While reading the live update page at the Telegraph, the following caught my eye:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/egypt/8288167/Egypt-protests-live.html\
16:35 Second, Rob Crilly, normally our Pakistan Correspondent, explains why the price of food is so politically important in Egypt:
"Hundreds of thousands of poor Egyptians took to the streets in 1977 to protest against plans by the government to end subsidies on sales of flour, rice, and cooking oil, sparking what became known as the 'bread riots'.
"At least 800 people died in two days of violence, which ended only after the Army was deployed to the streets and the government backtracked on the plans.
"Similar riots erupted in 2008.
"The latest unrest in Egypt is blamed in part on rising wheat prices, which have squeezed poor Egyptian households. Forty per cent of Egypt's population survives on less than $2 a day."
More info through the link above or at
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/8288934/Why-Egypts-government-is-stockpiling-food.htmlA few years ago, I read "City of Darkness, City of Light" by Marge Piercy, a novel account (in both senses) of the French Revolution, in which she focuses on both well known or less or unknown people who participated. An aspect she pays much attention to is the participation of women and the strong role rising prices and lack of bread played as impetus:
http://www.amazon.com/City-Darkness-Light-Marge-Piercy/dp/0449912752/ref=dp_return_1?ie=UTF8&n=283155&s=booksFrom Publishers Weekly
Depicting the experiences of three brave women, Piercy (Gone to Soldiers) explores the human reality of the French Revolution, bringing to life the immense role women played in bringing down the monarchy. Claire Lacombe escapes the grinding poverty of her youth by becoming an actress in a traveling troupe. Beautiful and filled with the determination that can be forged by enduring hardship, she becomes an inspiring symbol as she dares to participate in pivotal events. Manon Philipon, a jeweler's daughter, idolizes Rousseau and the life of the mind. Marrying an austere government bureaucrat, she learns that she has an innate grasp of politics.
Pauline Leon, the owner of a chocolate shop, is galvanized when she witnesses the executions of poor people rioting for bread. Their three stories are deftly braided with the lives of three men?the incorruptible Robespierre, the opportunistic Danton and Nicolas Caritat, an academician trying to walk the high wire between old and new. Men may be necessary to drive the plot, but women are its engine.
It is women who take to the streets looking for "justice, bread and freedom," and who win concessions on issues like divorce and inheritance rights. Piercy skillfully juxtaposes the political debates, painfully slow reforms and bloody confrontations against the ironies and absurdities of everyday life. Since the novel offers multiple perspectives, events sometimes overlap and readers must pay close attention to the dates listed with chapter headings. This is a minor obstacle, however, in a novel that adds fresh, powerfully grounding perspective to accepted historical fact. QPB featured alternate.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc
It's striking to me the similarity of the denial or restriction of basic needs, of persecution of those who demand needs and justice, of the arrogance of those who would deny and of reaching the stage of pouring into the streets.
Food for thought.