Arab Lefts - Histories and Legacies, 1950s 1970s

Explores the entangled histories of left-wing movements across the Arab world, Europe and Afro-Asian areas of resistance

Relocating the Arab Left in transnational dynamics and revolutionary networks, this book examines the circulation of people, symbols, and ideas between the Arab world, Europe and Afro-Asian areas of resistance. Based on an analysis of textual and audio-visual materials, this book sheds light on the resilience of Arab radical and democratic traditions that took shape despite local and global wars, state coercion, neo-liberal globalisation and repeated failures. Interrogating commonly accepted categories - in particular the category of 'Left' - the collection also invites reflection on how a re-engagement with the 'Long Sixties' relates to today's political landscape and conception of history and temporality.

. A transnational history of the Arab Left, this book opens new avenues for research on the Cold War, the Sixties and national emancipation struggles
. Features an interdisciplinary team of scholars that bring into conversation a wide range of concerns including radicalisation processes, revolutionary hopes, neoliberal globalisation, Islam and the Left, the legacy of Marxism, communism and left-wing politics in general
. Examines the interventions of a wide range of leftist parties and groups in the Middle East, including the Syrian Baath Party, League for Combating Zionism, Israeli Communist Party (MAKI), Syrian-Lebanese Communist Party, Tunisian Communist Party, Egyptian Communist Workers' Party, Socialist Lebanon and the Organisation of the Communist Action in Lebanon
. Traces the political involvement of Arab Left figures such as Khaled Bakdash, Mahdi Ben Barka, Clovis Maksoud, Husayn Muruwwah and Khalid Ahmad Zaki

Laure Guirguis is Associate Professor and Research Fellow at the Aarhus Institute of Advanced Studies (AIAS) and Associate Researcher at the Institute for Research on the Arab and Muslim World (IREMAM, Aix-en-Provence).

List of contents

0. The Arab Lefts 1950s - 1970s: Transnational Entanglements and Shifting Legacies, Laure Guirguis; 1. Unforgettable Radicalism: Al-Ittihad's Words in Hebrew Novels, Orit Bashkin; 2. Beating Hearts: Arab Marxism, Anti-Colonialism & Literatures of Co-Existence in Palestine/Israel, 1944-1960, Hana Morgenstern; 3. Free Elections versus Authoritarian Practices: What Baathists Fought For, Matthieu Rey; 4. Dealing with Dissent: Khaled Bakdash and the Schisms of Arab Communism, Sune Haugbolle; 5. A Patriotic Internationalism: The Tunisian Communist Party's Commitment to the Liberation of Peoples, Daniela Melfa; 6. Internationalist Nationalism: Making Algeria at World Youth Festivals, 1947-62, Jakob Krais; 7. Traveling Theorist: Mehdi Ben Barka and Morocco from Anticolonial Nationalism to the Tricontinental, Nate George; 8. Marxism or Left-wing Nationalism? The 'New Left in Egypt' in the 1970s, Gennaro Gervasio; 9. Non-Zionists, Anti-Zionists, Revolutionaries: Palestinian Appraisals of the Israeli Left, 1967-1973, Maha Nassar; 10. 'Dismount the Horse to Pick Some Roses.' Militant Enquiry in Lebanese New Left Experiments, 1968-1973, Laure Guirguis; 11. The 'Che Guevarra of the Middle East': Remembering Khalid Ahmad Zaki's Revolutionary Struggle in Iraq's Southern Marshes, Philipp Winkler; 12. Crisis and Critique: The Transformation of the Arab Radical Tradition, 1960s-1980s, Jens Hanssen; 13. The Afterlives of Husayn Muruwwah: The Killing of an Intellectual, 1987, Samer Frangie; Afterword. The Arab Left: From Rumbling Ocean to Revolutionary Gulf, Abed Takriti.

About the author

Laure Guirguis is Associate Professor - AIAS-COFUND Fellow at Aarhus Institute of Advanced Studies (AIAS) and Associate Researcher at the Institute for Research on the Arab and Muslim World (IREMAM, Aix-en-Provence). She is a historian who works on political violence, revolutionary dynamics and identity politics in the Arab world. She is the author of Copts and the Security State: Violence, Coercion and Sectarianism in Contemporary Egypt (Stanford UP, 2016) and of a forthcoming book on the New Left in the Arab East (in preparation, 2021).

Summary

Based on an analysis of textual and audio-visual materials,the booksurveys radical Left traditions in the Arab world that took shape between the 1950s and 1970s.

Product details

• Authors: Laure Guirguis
• Assisted by: Laure Guirguis (Editor)
• Publisher: Edinburgh University Press
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Released: 31.08.2020
• EAN: 9781474454230
• ISBN: 978-1-4744-5423-0
• No. of pages: 384
• Subject: Social sciences, law, business > Political science > Political science and political education