Understanding the Arab uprisings takes more than day to day media reports or longer articles (or even, now, books) churched out in the heat of the struggle; it requires reflection on similar events elsewhere in history. Arab history and the histories of other peoples can help place these things in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Syria and elsewhere in perspective.
Below is a list of books of interest in this respect. It is not meant to be complete or comprehensive. They are in no particular order (obviously this is not an alphabetic list or timeline); the books are organized relatively thematically: (1) Books dealing with the Arab region and Iran; (2) Books dealing with world history and social phenomena; (3) Books dealing with Arab history in general. All of them are books in English or in translation.
Not all of these books deal relate to or deal explicitly with the Arab region: some of them have to do with world and European history (the revolutions of 1848, to which the Arab uprisings are often compared). Some of them deal with Marxist and communist history and perspectives, systems theory, social collapse and related subject matter. These are taken from books read by this blogger over time (before the winter uprising in Tunisia) for classes or leisure or the like and which have been revisited in part or in full since January. Leon Trotsky wrote: “history would be useless if it taught us nothing.” The basic consensus seems to be that history is useful and does have something to teach us. These books are not all equal in prose, analysis, narrative or any other respect; but they are all useful in one or another way in trying to gain a bigger perspective on what is happening in the Arab world at the moment and some it has influenced other parts of the world. More books will follow eventually, with perhaps some French or Arabic ones which have relevance. Continue reading
