IB History Nasser: Why Did Authoritarian Rule Emerge? Key Definitions

A system of government where power is concentrated in a single leader or small group, with limited political freedoms, restricted media, and little accountability to the population. In Egypt, authoritarian rule persisted from the 1952 Free Officers' coup through Nasser, Sadat and Mubarak, and was restored under el-Sisi after 2013.

A title used in early-to-mid twentieth-century Egypt for educated, salaried professionals such as civil servants, teachers, lawyers, and army officers. The effendi class sat between the old landowning aristocracy and the rural and urban poor, and provided much of the leadership for nationalist and reform movements, including many of the Free Officers.

A unit of land area used in Egypt, equal to about 0.42 hectares (roughly the size of a football pitch). Land ownership was measured in feddans, and the concentration of feddans in a small number of large landowning families was a major source of rural inequality before 1952.

A secret group of Egyptian military officers, led by Gamal Abdel Nasser, who carried out the 1952 coup that overthrew King Farouk and ended the Egyptian monarchy.

A form of irregular warfare in which small groups use ambushes, sabotage, raids, and hit-and-run tactics against a larger, conventional military force. The term comes from the Spanish word for 'little war.'

An Islamist political organization founded in Egypt in 1928. Initially supportive of the Free Officers, it was banned by Nasser in 1954 after an assassination attempt, and its members were imprisoned or exiled.

A 1962 document outlining Nasser's vision for Egypt's political, social, and economic development. It established Arab socialism as the guiding ideology and mandated a 50% worker/farmer quota in the National Assembly.

A political ideology advocating the unification of Arab peoples and nations into a single state or close political union, based on shared language, culture, and history. Nasser was its most prominent champion in the 1950s and 1960s.

The Anglo-French company that owned and operated the Suez Canal from its opening in 1869 under a 99-year concession. Most of its profits went to British and French shareholders rather than to Egypt, despite the canal running through Egyptian territory, and it became a symbol of foreign economic control until Nasser nationalised it in 1956.

Egypt's dominant nationalist party, formed after the 1919 Revolution under Saad Zaghlul to demand independence from Britain. It led or shared power in most interwar governments but became associated with corruption and compromise with the monarchy and the British by the late 1940s.