Rethinking the repression-dissent nexus: assessing Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood's response to repression since the coup of 2013

ABSTRACT

This article examines the repression-dissent nexus in Islamist social movements. Several studies have overwhelmingly focused on the effects of repression on protest volume, level, and tactics. However, understanding the responses of individual members to regime repression and how they relate to the movement's collective response is rarely discussed. By analysing the response of the Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood to regime repression since the coup of 2013, this article explains the effects of repression on opposition movements. It argues that to understand the impact of repression on these movements, we need to differentiate between the collective and individual responses to repression. These two levels of analysis are crucial to better understand the repression-dissent nexus. Also, the article contends that collective and individual responses to repression cannot be explained by focusing solely on the structural and institutional factors (i.e. organization, ideology, leadership, etc.). Members’ personal experiences, memory, emotions, and trauma play a key role in shaping their response to repression. The article thus accounts for both the formal and informal effects of repression on Islamists.

KEYWORDS:

• Egypt
• Muslim Brotherhood
• Islamism
• repression
• emotions
• social movements

Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood has experienced unprecedented repression since the coup of 2013. Unlike previous waves of repression, where the Muslim Brotherhood (the Brotherhood thereafter) could accommodate and survive, the most recent crackdown has significantly affected the movement and undermined its political activism. Since 2013, the Brotherhood witnessed several divisions and schism, and it struggles to maintain its unity and coherence. This article investigates the impact of regime repression on the Brotherhood, not only as a collective actor, but also as individual members. Specifically, it explains how the Brotherhood responded to regime repression and how this response was shaped over the past few years. Scholars and analysts have attempted to explain the Brotherhood's response to repression since the 2013 coup. Some argued that repression will lead to the radicalization of the Brotherhood's members particularly the youth,¹ while others contended the movement will remain committed to its accommodative and peaceful strategy.² Moreover, some reports speculated the Brotherhood will seek reconciliation with the regime because of the high cost of repression,³ while others emphasize that the movement will never accept Sisi's legitimacy and will remain defiant.⁴ This article argues that to understand the impact of repression on opposition movements, we need to unpack their collective and individual responses to repression. One of the key gaps in the literature on the repression-dissent nexus lies in the lack of differentiation between these two levels of analysis. Scholars of social movements and contentious politics have extensively studied the relationship between regime repression and the dissent of political and social movements.⁵ In particular, the inconsistent and contradictory responses of opposition movements to repression has received significant scholarly attention during the past few years. Scholars have investigated the impact of repression on protests’ volume, scale, and level in what has become widely known as the ‘repression-dissent’ nexus. These scholars attempt to explain the divergent responses of opposition to regime repression and investigate the circumstances under which repression can lead to either the escalation or de-escalation of protests and mobilization. Mark Lichbach, for example, adeptly investigates the puzzling effects of repression on dissents’ tactics and whether it escalates or de-escalates (deters) dissent activities.⁶ Variance in an opposition movement's response to repression has prompted scholars to disaggregate the repression-dissent nexus by focusing on adaptive tactics and repertoire of actions,⁷ actors’ perception of repression,⁸ and bargaining calculations.⁹

However, despite the literature's contribution in enhancing our understanding of the repression-dissent nexus, it suffers two key shortcomings: the first lies in its overemphasis on the collective response to repression. Most studies on the repression-dissent nexus focus on opposition movements’ tactics in responding to repression (i.e. mobilization, backlash, de-escalation, etc.) without paying much attention to individual response(s) and how they are shaped by repression. The second is the focus on the role of institutional and structural factors (i.e. ideology, leadership, organization, etc.) in shaping the opposition's response to repression. While these factors are important in understanding the relationship between repression and dissent, they are not the sole factors that determine the opposition's response to repression. Other factors such as emotions, personal experiences, and trauma play a key role in responding to repression.

This article seeks to address these gaps and shortcomings by unpacking the response of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood to repression since the coup of 2013. Specifically, it unravels the impact of repression on the Brotherhood and its members. It does so by firstly differentiating between the collective and the individual response(s) to regime repression. The article argues that there is a divergence between the Brotherhood and its members’ response to repression. While the movement attempts to make organizational and strategic adaptation in order to accommodate repression, members adopt different tactics that range from confrontation with the regime to political apathy. Secondly, the article contends that opposition movements’ response to regime repression is not determined solely by the formal and structural factors. It draws attention to the role of informal and intangible factors in shaping individuals’ response to repression. Emotions, memory, and personal experiences, and grievances can play a key role in shaping responses to repression.

