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Introduction

Margaret Litvin

in Hamlet's Arab Journey: Shakespeare's Prince and Nasser's Ghost

This introductory chapter summarizes the journey of Shakespeare's Hamlet through the post-1952 Arab world and discusses this study's contributions to Arab politics and literary studies in general. ... More

This introductory chapter summarizes the journey of Shakespeare's Hamlet through the post-1952 Arab world and discusses this study's contributions to Arab politics and literary studies in general. Here, the chapter shows how the character Hamlet's central concern is the problem of historical agency. He asks what it means “to be” rather than “not to be” in a world where “the time is out of joint” and one's very existence as a historical actor is threatened. He thus encapsulates a debate coeval with and largely constitutive of modern Arab identity: the problem of self-determination and authenticity. Following Hamlet's Arab journey, the chapter attempts to clarify one of the most central and widely misunderstood preoccupations of modern Arab politics.Less

Hamlets without Hamlet

Margaret Litvin

in Hamlet's Arab Journey: Shakespeare's Prince and Nasser's Ghost

This concluding chapter reveals a recent convergence between the political concerns of Anglo-American intellectuals and their Arab counterparts. For many Anglo-American intellectuals, recent events ... More

This concluding chapter reveals a recent convergence between the political concerns of Anglo-American intellectuals and their Arab counterparts. For many Anglo-American intellectuals, recent events have thrust the Arab and Muslim worlds into focus, for better or worse, particularly in their experience of modern Arab politics: the feeling of being ruled rather than represented by one's own government. The chapter thus looks at the applications of political theatre today and how Hamlet is, once again, finding his way onto the modern Arab stage. Amid this discussion of Hamlet and twenty-first-century politics, the chapter also considers whether or not there will continue to be a distinct Arab Hamlet tradition.Less

Ideology and Political Economy in Inter-Arab Alliances

Curtis R. Ryan

in Inter-Arab Alliances: Regime Security and Jordanian Foreign Policy

This chapter examines the two key dynamics of inter-Arab politics, which are political economy and ideology. It analyzes how both ideological considerations and economic interests influence the ... More

This chapter examines the two key dynamics of inter-Arab politics, which are political economy and ideology. It analyzes how both ideological considerations and economic interests influence the foreign policies and alliance choices of Arab states. It suggests that despite the pervasiveness of ideology in Middle East politics, alignments and realignments in inter-Arab politics are determined far more by elite perceptions of threats to regime security than they are by ideological concerns.Less

Regime Security, Alliances, and Inter-Arab Politics

Curtis R. Ryan

in Inter-Arab Alliances: Regime Security and Jordanian Foreign Policy

This chapter examines international alliances, regime security and inter-Arab politics. It proposes the regime security perspective as an alternative to the Neorealist approach to alignment and ... More

This chapter examines international alliances, regime security and inter-Arab politics. It proposes the regime security perspective as an alternative to the Neorealist approach to alignment and alliance politics. It explains that this alternative approach emphasizes the different empirical realities faced by states in the Arab Middle East and throughout the developing world. It re-evaluates the key aspects of international relations theory in the Third World and suggests that alignments for post-colonial states are far more than simply deterministic responses to systemic security stimuli.Less

Security Dilemmas in Arab Politics

Curtis R. Ryan

in Inter-Arab Alliances: Regime Security and Jordanian Foreign Policy

This chapter examines the security dilemmas involved in Arab politics. It explains that security dilemma refers to an external dynamic of arms racing and spiralling regional insecurity and suggests ... More

This chapter examines the security dilemmas involved in Arab politics. It explains that security dilemma refers to an external dynamic of arms racing and spiralling regional insecurity and suggests that Arab states face two specific security dilemmas. The analysis reveals that the traditional focus on security as limited only to external military concerns is dubious at best for the Arab states system and perhaps well beyond given the fact that there is more than one security dilemma at work.Less

Prelude to War

Hillel Cohen and Haim Watzman

in Army of Shadows: Palestinian Collaboration with Zionism, 1917-1948

The first signs of Palestinian Arab political reorganization appeared at the end of 1943. Independent leaders reestablished the Nation's Fund, operating in three channels: propaganda against selling ... More

The first signs of Palestinian Arab political reorganization appeared at the end of 1943. Independent leaders reestablished the Nation's Fund, operating in three channels: propaganda against selling land to Jews, rescuing land that was in danger, and direct action against sellers. On the eve of the 1948 war, the Palestinian national institutions were unable to unite the country's Arabs. They were vulnerable to intelligence penetration by the Zionists, whom each faction and leader helped in his own way in order to harm his opponents. Many Arabs continued to maintain social and economic ties with Jews in violation of the Higher Arab Committee's instructions. Zionist intelligence recruitment was becoming more and more sophisticated. And the Arabs of Palestine were facing a war that commenced immediately after their leadership announced its rejection of the UN General Assembly decision to partition Palestine into two countries.Less

