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Timely book tackles 'complex' Iraqi Shiism The Shiite Movement in Iraq  Faleh A. Jabar Published by Saqi, London, 2003 Pp. 317 FALEH A. Jabar's book is timely. Following the fall of the regime in Iraq, an intensive media coverage has been focusing on the two Islamic sects, Sunni and Shiite. Jabar, a visiting fellow at the School of Politics and Sociology at London University's Birkbeck College, extends the understanding of Shiism in its social, cultural, political and economic dimensions, and highlights the fact that Iraq's Shiites have never constituted the homogeneous group that political analysts have too often insisted upon. “Iraqi Shiism is multi-faceted and complex; it's a religious cult, social boundary, political formation and source of ideas and knowledge,” the author writes. He adds that Shiism is not socially homogenous, but comprises the clerical classes of the holy cities, the urban bourgeoisie, modern intellectuals and tribal peasants and their chiefs. Through its five parts, the book also presents a history of the formation of the Iraqi state and its mutations in relation to the social forces that shaped it. According to Jabar, Shiite Islam has been the focus of sustained attention since the success of the Iranian revolution in 1979. Yet, beyond the Iranian case, he adds, the role of Shiism in politics across the Middle East has attracted little serious research. “Even less attention has been given to Shiism and Shiite militancy in Iraq — which preceded the Iranian revolution — and less still to their nature and origins; the social movements they engendered; the ideological responses they gave rise to and their specific sources of power and legitimacy.” The rise of modern Shiite Islamic militancy in Iraq can be dated to the late 1950s, following the end of monarchy in 1958. The book offers a perspective on the complexities of the Iraqi situation before and after the fall of Saddam Hussein. It draws a picture of the Shiite landscape, its institutions and authorities, personalities, families and factions, the economics of religious life and the financial flow of its system. Researcher, in the introduction, Sami Zubaida describes the book as a “unique contribution to defining in the modern context Iraqi Shiism and its society, culture and politics”. The book contains an important analysis of the social bases and effects of what it called “Saddamist regime”. In the part titled “the US perspective”, the author explains that there are three intertwined factors that may explain why the US shifted from containment to removal of the “Saddamist regime”. The failure of the previous US strategy, the tragedy of Sept. 11, and the rapid success scored in the removal of the Taleban's “medieval regime” in Afghanistan “produced joyful expectations,” the author says. The book can be found at Bustan Lil Kutob bookstore in Shmeisani. Hada Sarhan Monday, January 12, 2004 |