THE ILLUSION OF PROGRESS in the Arab World: A Critique of Western Misconstructions
Galal Amin, translated by David Wilmsen, AUC Press, 2006
True to his tradition of razor-sharp criticism of current affairs that has earned him throngs of dedicated readers, Galal Amin strikes again with this biting critique of the Western discourse on the Arab world. Following the runaway success of Whatever Happened to the Egyptians? (2000) and Whatever Else Happened to the Egyptians? (2004), the social commentator and American University in Cairo professor of economics widens his focus to scrutinize the region vis-à-vis a hostile global climate. The 160-page book, however, gets off to a bad start. It opens with a relatively trite attempt at deconstructing the concept of 'progress.' Amin's drawn-out description of the notion and causes of the Arabs' khawaga complex (the feeling of inferiority when compared with Europeans and North Americans), frequently slips into a mode of anecdotal musings with incoherent transitions from one idea to the next. Although his way of weaving incidents from the experiences of his father and grandfather is sometimes engaging for being so personal, he often uses these unique, private moments to make sweeping generalizations. Had he intended this book to be a more rigorous analysis of the issues he discusses, it would have been dismissed out of hand. But this was never his intention. Amin clearly wants to convey his personal observations in the form of quick, easily digestible snapshots of his thoughts on thorny issues plaguing the world. And to this end he succeeds with flying colors. The first chapter aside, the tempo picks up with each of the subsequent 11 chapters, in which he deconstructs and redefines concepts such as economic development, human rights, freedom, ethics and democracy. His chapter on human development is a real eye-opener. In it, he traces the historical origins of the notorious Arab Human Development Report, first published by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) in 2002. Not only was the UNDP satisfied with the misleading criteria — it set out to rank countries according to their degree of progress or backwardness based on per capita income, life expectancy at birth and the level of education — but it "strangely" chose to focus on the Arab world alone. To add insult to injury, the report "boldly claimed to present an even more accurate measure of human progress and backwardness and to rely on three other indicators, those being freedom and democracy, the state of knowledge and what is called 'the empowerment of women.'" In his biting critique, Amin shows how challenging it is to measure such vague concepts as freedom, empowerment and knowledge, and how any evaluation of "human" development needs to have a more holistic approach and not favor certain aspects of human life over others. Commenting on the 2003 report, he notes how it doesn't mention the role of foreign occupation of Arab land in hindering so-called progress and how the US' Greater Middle East Initiative eerily echoed the goals of both reports. In other chapters, Amin speaks of terrorism as a fabricated, fear-inspiring tool aimed to unite people and "discourage dissent." In the eleventh chapter, he evokes two classic literary critiques of human progress, Aldous Huxley's Brave New World and George Orwell's 1984, drawing comparisons between the nightmare scenario of psychological coercion, torture and brainwashing posited by both works and the post-9/11 world in which we live. He ends the book with two open questions: Do our Arab societies need modernization or reform? If striking the balance between tradition and modernity is at all possible, can it be achieved if it is offered to us "backed by the power of the gun?" The Illusion of Progress in the Arab World is a quick and captivating read. Amin's simple yet sharp arguments strike at the heart of the matter, deftly voicing the opinions of many Arab intellectuals. Christians in Egypt: Orthodox, Catholic and Protestant Communities Past and Present Otto F.A. Meinardus, AUC Press, 2006
As the final part of a trilogy on Egyptian Christianity, Otto Meinardus' Christians in Egypt offers an extensive overview of the main Egyptian Christian churches and organizations of the present day. Preceded by Two Thousand Years of Coptic Christianity and Coptic Saints and Pilgrimages — about the history and traditions of the Coptic Orthodox Church and the lives of Coptic saints, respectively — the new book responds to a "deficit in our knowledge of the wide spectrum of the various forms of Christianity in Egypt." Meinardus' simple, lucid style makes for an uncluttered reading experience, one easily accessible to the lay reader, but sophisticated enough to engage the specialist. Published after the author's death in 2005, the book opens with a chapter mapping the Pharaonic heritage of Egyptian Christians, many of whom "insist they are the true sons and daughters of the Pharaohs," a distinguishing feature of what Meinardus calls "the present religious and cultural renaissance of the Copts." He traces, for instance, pagan elements of Coptic iconography such as the ankh ("key of life"), a life-bestowing symbol presented to the pharaoh by pre-Christian