Egypt In Crisis: Independent Unions Emerge As Leaders
Our guest author today is Heba El-Shazli, regional program director for the Middle East and North Africa at the AFL-CIO’s American Center for International Labor Solidarity. She is currently on leave, serving as a visiting professor of international studies and modern languages at the Virginia Military Academy. This is the first of several posts on events in Egypt.
January 25, 2011 was the beginning of a peoples’ revolt in Egypt, a revolt whose outcome is still unclear. What is clear is that, after a smothering 30-year rule, Egyptians have broken the stifling collar of oppression to demonstrate for democracy and freedom. Also at issue are the corruption, high unemployment rates, inflation, and low minimum wages that impoverish even the hardest working, most educated people.
All of this has become fairly well known to Americans over recent days. What is far less known is the role of the
