The Egyptian People 65class (I never measured this, it is just a guess). Pragmatically,
this means if you move to Egypt on a business or academic
contract, you may be conducting business or socialising with
only a very limited segment of the population in this realm
of your life. At the same time, most of the people you see
around you, and with whom you will interact daily, definitely
reflect the poorer and less politically powerful majority of
the population.
People in the United States prefer to see themselves as a
‘mobile, classless’ society in which determination and hard
work designate one’s ultimate social position. A poor person,
through diligence and hard work, can become president. In
the United Kingdom, however, social position more closely
affiliates to birth. This can be seen by the fact that people
often know their ‘social class’ and in the continuance of
distinctions between ‘royalty’, ‘nobility’, and ‘commoner’.
Egypt’s social structure is somewhere between those of
the United States and the United Kingdom. Importantly, no
royalty or nobility exist in Egypt. Very distinct social class
differences delineate everyday life and potential opportunity
throughout Egypt. There remain remnants of the old ruling
family, but most have either maintained their elite status
through marriage or have taken a place among the ‘less than
upper class’ as a result of social power being transferred to
another group of people. Following the revolution in 1952,
social and political power transferred to a new group who
assumed the roles of the elite class in Egypt. While some
members of the ‘old’ upper class certainly remained (as do
their families now) among the upper class, a whole newly
formed upper class took hold. Over the 50 plus years since
the revolution, these statuses have become so ingrained, it
is virtually impossible for the foreigner to actually tell who
was among the old elite versus the members of the current
elite. That is not to say that, even to the casual observer,
one can delineate social class distinctions that exists in
everyday life throughout the country. Revolution and
elections notwithstanding, a relatively small group of old,
very influential families still control the majority of wealth
and power within Egypt.