The Contemporary Middle East – Serie

Zachary Lockman's informed and thoughtful history of European Orientalism and US Middle East studies, the 'clash of civilizations' debate and America's involvement in the region has become a highly recommended and widely used text since its publication in 2004. The second edition of Professor Lockman's book brings his analysis up to date by considering how the study of the Middle East has evolved in the intervening years, in the context of the US occupation of Iraq and the 'global war on terror'.

Zachary Lockman's informed and thoughtful history of European Orientalism and US Middle East studies, the 'clash of civilizations' debate and America's involvement in the region has become a highly recommended and widely used text since its publication in 2004. The second edition of Professor Lockman's book brings his analysis up to date by considering how the study of the Middle East has evolved in the intervening years, in the context of the US occupation of Iraq and the 'global war on terror'.

Across centuries, the Islamic Middle East hosted large populations of Christians and Jews in addition to Muslims. Today, this diversity is mostly absent. In this book, Heather J. Sharkey examines the history that Muslims, Christians, and Jews once shared against the shifting backdrop of state policies. Focusing on the Ottoman Middle East before World War I, Sharkey offers a vivid and lively analysis of everyday social contacts, dress, music, food, bathing, and more, as they brought people together or pushed them apart. Historically, Islamic traditions of statecraft and law, which the Ottoman Empire maintained and adapted, treated Christians and Jews as protected subordinates to Muslims while prescribing limits to social mixing. Sharkey shows how, amid the pivotal changes of the modern era, efforts to simultaneously preserve and dismantle these hierarchies heightened tensions along religious lines and set the stage for the twentieth-century Middle East.

In this 2010 edition of their book on the economic development of the Middle East and North Africa, Clement Henry and Robert Springborg reflect on what has happened to the region's economy since 2001. How have the various countries in the Middle East responded to the challenges of globalization and to the rise of political Islam, and what changes, for better or for worse, have occurred? Utilizing the country categories they applied in the previous book and further elaborating the significance of the structural power of capital and Islamic finance, they demonstrate how over the past decade the monarchies (as exemplified by Jordan, Morocco and those of the Gulf Cooperation Council) and the conditional democracies (Israel, Turkey and Lebanon) continue to do better than the military dictatorships or 'bullies' (Egypt, Tunisia and now Iran) and 'the bunker states' (Algeria, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Syria and Yemen).

Dispossession and forced migration in the Middle East remain even today significant elements of contemporary life in the region. Dawn Chatty's book traces the history of those who, as a reconstructed Middle East emerged at the beginning of the twentieth century, found themselves cut off from their homelands, refugees in a new world, with borders created out of the ashes of war and the fall of the Ottoman Empire. As an anthropologist, the author is particularly sensitive to individual experience and how these experiences have impacted on society as a whole from the political, social, and environmental perspectives. Through personal stories and interviews within different communities, she shows how some minorities, such as the Armenian and Circassian communities, have succeeded in integrating and creating new identities, whereas others, such as the Palestinians and the Kurds, have been left homeless within impermanent landscapes.

The international relations of the Middle East have long been dominated by uncertainty and conflict. External intervention, interstate war, political upheaval and interethnic violence are compounded by the vagaries of oil prices and the claims of military, nationalist and religious movements. The purpose of this book is to set this region and its conflicts in context, providing on the one hand a historical introduction to its character and problems, and on the other a reasoned analysis of its politics. In an engagement with both the study of the Middle East and the theoretical analysis of international relations, the author, who is one of the best known and most authoritative scholars writing on the region today, offers a compelling and original interpretation. Written in a clear, accessible and interactive style, the book is designed for students, policymakers, and the general reader.

The international relations of the Middle East have long been dominated by uncertainty and conflict. External intervention, interstate war, political upheaval and interethnic violence are compounded by the vagaries of oil prices and the claims of military, nationalist and religious movements. The purpose of this book is to set this region and its conflicts in context, providing on the one hand a historical introduction to its character and problems, and on the other a reasoned analysis of its politics. In an engagement with both the study of the Middle East and the theoretical analysis of international relations, the author, who is one of the best known and most authoritative scholars writing on the region today, offers a compelling and original interpretation. Written in a clear, accessible and interactive style, the book is designed for students, policymakers, and the general reader.

Joel Beinin's survey of subaltern history in the Middle East demonstrates lucidly and compellingly how the lives, experiences and culture of working people can inform our historical understanding. Beginning in the middle of the eighteenth century, the book charts the history of peasants, urban artisans and modern working-classes across the lands of the Ottoman empire and its Muslim-majority successor-states, including the Balkans, Turkey, the Arab Middle East and North Africa. Inspired by the approach of the Indian Subaltern Studies school, the book is the first to offer a synthesized critical assessment of the scholarly work on the social history of this region for the last twenty years. It offers insights into the political, economic and social life of ordinary men and women and their apprehension of their own experiences. Students will find it rich in narrative detail, and accessible and authoritative in presentation.

Joel Beinin's survey of subaltern history in the Middle East demonstrates lucidly and compellingly how the lives, experiences and culture of working people can inform our historical understanding. Beginning in the middle of the eighteenth century, the book charts the history of peasants, urban artisans and modern working-classes across the lands of the Ottoman empire and its Muslim-majority successor-states, including the Balkans, Turkey, the Arab Middle East and North Africa. Inspired by the approach of the Indian Subaltern Studies school, the book is the first to offer a synthesized critical assessment of the scholarly work on the social history of this region for the last twenty years. It offers insights into the political, economic and social life of ordinary men and women and their apprehension of their own experiences. Students will find it rich in narrative detail, and accessible and authoritative in presentation.

In this 2010 edition of their book on the economic development of the Middle East and North Africa, Clement Henry and Robert Springborg reflect on what has happened to the region's economy since 2001. How have the various countries in the Middle East responded to the challenges of globalization and to the rise of political Islam, and what changes, for better or for worse, have occurred? Utilizing the country categories they applied in the previous book and further elaborating the significance of the structural power of capital and Islamic finance, they demonstrate how over the past decade the monarchies (as exemplified by Jordan, Morocco and those of the Gulf Cooperation Council) and the conditional democracies (Israel, Turkey and Lebanon) continue to do better than the military dictatorships or 'bullies' (Egypt, Tunisia and now Iran) and 'the bunker states' (Algeria, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Syria and Yemen).

Across centuries, the Islamic Middle East hosted large populations of Christians and Jews in addition to Muslims. Today, this diversity is mostly absent. In this book, Heather J. Sharkey examines the history that Muslims, Christians, and Jews once shared against the shifting backdrop of state policies. Focusing on the Ottoman Middle East before World War I, Sharkey offers a vivid and lively analysis of everyday social contacts, dress, music, food, bathing, and more, as they brought people together or pushed them apart. Historically, Islamic traditions of statecraft and law, which the Ottoman Empire maintained and adapted, treated Christians and Jews as protected subordinates to Muslims while prescribing limits to social mixing. Sharkey shows how, amid the pivotal changes of the modern era, efforts to simultaneously preserve and dismantle these hierarchies heightened tensions along religious lines and set the stage for the twentieth-century Middle East.