By testing these theoretical propositions, the article seeks to contribute to the growing literature on the repression-dissent nexus. Specifically, the article focuses on two key aspects in explaining the Brotherhood's response to regime repression: the organizational adaptation and members’ personal experiences. On the first aspect, I define adaptation as a change, either strategic or tactical, in the movement's organizational structure as a result of regime repression. During repression waves, opposition movements tend to focus on their survival and how to avoid political elimination. Therefore, they are compelled to make organizational changes in order to adapt to the repressive environment. As a tight-knit and well-structured movement, the Brotherhood attempted to make some organizational changes to cope with the new environment after the coup of 2013. While the vast majority of literature on Islamists’ adaptation focus on changes that occur as a result of their inclusion and participation in formal politics¹⁰, this study explores the Brotherhood's adaptation under the conditions of sever repression and exclusion.

On the second aspect, the article investigates individuals’ response(s) to regime repression. It explains how members’ personal experiences affect and shape their response(s). Specifically, the article examines the impact of emotions on members’ behaviour and tactics. The role of emotions in politics has been a subject of scholarly inquiry over the past few decades. Across disciplines (comparative politics, political sociology, social movements, international relations, social psychology, etc.) research shows how emotions shape and affect individuals’ social and political behaviour.¹¹ As Marcus points out, “Emotion's role in politics is pervasive both because emotion enables past experience to be encoded with its evaluative history and because emotion enables contemporary circumstances to be quickly evaluated.”¹² While scholars disagree on defining emotions, they concur that they can play a key role in shaping individuals’ behaviour. The article explains how the responses of the Brotherhood's members to regime crackdown are shaped by a complex set of emotions such as anger, hate, despair, desire for revenge, etc. As Petersen points out, “the role of emotions should be examined within the context of the real-life experiences that generate them.”¹³ Since the coup of 2013, several members of the Brotherhood particularly among the youth have either disagreed with the leadership's strategy which resulted in significant divisions or abandoned the movement entirely.

Drawing on around 20 semi-structured interviews conducted between 2016 and 2018 with current and former members of the Brotherhood, the article illustrates how members’ emotions shaped their response to regime repression. Some of the interviews were conducted in person and others via technological and communicative tools such as messenger, Skype, WhatsApp, and other chat applications. Some of the interviewees chose not to use their real names and others preferred to be anonymous to avoid regime retaliation.

The article proceeds as follows: the first section provides a historical background on the Brotherhood's response to repression over the past few decades and how it impacted the movement's ideology and strategy. The second section highlights the Brotherhood's response to repression since the coup of 2013. It looks at different tactics adopted by the Brotherhood as a collective actor in order to adapt to regime repression. The third section explores individual members’ response to repression. It shows how regime repression impacted the Brotherhood's members over the past few years and led to different responses. Finally, the article draws some theoretical conclusions that can foster the research on the repression-dissent nexus.

Repressing the Brotherhood: a brief history

The Brotherhood's response to repression has changed over time. It was a mixture of accommodation and defiance, and it varied based on the degree and scale of repression and to what extent the movement can accommodate it. For example, during the 1950s and 1960s, severe repression under the regime of President Gamal Abdel Nasser against the Brotherhood led to significant divisions and factionalism within the movement. The Brotherhood was divided between two main currents: confrontational and accommodative. The first current was led by Sayyid Qutb and adopted a confrontational and noncompromising stance against Nasser's regime. The other one was led by the movement's former General Guide Hassan al-Hudabyi who adopted an accommodative and generally quietest stance from Nasser's regime.¹⁴ Moreover, the Brotherhood used repression for its own benefit. In some circumstances, repression served as a binding tool that created solidarity among the movement's rank-and-file, strengthened organizational coherence, and generated public support. This occurred through what is called the ordeal (mihna) narrative, which refers to “the sense of victimization that prevails among the Brotherhood's members because of regime repression.”¹⁵ Also, the Brotherhood's conservative leadership used repression in order to marginalize reformists and avoid calls for internal reform. Therefore, several prominent figures such as Abdel Moneim Aboul Fotouh left the movement after the uprising of 2011.¹⁶

