As Egyptian legislators debate a new law to oversee the work of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), I am reminded of Brazil’s experience in the 1980s — when we, like Egyptians in 2011, turned our backs on authoritarian rule and sought new ways to govern political life.
Egypt’s draft law has drawn the ire of civil society groups, notably for imposing harsh restrictions on foreign funding and foreign organizations and allowing excessive government supervision. Critics of the current text stress that its provisions would not have altered the outcome of a recent, controversial and high-profile trial where jail sentences were handed to 43 NGO workers for belonging to “illegal” organizations, under a widely criticized Mubarak-era law. It is this law which the draft precisely seeks to replace.
