Striking from the Margins presents fifteen authors stepping away from outdated and narrow-minded methods that have become standard for analyzing and understanding the Middle East.
Chapters focus on the period surrounding 2011, examining how states from the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean Sea have reckoned with the energies unleashed during the “Arab Spring.” Stathis N. Kalyvas points out how models by political scientists such as James Fearon or David Collier fail to explain civil wars in countries throughout the Middle East and North Africa, as in Lebanon or Iraq. By delving into group relations, networks, social structures, state and militia presence, and religion at the local level, the authors highlight a complexity of changing dynamics beyond culturalist analyses.
One of the book’s favorite terms, “state atrophy,” refers to the breakdown of centralized state government in countries such as Iraq and Syria. For example, Harout Akdedian proposes viewing state atrophy and the neo-liberal turn in Syria as an explanation of why religious entities evolved into political influences. In contrast, popular arguments claim the “return” of native religion was due to secularism being inherently unnatural in the region. The authors challenge this idea of Muslim predisposition to toxic practices, calling identity politics more relevant to the world of poetry than humanities.
Instead of subscribing to the familiar frameworks of tribalism, the authors propose that circumstances including state devolution or weakening economies are a more holistic way to understand what creates space for marginal social groups and ideologies to become mainstream. The rise in violence and sectarianism in the region is enmeshed with the evolution of these marginal ideas. Patterns of state atrophy and the subsequent malleability of power and religion in countries including Syria and Iraq are repeatedly exposed in this book. For example, Harith Hassan notes how actors on the margins of society, the Shiite Marj’iya, were empowered following the fall of Saddam Hussein and the Baath party ideology.
As the Middle East becomes increasingly visible at many levels through the lens of social media, snapshots and caricatures no longer suffice as critical analysis. There is a gap in the academic world that beckons for a movement beyond the prevailing ideological interpretations. Striking from the Margins is a crucial piece in the formation of new frameworks.
