Cambridge Middle East Library

Series · 8 books · 1983-1993

By Madiha Rashid al Madfai, Donald Malcolm Reid, Nancy Elizabeth Gallagher, and more

Books in series

Medicine and Power in Tunisia, 1780-1900

1983

Severe epidemics of plague, cholera, and typhus swept across Tunisia between the years 1780 and 1900. The society was galvanized into medical practitioners, religious authorities, and political leaders all tried to deal with the deadly crises. Muslims had, over many centuries, evolved ideas concerning the origin, prevention, and treatment of epidemic diseases that differed somewhat from those of their European counterparts. With European economic and political expansion that accelerated after the Napoleonic Wars, Muslims found themselves confronted not only by a new source of political power but by a new set of medical ideas. This study traces the medical confrontation through the society's response to epidemic disease.

The Renewal of Islamic Law

Muhammad Baqer as-Sadr, Najaf and the Shi'i International

1993

This is the first comprehensive study of the life and works of Muhammad Baqer as-Sadr - an Iraqi scholar who made an important contribution to the renewal of Islamic law and politics in the contemporary Middle East. Executed in 1980, Sadr was the most articulate thinker and a major political actor in the revival of Shi'i learning, which placed Najaf in Southern Iraq at its centre. Dr Chibli Mallat examines the intellectual development of Sadr and his companions who included Ruhullah al-Khumaini and assesses Sadr's innovative approaches to the study of law, economics and banking. The author convincingly demonstrates how Sadr's ideas and activities were influential in the rise of political Islam across the Middle East and played an important part in the Iranian revolution of 1979.

#10

Womanpower

The Arab Debate on Women at Work

1988

Womanpower unveils the lively but little-reported debate on women's positions in the modern Arab world. It paints a picture drawn from individual stories as well as from national development programs and attempts to explain why the process of social change in the region has been slow and uneven by linking it to political and economic developments. By illustrating particular themes—personal status laws, development policies, political rights—with examples from specific countries, Nadia Hijab builds up an informative overview of the Arab world today.

#11

Merchants of Essaouira

Urban Society and Imperialism in Southwestern Morocco, 1844–1886

1988

Essaouira was founded n 1764 by Sultan Sidi Muhammad b. Abdullah as his port for developing trade with Europe. Through a group of Jewish middlemen, it served as a link between Europe, Morocco and su-Saharan Africa. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries its fame rivalled Tripoli, Tunis and Algiers. Based on extensive untapped archive in Morocco, papers of Jewish merchant houses and consular records of Britain, France and the United States, this book gives an account of the city in its heyday. Essaouira was an opening to foreign penetration, but it was also important to the Moroccan government, because potentially dissident regions became tied to its commercial and political activities. The control of the sultans was undermined as foreign powers imposed liberal trade and intervened in Moroccan affairs. This study of a specific city and region throws light on the problems of traditional societies in the age of European economic imperialism.

#13

Cairo University and the Making of Modern Egypt

1990

Cairo University has been crucially important in shaping the national life of twentieth-century Egypt. It has educated much of the political, professional and cultural elite; doctors and lawyers, novelists and philosophers, bankers and prime ministers have all studied there. Founded in 1908 and for many years competing only with the religious al-Azhar, the European-inspired Cairo University quickly became the prime indigenous model for other state universities in the region and its influence has spread even beyond the Arab world. Professor Reid has drawn on university archives hitherto untapped by Western scholars and on a wide range of other Arabic and Western sources. He explains the university's part in the national quest for independence from Britain, in the perennial tension between secular and religious world views, and in the push for a more egalitarian society. Nasser and Sadat, Kings Fuad and Faruq, nationalist hero Saad Zaghlul and Nobel Prize winner Najib Mahfuz, all feature prominently in this fascinating history of Egypt's most important modern educational institution.

#14

Islam and Resistance in Afghanistan

1986

In this newly updated edition, Olivier Roy expands his penetrating study of the history, ideology and structures of the Afghan resistance movement to mid-1989. He examines the evolution of the military and political situation inside Afghanistan during the last years of the Soviet presence and discusses relations between the Afghan resistance and the Islamic fundamentalist movements. The situation created by the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan is also explored and in a new conclusion Professor Roy assesses to what extent the war has altered the traditional fabric of Afghan society.

#15

Jordan, the United States and the Middle East Peace Process, 1974–1991

1993

On July 31, 1988, King Hussein of Jordan renounced all administrative and legal ties with the Israeli-occupied West Bank of the River Jordan, initiating a new turning point in the Middle East peace process. In this path-breaking study, Madiha Madfai explores Jordan's role in the USA's peacemaking efforts during the Carter, Reagan and Bush administrations. She examines the events culminating in the action of 1988 and convincingly demonstrates the history of anger, anguish and frustration that lay behind the Jordanian decision.

#16

Water and Power

The Politics of a Scarce Resource in the Jordan River Basin

1993

Why do states in arid regions fail to cooperate in sharing water resources and how can they be encouraged to do so? In a provocative and well-researched analysis of the history and current status of the dispute over the waters of the Jordan River basin and its relationship to the Arab-Israeli conflict, Dr. Miriam Lowi explores the answers to these questions. This book will be of value to all those with an interest in the region, and to those concerned with the environmental issues of the politics of water scarcity.

Authors

Madiha Rashid al Madfai

Author · 1 books

Donald Malcolm Reid

Author · 2 books

Nancy Elizabeth Gallagher

A professor at the European University Institute in Florence (Italy); he was previously a research director at the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) and a lecturer for both the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences (EHESS) and the Institut d'Études Politiques de Paris (IEP). From 1984 to 2008, he has acted as a consultant to the French Foreign Ministry. In 1988, Roy served as a United Nations Office for Coordinating Relief in Afghanistan (UNOCA) consultant. Beginning in August 1993, Roy served as special OSCE representative to Tajikistan until February 1994, at which time he was selected as head of the OSCE mission to Tajikistan, a position he held until October 1994. Roy received an "Agrégation" in Philosophy and a Master's in Persian language and civilization in 1972 from the French Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales. In 1996, he received his PhD in Political Science from the IEP. Roy is the author of numerous books on subjects including Iran, Islam, Asian politics. These works include Globalized Islam: The search for a new ummah, Today's Turkey: A European State? and The Illusions of September 11. He also serves on the editorial board of the academic journal Central Asian Survey. His best-known book, L'Echec de l'Islam politique; The Failure of Political Islam. It is a standard text for students of political Islam. Roy wrote widely on the subject of the 2005 civil unrest in France saying they should not be seen as religiously inspired as some commentators said. His most recent work is Secularism Confronts Islam (Columbia, 2007). The book offers a perspective on the place of Islam in secular society and looks at the diverse experiences of Muslim immigrants in the West. Roy examines how Muslim intellectuals have made it possible for Muslims to live in a secularized world while maintaining the identity of a "true believer."