IMO Morsi failed it was b/c a bunch of medieval antiquarians cdn't solve the problems of a modern economy, so Egypt plunged into an existential economic crisis as the wheat stockpile imploded. Sisi circumvented the problem by using GCC connections to arrange emergency loans. https://twitter.com/joshua_landis/status/1277572010592305153
Since then the Sisi govt has focused on at least easing Egypt's energy crisis which cripples current account. This has taken 2 major forms. 1 Rapid development of renewable energy resources which Egypt has in abundance. 2 Exploit massive new discoveries of natural gas in the Med.
What this shows to me is that developing countries have far more need of competent technocratic administration than they do of theoretical democracy. Though I wouldn't deny that democracy is the icing on the cake of emerging economies that have finally made it.
What is often forgotten is that even leading Western powers weren't all that democratic during their iron age of rapid industrialization. Democracy was a fringe benefit of eventual modernization rather than an actual driver of it.
End Thread/ @joshua_landis
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