The role of subordinate financialisation in Egypt’s employment crisis

SUMMARY Studies of financialisation have largely ignored its impact in global south contexts. This briefing, therefore, adopts the ‘subordinate financialisation’ framework to study the impact of growing financialisation in Egypt, using primary data on the financial sector, employment and capital formation. To avoid the shortcomings of methodological nationalism, this briefing stresses the global south and historical dimensions of Egypt’s subordinate financialisation. The briefing concludes that traditional policy intervention, including progressive countercyclical measures, is unlikely to counterbalance the adverse effects of this extractive variety of financialisation due to its non-cyclical nature.