This hefty study attempts a reconsideration of Nasserism by viewing its relationship to various other social forces, starting with the Free Officers’ coup in July 1952, through the resolution of the power conflict between the elderly general Mohammed Nagib and Gamal Abd al-Nasser, and ending with the 1967 defeat, which was, in fact, the defeat of Nasserism.
The study focuses particularly on the relationship between Nasserism and the Egyptian left, a relationship characterized by the organized left’s support for Nasserist measures and changes that benefited the majority and Nasserism’s consistent rejection of other independent, active political forces in the country, including the left.
In the first of the book’s three sections, the author offers an economic, social, and political analysis of local conditions after the Second World War until the expulsion of the king, the Free Officers’ coup, and the elimination of the opposition. Marshalling prodigious facts and figures, the second section examines in detail the various stages of Nasserism, while the third discusses the fall of Nasserism and Sadat’s coup. The work closes with a special section on Sadatism versus Nasserism.
Al-Yasar wa-l-nasiriya wa-l-thawra al-mudadda: nazra jadida fi milaffat qadima, by Adel al-Omri, Markaz al-Mahrusa li-l-Nashr, 2009, 534 pp.
