Kirk Beattie's analysis focuses on the origins and consequences of political-ideological struggle in Egypt, which pitted liberal democrats, transitional authoritarians, Marxists, and Islamic fundamentalists against one another for control of the state and Egypt's future. Beattie examines the political stagnation that resulted and that spurred the Free Officers to seize power in 1952. He then investigates the military transitional authoritarianism of the officers in power.

Beattie illustrates how Nasser engineered the establishment of an autonomous state. That state afforded considerable decision-making latitude but at the same time compelled Nasser to search for a new ideological formula and to build new political institutions to overcome the obstacles created by intraregime, civilian, and foreign opponents trying to block his political economic development strategies.

Based on hundreds of interviews with key actors representing a cross-section of ideological viewpoints, this book provides a detailed analysis of government and opposition decisionmaking during the Nasser period. Beattie succeeds in clarifying the motivations and beliefs of the Egyptian elite and the real and perceived constraints that shaped their behavior.