Under Mubarak, the Brotherhood adopted different tactics in response to regime repression. Attuned to the rules of the political game, the Brotherhood took advantage of Mubarak's fight on terrorism during the 1980s and presented itself as a bulwark against extremism. During this time of repression, the Brotherhood adopted a non-provocative strategy towards the regime. It also retreated from politics to focus on the social realm and expand its constituency. This was the case during the 1990s after Mubarak repressed the movement and undermined its political clout. More interestingly, in some instances, exclusion forced the Brotherhood to develop its religious and political views. For example, the Brotherhood issued a political statement (bayan) in 1994 recognizing political pluralism and stressing women's political rights.¹⁷ Similarly, the movement issued another statement in April 1995 emphasizing the political and civil rights of Christians. The movement also reached out to other ideological forces such as leftists, liberals, and seculars. As regime repression mounted in the 2000s, the Brotherhood became more cautious in its political moves, yet more assertive. It adopted what Wickham calls “self-restrained” strategy in rhetoric and practice in order to avoid regime retaliation.¹⁸ For example, the Brotherhood chose not to run a full-fledged electoral campaign in the parliamentary elections of 2005 and 2010. It was keen to reach out to regime officials and to make political bargains on how many seats its candidates should contest.¹⁹

In March 2004, the Brotherhood issued what was considered at that time its most comprehensive political document, the “Political Reform Initiative.” The document was viewed by scholars as a major step towards adopting a progressive and moderate political agenda.²⁰ While the regime was sceptical towards the Brotherhood's new initiative, it was hailed by other political forces and paved the way for more collaboration with the Brotherhood in the following years. The Brotherhood used the initiative as a political platform in parliamentary elections in 2005 where it won around 20% of parliament seats. The Brotherhood's victory in the elections in turn provoked the Mubarak regime, which retaliated with more repression and exclusionary policies against the movement. This was evident in the following parliamentary elections in 2010 when the movement won no seats. Overall, the Brotherhood's response to the Mubarak regime was a mixture of accommodation and defiance, which enabled it to become the most powerful and influential opposition movement in Egypt for three decades.

The Brotherhood's response to repression after the 2013 coup

The Brotherhood's response to regime repression since the 2013 coup has witnessed several developments and changes. Immediately, after the coup the movement became defiant and sought to undo the coup by mobilizing its base and widening its allies. The movement was devastated by the loss of power after only one year in office and faced tremendous hostility and rejection from state institutions, the media, and political forces. The Brotherhood lost its balance and its options in dealing with the coup became limited with time. This can partially be explained by different factors, but most evidently by the extreme repression of the post-coup regime. General Abdelfattah Al-Sisi, who ascended to power after ousting President Mohamed Morsi on 3 July 2013, adopted an unequivocally heavy-handed policy against the Brotherhood with the aim of uprooting it. In fact, the level of repression against the Brotherhood under Sisi's regime is unprecedented and incomparable to his predecessors in terms of degree and scale. Sisi threw thousands of the Brotherhood's leaders and members into prison, freezing their financial and economic assets, confiscating educational and medical centres, and taking over thousands of their social associations.²¹ Moreover, the Sisi regime has killed several hundreds of the Brotherhood's members and supporters since the 2013 coup either by excessive and brutal force against its protesters at sit-ins (e.g. the Rabaa massacre on 14 August 2013)²² or by torture and extrajudicial killing.²³ Furthermore, the Brotherhood was designated a terrorist organization for the first time in its history which led thousands of its members to flee and live in exile across the world.²⁴

The unprecedented repression created major divisions and differences within the Brotherhood on how to respond to regime repression whether members should retaliate in order to stop regime repression. These divisions were heightened after the Rabaa massacre and the arrest of many senior leaders. This marked the first time the Brotherhood's General Guide and several members of the Shura Council and Guidance Bureau were arrested since 1981. Also, the movement's failure to reverse the coup and retain power coupled with an unprecedented wave of repression and exclusion created outrage, despair, and deepened the rifts among members.

During the first few weeks after the 2013 coup, the Brotherhood used its mobilization capabilities to draw thousands of its members and supporters into the streets of different urban and suburban areas, such as Cairo, Giza, Al-Fayoum, El-Mansoura, and Souhag. The Brotherhood was preoccupied by two goals: to create an anti-coup momentum that might change the status quo in its favour, and to maintain cohesion and solidarity among its rank-and-file. The Brotherhood created the “National Alliance to Support Legitimacy,” a coalition of Islamist parties and groups who rejected Morsi's removal and called for reinstating him.²⁵ It was established a few days before the coup by a groups of Islamist parties and aimed to endorse president Mohamed Morsi and counterbalance the calls for the June 30 protests. Among these parties in the alliance were the Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party (FJP), Al-Wasat Party, Al-Gamaa Al-Islamiyya's Construction and Development Party, and the Salafi Al-Watan Party. However, many of these parties have withdrawn from the alliance due to its failure in achieving its objectives. Between the coup and the Rabaa massacre on 14 August 2013, the Brotherhood organized daily protests across Egypt. The regime responded to protests violently and security forces used brute force against protesters killing dozens of the Brotherhood's members and supporters. As Ketchley notes, “The 14 August massacres would establish a precedent whereby soldiers and Interior Ministry-controlled security forces routinely used live ammunition, tear gas, and birdshot to disperse anti-coup protests.”²⁶ After the Rabaa massacre, demonstrations became significantly tense and confrontational as the Brotherhood's protesters, particularly the youth, became more defiant and determined to challenge the regime.

