this book Juan R. I. Cole challenges traditional elite-centered conceptions of the conflict that led to the British occupation of Egypt in september 1882. For a year before the British intervened, Egypt's viceregal government and the country's influential European community had been locked in a struggle with the nationalist supporters of General Ahmad al-'Urabi. Although most Western observers still see the 'Urabi movement as a "revolt" of junior military officers with only limited support among the Egyptian people, Cole maintains that it was a broadly based social revolution hardly underway when it was cut off by the British. While arguing this fresh point of view, he also proposes a theory of revolutions against informal or neocolonial empires, drawing parallels between Egypt in 1882, the Boxer Rebellion in China, and the Islamic Revolution in modern Iran. In a thorough examination of the changing Egyptian political culture from 1858 through the 'Urabi episode, Cole shows how various social strata - urban guilds, the intelligentsia, and village notables - became "revolutionary". Addressing issues raised by such scholars as Barrington Moore and Theda Skocpol, his book combines four complementary approaches: social structure and its socioeconomic context, organization, ideology, and the ways in which unexpected conjunctures of events help drive a revolution.
Words: community classes, in september, village east

Author: Cole, Juan R.
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Illustration: N
Language: ENG
Title: Colonialism & Revolution in the Middle East: Social & Cultural Origins of Egypt's Urabi Movement
Pages: 00000 (MicrosoftReader.lit) / 00416 (Encrypted PDF)
On Sale: 2001-02-15
SKU-13/ISBN: 9780691056838
Lib Category: Social classes
Lib Category: Egypt
Category: History : Middle East - Egypt