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Once Upon A Revolution: The Rise and Fall of Egypt’s Republic of Tahrir
An award-winning journalist tells the inside story of the 2011 Egyptian revolution by following two courageous and pivotal leaders—and their imperfect decisions that changed the world.
In January 2011, in Cairo’s Tahrir Square, a group of strangers sparked a revolution. Basem, an apolitical middle-class architect, jeopardized the lives of his family when he seized the chance to improve his country. Moaz, a contrarian Muslim Brother, defied his own organization to join the opposition.
These revolutionaries had little more than their idealism with which to battle the secret police, the old oligarchs, and a power-hungry military determined to keep control. Basem was determined to change the system from within and became one of the only revolutionaries to win a seat in parliament. Moaz took a different course, convinced that only street pressure from youth movements could dismantle the old order.
Thanassis Cambanis tells the story of the noble dreamers who brought Egypt to the brink of freedom, and the dark powerful forces that—for the time being—stopped them short. But he also tells a universal story of inspirational people willing to transform themselves in order to transform their society…and the world.
In January 2011, in Cairo’s Tahrir Square, a group of strangers sparked a revolution. Basem, an apolitical middle-class architect, jeopardized the lives of his family when he seized the chance to improve his country. Moaz, a contrarian Muslim Brother, defied his own organization to join the opposition.
These revolutionaries had little more than their idealism with which to battle the secret police, the old oligarchs, and a power-hungry military determined to keep control. Basem was determined to change the system from within and became one of the only revolutionaries to win a seat in parliament. Moaz took a different course, convinced that only street pressure from youth movements could dismantle the old order.
Thanassis Cambanis tells the story of the noble dreamers who brought Egypt to the brink of freedom, and the dark powerful forces that—for the time being—stopped them short. But he also tells a universal story of inspirational people willing to transform themselves in order to transform their society…and the world.
288 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 14, 2015
4 people are currently reading
282 people want to read
About the author
Thanassis Cambanis
9 books13 followersThanassis Cambanis is a journalist who has been writing about the Middle East for more than a decade. His latest book chronicles the idealistic and ultimately failed efforts of Egyptian revolutionaries to build a democratic order after Mubarak. His first book, A Privilege to Die: Inside Hezbollah’s Legions and Their Endless War Against Israel, was published in 2010. He writes “The Internationalist” column for The Boston Globe Ideas section, and regularly contributes to The New York Times, The Atlantic, the Globe (where he served as a foreign correspondent in Iraq and the Middle East), and other publications. He is a fellow at The Century Foundation in New York City. Thanassis studied international affairs for a master's degree at Princeton University, and did his undergraduate work at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He lives in Beirut, Lebanon with his wife Anne Barnard, a reporter for The New York Times, and their two children.
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
August 3, 2020
A terrific guide to the ups and downs of the ill-fated "Republic of Tahrir," and how Egypt went from a popular revolution against a dictator to embracing a new military dictatorship in less than three years. As an American reading this book in 2020, I found many resonances and distant echoes:
-the way the protest movement organically came together from many disparate social strands and building on prior protest actions (organizers from within labor, human rights communities, students, and Islamists who had all major grievances with the Mubarak regime's brutality) reminded me somewhat of #Occupy and now more recently with #BlackLivesMatter;
-the "breaking of the wall of fear" with the takeover of Tahrir in January 2011 and how that experience changed so many people, for life;
-the failure of the revolution/protest movement to congeal around a positive agenda, critically hobbling its ability to move forward once Mubarak was forced from power (and the way social media contributed to divisions among the revolutionaries);
-the role of state media in creating and sustaining a false narrative that undermined support for the revolutionaries and reinforced support for the party of order (aka the military), reminded me of how Fox News et al have created an alternative reality for 1/3 of Americans;
-the way the Egyptian military/intelligence "deep state" (which really exists there) broke the Muslim Brotherhood and deposed its leader Mohamed Morsi, who had been elected president after Mubarak's fall. I don't think Trump's election can be compared to Morsi's--to make the parallel work you'd have to posit that Mike Pence was the 2016 US presidential candidate of the Christian Right all by himself, and that once elected he started trying to impose drastic religious doctrines on the country, along with shutting down Congress and the courts. Also, for the parallel to be complete, that hypothetical President Pence would have to be operating without any meaningful media support.
Cambanis is an engaging story-teller and does a great job of summarizing the sweep of events. I would have appreciated more attention to the details of how the Revolutionary Youth Coalition worked and more voices from the various sectoral organizations that supported the January 25th movement and then spun apart. That of course would be a much longer book. But if you want a very readable guide to how the 2011 Tahrir revolution went awry, Once Upon a Revolution is highly recommended.
