Nationalism And Revolution In The Arab World The Middle East And North Africa

In this innovative book, Keith Watenpaugh connects the question of modernity to the formation of the Arab middle class. The book explores the rise of a middle class of liberal professionals, white-collar employees, journalists, and businessmen during the first decades of the twentieth century in the Arab Middle East and the ways its members created civil society, and new forms of politics, bodies of thought, and styles of engagement with colonialism. Discussions of the middle class have been largely absent from historical writings about the Middle East. Watenpaugh fills this lacuna by drawing on Arab, Ottoman, British, American and French sources and an eclectic body of theoretical literature and shows that within the crucible of the Young Turk Revolution of 1908, World War I, and the advent of late European colonialism, a discrete middle class took shape. It was defined not just by the wealth, professions, possessions, or the levels of education of its members, but also by the way they asserted their modernity. Using the ethnically and religiously diverse middle class of the cosmopolitan city of Aleppo, Syria, as a point of departure, Watenpaugh explores the larger political and social implications of what being modern meant in the non-West in the first half of the twentieth century. Well researched and provocative, Being Modern in the Middle East makes a critical contribution not just to Middle East history, but also to the global study of class, mass violence, ideas, and revolution.

Arab nationalism has been one of the dominant ideologies in the Middle East and North Africa since the early twentieth century. However, a clear definition of Arab nationalism, even as a subject of scholarly inquiry, does not yet exist. Arab Nationalism sheds light on cultural expressions of Arab nationalism and the sometimes contradictory meanings attached to it in the process of identity formation in the modern world. It presents nationalism as an experienceable set of identity markers – in stories, visual culture, narratives of memory, and struggles with ideology, sometimes in culturally sophisticated forms, sometimes in utterly vulgar forms of expression. Drawing upon various case studies, the book transcends a conventional history that reduces nationalism in the Arab lands to a pattern of political rise and decline. It offers a glimpse at ways in which Arabs have constructed an identifiable shared national culture, and it critically dissects conceptions about Arab nationalism as an easily graspable secular and authoritarian ideology modeled on Western ideas and visions of modernity. This book offers an entirely new portrayal of nationalism and a crucial update to the field, and as such, is indispensable reading for students, scholars and policymakers looking to gain a deeper understanding of nationalism in the Arab world.

A particularly trenchant political economy of the Arab world, set within the dual contexts of the historical development of the Middle East and the evolving world economic system. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Based on a decade of research, including in-depth interviews with many leading figures in the story, this edition is essential for anyone who wants to understand the roots of the turmoil engulfing the Middle East, from civil wars to the rise of Al-Qaeda and ISIS.

"An attempt to analyze the cause and character of a profound revolution taking place from Morocco to Pakistan. This Report examines the forces, groups, ideas, and institutions now in motion and estimates the direction which politics may take in the future in the area. While the transformation here under study embraces both the pervasive nationalist revolution and the ensuing "revolution of rising expectations," its sources and ramifications are broader and run deeper than nationalism and its discontents: (1) a way of life 1300 years old is being destroyed by challenges for which it was almost entirely unprepared; (2) a social system with new values is taking the place of traditional society; (3) a different range of ideological choices has opened up for a new kind of elite; (4) new political instruments are at the elite's disposal; (5) the fact that new men are using new means to attain new ends in their attempts to deal with the politics of social change entails widespread revolutionary consequences."--Author's report.

The Middle East provides a thematic analysis of major forces and trends in contemporary Middle East and a thorough examination of individual countries in the region. This comprehensive anthology, the first in more than two decades, explores the political environment, religious and ethnic factors, economic factors, the Arab world, the Palestinians and the territories, Israel, the role of the superpowers, and the Middle East's relationship with the rest of the world. Every informed reader will want to consult "The Middle East "to understand this important and complex area of the world. Contents (partial): William L. Cleveland, "Sources of Arab Nationalism"; Carl Leiden, "Arab Nationalism Today"; Opoku Agyeman, "Pan-Africanism versus Pan-Arabism"; Elbani Hermassi, "The Maghrib and the Middle East Conflict"; Lenore G. Martin, "Boundary Disputes in the Persian Gulf"; Bernard Lewis, "The Return of Islam"; Daniel Pipes, "Understanding Islam in Politics"; Emanuel Gutmann, "Religion and Its Role in National Integration in Israel"; George Moutafakis, "Minorities in the Modern Middle East Societies"; Stuart E. Colie, "The Shiites and the Lebanese Tragedy"; Kenneth J. Arrow, "Energy"; Fred M. Gottheil, "Saudi Arabian Economic Power"; Eliyahu Kanovsky, "Arab Oil Power"; Victor T. Le Vine, "The Arab World in the 1980s"; Bernard Lewis, "Islamic Political Movements"; Raymond N. Habiby and Fariborz Ghavidel, "Khumayni's Islamic Republic"; James P. Jankowski, "Nationalism in Twentieth Century Egypt"; Sheikh R. Ali, "The Iran-Iraq War"; Raymond N. Habiby, "Quadhafi's New Islamic Scientific Socialist Society"; Moshe Aumann, "Land Ownership in Palestine"; Fred M. Gottheil, "Arab Immigration into Pre-State Israel"; Yehoshua Porat, "The Palestinian-Arab Nationalist Movement"; Yonah Alexander, "The Nature of the PLO"; Sammy Smooha and John E. Hofrnan, "Arab-Jewish Coexistence in Israel"; Michael Curtis, "The Evolution of Israeli Politics"; Aaron S. Klieman, "Zionist Diplomacy and Israeli Foreign Policy"; Jay Adams, "Assessing Israel as a 'Strategist Asset'"; Saul B. Cohen, "Jerusalem's Unity and West Bank Autonomy"; Meron Benvenisti, "Postive Thinking in Jerusalem"; Steven L. Spiegel, "Recent American Policy in the Middle East"; Alan Dowty, "U.S. Decision-Making in Middle East Crises"; Michael Curtis, "American Interest and the Middle East"; Aaron Wildavsky, "American's National Interest in Israel"; Adam M. Garfinkle, "U.S. Policy in the Near Term"; James R. Kurth, "U.S. Policy and the West Bank"; Alvin Z. Rubinstein, "The Soviet Union's Imperial Policy in the Middle East"; Michael Curtis, "Africa, Israel, and the Middle East"; Victor T. Le Vine, "The Arabs and Africa"; W. Howard Wriggins, "South Asia and the Gulf"; Roy Licklide, "Arab Oil and Japanese Foreign Policy"; Linda B. Miller, "Western Europe and the Middle East"; Dan V. Segre, "Israel and the Third World."