With pressure mounting from the Brotherhood's members through their daily protests and demonstrations, an Egyptian court banned all Brotherhood activities on 23 September 2013, forcing the movement underground and its members to become more rebellious.²⁷ The ban afforded the regime another opportunity to escalate the campaign against the Brotherhood, and security forces continued its violent behaviour against the movement's protesters and supporters. The ban also added fuel to the relationship between the Brotherhood's leadership and its members who were outraged by the regime's uncompromising position. A tense debate ensued within the Brotherhood on whether to use self-defence tactics to protect protesters from police attacks. The movement's leadership rejected any use of violence and told members to stay home if they could not protest peacefully.²⁸ The Brotherhood's protesters continued their protests in the streets of suburban and rural areas such as Giza (Nahia, Badrashin, Helwan, etc.), Al-Fayoum, Beni Suef, Al-Dakahliya.

Following the closure of the public space, the Brotherhood's members moved to another venue for protesting and challenging the regime.²⁹ The movement encouraged universities’ students to organize marches and protests to maintain “revolutionary activism” (al-hirak al-thawry).³⁰ Benefiting from its longstanding network and experience in students’ activism, the Brotherhood used universities to mobilize its constituency. Protests were organized and led by mid-level leaders and graduate students under the umbrella of a network called ‘Students Against the Coup’ which was formed after the coup and was active at several Egyptian universities. Saif Al-Islam, a former member of the Brotherhood and a student at Beni Suef University, describes the situation during that time as follows:

After Rabaa massacre, we received instructions from our leadership to organize constant and daily protests in every faculty and to do whatever we can to revolutionize our fellow students. We also told to attract and recruit more people to join the protests against the coup. We were keen to operate under the umbrella of “Students Against the Coup” coalition not the Brotherhood in order to widen the revolutionary momentum in the university. We were inspired by protests at Al-Azhar University which were forceful and defiant.³¹

Moreover, to hamper the Brotherhood's activism at Egyptian universities, the interim government decided to deploy security forces inside universities. As Mohammed Abdel Salam explains,

On October 31, the transitional government announced a decision to deploy the police on the campuses of 22 state universities, as well as Al-Azhar University, aiming to stop pro-Muslim Brotherhood student demonstrations that condemned the military coup and called for the return of Morsi to power.³²

The Brotherhood's protests were described by pro-regime media as “thuggery” and an attempt to create “chaos” at Egyptian universities.³³ Also, the government attempted to counterbalance the Brotherhood's activism at universities by encouraging leftist and liberal students to protest and challenge Brotherhood supporters. While protests dwindled in cities and the streets because of police brutality, universities became the lifeblood of the Brotherhood's continued protests. In December 2013, the regime designated the Brotherhood as a “terrorist organization” which led to a backlash from the movement and led to significant divisions over how to respond to regime repression.³⁴ In fact, the designation was a merely political move from the regime in order to pressure the Brotherhood and implicate its members in violence. By that time, the Brotherhood's leadership control of its youth was significantly weakened.

Since the coup of 2013, the Brotherhood adopted several strategies for adaptation. In fact, one of the key characteristics of the Brotherhood lies in its ability to adapt and alter its strategy to cope with the new enviornment.³⁵ After the coup and with the imprisonment of several senior Brotherhood leaders the Brotherhood had to make organizational changes to adapt to the post-coup environment. These changes started with promoting new members to fill the vacuum left by the arrested leaders. Several members from the younger generation have become responsible for organizing protests, mobilizing the movement's base, running the Brotherhood's weekly meetings, and supervising its social and educational network. Also, the Brotherhood created new committees and changed the functions and tasks of the existing ones to cope with the post-coup environment. For example, the Brotherhood's Charity Committee, which was responsible for the Brotherhood's social service provision, became the ‘Committee for the Affected’ and focused on caring for the Brotherhood families and members struggling to cope with the loss of income from those who had died, been arrested, or expelled from Egypt. Likewise, the Proselytization Committee became the ‘Awareness Committee’ and focused on mobilizing people against Sisi's regime, particularly in rural areas instead of propagating the Brotherhood's ideology.³⁶ Also, the Students’ Committee was combined with the Youth Committee and assumed responsibility for mobilization against the regime at schools and universities. These organizational changes reveal the Brotherhood's ability to adapt to repression and to maintain its activism, albeit without real effect on the regime's power and influence.

