Good Collection of Primary Sources
3 stars
This is a good collection of primary sources on Arabic political thought during the first three quarters of the 20th century. The real pull of the period was between the experience of "tradition" and "modernity," both of which are contested concepts. There is little in the way of resolution, and a lot of the same questions remain important to politics in the Arab world.
That said, Islamism seems to have been delegitimized by the so-called "Arab Spring" and the subsequent explosion in political violence. Marxism, too, seems to have been largely delegitimized by the collapse of the Soviet Union, and I haven't seen much indication that Marxist politics have become more prominent. Arab Nationalism largely died with Nasser and, its last reverberations seemed to have died with Gaddafi.
The political scene, in many ways, looks bleak. Judging by the state of politics today, neoliberalism seems to be the hegemonic ideology, …
This is a good collection of primary sources on Arabic political thought during the first three quarters of the 20th century. The real pull of the period was between the experience of "tradition" and "modernity," both of which are contested concepts. There is little in the way of resolution, and a lot of the same questions remain important to politics in the Arab world.
That said, Islamism seems to have been delegitimized by the so-called "Arab Spring" and the subsequent explosion in political violence. Marxism, too, seems to have been largely delegitimized by the collapse of the Soviet Union, and I haven't seen much indication that Marxist politics have become more prominent. Arab Nationalism largely died with Nasser and, its last reverberations seemed to have died with Gaddafi.
The political scene, in many ways, looks bleak. Judging by the state of politics today, neoliberalism seems to be the hegemonic ideology, just as it is everywhere else. There are also some signs of a turn toward national populism, but many Arab states are too pluralistic to support such a political vision. What's next? It's hard to say, but it seems like the texts in here are at risk of becoming relics of the past.
My main gripe with the text is that there isn't enough in the way of introduction to and conversation between the individual pieces collected here. This makes it hard to see the "bigger picture," but it is a useful text to see the state of political thought as Boomers came of age. It's a different ideological world now, although individual Arab states have experienced a long-standing structural continuity based on exploitation for the benefit of Western powers.
Hopefully, the next generations will be able to throw this off and build something better.