Jordan and the Arab Cooperation Council

Curtis R. Ryan

in Inter-Arab Alliances: Regime Security and Jordanian Foreign Policy

This chapter describes a case study concerning the role of Jordan in the rise and fall of the Arab Cooperation Council (ACC). It suggests that Jordan may have been inspired by its successful alliance ... More

This chapter describes a case study concerning the role of Jordan in the rise and fall of the Arab Cooperation Council (ACC). It suggests that Jordan may have been inspired by its successful alliance with Iraq to create a multilateral political, economic, and security bloc within Arab politics in the form of ACC. This multilateral alliance, which also included Yemen and Egypt, achieved real economic integration and political cooperation before its collapse in 1990.Less

The Arab Dimension of Saddam Hussein’s Calculations: What we have Learned from Iraqi Records

Shibley Telhami

in Into the Desert: Reflections on the Gulf War

This chapter examines records of conversations between Saddam Hussein and his closest aides to understand why he believed that he could get away with invading Kuwait. Evidence suggests that Hussein ... More

This chapter examines records of conversations between Saddam Hussein and his closest aides to understand why he believed that he could get away with invading Kuwait. Evidence suggests that Hussein was less sensitive to the signals sent by the US prior to his invasion. While the US may have been able to send a stronger signal against invasion, Hussein's sensitivity to that signal would have been uncertain. A tougher US position prior to the invasion may have also played into Hussein's hand and helped him rally Arab public opinion against the US. The game for him centered, above all else, on Arab politics, and his miscalculations pertained more to Arab politics and public opinion than to American intentions.Less

Scarlett O'Hara in Damascus: Hollywood, Colonial Politics, and Arab Spectatorship during World War II

Elizabeth F. Thompson

in Globalizing American Studies

This chapter presents a recuperation of Gone With the Wind's foreign career by examining its first run in the Arab world, during the early years of World War II. Historians have generally assumed ... More

This chapter presents a recuperation of Gone With the Wind's foreign career by examining its first run in the Arab world, during the early years of World War II. Historians have generally assumed that Arabs held a high opinion of American culture until the Arab–Israeli war of 1948. Their views are based on a perceived preference for American schools and businesses in the Middle East. The chapter also suggests the ways in which historical context shaped the reception of Hollywood's universal vernacular: war conditions, movie advertising, and the particular conditions of urban public spheres appear to have variously altered responses to Gone With the Wind in Cairo, Beirut, and Damascus. It considers a limited body of evidence as a first step toward a history of Middle Eastern movie spectatorship. Such a history enriches the understanding of how Arabs' attitudes toward American culture have changed over time. The chapter also throws light on popular values in Arab politics at a specific moment, near the close of the colonial era. Arab responses to Gone With the Wind reveal profound tensions between universal humanism and particularist religious and national identity.Less

The Music (and Din) of the Spheres …

Nathan Brown

in Arguing Islam after the Revival of Arab Politics

This chapter aims to portray the places where religion is argued in public in the Arab world. , It also attempts to give that description historical depth, to explore how those places have evolved ... More

This chapter aims to portray the places where religion is argued in public in the Arab world. , It also attempts to give that description historical depth, to explore how those places have evolved over recent decades. Small groups, in which public and private spheres intertwine; public spaces (such as mosques and public squares); and the vast array of newer and older media are examined over time. Finally, the chapter shows that while states and regimes leave a heavy imprint, the degree of their control varies quite significantly over time and space. This last claim sets the stage for Chapter 4, which shows how the various spaces are linked and how that linkage enables what it called the “revival” of Arab politics in the sense of lively public argumentation in recent years.Less

Understanding the Revival of Politics

Nathan Brown

in Arguing Islam after the Revival of Arab Politics

This chapter first explains the meaning of the “revival” of Arab politics. It then discusses the overall aim of this book: to understand and map the revived forms of Arab politics as they really are ... More

This chapter first explains the meaning of the “revival” of Arab politics. It then discusses the overall aim of this book: to understand and map the revived forms of Arab politics as they really are and explore their effects. In particular, it presents various sites of Arab public life to understand when various spheres arose, who participates in them, and how. It develops a more comprehensive sense of the Arab public sphere and presents its effect on policy outcomes: the revival of Arab politics does matter for policy, but only under specific conditions. The analysis focuses on religion and especially on arguments about the Islamic shari‘a precisely because there is a strong religious coloration to much public life in the Arab world. An overview of the subsequent chapters is also presented.Less

