Democratic Palestine : 21 (ص 35)
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- عنوان
- Democratic Palestine : 21 (ص 35)
- المحتوى
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Interview with the Egyptian Communist Party
Class Structure of Egypt
Below is the concluding question and answer in the interview with the Egyptian Communist Party, which
we printed in our last issue.
Can you give us an idea about the class structure of
the Egyptian society?
It is a grave deficiency that, based on available information
and statistics, it is difficult to define Egypt’s capitalist strata in
terms of their position in the production system, their
ownership of the means of production and their share in the
profits. Until now, scientific efforts have not been exerted to
delineate the lines of demarcation between the various classes
and the strata within each class. However, there is sufficient
data to give a general picture of the class structure and how this
has changed, as reflected in the censuses of 1960 and 1976.
_ In 1960, the civilian labor force was approximately 7.8 mil-
lion. (This is much more comprehensive than the working class
as it contains all who are capable and willing to work, employed
and unemployed.) Of the 7.8 million, 576,400 were business
owners; these are the big bourgeoisie and the middle bour-
geoisie which are bureaucratic, technocratic, feudalist, capita-
list, industrial and middlemen. They constituted 7.4% of all
those working. On the other hand, the number of salaried
workers was approximately 3.8 million or 49.2%. Along with
salaried workers, there were 1.4 million unsalaried workers,
who are usually members of small producers’ families, and
130,000 unemployed. The number of self-employed (small
producers, farmers, professionals, shop and workshop owners)
was about 1.8 million; all of these constitute the petit bour-
geoisie.
The situation changed with the extent of the penetration of
capitalist relations in the Egyptian society. According to the
census of 1976, the number of business owners rose to about
860,000. In other words, the size of the big bourgeoisie and
middle bourgeoisie increased 49%. The number of salaried
workers increased to about 6.6 million workers and personnel,
or approximately 59.5% of the total number of workers, an
increase of 71.9% from 1960 to 1976. The number of unem-
ployed rose to 850,000 - five times the number of unemployed
in 1960. The rate of unemployment rose from 2.2% of the
civilian labor force in 1960, to 7.7% in 1976. This is in accor-
dance with a fundamental law of any capitalist system.
The extent of the penetration of capitalist relations in Egypt
is more clearly seen in another fact which complements the first
phenomenon. The number of self-employed in 1976 was
approximately 2 million, or 18.9% of the civilian labor force,
in contrast to 22.4% in 1960. This means the percentage of the
small producers of the petit bourgeoisie has diminished. The
percentage of unsalaried workers declined even more sharply;
their number decreased to 617,000; in 1960, they were 18.4%
of the civilian labor force; by 1976, they constituted only
5.5%. These statistics indicate the near disappearance of
family work. They indicate that small producers are diminish-
ing on the one hand, and being transformed into petit bour-
geoisie on the other, for they became almost completely
dependent on salaried work. In my view, these small producers
have become the representatives of the overwhelming majority
of what can be called the nationalist bourgeoisie or nationalist
capitalists. They are the ones who own enterprises with capital
that is solely Egyptian. Following the open door policy, the big
bourgeoisie and the overwhelming majority of the middle
bourgeoisie was directed towards cooperation with multina-
tional companies and capital. A glance at the size of the open
door projects shows that the majority possess capital ranging
from just under half a million pounds to three million pounds.
Only a few exceed that; they are the projects in which only the
big bourgeoisie participate. This shows that the upper strata of
the middle bourgeoisie, which are identified as the national
bourgeoisie, while striving to improve their cooperation with
foreign capital, no longer express their nationalism by fighting
for the independence of the domestic market. For this reason,
the social base of the open door policy is not limited to the big
bourgeoisie. It also includes the major strata of the Egyptian
middle bourgeoisie. The base of subordination is much larger
than what some claim it is- only a handful of what they term
parasitic capitalists. The petit bourgeoisie is in fact the true
representative of the nationalist bourgeoisie. They have a
prominent role in the completion of the tasks of the national
democratic revolution with socialist horizons. The following
table shows the distribution of workers according to occupa-
tion:
Occupation no. in 1000’s__ percentage
professionals, technicians, 699.1 10.6%
related jobs
administrators, related jobs 99.1 1.5%
writers, related jobs 698.7 10.6%
commercial workers 137.2 2.1%
service workers 716.3 10.9%
agricultural workers 2188.4 33.1%
production workers (industry, 1583.1 24.0%
transport and construction)
miscellaneous 478.1 7.2%
6600.0 100.0%
This shows that industrial workers, the most active and
organized faction of the working class, constitute 24% of the
civilian labor force. Along with agricultural and commercial
workers, they constitute 59.2%. Thus, wage earners in general
constitute approximately 17.5% of the population. This is
almost twice the percentage of wage earners in Czarist Russia
when the October Revolution was victorious.
The rural areas also experienced the penetration of capitalist
production relations more clearly between 1960 and 1976. On
the one hand, the number of agricultural workers decreased
from more than 80% in 1960 to less than 60% in 1976. The
increase in non-agricultural labor is an indication of extensive
capitalist penetration in the rural areas. On the other hand, the
number of those owning less than 5 acres of land, i.e., the
small farmers, increased from 2,919,000 (or 94.1% of all land
owners), to 3,479,000 in 1981 (or 95.6%). Their share of the
land decreased from 3,172,000 acres, with an average holding
of 1.1 acres, to 2,916,000 acres, with an average holding of .9
acres. At the same time, there was an increase in the number of
farmers owning 5-10 acres. There were 80,000 farmers, or
2.6% of land holders, who owned 516,000 acres, with an ave-
rage holding of 4.6 acres. This rose to 87,000, or 2.4% of all
land owners, owning 577,000 acres, with an average land hol-
ding of 6.6 acres. However, the number of rich farmers,
owning 10 or more acres, decreased from 1.2 thousand, or
3.3% of all owners, who own 2,396,000 acres, with an average
holding of 23.5 acres, to 74,000 or 2% of all land holders,
owning 2,004,000 acres, with an average of 27.1 acres in each
land holding.
35 - هو جزء من
- Democratic Palestine : 21
- تاريخ
- يناير ١٩٨٧
- المنشئ
- الجبهة الشعبية لتحرير فلسطين
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