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Brigands and State Building: The Invention of Banditry in Modern Egypt

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 June 2009

Nathan Brown
Nathan Brown
Affiliation:
The George Washington University
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Extract

A late nineteenth-century epidemic of banditry seems to have swept through the Egyptian countryside, at least according to the writings and actions of influential Egyptians at that time. Contemporary newspapers recounted daily episodes in which gangs composed of between six and sixty or seventy members raided large estates, robbed travelling merchants, and organized local protection rackets. The threat to public security drew the greatest attention in the decade following the British occupation of Egypt in 1882.

Type
The Politics of Terror
Information
Comparative Studies in Society and History , Volume 32 , Issue 2 , April 1990 , pp. 258 - 281
Copyright
Copyright © Society for the Comparative Study of Society and History 1990

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References

1 Berque, Jacques, Egypt: Imperialism and Revolution (London: Faber and Faber, 1972), 133.Google Scholar

2 Milner, Viscount Alfred, England in Egypt (London: Edward Arnold, 1904), 279.Google Scholar

3 Berque, , Egypt, 131.Google Scholar

4 Hobsbawm, Eric J., Bandits (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1985), 17.Google Scholar

5 Marsot, Afaf Lutfi al-Sayyid, A Short History of Modern Egypt (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1985), 78.Google Scholar

6 See Richards, Alan, Egypt's Agricultural Development (Boulder: Westview Press, 1982), 57;Google ScholarBerque, Jacques, Egypt, passim; Anwar 'Abd al-Malik, Nandat Misr (Cairo: AI-Hay'a al-'Aroma li-l-Kitab, 1983), 102;Google ScholarBarakat, 'Ali, “Al-Qarya al-Misriyya fi A`qab Mdrakat Al-Tall al-Kabir, 1882–1906,” Al-Siyasa al-Duwaliyya, 74 (October 1983), 47;Google Scholar and Fathi, 'Abd al-Fattah, AlQarya al-Misriyya (Cairo: Dar al-Thaqafa al-Jadida, 1975), 214.Google Scholar

7 For some attempts to investigate the political and social nature of banditry, see Arnold, David, “Dacoity and Rural Crime in Madras, 1860–1940,” Journal of Peasant Studies, 6:2 (01 1979), 140;CrossRefGoogle ScholarCrumney, Donald, ed., Banditry, Rebellion and Social Protest in Africa (London: James Currey, 1986);Google ScholarHart, David, Banditry in Islam (Wisbech: Menas Press, 1987);Google ScholarKoliopoulos, John, Brigands with a Cause, Brigandage and Irredentism in Modern Greece 1821–1912 (Oxford: Clarendon, 1987)Google Scholar and Slatta, Richard, ed., Bandidos, The Varieties of Latin American Banditry (Westport: Greenwood, 1987).Google Scholar

8 This should only be taken as observing that banditry does not appear to have been one of their weapons, not as discounting the existence of peasant resistance. I have written elsewhere of the numerous forms of peasant resistance in Egypt. See Peasant Politics in Modern Egypt: The Struggle Against the State (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1990).Google Scholar

9 Dar al-Wath'iq al-Qawmiyya (the Egyptian National Archives), Awamir al-Diwan alKhidawi (Orders of the Khedival Court) [henceforth DWQ/ADK], Carton 3, Folder 28 for February/March 1887.

10 DWQ/ADK, Carton 3, File 2 for November/December 1884.

11 DWQ/ADK, Carton 3, File 7 for April 1885.

12 The two were later pardoned, though it is unclear why. The pardon came after they had served a few months. DWQ/ADK, Carton 3, Folder 21 for July 1886.

13 DWQ/ADK, Carton 3, Folder 26 for December 1886.

14 DWQ/ADK, Carton 3, File 19 for May 1886.

15 DWQ/ADK, Carton 3, File 74 for April 1891.

16 Hobsbawm, , Bandits, 17–18.Google Scholar

17 Mixed gangs led by bedouin but containing peasant members were especially common. For examples of the attribution of raids on estates to bedouin-led gangs, see the execution orders in DWQ/ADK; Carton 3, Folders 15 (January 1886), 19 (May 1886), 29 (April 1887) and 52 (February 1889). Bedouin bandits were especially active in the provinces of Buhayra, Giza, Bani Suwayf and Fayyum. Complaints about bedouin banditry—especially in these areas—were common in the national press. See, for example, Al-Muqattam, on 18 February, 23 April, 13 July 1891, and 22 July 1897. Salim al-Naqqash discusses the involvement of the bedouin in banditry and government efforts to combat the problem. See Misr li-Misrivyin, Vol. VI (Cairo, 1884), 98.Google Scholar

18 Marshall, J. E., “Public Security in Egypt,” September 8, 1912, Public Record Office, Foreign Office records, London. [hereafter P.R.O, F.O.] 371/38890, file 1364.Google Scholar

19 See Al-Muqattam on 20 and 24 March, 13 July, and 24 October 1891 for representative complaints about Sa'idis (and even Nubians and Sudanese).

