This is a seasoned US Middle East specialist who does not want to be identified in any way: "As you know, I have a hard time reading anything written in the last twenty years and especially since 9/11. I prefer to read material from the 70s and 80s when in my view the analysis was sharper and the writing better. With that in mind, anyone who wants to analyze events in Egypt/Tunisia,etc. ought to read the following. Not for predictions as to what might happen, but instead for models as to how to look at sudden uprisings.
First ( and I'm sure you'd agree) is Hanna Batatu's "The Egyptian, Syrian and Iraqi Revolutions: Some Observations on Their Underlying Causes and Social Character." This was published by Georgetown CCAS in January 1983 and you can probably find it on-line. It is a masterpiece in just 27 pages.
Second, plowing through my basement I came across Ghassan Kanafani's "Palestine: The 1936-1939 Revolt." published by the Tricontinental Society and the PFLP in the UK in 1981. ( I was astounded to see that copies of this are going for $40+ on used book sites -- but it is definitely worth it.)
Third, is Ruth First's "Libya: The Elusive Revolution" (Penguin, 1974) for an insightful study of how a leftist/social military junta moves (quickly) into a reactionary, right-wing regime.
Finally, look at a 1906 pamphlet "Atrocities of Justice Under British Rule in Egypt" by Wilfrid Scawen Blunt for an account of how sudden risings can take place when the surface appears calm."
First ( and I'm sure you'd agree) is Hanna Batatu's "The Egyptian, Syrian and Iraqi Revolutions: Some Observations on Their Underlying Causes and Social Character." This was published by Georgetown CCAS in January 1983 and you can probably find it on-line. It is a masterpiece in just 27 pages.
Second, plowing through my basement I came across Ghassan Kanafani's "Palestine: The 1936-1939 Revolt." published by the Tricontinental Society and the PFLP in the UK in 1981. ( I was astounded to see that copies of this are going for $40+ on used book sites -- but it is definitely worth it.)
Third, is Ruth First's "Libya: The Elusive Revolution" (Penguin, 1974) for an insightful study of how a leftist/social military junta moves (quickly) into a reactionary, right-wing regime.
Finally, look at a 1906 pamphlet "Atrocities of Justice Under British Rule in Egypt" by Wilfrid Scawen Blunt for an account of how sudden risings can take place when the surface appears calm."
PS Personally, I commend all the choices and I also add the chapter on the Mosul Revolt in Batatu's The Old Social Classes and the Revolutionary Movements of Iraq."