The Brotherhood's organizational adaptation led to the emergence of a new line of leadership among the youth who began to operate independently from the old leadership. With the absence of the movement's senior and old members, young members became responsible for maintaining the Brotherhood's existence and running its daily activities for the first time in the movement's history. Over the past few decades, Brotherhood's young members were marginalized and excluded from the decision-making process. As a conservative movement, age, in addition to loyalty and devoutness, plays a key role in members’ seniority inside the Brotherhood. This has changed after the coup when young members became the de facto new leadership of the movement. More importantly, the new leadership became popular among the rank-and-file because of its confrontational discourse and non-compromising position towards regime repression. According to a young Brotherhood member named Mustafa Ahmed, “the new leadership is more revolutionary and knows how to deal with Sisi's oppressive regime and it will never surrender to it.”³⁷

The new leadership's non-compromising stance against the regime and confrontational discourse gained it support and popularity among many of the Brotherhood's young members particularly those who were disenchanted by the old leadership's strategic mistakes after the coup. Therefore, a new committee of middle level and young members was formed in February 2014 that took over the Brotherhood. This committee was called ‘The Supreme Administrative Committee’ and led by Mohamed Kamal, a former member of the Brotherhood's Guidance Bureau alongside other members who were not in prison.³⁸ It claimed leadership over the Brotherhood against the old leaders who were in control of the movement for decades, such as Mahmoud Ezzat, the acting General Guide of the Brotherhood, Mahmoud Hussein, the Brotherhood's Secretary-General, and Ibrahim Munir, the Brotherhood's representative in London who was appointed as Deputy of the General Guide after the coup. The announcement of the new committee created an unprecedented split within the Brotherhood that was described by the old leadership as illegitimate. In December 2015, the old leadership declared control over the movement and dismissed the new committee.³⁹ Nevertheless, the new committee announced the election of a new Shura Council in December 2016, which was met with anger and refusal from the old leadership.⁴⁰ Ironically, the new committee has made significant changes in the Brotherhood's administrative rules and bylaws. For example, it separated the legislative and executive powers in the Brotherhood, and empowered the Shura Council, the Brotherhood's legislative and representative body, which used to be subordinate to the Guidance Bureau. The changes were vehemently rejected by Ezzat and Hussien.⁴¹ Divisions between the old and new leadership continued, however, the old leadership retained control over the movement and the Supreme Administrative Committee was dissolved after the security forces had killed Mohamed Kamal. Kamal was considered by Sisi's regime as the new leader of the Brotherhood and was accused of being behind the attacks on regime officials and security personnel during 2015 and 2016.⁴²

Emotions in politics: members’ response to repression

The response of the Brotherhood's members to regime repression was shaped and affected by their emotions, personal experiences, and grievances. Emotions such as anger, hate, and despair have played a key role in shaping their response to repression. Members had different responses that ranged from adopting revolutionary and confrontational tactics to political apathy. Members who lost their friends, relatives, and family members were more inclined to be defiant and participate in confrontational and violent activities against the regime than others who did not have the same experience. For example, Nabil Sherif is a 22-year-old Brotherhood member who lost two of his friends at the Rabaa massacre. Nabil was arrested and imprisoned for two years for throwing rocks and Molotov cocktails at police vehicles while protesting outside Al-Azhar University in November 2013. According to him, getting revenge on the regime and its officials is a tribute to his lost friends.⁴³

Also, the memory of massacres and killings that followed the coup had significant impact on the Brotherhood's members. Not only does memory invigorate a sentiment of vengeance towards the regime and its official representations, but it also creates political trauma for several members.⁴⁴ For example, an interviewee who lost his brother at the Rabaa massacre on 14 August 2013, recalls how shocking the scene was that day for him and his family to the extent that he “would do anything to extract revenge from the police.”⁴⁵ He mentioned that he receives counseling to overcome the images and memories from that depressing experience. Several young members in the Brotherhood have lost their lives or the lives of a relative or a family member since July 2013. These members built their narrative against Sisi's regime based on their personal experiences from the last five years. Therefore, some of them did not mind abandoning the Brotherhood's peaceful strategy for the sake of revenge and healing their personal wounds. As one of the interviewees explains:

