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Why did the Muslim Brotherhood become Egypt’s strongest organized political group after Hosni Mubarak resigned?

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Founder of the Muslim Brotherood — Muslim Brotherhood Hassan al-Banna, a schoolteacher in Ismailia, Egypt, founded the Muslim Brotherhood in 1928 as an attempt to modernize Islamic society.

After Hosni Mubarak resigned in 2011, the Muslim Brotherhood emerged as Egypt’s strongest organized political group primarily because it was the only major faction with an established, nationwide infrastructure following the court-ordered dissolution of Mubarak’s National Democratic Party (NDP) in April 2011.1

While the group had operated under various restrictions and bans for decades, it had spent years building a base through social services and, more recently, by competing in parliamentary elections as independent candidates. This long-standing organizational capacity allowed them to quickly pivot to formal politics by founding the Freedom and Justice Party.231

When parliamentary elections were held between late 2011 and early 2012, no other political faction could compete with the Brotherhood’s level of organization, enabling them to secure approximately 47 percent of the seats in the lower house of parliament. This dominance in the legislative arena provided the momentum for the group to eventually field a successful presidential candidate, Mohamed Morsi, in 2012.1