction we need to shed more light on the agency of actors, their resources, interests and belief systems. The presentation seeks to draw the “big picture” while looking at seemingly marginal actors and their informal politics such as Cairo’s poor or Egypt’s neighbourhood committees (lijan shaabiyya) that spread after 2011.

Prof. Dr. Cilja Harders is Professor of Political Sciences and Director of the Center for Middle Eastern and North African Politics at the Freie Universität Berlin. She has extensive research experience in the Middle East with a focus on Egypt since 1992 and is co-editor of Local Politics and Contemporary Transformations in the Arab World (Palgrave, 2013).