Into Egypt: a country invites the world, and its scrutiny.

Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt

THE World Economic Forum holds its Annual Meeting in Davos, high up in the Swiss Alps. That glamorous talkfest takes place in January. But every spring, the WEF comes to the Middle East, for a three-day conference focused exclusively on this crucial region. For the last three years, the conference has been held in Jordan, on the Dead Sea. But this year, the conference has come to Sharm El Sheikh, the famous Egyptian resort on the Red Sea. There is much discussion here about which site is preferable. I can't help framing it this way: Better Dead than Red, or better Red than Dead?

Egypt is proud to have snatched the conference away from the Jordanians (who, regardless, will get it again next year). And this is a critical period for Egypt. Almost every day, the country makes worldwide news, most of it bad: democrats jailed; judges threatened; protesters beaten up. And terror still strikes. In April, bombs went off in Dahab, just north of here. About 20 people were killed. And last summer, about 65 were killed in Sharm El Sheikh itself. In the last year and a half, some 120 people have lost their lives to terror in this Sinai region. But Klaus Schwab, founder and leader of the WEF, refused to cancel or move the conference. For him, he explained in a memo to participants, it was a matter of solidarity, defiance, and determination.

If anyone was deterred from coming here, it doesn't show: Attendance is robust and enthusiastic. And security is tight, not to say stifling. You can hardly turn around without being checked, whisked, or otherwise examined. Indeed, you can hardly turn around. We are in a mini-police state--but I imagine most people are reassured, even as they, as we, chafe.

Egypt may be having problems on the political front, but they are making big strides on the economic front. And they're happy to trumpet it. On the roads to Sharm El Sheikh's Congress Center--specially built for this conference, in under eight months--are signs: "Egypt: Open for Business"; "Egypt: Open for Competition"; "Egypt: Open for Growth"; "Egypt: Open for Change." These are not empty claims, for the facts back them up. Tariffs, taxes, and other barriers are falling; GDP is rising (by a projected 6 percent this year). Inflation has been subdued. Foreign investment is pouring in, and the Egyptians are asking for more.

This burst of liberalization has been overseen by what the country's publicists call a "dream team," a "handful of reformist ministers." They are led by the prime minister himself, Ahmed Nazif. He is the face of what you might call the New Egypt.

Old Egypt, of course, is represented by Hosni Mubarak, president and boss of this country for 25 years now. He officially opens the conference, with a speech in Plenary Hall. Though nearing 80, he seems in blooming health, full of vigor. He looks like he could go on and on, through elections fair and foul. He also looks like a thug--unkind to say, but true. It's not his fault if he looks like a thug; it's his fault only if he acts like one. His speech to us is nothing much: full of platitudes, banalities, and little jabs at the United States. But he concludes with some nice poetry about the Sinai, and its importance to history: Moses and the Ten Commandments; Joseph and Mary's flight with their baby; and so on.

Mubarak takes no questions; but Nazif certainly does, over breakfast with journalists. The prime minister is stubbornly optimistic about his country's future. "There's no turning back," he says--no turning back from the reformist course that Egypt has set. "Some people are scared of change. But I'm not." A full transformation will take time, to be sure. "But we have time. We're not in a hurry." For years, Egypt was "a closed environment," but now it's opening up. "We're not used to it." Habits of democracy will have to be developed. But they will be. Overall, Nazif's message to this inky assemblage seems to be, Have a little patience, and a little perspective.

And, like many another politician or government official, Nazif complains about the media, particularly the foreign media. They portray Egypt as a glass half empty, he says. They ignore the good that has been accomplished. And, in any case, "we're filling in the other half!" A reporter attending the breakfast asks about presidential succession: Will Gamal Mubarak, now a big in the ruling party, replace his father? Nazif bristles a little at this. "We are an institutional country," he says, with established processes for such matters. This is not a banana republic, he seems to be saying (or a fig-and-date republic). He goes on to say--if I may again interpret--If Gamal becomes president, it will be in the manner of Bushes and Adamses, not in the manner of the Syrian Assads.

COMPUTER SCIENCE AND POLITICAL SCIENCE

Later, I interview Prime Minister Nazif one on one. He's an impressive-looking man, in his mid-50s, tall and solid, with a full head of gray-white hair. And he speaks like the intellectual he is. His Ph.D. is in computer engineering, from McGill, and his research was in computer vision. "What's that?" I ask. "In the simplest possible terms, it's making computers understand pictures, images." And "it is a beautiful science." A mark of Nazif's interests and inclinations is his membership in the American Association for Artificial Intelligence.

He spent most of the 1970s in the West, returning to Egypt in the early 1980s. As he tells it, the country had experienced the '73 war, the peace accords with Israel, the assassination of Sadat, the rise of Mubarak--"and we were all thinking, 'Where do we go from here?'" The message from the government was clear: Rebuild the country. And Nazif was intrigued with the idea of using computers to lift the country up, or aid it in some way. He worked in academia, business, and government. He co-founded the Internet Society of Egypt, among other organizations. And he served as Egypt's first-ever minister of communications and information technology, from 1999 to 2004. Then he became prime minister.