20 Al-Muqattam, 24 October 1891.Google Scholar

21 Hobsbawm himself is much more flexible here than is generally understood. He is willing to consider “avengers” as social bandits even though for such characters to “be terrifying and pitiless is a more important attribute … than to be a friend of the poor.” This is because “their appeal is not that of the agents of justice, but of men who prove that even the poor and weak can be terrible” (Hobsbawm, , Bandits, 61, 58).Google Scholar

22 See the exchange between Blok and Hobsbawm: Anton Blok, “The Peasant and the Brigand: Social Banditry Reconsidered,” and Hobsbawm, Eric, “Social Bandits: Reply,” Comparative Studies in Society and History, 14:4 (1972), 494.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

23 Borg to Egerton, 26 November 1885, P.R.O., F.O. 141/224.

24 One of the few cases in which a social dimension has been attributed to a particular bandit is that of Adham al-Sharqawi, who was a widely known but probably partially mythical bandit. Fathi 'Abd al-Fattah portrays him as a peasant who targeted the rich (see AI-Qarya al-Misriyya, 214). In his autobiography, Sadat mentions him (among others) as a folk hero but in connection with political rather than social issues—specifically with regard to the struggle against the British occupation. See his In Search of Identity (New York: Harper and Row, 1979), 5–6.Google Scholar

I should admit that all my information on the other bandits whose memory has been preserved in popular Egyptian culture comes from urban Egyptians. One Egyptian bandit active in Upper Egypt earlier in this century, Al-Khutt, was even the subject of an Egyptian television series. Although the Egyptians with whom I have spoken say that he actually existed, I could find no mention of him in the contemporary press, suggesting that time has embellished his stature though not his character, since he has become a model not for the peasantry but for other bandits. Several bandits active recently in Egypt have dubbed themselves—or been referred to in the press-as Khalifat al—Khutt [Al-Khutt's successor]. See, for example, Al-Wafd, December 13, 1984.

25 In a raid on an estate, bandits often encountered such resistance not only from hired guards (who just as often ran from or colluded with bandits) but also from estate residents. For example, in April 1891, the residents of a village successfully fought off a bandit gang consisting of Sudanese living in the nearby city of Tanta (Al-Muganam, 31 March, 10 April and 13 April 1891).Google Scholar

26 Al-Muqattam, 26 March 1891.Google Scholar

27 Report by His Majesty's Agent and Consul-General on the Finances, Administration and Condition of Egypt and the Soudan in 1904, p. 44.Google Scholar

28 Such was the claim of Muhammad al-Babli, the Director General of the Police Academy, in his book Al-Ajram fi Misr, Asbabuha wa Turuq ellajiha (Cairo: Matbdat Dar al-Kutub alMisriyya, 1941), 10–11.Google Scholar See also Baer, Gabriel, “Fellah Rebellion in Egypt and the Fertile Crescent,” Fellah and Townsman in the Middle East (London: Frank Cass, 1982), 298.Google Scholar

29 A short wave of banditry occurred around 1914. In that year one newspaper reported the (certainly exaggerated) complaint that the activities of ashqiya' in Upper Egypt had so frightened residents that they were flocking to Cairo for safety (Al-Ahram, 4 July 1914).Google Scholar

30 In July 1920 the administrative head of the subprovincial district of Disuq ordered a roundup of bandits operating in the area. He managed to have forty-four arrested (Al-Ahram, 28 July 1920).Google Scholar

31 'lzbas were settlements or clusters of residences set off from the main body of a village; the owners of large estates would often construct them to house their workers.

32 Law Number 69 of 1933, Related to 'lzbas. For the text of the law, see Ghannam, 'Abd al-Ghani, Al-lqtisad al-Zira'i wa-Idarat al-Mazari (Cairo: Matba'at al-'Ulum, 1944), 341–3.Google Scholar

33 See, for example, Al-Wafd, 11 February 1988, 1.Google Scholar

34 See Al-Masa', , 27 November 1984 for an account of a gang in Minufiyya that was arrested for the theft of approximately US $7,000 worth of cattle. The bandits ransomed the stolen cattle back to the original owners, a common practice among rural Egyptian gangs.Google Scholar

35 For instance, in May 1952 a gang of forty raided the estate of the Groppi family in Qalyubiyya province and engaged in a gun battle with local guards and with the police (see Al-Abram, 22 May 1952).Google Scholar

36 For instance, in February 1931 a gang in the Buhayra Province planned and executed the murder of the man responsible for the killing of the gang's leader seven years earlier (Al-Ahram, 5 February 1931).Google Scholar

37 There are scattered reports of widespread brigandage in the 1870s and early 1880s, even though the sense of national crisis emerged only in the mid-1880s. For earlier reports of banditry, see Baer, “Fellah Rebellion,” 298. Also see Borg to Malet, 22 February 1882 and Felice to Borg, 23 February 1882, P.R.D., F.O. 141/160; and Dufferin to Granville, 20 February 1883, P.R.O., F.O. 141/168.

