Notes on the background of Arab Socialist thought

Bibliographic Data

ID10075583
AuthorsMalcolm H Kerr (corresponding author)
Year1968
Volume3
Issue3
Pages145-159
Publication date1968-07-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Contemporary History (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0022-0094 • E-ISSN: 1461-7250
PublisherSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/002200946800300309
OpenAlexW19710225
LanguageEN
Citations received5

To an extraordinary degree, explanations of the ideas and causes of modern Arab political movements have dwelt upon the terminology the Arabs have employed. The Arabs, it is said, are verbalizers par excellence. They are both practitioners and victims of eloquence; they are moved by the repetition of slogans and epithets. Thus as early as I879 we find an Azharite shaikh attracting attention by publishing an 'Essay on Eight Words'l elaborating on the meaning of such new terms as 'nation' and 'fatherland'. Today, in the view of some, almost the whole substance of Arabic political dialogue is represented by a handful of staple terms: qawmiyya, 'uruba, thawra, wahda, ishtirakiyya, isti'mar, sahyuniyya, raj'iyya (nationalism, Arabism, revolution, unity, socialism, imperialism, zionism, reaction) various appellations of the forces of light and darkness. Ten and twenty years ago the dominant slogan was nationalism; in recent years, increasingly, it has been socialism. The latter slogan supposedly reflects the reality, embodied today in the existence of regimes in Syria and Egypt, and of strong movements elsewhere, that are bent on redistribution of wealth and on state-promoted and state-controlled industrialization

Aesthetics · Ancient history · Art · Literature · Political science · History · Islamic Studies and History · Jewish and Middle Eastern Studies · Philosophy

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