When you listen to Nazif--and I have heard him on several occasions--you think that you're listening, not to an Egyptian official, much less the prime minister, but to an oppositionist, a dissident. With his talk of markets, democracy, and freedom in general, he sounds like a chair-holder at the American Enterprise Institute. I ask whether he considers himself a liberal democrat. He says he does. And "one thing I've always done is challenge what exists. I'm pro-change, and I'm a builder by nature. Some people criticize in order to find faults; I criticize in order to remove faults, and that's a big difference."

I ask what he thinks of socialism. "It depends on how you interpret it. Socialism in the sense of Egypt in the 1960s, I'm completely opposed to. Because the idea then was, everyone is equal irrespective of their efforts, irrespective of what they give in return. But if by socialism you mean that we have to have some sort of redistribution of wealth to help the poor--yes. Again, though, how do you help the poor? How do you make them change their status? If you give a subsidy with no expectation of return whatsoever, you're just encouraging the poor to stay poor. There's no incentive. But if you demand something in return--self-improvement--then you are getting somewhere."

Inevitably, our talk turns to Ayman Nour. He is the democrat who challenged Mubarak in last year's presidential election, and who now finds himself in jail. The charges are absurd, or so many of us find: They have to do with forging signatures on petitions. Nazif gives no quarter on the subject of Nour. Speaking at length, he insists that the judicial process has taken its course, with no interference from "the government" (meaning, Mubarak et al.). He further says that, though the Nour case is a cause celebre in the West, it is no such thing in Egypt, because it is better understood here. (Indeed, I find evidence at the conference that Arab journalists are put out by attention to Nour. One woman sniffs that the case has been "taken out of proportion." Like others, she is most interested in why Americans aren't hollering about the Egyptian government's treatment of the Muslim Brotherhood, the Islamic fundamentalists.)

And how about Judges Mekki and Bastawisi, who were subjected to disciplinary hearings when they pointed out fraud in recent elections? Again, Nazif makes no apologies, saying that appropriate procedures have been followed in these cases, too, and that they have been badly misunderstood in the West. He maintains that the judiciary has long enjoyed independence in Egypt. "This is not something that must now materialize."

Nazif is not at his most encouraging on these highly sensitive matters. But, on a range of issues--such as Sudanese refugees, the Palestinians, and America's role in the Middle East--he is thoughtful, if not entirely persuasive. I think of a phrase popular, or once popular, in American culture: "as good as it gets." Nazif and his allies are as good as it gets in the Arab world, at least among ruling elites. What can an outsider do but root for them?

As I'm parting from Nazif, I remind him of the breakfast discussion about presidential succession. Would he himself be interested in running for the post? Like most any other politician, he smiles and demurs: "I think it's too early even to think about something like that, but I don't see the presidency in my future." I think of another American expression, this one from politics, which I adapt: Egypt could do worse, and probably will.

SONS AND SAVIORS

Will it be Gamal Mubarak who succeeds the incumbent? He is head of the policy secretariat of the National Democratic Party, or NDP. He has just come back from meetings in Washington, including with President Bush and Vice President Cheney. At Sharm El Sheikh, he talks a very good game--a reformist and liberal game. Whether he is for real remains to be seen. I have observed Saif Qaddafi, the Libyan dictator's son, at Davos. Gamal seems the more promising character, I must say. And Robert Zoellick, the deputy secretary of state, weighs in interestingly. In a session with journalists, Zoellick says that Gamal seems intent on overhauling his party, while "what I will politely call the more traditional NDP leaders I have met" exhibit no interest in change whatsoever.

Zoellick notes that the Egyptian government has made a number of "mistakes" lately. Like what? "Like beatin' people up," when they have taken to the street to protest. But, he says, we should not overlook the changes that have already occurred in Egypt. Five years ago, citizens would not have demonstrated--it was too dangerous. It's still dangerous, manifestly, but less so. And a major Egyptian businessman, M. Shafik Gabr--chairman of the Arab Business Council--says something memorable, in a panel discussion. "When I talked about privatization 15 years ago, I was called a traitor to the Egyptian government." Not anymore. Privatization is the policy of the government. And Gabr may be the first person I have ever heard use the phrase "trickle down" underisively.