I don't believe in peaceful protests anymore; this brutal regime should be confronted with all means of resistance including violence and blood. We must rethink our strategy and tactics otherwise we will perish.⁴⁶

Furthermore, the brutal crackdown against the Brotherhood has created divisions and disagreement among members on how to respond to regime repression. For example, some of the young members of the Brotherhood believed that retaliation against the regime is warranted and considered as self-defence against the regime repression. Calls for revenge from the regime and security forces increased among Brotherhood's youth and words such as resistance, vengeance, and retribution found their way into their everyday discourse. Therefore, attacks on regime officials such as police officers, judges, and anti-Brotherhood media personnel were cheered by those members. Interestingly, the Brotherhood's senior leaders who spent their youth in prison under Nasser's regime in the 1950s and 1960s tend to invoke their own memories and narratives to endure and quell calls for confrontation. For this group, memories of regime repression invoke narratives of patience, endurance, victimhood, and God's revenge.⁴⁷ However, this narrative has less appeal among the young members of the Brotherhood who holds the movement's leadership accountable for what happened since the 2013 coup.

Also, repression led to cases of political apathy among some of the Brotherhood's members. This apathy was driven by a sense of despair and lack of faith in the movement's leadership. The high cost of protesting and political participation coupled with frustration from the Brotherhood's incapable leadership disenchanted several members who not only broke ties with the Brotherhood but also with politics as a whole. Mustafa Ahmed, a 23-year-old member in the Brotherhood who fled the country to Sudan after he was released from prison on bail, believes Sisi's regime has consolidated its power and there is no value in resisting it. He states, “I don't believe anymore in peaceful change. I don't believe in pushing back either. I don't care about politics. What I do care about is the release of thousands of people who are now in prison.”⁴⁸ He also expressed bitter sentiment towards the Brotherhood's leaders which led him to abandon the movement. According to him, “The Brotherhood achieved nothing since entered politics a few decades ago. They failed in politics miserably and should focus on daw’a and charity.”⁴⁹

Furthermore, some members experienced political trauma after the coup which prompted them to abandon political activism and focus on their career and personal life. Abdurrahman Ahmed, an exiled young member of the Brotherhood who spent two and a half years in prison between 2014 and 2016, mentioned that he was traumatized by regime repression which led him to leave the Brotherhood and avoid politics. He states, “I was almost destroyed in prison. I was tortured and severely punished because of joining the Brotherhood. In prison, you would lose either your life or your sanity and the only way to have both is to leave politics forever.”⁵⁰

By listening to the Brotherhood's members and reading their writings and posts on social media, one can easily discover the tense emotions and feelings of despair, trauma, revenge, and resistance that shape their stance towards the regime. Several members expressed bitter feelings not only towards the regime but also towards their leadership. Some of them feel betrayed by both sides, albeit for different reasons, and decided to take their fate into their own hands. It is also important to point out that neither the old nor young leadership in the Brotherhood has a clear plan or strategy on how to deal with the post-coup regime which leaves the movement in a state of disarray.

Conclusion

Opposition movements’ response to repression is uneven. A key finding of this article is that the repression-dissent nexus cannot be explained without disentangling and investigating institutional, structural, and individual factors. The case of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood reveals the necessity to account for unpacking collective and members’ responses to repression and to be aware of their divergence. While the collective response to repression is important, scholars should pay attention to individuals’ personal experiences and emotions to better understand the repression-dissent nexus. Another key finding of this article is that severe repression can lead to contradictory responses within opposition movements. While the Brotherhood's leadership is inclined to adapt and accommodate regime repression, some of its members couldn't and adopted noncompromising and confrontational stance against the regime. Yet, confrontation is only one outcome of regime repression. Some of the Brotherhood's members particularly those who were imprisoned and tutored tend to eschew politics and become quietest. They were driven by a sense of frustration and disillusionment. Also, repression against Brotherhood led to de-politicization of some of its members and created a sense of political apathy among them. Not only have these members left the movement but also abandoned politics entirely. Furthermore, extreme repression has far-reaching consequences on the coherence and capabilities of opposition movements even those who are highly ideological and disciplined such as the Brotherhood. Repression can lead to significant divisions and splits over strategy, discourse, and tactics which affected its mobilization and organizational capabilities. Not only has it decimated the Brotherhood's political activism but it also eroded the movement's leadership credibility. Some members have abandoned the movement because of what they perceive as an incompetent leadership. Finally, to better understand the effects of repression on opposition movements, scholars need to pay attention to role of intangible factors (i.e. emotions, memory, etc.) which shape movements’ response to repression. As the article explained, emotions such as anger, despair, hate, etc. can play a key role in determining members’ response(s) to repression which may range from retaliation to political apathy.