-the way the protest movement organically came together from many disparate social strands and building on prior protest actions (organizers from within labor, human rights communities, students, and Islamists who had all major grievances with the Mubarak regime's brutality) reminded me somewhat of #Occupy and now more recently with #BlackLivesMatter;
-the "breaking of the wall of fear" with the takeover of Tahrir in January 2011 and how that experience changed so many people, for life;
-the failure of the revolution/protest movement to congeal around a positive agenda, critically hobbling its ability to move forward once Mubarak was forced from power (and the way social media contributed to divisions among the revolutionaries);
-the role of state media in creating and sustaining a false narrative that undermined support for the revolutionaries and reinforced support for the party of order (aka the military), reminded me of how Fox News et al have created an alternative reality for 1/3 of Americans;
-the way the Egyptian military/intelligence "deep state" (which really exists there) broke the Muslim Brotherhood and deposed its leader Mohamed Morsi, who had been elected president after Mubarak's fall. I don't think Trump's election can be compared to Morsi's--to make the parallel work you'd have to posit that Mike Pence was the 2016 US presidential candidate of the Christian Right all by himself, and that once elected he started trying to impose drastic religious doctrines on the country, along with shutting down Congress and the courts. Also, for the parallel to be complete, that hypothetical President Pence would have to be operating without any meaningful media support.
Cambanis is an engaging story-teller and does a great job of summarizing the sweep of events. I would have appreciated more attention to the details of how the Revolutionary Youth Coalition worked and more voices from the various sectoral organizations that supported the January 25th movement and then spun apart. That of course would be a much longer book. But if you want a very readable guide to how the 2011 Tahrir revolution went awry, Once Upon a Revolution is highly recommended.
April 27, 2017
I was under the impression that this book primarily documented the 2011 Egyptian revolution. But I couldn't have been more wrong. Following the lives of the two activists who were crucial to the revolution, the author unfolds the events that led to the revolution and its aftermath. I'd highly recommend this book to anyone who is interested in Egypt's recent past.
February 15, 2015
Abandoned. Not sure if it was the subject matter or the presentation. Made it to page 180 and decided it wasn't right for me. It tells the story of the Arab Spring in Egypt 2011.
May 14, 2015
Once Upon A Revolution, by Thanassis Cambanis
Books such as this one do more to allow readers to gain insight into political change than any other form of journalism - in this case, the locale and incidents have to do with Egypt’s Tahrir Square revolution of 2005, the first major outpouring of the Arab Spring. The author interviews a handful of people as the revolution begins and follows them through the revolt’s initial stages, then the reach of these few into politics, their political repression, and finally, to the disintegration of these few’s ideals amid an eventual and common unease with a fight that would have of necessity to be one of long duration.
In this respect this revolt had much in common with the leftist revolution that reared its head in the US in the 1960s. That is, endemic problems weren’t solved quickly enough to keep the populace from being uncomfortable with the inevitable counter-revolution, repression, both political and social, and the forces trying to improve poverty, income inequality, police relations among the poor, corruption. As a result, the democratic movement, as in the 60s revolts, fragmented.
A couple of facets of the Arab Spring, as manifested in Egypt, are worth noting.
The revolution was led by secular forces, and was eventually repressed by the Muslim Brotherhood.
Those leading the revolution were committed to peaceful change, even in the face of beatings and murders by the police, the military, and eventually by the Brotherhood.
Cambanis’ writing here is some of the best journalistic writing of this type I’ve read, despite English being a secondary language. He rarely repeats himself, his reportage is neatly laid out in chronological fashion, and he manages a studied objectivity throughout.
And this brings up one other thought concerning what the Tahrir-ists were trying to do: We in the U.S., because we were the first to forge a significant national democracy, albeit at the beginning of our nation, tend to think that ours is perfect. All one has to do to be dissuaded of that attitude is to note the excusable lack of insight our founding fathers had into the power of corporations, globalization, mass politics, the flood of technology, particularly concerning communication and privacy issues, and a plethora of social issues. The Tahrir-ists did recognize these issues and openly desired to improve on what the U.S. has been trying to import to the Middle East in the name of democracy. Too, they realized the difficulty of trying to implement such a government and constitution without a modern prototype, particularly in an area of the world still tied by tribalism and religion to ancient socio-political constructs.
My Rating: 18 of 20 stars
Books such as this one do more to allow readers to gain insight into political change than any other form of journalism - in this case, the locale and incidents have to do with Egypt’s Tahrir Square revolution of 2005, the first major outpouring of the Arab Spring. The author interviews a handful of people as the revolution begins and follows them through the revolt’s initial stages, then the reach of these few into politics, their political repression, and finally, to the disintegration of these few’s ideals amid an eventual and common unease with a fight that would have of necessity to be one of long duration.
