ABSTRACT
This chapter examines economic developments in the broader sense, including economic and social policies which shaped the creation and distribution of wealth. It focuses on the failure of successive policies - a private-sector-based economy under the monarchy and in the early days of the republic; growing emphasis on the public sector and the expansion of welfare policies from the mid-1950s under Nasser; the selective revival of the private sector in the 1970s under Sadat (infitah); macroeconomic stabilization and structural adjustment from the early 1990s and increasingly oligopolistic variations on the same theme under Mubarak; and finally Sisi’s new combination of private and public with particular advantages for military-related firms - to promote sustained growth, in particular the transition to higher value-added products, the reduction of poverty, and the equitable distribution of income and wealth. In the process, the chapter discusses étatist policies under the monarchy, the limits of subsequent ‘socialist’ policies and the ‘social contract’, the return to private sector growth without market growth, and the impact of economic policies on domestic politics and external relations. Again, developments reflected not only choices made by Egyptians but also conditions beyond their influence.