On this same panel is another apostle of change in the Arab world, or rather, the Muslim world: Shaukat Aziz, the prime minister of Pakistan. He is a smooth, smooth operator, a former executive with Citibank. He remembers being "an armchair critic, sitting in my office in Manhattan"--but he went home in the late 1990s, to participate in his country's hoped-for revival. He lists the elements of a country's success: "liberalization, deregulation, privatization, transparency, improvement in governance." This is sweet music, and you could call it the World Economic Forum's theme song. Aziz spends some time on resistance to change--"a natural human trait." In his telling, the entrenched interests in Pakistan have resisted change fiercely. But they have not been successful. "Globalization is upon us," says Aziz, "it is not a cliche." Having said that, he cites a cliche, and a true one: "Globalization is a tidal wave: You can either ride it, and go far; or resist it, and be swept away."

He emphasizes the need to explain to people what you are doing, as you go. In many parts of the world--Reaganites will have a hard time believing this!--"deregulation" is a dirty word. People interpret it to mean an abdication of governmental responsibility, a laying bare to predators. This mindset must be amended. And the prime minister tells several illustrative, and amusing, tales from Pakistan. For example, do you know what it's like to inform the communications ministry that it is no longer running the phone company? What? Not running the phone company? But that's why we exist! That is why they used to exist.

Yet another reformer is Bassem Awadallah, formerly finance minister of Jordan, now director of King Abdullah's office. He makes the point that, "if reform were easy, it would have happened a long time ago." Governments don't reform on their own, out of some moral awakening; they do so when crisis is upon them. And that opens the way for "a culture of meritocracy, the rule of law, freedom of expression." Some countries are moving faster than others (and some are not moving at all). But pace of change matters less than that "the train is moving in the right direction." Like many others at this conference, Awadallah stresses that governments must make room for legitimate parties, a legitimate opposition. People must have choices other than the status quo or radical Islam; otherwise stalemate or disaster is ensured.

BEHOLD AN ARAB BLOG NETWORK

One bright morning, I moderate a panel on new media in the Arab world, and it has a title: "The Revolution Will Be Televised." There is no doubt that new media are making a difference in this region. Cable television is prominent, yes. But the Internet is increasingly a factor, and so are cellphones: on which text messages are sent. These messages fly around the Middle East (for purposes vile or wholesome). Young journalists are present at this discussion, and they are encouraging: moderate, enlightened, reform-minded. The best of them have no desire to work for state-run media, and no desire to be bosses in them. They want independence, and a multiplicity of views.

A Palestinian says that taboos are being broken down. For example, in the territories, it used to be impermissible to discuss sexual harassment; now it is possible. And it's a pleasure to be introduced to iToot.net. This is an Arab blog network, run by a young Jordanian, Ahmad Humeid. On this network, freedom of expression is not merely an abstraction; it's a fact. And this is something fairly new under the Middle Eastern sun. Governments can always crack down, and some of them already have. But people, in general, are getting bolder. Someone on the panel suggests that there is all too much information on the Internet. Someone else counters, "Too much information! The thought of it makes my heart glad!"

What there is no debate over, really, is whether Muslim countries can become democratic. Rightly or wrongly, it is taken for granted. One afternoon, I decide to put the question to the Turkish prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan. "Some people say that Islam and democracy are incompatible. What do you say?" Erdogan answers that his response need not be verbal; he can simply point to his country, Turkey. "We are a country in which 98 percent of the people happen to be Muslim. And we are a democracy, in which the rule of law, secularism, and the fundamental rights of liberty are held dear." Erdogan makes the common observation that Turkey is "a bridge between the Arab world and the West." And since many eyes are on Turkey--if I'm interpreting the prime minister correctly--"we are condemned to success." An arresting phrase, that: "condemned to success." Turkey cannot afford to fail, he seems to be saying; it needs to set an example.

Bob Zoellick says that, when he comes to the Middle East, he can sense the old order breaking down. He had the same kind of feeling in the last years of the Cold War. Not that the two situations are identical. He paraphrases Mark Twain: History doesn't repeat itself, but sometimes it rhymes. And Zoellick has little patience for those who say that democracy has no chance here. He recalls being a teacher in Hong Kong, in 1980. And his Chinese students said, "Oh, democracy's not for us--not for us Asians. They have democracy in Japan, in some odd form. But that's an exception." And now, says Zoellick, we see democracy in South Korea and Taiwan. And, to varying degrees, in other East Asian countries as well. "I don't believe anyone is immune to democracy."

Depending on what you choose to emphasize, you can say that the Middle East is going brilliantly, or going abysmally. We are all under the influence of the last person we have met, or the last article we have read. The truth is, all the good news is true; and all the bad news is true. Which is more important, and which will win out in the end? In Egypt, there are bright faces, like Ahmed Nazif, and that "dream team." And then there is Muhammad Abd al-Fattah, a member of parliament, who recently said that "9/11 was carried out by American agents," so that "Bush would have a pretext to declare war on Islam." But I have a feeling that these people--the authoritarians and the nut jobs--are yesterday's men. And that the liberals, or relative liberals, I have met are tomorrow's men. That train that Bassem Awadallah mentioned? Whatever its pace, it seems to be moving, and not backward, either.