In this respect this revolt had much in common with the leftist revolution that reared its head in the US in the 1960s. That is, endemic problems weren’t solved quickly enough to keep the populace from being uncomfortable with the inevitable counter-revolution, repression, both political and social, and the forces trying to improve poverty, income inequality, police relations among the poor, corruption. As a result, the democratic movement, as in the 60s revolts, fragmented.
A couple of facets of the Arab Spring, as manifested in Egypt, are worth noting.
The revolution was led by secular forces, and was eventually repressed by the Muslim Brotherhood.
Those leading the revolution were committed to peaceful change, even in the face of beatings and murders by the police, the military, and eventually by the Brotherhood.
Cambanis’ writing here is some of the best journalistic writing of this type I’ve read, despite English being a secondary language. He rarely repeats himself, his reportage is neatly laid out in chronological fashion, and he manages a studied objectivity throughout.
And this brings up one other thought concerning what the Tahrir-ists were trying to do: We in the U.S., because we were the first to forge a significant national democracy, albeit at the beginning of our nation, tend to think that ours is perfect. All one has to do to be dissuaded of that attitude is to note the excusable lack of insight our founding fathers had into the power of corporations, globalization, mass politics, the flood of technology, particularly concerning communication and privacy issues, and a plethora of social issues. The Tahrir-ists did recognize these issues and openly desired to improve on what the U.S. has been trying to import to the Middle East in the name of democracy. Too, they realized the difficulty of trying to implement such a government and constitution without a modern prototype, particularly in an area of the world still tied by tribalism and religion to ancient socio-political constructs.
My Rating: 18 of 20 stars
November 15, 2015
Usually I am not swayed by affective arguments, particularly from a journalist's perspective. This is a good history of the movement that spawned Tahir Square and eventually resulted in the Army coup that gave the world President el-Sisi. The movement toward democracy was coopted by the Muslim Brotherhood after the fall of Mubarak. The Brotherhood got Morsi elected who continued the authoritarian practices giving them the ideological twist and thought that they could challenge the Army. Not too smart.
The author views the time period through the actions of several of the leaders who brought the revolution to Tahir Square. These leaders were there at the beginning and of diverse often competing backgrounds. They pulled off the upset with the help of the benign neglect of the Army. The leadership was unable to lead afterward, principally because of their political naiveté and lack of long term goals. We essentially did the same thing in the US with Johnson and got Nixon. (Of course we had MLK and RFK assassinated which left us bereft of leadership.)
What I learned: the street Egyptians and the intelligentsia really hate the U.S. and Israel. I have no sympathy for the Egyptian populace. One can die a slave under any number of masters. I hope we do better.
The author views the time period through the actions of several of the leaders who brought the revolution to Tahir Square. These leaders were there at the beginning and of diverse often competing backgrounds. They pulled off the upset with the help of the benign neglect of the Army. The leadership was unable to lead afterward, principally because of their political naiveté and lack of long term goals. We essentially did the same thing in the US with Johnson and got Nixon. (Of course we had MLK and RFK assassinated which left us bereft of leadership.)
What I learned: the street Egyptians and the intelligentsia really hate the U.S. and Israel. I have no sympathy for the Egyptian populace. One can die a slave under any number of masters. I hope we do better.
February 21, 2015
Very well written. Cambanis come to follow two of the early participants in the uprising, one a secular Muslim and the other with very strong religious ties to his faith. How they came to work together was well documented. I was struck by how much the Western press lacked a deep understanding of the uprising. How our media and political leaders manipulated the 'spin' to advance our stereotypes of the region. We forgot that the Egyptian citizen lost and the military and the elite actually won, or at least have won to this point. The book raised serious questions about the need for political and civic institutions are necessary to sustain or build a democracy. Naively, America political leaders claim, all people need to do is to create a democracy without any deep understanding of what is that really means. Perhaps, it is because we equate democracy with voting not discussion and the need for associations and institutions.
August 7, 2015
At first I thought this book would be really preachy, but I was pleasantly surprised. It's a good run down of not only the 2011 revolution, but also the following years that saw the Muslim Brotherhood come to power to just as quickly lose it and the return of military rule.
August 18, 2015
An engrossing piece of long-form journalism and a very compact primer on the Egyptian revolution. More than token analyses at the book's beginning and end would have been nice, and I really can't fathom why Cambanis chose such a banal title, but an entertaining and informative read on the whole.
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February 1, 2016Research.
April 12, 2017
I enjoyed reading this book a lot, it was so useful to go through the events in detail after 6 years and recall how great the revolution was, how things went wrong, be reminded that change takes time, and end the book feeling hopeful about the future in Egypt.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews