ABSTRACT
The last six years have witnessed what can undeniably be termed the most sincere efforts over the last four decades to redress the political and economic situation in Egypt. However, inasmuch as these efforts have hitherto been directed at reforming this or that aspect of the system, and not at the general framework of that system, we believe they have reached a dead end. The time has come for a different kind of approach. Over the past six years we have been dealing with the symptoms, now we have to tackle the very core of the diseases if they are not to become terminal. The situation calls for a frontal attack on the root causes of the problems plaguing us, not for stop-gap solutions to their manifestations. We advocated just such a global approach in a series of articles which ran in the press through 1985 and were published in book form early in 1986 under the title: What is to be Done? Diagnosing and Analysing the Problems of Contemporary Egypt.