gods to confer the divine spirit upon him. In the fifth century, this symbol became the Coptic sign of Jesus' redemptive cross. The chapter includes interesting details like ancient funerary customs that have survived in some form to the present day, such as the recognition of the death bird, which was to receive the soul of the departed and fly with it to the heavens. One of the most interesting chapters is the second, entitled "Egyptian Christians as citizens of an Islamic society in the Middle Ages." Meinardus contends that this issue is marginal to his discussion — perhaps to justify the little space he allocates to it and the fact that his discussion seems incoherent and at times contradictory. He bases his analysis on three sources: The History of the Patriarchs of the Egyptian Church (from the seventh to the twelfth centuries), the writings of Abu Al-Makarim and the fifteenth-century Islamic historian Al-Maqrizi. Meinardus writes that the attitude of the Church toward the Islamic state largely depended on the attitude of the state itself to the religion, which varied between persecution, qualified sufferance and freedom. Although he says that the Copts rarely found themselves in a position of having to apostatize to save their lives, he also argues that the Muslim state's attitude of sufferance (a compromise based upon the payment of a tax or surrendering certain privileges) was a source of pressure by the Muslim authorities on Copts, causing them to succumb to frequent intimidations. Based on a single source, he attributes the conversions of 24,000 Copts to Islam between 744 and 768 to this form of indirect pressure, stating (without much evidence) that exemption from paying the jizya (poll tax) was the primary reason for their acceptance of Islam. Meinardus skirts the issue by saying that the attitude of the various Muslim rulers showed marked differences, the Fatimids being the most friendly and the Ayyubids the least. But he also cites the "tragic disunity" among Christians as one of the primary factors leading to the involvement of the state in the affairs of the Church, where the governor often served as mediator and arbitrator. He makes an interesting note about how the worst persecution of the Copts, which took place under Fatimid Caliph Al-Hakim Bi-Amr Allah, was instigated by a monk. Meinardus sums up the ambiguity in the church-state relationship with the fact that some Copts interpreted the Arab conquest as a deliverance from Byzantine oppression, while others believed the opposite. He asserts, however, that consistent Coptic opposition to the state never emerged. The "negative attitudes of the Copts toward the state were caused largely by temporary and symptomatic situations," and although they had to respect the government, they abhorred the teachings of Islam. In his final analysis, he seems to say that an attitude of genuine and spontaneous acceptance between church and state was a rare phenomenon in the 1,300 years of Muslim rule in Egypt, despite the countless examples of relatively peaceful coexistence. This superficial yet fascinating probe into the thorny issue of Coptic-Muslim relations is especially pertinent considering recent tensions, but the book also offers a comprehensive compilation of Christian churches (Coptic, Greek, Armenian, Syrian, Catholic, Episcopal and Evangelical), agencies, societies and ecumenical organizations in Egypt, as well as a calendar of all Christian feasts and fasts. Islamic Calligraphy Sheila S. Blair, AUC Press, 2006
In attempting to define the significance of Arabic calligraphy in her 681-page Islamic Calligraphy, Sheila Blair makes a pertinent linguistic analogy: "Calligraphy is to writing as fusha (literary Arabic) is to plain speech." It is, she says, a script intended to make an aesthetic impact on the viewer and speak through its appearance, not merely through its meaning. Though Blair is wary of the term 'Islamic Art,' which she sees as "a poor name for an ill-defined subject," she does refer to 'Islamic Calligraphy,' noting that writing has been the hallmark of artistic expression in the Islamic world since the seventh century. Unlike other art historians and philosophers — including Iranian mystic Seyyed Hussein Nasr, who approach the art from a spiritual perspective, designed to inspire remembrance of God — Blair asserts that her purpose is to apply some of the methodologies developed in the study of Western art history to trace the development of Arabic writing over the past 14 centuries and put it in a global perspective. Blair certainly achieves this in this informative, comprehensive and deeply indexed reference book. She provides the historical context in which the various forms of Arabic script emerged in tandem with the expansion of Islamic rule. She explains, for instance, how regional variants began to appear in the maghribi script of Spain and North Africa. Enhanced with more than 150 color illustrations and 100 black-and-white details, this visually appealing guide is ideal for students of Islamic art. And for the non-specialist, simply flipping through the perfectly captioned images give a true feeling of the evolution of Arabic script. et | 
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