Book Reviews

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    Book Review – ‘Cold War in the Islamic World’ by Dilip Hiro

Book Review – ‘Cold War in the Islamic World’ by Dilip Hiro

by Simon Mabon
As the rivalry between these regional superpowers grows ever more fractious, a new book by the prolific Indian journalist Dilip Hiro seeks to explain this new cold war in its historical context. Simon Mabon finds much to admire in Hiro’s rich analysis and engrossing writing, though there is lack of engagement with the scholarly literature, depriving the reader of […]

December 19th, 2018|Book Reviews, Iran, Saudi|0 Comments|
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    Book Review – ‘AngloArabia: Why Gulf Wealth Matters to Britain’ by David Wearing

Book Review – ‘AngloArabia: Why Gulf Wealth Matters to Britain’ by David Wearing

by Courtney Freer
The UK’s close relationship with the Gulf, and particularly the monarchies of the Gulf Cooperation Council, stems from both a long history of engagement and Britain’s enduring need to project power on the global stage even as its military and economic clout wanes. David Wearing has traced this relationship in a new book, which, though thin on […]

November 20th, 2018|Book Reviews, GCC, Saudi, Yemen|0 Comments|
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    Book Review – ‘Islamists and the Politics of the Arab Uprisings: Governance, Pluralisation and Contention’

Book Review – ‘Islamists and the Politics of the Arab Uprisings: Governance, Pluralisation and Contention’

by Abdullah Al-Arian
Long suppressed by Arab regimes and kept on the margins of their societies, Islamist groups stood to benefit the most from the uprisings that have since been labelled the ‘Arab Spring’. Hendrik Kraetzchmar and Paola Rivetti’s new edited collection sketches the heterodox nature of these groups – complex actors inspired by as many intellectual, moral, cultural, political and socioeconomic commitments as any other […]

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    Book Review – Seth Anziska’s ‘Preventing Palestine: A Political History from Camp David to Oslo’

Book Review – Seth Anziska’s ‘Preventing Palestine: A Political History from Camp David to Oslo’

by Ian Black
The idea of self-rule or autonomy for the Palestinians first appeared in the Camp David peace talks between Menachem Begin’s Israel and Anwar Sadat’s Egypt in 1978. Forty years on, an independent, sovereign Palestinian state has still not been created, in part because that concept of limited autonomy still casts a long shadow. Seth Anziska’s meticulously-researched tome is an […]

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    Book Review – Calvert W. Jones’ Bedouins into Bourgeois: Remaking Citizens for Globalization

Book Review – Calvert W. Jones’ Bedouins into Bourgeois: Remaking Citizens for Globalization

by Madawi Al-Rasheed

The formation of the state in the Arab Gulf, a late twentieth-century development, was accompanied by top-down social engineering in which oil rent was deployed to achieve various objectives. Substantial wealth created huge state bureaucracies, new cities, educational institutions, oil installations, welfare services, local and global financial corporations, heritage industries, health provisions, and many other services associated […]

August 6th, 2018|Book Reviews, GCC|0 Comments|

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