38 Al-Muqattam, 25 May 1894.Google Scholar

39 Of course, the policies of the central government could affect villagers greatly. Even the ambitious government of Muhammad 'Ali generally dealt with villages as units. See Kenneth Cuno's exhaustive study, Landholding, Society and Economy in Rural Egypt, 1740–1850; A Case Study of al-Daqahliyya Province (Ph.D. dissert., Department of History, University of California at Los Angeles, 1985). The state's direct and sustained administrative presence in the village did not really begin until the late nineteenth century.Google Scholar

40 See al-Naqqash, Salim, Misr li-Misriyyin, Vol. VI, 98. As noted above, the bedouin consistently played a leading role in rural crimes and banditry. It is indicative however, that such bedouin were no longer seen as a scourge on sedentary society but instead as a criminal element within the society.Google Scholar

41 See, for instance, the article by the Shubra Khayt correspondent in Al-Muqattam, 9 January 1891,Google Scholar as well as the article “Reform of the Police,” Al-Muqattam, 10 August 1891.Google Scholar

42 See Brown, , Peasant Politics, chs. 3 and 4.Google Scholar

43 al-Babli, Muhammad, Al-Ajram, 11–13.Google Scholar

44 Mitchell, Timothy, Colonising Egypt (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988), 97. Mitchell seems to attribute the establishment of the Commissions of Brigandage to the British. This is not quite accurate, as will be seen later.Google Scholar

45 This complex story is told well by a number of authors. Two contemporary accounts by British officials involved in the process are Viscount Milner, Alfred, England in Egypt (London: Edward Arnold, 1904)Google Scholar and, of course, Cromer, Lord, Modern Egypt (London: MacMillan, 1909).Google Scholar The two leading historical works on this topic are al-Sayyid, Afaf Lutfi, Egypt and Cromer (New York: Praeger, 1969)Google Scholar and Tignor, Robert, Modernization and British Colonial Rule in Egypt, 1882–1914 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1966).Google Scholar

46 Cromer, , Modern Egypt, Vol. II, 487–8.Google Scholar

47 Ibid. 288. This is in reference to Maxwell and his successor, Raymond West. Cromer uses nearly identical words (p. 488) with regard to Clifford Lloyd: “It was desirable to throw a certain amount of cargo overboard in order to lighten the ship.”

48 Ibid. 488.

49 al-Naqqash, Salim, Misr li-Misriyyin, Vol. VI, 227.Google Scholar

50 Milner, , England in Egypt, 278–9.Google Scholar

51 The story is recounted in Al-Sayyid, , Egypt and Cromer, 72–74.Google Scholar

52 Milner, , England in Egypt, 115.Google Scholar

53 Ibid. 279–80.

54 See Cromer, , Modern Egypt, Vol. II, 288.Google Scholar

55 Baring to Salisbury, 9 May 1889, P.R.O., F.O., 141/266, No. 221.

56 Cromer, , Modern Egypt, Vol. II, 290.Google Scholar

57 References to this new more active policy can be found in Al-Muqattam, I September and 14 September 1891. On the more general matter of ghafir reform, see P. Machell, “Memorandum on the Ghafir System,” included in Cromer's 1905 Annual Report. The attempt to make the ghafirs into a professional force actually began in 1884 but was not seriously pursued until 1891.

58 For a representative complaint, see “Al-Amn al-'Amm fi al-Bilad,”Al-Zira'a, 15 March 1893, 558–60.Google Scholar

59 Cromer, , 1907 Annual Report, 85.Google Scholar

60 See Cromer to Salisbury, 13 February 1897, P.R.O., F.O., 141/324, No. 22. See also Al-Muqattam, 18 February 1897.Google Scholar

61 Cromer, , 1907 Annual Report, 32–33.Google Scholar

62 It is interesting to note that the connection between ashqiya' and state repression lives on in Egypt—during the debate during the spring of 1988 over the extension of the Emergency Law, the government justified its need for extraordinary powers in terms of the existence of ashqiya' who threatened public security.

63 The major problem is that Hobsbawm focuses almost exclusively on the relationship between bandits and subordinate classes. Even in his reply to his critics (see the “Postscript” in Bandits), Hobsbawm insists on the centrality of this relationship. The relationship is, of course, worthy of attention, but it may lead us to miss some of the complexity of the place of bandits in society. As should now be apparent, we must also be alert to the relationship between bandits and other groups and institutions.

64 For the Greek case, see Koliopoulos, , Brigands with a Cause. For Mexico,Google Scholar see Vanderwood, Paul J., Disorder and Progress, Bandits, Police and Mexican Development (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1981).Google Scholar

65 Gould, Andrew G., “Lords or Bandits? The Derebeys of Cilicia,” International Journal of Middle East Studies, 7:4 (1976), 485.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

66 Gould, , “Lords or Bandits?,” 500.Google Scholar