Acknowledgements

The author thanks Chris Kato and Hannah Porter for assisting in editing this article, as well as the two anonymous reviewers for their comments.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Khalil al-Anani

Khalil al-Anani is Associate Professor of Political Science at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies. He taught at Johns Hopkins University, George Washington University, and Georgetown University. He is the author of Inside the Muslim Brotherhood: Religion, Identity, and Politics (Oxford University Press, 2016).

Notes

1 Ayoob, “Muslim Brotherhood Ripe for Re-radicalization”; Bayman and Wittes, “Muslim Brotherhood Radicalizes.”

2 Fahmi, “Why Aren't More Muslim Brothers Turning to Violence?”

3 Hasan, “An Initiative for Reconciliation between Egyptian Regime and the Brotherhood.”

4 Salah and Aly, “The Brotherhood Rejects Reconciliation with the Regime.”

5 McAdam, “Tactical Innovation and the Pace of Insurgency.”

6 Lichbach, “Deterrence or Escalation?”

7 Tilly, Regimes and Repertoires.

8 Opp and Roehl, “Repression, Micromobilization, and Political Protest”; Hess and Martin, “Repression, Backfire, and the Theory of Transformative Events.”

9 Moss, “Repression, Response, and Contained Escalation Under ‘Liberalized’ Authoritarianism in Jordan.”

10 El-Ghobashy, “Metamorphosis of the Egyptian Muslim Brothers.”

11 Goodwin, Jasper, and Polletta, “The Return of the Repressed”; Marcus, “Emotions in Politics”; Polletta and Jasper, “Collective Identity in Social Movements”; Fattah and Fierke, “A Clash of Emotions.”

12 Marcus, “Emotions in Politics,” 221.

13 Petersen, “Emotions as the Residue of Lived Experience,” 932.

14 Zollner, The Muslim Brotherhood, 44–6.

15 Al-Anani, Inside the Muslim Brotherhood, 141–3.

16 Kirkpatrick, “Egypt Elections Expose Divisions in Muslim Brotherhood.”

17 Wickham, The Muslim Brotherhood, 69–70.

18 Ibid., 99.

19 Al-Masry Al-Youm, November 25, 2010 https://www.almasryalyoum.com/news/details/28953.

20 Wickham, The Muslim Brotherhood, 104.

21 Fayed, “Is the Crackdown on Muslim Brotherhood Pushing the Group toward Violence?”

22 On August 14, 2013, Egypt's security forces, backed by the military, killed more than 800 protesters of the Muslim Brotherhood's members and supporters who were in a sit-in at the Rabi‘a al- ‘Adawiyya and Nahda Squares. According to Human Rights Watch, these massacres were “the most serious incident of mass unlawful killings in modern Egyptian history.” For more, see Human Rights Watch, “According to Plan.” August 12, 2014. https://www.hrw.org/report/2014/08/12/all-according-plan/raba-massacre-and-mass-killings-protesters-egypt.

23 According to several human right reports, extrajudicial killing and forced disappearance have become a common practice by Egyptian security forces, particularly against Islamists. Also, mass death sentences against the Brotherhood's leaders and members has become a norm in Egypt. For human rights abuses, see for example: “Egypt: New Leader Faces Rights Crisis.” Human Rights Watch, June 9, 2014. https://www.hrw.org/news/2014/06/09/egypt-new-leader-faces-rights-crisis and for extrajudicial killings in Egypt see for example, Sudarsan Raghavan, “Since Trump's Mideast Visit, Extrajudicial Killings Have Spiked in Egypt.” Washington Post, August 30, 2017. https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/since-trumps-mideast-visit-extrajudicial-killings-have-spiked-in-egypt/2017/08/30/62bf48c0-8200-11e7-9e7a-20fa8d7a0db6_story.html?utm_term=.8ba842b703a2.