Politics and Policy; Affect and Effect

Nathan Brown

in Arguing Islam after the Revival of Arab Politics

This chapter reflects on the current political dynamics in the Arab world, showing that the revival of politics in the sense of strong public debates has been hampered in its effects by problematic ... More

This chapter reflects on the current political dynamics in the Arab world, showing that the revival of politics in the sense of strong public debates has been hampered in its effects by problematic political structures; reborn politics offers excitement and engagement but not more just or responsive political orders. Indeed, the republic of arguments flounders in its efficacy in part on the unjustness and unaccountable nature of existing political structures. The underlying problem—of people speaking but states only hearing when they wish—will not be easy to fix. Unless this problem is fixed, states may find their citizens resentful and full of complaints. Residents of the Arab world are discovering how complicated things become when real people—with all their insights, insecurities, passions, preferences, predilections, prejudices, altruism, and egoism—barge into public places.Less

2011: Revolutions in Arab Sovereignty

Ariel I. Ahram

in Break all the Borders: Separatism and the Reshaping of the Middle East

Chapter 2 discusses the breakdown of the normative and practical consensus surrounding sovereign statehood and the possibilities of a new Wilsonian moment in MENA. The 2011 Arab uprisings represented ... More

Chapter 2 discusses the breakdown of the normative and practical consensus surrounding sovereign statehood and the possibilities of a new Wilsonian moment in MENA. The 2011 Arab uprisings represented a continuation of a global crisis that led to the proliferation of civil wars, state failures, and state births. None of the initial uprisings in Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen, Libya, or Syria were bent on separatism. But the outside intervention gave separatists new ways to challenge the legitimacy and capacity of existing states and make claims for self-determination. The international community, however, vacillated in its response to these efforts, creating conditions for state collapse.Less

Introduction

Nathan Brown

in Arguing Islam after the Revival of Arab Politics

This introductory chapter provides an overview of the book’s main themes: how arguments over religion take place; how contentious they are; and the varying degrees to which they affect policy ... More

This introductory chapter provides an overview of the book’s main themes: how arguments over religion take place; how contentious they are; and the varying degrees to which they affect policy outcomes. While they can aggravate conflict and polarization, these problems stem less from their religious character than their lack of policy traction, and there are few mechanisms that induce participants to come to an agreement or affect a decision. It is their ineffectual nature, much more than their content, that makes the arguments increasingly divisive. The introduction lays out the aim of the book to describe what might be called an ethnography of existing Arab politics as it really is. It offers an explanation of the effects of political arguments over religion in the Arab world, focusing on whether people experience the political world differently or whether policy changes as a result of the vitality of political arguments over religion.Less

Domestic Conflict and Regime Maintenance

in Constructing International Relations in the Arab World

This chapter links the coming of Westphalian sovereignty to the timing and character of political struggles inside Egypt, Tunisia, Jordan, Iraq, and Syria. The existence of liberal democratic ... More

This chapter links the coming of Westphalian sovereignty to the timing and character of political struggles inside Egypt, Tunisia, Jordan, Iraq, and Syria. The existence of liberal democratic institutions throughout the Arab world greatly helped the emergence of an anarchic Middle Eastern states-system. Egyptian nationalists adopted a foreign policy platform whose primary components implied the principles of Westphalian sovereignty as part of an intense struggle to win the support of the country's small-scale manufacturers and shopkeepers. The Jordanian leadership played in preventing the formation of a tactical alliance between discontented members of the petite bourgeoisie and radical organizations actively engaged in trying to overturn the Hashemite regime. The coming of Westphalian sovereignty indicated the significance of popular participation and electoral institutions in Arab politics during the first half of the twentieth century.Less

The Public Politics of the Private Realm

Nathan Brown

in Arguing Islam after the Revival of Arab Politics

Religion weaves together public and private concerns, making relations among family members a matter of public discussion and contestation. After some general reflections on the nature of personal ... More

Religion weaves together public and private concerns, making relations among family members a matter of public discussion and contestation. After some general reflections on the nature of personal status debates, this chapter examines how the Islamic shari‘a gives individuals seeking to negotiate family relations in public settings a starting point. It considers fatwas, an odd combination of public and private argumentation where moral authority is detached from enforceability. It next considers instances in which binding and coercive state authority is invoked in personal status matters in courts of law. It examines the adjudication of disputes, and shows that those using the courts, unlike fatwa seekers, often fail to understand public teachings about their own proper behavior and instead are able to manipulate them to serve their own private interests. Finally, it assesses the politics of the Islamic shari‘a in the Arab world today, focusing on the experiences of Jordan, Egypt, and Morocco.Less