Over the weekend, I attended a workshop with IR people from very different backgrounds. As it often happens, small-talk themes varied from workshop-related conceptual disagreements and the situation at the respective home institutions to actual political events. This time, the most prominent topic given the coup against Morsi last Wednesday was the Egyptian crisis and its causes.
What struck me most about the reactions was that a large part of the participants actually justified and legitimized the military’s actions to push Morsi out of office. This was demanded by the Egyptian people by being on the street and protesting against the ruling regime, it was often said. Morsi made too many mistakes as he was not able to improve the economic situation and because he set different groups against each other, others claimed. The military had to interfere in order to reconstitute order and in order to protect the democratic endeavor in Egypt.
Truth be told, this sucks: what is a military coup should also be named a military coup.