24 The designation decision was issued by Hazem El-Beblawy's government and was declared by the Deputy Prime Minister, Hossam Essa. To watch Essa's video, see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R-F5MSD2LUM and “Egypt designates Muslim Brotherhood terrorist organization,” Reuters, December 25, 2013 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-explosion-brotherhood-idUSBRE9BO08H20131225.

25 For more on the Anti-Coup coalition, see Aljazeera Net. https://www.aljazeera.net/encyclopedia/movementsandparties/2015/5/28/%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AA%D8%AD%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%81-%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%88%D8%B7%D9%86%D9%8A-%D9%84%D8%AF%D8%B9%D9%85-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%B4%D8%B1%D8%B9%D9%8A%D8%A9.

26 Ketchley, Egypt in a Time of Revolution, 142.

27 Elwazer, “Egypt court bans Brotherhood activities.” CNN, September 23, 2013. https://edition.cnn.com/2013/09/23/world/africa/egypt-muslim-brotherhood/index.html.

28 Personal Interview with Abdelrahman Youssef, April 2014.

29 Ikhwanonline, October 13, 23. http://www.ikhwanonline.com/official_statements/165111/Default.aspx.

30 Al-Masry Al-Youm, September 30, 2013. https://today.almasryalyoum.com/article2.aspx?ArticleID=398508.

31 Interview with Saif al-Islam via messenger, September 2017.

32 Abdel Salam, “Egyptian Universities between the Brotherhood and the Military.” Sada, December 20, 2013 http://carnegieendowment.org/sada/53998.

33 Al-Masry Al-Youm, November 27, 2013. https://today.almasryalyoum.com/article2.aspx?ArticleID=404737&IssueID=3062.

34 Reuters, December 25, 2013.

35 Sumita, “Pathways of Islamist Adaptation.”

36 Abdelrahman, “The Brotherhood's Changing Approach,” Sada, June 4, 2014. https://carnegieendowment.org/sada/60317.

37 Interview with Mustafa Ahmed via WhatsApp, November 2017.

38 Mohamed Khaial, “Coup Overthrows the Old Guard in the Brotherhood,” Shorouk News, May 30, 2015. http://www.shorouknews.com/news/view.aspx?cdate=30052015&id=309dd72d-90e7-4551-803d-ca3ab084b1a0.

39 Mohamed Abdelmoniem, “A New Coup within the Muslim Brotherhood,” Masr Alarabiya, December 14, 2015. http://www.masralarabia.com/%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AD%D9%8A%D8%A7%D8%A9-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%B3%D9%8A%D8%A7%D8%B3%D9%8A%D8%A9/837653-%D8%A8%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%88%D8%AB%D8%A7%D8%A6%D9%82-%D8%A7%D9%86%D9%82%D9%84%D8%A7%D8%A8-%D8%AC%D8%AF%D9%8A%D8%AF-%D8%AF%D8%A7%D8.

40 Mustafa Hashim, “The Supreme Administrative Committee of the Muslim Brotherhood Announces the Election of a New Shura Council,” Aswat Masryia, December 20, 2016. http://www.aswatmasriya.com/news/details/71219.

41 Mohamed Hamama, “Brotherhood Leader: The Formation of the New Guidance Office Does Not Include Any Previous Leaders.” Mada Masr, December 22, 2016. https://madamasr.com/ar/2016/12/22/news/u/%D9%82%D9%8A%D8%A7%D8%AF%D9%8A-%D8%A8%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%A5%D8%AE%D9%88%D8%A7%D9%86-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AA%D8%B4%D9%83%D9%8A%D9%84-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AC%D8%AF%D9%8A%D8%AF-%D9%84%D9%85%D9%83%D8%AA%D8%A8-%D8%A7/

42 Mohamed Kamal was assassinated by security forces on December 4, 2016, and the regime accused him of directing the Brotherhood's youth towards violence. For more see Mohamed Hamama, “Interior Ministry announces death of influential Brotherhood leader,” Mada Masr, October 6, 2016. https://madamasr.com/en/2016/10/06/feature/politics/interior-ministry-announces-death-of-influential-brotherhood-leader/

43 Interview with Nabil Sherif via Skype, November 2017.

44 For a detailed account on political trauma in Egypt after the January 25 Uprising, see Matthies-Boon, “Shattered Worlds.”

45 Interview with an exiled member of the Brotherhood, March 2016.

46 Interview with Ibrahim Najah via Skype, November 2016.

47 Al-Anani, 141–2.

48 Interview with Mustafa Ahmed via WhatsApp, November 2017.

49 Ibid.

50 Personal interview with Abdurrahman Ahmed, July 2018.