Search results
Politics, for the Arab philosopher Ibn Khaldun, concerns ‘the administration
of home or city in accordance with ethical and philosophical requirements,
for the purpose of directing the mass toward a behaviour that will result in
the preservation and permanence of the (human) species’. This quest for
survival, which remains central to contemporary political projects, raises a
number of fundamental questions about space, law, security and ultimately
survival, which remain pertinent today.
This chapter sets out the
theoretical material underpinning the book, introducing concepts of
sovereignty, space and nomos and demonstrating the way in which they can
facilitate analysis of the Middle East. It does this by introducing the
reader to the work of Giorgio Agamben, Hannah Arendt, Peter Berger and
Robert Cover to provide a theoretical framework. Drawing on concepts such as
bare life and the state of exception, it argues that by looking at the
relationship between rulers and ruled and the way in which this relationship
plays out within – and across – space, we are better placed to understand
political dynamics across the Middle East.